Interface: A Techno Thriller (7 page)

She leaned forward and focused through glasses that had been fashionable twenty years ago. In front of her were six test tubes, racked and housed inside a vacuum-sealed chamber. Six control strains of the Ebola variant that had arisen in central Sierra Leone. Various Big Pharma companies had provided test batches of candidate anti-virals and though Daniella didn't have much love for big business, in this situation she would take all the help she could get. So far it hadn't proven enough. She needed to add some variations of her own and find the one small change that would make all the difference.

Behind her, a man cleared his throat.
 

Lawrence turned and saw the director of the clinic standing in the doorway. By his standards, Dr Kimoto's smile was less than broad.

"Dr Lawrence," he said, "do you have a moment?"

"I'm just writing up this batch." She nodded to the test tubes.

"I'll keep it brief. If you please." And he walked away without waiting for a further response. She shrugged, following him down a corridor stacked with boxes of supplies, and into his office. He closed the door firmly and indicated the seat opposite his desk. "Your work here has been exemplary, if a little unorthodox." Kimoto took his own seat. "You bring a perspective I've not seen before in a virologist."

"I'm just trying to make a difference. Like everyone else here."

"And nobody appreciates that more than I. Of course the challenges we face are many, but we do still have procedures and processes. We are accountable. And that means I have to maintain oversight." He raised his eyebrows questioningly.

"Has there been a complaint about my work?"

"In the three months that you've been here? Not one. It takes a rare talent to come into a new research environment, shake up all the systems, and not put anyone's nose out of joint." He paused. "Quite frankly I'm amazed you haven't risen to a higher station in your field."

"I like to stay in the lab."

He shrugged. "Still, I was curious about your previous work. You've moved around a great deal."

"I've always gone wherever the need is greatest."

"And why did you come here to our humble facility?" He spread his hands. "To help others?" He paused. "I placed a call to a former colleague of mine at University College London. He read medicine at the same time as you at Edinburgh. Roxburgh was his name; I'm sure you remember him?"

Lawrence shifted in her chair. "I can't say it rings a bell."

"He remembered someone by your name. Someone who looked quite different."

Daniella shrugged. "Perhaps his memory is as bad as mine."

"The Daniella Lawrence my colleague knew at Edinburgh had only three fingers on her left hand. Now, either you grew them back or you aren't who you say you are." He patted his palm on his desk. "Shall I keep digging? It's confusing, because your knowledge and skill are no fraud, even if your papers are."

Daniella let out a slow breath. "Do you know how many hospitals and missions I've worked in over the last twenty years? None of them have asked these questions. None of them cared when I was so good at my job." She sighed. "I'll leave tomorrow if you want, though I'd rather stay a few more days: then I can put the project in shape to be handed over."

"What I'm worried about is whether the trouble in your past is likely to follow you here."

Daniella let out a long breath and smiled. "They don't even know
to
look for me."

He blinked several times. "Then, Dr Lawrence, keep on doing what you do. And I will say nothing further about this. To anyone."

"I appreciate your discretion."

"And
we
appreciate your hard work." Kimoto lowered his voice. "But perhaps it would be wise to appear a little less brilliant so that you don't arouse anyone else's suspicions."

"I'll keep that in mind." She stood and turned to leave.

"Before you go, your mail arrived." He handed her two medical journals wrapped in clear plastic and a copy of the
Financial Times
. "Do I need to know why you pay a small fortune to get the
FT
delivered every day?"

She grinned. "I like to keep abreast of current affairs back home. Let's just say that no one knows to look for me, but that doesn't mean I don't intend to watch them."

SIXTEEN

KATE EASED BACK IN HER chair, staring at the finished copy of her report spread out across the dining room table. Her eyes stung from a lack of sleep and too much coffee. In the day and a half since meeting with Armstrong, she had called in favours, accessed internet databases that were not readily accessible, and reviewed hundreds upon hundreds of pages of information. From all of this she had begun to draw a picture as startling as it was alarming. Now, she just needed approval to publish.

A bell in the hall clanged loudly. Kate padded down the corridor and pulled open the front door. Geraldine stood there holding two bottles of red wine, her expression weary.

"I've come to see if you've really been working or just painting your nails and watching soap operas."

"If only." Kate frowned. "You brought
two
bottles?"

Geraldine pushed past her. "I wasn't sure how tedious this was going to get. Maybe two won't be enough."

Kate closed the door and grabbed one of the bottles. "Your enthusiasm is so motivational."

"It's been a difficult week." She sniffed the air. "Did you order food? Or is there a chef next door?"

"Thai. It's in the kitchen."

"Then why are we standing here?"

Five minutes later they had assaulted the various dishes and Geraldine was on her second glass of wine. Kate sipped hers slowly and tapped the folder in the middle of the table. "When you're ready, boss."

Geraldine folded a crispy duck pancake together. She made a gesture for Kate to carry on.
 

"It's finished. Just needs your approval." Kate put down her glass. "But it turns out the real story's not CERUS's financial troubles."

Geraldine let out a sigh. "Oh great. Another disgruntled employee trying to push an exposé on Bern's personal life. Nobody cares, Kate."

"If it was that, I would have told you over the phone. Look, Richard Armstrong has been there from the start. He knows things. CERUS
is
in financial trouble, but the
real
story is what they're going to do to avoid it." Kate leaned closer. "Armstrong said they're looking to old research: projects that were shut down."

"The story people will want to read," Geraldine said, "is a thirty billion company failing."

"Not when they hear why the old research was shut down. People died."

"How? When?"

"He hasn't told me yet," Kate said. "I don't think it was recent."

"You don't
think
?" Geraldine slapped the folder. "What the hell is this if you don't
know
?"

"I've searched through every story relating to CERUS: everything from the last twenty-eight years." She paused. "And I found nothing."

"So Armstrong is lying." Geraldine took a long drink of wine. "Wonderful."

"I don't think so. The one thing I did find was a lot of rumours about their earlier work involving bio modification and bio compatibility: about synthesising materials that work harmoniously with the human body."

"Like a hip replacement? Crazy
and
boring."

"That's one example. Or a pacemaker. The important thing is that Armstrong's a career scientist, not a lawyer or a marketer. He
could
know about something that was hushed up. And there
is
one relevant death on record: one of the scientists on a nanotech project. Dr Dominique Lentz. Given her areas of expertise I think she might have worked with Armstrong."

"Kate, those are some interesting bits and pieces, but it isn't a story. You haven't give me a single hard fact about any of these things being connected. Sure, people in suits going to prison always sells." Geraldine shrugged. "But this is still all conjecture."

"Actually, no, it isn't." She turned around to unlock a chest of drawers. From the top one, she removed a black metal box. She flipped the combination lock to the correct code and opened it to reveal a padded interior. From within, she lifted a small glass vial and placed it on the table.
 

Geraldine peered closer. "And what is that? Some sort of chemical?"

"Nanotech."

Geraldine flinched back. "You're kidding."

"Inert nano is pretty common now - it's simply a change to the way a material works on a nano scale. With inert nano, you can increase conductivity, reduce friction coefficients, but the change is a fixed one."

"So this is inert nano?"

"No. Armstrong said it was the other kind - intelligent nano. It changes reactively, based on data received and interpreted: the particles can adjust to variations in circumstance, including what is happening to other particles. They can talk to each other, adapt, and change. They communicate. At least they can once they're programmed."

"Presuming the scientists are right. Can these things learn? What if they lose control?"

Kate shrugged. "That is of course the principal reason intelligent nano is banned. That nanites might get to the point they can make their own decisions – evolve their own programming. And yet the potential for things like smart drugs, manufacturing, computing is undeniable."

Geraldine reached out and picked up the vial. "This guy, Armstrong. He was one of the nanotech team?"

Kate nodded. "And he's a company man. Twenty seven years." She picked up her glass and took a long sip. "He says he's not after money: claims it's just about stopping the research before it gets out of hand like it did twenty-five years ago."

Geraldine's eyes narrowed. "If there's even a grain of truth in this, it's a huge risk for him to speak to you." She paused. "Despite his reluctance to go to the authorities, I think it's our duty to inform them. And this," she waggled the vial in the air, "is stolen property. We can't keep quiet about it."

Kate sighed.
 

"So let's be publicly loud, say, in a lead story." Geraldine stood. "If we're doing this, we can't afford to sit on it. First thing tomorrow, get on the phone and set up another meeting with Armstrong. Get the story: the whole story." Geraldine leaned over and picked up the folder. "And you know what? I might even read this." She hefted it in her hand and frowned. "Or at least some of it."

SEVENTEEN

DESPITE EVERYTHING THAT HAD HAPPENED to him since Friday night, Tom refused to miss his mother's anniversary. He usually went alone, but Dr Chatsworth and Jo had been adamant that it was not a good idea. In the end, they had compromised. Jo collected him from the Angstrom Clinic first thing in the morning in her reconditioned Mini Metro, which alternately stuttered and purred its way down the private road and out of the gates. A quick stop at a florist and they were heading northwest towards the M40.

Two hours later, they were sixty miles outside of London in the tiny Oxfordshire village of Kingsford. They parked and Tom walked ahead. The gravestone was a simple granite slab, located at the rear of a walled field, opposite the small church. Tom's mother lay amongst the former school teachers, farmers, stockbrokers and shopkeepers of the small rural community that had welcomed her into its heart in the months before her passing. He stood looking around the carefully tended plots.

Her death had been uncomfortably like the chaotic last few days. It had all happened so quickly. One moment she had been in perfect health, the next they were diagnosing her with terminal cancer. She had been based in the south of France at the time, in an old run-down villa in the mountains, while Tom lived in London during term-time, studying Law at University College London. After the diagnosis she had reluctantly moved back to the UK, taking an experimental course of treatment at a private hospital. Less than nine months later she was gone.
 

Of course with hindsight he'd realised that she must have been feeling unwell, but why had she never mentioned it at the regular health checks she'd always gone to? Surely they couldn't have missed how ill she was if she'd given them any indication. Or maybe the health checks had been to do with her illness in the first place. Maybe the illness wasn't new at all and his mother had decided not to burden him.

He wished he could go back and notice something, or say something to get her to confide in him. Of course it would have been hard, but nothing could have been harder than suddenly losing his only family. His father had died when Tom was only a few months old and both his parents had been only children. Jo was the closest thing he had to family now. He glanced over his shoulder and saw her standing at the edge of the graveyard, her hands in the pockets of her coat.

Tom knelt by the gravestone and brushed aside a couple of stray weeds that had started to encroach. Then he removed the daffodils – plain and simple, as she always preferred – from their wrapping and placed them loosely in the small vase at the front of the grave.
 

"Happy birthday, Mum
," he whispered.

Then he stood and walked back to Jo.

◇
◇
◇

They stopped at a roadside café on the outskirts of Oxford. Tom cast his eye over the menu and ordered a huge all-day brunch.

"Your appetite hasn't suffered from the poking and prodding they've been doing at the hospital then," Jo said, as she chose a tuna salad.

He shrugged. "What can I say? I feel great. Getting the all clear from the clinic was a huge relief."

She frowned. "All clear? Really?"

"You were there. You heard the doctor."

Jo drummed her fingers on the table. "I heard what he said. I just... I can't believe you're not more freaked out."

The waitress reappeared and placed two large mugs of coffee in front of them. Tom waited until she had returned to the kitchen before speaking. "Freaked out about what?"

"Someone gave you hard drugs. They could have killed you."

"We don't know that I didn't choose to take them."

Jo pulled at her ponytail. "Seriously? Tom, that is so not you. It's just not possible."