Callsign: King (Jack Sigler) (Chesspocalypse #1)

Sara grabbed a specimen collection kit. “I’d like to see her right away.”


“Of course.” He gestured for her to follow. Not surprisingly, Fulbright joined them as if he had every right to. As they walked, Abdullah brought Sara up to date on the patient’s history. “The patient was brought to us three days ago. We haven’t been able to ascertain the identity of the man who dropped her off. She was catatonic, but clearly suffering from dehydration.”

“How did you identify her?”

“She wore a badge from a research firm; Nexus Genetics. We were able to learn that she was part of an expedition to the Afar region—the Great Rift Valley. Nexus has not been forthcoming with information about Miss Carter or the purpose of the expedition.”

“Geneticists doing field research in the Rift Valley?” Sara didn’t like the sound of that. She made a mental note to check up on Nexus at the earliest opportunity. “I suppose there’s a chance they might have been exposed to something contagious, but that’s a pretty remote area. If she’s picked up something, she would have got it from an animal or possibly a windborne vector. Possibly a bacillus or fungal spore. I doubt we’re looking at anything communicable.

“But,” she added, as they filed into an elevator car, “it is more probable that it’s just a case of dehydration. How is she responding to therapy?”

Abdullah pressed a button on the control panel. “Her vital signs have improved. Blood tests confirm that her organs are functioning properly, and her white blood cell count is normal. However, she has not regained consciousness.”

“Was she injured?” Even as she asked, Sara knew that there was a much more likely explanation: psychological trauma.

Abdullah confirmed her suspicions. “I believe her condition may be psychosomatic. When she arrived, she was holding an object—clinging to it, like a lifeline. When we tried to take it from her, she became agitated, almost to the point of cardiac arrest. We decided to let her keep it.”

“What object?”

The elevator car settled to a stop and the doors slid open. Sara’s senses were immediately hit with the smell unique to hospitals—a mixture of sickness and heavy duty disinfectant that grew stronger as they moved through the hallway. It was a like a siren, blaring in her head, but Abdullah’s answer shocked her out of her sensory fugue.

“A skull. An ape skull, I think.”

Sara almost gasped aloud. A primate skull in the hands of a geneticist suspected of being a carrier for an unknown contagion? Now she was certain that Fulbright knew more than he was letting on, and suddenly wearing the hazmat suit didn’t seem quite so unnecessary.

But there was a piece that still didn’t fit. “I didn’t know there were apes in that part of the Rift Valley.”

“I don’t believe there are. But the skull looks very old. A fossil, perhaps. As I said, she became agitated when we tried to take it away, so we have left it alone.” He stopped at a closed door, but made no move to enter. “This is her room.”

There was a sign taped to the door, and even though she couldn’t read Amharic, Sara had a pretty good idea what it said. Ideally, there should have been a number of other contamination control measures—a negative air pressure system, rubber seals on the door, plastic sheeting at the very least—but as both Abdullah and Nakamura had stated, there was no reason to believe that the patient was sick with a contagious disease. She nodded to the men, and then tugged the suit’s cowl over her head and zippered herself in. The hospital odor vanished as oxygen began to flow from the suit’s self-contained breathing apparatus. All three men conspicuously took a step back as she reached for the door handle.

Beyond that portal was an ordinary hospital room. A tall, dark-skinned woman, covered in a simple white sheet, lay supine upon a very ordinary hospital bed. Sara listened to the gentle hiss of air in her suit for a moment, waiting to see if the woman would stir—she did not—then moved forward.