Kate unfolded the delicate yellow page with the map, studied it for a few moments, then placed it back inside the journal. “It was the same device — the Bell — in China. They used it on me, on hundreds of people. That’s what they’re doing, trying to find a genetic key that will impart immunity to the device. All my research, all the Immari research into genetics has been about this one end: finding the Atlantis Gene. All Martin’s lies, my whole life… they used me.”
David gazed out of the basket at the mountains and forest flowing by below. “Well I’m glad they did.”
Kate focused on him.
David looked her in the eyes. “It could have been someone else. Someone who wasn’t as strong. Or as smart. You can figure this out, and you can still stop them.”
“I don’t see—”
“Let’s just go through what we know. Let’s just lay all the pieces of the puzzle out there and see what fits together. Ok?” When Kate nodded, David continued. “Back at the monastery, I said I knew what the Bell was. It’s an old World War II legend. Conspiracy theorists still talk about it — Die Glocke, or the Bell. They say it was an advanced Nazi weapons project, or possibly a breakthrough energy source. The theories get wilder from there. Everything from anti-gravity to time travel. But if it caused the Spanish Flu in 1918, and bodies from China got out—”
“It would be another pandemic, this one much worse than Spanish Flu, or the 1918 flu pandemic as it’s now known.”
“I mean, is that possible?” David said. “Are the Immari statistics even right? How could we not have a vaccine for something that killed 2-5% of the population?”
“We studied Spanish Flu in medical school. Their stats are right, or close. We think Spanish Flu killed between 50-100 million — so about 4% of the total global population—”
“It would be like…280 million dying today — the entire population of the United States. Surely they have a vaccine. And how could the Immari hide this — or sell it as the flu?”
“At first, doctors didn’t think it was the flu. It was initially misdiagnosed as dengue, cholera, or typhoid — mostly because the symptoms were very… distinctly un-flu-like. Patients had hemorrhages from mucous membranes, especially from the nose, stomach, and intestines, even bleeding from the skin and ears.” Kate thought back to the dark room with the Bell hanging over the cowering crowd, of the bleeding bodies. She had to focus. “Anyway, of all the flu strains in the world, it’s still the least understood — and the most deadly. There is no vaccine. Spanish flu essentially caused the body to self-destruct; it killed through a cytokine storm — the body’s own immune system ravaged it. Most flu strains are devastating for people with weak immune systems — children and the elderly. That’s why we vaccinate — to boost the immune system. Spanish flu was fundamentally different. It killed people with strong immune systems. The stronger the person’s immune system was, the worse the cytokine storm was. It was deadly for people aged 25-34.”
“It’s almost like it killed anyone who could be a threat. No wonder the Immari think it’s a weapon,” David said. “But why unleash it? The world wouldn’t stand a chance. In 1918, at the end of World War I, borders were sealed everywhere, the whole world had ground to a halt. Think about how connected we are today, a similar outbreak would wipe us out in days. If what you say is true, the contagion has already left China and is scouring the world as we speak. Why would they do it?”
“Maybe they don’t have a choice.”
“There’s always a cho—”
“In their minds,” Kate said. “Just based on the thinking in the journal, I have a couple of theories. I think they’ve been looking for the Atlantis Gene so that they can survive the device. That’s why they wanted to know what I did to the kids, why they kidnapped them. They must be out of time.”
“The satellite photo — with the codes on the back. It had a sub in the middle.”
“Kane’s sub,” Kate said.
“I bet so. And there was a structure below it. We know they’ve been looking for the sub since 1947 — the obituary in The New York Times decoded to: Antarctica, U-boat not found, advise if further search authorized. So they finally found the sub, and under it, another Atlantis City — a threat.” David shook his head. “But I still don’t get it, the science, why unleash another pandemic?”