Monk, on the other hand, was former Special Forces. Though he had shed his uniform with the Green Berets years ago, he still maintained his muscular bulk and kept his head shaved smooth. He now wore jeans, boots, and a tight-fitted T-shirt with a bulldog growling on it, a countenance not all that dissimilar to the man’s own face. But that tough exterior hid a mind as sharp and quick as any chess champion. After joining Sigma, the former medic had been retrained in the biological sciences, earning a master’s degree in biomedicine. He also played a mean pickup game, often besting Gray on the court, even though Monk only stood shoulder-high to Gray.
Painter glanced to the side. “Looks like Kat’s ready.” Another window opened on the screen, revealing the slightly freckled countenance and dark auburn coif of Kathryn Bryant, Sigma’s intelligence analyst. “Maybe you’d better call Monk and Lisa over to listen to what she has to say.”
“Will do.”
Gray motioned to the two, who had already overheard the director’s suggestion. They took the seats opposite Gray, while he shifted the pad, so they could all get a proper view.
Monk waved to Kat. The pair were married, with two young girls. “How’re Harriet and Penny?”
“Missing their daddy already. I think they blame me for you leaving again.”
“Duty calls,” he said with an apologetic smile.
“More like the Smithsonian demands,” she countered.
After a frantic call had reached D.C. from a U.N. relief camp, word of a possible viral contagion had spread throughout the Institution’s network. With much of the world still recovering from the last pandemic, the scientific community had become hypervigilant. No one was going to risk another plague sweeping the world.
The director of the Smithsonian Global Health Program—a board-certified zoo veterinarian—had first sounded the alarm. Global Health was part of the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute, affiliated with the National Zoo. Their mission was to address the rising health crises involving humans, wildlife, and the greater environment. They named their approach One Health, recognizing how inextricably bound humans and animals were to the well-being of all. In fact, 75 percent of all emerging diseases in the past century—Ebola, HIV, COVID-19—all passed to the human population from animals, a method known as zoonotic transmission. So, it only made sense to continually monitor wildlife populations and prepare for the next threat.
Like what might be happening in the Congo.
Still, this investigation might prove to be a false alarm. For the moment, it was only a potential threat. Sigma had only become involved because of its own intimate ties with the Smithsonian Institution. Sigma’s headquarters were buried beneath the Smithsonian Castle on the National Mall. The location was chosen due to its proximity to both the extensive research labs of the Institution and to the neighboring halls of power in D.C., which served the group well.
Sigma Force operated covertly under the auspices of DARPA, the Defense Department’s research-and-development agency. They were all former Special Forces soldiers, recruited in secret by Sigma and trained in various scientific disciplines to act as field agents, protecting the United States and the globe against all manner of threats. Their name arose from the Greek letter ∑, which represented the “sum of the best,” the merging of brain and brawn, of soldier and scientist. Their motto was a simple one: Be there first.
Following that directive, Director Crowe had rallied Sigma when word reached the Smithsonian about a possible emerging threat. He had immediately enlisted an associate who had helped them in the past—a former Army Ranger—who was already in Africa. Captain Tucker Wayne had agreed to secure the Global Health veterinarian and get him onsite until Sigma could reach the continent. Whether this threat proved to be real or not, Sigma intended to be there first, ready to find out.
“Any word from Captain Wayne?” Lisa asked, leaning closer. She had her blond hair tied back in a ponytail. A pair of reading glasses perched on her nose. “Was he able to find Dr. Whitaker?”
Painter nodded. “They’re already en route to Kisangani. They should be landing within the hour and will airlift via helicopter to the campsite.”
“Wait,” Monk said. “I thought the plan was for all of us to rendezvous at the University of Kisangani and set up a base of operations there first.”
“You’re still five hours out,” Painter explained. “And a series of thunderstorms is rolling through the area. All that lightning will ground any helicopters. To avoid any further delay, Tucker has agreed to try to duck under that storm before it hits. Especially after the latest word out of the camp.”
“What word?” Gray asked.
“Two hours ago, there was another garbled radio call. From the same doctor working there. Gunfire could be heard in the background. The doctor warned against anyone going out to that camp.”
“Then maybe Tucker should wait for us,” Gray warned. “Who knows what mess he and that researcher might be flying into?”
“I’ve taken that into account. FARDC—the Congolese military—is flying in ahead of them. Everyone’s rushing that storm. Only after an all-clear from the Congolese army will Tucker proceed. The FARDC team should be lifting off from Kisangani as we speak.”
“They’re already airborne,” Kat corrected. “Heading out in two helos.”
“Still, maybe Tucker should wait for us,” Gray said. “We don’t even know if there is any real threat. He could be endangering himself and Dr. Whitaker for no reason.”
Painter remained silent for a breath. “Tell them, Kat.”
She shifted in her seat, clearly reading from a screen. She was in the communication nest at Sigma. “I’ve been monitoring chatter and intelligence across the breadth of Africa. A WHO field camp in Uganda, near the border with the DRC, has reported strange cases coming in from the jungle, of a baffling debilitating malaise. A score of afflicted have trickled in over the past two weeks. The WHO has been slow to spread the word as there’ve been no deaths. Then at a hospital in Burundi, farther to the south, they have a handful of similar cases, people suddenly growing leaden and mute. And maybe more cases in South Sudan, but verification is sketchy.”
“So, it’s not only the U.N. camp that’s afflicted,” Lisa said. “Something must be spreading. But how?”
Kat shifted and brought up a map on another window. It showed a swath of central Africa. The view was overlaid with arrows and spiky arcs.
“This is a weather map,” she explained. She tapped a button and set those same arrows and arcs into motion, sweeping slowly to the northeast. “This shows the direction and force of the spring monsoon that led to all the recent flooding. The wet winds off the Atlantic sweep north and east, running into the hot dry winds flowing south off the Sahara.”
Lisa straightened with a grimace. “Kat, you don’t think—”
“All the reported cases lay in the path of those winds,” Kat warned grimly. “Uganda, Burundi, even South Sudan. Maybe it’s coincidental. But I’ve searched for any matching reports out of Angola and Zambia to the south.” She shook her head. “Nothing so far. It’s all quiet in that direction.”
Gray stared from Lisa to Kat. “Are you suggesting that whatever is spreading is airborne, being seeded by those monsoon winds?”
“At this point, it’s only conjecture,” Kat said.
Lisa took off her reading glasses. “It’s theoretically possible for a viral contagion to spread that way. It’s already been documented that millions of viruses rain out of the sky every day, sweeping down out of the upper atmosphere.”
Monk frowned. “That might be true. But it’s doubtful that the number of particles would be sufficient to be infectious. Sure, aerosolized transmission—from one person to another—happens, but viruses need a host. Few viruses live long in an environment outside of one, especially when exposed to sunlight and UV radiation.”
“That’s not entirely true,” Lisa countered. “While flu viruses live only a day or so on open surfaces, cold viruses can be contagious for up to a week. And there are others that can survive longer. Still, like Kat said, this is all conjecture.”
“That’s why we need more intel and data,” Painter said.
“And as quickly as possible,” Gray added. “Something tells me I won’t be leaving Africa any time soon.”