Lethal Agent (Mitch Rapp #18)(70)
There was a brief lull as a falling Rottweiler knocked them back and Rapp took advantage of it to chuck the open kilo bags on top of them. They were momentarily enveloped in an impressive cloud that, when it dissipated, left them all a ghostly white. Predictably, their barking and attempts to get to him increased in intensity. He started to regret the light running shoes he’d chosen as he kicked at them, trying to protect his ankles from fangs coated in foaming saliva.
As the coke went to work on them, though, they lost their focus. Some started fighting. Others just ran around in circles or attacked the walls. One bolted out into the rain that had started up again.
While they were distracted, Rapp went to a window on the eastern edge of the loft. He stood to the side of it, gently pushing the wood shutter open and taking a look outside. The downpour had reduced visibility to less than twenty feet.
He climbed down the front of the building with the water pounding on him from above. About halfway to the ground, the force of it became too much for the slick handholds he was improvising and he lost his grip. Fortunately, the landing was soft—about three-quarters mud and one-quarter what was left of the guard the dogs had taken out. Rapp scrambled for the AK and, when he found it, ran for the cover of the coca plants.
CHAPTER 34
NORTH OF HARGEISA
SOMALIA
“I . . . I couldn’t make as much. You didn’t give me time.”
Sayid Halabi looked over his laptop at Gabriel Bertrand standing in the rock archway. The package in the Frenchman’s hands seemed to glow in the dull light. Vacuum packed and covered in duct tape, it was indeed smaller than last time. The anthrax it contained could be augmented with other materials to mimic the kilo packages expected by the Mexican smugglers. And, with luck, it would be deployed in America to some minor effect. But the handful of victims it would produce no longer mattered.
Halabi continued to silently watch the scientist as he shifted his weight uncomfortably from one foot to the other. The goal had been to keep him ignorant of the reality and scope of the upcoming attack, using him only to fill in critical pieces of information not available elsewhere. But this was now impossible. The complexity of accelerating the timetable on a biological attack of this scale made continued efforts at subtle manipulation impractical. Halabi would get only one chance. If he failed and was discovered, the entire world would line up against him. Militaries and intelligence agencies that had spent decades battling each other would join forces, coordinating their massive resources with the goal of exterminating both him and the organization he led. The next week would decide whether ISIS reshaped the planet or disappeared from its surface.
“It will be enough,” Halabi said finally.
The Frenchman approached cautiously, leaving the anthrax on the plywood desk. He was a comically weak man. Ruled by cowardice and arrogance. Devoid of a belief in anything greater than himself. But unquestionably in possession of a magnificent mind.
Bertrand had written extensively on the history of contagions spanning from early Egypt to the outbreak of SARS in the modern era. He’d studied the spread of pathogens, examining how they initially took hold, modeling their paths, and scrutinizing their aftermath. Even more interesting, he’d done a great deal of work detailing how epidemics of the past had been made worse and how those mistakes had the potential to be repeated on a much grander scale in the future.
Halabi rotated his laptop so the man could see the screen. “Do you know what this is?”
Bertrand squinted at it for a moment and then shook his head.
“It’s a population map of the United States, with transportation infrastructure overlaid—airports, bus and train routes, major highways . . .”
Not surprisingly, the man didn’t understand. And there was no delicate way to remedy his ignorance.
“I intend to infect five of my men with the virus you discovered in Yemen and transport them across the U.S. border,” Halabi said bluntly. “From there, they’ll spread the disease throughout the country and the industrialized world.”
Bertrand’s expression went blank. “I . . . I don’t understand. What are you saying?”
“I don’t know how I can be more clear.”
He stood frozen for a time before taking a few stumbling steps back. “You . . .” he stammered. “It’s . . . It’s not possible.”
“It’s not only possible, it’s quite simple. YARS is extraordinarily contagious, so infecting my people will be a trivial matter. And I have a group of smugglers in Mexico willing to transport them across the border.”
“You can’t do that.”
“I assure you that I can, Doctor. In fact it’s already in motion. I just need you to help me with a few final details.”
Bertrand squinted through the semidarkness as though he were looking at a child unable to grasp a simple concept. “This isn’t anthrax. It’s a highly contagious, extremely deadly disease with no effective medical treatment. Even Spanish flu . . .” His voice faded for a moment. “In 1918 and 1919 it killed more than thirty million people worldwide.”
“I’m aware of the history of the Spanish flu,” Halabi said calmly.
“All evidence suggests that this disease is even more contagious and has a significantly higher mortality rate. Add to that the rise in long-distance travel and the increase in the world population, and you could be talking about casualties in the hundreds of millions.”