The Extinction Trials(59)

He paused, Maya assumed, for the benefit of any human watching the video.

“I have further been instructed to create this video to provide background information as might be needed. The first item of background concerns Genesis Biosciences. What we know at this point is that Genesis is part of a coalition called The Human Union, or simply The Union. The Union’s goal has been to unleash a change of unknown effect. We know thus far that several governments were investigating The Union and Genesis specifically. We know that a deep-cover agent whose codename was Hazel discovered the Genesis component of The Change: the Genesis Virus or GV. One thing we’re certain of: GV acts to erase memories. It is effective in 90% of hosts who are infected. The other 10% perish. We believe that Genesis was planning to unleash this virus, and that Hazel learned of their plan. The operative informed the government, and the government launched a preemptive strike against Union cells and targeted Genesis locations where they believed The Change would begin. We call this event The Strike. The Strike was only partially successful. Enough elements of the Union organization survived to set in motion The Change. In fact, we believe that The Union was so devastated by The Strike that they initiated The Change earlier than planned in a desperate attempt to buy time to rebuild their organization. Further background is provided in additional videos.”

The tablet went dark, and Maya held up her hand. “There’s something you all should know. As I said before, when I first got sick, I was visited by someone named Parrish. He confirmed that I worked at Genesis Biosciences. He also told me that I was working as a government agent to investigate Genesis and that my codename was Hazel. Because of my hazel eyes.”

She stared at the group. “If what he told me is true, if I am Hazel, then my actions set all this in motion—the raid on Genesis Biosciences, The Change, and even The Extinction Trials.”





Chapter Forty-Six





For a long moment, no one said anything. The boat raced across the water, away from the container ship and the storm consuming it.

Owen’s mind was racing too, trying to process Maya’s revelation. She was… some kind of covert operative. As he thought about it more, it made sense. Several times, in dangerous situations, her instincts had saved him—and the entire group. She had a firm handle on her fear and the courage to see her missions through.

She was pacing the deck now, head down. “This video confirms what happened to me. I wasn’t just an employee at Genesis Biosciences. I was a government agent embedded there to investigate them. I figured out what they were doing, and I notified the government. They initiated the raid—and Genesis gave me the virus to wipe out my memories and keep me from providing any other information to the government. I think they expected it to kill me. When I didn’t die fast enough, they sent someone to finish me off. But I fought back—and got away.”

“If that’s true,” Alister said, “how and why did you end up in The Extinction Trials?”

“I don’t know,” Maya whispered.

“I think,” Owen said carefully, “that we should watch the rest of the videos before we start making any more conclusions.”

When no one protested, Owen motioned to Will, who clicked the next video:

2_ARC Technologies … [23]





The proctor again appeared, still standing on the cargo ship’s bridge.

“Topic two: ARC Technologies. As detailed in video number one, which you should have already viewed, I am in the employ of ARC Technologies. ARC has its origin in data warehousing and archival record storage. We later expanded our business into specialized data storage and data analytics services. As such, we had key relationships with the organizations that became the principal players in The Change and what occurred after. Of particular interest is a team dedicated to Genesis Biosciences and related companies that compose The Human Union—what we called the ARC-Union group. The ARC-Union group first became aware that The Change was going to take place after the government coalition initiated the strike against Genesis Biosciences and their Union partners. I will hereafter refer to the government coalition as simply The Alliance. The following videos will detail ARC’s role and what we soon learned.”

Alister put his feet up on the coffee table in the lounge area. “Why? Why do they have to make six videos instead of one? Why leave all these breadcrumbs? Why not just tell us the answers we need to know?”

“I think the answer,” Owen said, “will soon be obvious. Perhaps they left clear instructions elsewhere and those efforts have failed. We were the last people to wake up in that station. It would seem that direct efforts have failed. This is their last line—essentially, ARC’s last hope of success for The Extinction Trials.”

“No pressure,” Alister muttered.

Will tapped the tablet and started the next video:

3_Revelation ………………… [90]





“Video number three. This video presupposes you have completed the preceding two videos. It concerns ARC’s Revelation Project, which was principally focused on Genesis Biosciences, as well as various government programs to improve the long-term health and longevity of citizens.

“But first, some background. For some time, ARC has been working on a project called The Extinction Trials. While ARC’s expertise has traditionally been in storing data and certain biological and chemical samples, The Extinction Trials was a new endeavor for us: the archive of human beings before an extinction-level event. It was assumed that The Extinction Trials would be activated sometime in the distant future. However, events that have previously been described—The Change and the allied strike that preceded it—accelerated the initiation of the trials. ARC, fortunately, had insight into both of the organizations that were now at war in a world that was changing rapidly. And we had a particular tool that was applicable to determining potential outcomes—a project called Revelation. At the time of The Change and during the Change War that followed it, we collected large amounts of data and fed it into the Revelation program, which analyzed that data and predicted outcomes. The next video details what we found.”