The First Bird: Episode 1 tfb-1 Read online

  Carla looked the young woman up and down. Megan met her gaze and held it, matching her intensity. Matt briefly thought about ducking for cover.

  “Oh, I’m coming.” Megan looked at Matt, her jaw clenched. “Where?”

  Matt smiled. Megan was combative, and was digging in even though she had no idea what the trip involved. Someone had just told her she couldn’t do something — bad move.

  “Dr. Nero?” The huge driver stood behind Megan, looking like he’d be more than happy to wrestle her back into the car.

  Matt spoke over his shoulder to the hulking man. “Don’t even think about it.” He turned to face Carla, wondering what he would do if the driver tried anything.

  Carla tapped a finger on the table for a second or two, ignoring the younger woman’s ferocious stare. “I don’t have the authority to endorse your … girlfriend’s travel. Besides, this is no Contiki tour, with cocktails and paper umbrellas. Professor Kearns, you know where we’re going. People die, or sometimes disappear, down there. You want to put your friend at risk?”

  Megan pulled up a chair and sat down, leaning into Carla’s face. “Listen, lady. I’ve climbed Lizard Head Peak in Colorado — thirteen thousand feet of crumbling volcanic plug — solo. I’ve dived to three hundred feet using an experimental hypoxic gas blend, and I’ve been in many tropical jungles besides the Kokoda. But I’m not here for a pissing contest. What the hell is this all about?”

  Carla studied Megan’s angry face, then smiled. The shark was back. Uh-oh, thought Matt. If Carla tried to slap Megan down that would ratchet his girlfriend up to supernova level. He needed to throw in a circuit breaker.

  “Two choices, Carla — either we both go, or neither of us does. Don’t think of it as an intrusion or a hindrance. Think of it as double the help.”

  She swung around, shaking her head, her face carrying a hint of warning. “You really don’t know what you’re asking.”

  ‘You’re right about one thing. I certainly don’t know what the hell I’m asking for. So, if you want our help…’ Matt shrugged and took Megan’s hand. Megan smiled back, and then turned to Carla with a look that said checkmate.

  Carla shrugged and nodded, almost sadly. “I see I’m outnumbered and outgunned. If that’s the price of your assistance then I have no choice but to accept your terms, Professor.”

  “Really? Uh, thank you,” said Matt.

  “Damn right,” Megan threw in, her jaw still thrust forward with hostility.

  Carla reached down and pulled another folder from a slim briefcase. “Professor Kearns — Matt — I’m going to lay my cards on the table.” There was a hint of a smile.

  Matt smiled back as his brain worked to catch up with what had just happened. A few minutes ago, he had been trying to get out of the trip, then somehow he found himself demanding to be taken. How did that work? Matt had a sneaking suspicion that he was the one who had really been outgunned.

  Carla slid the folder across the table, keeping one hand on it. “Before I show you this, please remember that within US borders, we have great authority when it comes to protecting our nation’s health. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that this is confidential. One word, and there will be enforced incarceration until we deem the threat to public health to have abated.” She locked eyes with Megan. “Agreed?”

  Megan held the woman’s gaze, breathing deeply. Matt could feel the waves of anger rising off her. He sat as still as stone, waiting them out.

  Seconds passed as the two women eyeballed each other, until Carla raised one eyebrow, her smile never slipping.

  “Whatever.” Megan went to grab the folder, but Carla didn’t move her hand.

  “Agreed?” She tilted her head.

  After a few more seconds of compressed lips, Megan muttered “fine,” then snatched the folder and flipped it open. Round one to Dr. Carla Nero, thought Matt.

  Megan immediately recoiled. “Jesus Christ! What the hell is this?”

  Carla’s face was devoid of emotion as she nodded slowly. “That, my dear, was Professor Jorghanson.” She spoke without looking at the images. “Forty people he came into contact with are also dead — a trail of bodies leading from the airport to the taxi rank and his hotel. The same goes for another seven people in and around a private quarantine facility in LA. Added to that, we have over eighty people in a negative air pressure isolation unit — a warehouse, really …” She looked from Megan to Matt. “… and all are expected to die in the next few days.”

  Matt looked down and flinched. “That many? But what the hell could do this? You said it was a parasite? But how? What?” He gritted his teeth as he looked at the way-too-clear photograph. A body was laid out on a metal table, stripped of its skin. Meaty, glistening, with blue and red veins and arteries, stringy sinew and streaks of fat shining wetly under the harsh lights of a white tiled medical examination room. It was the face that unsettled Matt the most. The features weren’t fixed in shock or agony, but instead held an expression more like … surprise. It was as if Professor Pieter Jorghanson, even in death, still didn’t understand what had happened to him.

  On another table, in a large silver bowl, sat a pile of gray, rubbery-looking material. Matt winced, realizing that it was the man’s skin. “What a ghastly way to die.”

  “They all died like that. The parasite that came back on the specimen is a form of burrowing mite. It exudes an enzyme that liquefies the protein in the subdermal layers of its host — liquefies them for consumption. In the process, it literally flays the host alive … from the inside out. The only upside — for want of a better term — is that the nerves are the first thing to be short circuited, so the process is actually quite painless.”

  “Painless? How the hell do you know that?” Megan pushed back her seat and walked a few paces away from the table.

  Carla watched her go, but there was no smile on her face now. She turned back to Matt. “Professor Jorghanson had age-related macular degeneration, cirrhosis of the liver, and a mild form of recessive morbilli virus. He probably contracted the more benign strain of measles as a kid, and his system stored it instead of eradicating it. Regardless, he was still a fairly robust man.” She held Matt’s eyes. “You see, we know he wasn’t in pain at the end, because Professor Jorghanson was still alive when he was brought in … like that. The decorticating process didn’t kill him — it was the shock and fluid loss that did.”

  She closed her eyes for a second or two and drew a deep breath. “At least now we know what we’re dealing with. Still, by the time we get to an infested victim, the subdermal insult is … significant. The patients are being kept in an induced coma until we can work out a way to do comprehensive skin grafts — if they live that long.”

  Matt shuddered. He didn’t want to see anymore, but Carla pulled another photograph from her folder and laid it on the table. This one showed an enormously magnified arthropod creature — teardrop-shaped, with a serrated head, powerful-looking crab-like legs, and several fleshy looking dewlaps trailing behind.

  “Public enemy number one — sarcoptes scabiei primus — the scabies mite.” She pulled a face. “‘Primus’ meaning ‘comes first’. This little monster is perhaps the first ever scabies mite, hence the tag.”

  “You’re kidding. Scabies? As in, what sailors from the fifties used to bring back after an exotic holiday?”

  Carla snorted softly. “Yes, and no. It’s a recognizable parasite, but not one we’ve seen before, other than trapped in fossilized amber.” She tapped the photograph. “This little critter eats and lays eggs … and that’s all it does. The near-microscopic size of the mite, plus the fact that an infested individual can be carrying millions of mites, makes transference fast and easy. You do the math.”

  “But scabies is treatable.” Matt pushed the picture back toward her.

  “Sure it is. A five percent preparation of permethrin or a twenty-five percent dose of benzyl benzoate in a solution should kill ’em every time … but not these monsters.
The only effective thing we’ve come up with is DDT, and as it’s a subdermal infestation, we would need to inculcate the insecticide, once the mites are on, inside the host. We’d also need to perform mass spraying of the open environment to tackle the free-range variety. By the time the enviro-freaks ever allowed that to occur, half the population would be infested, or dead. Bottom line, we’ve got months — maybe weeks — to find something that will be fast, effective, and have minimal effects, both to us and the environment.”

  She sat back wearily. “Something in their natural habitat kept these things in check. Otherwise, the Ndege Watu, Jorghanson’s specimen, and just about every living creature down there would have been skinned alive. I’m betting that the natives know what that something is, and I need to find out.”

  Matt nodded, more in sympathy with the problem than with any actual understanding of how it could occur. “It’s a nightmare, but you said you had to twist arms to make this happen. For heaven’s sake, after seeing these pictures, who in the hell do you need to convince?”

  “That’s our problem. The CDC has no jurisdiction outside of the American continent. We don’t have time to make formal requests to foreign governments, who could vacillate while we burn with infestation. In fact, they’re more likely to slap a ban on us for stealing their property.”

  “You mean the specimen?”

  She nodded. “We need to join a group already authorized to travel to the Gran Chaco Boreal. There’s a private expedition leaving tomorrow. We’ll be leaving with them.”

  Matt glanced over his shoulder at Megan, who was sitting on a low wall, staring at the ground. He wondered if she was still determined to accompany him. “This private company, do they know where to go? And the danger the mite presents? I’m guessing they’re some sort of global medical team. Medical Corps International or Médecins Sans Frontières, someone like that?”

  Carla laughed. “I wish. Not even close. Before he died, Jorghanson sold the location and rights to the specimen to a Mr. Maxwell Steinberg.”

  Matt sprang forward. “You’re shitting me — Dinosaur Kingdom Max Steinberg? I loved that movie! But how is he even allowed to be involved, given the danger?”

  “Mr. Steinberg is aware of the risks, and doesn’t see them as a problem, not when it comes to locating ‘the find of the century’. People like Steinberg regard problems like this as things to be negotiated away or bulldozed over.” Carla’s hand curled into a fist, her anger palpable.

  “Steinberg’s argument is that there are more bugs on the average person’s pillow than on the specimen, and that more than five thousand people die every year from food poisoning, so our little problem is nothing to be too concerned about. He can be very persuasive, especially when he’s making eight figure donations annually to both political parties.” She tilted her head. “But he has his uses. Though the CDC has no power outside our national borders, we certainly carry a big stick within them. If he wants to bring something back, he better play ball. We can use him, just as he’ll try to use us.”

  Matt nodded, trying to come to terms with the politics and dynamics of a side of government he rarely saw. “And the original specimen?”

  Carla looked grim. “Now destroyed, but not before it succumbed to the burrowing mite itself, and managed to contaminate a lot of innocent people. Steinberg blames us for not getting it into some sort of treatment sooner.” She snorted. “You see, it was taking the specimen out of its environment that signed its death warrant. No modern man has ever come into contact with this bug. In fact, excepting Jorghanson’s lost tribe, perhaps no human has ever been affected by it. The thing is a living fossil, a primordial remnant.”

  “That’s the bug, but you said it was a passenger? On the ‘specimen’ you destroyed? What exactly was this ‘specimen’ you keep referring to?”

  Carla half smiled, but her eyes were sad. “What was it? It was a magnet, and one causing a stampede that we need to get in front of. Our primordial parasitic remnant was living on something just as ancient. And given that the parasite could have been a factor in the demise of the dinosaurs, I think it’s appropriate that it was found …” She glanced briefly over her shoulder, perhaps to see where the waiter was, before placing a final photograph on the table. “… found existing on the body of another living fossil. The specimen was a living archaeopteryx, the first bird, and we need to find its home before we end up like the dinosaurs.”

  CHAPTER 4

  Maxwell Dodi Steinberg belched as he drank his imported beer and looked out over the choppy Malibu surf. He leaned his hand against a sheet of the toughened curved windows that ran the fifty feet around the living room of his clifftop mansion — four furnace-toughened three-quarter inch sheets, invisibly bonded together, each costing more than your average Rolls Royce.

  He peered down at the rooftops of his neighbors — aging movie stars, rock promoters, and business tycoons. He could have bought them all a hundred times over — not bad for a skinny Jewish kid from Arizona. He belched again, then swallowed the beer-flavored acid that came up with the gas.

  Steinberg was pissed off. He was one of the wealthiest and most powerful movie producers in the world. His special effects movies had grossed billons of dollars, and he counted A-list celebrities, presidents, and Tibetan spiritual leaders amongst his inner circle. So he could afford to — and did — pay a fortune for the rights to Professor Pieter Jorghanson’s prehistoric bird … and then the CDC freakin’ went and destroyed it — and cremated what was left! Even though it was dead, he could have had the bones reconstructed. Movies were one thing, but merchandizing and surround marketing sales were where the real money was.

  He put the bottle to his lips, thinking. Alive would have been best — better a living fossil than just another dead one.

  He sucked heavily on the freezing beer and picked up a pile of papers from one of the cream leather couches. He still had the professor’s notes, and a map to the village, which was a start, at least. As far as he was concerned, he was counting down to launch. He’d lead a team down to the jungle himself. He’d find Jorghanson’s Garden of Eden-cum-Lost World, even though the old boy had managed to succumb to some sort of jungle mange. He’d seen the photos — yecch.

  Steinberg gulped more beer and snorted. He’d make sure he was better prepared. He’d take jungle specialists, paleontologists, an entomologist, a medical doctor, plus enough fucking DDT to level the entire Amazon if he needed to. For his sins, he’d also been told he had to take some CDC pencil-neck, who now also wanted to bring a linguist — sheesh. What, they didn’t trust that his language expert would tell them what he found out? He snorted again — of course he fucking wouldn’t! He toasted his reflection in the glass, turning side-on and sucking in his gut, and thinking he should probably put some pants on.

  Steinberg’s mind whirled at the possibilities. Talk about fiction turning into fact. It was a goldmine and a dream come true, all rolled into one. He didn’t need the money, but he certainly liked the attention and respect that came with being a winner. And that respect, baby, was global respect.

  His people had smoothed a path with the Brazilian government. Visas were approved, and local guides, and anything else he needed, would be provided. Funny what a couple of hundred grand dropped into a few Mickey Mouse bank accounts could get you.

  Respect, yeah, that’s what it freakin’ got you.

  CHAPTER 5

  Matt sat in the back of the Cougar AS532 and dozed. The flight in Max Steinberg’s Gulfstream G550 from LAX to Brasília International Airport had taken twelve hours. After a quick customs check on the tarmac, they were escorted directly to a big green military helicopter, which would take them to the Mato Grosso Plateau, part of the Brazilian Highlands. It was an ancient tableland that fell away to flood plains called the Pantanal, the largest continuous wetland on the planet. These flood plains at their darkest heart contained the almost inaccessible Gran Chaco, one of the largest unexplored places on the planet.

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nbsp; Matt felt a hand on his leg, and opened one eye to groggily peer around the cabin. He felt like crap — he didn’t travel well — and probably looked like he felt. The twin-engine chopper could take twenty fully kitted soldiers, but today its cargo was less than half that. Glancing around, Matt could see that the warm cabin and long flying time was having the same effect on most of his companions. Other than a single brusque movie producer, the group consisted of scientists, specialists, and a formidable-looking guide — or maybe bodyguard — Kurt.

  Kurt was the only one who seemed fit and alert. He had spent much of the early ride explaining the specifications of the helicopter to Megan. Matt noticed that he suddenly became very tactile when talking to her, using his hands to illustrate the flight characteristics of the craft, and touching her shoulder, arm, and eventually her leg. Creep, he thought.

  Matt had listened to Kurt expertly describe how they would coast along at a hundred and fifty miles per hour, well within the chopper’s potential of more than one eighty. The bodyguard had gestured port and starboard, at the housed engines — a couple of Turbomeca Makila 1A1 turbo shafts that could punch out 1589 horsepower on command, he had intoned solemnly. Then he had nudged her and winked, and lowered his voice to a conspiratorial level — apparently it’d last about twelve seconds against one of Uncle Sam’s Black Hawks, and even less against an Apache. These last nuggets necessitated a good-natured grab of the knee. Matt had groaned and sat back after that.

  He felt his eyelids drooping again, until he felt the hand on his leg start to dig in, like a claw. He opened his eyes to see Megan leaning toward him. He pulled back one cup of his headphones, and she placed a finger on his ear, then rested her chin on the hand. This allowed her voice to be carried to him more via vibrations than by sound waves. It worked. You didn’t have to shout, but you did need to concentrate.