“How are you?” he asked warmly.
Alison beamed. “Good now, thanks to you and Steve. How did you know where we were?”
“Borger found you.”
“Ah, the mysterious Mr. Borger I hear so much about. Does that mean I finally get to meet him?”
Clay smiled. “In the flesh. Though you might want to keep your sunglasses on. His shirts can be a little hard on the eyes.” He let the smile fade from his face. “How are Chris and Lee?”
“Pretty good. Steve couldn’t find any signs of critical injuries, but their wounds will take some time to heal.”
“Well, they’re in good hands now.” Clay looked at the ladder just as Caesare appeared. He climbed over the edge effortlessly and nodded to the Captain before approaching Clay.
“Nice job, sailor,” said Clay, pausing when he noticed that Caesare was not smiling.
Instead, he looked at Clay with a serious face. “I’m not staying long.”
“What?”
“We have a problem.” Caesare gave a slight nod to Alison. “It seems DeeAnn Draper and Juan Diaz have gone missing. Along with Dulce.”
“For how long?”
Alison peered up at him. “We haven’t heard from either one of them in a few days.”
“I called a friend at the CIA,” Caesare said. “There’s been no activity on their cell phones from the tower they were connecting to outside of São Luis. I also had him dig deeper into our billionaire, Mr. Alves. It seems he’s not quite the Boy Scout philanthropist he seemed. He’s involved with some bad elements in Brazil.”
Captain Krogstad walked up behind them. “Trouble?” he asked.
“You could say that,” Clay answered, then turned back to Caesare. “So, do you have a plan?”
‘Yeah, my plan is to find them,” Caesare stated flatly. His face became even more serious. “I talked to Langford and got clearance. As long as you stay here working with Borger and Commander Lawton.”
Even though it wasn’t a surprise, Clay still didn’t like hearing it. He wasn’t one for staying behind. “Do you need anything?”
“Nope. I’ve got what I need on the boat. I’ll need to hold onto your bag. Langford diverted a transport plane on its way down. It should be waiting at Georgetown’s airport by the time I get there. Which means I should be in São Luis by sundown.” Caesare turned to Krogstad. “Captain, can I borrow one of your crew? I can take the Prowler to shore, but I need someone to bring it back.”
“Of course. Whenever you’re ready.”
Caesare opened his mouth to speak but was interrupted by someone shouting from across the deck. It was Borger. He was waving frantically and running toward them. When he reached them, he spit out the words and bent over as though someone had just given him the Heimlich maneuver. “You guys gotta get in here!” He pointed back the way he came and rested his other hand on his knee, nearly hyperventilating.
“What’s wrong?”
Borger couldn’t reply. He was desperately trying to catch his breath. After several more inhalations, he finally got it out. “Hurry! The lab!”
The other five immediately bolted for the stairs less than a hundred feet away. Rapid pounding on the gray metal steps could be heard as they made their way up.
Clay reached the lab first. He grabbed the door and pushed it open forcefully, stepping inside along with it. Behind him, Caesare entered, followed by the two women, Krogstad, and finally Borger in a distant last.
Startled, Commander Lawton jerked her head away from the large monitor in front of her. There was an instant before she spoke when her eyes flashed on Caesare, a gesture which only Alison and Kelly caught.
“We have a problem,” she stated as she stood up. “A big one!”
“What?”
Lawton smiled politely at the women and turned back to the screen. “Look at this.”
Instinctively, everyone stepped in closer behind her.
Lawton enlarged a window on the screen and it zoomed in, displaying the twisted shape of a simple life form.
“What’s that?” asked Clay.
“Bacteria. A human intestinal bacteria to be exact.” She turned back around, facing them. “I wanted to try something. Any of you guys familiar with ‘horizontal’ gene transfer, or HGT?”
Borger looked down the line and then meekly raised his hand in the affirmative.
Lawton rolled her eyes. “I don’t mean you, Mr. Borger.” Seeing five blank stares, she continued. “Horizontal gene transfer refers to the passing of genes to other organisms, not including traditional reproduction. It’s most commonly used to refer to gene transfers between two dissimilar organisms. And ‘artificial’ HGT is essentially what we refer to today as genetic engineering. For example, transferring a glowing gene to a fish so it glows in the dark. That one makes a neat pet.”
“But even without artificial assistance, some genes in genetically modified foods, such as soy and wheat, have been documented to actually ‘jump’ to another organism such as bacteria. One study observed it happening in human digestive bacteria, which is why I chose that one.”
They still appeared to be with her. Lawton went on.
“I wanted to see if Clay’s plant had a similar ability, to ‘jump.’ Therefore, I extracted the chromosomal DNA I told you about and injected it directly into one of the bacterial cells.” She motioned with her hand to the on-screen picture behind her. “See Exhibit A.”
“And?”
“And it worked.”
“Impressive,” Clay said.
She shrugged. “Not so much. There are much more efficient ways to do it than my brute force technique. But bacteria are a single cell organism, so it’s not horribly difficult to do. Besides, I don’t know if ‘impressive’ is the word you’ll want to use when I tell you the next part.” She turned and retrieved a small petri dish from the table behind her. “This,” she said, presenting it in her palm, “is what it looked like two hours ago.”
They all peered into the clear dish which didn’t appear much different than water.
“Okay,” Lawton nodded briefly. She turned and set the dish down, while picking up another. “And this is what it looks like now.”
The others behind her let out a collective gasp. The dish no longer resembled water. Now it looked like a thick pink soup.
“What happened?” asked Krogstad.
“It grew, sir. A lot. These are all new bacteria, all from the one I transferred the plant’s genes into.” She reached into the dish and gently lifted an edge of the pink material with a fingertip. She let it drop back down into the dish for effect, complete with a squishing sound.
“All that in two hours?”
“Yep. Of course, given the right growing medium, bacteria can grow quickly. But not like this.”
Clay was still watching the dish. “I take it this is a result of the telomere not allowing them to die?”
“Actually, no,” Lawton replied. “It’s because of the other attribute, the rapid regeneration. I don’t know what piece of DNA code is responsible for that, but it’s in there somewhere.”
“Okay. So, you’re saying we have an HGT transfer from the plant to a bacteria.”
“A human bacteria,” Lawton corrected. “And now for the next part, and our problem.” She folded her arms and turned back to the screen. “Fortunately, human bacteria don’t transfer their genes into regular human cells. At least they didn’t until a couple years ago. That’s when a team of scientists at the University of Maryland School of Medicine published a report showing evidence that it does happen. They demonstrated that their bacteria can, on occasion, transfer its genes into healthy human cells.”