When he was done, Wei slipped the bag and the empty vials into his coat pocket. He left the rest of the contents in the satchel.
He sat back down on his daughter’s bed and held her hand for the last time. God, she was so beautiful. So perfect. Just like her mother. She had been his sunshine in a world of darkness, with her eyes always so bright and pure.
Now, her heart was in the last stages, and a final gift was all he had left to offer. When he’d learned of the discovery in Guyana, he knew it was his last hope. His only hope. And he had moved heaven and earth to make it happen.
Now his precious seventeen-year-old daughter lay helpless, fighting against a disease that was quickly breaking her body down. Why were the most beautiful so often the ones taken?
Wei would never know if the DNA solution helped her. He could only pray now that it would. If it did, he hoped that she would one day learn the truth about why her father took his own life. That it was an act of a man who had sacrificed everything to give her one last chance.
From the beginning, he knew it was unlikely they would be able to harvest the plants without someone finding out. He also knew that they might have to fight their way out to protect it. But when the Americans showed up, Wei knew his fate was sealed.
Nevertheless, a preemptive strike against the United States would only lead to trouble. Especially when they finally discovered it was a Chinese submarine that had destroyed the U.S. science vessel and not the Russians. And the most obvious solution to avoid the Americans’ rage was to blame the attack on a rogue officer. Someone with both the authority and the mental deterioration to do it. After all, the man had lost both his wife and daughter. Once identified, his government would, of course, have to make him the example and the punishment severe.
However, Wei had other plans. Even in her critical condition, he had moved his daughter to a safe location. Some place his masters would never think to look. After the funeral service, he changed her name and enlisted the help of a truly honorable man: a rural doctor and a faithful man of God.
The doctor would care for Wei’s daughter until her final day, whenever that would be. The rest of his satchel, packed full of money, would provide whatever resources the man needed to help his people. And one day, he might just be able to tell Wei’s daughter the truth. That Wei was not mad. He was not insane. He was a man of morals who had seen too much in his life, and too much of the true state of humanity. He was not about to unleash the power of immortality upon a race whose only decent values came from the unavoidability of death. Left unchecked, with no earthly penance, he had little doubt that his fellow man’s soul would become something truly terrible.
And yet, in the end, he was a father. A father who loved his daughter more than life itself. He could destroy the precious cargo of his masters, but he would never let his little girl go without doing everything he could to save her.
If she survived, perhaps her special DNA would one day in the future be discovered when the human soul had grown wiser. But the time was not now.
He only hoped that whoever was in charge of the discovery for the Americans, believed the same.
76
It was his fault.
Admiral Langford stared down at Krogstad’s headstone less than twenty feet away and struggled to maintain his composure. Giving orders that cost lives was not for the faint of heart. Nevertheless, no one could avoid the emotional agony when that person was a friend.
He had ordered Krogstad to stop the Chinese warship at all costs with a ship that had no ability to fight. But after the Russian torpedo attack, Krogstad was left powerless to do anything but delay the inevitable. He lost his life, along with several of his crew. And for what? The corvette had escaped with its cargo, protected by the Forel. It appeared the Russians and Chinese had been aligned the entire time.
The response from the United States would come soon enough, and Langford was quickly growing wary as to where it would end.
The Chinese now possessed one of the greatest discoveries in history, and the U.S. had nothing. The sample from aboard the Bowditch could not be found, which was not surprising considering the sheer damage to the ship and its science lab.
Langford glanced up forlornly at Krogstad’s wife and family, still huddled in front of the marker. Commander Lawton stood next to her mother with an arm around her shoulders. All they would know was that Roger Krogstad was innocently attacked and that he still managed to save most of the lives aboard his ship. They didn’t know that their husband and father was dead for a very simple reason. And that reason was standing only a few feet behind them.
Langford finally turned to go as the rain began to drizzle. He looked solemnly at Clay, who was standing nearby, waiting.
“It was a nice service.”
Langford nodded. “Did you know that Roger and I entered the academy together?”
“Yes, sir.”
“He was a hell of a captain.”
“He was indeed.”
Langford squinted up at the dark clouds and sighed. “The Russians are denying everything. Claiming they didn’t have any knowledge of the Forel or its mission.” He scoffed. “Next they’ll tell us someone stole the damn thing.” He looked back at Clay. “And Brazil is insisting that both the Forel and the Chinese corvette were sunk off their southern coast. So it appears the Chinese now have their ‘deniability.’”
“Sunk by whom?”
“That’s a good question.”
“What happens now, sir?”
“Who knows?” He looked at Clay. “Go take some time off, John. You’ve earned it. I’ll do my best to leave you alone this time.”
EPILOGUE
Caesare was nearly finished typing his last report when Borger opened his office door and stepped inside. He closed it quietly behind him and stood, waiting until Caesare was done. While he waited, Borger scanned the room very carefully with his eyes.
“The room’s clean, Will,” Caesare said without looking up.
“Are you sure?”
“Would you like to bring your device back and scan it again?” When Borger paused to consider the question, Caesare looked at him. “What’s up?”
Borger spoke in a hushed tone. “There’s something I wanted to talk to you about. About… Guyana.”
Caesare saved and closed his document then leaned forward. He watched as Borger grabbed the only other chair in the room and dragged it forward to the other side of the desk. “What is it?”
Borger didn’t speak right away. Instead, he blinked twice before inhaling and spoke barely above a whisper.
“I’ve been thinking…”
“That was my first guess.”
“About the mountain. About what we found.” He paused again. “We both agree it came from somewhere else, right?”
“Right.”
“And ‘somewhere else’ means pretty far away. Maybe really far.”
“Okay.”
“So… I’ve been thinking about something: efficiency.”
“Efficiency?”
“Traveling through space takes energy, right? And if you want to do it quickly, it takes a lot of energy. We already know this. It’s why even our spacecraft and probes are as small as possible.”
“Correct.”
“Traveling to Mars or Jupiter takes a while. And relatively speaking, they’re not really that far away, right? So traveling a very long distance, like between stars, means you have to travel pretty fast if you want to arrive anytime in the foreseeable future. I mean, who’s going to send something if they have to wait ten thousand years to get there?”