“Jesus…,” Goddard muttered.
Mulder made a downward, circling motion. “The Last Trump. Not with a bang but with a gurgle. Down the toilet. All mammalian life within the target area.”
“God!” Wrench exclaimed, “What good’s an army? With that stuff…!”
Mulder raised his head to look at the little man. “Quite right, Charles. In the old days an army consisted of human beings with swords and spears, guns and cannon… whatever was state-of-the-art at the moment. You could see the enemy, watch him coming, gird up your loins and fight. Then warfare went out into space: missiles, bombs, satellites, platforms. You… the intelligence agencies… can still see those weapons, but they’re so powerful that neither side dares to start a war. The only atomic devices used in this century were dropped during the China-Viet Nam War.”
“And we’ve learned a lesson from that.” Lessing said.
“Quite so. Hopefully, at least. But you see where I’m going: a conventional army costs money, but every state can afford something, and it’s visible to its foes. Space weapons are prohibitively expensive… billions, trillions… more than even the United States or the Soviets can tolerate, decade after decade, generation after generation. They’re too powerful to employ without the risk of a retaliation that will turn your own country into a radioactive wasteland, and they’re still relatively easy to keep track of; both you and your opponents know what’s there.” He tapped the chair arm for emphasis. “Think, though: all you need for Pacov… or for the toxin counterpart the Russians call ‘Starak’… is a handful of scientists, a wet lab, and a delivery system. Cheap, cost-effective, and easily concealed. Any petty terrorist organization can afford it, any banana republic, any fanatic religious sect.” He got up and came to stand over Lessing. “Just how big were those Pacov cannisters?”
It didn’t matter now. He might as well tell it. “A little globe, like a Christmas-tree ornament. And a cylinder, about this size.” He indicated four inches between thumb and finger.
His own stash of Pacov came to mind. Maybe Mulder’s movement, the descendants of the Nazi SS, were indeed reformed, just another bunch of nice guys making a living through hard work and honest capitalism. He didn’t trust them. Not them, not anyone. He was willing to tell Mulder some of what he knew, but he’d be damned if he’d hand over his samples to these people, or to anybody except maybe God Himself. And only then if the Big Guy asked politely.
Mulder wiped pearls of sweat from his forehead. “A family enters a country as tourists. Pacov-1 goes along in a box with their children’s toys—”
Wrench uttered a nervous giggle. “With a clown face painted on it!”
Mulder scowled in irritation. ‘Tes. A month or two later a man arrives with Pacov-2 disguised as a deodorant stick or a tube of insect repellent. He goes to his hotel room, cracks the container in the sink, and leaves again. He’s safe because he wasn’t exposed to Pacov-1, which is now quiescent.”
“And everybody in the target area dies,” Goddard breathed.
“True,” Mulder said, “but messy! There are no neat limits to a biological weapon, no idea how long it will really last! Viruses are unpredictable, and they can mutate. Did you know that there’s an island near Scotland that is still uninhabitable because of British experiments after World War II? Almost a century later! Biological weapons are cheap and effective, but they’re two-edged swords.”
“As blackmail…!” Goddard held up his cupped hand and made a throttling gesture.
“What if your target calls your bluff? Don’t be stupid. Bill! They might decide to sterilize your side of the planet with atomic bombs! Or use Starak or another BW agent of their own! And if Pacov got out of hand, you could end with a cemetery instead of a world!”
No one spoke for a time. The sun had grown insistent, and waves of heat beat against the rippled, bubbly glass of the windowpane. The old air-conditioner chugged and sputtered, just managing to keep the inferno outside at bay. Mulder wiped his face. Wrench fidgeted, and Goddard sat like a carved behemoth. Lessing pulled the pillow around, both for comfort and also to watch the other three. Silent watching often got better results than speech.
“They blame us… my ancestors… for genocide,” Mulder mused. “Is Pacov our doing? Those missiles in the sky? Yes, we fought a war, and yes, we bombed and shot and slew. So did the Allies. Match Auschwitz against the firebombing of Dresden or the horror of Hiroshima. All horrible, all stupid. We’ve learned, Alan, learned a lot in a hundred years.”
Lessing blurted out, “And the ‘Holocaust’?”
“Didn’t Wrench tell you that there never really was one… at least, not the way the Jews tell it. Forced labor and camps and disease and maltreatment, yes; it was war time, and my ancestors did what they believed they had to do. And there were some shootings in the eastern territories, mass executions of Jews and communist guerrillas. But no gas chambers, or any of the other fanciful inventions claimed by the Jews. But it’s always the victors who write the histories.”
“And hold the war-crimes trials,” Wrench whispered.
“Anyhow, whether there was a ‘Holocaust’ or not is irrelevant to this age. No one wants a war that will end life on earth. Nor can one people rule a world of slaves. The Israelis have expanded into a slave-empire, and they are just beginning to reap the whirlwind. No, we’ll win our way, Alan. We are the people who invented the technology and organization that makes this modem world possible. We’re fitted to win. We want a healthy people, a healthy environment, a healthy world. A radioactive desert or a rotten orange crawling with germs… neither is of use to us… or to the Jews or anyone else.”
Lessing said slowly, “I don’t know whether I believe you or not. I don’t know that I care whether I believe you. It all happened a hundred years ago. Your Hitler is as dead as last week’s curry.” Goddard stiffened, but the others ignored him. “What do you intend to do, Mr. Mulder? What do you want me to do?”
Mulder heaved himself to his feet, Goddard leaning forward solicitously to lend a hand “We want you to find Pacov. Who paid you? Who’s got it now?”
“Ask Gomez.”
Goddard snorted. “Gomez is dead, Lessing. His heart stopped It had a bullet in it.”
Lessing stared. “Who? When?”
“You thumbed him. That’s the rumor. We know you didn’t, because you were in Pretoria. But the meres don’t know that. In some circles you’re dead meat.”
“But you know other meres,” Wrench prompted. “People above
Gomez’s level?”
“You can go and inquire,” Mulder interrupted smoothly. Or you can go your way and face those waiting for you outside Indoco’s fences. The Izzies are looking for you, and the Americans want you. Somebody knows about Pacov and Marvelous Gap, somebody who either wants to interrogate you or see you unzipped. We can protect you. You can stay here for a while, and if things blow over, fine. Otherwise we can hire you as chief of security at Club Lingahnie, our new spa on the island of Ponape. The south Pacific is lonely, but it’s safe.”
“He’d have to leave his Indian popsy here,” Goddard sneered.
Surprisingly, Mulder turned on the man. “That’s enough, Bill! Do you know where the word ‘Aryan’ comes from? Sanskrit, Bill, the ancestor of Hindi and other North Indian languages. It originally meant ‘noble.’ India was invaded about 1,500 B.C. by the Aryans, relatives of our own ancestors.”