As she continued to explain, it became clear that outside of a laboratory environment, the victim had to have a strep infection for the NFI microbe to mutate. Austyn thought of all the cold medications they were testing in the U.S. This narrowed the field down to medications relating to a sore throat where the victim actually has strep throat.
Fahimah gave her sister some water.
"If this is too much for you, we can stop and get back to it later," he told her again.
"No," she said adamantly. "You see… I was so frightened of this NFI… that I destroyed everything. Not only what Fahimah did for me at the lab… but any documentation I had outside, too." She touched her head. "What is left is here."
Austyn understood now the need to remove the bacteria through the amputation. "Can you tell me about the remedy you took to survive?"
Rahaf motioned to Fahimah and sipped some more water first. "Most classes of antibiotics were discovered in the 1940s and '50s. You know that they work by blocking synthesis of the cell wall, DNA, and proteins within the bacteria."
Austyn knew this. "And I know that most of today's antibiotics are simply a variation on that original concept."
"Exactly. The fact that they work in similar ways may be one reason why bacteria are developing resistance," Rahaf told him. "Now, this remedy was not something that I discovered. It is a product presently under testing by one of your pharmaceutical companies. The antibiotic was discovered by isolating a certain microorganism from a sample of soil from southern Africa."
Austyn wrote down the information. She told him the name of the company and how successful the product had been so far on mice. She said she heard it might be a decade before it became available for humans. Rahaf had gone to school with one of the lead scientists working on the project at the time, who had given her a sample of the product.
"If the compound passes clinical trials it will become only the third entirely new antibiotic developed in the past four decades."
"Do you know how this antibiotic works differently from the others?" Austyn asked.
"It acts to block enzymes involved in the synthesis of fatty acids, which bacteria need to construct cell membranes."
She had to stop again. Fahimah gave her sister more water. The burst of energy Rahaf had gathered to give him this information was draining from her body. He hoped she would bounce back. But he could see the pain was too much.
"I need the nurse, my love," she told her sister.
Fahimah ran for the door, and Rahaf beckoned to Austyn.
He went to her and held her thin hands. The green eyes met his. "She has suffered."
He nodded.
"You make good on that suffering. You make sure she is taken care of."
"She will be," he promised her.
Chapter Forty-Seven
They were calling it a mild heart attack. At least, this was what the initial ECG and blood tests indicated.
Faas was far from being out of the woods, but he'd made it clear that it was a matter of national security for him to take a call from Agent Newman. Considering everything that was going on around the country, none of the doctors or nurses had a problem with it.
One of the nurses handed him a phone as soon as they rolled his bed into a curtained-off area. They told him he was only between tests. This was a rest stop only.
"Pressure of the job getting to you?" Austyn asked.
"No, I'm faking it. It's a good way to get my ex-wife's sympathy back." Betty had been the one who'd called 911. She was at the hospital by the time the ambulance had brought him in. Now she was talking to the doctor in the hall.
"Great idea. How is it working?"
"So far, so good," he said. "What have you got?"
"Some very good things," Austyn said. "But first of all, you should know that you're the third call I've made. NIH already has this information, and so does our department. So you don't have to leap out of bed and try to do everything yourself."
The curtain opened and Betty walked in. She frowned at the phone in his hand. He made a sign that it would only take one minute.
"Tell me. Make it short."
"All the initial victims at each site had to have strep throat, and they had to have an outside staph infection introduced, probably orally. So NIH is checking the inventory of the drugs these people had that might have something to do with that. Once that initial person became infected and decomposition began, the bacteria could spread in any of three ways: direct contact, airborne particles and insect transmission, depending on environmental conditions."
"Interesting. Go on."
"But there's something else. I was talking to Bea Devera at the office. She said they've been getting about a dozen phone calls from some pharmaceutical company executive who claims he knows what's going in. In fact, he's already made a call to the White House claiming he's behind the attacks, and that it's not over."
"Shit. Is anyone checking him out?"
"Yeah. Bea said the guy was on the research vessel with all those kids. She's on her way to the hospital where he is, along with about a hundred other agents."
"Okay."
Faas took his wife's hand when she came closer to the bed.
"I'll talk to you later," he said, handing the phone to Betty.
"What's going on?" she asked.
"They're all jerks. I have to have a heart attack for them to get their act together. They might just have the case cracked."
She smiled. "See? This is what I've been telling you for all these years. You need to delegate more."
Chapter Forty-Eight
Fahimah held her sister's hand as the nurse gave Rahaf a shot of morphine. One of the doctors had stepped out only moments before. He'd whispered to Fahimah that these could be her sister's last moments.
She placed a kiss on the fragile fingers. Once again, there seemed to be no end to her tears. She had no will left to fight them. The sorrow was overwhelming her.
"We're at the reflecting pool," Rahaf breathed. "Do you see the hanging mist?"
Fahimah looked at her sister. Her green eyes were distant. She had a smile on her face.
"Yes, I do, my love. We are at Tagh-e-Bostan."
"Do you remember her poems?" Rahaf asked. "The Saint of Basra?"
Fahimah didn't need any book of verse. For five years the Sufi poet's words had carried her. She recited them softly, as she remembered them. As she wanted to remember them.
"'Oh, my joy, my dream, my support. My friend, my precious one, my intention. You are the soul of my heart, my hope. You are my comfort — your desire sustains me.'"
Rahaf's lips kissed their joined fingers. She closed her eyes.
"So many blessings you have given me, my sister. Now your love is my desire and my heaven. It clears the path to my captured heart. Now, so long as I live, I will not be apart from you. You are my strength when I despair. If you are pleased with me, then — my heart — my happiness has begun."
The fingers relaxed in Fahimah's hand. She reached out and touched Rahaf's face. She was gone.
"I will not be apart from you," she whispered. "Firishte."
Chapter Forty-Nine
Federal agents, local police, representatives from practically every health-related branch of government swarmed the buildings and grounds of Reynolds Pharmaceuticals. David Link's suspicions were confirmed. Out of sixteen individual cases that were reported and the victims who'd already been autopsied, all had had strep throat, and a piece of the Strep-Tester — be it the outer paper or the tester itself — was found in all but one case.