Fifteen minutes later, Paul entered his final authorization code and the main screen began blinking:
Euthanasia Protocol Transmitted to Population Subset
Paul stood and said, “I’d like to be alone in my office now.”
“Sure, Paul.” North addressed one of the soldiers. “Escort Dr. Brenner to his office. Remove his computer and phone and see that he has any food and drink he requests.”
In his office, Paul sat on the couch and stared at the floor. He had never felt worse in his life.
CHAPTER 8
CDC Headquarters
Atlanta, Georgia
Paul Brenner checked his watch for the hundredth time, then got up from the couch and paced to the window. The three rings of military vehicles barricading the CDC tower sat silently, some of the soldiers standing and smoking, most sitting in their Humvees or slumped against the sandbags.
Shouts erupted in the reception area outside his office. The door handle rattled then shook as someone began pounding on the solid wood door.
“Unlock this door, Brenner!” North’s voice was hoarse but strong enough to strike fear into Paul.
He’s alive. Paul checked his watch again.
“Three seconds, Brenner! Or we open this door without you.”
Paul froze.
Behind the door, he heard something that amounted to “aim down, we need him alive.” Shots sprayed splinters into the room, and the door swung open.
Terrance North staggered in, clutching his chest. “You tried to kill me.”
“You should get to the infirmary—”
“Don’t play games, Paul.” North jerked his head to the guards. “Take him.”
Guards seized Paul’s arms and dragged him down the hall.
In the Continuity situation room, the young computer programmer silently watched North throw Paul against the wall and spit words slowly in his face. “You stop this now, or I swear I’ll have these soldiers shoot you.”
Paul couldn’t believe the man could still stand. North’s cardiovascular health had kept him alive far longer than Paul had anticipated. His mind grasped for any diversion that might buy time.
In his peripheral vision, he saw Natalie enter the hall with Matthew. He tried to look away, but it was too late—North had seen them.
“I’ll execute the boy first. You can watch.” He gasped for breath. He released Paul and collapsed onto the table, panting now. “Major—”
Paul swallowed and spoke to the three soldiers. “Stop. Major, I believe you swore to defend this country against enemies foreign and domestic. That’s all I’ve done. Thirty minutes ago, the Secretary forced me to use Continuity to execute millions of our own citizens.”
“He’s lying!”
“He’s not,” the skinny programmer said. “North gave me the same orders. I wouldn’t do it either. I cracked the access codes days ago. I’ve been lying about it.”
North shook his head and stared at Paul with disgust. “You’re a fool. You’ve killed us all. When the Immari come, they’ll wipe us out.”
The soldiers slowly lowered their rifles. Paul exhaled as he watched Terrance North convulse and fall to the floor, taking his last breaths. It was the first life Paul Brenner had ever taken, and he hoped it would be his last.
Paul was rubbing his temples, staring out the window, when the shattered door to his office creaked open.
Natalie came in and stood beside him for a moment, gazing at the rings of military outside the building. Finally, she said, “How can I help?”
“We’re in a tough spot. It depends on what the White House does next. The Marines inside Continuity will follow Major Thomas, who’s supporting me for now, but if the Administration orders a full assault on the building, we won’t last long.”
“So…”
“We need to get Matthew out of here. I don’t want you here either.”
“How? Where can we go?”
“The Orchid Districts won’t be safe. Or the cities. Probably not the roads for that matter. My grandmother has a cabin in the mountains of North Carolina.” He handed her a map with highlighted directions. “Take Matthew and a few Marines and get there as quickly as you can. The stock room is still pretty full here. Take food and water—as much as you can pack into a Humvee and get out before the next shoe drops.”
“What about—”
“There’s a call for you, sir.” Susan, Paul’s secretary, was leaning in the door frame.
Paul hesitated. Was it “the call”—the surrender or face the firing squad call? “Is it…”
“It’s your ex-wife.”
His nervousness turned to surprise.
Natalie’s face was even more surprised.
Paul raised a finger. “Yes, my ex-wife is alive and well, and I haven’t talked to her in years.” He turned to Susan. “Tell her I can’t talk—”
“She says it’s important. She sounds scared, Paul.”
Paul walked into the outer office and picked up the phone. He hesitated, not sure how to start. He settled on, “Brenner.” It came out harsher than he intended.
“Hi, it’s, um, Mary, I’m… I’m sorry to call—”
“Yeah, Mary, it’s… a really bad time.”
“I found something, Paul. A signal on the radio telescope. It’s organized. A code of some type.”
“What kind of code?”
When the conversation was over, Paul hung up the phone and glanced out the window at the soldiers waiting outside the building. He needed to get out of Atlanta, possibly the country, and if the code was real, it could change the entire equation. It had to be connected to the Atlantis conspiracy, though Paul wasn’t sure how. The timing, it arriving just as the plague had been cured couldn’t be a coincidence. He addressed the Marine standing in his office. “Major, assuming we can get out of here, can you get me a plane?”
Three hours later, Paul was standing in Mary’s office, trying to understand what she was saying.
“Stop.” He held up his hand. “Is it one code or two?”
“Two,” Mary said. “But it could be the same message encoded in two formats—”
“Don’t say another word, Mare!” John Bishop, Mary’s colleague, placed his hand on Mary’s forearm and focused on Paul. “We need to talk turkey first.”
“What?”
“We want ten million dollars.” John hesitated. “No—a hundred million!” He pointed his index finger down at the table. “Seriously. A hundred million—right now or we delete this thing.”
Paul looked at Mary, confused. “Is he drunk?”
“Very.”
Paul gave the Marine a quick nod, and he and another soldier dragged John, kicking and screaming, out of the room.
Now that they were alone, Mary’s expression changed. “Paul, I appreciate you coming, really. I’m surprised. I actually was just hoping to get out of here.”
“We will.” He pointed at the screen. “Now what is the code?”
“The first part is binary. Just numbers—Earth’s location relative to the center of the galaxy and our solar system.”
“The second part?”
“I don’t know yet. It’s a sequence with four values. The first just had two values—zero and one, on and off. I think the second sequence could be an image or a video.”
“Why?”
“CMYK. Cyan, magenta, yellow, key—or black. It would be an accurate way to transmit a high-res image or video. The image could be a message or even a universal hello. A greeting. Or instructions on how to transmit a message back.”
“Uh huh. Or a virus.”
“It’s possible. I hadn’t thought of that.” Mary chewed her lip. “In the first part of the message, the binary code was readable to us. It indicates that we have binary computing ability, that we could store the CMYK image as a computer file, but I don’t see how it could—”
“No, I mean an actual virus, a DNA virus. A.T.G.C. Adenine, thymine, guanine, and cytosine are the four nucleobases that form DNA. Or it could be RNA, with uracil standing in for thymine. The code could be a genome. It could be an entire life form or a gene therapy.”
Mary raised her eyebrows. “Oh. Yeah. Maybe. That's… an interesting theory.”
“Or their DNA could be composed of other nucleobases.” Paul paced away, deep in thought.
Mary glanced around. “Did you… think of that before you decided to come here?”
“No.”
“Then…”
“I think this signal could be connected to the Atlantis Plague and possibly a war that’s starting as we speak.”
“Oh.” Mary paused. “Wow.”
“There&rsqu