As Kira thought about it, she realized he was right. Even a mediocre molecular biologist, his mind transformed by her treatment, could manage something relatively simple like this. And the entire female population wouldn't have to be infected at once. If an engineered virus was set loose, designed just to attack female eggs and nothing else, the attacks would go unnoticed for some time. Each woman infected would have her ability to reproduce destroyed without coming down with as much as a sniffle. And once all human egg cells were destroyed, that was it. Even cloning required an intact egg cell to work, albeit one with its own genetic material removed to get an exact carbon copy of the donor.

"I can see in your eyes that you're beginning to fully grasp the implications of what I'm saying," said Sam, gloating. "The only real challenge is a logistical one: making sure the hyper-contagious virus is spread to every corner of the world. But there are any number of ways to accomplish this." He began ticking them off with his fingers. "Genetically engineered E. coli, designed to be able to out-compete and replace the E. coli found in every human guta"harmless other than having a gamete destroyer on board. Poisoned water supplies. Contaminated cigarette filters."

Kira looked puzzled by this last entry.

"Don't be fooled by the anti-smoking lobby, my dear," said Sam. "Cigarette use is thriving in every corner of the world. Over five trillion are smoked each year. Do you think it would be difficult for someone with immeasurable intelligence to figure out a simple way to contaminate a majority of the world's cigarette production lines with a hyper-contagious agent? With all the world's smokers playing the role of Typhoid Mary, it would spread to every human on the planet in no time." He grinned. "I guess second-hand smoke isn't the biggest danger you can face from smokers, after all."

Kira shook her head in disgust but said nothing.

Desh's mind leaped! A ma.s.sive acceleration of his thoughts occurred in an instant. Like one hundred billion dominoes falling into place at once; like a chain reaction leading to a ma.s.sive explosion, his neurons had reordered themselves into a more efficient architecture. Thoughts arrived at a furious pace.

Square root of 754, Desh thought to himself, and seemingly before the thought was even finished he saw the answer: 27.459. Time seemed to slow down. His thoughts had been traveling through mola.s.ses previously, but now they were jet-propelled.

As Sam delivered a sentence the pauses between each of his words were agonizingly long. Spit a It a Out! thought Desh impatiently. He studied Sam and realized his body language communicated almost as much as his wordsa"in some cases more. His every movement, breath, eye blink, and facial expression telegraphed what he was thinking.

Sam opened his mouth to speak and a thought flashed into Desh's mind: just to be sure, I'm going to use several strategies. This is what Sam was about to say, or something very close.

"Anyway, to ensure maximum exposure, I plan to use multiple strategies," said Sam, right on cue. "But I don't think we'll really need the others. When we unleash the engineered cold virus on the world, that alone will almost certainly do the trick."

"We?" said Kira.

"Me and my terrorist friends, of course. It helps to have a vast organization with cells in every country that follow orders without question. That way we have thousands of epicenters for our little infection."

Desh turned toward Kira Miller handcuffed beside him. In a flash of intuition he knew: he was in love with her! He had been for a while now.

But how did he know this?

A memory of all of his recent vital signs flashed into his mind. Heart rate, levels of brain chemicals, pupil dilation. His body and brain had been responding to her so powerfully his condition was laughingly obvious. The un-enhanced version of David Desh had been clueless, and in fact would have called the idea beyond ridiculous if someone had had the audacity to suggest it, not believing love was even possible in such a short amount of time. But he had been hit by Cupid and hit hard.

Enhanced Desh was not in love, of course. Far from it. He had lost his ability to feel love the instant his mind had transformed, just as Kira had suggested. Now he was able to gaze into Kira's limpid blue eyes and feel nothing. He could study her with clinical detachment. Love was a lizard brain instinct. A survival mechanism bred into the species that was totally separate from reason. Women were extremely vulnerable during pregnancy, and children were helpless for many years. If humans didn't have a mechanism for cementing a pair bond, nothing would remain but selfishness and promiscuity. Certain animal species were wired in the same way.

How did he know that!

And there was more, he realized in amazement. He knew that research on prairie voles, animals known for establishing long-lasting monogamous bonds with their partners, had shown that the male brain became devoted to its partner only after mating, coinciding with a ma.s.sive release of the neurotransmitter dopamine. Experiments had later shown that the dopamine restructured a part of the vole's brain called the nucleus acc.u.mbens, a region that was also found in the human brain.

Desh traced these memory threads to their source. A magazine article. The memories surrounding it were so vivid, it was as if he was there once again. He was a freshman in college, flying home to visit his family. There was a faint smell of microwaved airplane Chicken Marsala in the air. He was sitting next to a older woman who was flying for the first time. He saw her face just as clearly as if he was staring at her now. He had brought a book, but hadn't been able to get into it. He reached for the airplane magazine, the one that was tucked into every seat pocket. He flipped through it. Page twenty-eight had a torn corner. Three words had been filled in on the crossword puzzle by the previous pa.s.senger before they had given up.

And beginning on page nineteen, there was an article on the chemistry of love. He could see every word: read and digest them far faster and more efficiently than he could a page of text he was reading for the first time. Prairie vole males only fell in love after s.e.x. Interesting. The pathetic lizard brained h.o.m.o sapien he had been before his recent transformation had become smitten with Kira Miller prior to even a single kiss.

Desh would have bet his life he knew nothing about the mating habits of prairie voles. But he would have been wrong. What else was buried in the near-infinity of his memory, ready for instant access?

"Not even terrorists would help you destroy the future of all mankind," said Kira. "Their wives would be affected as well."

"Good point. That's why I didn't tell them," he said smugly.

Kira frowned. She should have seen this coming. "They think they'll be unleashing an Ebola attack against the West, don't they?"

Sam smiled broadly. "I think the bit about the affliction being triggered by pork is what really won them over. It has a nice, *The finger of Allah striking down the infidels' ring to it. They really loved the PowerPoint presentation," he said sardonically. "Naturally, I had my representative demonstrate the real thing on some of their prisoners, triggered by bacon, and when they saw how horrific a disease it really is, they loved the idea even more."

"You faked the demonstration, didn't you?"

He nodded. "Right you are. Perfecting something like that in the proper time frame would take your skills, combined with heightened intellect. My representative saw to it that the prisoners were infected with the genuine Ebola virus before they got the fake, supposedly genetically engineered, cold virus and were forced to eat bacon. Since the real Ebola is highly infectious through contact with blood, he made sure no one got too close while the prisoners were, ah a expiring. When the audience left, to make sure the infection was contained, he torched the bodies." Sam smiled cruelly. "Reminds me of your brother," he added coldly.

34.

David Desh had fought terrorism for many years and had a wealth of knowledge imbedded in his mind. He focused on anti-terror strategy for thirty seconds and had insight after insight. Patterns of sleeper cell organization flashed into his head that US forces had completely missed. There was a better way to find them. It was so obvious. There was a better way to deploy Special Forces teams. There was a better way to arm them.

He was a kid in a candy shop. Wherever he turned his intellect, provided he had a solid knowledge base in the area, and sometimes even if he didn't, breakthrough ideas presented themselves. Desh was able to monitor and a.n.a.lyze the conversation between Sam and Kira with just a small fraction of his attention, and on multiple levels at once. While calm on the outside, Sam was enjoying himself so much he was almost giddy, especially when he was able to taunt Kira about the murder of her brother. And while her pretend stoicism might have fooled other men, Sam knew with certainty, just the way a dog could smell fear, that his barbs were boring into quivering, exposed nerves just as surely as if he were wielding a dentist's drill.

As Desh continued exploring his newfound faculties, he realized with a start that his autonomic nervous system was now under his complete control! It would work as usual, unsupervised, until he decided to a.s.sume command.

His resting heart rate was about fifty beats per minute. He lowered it to forty. Then thirty-five. Then back to fifty. He adjusted his body temperature down to ninety-seven and then quickly brought it back to normal. He ordered his circulation to abandon his extremities and concentrate at his core, something the body did naturally in extreme cold to conserve body temperature. His circulation dutifully complied, the blood altering its usual path. He ordered it back to normal and blood immediately rushed back into his extremities. He accomplished all of these feats without any idea how he was doing so.

Desh pondered existence for several minutes. He could use a far more extended a.n.a.lysis, even enhanced, but it was immediately clear that Kira had been right. There was no G.o.d or afterlife. He had been a fool. Without emotional baggage, and able to draw on his memory of everything he had ever read or heard, this was crystal clear. Like love, religion was a useful delusiona"an opiate of the ma.s.ses sort of thing. He still harbored some slight interest and affection for h.o.m.o sapiens, but could see how this interest could quickly wane. The power of thought he now possessed was intoxicating. How had Kira managed to resist it for so long? To ignore the will to power that was the obligation of every living being? And Kira had achieved a higher level of optimization even than this. Incredible!

Desh had been so quiet that Sam had almost forgotten he was there. His eyes remained locked onto those of Kira Miller. "I hatched the sterilization plan using only one of your pills," he boasted, "right after you escaped Lusetti. I began to frame you for the E. coli plot immediately, and I added evidence that it was reala"because I was making it reala"as I went along. At least real as far as the terrorists were concerned."

"I hate to break it to you," spat Kira condescendingly, "but this plan of yours won't get you what you want. Were you not paying attention the last time you tried to get the secret to longevity? I was desperate to save my brother's life, remember. But I couldn't unlock the memory of the flash drive's location. It wasn't that I didn't want to. I couldn't. Is this ringing a bell? The enhanced me set things up to make sure nothing, or no one, could ever force the secret from me. Not by threatening me, my brother, or the entire universe for that matter. Shoot me full of truth drugs again and I'll tell you the same thing: bigger threats and greater duress just make the information more impossible to access."

Sam glared at her. "No, my dear," he said evenly. "I haven't forgotten. My strategy takes this into account as well. But I've always believed that you could find a way inside your little memory prison if you were, uh a properly motivated." He paused. "Well, I'm giving you plenty of motivation."

Kira shook her head. "I set up a failsafe that I can't fool. Can't! If I've been coerced in any way to seek out the information, the failsafe kicks in and locks me out. Even if I enhance myself I can't undo it. I locked the metaphorical gate and fused the keyhole."

"Then this will be your chance to put that to the test, won't it?" said Sam, undaunted. "You will tell me the secret," he said, sneering. "Make no mistake. I believe you'll be able to break through your self-imposed memory barrier to prevent me from going forward with my sterilization plan. But if I'm wrong, you'll ultimately tell me anywaya"of your own free will."

"If you believe that you're even more insane than I thought," snapped Kira defiantly.

"Guess again," said Sam icily. "I'll keep you a hostage until you've confirmed that the entire species is sterile, however long this takes. And on that day, you'll know that the survival of humanity will depend on you. Despite your hatred of me, you'll do everything in your power to make mankind's last generation immortal." He held out his hands. "No duress at that point. No threats. You'll honestly want to share your secret, of your own accord. At that point your request for the information from your memory will sail right past any failsafe mechanisms in your mind."

A horrified expression came over Kira's face as she realized what he said was probably true.

Sam smiled. "And you won't have to worry about overpopulation. I'll have removed your objections to sharing your secret, and I'll make sure you aren't under any duress." He paused. "But no need to thank me, my dear."

Kira lunged at him, her eyes burning with hatred, and she was yanked back, hard, by the cuffs, which almost pulled her arms from their sockets, and cut into the skin on the back of her hands painfully.

"Look, I'm on your side," said Sam, extending the palms of his hands innocently. "I don't want to do this. Really. It's a lot more ha.s.sle than it's worth. I'd rather just give all the terrorists vials of aerosolized water to spray about in population centers rather than active virus. All you have to do is give me the secret and agree to work on immortality. Find a way to unlock your own brain before the deadline." He shrugged. "And if not, I'll just wait for you to give it to me by choice."

Kira felt nauseous. "All this just for a few more years of life?"

Sam grinned and shook his head. "A h.e.l.l of a lot more than a few. We both know that. With the proper use of your gell pills and an extra seventy years, I have every confidence I can push you, nanotechnologists, and others to eventually make your blueprint for immortality a reality. Your treatment will buy me enough time to be certain I'll be alive when immortality is perfected."

Silence hung in the air for several long seconds as Kira glared at him hatefully. "I need information on the viral construct used," she said finally, "and the method for attacking egg cells. I won't even make an attempt to unlock my memory unless I'm convinced this isn't a bluff." She frowned. "Not that my attempts will do any good anyway," she added grimly.

"Trying to buy time already, I see," he said approvingly. "But it's a fair request. I'll give you the information you require. With respect to timing, everything has been ready for a while now, awaiting your capture. But there are some details I have to start in motion now that I have you, so this will give you about three days. After that, if you haven't told me what I want to know, I will begin distribution of the vials. Once they've gone out, not even I can recall them, and the terrorist cells around the world can't be reached to abort the mission. At that point it will be out of my hands," he added.

Kira's eyes darted around the room, desperately seeking a way out.

"I can practically see the wheels turning in that brilliant mind of yours, my dear. Think you can trick me somehow? Think you can escape and then stop me? Well, I've gained a very healthy respect for your abilities. As impossible as this would be, I'm not sure I'd put it entirely past you." Sam paused. "Which brings us to our little outpatient surgery on your skull," he said, smirking.

35.

David Desh turned his attention to the last forty-eight hours of his life. He had been drinking from a fire-hose but now was his chance to sort everything out. Kira's a.n.a.lysis was right, as far as it went, but she had been too shortsighted. Doubling the span of human life in one fell swoop would lead to disaster. But there was a better answer than just burying the discovery and walking away. And it didn't involve sacrificing the next generation. It simply meant expanding human territorial boundaries to adsorb population increases: it meant conquering s.p.a.ce.

If humanity could readily expand into infinity, Kira's therapy could be disclosed to the fanfare it deserved, with no concerns for its effect on the species. Not the pathetic attempts at s.p.a.ce travel that were currently being made, focused on incremental improvements, but attempts at revolutionary leaps in technology, with inexpensive interstellar travel as the goal. Leapfrogging the next several generations of s.p.a.ce technology in a single bound. Antimatter. Wormholes. Alcubierre's warp drive. Tachyonic drives.

This would require the optimization of top physicists, perhaps with Kira's even more potent potion. This is why she had failed to consider it. She was too used to working and thinking alone, too certain until she had decided to trust Desh that this was critical to her survival. And too certain that her enhancement therapy was too corrupting to be unleashed.

But it didn't have to be that way. With enhanced intellect, there should be a foolproof way to a.s.sess someone's inherent trustworthiness and integrity. Yes, the treatment led to a ruthless megalomania, but the ethics and morals of those treated would return to baseline levels when their brains returned to normal.

It would require teamwork among truly good people, but it could be done. Safeguards could be taken to ensure that whoever was enhanced remained under control and working toward joint purposes. Even Sam had managed to enhance someone who was already a psychopath and contain him for the hour. It would simply require a team of Dr. Jekylls to restrain the one chosen to unleash their super-intelligent Mr. Hyde.

He pondered the ident.i.ty of Smith and Sam and their possible connections to Morgan, Kira's boss at NeuroCure, and also how Morgan had managed to learn of her work in the first place. He called up his every memory since he had first stepped into Connelly's office and let his mind search for patterns and connections. His mind raised a few interesting possibilities to his consciousness for consideration. Very interesting possibilities, in fact.

After a few more minutes of concentrated thought on the subject, the probability that he was on the right track continued to grow, although there were so many unknowns he was far from certain of this. Still, he needed to a.s.sume his working hypothesis was true and plan accordingly.

And in the meanwhile, he would attempt to do something about another discovery he had made, one that he had already incorporated into his a.n.a.lysis. To do so would require redirecting untold trillions of his own antibodies and lymphocytes. He wondered if his newfound ability to control his autonomic nervous system applied to his immune system as well. There was only one way to find out.

Sam smiled at Kira and tapped his head, just over his ear, with his index finger, taunting her. "While you were unconscious," he said, "I took the liberty of having a tiny, tamperproof capsule implanted in your skull. With an explosive charge inside. Not much of a charge, I'll admit, but enough to turn the inside of your skull to liquid."

Kira's eyes widened in alarm. The persistent, piercing pain from the minor surgery, obviously performed without anesthetic, served to make Sam's words all the more chilling.

"I've set it to blow at 10 p.m. Eastern Standard Time. And it will, too, unless I transmit the proper encrypted signal from my cell phone before then. If I do, it resets for 10 o'clock the next morning. And so on. It resets in twelve-hour increments. You see where this is going?"

Kira glared at him but said nothing.

"Your chances of escape are exceedingly small. But I'm a careful man, and you have an impressive history. So I've implanted this explosive device to be on the safe side. Just in case you do manage to pull off a miracle and escape, or think you see an opening to kill me while you or Desh are still hostages." He paused. "So until you've given me your secret, if I happen to end up dead somehow, you'll have until the clock strikes ten, either a.m. or p.m., whichever is closer, to say your prayers. With me dead, the sterilization plan goes forward automatically. And even if you managed to escape and kill me right after I've reset the timer, you would only have twelve hours to stop my plans. Even with your skills, even taking multiple doses of your treatment, you'd never be able to do it in that short of a time."

"You're bluffing," said Kira. "Implanting an explosive device in my skull would be risking my death, leaving you no way to get the secret of longevity you so desperately want."

Sam shook his head. "No risk at all. I have every intention of resetting it every twelve hours religiouslya"as long as I'm in good health. The only way you die is if I'm already dead, and at that point the fountain of youth won't do me a lot of good."

"No risk at all?" said Kira scornfully. "You're more insane than I thought. What if the receiver fails? And what if your signal can't make it down to this bas.e.m.e.nt and through my skull? How many bars of reception do you think I get inside my head, anyway?" Her lip curled up in disgust. "Take it out."

Sam's eyes blazed, betraying a rage at having been spoken to in this manner, but only for a moment. His eyes quickly returned to normal and he smiled serenely. "Not to worry. The device has two receivers for redundancy. And while the explosive is a few centimeters deep in your skull, the receivers are affixed just a few millimeters below the surface of your skin. And they're next generation. Won't be available to the public for another year. Nothing but the best for you, my dear. You could be in a coal mine in West Virginia with your head in a freezer and my call would make it through."

Kira glared at him but said nothing.

Sam pushed himself off his perch on the table to a standing position on the concrete floor. "So let's review your options," he said. "Option one: you tell me the secret, and no one's reproductive abilities have to be destroyed. I remove the explosive device from your skull and you live a life of luxurya"heavily supervised luxury, but luxury nonethelessa"while you continue to work on immortality."

Sam smiled insincerely. "Option two: you don't tell me, our generation will be the end of the line for humanity, and you'll end up telling me your secret and working on immortality eventually anyway."

Kira's eyes continued to burn with a seething hatred. "As I've said," she hissed in barely contained, clipped tones. "I need to verify that you can do what you say before I make any decisions."

Sam nodded. "I'll make sure you get all the evidence you need."

36.

David Desh realized it was time to turn his attention toward escape. Even though his watch had been removed and he had been unconscious for an extended period since he had last looked at it, his mind had somehow kept perfect track of time. It was nearing 10 o'clock. Sam's discussion had come to a somewhat logical conclusion, and he would need to leave and reset the b.o.o.by trap in Kira's head. He had no doubt planned to end the conversation just prior to having to reset his device for dramatic effect.

When Sam left, would he leave them alone, handcuffed, or would he have them actively guarded? Desh raced through probabilities and options, considering and discarding dozens of strategies. His mind seized on one he thought had a good chance of succeeding. But he would need to interact with the species h.o.m.o sapiens dullard, which meant he had to create an avatar personality of the old Desh so he could operate on their delayed level and not arouse suspicion.

Sam's watch began emitting a series of high-pitched beeps, and he smiled in satisfaction. He pushed a b.u.t.ton on his watch and the beeping stopped. "I'm afraid I have to go now, my dear," he said to Kira. "I have a helicopter waiting for me. And it's already 9:40. You were unconscious for quite some time. So before I leave, I need to reset the device in your skull. If I don'ta"" He spread his hands helplessly. "Well, let's just say that neither of us wants that."

He barked an order and seconds later three plain-clothed men had joined him in the bas.e.m.e.nt, each holding a tranquilizer gun. Under any other circ.u.mstances they would have been armed with automatic rifles, but Sam was taking no chances that something would go awry and result in Kira's death.

Sam gestured at Smith's corpse lying in a pool of blood ten feet away. "I'll call in a clean-up crew when I'm in the air," he informed the newcomers. He didn't offer any other explanation for the body and the men didn't ask for one.

Sam pointed to the tallest of the three men. "Jim here will be in charge when I'm gone," he announced to his prisoners. "He'll take good care of you." He paused. "Mr. Desh, I'll be back to interrogate you tomorrow morning. As much as I would enjoy slicing off digits and beating you to within an inch of your life, I'm afraid that truth drugs have become just too d.a.m.n good to justify this sort of thing. Oh well," he said in disappointment. "I'm sure the session will prove interesting, nonetheless."

Sam turned to Kira. "As for you, my dear, you'll have all the information you'll need to confirm the activity of our sterility virus very soon."

Sam paused in thought, and a look of mild amus.e.m.e.nt came over his face. "Jim, if the girl needs to relieve herself," he continued, "I want one of you in the bathroom with her and one of you outside the door. And don't turn away while she's going either. As for Desh here, if he needs to goa"" He shrugged. "Let him pee in his pants."

With that Sam turned and walked to the wood staircase. When he reached it, he turned and faced Kira. "One last thing. Listen for three high-pitched beeps in a few minutes. This will tell you that your twelve-hour clock has been reset." He smiled. "I thought it was considerate of me to provide an audible confirmation for you. I'm trying to minimize your stress until you've come to your senses."

"Yeah, you're a real prince," said Kira bitterly. She paused. "Look, we're handcuffed to a concrete wall. Do you really think you need three guards?"

Sam looked amused. "Just the fact that you asked the question tells me that I do." With that he took a careful look at his watch and rushed up the stairs.

The three guards fanned out in the bas.e.m.e.nt at equal distance from the prisoners.

Kira turned toward Desh with an alarmed look in her eye. There was no getting out of this situation. Moriarty, or Sam, or whoever he was, had won. He had an explosive charge planted in her head and a knife at the throat of the entire species. The situation was hopeless.

Desh winked. The gesture had been completed so quickly she had almost missed it, but it was unmistakable. She wrinkled her forehead in confusion. What did he know that she didn't?

It was time. Desh instructed sweat to exit the pores in his face, and in less than a minute moisture started to bead on his forehead and cheeks. At the same time, at his command, the color drained from his face and lips. He moaned softly.

Hearing the prisoner moan, the guard nearest Desh studied him more closely. "Jesus," he said to his companions. "This guy is sweating like a pig. He looks like death."

"I need a doctor," gasped Desh, the avatar personality he had set up ensuring he said the words in character and with mind-numbing slowness.