Chapter 13

After the co-pilot closed the fuselage door and secured it, he faced everyone in the cabin. “We are taking off immediately. New orders from the military requires an ascent that will be uncomfortable but quick. Strap in tightly and do not move about the cabin until I give the word.”

The takeoff was brutal, pulling several gravities. Then the plane made several sharp turns before leveling off. “We are cruising now,” the voice over the intercom announced.

The woman in the front seat stood up and adjusted her jacket. She pulled the tape on the box she had brought in and opened the lid. “My name is Captain Denise Withers and my first duty is the delivery of your meals. You put in an order for Kansas City barbecue, I believe,” the woman in a navy uniform said, holding a large box in her arms. The box did not hide her well-proportioned figure.

Eitan thought her energy signal was a touch squirrely. She was generating more energy, akin to someone who is nervous but there was more to it he had not encountered before. She was a puzzle.

“Let us give thanks to the capricious gods for this delivery,” Sten said, and he jumped up from his seat.

Akemi nudged Eitan, “For which delivery is he thanking the gods?”

Eitan looked at her with a manic grin. “In the face of chaos, it’s nice to know that some things remain the same.” He stood up and pointed his finger at Sten. “Relinquish your claim upon that handsome box, young varlet! The booty is all mine.”

“You’re not helping,” Akemi yelled as she stood up. “The box is mine, you oafish trolls. You shall never be allowed to handle such a proud box with your clumsy fingers.”

“Coquettish strumpet, your vile words are as mud on a pig’s snout,” Sten said, giving her the finger.

“Speaking of squealing pigs, I think yonder wench ponders your impending emasculation,” Eitan said, only to receive the same raised finger in reply from Sten.

Nikki and Joseph were sniggering, trying to muffle their laughter with limited success. The captain gave them a look as if asking for help, but Joseph just waved her off. “Welcome to my insanity,” he gasped.

The captain narrowed her eyes and bared her teeth at Sten. “I’m putting this box down in the galley. You come near it,” she said to Sten, “and I will render you unable to bear children the rest of your living days. Got it?”

“Yes,” Akemi said pumping her fist. She started singing, “Come on out; come on in. You ain’t seen nothing like the mighty Sten.”

“It’s Quinn, you pox-ridden popsy,” Sten said, “You shall not sully the words of the sainted Bob Dylan and live to see the daylight. May your panties be infested with the lice of a thousand whales.”

“Ooo, whale lice,” Eitan said, leaning against the bulkhead. “The curse is harsh.”

“Sit down, Sten,” Nikki said, finally rising from her seat. “In fact, all three of you lovely children take a seat before I tear each of you limb-from-limb for embarrassing me in front of a stranger. If any of you wish to be fed, then I suggest you act like the little goddamn angels you are supposed to be. Got it?”

“Got it,” all three said in unison. They sat and started giggling.

“Welcome, Captain Withers,” Nikki said. “It’s been a long and eventful day, and we’re all just a tad punchy. Thank you for bringing the food. Please join us. You,” she said, pointing her finger at her husband. “Make yourself useful and feed the brats before they start chewing on the furniture.”

The captain put down the box in the galley and returned. “Is this how your family communicates?”

“Never mind the banter,” Nikki said. “They’ve been trying to one up one another since we got them. I stopped keeping score a long time ago. They’re good kids, at least when they are sleeping.”

Joseph handed out three heaping plates to each of his children. As his children fell upon their plates with ravenous intent, he invited both women to make their own plates according to their likes.

The captain held up her hand. “I’m good. While you eat, I need to bring you up to date on some information and solicit some analysis from you. First, do anyone of you have any digital devices, cell phones, tablets, or laptops?”

“We left them in the house,” Sten said between bites. “We’re not sure what Whitcomb compromised. No digital footprints to follow, or so we believe. Which one of you thieving knaves took the tub of extra sauce?”

The captain ignored him. “Right. The Times and the Journal both released articles today describing over a hundred and fifty similar cases of respiratory failure, mostly in the northeast. The source of these cases is unknown, but the CDC has declined to issue a quarantine at this time. Most of the affected are between the ages of nineteen and forty years old.”

Sten raised his sauce-laden hand, swallowing his mouthful first. “It’s nano. Ask Akemi if it meets her predictive model of display.”

The woman was taken aback. “You sound as if I’m giving you old news.”

Eitan sat back from his plate. “We’ve known since the end of Spring Break that Hobart Corporate was pushing a new MB series to targeted recipients of previous series. My roommate was one. The marketing materials were total bullshit, and we warned him off.”

“Eitan,” Nikki growled.

“Nonsense,” Eitan said. “The descriptions were total nonsense. They offered promises that Dr. Hobart would have never agreed to present; the product claims were everything that he knew nano could not produce.”

“Good nano takes twenty-four to thirty-six months to present the activation of potentials,” Akemi said. “Flushing crap out of your system may present in weeks or even quicker if your name is Eitan, but that is removal and not production.” She belched.

“If Whitcomb and his nitwits did what they were told not to do,” Akemi continued, “ravaged bodies could start appearing as soon as six weeks after application. We are at sixteen weeks since we saw the solicitations, which means, yeah, shit is hitting the Hobart fan.”

“Akemi,” Nikki growled again.

“Doo-doo and poo-poo are slamming into the mechanically driven blades, spreading their bacterial-laden loads across emergency rooms and newspapers of the continent. Happy?”

“Is there a cure or a therapy?” Captain Withers asked.

Joseph put down his fork and wiped his face with a napkin. “In a word, no. This is my field. When the body stabilizes, new nano can be programmed to mitigate some types of damage, such as the destruction of the gut biota. Nano does not do it alone though. In the case of the gut, healthy feces are also introduced, and the nano helps it propagate. Nano compliments known therapies, but it cannot repair the damage without guidance from the body’s own repair mechanisms.”

“This is going to tank Hobart stock,” Akemi said. “They will have to file for bankruptcy protection to survive the lawsuits.”

Nikki pushed away her plate. “We cashed out our options in March, after Eitan’s call. If the rest of the economy doesn’t tank with Whitcomb’s folly, we will still have retirement.”

“Which brings us up to today,” Captain Withers said. “What happened today that set off Camille Cordigan and sent her teams into field operations?”

The people in the plane went silent. The captain looked at each person and none would meet her challenge of looking her in the eye.