Germ

eternity.

She cleared her throat.

On the way to meet the clone-phoner, they'd stopped by a grocery store for a supply of food and drinks. Now Allen reached into a small Styrofoam ice bucket in the foot well and pulled out a Pepsi. He handed it to Julia.

She nodded her thanks and took a swig.

They rode in silence. Stephen clutched the wheel in both hands and checked the side mirrors with obsessive frequency. Allen rolled an unopened Dr Pepper between his palms and stared out the windshield. Julia leaned back, hiked a shoeless foot up onto the chair, and thought about the events since Goody's phone call yesterday morning. She carefully considered every word she could remember, every move she'd made or seen, searching for a question that needed answering, a clue that needed exploring. They were there, waiting for discovery. They always were.

fifty-four

Jorge Prieto watched his blood drop a dozen feet and disappear into the rich, dark soil below. He had long stopped trying to snort back the constant flow that poured from his nostrils, or blot it with the thin cotton sleeves of his khaki coveralls. Cradled in the fork of two limbs in a thirty-meter copaiba tree, he painfully sucked in air through clenched teeth, trying to relieve his burning lungs without making a sound. It had taken all his energy to break away from his captors and make it this far.

Not far enough! Gotta move! Move . . .

But his aching body urged him to wait, just a few more minutes of rest.

Brought in blindfolded five weeks ago, he had no idea how much farther to the compound's perimeter. A kilometer? Twenty? No matter, he had to make it, had to.

Before he could suppress the urge, he coughed, hawking up something from deep inside. Stifling a groan, he listened for pursuers. He heard nothing but the ghostly howl of wind flitting through the tree-tops. He planted his sweaty face on a forearm and waited for the feeling that his organs were shifting freely within his body to pass.

What had they done to him? What?

When the pain had come, cramping his stomach, raising the temperature of his skin, he'd cursed Karai-pyhare, the evil troll whose invisible caress left victims shaken and sick. A silly superstition, he knew, but childhood beliefs die hard. His adult mind recognized the symptoms of influenza. Then the headaches, dizziness, nausea, and perspiration spiraled higher like a brewing storm, and he realized something far more serious had hold of him. Dysentery, he thought when blood showed up in the toilet, maybe jungle fever—malaria.

He thought of how his captors had seemed obsessively concerned over his condition, attaching a million confusing machines to him and running all sorts of tests. He'd asked about chloramphenicol for dysentery or chloroquine for jungle fever—medicines you learned about growing up poor on the Tropic of Capricorn. They had shook their heads dismissively.

That's when I knew you'd done something to me, you devils, you monstruos! I saw it in your faces, and knew I had to get away . . . had to warn others . . .

Most everyone, it seemed—his fellow 'prisoners,' the guards, himself—had cold symptoms to greater or lesser degrees. The ones who had complained of cramps or bloody noses disappeared within a few days. If he was going to make a move, it had to be quick.

The crack of a twig startled him. His face made a sticky suction sound when he raised it to glare into the dense subtropical forest. Pitch-black shadows made darker by irregular spots of bright sunlight—nothing more. Even the contraptions hidden in the trees—the tiny cameras and monstrous machines that defied imagination—were invisible to him now. He turned to face the ground, and a ribbon of blood spiraled down like an eel escaping into the deep.

In his mind's eye, he saw Juanita floating up to him as if through water: her cashew-colored skin, mahogany eyes, soft lips . . .

No! He must not let his thoughts scurry away; but they were becoming so slippery, so rebellious.

Concentrate! Escape! You don't belong here. You are not a prisoner.

And that was true. He had done nothing wrong, nothing to deserve imprisonment. Jorge Prieto had always accepted personal responsibility, had always tried to do the right thing. When he slipped, he worked hard to make amends. Had he fled when Juanita said she was with child? No. Casper Merez had even pushed a half million guaranis into his hand—a month's wages!—and told him, 'Go, Jorge. Such a burden is not for a seventeen-year-old boy. Go find the man inside first.' But the man was already there, and he had married the girl instead. Now, twelve years later, he and Juanita had not just one but four ninos, three girls darkly pretty like their mother, and a boy strong and forthright like his father.

And did his family starve when their mouths became too many for their backwater town of Piribebuy to feed? No, he had moved them to Itaipu, where construction on the world's largest hydroelectric plant paid him for as many hours as his back could bear.

Always food on the table, shelter from the elements. The minimum a man provides his family.

Maybe he should have worried more about the many people who vanished from Itaipu. Some said it was the demon Kurupi, who came in the night to feast on human flesh. Others thought those gone had tired of the bone-breaking work and fled back to their poorer but happier villages. He had not known what to think, had not really thought about it at all. Feed his family, be a man—only these things mattered.

Now Jorge Prieto knew better. The truth had come to him instantly in the form of two men leaping from a slow-moving van, clubbing him, shackling him, dragging him into their metal lair.

Kurupi, yes—but with the faces of men.

He pushed into a sitting position, his legs dangling through the fork, his back hard against the massive tree trunk.

As much as he wanted to provide again for his family, he wanted more to tell them that he had not simply left them. What had his disappearance done to their hearts? It was a twisting knife in his own chest to ponder the question.

So he had watched for a chance to escape. This morning, it had come.

Movement in his peripheral vision.

A guard emerged from the darkness, stepping silently over the muscular roots of a mahogany tree. The man, clad in shades of green, carried an assault rifle, panning its barrel as his eyes scanned the forest before him. He did not look up. When he was directly underneath, Jorge Prieto leaped through the fork, aiming his legs on each side of the soldier's head. They crashed down together, the other man cushioning Prieto's fall. Still, Prieto rolled away in agony, every organ blazing with its own unique pain. He vomited, crimson streaked with oily black swirls. Dark mist moved through his brain, stripping away rational thought. But he knew he had to get away, as an animal knows when to hide, when to run, when to strike.

He pulled the weapon out from under the collapsed soldier, staggered away. Unsure of what made him look back, he did—in time to see the soldier on his knees, pulling a pistol from a holster at his hip. Prieto swung the automatic rifle around and squeezed the trigger.

The sound shattered the calm jungle. Birds of all sizes and colors burst through the leafy canopy, adding their own panicked squawking to the rustling of the countless plants they disturbed. Soldiers instantly hunched lower, pivoting in the direction of the machine-gun fire. Gregor von Papen, nearly invisible among the mottled greens and tans of the forest in his camo, considered drawing his sidearm, decided not to, and marched into the barrage's dying echo.

Gregor thought of this as his descabellar, the final kill offered a retiring matador. He wasn't retiring, of course; he would die commanding security forces. But Litt had proclaimed an end to his need for test subjects.

'We've arrived,' he'd said. 'Target practice is over. Let's get on with the war.' He wanted all the prisoners gone immediately. 'Managing them will put a strain on our resources during this critical time,' he'd said.