Plague Ship

“Je

“Just so I know in case I meet him, what cover story did we use in our approach of Je

“I have it all here in my report.” Linda held up a binder. “Max is a real-estate developer from L.A. who wants to get his son back. We are the private security company he’s hired to coordinate his return.

Je

“Okay, so once we grab Kyle we get him to the airport, where Tiny Gunderson flies to Rome, and we hand him over to Je

“Chairman, please,” Linda said, as if she’d been insulted. “Max’s ex has e-mailed a picture of Kyle.

We’ll doctor it so it looks like an official passport shot and print a new one from our store of blanks.” Juan indicated Linda should wipe some grease from her chin. “That takes care of problem number one.

Now, on to problem number two. What happened to the Golden Dawn and why? What do we know so far?”

Linda tapped at the keys of her laptop to bring up the information. “The Golden Dawn and her sister ships, the Golden Sky and Golden Sun , are owned by Golden Cruise Lines. They’re out of Denmark, and have been in business since the mid-eighties. They do the typical Caribbean, Mediterranean, and South Seas cruises that everyone else does, as well as charter ships for specific groups or events.

“The company was approached four months ago to ferry four hundred and twenty-seven Responsivists from the Philippines to Greece. The Dawn was the only ship available.”

“That seems like a lot of people to staff a reproductive-education clinic,” Juan said.

“I thought so, too,” Linda agreed. “I’m looking into it. There is nothing on the Responsivist website about the trip or what such a large group was doing in the Philippines.”

“Okay, keep going.”

“They left Manila on the seventeenth, and, as far as what Murph could get from the logs, there were no incidents reported. It was smooth sailing all the way.”

“Right up to the point where everyone died,” Max said caustically.

Eric glanced down the table at the Corporation’s number two. “Not everyone died. I went back over the computer discs of the UAV flyby. One of the Golden Dawn’s lifeboats was missing.” He glanced at Cabrillo. “Sorry, I didn’t notice it last night.”

Juan let it pass.

“The ship’s computer log confirms that a lifeboat was lowered about eight hours before we showed up,” Mark confirmed.

“So the killer or killers were on the Dawn the whole cruise?”

“That’s what it looks like to us. Stoney and I hacked the cruise line’s computer for a passenger manifest and list of the crew, but without having the bodies to verify who was aboard when she went down there’s no way to narrow our list of suspects.” Mark forestalled Juan’s next question. “We already checked.

There were no unscheduled crew substitutions after the charter was first proposed, and there were no last-minute changes to the passenger manifest. The people who were supposed to be on that ship were on it.”

“Then who the hell killed them all?” Max asked.

“If I were to guess, I’d say the Responsivists either did it to themselves, but they aren’t a suicide cult, like Jim Jones’s Peoples Temple or Japan’s Aum Shinrikyo. Some people claim Lydell Cooper took his own life in the ultimate act of Responsivism, but the group doesn’t support suicide. They say that since you’re already born, it is your moral responsibility to spread their beliefs, not kill yourself. The other option is that someone infiltrated the group.”

“Any suspects?”

Linda said, “Because of their stance on birth control and abortion, they’ve been engaged in a ru

“My money’s on a group of zealots,” Mark said. “A countercult to the Responsivists, maybe made up of former members or something. You know, apart from the whole not-having-kids thing, this group’s into some pretty weird stuff.”

Juan ignored him. “Let’s explore why they would kill some of their own. Ideas?”

“No, seriously,” Mark continued. “Once you’ve been involved for a while, do your charity work in some third world toilet, they start letting you in on some of the bigger secrets to Responsivism, and how the knowledge will save you.”

“Go on,” Juan said to indulge him. Murph might be flakey, but he had a topflight mind.

“Ever heard of ’brane theory?” He’d already talked with Eric about it so only Stone didn’t return a blank stare. “It’s right up there with string theory as a way of unifying all four forces in the universe, something Einstein couldn’t do. In a nutshell, it says our four-dimensional universe is a single membrane, and that there are others existing in higher orders of space. These are so close to ours that zero-point matter and energy can pass between them and that gravitation forces in our universe can leak out. It’s all cutting-edge stuff.”

“I’ll take your word for it,” Cabrillo said.

“Anyway, ’brane theory started to get traction among theoretical physicists in the mid-nineties, and Lydell Cooper glommed on to it, too. He took it a step further, though. It wasn’t just quantum particles passing in and out of our universe. He believed that an intelligence from another ’brane was affecting people here in our dimension. This intelligence, he said, shaped our day-to-day lives in ways we couldn’t sense. It was the cause of all our suffering. Just before his death, Cooper started to teach techniques to limit this influence, ways to protect ourselves from the alien power.”

“And people bought this crap?” Max asked, sinking deeper into depression over his son.

“Oh yeah. Think about it from their side for a second. It’s not a believer’s fault that he is unlucky or depressed or just plain stupid. His life is being messed with across dimensional membranes in space. It’s an alien influence that cost you that promotion or prevented you from dating the girl of your dreams. It’s a cosmic force holding you back, not your own ineptitude. If you believe that, then you don’t have to take responsibility for your life. And we all know nobody takes responsibility for himself anymore.

Responsivism gives you a ready-made excuse for your poor life choices.”

“With people suing fast-food companies because they’re overweight, I can see the attraction,” Juan said.

“But what’s this have to do with someone killing a ship filled with Responsivists?” Mark looked a little sheepish, “I haven’t thought it all the way through, but what if it’s true, you know”—his voice took on a feverish edge—“and some alien from another ’brane is fighting one trapped in ours and we’re caught in the middle? Like pawns or something?” Cabrillo closed his eyes and groaned. Mark’s flakiness was overwhelming his first-class mind again. “I’ll take that under advisement, but, for now, let’s stick to terrestrial enemies.” Mark whispered to Eric, “That sounded better when we were talking last night, didn’t it?”

“That’s because we hadn’t slept in twenty hours and had downed about thirty Red Bulls each.” Eddie Seng popped a piece of bread into his mouth. “Could this particular group have been selected because they were trying to leave the cult and the leaders made an example out of them? Eric mentioned earlier that kidnapping isn’t beyond them. What if they’ve taken the next step to murder?” Max Hanley shot him a startled look, his face etched with concern over Kyle’s safety.