Page 105 of Drift

“MAOA?” Gray read the paper. “The supposed warrior gene.”

“Hm. It’s something Halliday mentioned a few years back during sectioning,” Martin added eventually. “Mostly to try and reason the madness, bless hisI really want a psychopath as a petsocks. He theorised that MAOA picks up the termwarrior genebecause, when they studied a group of psychopaths, manifestations of aggression in them could be linked backtothat gene.” A snort. “They were born with it, so to speak.”

Gray thought it over. “So find the gene responsible, someone could heighten those aggressions via that gene.” He shook his head, then tapped each condition. “There’s too many different disorders here, too many unrelated genes.”

Larry from the Health Agency finally came in and nodded. “Each disorder has a highway of different genes that trigger each disorder, and where this warrior gene may present in a psychopath, they may not be with these. And psychopaths aren’t being targeted, right, so…?”

Gray frowned, then drew the shape of an umbrella around the disorders. “But maybe they liked the idea of the warrior gene theory.” He wrote it at the top of the umbrella. “So instead they find something that can exacerbate something in the whole spectrum of disorders in general: aggression? Only they steer clear of psychopaths.”

Giving a frown, breaking his standoff, Light came over and stood by Larry as he looked at the umbrella Gray had drawn around the conditions. After a moment, he took the report Larry had been holding.

“Fuck,” breathed Light, and he looked at Larry. “Fucking has to be.”

Gray took the report off him after Light tapped at something on the final page.

“If no drugs were detected, what searchdoesit leave when it comes to swelling on the brain beyond blunt trauma and drugs?” added Light.

Gray looked it over.

Test of serum/cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), trace for… IgM antibodies….

Gray looked at Larry. “A fucking virus? You’re testing for an unclassifiedvirusnot a drug? When did you first suspect it wasn’t a street drug?”

Larry jolted at Gray’s hard tone. “There was nothing to tell.” He tapped the file. “It was my working theory from a few days ago over just how fast and violent the whole human system shut down after infection. I was hoping our live patient could confirm the theory, but we still can’t trace what it is, just that it’s giving every symptom of a fast-reproducing virus. I think this is an unclassified, manmade strain, which is why we can’t test for it.”

“Manmadevirus.” That changed everything. “I should have been notified as soon as you had a working theory,” said Gray. “That’s synthetic virology, that’s—”

Scattered locations… testing response. A warrior gene theory. Or a version of it that wouldn’t prejudice. One that drove all disorders deeper into hell.

Shit. Gray took his phone off Martin and upgraded the threat level to Critical with Thorn and across all agencies. This had the potential to move from a localised testing phase into mass infection on a major city.

“Bloodbourne virus.” That came off Light as he pointed at the board. “It’s taken a lot of planning and teamwork to target one victim in any given location with a potential virus transmitted through the blood.” He frowned. “That’s got to be a plus. Would they have the manpower for anything beyond the limits of a couple of homes?Infection would be harder at city level.”

He’d seen where Gray’s head was going, but only partly.

Gray quickly shook his head. “They’re feeding us only what they want us to see. We’re working with a geneticist not doctor, and look at the MO. The hits so far have been across the UK, across different demographics: male, female, young, old, rich… poor.” He wiped a hand over his face as Light’s eyes widened.

“Virology evolution?” mumbled Light. “They’re going to move from bloodborne to airborne transmission?”

“With some bloodborne viruses, only addition of a vector is needed for the mutation to be theoretically possible to make a shift to airbourne,” said Gray. “And…. Mind games. Fuck. They’re feeding us information on only one type of strain and victim so that we only work on one potential strain, one type of victim.”

As Raif and Simon came over, Gray looked back. “Give me all the intel you’ve collected on Jude and who he’s staying with. He was there in Wales, so he damn well knowssomethingabout thisvirus. Ray’s wife was also followed after we lost the signal to the phone, and they came right here, so either Jude told someone, or he’s being watched at home.” Yeah, Jude was damn well mixed up in all of this somehow. “Main point being,” he said, “if they are working a virus, you can goddamn bet they’re playing vaccines too so as not to poison their own. We need both. We need Jude and who he’s feeding back to.”

Raif nodded. “I tracked his location via the phone, but despite all the ill signs, something’s off here.”

Simon handed Gray the iPad he’d been working on.

Jude stood in the kitchen of an old townhouse, unpacking a duffel bag of medical supplies. A man sat next to him, holding some tablets, and the image from the drone was up close and clear enough to catch a scar running left to right of the man’s throat.

“That’s Jackson,” said Raif. “This particular nest of his is in an old townhouse in Cromer Road, a street in one of London’s most rundown areas of Barking and Dagenham.”

“The tattoos of Saint and Sinner are gone off Jude’s forearms,” mumbled Simon. “So too are the two white highlights from his fringe.”

Pure jet blackness covered Jude’s eyes, and Gray nodded. Jude had exposed his face and tattoos for a reason, no doubt also running with the confidence that reports would go out with an English-Korean kid with highlights in his hair too…. With focus on him, he’d get the Redhead hidden, out of harm’s way. But he’d make sure that image gave one version of he was, and he’d change it all once he got away. He was used to shifting skins in order to avoid detection as well.

Simon focused Gray’s way. “At Raif’s suggestion, we also kept a track on any reports of medical theft over the past two days. Jessop’s Pharmacy came up.” He swiped at his iPad and handed it back to Gray with a long list of stolen goods.

Gray wiped at his mouth. Hitting a pharmacy was another strike of ill Jude’s way.

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