“Well, as you say, it’s hard to categorize exactly what kind of company Icarus is looking for. What I can tell you is that each of our investments is part of a larger, coordinated experiment.”
The interviewer raised his eyebrows. “Interesting. What kind of experiment?”
“It’s a scientific experiment—one meant to answer a very important question.”
“Which is?”
“Why do we exist?”
The moderator feigned shock and turned to the crowd. “Is that all?”
The audience laughed, and Desmond joined in.
Desmond leaned forward in the club chair, glanced at the moderator, then focused on the camera. “Okay, I think it’s fair to say that many of you out there—in the audience and watching this video—would say the answer to that question is simple: we exist because the physical properties of this planet support the emergence of biological life, that we are biologically inevitable because of Earth’s environment. That’s true, but the real question is why? Why does the universe support biological life? To what end? What is humanity’s destiny? I believe there is an answer.”
“Wow. You almost sound like a person of faith.”
“I am. I have absolute faith. I believe there’s a great process at work all around us, a larger picture of which we have only seen a very small sliver.”
“And you think the technology Icarus is funding will deliver this ultimate truth?”
“I’d bet my life on it.”
Peyton had just fallen asleep again when a noise from the bedside table woke her. She froze, listening, but it stopped suddenly.
It came again: something brushing up against the table.
A vibration.
A glow emanated from beyond the lamp, throwing light up at the ceiling.
She exhaled, grabbed her buzzing cell phone, and checked the time—3:35 a.m. She didn’t recognize the number, but she knew the country code. 41. Switzerland.
She answered immediately.
“Peyton, I’m sorry to wake you,” Dr. Jonas Becker said.
The German epidemiologist led a rapid outbreak response team for the World Health Organization. Peyton held a similar job at the Centers for Disease Control. The two epidemiologists had worked together a dozen times in hot zones around the world, and over that time, they had developed a special bond.
“It’s okay,” she said. “What’s happened?”
“I just emailed you.”
“Hang on.”
Peyton’s bare feet again slapped against the hardwood floor as she raced to the second bedroom. She sat at the cheap Ikea desk, woke her laptop, and activated her secure VPN software, opening a remote link to her terminal at the CDC.
She studied the pictures in the email, taking in every detail.
“I see it,” she said.
“The Kenyan Ministry of Health sent us this a few hours ago. A doctor at a regional hospital in Mandera took the photos.”
Peyton had never heard of Mandera. She opened Google Maps and studied the location, which was in the far northeast of Kenya, right at the borders with Somalia and Ethiopia. It was the worst possible place for an outbreak.