gave him a quizzical look. “I make no apology for our work here. Playing at God is the only choice we have if we want to save the earth. Consider what humanity has done to the planet. Your brilliant discovery will help restore the balance.”
This is how the great crimes of history begin, Henry thought, with the perpetrators congratulating themselves. “There’s something I’ve wondered about,” he said. “That hybrid virus I created was never fatal in the laboratory.”
“Not in mice,” said Jürgen.
“No, not in mice. Which is what still confuses me. I’ve often thought about that day in the Indian camp. In addition to the humans, there was a dead mouse in one of the huts.”
“A different species, no doubt.”
“Of course, and yet. Was there something different about the ‘field test,’ as you called it? So many variables. It troubled me for years. So I decided to see if I could replicate the results of that original experiment. I re-created the same hybrid and gave it to mice. They lost consciousness but fully recovered, exactly as they had done before. There was nothing surprising about this. I tested it in ferrets and guinea pigs with the same result. I had always suspected and hoped to find that the hybrid I created did not kill anyone.”
Jürgen said nothing.
“It took some time for me to figure out how you did it,” Henry continued. “Only someone with your talent could have imagined the alteration that would take an apparently harmless—what did you call it? An incapacitant?—and engineer it into a massively fatal disease. Only you would have had the skill to modify the virus’s genetic control elements to alter the virulence. It took me many trials to achieve the same result in laboratory animals. So I know how you did it, but I still don’t understand why. Again and again you told me that the subjects would not be harmed, that this was the humane way of removing an evil from the world.”
Jürgen stared out at the oaks, aflame with color and just beginning to carpet the earth with fallen leaves. “That’s not what the client wanted,” he said quietly.
Henry thought for a moment and said, “It’s not what you wanted.”
“Perhaps, yes, I agree,” said Jürgen. “It was also a test for me. To see if there was a perfect way of annihilating much of humanity. I know what you think when I say those words. But we face a choice, Henry. To save the earth or to allow humanity to continue to wreck it. I have made my choice. If you were totally objective about the situation, you would agree that it is the correct one. I realize that for a man like you, with family, friends, you cannot see the situation clearly. To do so would be inhuman, this is what you think. Of course it is. But this is only because you are human. If you had an infestation of termites that was destroying your house, you would think nothing of exterminating them. Because you don’t see the situation as a termite does. This is how we are different, then, you and I. For me, the termite and the human, they are equal. They each deserve life. I speak for the other creatures. I defend them. Many people say they do as well, but no one else is willing to impose the only solution that will work, which is to reduce the human population to the point that precious life forms other than our own are preserved.”
“There are better ways of preserving life,” said Henry. “Even right here—they showed me—you are bringing extinct forms back into existence.”
“Insufficient,” said Jürgen. “The earth is ransacked by extinctions every hour. We cannot hope to make a real difference.”
“You don’t really expect me to help you in this insane endeavor, do you?” Henry asked. “I don’t know why you sent for me.”
Jürgen smiled awkwardly. “I can’t hide the truth from you. That’s always been a problem. You’re correct. To make the virus again, this is not impossible. I have done it already. But I need you, because there is no one else in the world who can stand in my way. No one else who knows the virus so well, no one else who could possibly create a vaccine or a cure. And so you must stay until we are finished.”
Henry went to the door. It was locked.
“Henry, you can’t just walk out of here. The compound is totally secure.”