Attempting to flee his guilt David escapes to China and bums around trying to forget. After six weeks Homeland Security interrogates the team at NORBAC wanting to know why David is in China. David is arrested by the Red Army and taken to a remote location where they want him to investigate a mysterious, virulent pandemic that is killing 2 out of 3 people. David eventually agrees but is appalled by the antiquity of the equipment and the secrecy he must work under. He gets a partial message to NORBAC and after some analysis they reply that the mystery bacteria is an unknown hybrid of two bacteria, one of which causes food poisoning and is not usually fatal! One useful fact provided by NORBAC is that the hybrid contains over 100 copies of the same gene for some unknown reason. David is baffled by the hybrid and doesn't understand the 2-in-3 death rate.