These excerpts from Greg Bear’s novel, Quantico, detail a complex, global thriller involving bioterrorism, government conspiracies, and dedicated law enforcement agents. The narrative follows FBI agents like Griff, Rebecca Rose, William Griffin, and Fouad Al-Husam as they track an anthrax plot, initially linked to an anti-Semitic extremist known as the Patriarch, but later revealed to be an operation led by former FBI agent Lawrence Winter. Winter substitutes a transgenic yeast for anthrax in a terrorist plot, code-named Desert Vulture, designed to cause widespread memory loss through airburst fireworks in various global locations, culminating in an attack during the Hajj pilgrimage in Mecca. The agents, operating both domestically—investigating crime scenes in Washington State and Arizona—and internationally through the covert BuDark task force in the Middle East, struggle against both the perpetrators and bureaucratic infighting within the FBI and other government agencies to neutralize the threat.

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“What did the council decide on item 42?” — answered with the speaker and the moment.