This is the second installment in a series that envisages a dark tragedy where individuals rationalize moral and legal violations of the highest order. It is written in a genre that attempts to shed light where it is needed; contemporary historical fiction.
Those who have not read Fraudley’s Downfall, Part One, The Information, may want to do so before reading here, as some of the same characters continue their escapades in this second chapter — as the plot thickens.
Any resemblance of the individuals depicted in this tale to actual people is fully intentional. Artistic license has been taken in this abridged account that can only give an imagined glimpse into the world behind the malfeasance that is unfolding. Readers are likely to be aware of the omission of copious additional offenses.
A golden dawn crowns the nation’s capital as Francis Fraudley’s limo streaks through the nearly empty streets of the city. He shakes his head as he sees the early stirrings of a homeless encampment while passing Layfayette Square. His phone rings as the vehicle is stopped at the White House entrance. He ignores the Secret Service detail inspecting the vehicle, and speaks angrily into his phone.
Fraudley is still shouting as the heavy barriers drop and they are waved through the gate. “I don’t care what you have to do, just make sure anyone covering the story doesn’t refer to it as gain of function or directed evolution. Get them the information on viral engineering that explains how we are staying ahead of the next variant. And do it now or I’ll have your head on a platter.”
He ends the call, gets out of the limo, and enters the West Wing. Fraudley marches down the main hall of the White House office wing as if he owned it; then pushes a door open without knocking.
Bob Murphy, a stern executive in a dark pinstripe suit is behind his desk on a phone call, though Fraudley begins talking immediately, pacing in front of him. “What the hell is going on? I told you to make sure those Twitter accounts were shut down, now those criminals won’t shut up and are making more trouble than before. Obviously, you didn’t stay on top of it.”
Murphy hangs up the phone quickly and is overtly apologetic. “Dr. Fraudley, we did everything we could and the original board was compliant, but…”
“I’ve heard enough buts, and I’m not going to listen to your crap. You put the screws on that idiot who is letting anyone back on Twitter and let him know we’ll make him responsible for spreading lies that make people sick and die. Tell him he’ll be charged with murder and his billions won’t keep him out of prison.”
“I don’t know if I can tell him that,” Franklin says meekly. “I’d really need to run this by Justice.”
Fraudley is livid and leans over the desk, snarling at Franklin. “You don’t need anyone’s opinion but mine. Do it right now or I’ll go down the hall to your boss and make sure you’re outside on the street with the filthy homeless bums.”
“I’ll do everything I can.”
“You’ll do everything I say.”
With that said, Fraudley storms out.
In a brightly lit, huge, open-plan office of the Washington Herald, Bella Willing is at her computer typing. She is a rising star reporter at the newspaper, with an uncanny ability to find exclusive sources inside and outside of the government.
Bella is very clever, although naively believes she is on the side of truth and righteousness when there has been no sign of these attributes in Washington for a long time. She is proud to be a member of the corporate news world and trusts that the standards and practices of the free press are a blessing to democracy.
Throughout the pandemic, Bella believed that the information obtained from the government was reliable. She also felt that upstanding fact-checking organizations had provided valuable data for background on her numerous articles.
Recently though she’d been troubled.
She couldn’t ignore the increasing number of news reports about young athletes dying on the field and generally, the unexplained deaths; it was particularly obvious that no one was asking why. Without telling her colleagues or editor, she had gone down a rabbit hole on social media and emerged in a world where it was taken for granted that vaccines were causing severe side effects.
At first, it appeared to be the same rhetoric she had learned to ignore, but Bella quickly realized there were some serious scientists and doctors presenting reasonable arguments. But she still refused to believe that the pharmaceutical companies and government agencies would allow this to happen.
Despite what she was learning, like many other reporters, she was still attached to her previous decisions and stories; accepting a different version of events over the last few years would be devastating.
Bella is reading yet another report of a professional football player who suddenly collapsed when her phone rings. She looks to see who the caller is, and answers.
“Hey Myron, what’s up? Have you got something for me?”
Myron Banks is sitting in his plush office at the Center for Ultimate Truth, leaning almost too far back in his chair. There is an open folder with some papers spread out on his desk.
“I sure do. I just got some amazing info that I know you’ll appreciate. And if you publish it soon, it can be an exclusive, just for you.”
“Can you send it to me?” Myron hesitates as Bella waits impatiently for an answer.
“I’d like to tell you more about what we’ve got, but not over the phone. How about we meet at the usual place and then I take you out for lunch?”
“I’ll see you there in an hour.” Bella ends the call and goes back to reading. She finds it intriguing that without any substantiation, all the reports of athletes collapsing are now insisting that the cause is not the vaccine.
Bella grabs her backpack and puts on her jacket she starts walking towards the office door. Then she returns to her desk and takes out a small audio recorder from a drawer. She puts it in her pocket and departs.
Bella and Myron emerge from the entrance of Union Station mixing in with the dozens of train passengers heading out into the city. They pass the waiting taxis and cross through traffic. Walking towards the Capitol building away from the din of the street noise, Myron begins his pitch.
“I’ve got a new source. We are going to start getting information about how the anti-vaxers are funded, and also how their investments contradict the rhetoric. I wanted to offer some incredible information to you first.”
Even though he has given her material for stories before, Bella senses that Myron is pressing her more than usual, and asks “why me?”
“Because you’ll know the importance of what you’re looking at.”
They turn a corner and enter a restaurant within the shadow of the Capitol building. The dim lighting and very private high-backed booths look like they were designed for discreet encounters. Sitting across from each other, Myron takes out a folder from a thin briefcase and slides it across the table to Bella.
He speaks almost in a whisper, “Have a look at these.”
Bella goes through a few pages of documents, then looks up.
“Myron, most everything else you’ve given me before is supported by reports from federal agencies and medical trials. These financial files could be explosive, but I’m going to need to verify that they are what they seem to be. Where did you get them?”
With a crooked half-smile, Myron replies, “From an impeccable government source.”
Bella looks down again at the papers and then leans towards Myron and says, “Well, I’ll either need to know exactly how you got them, or you’ll have to tell me who gave them to you.”
Myron exudes the slickest false confidence. “Isn’t it enough to have proof in your hands that the most aggressive purveyors of anti-vax disinformation have invested in the vaccine?”
“No one will publish this without some kind of backup.”
Myron feigns confidence. “Don’t worry, I’ll get it for you. But I’d start writing your article before someone else gets a hold of these.”
Fraudley is irate as he storms back into his office, ignoring his assistant and slamming the door behind him. He sits behind his desk and calls Pedro Faschic, the executive director of GreenDay Partners, a conglomerate of laboratories that experiment with viruses, and the beneficiary of huge government grants.
Faschic is one of those very special human beings who can’t help lying when his mouth opens, in his continuing attempts to manipulate others. He sincerely believes he has outsmarted the world. His company is an extension of his duplicitous personality. GreenDay appears to be involved with environmental concerns and protecting the world from emerging infectious diseases; however, GreenDay is just a cover for the darkest destructive research — developing biological warfare.
Faschic’s dealings with Fraudley have come under scrutiny. Publication of their email exchange provided a glimpse into the nature of the relationship — and Fraudley’s direct ties to the underbelly of risky experimentation with viruses.
Fraudley is yelling into his phone. “Now I find out that you don’t have any non-disclosure agreements with your employees, including this author who used to be your VP! Your guy just published a book with every detail we needed to keep under wraps. How can you be such an idiot?”
Faschic calmly defends himself. “Don’t worry Francis, he’s a veteran with PTSD, and admits to having a grudge against me for not taking his advice on how to run the company.”
“Everything he writes about in his book is explosive and will blow you out of the water. He’s getting ready to testify to Congress.”
“Calm down Francis, I’ve got at least ten people who will contradict everything he’s said.”
“Don’t tell me to calm down! You said if I could arrange for the local police and the FBI to put pressure on him, the book would never be published. Look, if this gets worse, I’ll be telling Congress that you’re the bad egg that was out of control. So you better fix this and fast.”
Faschic is unshakeable. “Remember when this first started? You asked me to help make sure that gain of function was just another topic the conspiracy theorists were making up. We couldn’t let this get any traction. Well, I just did what you asked, I took the heat for a while, then it all calmed down.”
Fraudley loses whatever composure he had remaining. “You’re on thin ice Faschic. And if need be, I’ve got everything ready to make sure you will sink and never come up for air.”
“Francis, don’t threaten me, I know that you and your buddies at Defense have set me up here. You won’t get away with it. If need be, I’ll tell the press and Congress everything. You can retire in a prison jumpsuit.”
Fraudley ends the call without replying and slams his phone on his desk.
Bella is in her editor’s office at the Herald. She sits across from Derek Sharp, whose insightful and aggressive investigative reporting over decades allowed him to rise in the ranks of corporate news. He is one of the most influential editors in Washington and is confident the Herald has covered the pandemic with appropriate dignity.
Sharp remained under incredible pressure from his publishers. Readership of the Herald had been shrinking and its online presence was the only hope for keeping it alive. He no longer thought like a reporter; his priorities were corporate. And Bella, his shining star, had insights that attracted younger readers, the new lifeblood of the paper.
After showing Sharp the documents she got from Myron, Bella makes her point. “Although this material is incredible, and would be picked up by all the partners of the Honest News Initiative, I’m concerned. They look legit, but we have to verify somehow that these are what they appear to be. They are only copies.”
Sharp shrugs and dismisses her concern. “You got these from your fact-checkers at the Center. We can cover ourselves and say it’s from them. That’s been good enough before and no one will be concerned.”
Bella presses him. “Something doesn’t seem right. I’m not sure what it is, but I want to see what I can find out — some kind of verification.”
“Look, these people are on the Corrupt and Cancelled list, they have already been discredited as spreaders of disinformation — no one will be surprised.”
“I don’t know, the atmosphere is different from a year ago. They have a vocal growing group of supporters and we need to be on solid ground. I’d like to get confirmation before writing about it.”
Sharp realizes he can’t say no to Bella; she reminds him of who he was as a young idealistic reporter. “Okay, do whatever you need to do, but let’s not sit on this, get right on it or it will show up somewhere else.”
Doctor Richard Reid and his wife, Dr. Susan Mills, are weeding a sprawling garden at their country farm in the rolling hills of Maryland, taking a break from what has been a grueling week of interviews and travel. The calm of their home is a salve for their hectic pace.
The route to Washington through the historic countryside is under two hours, and they know the road well. Reid is one of the most respected cardiologists in the world, and for decades has testified before Congress regarding legislation that supported programs for cutting-edge research.
Susan is a renowned pediatrician who championed natural childbirth for decades. Most recently, she and Richard have become leading voices in a sober, critical view of the new line of vaccines for the virus associated with the pandemic. Both of them are interviewed regularly — the readership of their blog is greater than most national news websites.
They both look up as their dogs bark defensively, as they see an unfamiliar car approaching on their long driveway. The car stops near the garden gate and a young woman emerges.
“Sorry to just show up uninvited. I’m Bella Willing, a reporter for the Washington Herald, are you Dr. Reid and Dr. Mills? If you have a few minutes, I think you’ll want to hear what I have to say.”
Susan and Richard look at each other, and although they are unshakeable and fearless, they know how the Herald has covered their perspective with venom. Nonetheless, Susan is cordial. “Why don’t you come inside for a cup of coffee.”
The three of them sit in a large kitchen at a round oak table. Susan offers Bella a homemade oatmeal cookie with her coffee, which she accepts gratefully. Richard breaks the silence. “So how can we help you today?”
Bella is surprised; she had expected a brief hostile, confrontation. But somehow she feels very comfortable with Susan and Richard. They certainly did not come across as the misguided souls that the press had covered with derision over the last few years.
She takes a folder out of her backpack and puts it on the table. “I was given these files which seem to show that you have around fifty-thousand dollars invested in Pfakir Pharma. I thought it would be fair to give you an opportunity to comment on them.”
Susan reaches for the folder and opens it, looking carefully at each page of copies of accounting records and tax returns. She passes each of them to Richard, who also looks over the pages. Neither of them seems to be surprised.
Bella is almost apologetic. “Before writing about these and making them public, I needed to know if they were really yours.”
Susan smiles at her. “Bella, most people are surprised to learn that we are not crazy or outlaws. Both of us are doctors and have relied on the pharmaceutical industry as partners for many years. In the past, it made sense that we invested in these companies. But as soon as we started recognizing their duplicity, we sold all of our stocks. These are definitely copies of our documents, and we did own shares in Pfakir a few years back, but someone has changed the dates on these papers.”
Somehow Bella is relieved. She knew intuitively there was something not right, and starts to feel justified that she had come to speak with Susan and Richard. “Is there any way you can confirm that?”
“I’ll go get the originals, it won’t take long.”
While Richard and Bella sit waiting for Susan to return, she asks him something that has been troubling her. “As a cardiologist, do you have a theory about what’s happening to all the athletes getting myocarditis?”
“It’s not just athletes, but they are more susceptible to the effect of the vaccine on the heart. I can give you a couple of papers that explain why if you’re interested. It’s not rocket science, it just takes an open mind to understand.”
“That would be really helpful. Somehow this kind of analysis isn’t available.”
Richard laughs. “Oh it’s available, it’s just that no one really wants to consider that the vaccine is doing more harm than good. But be careful Bella, once you scare the powerful with the truth — they will attack, slander and belittle you — and reveal how they really feel about freedom of speech.”
Susan returns with a few papers in hand and shows them to Bella. Her eyebrows raise when she sees that indeed the dates on the originals are four years earlier than the copies she has.
Susan is also concerned for Bella. “I know you can’t tell us who gave you these falsified copies but be careful, whoever it is, you shouldn’t trust them.”
As Bella drives back to Washington, she reconsiders everything she has believed and written about the pandemic over the last few years. Recognizing that everything she reported was based on lies and deception, tears flood her eyes.