Muhaimin’s phone was still ringing when he looked carefully at the map on the computer screen and saw that the District was completely surrounded by these large red clusters. A quick tally in his head concluded that he didn’t have enough men to equal this many heat signatures. Even if he did, they were not organized correctly, nor in their assigned areas of responsibility.
“Ready me a plane, Agent,” Muhaimin ordered the man at the controls. He had made his decision. An evacuation was the only remaining option.
“Where would you like it to take you, Executive Commander?”
“To the land of the Aryans.”
“That’s not going to be possible, Executive Commander.”
Muhaimin walked over to the agent and examined the computer screen in front of him. There, in plain sight, more than 180 ships with more than 1,200 aircraft were taking up offensive postures just off the coast of Virginia.
“What is this?” Muhaimin yelled.
“Sir, it appears to be the United States Fleet Forces Command.”
USFLTFORCOM was an ace up the sleeve of Admiral William S. Dixon. He had secretly pulled the Atlantic fleet out into international waters to buy enough time and intelligence so he could utilize them. With the recent knowledge of the survival of General John James and his command, the time to reveal surprises and long-awaited disclosures had finally come. The fleet consisted of more than one hundred thousand Navy and Marine Corps personnel.
Also among the admiral’s surprises was the USPACFLT, or United States Pacific Fleet. It was neutralized by the North Korean EMP attack and consisted of two hundred ships, two thousand aircraft, and two hundred fifty thousand Navy and Marine Corps personnel. Admiral Dixon had lost communication with them and could not risk revealing the location of the USFLTFORCOM for the purpose of bringing USPACFLT personnel to dry land. For the time being, he had to leave them alone.
Muhaimin’s phone had finally stopped ringing. He was aghast at the new turn of events. He could only assume that both coastlines of the United States were secured by fleets of this size. There was no way home for the executive commander, giving him two possible options—fight or hide. His pride was too great to support the latter, so he commanded the agent to call every remaining UN soldier and to order them into defensive positions in and around the District. He gave the agent explicit instructions to hide the knowledge he was privy to from any and all remaining troops.
O’Hare International Airport, Chicago, Illinois
Staff Sergeant Konat gave up on trying to contact Muhaimin. He had let the phone ring a couple dozen times before cancelling the call and commanding the pilot to stand down.
Sergeant Kateli looked at Konat and asked, “What now, Staff Sergeant?”
Konat knew that once he and his men left the airport, it would be up for grabs. Konat had a firm grip on the security of the airport, but recent events caused him to pull down some of the security, and that had compromised its security significantly.
“Stand down until I can get in touch with the executive commander. He must be away from his phone.”
The pilot, a Russian captain named Lovzansky Vyacheslavovich, was at the controls of the luxury 2020 model Bombardier Global jet. He was well aware of the assassinations of his comrades conducted at Muhiamin’s order and was relaying information, via radio, to fragmented Russian UN units now in hiding. In turn, they were using mobile command units to communicate that information back to Russia. The comings and goings at O’Hare might have seemed inconsequential on a grand scale, but Russia was paying close attention to what was happening in the former United States, and there was enough smaller activity to amount to a larger influence over the outcome of UN operations. The Russians were aware of Muhaimin’s sedition and were considering all available options to assist the Americans in their fight against him.
Goose Island, Chicago, Illinois
The snipers were in place, but there was no activity in the guard towers. It was as if nobody was home. When the information was relayed back to the general, he contacted Admiral Dixon for an update on the interior activity of the compound. The admiral’s intel was limited to the most recent aerial photographs. The MCUs were not designed to receive live satellite feeds unless it was streamed in from the District, and they were not about to petition for that. All the admiral could do was communicate back to the general that the current intel on the compound was less than a week old.
Not having much to work with, General John James gave the order to breach the compound.
Nathan had the militia taking cover behind the armored vehicles, waiting for the 0311 Marines to make entry and to clear the area of hostiles. 0311 was the Marines’ numerical classification for riflemen, or foot infantry. His job was to come in after the initial gunfight and to neutralize any remaining threats.
Nathan watched as the large gates of the compound were breached by explosives and the debris was pulled away, off the road, from obstructing the entrance. The compound was flooded with Marines, and they filled the air with the sounds of their famous war cries, the same terrifying barking sounds that the Germans heard in 1918, at the Battle of Belleau Wood, and later called dogs from hell.
He and his men patiently waited for the command to enter the island, but he never heard a shot fired. The sounds of motivated Marine shouts faded away and then came an eerie silence. He stood up from his position and walked up to the bridge that led to the island’s large entrance. He stood there, looking in and trying to catch a glimpse of anything, anything at all, but there was nothing. Over his shoulder, to his rear, several hundred armed veterans and civilians were standing. All of them were gazing toward the island, waiting to hear a command.
Nathan began walking toward the island, with the militia in tow. Once he reached the entrance, he paused to listen again. He could hear the Marines talking in low tones and knew they were all safe. The same couldn’t be said about the previous inhabitants. The scene would have been horrifying to the basest of humanity. Dead Americans were strewn about in the streets. Many of them had been dismembered, others disemboweled, beheaded, shot, flayed, and hanged—there were none left alive.
Nathan ordered his men to conduct a clean sweep of the compound. The 0311s walked around the compound and searched bodies for identification cards. Most of them had picture IDs attached to lanyards that were hanging from their necks. For those who were beheaded, their ID cards were not far from the body.
Nathan had seen some gruesome scenes in life, but this topped all of them. There were no children in the compound, but still he had a sinking feeling that he was going to stumble onto a scene involving children, and that, he thought, would be too much to bear.
As he was sweeping from room to room, he was taking note of the IDs. He ordered a dozen of his men to backtrack and collect the IDs from every corpse they encountered. They contained important data that might come in handy later. The IDs contained a photo, name, specialty, and place of employment. The island was large enough to contain several structures where the inhabitants could employ their services. The factories, workshops, and other labor-related facilities were inconsequential at this point, but it was clear they could have been self-sufficient for some time to come.
“Island of the dead,” a familiar voice said to Nathan. It was Markus, from the Syndicate group. Approaching him, to his rear, was Troy. Nathan pushed Markus away and embraced Troy.
“What happened to you, man?” Troy asked.
“We were separated when Markus’s men chased us down and cornered us on a rooftop.”
“They caught us, too. Good thing, huh?”
“Good thing?” Nathan asked with a tinge of confusion and disgust, looking back at Markus.
“Yeah, he took us in and here we are.”
“Is that right?”
Nathan was still looking at Markus. The discussion he and Markus had over the tour of one of their buildings was one that still needed to be addressed.
“Tell me, Troy,” Nathan said, “w
ere you sheltered on the tenth floor?”
“What about it?”
Markus was becoming uncomfortable and began repositioning himself. Nathan already had his rifle pulled up and pointed at him. To Markus’s left, Denny was moving into position, with his rifle trained on Markus.
“Improvise, adapt, and overcome, Nathan,” Markus said. “Don’t you remember our talk?”
Rory Price found the gathering of militia members and walked into the midst of it. He first saw Nathan and that he was pointing his weapon at a man. He moved around the crowd until he could see the target. He was dismayed to see that Markus was in their company.
“Nathan, this man is no good for us,” Rory said.
Troy didn’t know what was going on, so he watched and listened.
“I took you in,” Markus said, pointing to Rory, “and I took you in,” pointing to Troy, “and I took you in,” pointing to Nathan. “All of you are alive because I played a part in your survival.”
Nathan would have shot him dead right there on the spot if it were not for all the witnesses. The only thing that kept him from doing so was that he wasn’t sure what the others would think or do, especially in light of the fact that Markus was clearly American and they were attempting to reestablish a constitutional republic.
“Markus here has been cannibalizing Americans. He’s been detaining them under the guise of housing assistance, then escorting them like lambs to the slaughter when his Syndicate gets hungry,” Nathan accused. “What do you know, preacher?” he then asked Rory.
“The same thing, Nate. He tried to get me to join the Syndicate as their minister.”
“Yeah? He tried to get me and Denny to join as muscles because we killed upwards of twenty men. Isn’t that right, Markus?”
Troy interrupted, “What did he recruit us for?”
“Protein,” Nathan said.
Markus was done talking. Nathan saw his hand was firmly squeezing the grip of his rifle.
“Lay your weapon down, Markus. You’re under arrest and you’re going to stand trial.”
Markus set his rifle against the wall, and a couple of militia members grabbed him and placed him in flexi-cuffs. They marched him away while the rest of the militia finished their sweep.
O’Hare International Airport, Chicago, Illinois
Staff Sergeant Konat’s phone notified him that he had received a message; it had come from the District. His orders were clear— round up all troops loyal to the executive commander and deploy to the District immediately. Konat knew the executive commander’s influence was waning and that the theater of war was narrowing around him. Konat’s men were loyal to Konat only. Whoever he took his orders from didn’t concern his team. They did what Konat commanded, and those were the rules. He knew this as a matter of fact, so he saw no reason to clue them in on his next decision. Konat grabbed the pilot by his jacket and pulled him out of the pilot’s seat.
“We’re taking a commercial jet to Iran,” Konat said to Vyacheslavovich, and he said it loud enough for his comrades to hear. They were all eager to go home; they wouldn’t have complained either way.
Vyacheslavovich wasn’t about to fly these thugs overseas. He knew his usefulness would be at an end once he landed on their soil. They had been calling him an infidel for some time, hoping he would give them a reason to shoot him. Vyacheslavovich opened the door and lowered the staircase. The men walked across the landing strip and to the nearest commercial jet; all the while, the captain was being controlled by Konat’s grip on his coat and a rifle in his grasp.
Goose Island, Chicago, Illinois
Roughly an hour had passed for the men. They had been busy collecting ID cards and sweeping the enormous compound for any signs of life. Seventy-three survivors were found hiding beneath one of the facilities where the waterworks and furnace systems were being operated. These individuals were detained and sent back to command for further intelligence gathering. Twenty thousand ID cards were recovered, corresponding with records they had recovered from the personnel office. Every possible piece of data they could find was collected and sent to command.
Banks was busy searching through the medical records when he stumbled upon a consistent word that appeared in every single resident’s clinical file. They had each received an injection of something called EbolaProzyme. Once he had made the find, he grabbed what he could and briskly walked out of the facility yelling, “Let’s go. Everybody out!”
Everybody took notice of the rapid evacuation from the medical department.
“What’s going on?” Nathan asked.
Banks kept walking as he explained to Nathan his discovery. “Everybody in this place has received some kind of injection with the word Ebola in it. I don’t know what that is, so we’re not sticking around.”
“If they had Ebola, don’t you think we would know it?”
“I don’t know. I’m not a physician.”
The entire compound was evacuated, and every unit was recalled to Navy Pier. From there, they had a roll call to account for everybody, and a massive debriefing was conducted. Command seemed focused on two things, why the people within the compound were killed, and what was this EbolaProzyme injection? All the thinkers worked together to conclude that FEMA was no longer in charge, so this Muhaimin guy must have ordered the residents of the FEMA camps to be put down. As for the EbolaProzyme injection, they called upon a man that had escaped from the Goose Island project while it was in its early stages. He was known simply as the oracle.
“Give him a pen and paper,” Buchanan commanded one of the Marines.
The oracle received the pen and paper and looked at the general, awaiting his line of questioning.
“Charles tells me you escaped Goose Island not long after it opened. Is this correct?” General John James asked him.
“Yes,” he scratched on the paper.
“Do you know anything about this medication called EbolaProzyme?”
“It’s not a medication,” he scratched down. “It’s a live virus.”
Only the general, the admiral, and Buchanan could see the answers he was sharing with the officers. They were briefly making eye contact with one another, waiting for some kind of reaction.
“I don’t understand,” the admiral asked him. “If it’s a live virus, then why aren’t we all infected? You’ve been with Buchanan for some time, I hear.”
“I wasn’t given the injection, you were,” he wrote down on the paper and then pointed at each of the officers.
“We were?”
The oracle nodded.
“I wasn’t given this injection,” Dixon answered.
“Neither was I,” James and Buchanan added.
“You all were. Original contingency: 100% compliance. Plan B: Controlled Ebola outbreak. Last resort: Operation Black State.”
The oracle was a wealth of knowledge. He had overheard a great deal of conversations between the FEMA workers. Employees of the early Goose Island project were not tight-lipped, especially around those labeled nonessential. All nonessential humans were deemed invasive and only had one destiny. The oracle’s name was Gavin Butler, and he was detained at the Goose Island project and scheduled to be exposed to the Ebola virus but escaped before he was able to meet the same fate as the millions that came after him.
The disease was managed at the old metal works plant, where people were exposed to the virus and deteriorated rapidly. Their bodies were incinerated in enormous furnaces, and their ashes blanketed the Chicago region for miles. The employees were immunized with the EbolaProzyme injection. The live Ebola virus was reverse-engineered on the West Coast at one of the many biocontrol and engineering facilities. Live cultures were used to find ways to bind with DNA strands in a way that made the recipients immune to the unaltered version.
“Are you saying the military was injected with this to keep us safe from exposure?”
“Yes.”
“They must not have anticipated the military working against them,” B
uchanan said.
Overhead, the sound of a commercial airliner could be heard. Everybody that heard the sound ran into open spaces where they had a clear view of the sky.
Captain Vyacheslavovich was in the pilot’s seat, relaying information to the Russian MCU that he had been in contact with. He had secured the door to the cockpit and was in full control of the enormous commercial airliner. It was a dicey move for the pilot. The way he figured it, he was not going to live to see his family or his country again. So he took the risk of locking the Iranians out of the cockpit. Russia was communicating directly from the Glavnoye Razvedyvatel’noye Upravleniye, the leading Russian intelligence agency, and had conferred with them on the location of the nearest US military force.
Vyacheslavovich knew the Iranians’ desire was to escape the area, but the captain had other motives in mind. If he could fly the airliner low enough, he might be able to make a landing near US military forces and essentially hand them over.
One of the Iranians noticed the plane was deviating from the appropriate flight path and stood up from his seat to make his way to the cockpit. Once there, he attempted to open the door, but it was secured from the other side. He began beating on the door and shouting, “Unlock this door, infidel,” but there was no response. The rest of Konat’s team saw that they were locked out of the cockpit and began gathering towards the front of the plane.
The first soldier pointed his rifle at the door and attempted to breach the door by shooting it near the locking mechanism. The framework was securely constructed to withstand such attacks. The bullets proved useless.
Admiral Dixon received word from NORAD that Russia was attempting to contact them. As an offering of their good intentions towards an alliance with the US military against Muhaimin, they shared information about the airliner and its passengers. Dixon took the information but was unsure how to use it. The airliner was circling back and appeared to be setting a course towards their location on the ground.
Whiskey Black Book Set: The Complete Tyrant Series (Box Set 1) Page 74
