Dawn of a New Day

by Mariano, NIck

  THE VIRUS SPREADS

  Reports were now coming in from a few European countries reporting isolated incidents of the virus, however, authorities had been quick to respond and the infectees were quickly detained or killed. Asia still appeared to be the hot spot at the moment and Malaysia and the city of Kuala Lumpur had the most activity. The city continued to be on lockdown and after several days people began to venture outside despite warnings from the local authorities. Groups of the infected were spotted at some of the shopping malls around the city and at the moment China Town seemed to be overrun by them. Police and military responded almost by the minute to attacks around the city and the authorities had no place left to relocate infectees as most detention centers were either filled or had turned into areas of mass carnage. Police had been instructed to shoot confirmed infectees, with shots to the head appearing to be the only reliable way to ensure that once they went down, they stayed down. The CDC Global Rapid Response Teams continued inoculating citizens, however, no one knew if the vaccine was having any positive effect. Air traffic had come to a standstill. Almost every country had placed Malaysia on the no fly list and even ground transportation was now limited. Bordering countries had set up checkpoints at their borders and all vehicle traffic from Malaysia was being turned around and back to that country.

  A waiter returned to Room 326 at the JW Marriott Hotel to retrieve dishes from a breakfast service he had served earlier in the day. The room was registered to an Alex Pogue from the United States and when he served her breakfast she appeared to be under weather and ill looking. He knocked several times before entering the room and was shocked to find Ms. Pogue passed out in bed and her face appeared to be covered by large black and blue sores. He thought of trying to wake her but had heard of some strange virus spreading throughout the city, so decided to call the front desk and request medical assistance. He waited for the EMS personnel to arrive when all of a sudden Ms. Pogue appeared to stir and start to get out of the bed. The waiter stared in disbelieve as he approached the sick looking woman. She suddenly lunged toward him and bit hard on his back. He tried to shake her off, however, despite her size she seemed to have super strength. She continued to bite him and eventually he passed out from the shock of the event and loss of blood. When the EMS team finally arrived they found Ms. Pogue sitting quietly on the floor and lunching on the now dead waiter.

  The American Embassy had been monitoring the events throughout town and working with authorities in an effort to contain the spread of the virus. A Warden Notice was issued to all registered Americans in the country advising them that travel to the downtown areas was no longer safe and they should stay indoors and await further instructions. Only essential personnel were required to be at the embassy, however, most employees opted to stay there as it might be one of the only safe places in the city. The embassy had high walls and a detachment of U.S. Marines and three Diplomatic Security Special Agents provided an armed response to any threats. Emergency food and water was also on hand and so the Ambassador and his staff could stay in place for a number of weeks if necessary. Meanwhile reports of roaming infectees and attacks came in from throughout the city. The smog conditions also had not improved and people continued to become sick with respiratory illnesses making it difficult to differentiate between just sick people and those who had been infected. With everyone on edge, it was believed that many of the people now being killed by security forces might not actually be infectees from the super virus.

  Meanwhile back at Fort Detrick, at the U.S. Army’s Medical Command, work continued trying to solve the question of how to battle the mutated super virus. Many of the doctors and the scientists had previously worked on battling the Nazi virus during the ISIS attacks in New York State. At the time, doctors and scientists at Fort Detrick and the CDC finally realized that it might be impossible to cure those who had already become infected either by inhaling the virus or after being bitten by an infected zombie. One group of scientists then decided to try to develop a vaccine to prevent people from becoming infected in the first place. Working with various vaccines that were developed during the Cold War to combat possible biological attacks by the Soviets, one group finally made a major breakthrough. A number of lab animals were inoculated with a vaccine labeled X554 and then exposed to the virus by using tissue from infected bodies. After five days the animals showed no signs of the infection and the scientists decided to rapidly move the experiment to the human stage. A volunteer came forward to act as a test subject and the vaccine was administered. The subject was then exposed to some newly infected patients for several hours and then put in isolation. After five days the subject reported no ill effects from the exposure and blood tests confirmed that the virus had not taken hold in his body. Although the scientists weren’t 100% sure that they had a totally effective vaccine, they also knew it was the only thing they had so far. An initial supply of the X554 vaccine was stored at Fort Detrick and medical teams were dispatched to outlying areas in NY where the virus had not yet spread. People were administered the vaccine and the scientists and doctors sat and waited to see if any new cases would be reported in these areas. Meanwhile a number of pharmaceutical companies were pressed into service by the federal government and started to manufacture the vaccine. Gradually all the Eastern states were brought under control and only a handful of new cases were reported. By this point in time, however, over 15,000 had been infected and 13,000 had already died. The government mandated that all persons in certain areas of the United States, where infections were previously reported, must be vaccinated. The program continued for several weeks and it appeared that things had finally slowed down and the virus had run its course.

  Fort Detrick had a long history as being one of the key locations for working with various pathogens. In its early days the Army’s Chemical Warfare Service was based there and had responsibility and oversight of research and development. The projects were cloaked in secrecy and perhaps only the country’s Manhattan Project would be more secret and out of the public’s knowledge. During the days leading up to World War II the facility would produce offensive biological weapons to be used if necessary. Over 5,000 bombs containing anthrax spores were produced at the base, however, files never reflected if any of the bombs were ever used during the war or post war times. The base would eventually be nicknamed “Fort Doom” and local residents in Maryland would always wonder exactly what was taking place at the facility.

  Following the war from the 1940’s to mid 1950’s, the U.S. Government would employ over 1,600 German and Austrian scientists and engineers, who had done research for the Nazis and who had expertise in aircraft, rocket technology and biological warfare. After the war the base would become the nation’s permanent facility for peacetime biological research and development, although it was never publicized exactly what research was being conducted there. Finally in 1956 the facility’s name was changed from Camp Detrick to Fort Detrick and its mission was to continue biomedical research and work with biological agents that required specialty containment. The facility continued to conduct its research and development until 1969 when the United States ratified the Geneva protocol prohibiting the use of chemical and biological weapons. Offensive biological research was then outlawed and the facility moved to research only on a defensive level. Fort Detrick would now focus only on diagnostics, preventive measures and treatments for biological infections. It would work hand in hand with the CDC and other government agencies engaged in similar research. Several medical research teams would make Fort Detrick their home, including, the U.S.Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, the Naval Medical Logistics Command and the Telemedicine and Advanced Technology Research Center. The Fort would grow in area and size until over 7,800 military, federal and contractor employees would work there, including The Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Defense.

  There was no better facility
to tackle the mutated virus, however, even with the expertise available, everyone had hit a stonewall. Even though they now knew that the Asian version of the infection was much more complicated than the U.S. strain, scientists and doctors still couldn’t figure a way to combat the infection.

  Finally several scientists decided to look into the basis for the original virus that was engineered by Mengele in the 1940’s. Research done by the Germans employed at the Fort during the 1940’s and 1950’s was scoured for clues. A CDC Global Rapid Response Team was sent back to Germany to research its archived war files in hopes that some of the records from Auschwitz could be located and examined. Previous research following the New York State outbreak failed to turn up anything of substance but scientists hoped that they had missed something the first time around.

  Knowing that the end was near and watching Germany begin to fall on both the Western and Eastern Fronts, Mengele decided that it was time to destroy many of the files concerning his experiments at Auschwitz and so he ordered the SS guards to gather all the files and destroy them. He decided, however, to save the files regarding the super virus that he and his doctors had perfected in the event that it might become useful to him later on. He altered some of the data and inserted the files into some of the routine files that were held at the camp. When it finally became inevitable that Germany would fall, Mengele decided that it was time to depart his beloved Auschwitz and move west away from the advancing Allied and Russian armies. He had heard about the Fuhrer’s suicide and that his boss Himmler had also taken his life. He had no desire to join them anytime soon. He dressed himself as a lowly German infantry soldier and headed westward. He traveled alone and worked along the way at some of the camps. He was eventually captured near Munich but quickly released as the Allies had better things to do than arrest a common German infantryman. So far his disguise seemed to be working very well. He kept a low profile and avoided further arrest while he moved through Germany. He took up residence at one city after another, but never for long. As the years passed he knew that he was on borrowed time and that the Allies and the Jews were actively hunting for him and other war criminals. Finally, in 1949, using false identification that he had managed to obtain, he received travel papers through the International Red Cross and relocated to Argentina. Once he arrived in South America he took up residence in one country and then another to avoid being captured as the war crimes hunters were actively pursuing Nazis throughout South America. He still had many of his experiment papers with him and much of the research done by him and his doctors was still hidden away in some of the routine files left behind at Auschwitz.

  The CDC Global Rapid Response Team arrived at the Headquarters of the German Federal Intelligence Service, Bundesnachrichtendienst, located in Pullach, near Munich and Berlin. The BND had 300 locations in Germany and foreign countries and employed over 6,000 people. The Team explained that they were looking for notes and research papers from Mengele’s experiments at Auschwitz and that they realized teams had previously scoured these files following the ISIS attacks in New York State early that year. They said they hoped the first teams had missed something and that they would start from the beginning and see if anything was missed the first time around. The Germans provided 100 people to help the Americans in their search.

  THE EMERGENCE OF THE HORDES

  The mysterious box was brought up from the ocean’s floor on May 15th, 2015, and the first person infected, Harold Strauss, would attack people at the local hospital less than a week later. Special Agent Max Taylor would arrive in Kuala Lumpur on May 20st and become known as Passenger Zero in Asia. The Asian variety of the super virus would get underway shortly thereafter and by the end of May several hundred people would become exposed to the virus by means of person-to-person contact. By the beginning of June the virus was spreading in the United States but at a much slower pace than Asia because of enforced government controls. As June started in Kuala Lumpur the entire town was on lock down although infectees wondered through the malls and had overrun the streets of the city and China Town. As the month progressed another type of mutation or change occurred within the infectees. Previously they had tended to roam the streets alone or in groups of two or three. Suddenly authorities noticed that they were now organizing themselves in larger hordes making it much more difficult for authorities to confront and stop them. Another startling change was also noted. Besides organizing into hordes, as zombie groups would now be called, they were starting to display added mobility and motor functions. The infectees, who didn’t die after being infected, were now becoming faster in their pace and some could even open doors when confronted with them. This enabled them to enter buildings and houses that previously they would be locked out of. The authorities and CDC were baffled by these new developments since these characteristics were never noted during the New York outbreak and only isolated incidents of these abilities were reported in the U.S.

  Police authorities decided to equipment their men with full riot type gear, as this gave them some added protection during an attack. Automatic weapons were also issued and police and military were instructed to shoot and ask questions later. The Government had issued strict instructions that people were not to leave their homes, so if someone was seen on the street; police should assume it was an infectee.

  The CDC and scientists at Fort Detrick were also experimenting with alternative means to stop infectees. Various gases were tried on captured infectees but so far none had a permanent effect on them. Electric shock devices were given a try and although they did temporarily disable the infectee, they did not kill him. Presently it appeared that only disrupting the person’s brain by either shooting him in the head or driving an object through it, was the only guarantee of stopping a person once he turned. In the U.S. the X554 vaccine seemed to have brought things under control better than in Asia. Scientists thought the fact that many of the Asian sampling had respiratory infections played a major role in trying to control the virus there. Some new infections in the U.S. were noted but things were more controlled at the moment.

  Other Asian countries were reporting new infections, as were some European countries. The outbreaks were much smaller than Malaysia, however, it didn’t take many infectees to get the epidemic going once they got out among the population. Only South America and some of the island nations remained infection free and many of these nations had closed off all outside transportation until the crises was resolved. Most countries, infected or not, had fully mobilized their militaries and were following the advise of the CDC and Fort Detrick on how they should tackle possible infectees.

  In Kuala Lumpur it was a sunny and warm day and despite warnings from the government, people were starting to get cabin fever from being cooped up for too many days. People strolled down the streets and some of the local restaurants had decided to open up, as their businesses were being hit hard during the crises. Most hadn’t been open in over a week. Although the military and police were constantly patrolling the areas, many looked the other way so that people could try to get back to normal. Many areas appeared to have been totally cleared of infectees, however, no one knew where they might pop up next or if they were hiding some place. Police kept a constant watch and some cities were now using drones to fly over cities and look for hordes that might be roaming the streets. So far no major incidents were reported any where in Kuala Lumpur and people relaxed and ate at sidewalk cafes and even some mall restaurants that were open. Suddenly, as the day started to change into evening, several hordes appeared on the drone screens at police headquarters. Authorities radioed street patrols but it was already too late. In several areas the hordes had somehow communicated among themselves and had begun to converge on several restaurants from varying directions, completely encircling the people within. Several hundred infectees appeared and the police quickly realized that they were outnumbered but made a brave effort to protect both themselves and the people outside. Raging battles began to take place throughout the cit
y and additional reinforcements were brought in but the areas of conflict multiplied quicker than the authorities could direct men to them. After several hours of conflict and havoc several hundred people were either dead or now part of the infectee army that was rapidly growing within the city. Only one or two police and military patrols had been successful in fending off the roving hordes. As quick as the hordes appeared, they also vanished. Medical crews and military troops were dispatched to the areas with the worst casualties, however, rather than a rescue effort, it quickly became a cleanup operation. The local news stations that night reported on the horrific events of the day and people were again told to stay indoors until the authorities said otherwise.