Harvest Of Evil

by William Lehman

  Now at this point, I had enough to bust them, and was just about to call Bill and Pete to start moving when I got the strangest damn smell, and a funny taste in my mouth. It was sort of one part cinnamon, one part chocolate, and two parts carrion. Then the screaming started. I looked through the viewfinder at the guys down below, and they were screaming and grabbing at their faces. As I watched, huge boils were forming on their faces, and other exposed skin. I don't know what it was, but it looked like it hurt like hell. All of their exposed skin was red and inflamed, boils where growing everywhere, then popping and oozing thick green gunk. I could smell it suddenly, a putrid odor, rotting meat, gangrene, and breached intestine, about enough to make me gag. The bad side of my senses, I could smell gross things just as acutely as good things. About this time my military training kicked in, and all I could think was B/C attack. Now, I don't know any war gas that would do quite what this was doing, though mustard gas and a couple of the blister agents were close, and while there were a few biological agents that might do something like this, what the Hel would they be doing here? Of course, I didn't think about that, just "Oh fuck, it's too late to don MOP gear now, even if I had it on me, instead of back at the truck." I shouted over the radio for Bill and Pete to get back to the trucks, get MOP gear on, and establish a buffer zone.

  "Don't worry about me, I'm already fucked," I continued.

  3

  Of course, if I had really been screwed, this would have been the shortest narrative on record. After a couple of minutes, I realized that I wasn't getting any boils, and nothing hurt, so whatever it was, it wasn't affecting me up here. This meant that either I was immune, due to various shots I received courtesy of my rich 'Uncle', or due to my intermittently furry nature, OR, I was out of range of whatever the Hel it was. While I was busy waiting to get hit with whatever it was, the guys down below had quit screaming. I looked back down there, and all four of them were down.

  I called back to Pete, to get my MOP gear and mask, and after they suited up, to put them inside the perimeter, then told them that I was all right so far, but that all four suspects were down, and that I would go in after I had fully suited up. I also asked Pete to get on the cell to Headquarters and get me some bacteriological/chemical experts out here, NOW. Also some backup officers to help cordon the area.

  Pete replied right away, "Damn, John, good to hear your voice man, what the fuck is going on in there? How many officers do you need? Do you want medical? Talk to me man!"

  "I'm OK. I don't know what's going on yet, everyone down in the valley dropped like flies, some sort of germ or something, I don't know. No medical for now, whatever this shit is, may be catching. For all I know the only reason I'm still alive is because the bug doesn't like cats," I replied, still a bit shaken. "Anyhow, I want to get a mask on if for no other reason than the smell. It's bad, Pete, real bad. I think we'll need another three or four officers at least, just to do cordon work, and the Hazmat Team, plus whatever they want to bring, better get the L. T. out here too, though I don't want anyone inside the cordon till the Hazmat boys OK it. Now get your ass in gear, I am heading back for the CP, and I want to get into full MOP as soon as I can, this may just be a slow spreading thing."

  With that, I pulled the disk out of the camera, and started running back to the CP. When I was about 100 yards from the CP, I stopped, and shouted for Pete and Bill. Pete heard me (Bill isn't a 'Thrope, so his hearing isn't nearly as good), and shouted that he was in gear, and had dropped my gear in the clearing. I replied that I had the disk from the camera, but it may be contaminated, and that no one could see it until CDC cleared it. Then I trotted into the clearing making sure that Pete and Bill were way clear, put on my MOP suit, left the disk, and started back to the site.

  When I got back to the site, I picked up the camera, put a new disk in, and started down to were the bodies were. It wasn't worth my time to check the pulse on the bodies, I couldn't have felt it anyway through the MOP suit gloves, and the corpses were very obviously just that. There were huge boils and blisters all over, in many places the skin had burst and new boils had formed underneath. The skin was sagging off of the muscle tissue, and based on the green, black, and red froth coming out of their mouth and nose, the insides were just as bad as the outsides. All in all, a really disgusting way to die.

  I started by taking film of everything, using a flashlight with one hand and the camera with the other. I had the night vision optics for the camera, but they're worthless for color and detail work. After I got a few shots of everything 'in situ', and a couple scans of the area as a whole, I started walking down the path they had driven up, to act as a barrier until I could get some relief. This was going to be a long and messy night.

  About twenty minutes later, one of our patrol vehicles started to pull up the road, with disco lights flashing. I got on the radio the second I saw the lights, and told him to stop right there. It was the Lt., and she wasn't sure whether to be pissed or scared.

  "John, I'm coming up there, tell me what the hell is going on."

  "Lieutenant, if you have MOP gear on, and you want to cost the Dept. a brand new Durango, and you are willing to bet that MOP gear is what is keeping me alive, instead of my medical condition, and you are willing to relieve me of site command, you come right ahead. But I really don't want to explain to your husband why you died of something that didn't kill me. So, if you don't MIND, MA'AM please stay upwind of this mess until we get someone out here to tell me if I'm going to drown in my own dissolved lungs later tonight, and what the Hel killed these guys. What I really need is someone to start laying out an inner and outer perimeter, at least as far away as you are now, with check points. I also need a wind plot. Until we know otherwise, I have to assume this is contagious, or some form of toxic gas, and we may end up cordoning off an awful big area." Well, that wasn't going to get me any brownie points with the lieutenant, but right now I wasn't too worried about my future with the department.

  *****

  What followed was a very long two hours. Several more officers checked in with the lieutenant and were put on the perimeter until we could get someone to tell us what was what. The only good news was that the winds were light and steady, so whatever the Hel this shit was, it would only spread in one direction. The bad news was that the direction is down hill, towards civilization, if you could call Index WA. civilization.

  At two hours and forty-five minutes into this disaster, I heard a sound I hadn't heard in several years, the womp, womp, womp of a CH-47 "shit hook" (the official name is a 'Chinook' but you know how troops are). If you've ever heard one of these heavy lift helos, you'd know what I mean when I say that they have a unique noise. This one flew in upwind and stopped a couple miles away at a hover, then lifted off again, and flew back upwind.

  About ten minutes later, I heard the growl of a diesel engine coming up the path, and the L.T. saying "OK John, here's your Hazmat experts." Three or four minutes later, the vehicle I had heard hove into view from around the bend of the path. It was an eight-wheeled armored vehicle done in standard US Army Woodland Camo. This thing was buttoned up tighter than a frog's ass, was moving very slowly, and looked sort of like an Army Stryker, except that it didn't have a turret. It stopped behind the trailer the victims had brought in. (Now they were victims, three hours ago they were suspects, ain't language wonderful?)

  This eight-wheeled rig stayed there for a few minutes, then moved over to where the bodies lay, and I could see a probe come out of the bottom and take samples. A couple minutes later, it went around the area taking more samples, then parked. The guys inside moved around for a while, then the speaker on the top clicked.

  "Well Officer, it's not chemical, and it's not a military bug." The speaker was a little scratchy, but clear enough.

  "OK, what killed these guys ?" I snapped.

  "Damned if I know, but either it wasn't B/C, or it's gone now."

  "OK, next question, ever heard of anything that will do that"-- I poi
nted at the bodies-- "not kill someone 75 yards away, and disperse in under three hours?" I asked sort of peevishly.

  "No, I haven't, but I know of several things that will do this sort of thing, and become non-lethal within 30 minutes. Trouble is, all of them are area effect, and all of them leave traces," he responded.

  "OK, how about something that we have an inoculation for?"

  "Why would you ask that?" replied the disembodied voice from the Chem. vehicle.

  "Because I was SOCOM, and I was the guy 75 yards away who didn't die!" I snapped.

  "No, everything I have ever heard of leaves some sort of residue that we can test for, most of it disperses within 24 to 48 hours, but nothing like this. Just stand by though, we're only the initial team, CDC is right behind us, they wanted us to go in first and insure it wasn't military."

  "Oh, lovely, you mean I may have some sort of new bug named after me?" About this time I heard several sets of footsteps coming up the path. A few moments later they hove into view, all in bright yellow Moon Suits, with CDC in red on the front. "Hi guys, if you are guys, glad to see you, I think." This just wasn't turning out to be my day.

  "I'm Doctor Madison, this is Doctor Apple, and Doctor James, and the rest of our team," said the lead suit. "And you are…?"

  "Officer John Fisher, Federal Park Police, I'm the guy that called you out."

  "Good, if you'll just go with Dr. James here, we can get started."

  "Um, folks, there is just one little problem, this is still a crime scene, and I'm still the OIC, until relieved, and once this all gets cleared away, there still has to be some evidence." By now I was getting just a little nervous, OK, a whole lot nervous, but I would never admit something like that.

  There were still people walking up behind the doctors, we seemed to have about ten guys in CDC Moon Suits, and more coming. Then one stepped out from behind the others, and I noticed it was a bit shorter than normal, and had tape over the "CDC" and "Police" written on the tape. Oh Hel.

  "Hi, Lt. Murphy."

  "All right, Fisher, I have a suit on, I have the evidence crew in suits right behind me, I relieve you, go with the nice doctors." She seemed to be taking a little joy in this.

  They took me down the road to this trailer that looked sort of like one of the high dollar Airstreams. Inside, I was ordered to strip down to nothing, and put all of my metallic objects in this box sticking out of the glass wall in front of me. I opened up the box and it was full of this nasty green horrible smelling shit that had the consistency of baby snot.

  I looked through the glass at the guys on the other side, and said "You want me to put my pistols and other weapons in this stuff? You have got to be out of your mind."

  "It's that or lose them to the incinerator, officer." said one of the guys on the clean side.

  Shit. Fine. "OK, but have one of my team take charge of them and clean them up for me please. I might just survive this you know. If I do, I will be wanting these. Now, what about my clothes?"

  They told me to put all of the clothes in this special bag, and started to teach me how to 'J seal' it. I informed them that I had been J sealing stuff when they were still in grade school. Soon all of my clothes had disappeared into the bowls of the CDC, never to be heard from again. This cost me my lucky boonie-hat damn it!

  *****

  The next day and a half was an unending series of medical tests, blood draws, X-rays, and more tests, all conducted with me on one side of a glass wall and everyone else on the other. I had to go over the story more times than I can remember, we all watched the tape several times, I had to answer questionnaires about my health past, present, and future. Had to change back and forth for the good doctor…After that they left me alone, other than to come in and check on me, get me food, etc… for another five and a half days.

  *****

  At the end of this interminable ordeal, one of the doctors walked into the glass room I had been living in for the last seven days, and said "OK, you can leave now."

  "Just like that, no check out interview, no bill, just 'you can leave now?' I'm hurt." Dr. Apple was the one who had done most of the actual patient interface with me, and I had to give her a hard time.

  She grinned and said, "Actually, I think your lieutenant has been chomping at the bit to get you back in the field, and she's waiting outside."

  "Oh joy, oh rapture, cheree, cher-fucking-roo, this can't be good, sure you don't want to hold me for a few more days?"

  "Aw, is the great big puddy tat afwaid of the little girl?"

  "Oh, shut up. I'm going. Just as soon as you give me something to wear other than this damn gown."

  I walked out of the trailer in the clothes that one of the boys had brought for me, and thank the gods they had, or it would have been prison coveralls for me. When I got out of the door, there was Lt. Pam Murphy, 5'4", red hair, button nose, freckles, nice set of tits, and a husband damn it. She was OK to work for most of the time, but had never been in the military, so she didn't understand some of the things that the guys in our unit knew instinctively.

  As I stepped out into the sunshine (Yea, it wasn't raining!) she smiled at me with that slightly predatory smile of hers, and said "Welcome back John, through gold bricking yet? The pot case is tentatively closed, but you have two new ones."

  "Huh" I replied, OK, so it wasn't too witty, hey it had been a long couple of days.

  "I said, you have two new cases, both of them related to the Grow Operation case, which we have tentatively closed." She gave me that grin again.

  "Alright, I will deduce that Chuck, and George, and their two unnamed confederates did not die by some unidentified plague, and that their death has been declared suspicious, so that's one new case, but what the hell is the other one?"

  "You have a clue," she said, "remember when 'George' said 'we don't want any more surprises'? Well, we found their first surprise. Here are the pictures and the lab reports."

  What she handed me was a manila folder almost an inch thick. In it were thirty pictures, and the complete pathology report for a murder, plus the autopsy reports on the four I saw die. The victim was a Hispanic male, 22-25 years of age, weight estimated at 170 lbs, height 5'10", dressed in jeans and a flannel shirt, with two rings, and a watch (see appendix A). The victim's name is unknown, the only difference between this guy and the guys you see walking around during picking season anywhere in farm country was a gold ornamental object dangling from a chain around his neck. (see appendix B for full description and assay report.) He was killed by an edged weapon, multiple defensive wounds, probably a machete, then buried in a shallow grave on the grow site. According to the lab report the murderer was left handed, and the victim was not in the system. Well, there were any number of illegal immigrants in Washington at this time of year, most were pickers for the apple growers, and most also did brush picking on the side, a sideline that could make them a fair amount of change by their standards. I had to wonder why someone with almost 5 oz. of gold would be picking brush though.

  Of course, the other option is that he was part of the drug dealing chain. So, all I have to do is find someone in the illegal alien community or the drug running community that knew the victim and would be willing to talk to a 'Federale', sure, no problem. I also noted that the body had been in the ground for about four to six weeks, matched no missing person cases, and appeared to be well fed and healthy prior to the murder.

  Included in the pictures were pictures of "Chuck and George," and their up to now unnamed buddies. Both Chuck and George had their pistols on their right sides, and not in cross draw holsters, the other two didn't have guns on, but their wallets were on the right side, and their watches were on their left sides, 98% that they were right-handed. So much for easy answers, none of the guys I watched die were the murderers. Damn, and I was hoping for poetic justice. Of course if it had been that easy, Lt. Murphy wouldn't have handed it to me, she would have just closed the case.

  Then I went on to the autopsy
reports on the four I had been watching. Chuck was Charles Alberts, George was George Geisendanner, and the other two were Anthony Bivens, and Michael Snedker. All four were students at U.W., with student I.D. cards, drivers licenses, and all of the other paraphernalia normally found in the wallets of the average American male. The pathology and toxicology reports were more interesting, the victims died from drowning in their own blood, and their livers were missing. There was no indication of what happened to the livers, the doctor that conducted the autopsy believed that the liver of each subject had dissolved, but could not explain how or why that happened. What was amazing was that they apparently died for no reason. Toxicology showed no trace of poison, microbiology showed no infection, the CDC indicated that there were no unknown microbes in the bodies, the ground, or the only witness (Officer Fisher, PSP, see appendix M), nor were there any known disease vectors present. The samples of fluid collected from the pustules were composed of dead white blood cells, and lymph, with no indication of what infection might have caused it. The lungs were filled with blood, as if from a blister agent, but there were no toxins found. The one thing that was sure is that this wasn't an accident. Healthy wealthy college kids don't just drop dead of something that looks like a Biblical plague by accident. Hey, wait-a-minute, Biblical plague…