The heavy government sedan behind me gained on my anemic truck despite the best I could do; it wasn’t long before I heard the impact of bullets. But five thousand gallons of Eden-Plague-infused solution protected my person from harm. Three hundred yards to go.
Unfortunately the wheels were not so well covered. I felt one of the dual tires in the right rear go flat, and I steered gently, carefully, to avoid getting the liquid sloshing and so overturn the truck. Only two hundred yards now.
The car roared up, trying to get alongside on the right, upwind of the mist. I kept the speeding truck close to obstacles on that side – parked cars, fenceposts, curbs – preventing them from passing me. One hundred yards.
The truck shuddered and I felt the other right rear tire go. The vehicle settled on its suspension and I could barely control it, so I just kept my foot on the floor and aimed for the piece of fence that separated the sports complex from the water treatment plant’s eastern perimeter road. Strips of shredded rubber banged into the fender well, louder than the gunshots, and I prayed for speed as the barrier came up.
I crashed through.
I still had about thirty miles per hour going for me and I was holding it as I roared along next to the enormous rectangular pools that held and distributed the water for treatment. I blessed the designers of the Eden Plague, as Elise had told me that the processing would not kill the virus. Even now, the mist was settling into the pools, contaminating Los Angeles’ main tap supply with the life-giving microbe.
I’d almost made it to the end of the complex when I felt the tearing of a bullet in my shoulder and my right arm went numb. My vision blurred and the unstable truck yawed to the left, then rolled once and ground to a halt, breaking open the tough plastic solution tank. I felt the liquid slosh onto me.
Moments later the legs of my pursuers walked into my line of vision. My head was at an awkward angle, pressed against the ground and the remnants of the broken driver’s window of the truck. Dust and grit swirled over me, getting in my eyes, and I was sure my body was broken in several important places. I wondered whether the virus would knit my bones in this awkward position.
I could hear the buzz of a helicopter getting closer. It didn’t matter. I’d done the job.
“Should we get him out?” asked a voice attached to the legs.
“They said not to touch him. He’s contaminated.”
“This whole thing’s probably contaminated. Stay upwind. Besides, he can lie there and bleed for all I care. Scumbag terrorist. ”
“Did they say what the stuff is?”
“No, just some kind of chemical. Nothing too bad. I already called it in. They’re shutting down the plant until they can make sure the water is safe.”
“High five, partner.”
“Yep. Might get a commendation out of this one.”
“We should.”
The sound of the helicopter drowned out their conversation, though it barely added to the gritty wind. The legs walked out of my line of sight. I waited. It seemed like forever, but was probably just a few minutes. I drifted off in a fog of pain. This was good, because the gnawing hunger of the Eden Plague was coming back.
I awoke to the smell of plastic and my own bodily fluids. The world looked blue, but that was just from the colored sheet covering my face. It was loose enough for me to breathe, but I couldn’t move. I think I was wrapped and taped. I could hear sounds of activity nearby, snippets of conversation and orders. It sounded like they were cleaning up the crashed truck. I felt myself being lifted. The motion told me that unfortunately I was right; pieces of me had healed into an unnatural configuration. My mind drifted to wondering if someday Elise and the rest would be able to adjust the virus to straighten out bones too.
A resonant, commanding voice rose from the babble. “Put him in the chopper.”
I laughed to myself, my mind seizing on irrelevancies. Nobody who actually lived and worked around helicopters called them ‘choppers.’ Aircrew called them ‘airplanes” or ‘birds’ or sometimes ‘helos,’ or by their military designation – ‘Black Hawks’ or ‘Sixties’ or “Hueys.’ Never ‘choppers.’
Amateurs.
They put me inside the running bird, which sounded to me like some kind of Sikorsky, probably a UH-60 Black Hawk. I was in the hands of the enemy, now, and in God’s, Cassie would say. I sure hoped she was right. I could use some God right now. I closed my eyes, said a prayer, and let the pounding of the rotors lull me to sleep.
***
It had taken five days for Nightingale and Nguyen to work their way back up through Mexico, eventually crossing using false documents at San Ysidro, the busiest border station in the US. Now they were checked into a nondescript motel in Mission Hills, California, eating free continental breakfast and watching the headline news.
“Search and rescue forces of three nations were mobilized today as the cruise ship ‘Royal Neptune’ was reported overdue to arrive at Port Canaveral, Florida from Bermuda. While the US Coast Guard cautions against speculation, the internet is already buzzing with talk of the latest victim of the Bermuda Triangle.”
The two men turned to each other with ill-concealed horror.
Larry downed his coffee. “Damn. DJ was right. They hijacked it, quarantined it,” he whispered.
“Or sunk it to the bottom with a torpedo. The war, it is starting.”
“So it is. Let’s go fight it.”
They drove their rental car the mile or two to the north edge of the fence line surrounding the Van Norman water treatment plant. There was a communications conduit thirty yards inside the fence, where it ran from the main structure to a point where it dove into the ground. Beneath the earth, it would join and run alongside the enormous pipes of the Los Angeles Aqueduct, providing a secure fiber-optic link all the way up the pipeline. The line connected the whole system together, computers at each critical node – control valves, hydroelectric generators, pressure sensors – and the water treatment plant in front of them. But right here, it was exposed.
Larry checked his watch. “Some time in the next hour, I’d say. You still think you can do it fast enough?”
“As long as nobody shooting at me, I do it in under one minute. If they are, I do it even faster.”
Larry shrugged, resigned. “Sure hope you’re right. This is gonna take some nice timing.” He stared at his phone.
Seventeen minutes later the phone beeped and the go-code displayed.
They immediately exited the car, walking up to the fence. Larry worked heavy-duty wire shears along the cyclone fencing, making a hole within seconds big enough for Spooky.
Nguyen slipped through with a tool bag in his hand, his eyes roaming over the concrete and steel facility. They were far away from any of the plant workers’ usual locations, and the fence line only got checked twice a day. He dropped to his knees next to the conduit, taking a battery-powered saw and slicing carefully through the thin conduit pipe. He peeled it away with pliers, exposing the fiber-optic lines within.
With a few deft movements of his fingers he attached a clip-on shunt, which interposed itself into the line. Now, unknown to the plant managers, Spooky had access to the computer that ran the whole system. He pressed a button and the LED on the shunt started flashing. He slipped back across the hot dry dirt, through the fence, and into the car.
The tiny flash drive in the device dumped the cyber-worm Vinny had prepared into the line, where it burrowed its way in and immediately started taking over the system. Within two minutes the control computer, though otherwise unaffected, would ignore all commands to shut down water distribution. It would take tens of minutes or even hours to manually close valves and stop the contaminated liquid from flowing out into greater Los Angeles. By that time it would be too late.
Larry put the sedan into reverse, backing into a position away from the fence but facing down the long perimeter road. “I know he said to leave right away, but I ain’t gonna miss this.”
“It will not
make us happy. We cannot interfere.”
“I know.”
So they had a front-row seat for the DJ Markis road rally. They cheered as he started the sprayer and crashed through the fence; they pounded the dashboard as he cut off the pursuit and kept the mist going; they groaned when the truck rolled, and the helicopter landed. And they sweated as they watched the blue-wrapped bundle carried on a stretcher into the helicopter, both men wondering to themselves whether Markis was alive or dead.
-24-
Infection Day minus one.
Cassandra Johnstone steered the bulk milk truck down the gravel track under the trees that line the little landing field outside of Athens, Georgia. She checked her watch. Ten minutes to go. She didn’t want to be too early; the less time sitting around, the less time for people to question her presence.
She pulled the truck over before the rough road broke out of the tree line. She was at the downwind end of the runway. Hopping out of the cab, she made a final check of the hose, the pump, and the fittings.
She looked up from her check as a single-engine, low-winged airplane roared overhead and landed lightly on balloon tires. It turned around and taxied toward her. She jumped back in the truck and drove out to the end of the runway, meeting the aircraft as it turned around and lined up for takeoff. As she pulled up, she looked over the plastic tanks, tubing and brass nozzles of the crop-duster.
David Markis waved at her as he climbed down from the cockpit. His expression was anything but happy, however, as he reached back in to drag a struggling figure out of the second seat. It looked like a woman, her mouth, hands and feet taped and her eyes wild with fear and anger.
“Sorry, I had to take her with me. She was too suspicious about me wanting to rent the plane.”
“It’s all right, I’ll deal with her.” At the bound woman’s muffled shriek, Cassandra reassured her. “You won’t be harmed, miss. And neither will anyone else. You probably think we’re terrorists but this stuff won’t hurt anyone. And I’m sure you’d love to argue about it but I don’t want to hear it right now.” She dragged the prisoner over to the truck cab and boosted her gently into it. From there she started the pump.
The senior Markis hooked up the hose fitting and quickly transferred the full capacity of five hundred gallons to the plane. As soon as he had it in, he unhooked and leaped back into the aircraft, taking off into the puffy clouds of the burning Georgia summer sky.
Once she had parked back in the trees, Cass looked over at the bound woman. “Look, I know you’re scared, but really, there’s nothing to worry about. If I take that tape off your mouth will you behave?”
She nodded, wide-eyed.
Cass’s phone beeped at her. She looked at the incoming text, nodded in satisfaction. She worked the tape gently off of the younger woman’s face, revealing a strong chin and defiantly furrowed brow. They stared at each other for a long moment.
“What’s your name, hon?”
“Janet Bills. You don’t look like a terrorist.”
“What does a terrorist look like?”
She squirmed uncomfortably. “I don’t know. Crazy eyes? Crazy talk?”
“Well, you happen to be right. I’m not a terrorist, we’re just doing something illegal. But it won’t hurt anyone, so don’t worry about it. In a couple of hours I’ll let you go and everything will be fine.”
“Where’s he going?”
Cass pondered this for a moment, then decided it didn’t matter if she told her. Besides, it was going to be a long vigil if they couldn’t talk about something. “Sanford Stadium. Athens. There’s a big Prosperity Gospel revival thing going on, all those suckers that think they can name it and claim it so God will give them a new Mercedes and a new bass boat. Lots of offering plates pouring money into the preachers’ coffers, just proving how much money God is giving the faithful. Talk about your self-fulfilling prophecy – for the preachers. About seventy-five thousand people. And they paid ninety bucks a head for the ‘seminar,’ not counting the concessions. You do the math.”
“My father’s a pastor, and he said those people aren’t following God.”
Cass nodded. “I have to agree with you there, honey. Sounds like your father’s a good man.”
“So what is he going to do? What’s in the tanks?”
“What do you think it is?”
Janet thought for a moment. “I dunno…skunk stink? Some kind of dye? Like throwing blood on people that wear furs? I can’t think of anything else that wouldn’t hurt people.”
“Smart girl. Would you like a drink?” Cass hoped Janet wouldn’t notice she hadn’t actually confirmed her guess.
“Sure.”
Cass opened the juice bottle, and Janet drank with her taped-together hands.
“So how did you get into flying?”
“I just always wanted to fly, so in high school…”
Cassandra kept her talking until David came back. Then she cut the tape binding Janet’s hands and hopped out of the milk truck. When she had climbed into the second seat of the plane, she threw the truck keys down to the waiting woman.
“There’s an envelope under the drivers’ seat with some money for the plane. You might not get it back. Have a nice drive, and sorry to inconvenience you. Oh, it kind of sticks in second.”
Janet nodded and waved.
They took off, winging their way northeastward. “I think I got a Stockholm buddy.”
“What? Oh, you mean like Stockholm Syndrome? You held her hostage and now she likes you?”
“Yep.” A pause. “So how did it go?”
“Seventy-five thousand new converts. Just not quite the religion they expected,” laughed Markis.
“Yes, and tonight and tomorrow they’ll pass through the Atlanta airport and go back home to a thousand different places and then there’s no way they’ll be able to squash it.”
“Lord willing and the crick don’t rise. But they’ll try.”
***
I woke to the smell of disinfectant and lanolin. My cell was dim and clean, my narrow bed’s covers of ragged rough green wool with “US” printed here and there on them. I’d seen the same blankets in a few old barracks back when I’d been in the Army, though these days they had mostly migrated to the surplus stores. There was a naked steel toilet with no seat, and a sink with only one tap; no hot water. A roll of paper, in an incongruously cheerful green wrapper
I struggled to a sitting position, finding myself unable to straighten up. My right arm and shoulder were pain-free but twisted like a lightning-struck tree trunk. I stared at the strange crook in my forearm, shoving aside the surreal feeling. The limb was useless; the muscles were so misaligned I could barely close my hand. It reminded me of someone with cerebral palsy; I was half of Steven Hawking. I tried to remember if he was still alive, and I said a little payer that the Eden Plague would find him and free that amazing mind from the prison of his crippled body.
My left side, hand and arm were more or less useable, though my ribs were a bit compressed. My spine must have been broken as well, and healed in this hunched-over position. Fortunately my legs seemed to function reasonably well, so I struggled to move over onto the toilet. I was clothed in orange pajamas, with a convenient elastic waistband.
The necessaries finished, I drank from the faucet and lay back down on my bunk, on my side in a semi-fetal position, and tried to ignore the cat-claws in my gut. The Plague wanted to be fed.
Booted feet tramped outside my door. The little window opened, then shut, and the locking mechanism opened with a heavy clunking sound. The door slid back, then sideways on rails, and three men in blue hazardous material suits, filter masks and face shields came in.
Two of them had those huge-barreled revolver-blunderbuss things. The enormous tubes pointed my direction, naked threats. The other man carried a stainless steel chair.
The two guards took positions in the corners to the left and right of the door, and the man in charge sat down on the chair across fr
om my bunk, in front of the door.
“It’s not airborne, you know,” I said without moving. “And I’m hardly in a position to jump you.” I held up my twisted arm.
“It’s just precautionary,” a familiar rich voice said, and my fears – my expectations rather – were fulfilled. It was Jenkins, the Third.
“I’ll say it again, Mister Jenkins. I am sorry about your son. I take full responsibility, and I’ll say so in front of any court or tribunal you care to convene.”
He laughed, a deep, cruel sound. “You’re never going to see the inside of a courtroom. You’ve just become a lab rat. A guinea pig. You’re going to bless the days when it’s just my scientists experimenting on you, because the other days, I’m going to test the limits of your suffering.”
“It’s our suffering that defines us, Mr. Jenkins.”
“What?”
“C. S. Lewis. Loosely quoted.”
“Then you are about to be defined quite vigorously.” He laughed again, a naked, evil thing.
“It sounds to me like you’re afraid. What is it that scares you?”
“If I fear anything, it’s the wanton disruption of the American way of life that you are trying to bring about. Have you thought about the chaos you might have caused had we not caught you in your little scheme?”
“What part of today’s ‘American way of life’ do you love so much? What part did the Founding Fathers sacrifice so much for? Is it our citizens dying of cancer? Heart disease? Or just traffic accidents? Is it the rampant violent crime, or drug use, or the PTSD of veterans like me? The drug use and PTSD that caused me to lose control and kill your son? We can get rid of all that if you just stop fighting it.”
He snorted. “Listen to yourself! You want to surrender the destiny of the human race to an untested virus that might mutate and wipe us all out. Or this thing could be a Trojan Horse designed by aliens or the godless communists to destroy the Free World. What if everyone welcomes it, and after a certain amount of time, or the deployment of some trigger mechanism, kablooie! Everyone infected with it dies or goes crazy, and the old Soviets win the Cold War from their graves while the Russians and Chinese and Al Qaeda laugh and cheer.”
The Eden Plague Page 18
