Before her sat the most powerful man on the planet. Utterly, completely alone.
And entirely open to suggestion.
Her feelings of pity were short-lived.
DAY THREE
CHAPTER 51
General Rammes stood no more than a few feet away from the most fantastic killing machine he’d ever seen. What had been Sergeant Wilson a few hours before now stood on the other side of the thick Plexiglas shield, yellow eyes burning furiously with a hatred and hunger that escaped description.
It just stood there. Staring back at him. Eye-to-eye. Unmoving, except for the slow rise and fall of its chest. The eyes didn’t even blink.
Behind those eyes, Rammes could sense intelligence. It was a horrible creature, rebuilt for rapid killing, but there was something un-animallike about the eyes. There were thoughts running through its head. It was watching him. Examining him. Studying him. It was reasoning.
The interior of the room was now dark, as the creature had smashed the overhead lights about an hour ago. The things had an obvious aversion to light of any kind, but the fluorescent lights of the holding room didn’t have the destructive effect that sunlight did. When the things entered sunlight, they died. They were true creatures of the night. Modern-day vampires mixed with the cunning of the wolf, the running ability of the gazelle, the strength of the grizzly bear, and the killing ability of a swarm of blood-frenzied great white sharks. Unstoppable, except when they were blown limb from limb. And there were so many.
Behind the creature, another set of bioluminescent eyes glowed from the darkness, the mutated rat slowly moving from one edge of the room to the next, its gaze fixed squarely on the general.
“It’s waiting for orders.”
“General?” Carolyn swiveled her chair away from the computer screen she had been studying for the last few hours.
“I said it’s waiting for orders. The rat. It’s waiting for orders from the bigger one.”
“How can you tell?”
“I’m an old soldier. I can tell.”
Garrett rose from his chair by Carolyn’s workstation and stood by the general. “It makes sense, sir. I’ve seen it. The rats react to the bigger ones. They understand audible commands. When I grabbed Carolyn from the crash site, one of the big ones seemed to alert the others to my presence. It was a low, moaning sound. As soon as it let out that sound, the whole wave of the things turned in my direction.” He shook his head. “It didn’t dawn on me until what you just said.”
As if on cue, the thinker let out a moan. Even through the thick Plexiglas, the members of the Vanguard team could hear it. They could feel it in their chests.
The rat began to scratch at the floor. Slowly at first, and then the motions grew more frantic. Its front paws, tipped by the long, black claws, tore at the steel floor, scratching away a layer of paint.
The thinker broke its gaze with the general and lowered itself to the floor. Its long arms began flailing at the floor, claws trying to dig through the steel.
“Carolyn? What do you make of this?” Rammes asked.
Carolyn glanced at the clock on the far wall. “It’s time for them to go to ground. The sun will rise here in a few minutes.”
“How the hell can they know that? They’re hundreds of feet underground!”
“General, have you ever known what time it is, even though there’s no clock in sight? Have you ever woken up just a few minutes before your alarm clock is set to go off?”
“Yes, I’ve done that before.”
“Biological clock. In some creatures, it’s as accurate as anything that comes out of the Naval Observatory. Quite amazing, actually.” She stood next to the general, watching as the creatures scratched furiously at the steel floor. “Most of us only experience it in subtle ways, like waking right before the alarm clock goes off. Some people have more advanced awareness of it. They can tell the time of day even after being secluded from any normal source of time—the sun, a clock, anything. Some can even tell you what day of the month it is even after being secluded for extended periods of time. We’ve seen it in some POW cases.”
“So you’re telling me these things instinctively knew it was time to start digging?”
“That’s right.”
“Looks like the little bastards are going to be awful disappointed when they can’t get through that floor.”
CHAPTER 52
The city of Little Rock, Arkansas, was a bloody mess.
The Army Stryker vehicles entered Little Rock from the east and northwest on I-40, moving rapidly toward the portions of the city that had been under attack by the flocks of mutated birds.
There were cars leaving the city, but not many. Not many at all. Blackhawk helicopters circled overhead, their speaker systems thundering evacuation orders to the survivors below.
The scene was unlike anything any of the soldiers had ever seen. Bodies littered the streets by the hundreds, torn apart and shredded by the thousands of ravenous beaks that had eaten them alive during the night. Arms and legs were still recognizable, but the torsos were mangled. Eyes had been plucked from screaming heads, tongues torn out from shrieking mouths. Quick. Incredibly violent.
As the eight-wheeled Strykers entered the center of the city, the drivers were forced to slow to avoid driving over the dead. They slowly weaved through the city streets, trying as hard as they could to show some measure of dignity toward those who’d been their fellow citizens just a few hours before.
It was a horrid scene.
A scene that was being repeated in Oklahoma City and Minneapolis-St. Paul as the sun began its leisurely rise into the sky, marking the start of another day. A day of hiding for the mutated creatures. A day of planning for their human foes.
Soldiers spilled from the combat vehicles, rapidly spreading out to find any sign of the birds that had so ravaged the city. They ran to the shadowy places—the darkened buildings, the alleyways, the sewers. They searched the back rooms of buildings, the attics of houses.
It didn’t take long to find them.
Where there wasn’t direct sunlight, there were casings. Thousands of them. Small, oval-shaped cocoons, gray and hard as bone, completely harmless-looking, but inside—the soldiers knew—dwelt incredible evil. Changing. Growing. And if the last day was any lesson, multiplying. Doubling in number. Preparing themselves for another night of flying. Of feeding. And killing.
The ground waves, as they’d done twenty-four hours before, had stopped their advances and had encased themselves in the thick, bone-like cocoons. But this time, they hadn’t gone deep. Most were just under the surface, no more than a few inches. Some were even visible, their curved surfaces breaking through the soil and dully reflecting the morning sunlight.
In very short order, their locations were mapped. Analyzed. Subjected to computer simulations of nuclear blast effects. To the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the data looked promising.
“This is Metzger.”
“Hello, General. What do you have?” Jessie Hruska was comforted by the voice on the other end of the secure phone.
“The casings in the three bird cities are out in the open—in buildings, houses, the sewers—well within our reach. One weapon each should eradicate them.”
“And the ground waves?”
“Different this time. They’re not buried deep. They’re almost entirely on the surface.”
“On the surface?”
“Nothing deeper than a few inches. We don’t know why, but they’re there. We figure two to three weapons for each ground wave location should finish them off. If we hit them before sunset, this thing could be over.”
The chance to destroy them before the sun set again was just the answer they’d been looking for. Ending it now, though, would ruin her plan.
The whole situation had been a blessing in disguise, the chance the
y’d all been waiting decades for. A worldwide crisis of unimaginable magnitude, developing rapidly, stressing every single means of control. Complete and utter chaos. The perfect playing field for all those placed in positions of power—or at least beside those positions of power—to shape the unfolding situation into the cataclysmic realization of destruction. On a global scale.
She knew she had to manage the situation. Controlling the president would be easy enough—he was now entirely subjugated to her every whim. It was those around him who worried her. The other members of his cabinet. And especially, the vice president. Allison Perez knew Andrew better than most and would surely be attuned to any personality changes. If Perez were close, Jessie could possibly arrange another “accident”—like the one that removed Andrew’s dear Kate from the equation—but the bitch was nowhere near Washington, DC, completely out of reach. Jessie knew she had to act fast. Decisions had to be made.
“I’ll brief the president, General.”
“Copy. Metzger out.”
Jessie quickly made her way to the Oval Office.
CHAPTER 53
“At sunrise yesterday, every single one of the things went to ground to avoid the sunlight. They dug deep and encased themselves in the cocoons. To multiply.” Carolyn pressed her face mask against the Plexiglas wall, trying to see into the shadows.
“What are these things going to do, since they can’t get underground?”
“I say we wait and see, General.”
“Wait a minute. What’s that on the big one’s back?” Garrett asked.
A bubbling foam had appeared along the length of the creature’s spine, slowly spreading across the thing’s back.
Carolyn shined a penlight toward the back of the room where the mutated rat had been scratching. The same foamy substance was spreading out from its spine, as well.
She was shocked as the thinker suddenly stood, its eyes just inches from hers on the other side of the Plexiglas wall. Its mouth opened, revealing row upon row of glistening, obsidian shark’s teeth. A low moan escaped its open maw.
She screamed and stumbled back, landing quite unladylike on her hindquarters. “Son of a bitch!”
“Are you all right?” Garrett asked as he helped her back to her feet. He was trying hard not to laugh.
“Yes, damn it, I’m fine.” She pulled her arm away as he let out a genuine grade-A chuckle. “The thing just surprised me, that’s all.”
“More like scared the living shit out of you, I’d say.”
She shot him a warning glance through her face mask.
“Oh, come on, now,” Garrett said. “It was funny! We haven’t had anything to laugh about in a while.”
Her expression didn’t change.
Oops, he thought, not in a mood for humor. Better keep my trap shut.
“They’re making their cocoons,” Rammes said. “Take a look at this—they’ve stopped trying to dig, too.”
They watched as the rat crawled back into the security of the opened ammunition box, the foamy substance now covering most of its body.
The thinker turned and crawled under the examination bed, finding shelter. It too was rapidly being covered by the foamy mass.
Within minutes, revealed by Carolyn’s penlight, both the mutated rat and the thinker had been completely covered by the thick foam, which was now starting to darken, from white to gray. It was solidifying. Hardening.
“When they’re done, we need to take them out of there.”
The statement made every single person in the clean room turn and look at her as if she’d just loosed one of the loudest lady-farts ever heard in human history.
Garrett spoke first. “You’re kidding, right?”
“No. We need to see exactly what’s going on inside those casings.” She turned to Josh Ewing, who was, like everyone else, staring at her in disbelief. “Josh, I need a CAT scanner down here ASAP.” She turned to the general next. “Sir, we should be safe until sunset—they won’t start to emerge until then. If those casings start to crack even one millimeter, we’ll blow them both to holy hell.”
“Funny, that’s what I was going to say. And Carolyn?”
“Yes, sir?”
“That was spoken like a true trooper. Hooah, Ms. Ridenour.”
“There’s that damn word again.”
CHAPTER 54
His face.
As with every person she’d manipulated with the drug over the years, their faces were always the same: glassy, vacant eyes, mouths hanging open ever so slightly. They were puppets whose master had abandoned them. Left them motionless. Powerless.
As she walked into Andrew’s field of view, she watched his expression immediately brighten and come to life. His puppet master had returned.
Now more than ever, she knew she had to keep him secluded, away from the others, lest they see him in his weakened state and decide to act. It wasn’t going to be easy, but if she was successful, she wouldn’t have to do it for long.
“Andrew?”
“Yes, Jessie?” Andrew fumbled with the papers on his desk, trying to appear occupied. After all, he was the president of the United States and being un-busy wasn’t part of his job description. He knew he must’ve been doing something before she walked in. He just couldn’t remember what it was.
“General Metzger reports they’ve mapped the locations of the casings.”
The president’s mind was foggy, as if he had woken from a long sleep. But if that were true, if he’d fallen asleep at his desk, why did he feel so exhausted? “Did they find the birds? Are they still in the cities?”
“Yes. Hidden in buildings, houses. Out of the light. They’re concentrated, Andrew. General Metzger is confident they can all be wiped out with a single weapon each.”
A single weapon each? he thought. What kind of weapon? Is Metzger suggesting using nuclear weapons on American soil? Gradually, the president’s thoughts returned to their proper place. He’d considered—no, nearly decided—to use nuclear weapons himself. It was the only way. Conventional weapons weren’t working. They couldn’t work. Didn’t. Multiplying too fast. Too fast. Chemical weapons didn’t work. Resistant to their effects now. Nukes are the only way. The only way to stop this. Stop it. Before it’s too late.
Jessie watched, fascinated, as Andrew struggled with his thoughts. She knew what he was thinking. Knew what he was remembering. She’d made sure he was convinced conventional weapons weren’t the answer, which, in this case, was actually true. She’d also convinced him that chemical weapons were a possible answer—even though she knew using them before the Vanguard team had evaluated their effectiveness was taking a huge gamble. A gamble that had been paid with thousands of American lives. She’d hurried her president into making that decision, so in reality, the blood of the innocents was on her hands. So be it.
Her voice seemed unnaturally loud in the quiet of the Oval Office. “It’s time, Mr. President. It’s time to use all resources at your disposal to eliminate this threat.”
“Get me General Metzger. Right now.”
“Andrew, I just told you I talked to—”
“Jessie, I need to speak with him now, please.” The voice was forceful, yet still clouded by the drug-induced connection he had with the woman standing before him.
He was a strong man, she knew. Probably the strongest man she’d ever tried to control. It wasn’t surprising he would maintain some of the character traits that brought him to the presidency in the first place. They would be hard to undermine completely. But, they could still be controlled. Enough. “I’ll connect him immediately.” She reached for the secure phone on the president’s desk and asked the person on the other end to immediately connect her to General Metzger in the NMCC. It was a good sign that the president had not simply picked up the phone and done it himself—he needed her to do it. For him.
“Metzg
er here.”
“General, this is the national security advisor. The president wishes to speak to you. Stand by.” She pushed a button on the phone and returned the handset to its cradle. “It’s on speakerphone, sir.”
He didn’t object.
“Thad, this is the president. I understand you’ve located the bird casings.”
“Yes, sir. Their locations have been mapped in all three cities.”
“And the ground waves?”
“They repeated their digging from yesterday morning. However, they are barely under the surface this time. Some of the casings are even visible, poking out of the ground. These locations are also completely mapped. Unlike the birds, the ground waves are somewhat more spread out and harder to—”
“Destroy with a single weapon, General?”
General Metzger paused, suddenly uncomfortable with the president’s tone of voice. “Yes, sir. It would take two, maybe three weapons to destroy each of the ground waves.”
“And the birds, General? Can they be destroyed with a single weapon targeted against each of the cities?”
“Yes, sir. We’ve run their locations through numerous nuclear blast simulations. Completely eradicated them each and every time.”
“And have you run the ground wave locations through the same simulations using multiple weapons?”
“Yes, sir. Similar results.”
“What are the effects, General? What are the long-term consequences?”
“Well, sir, that depends on the timing of the attack.”
“Explain.”
“If we strike now, we’ll lose significantly more people to the immediate blast effects. I’ve heard that the evacuations are ongoing, but moving slowly.”
“So, you’re suggesting we strike later, after letting the evacuations proceed for the rest of the day?”
“No, sir. That’s your suggestion, not mine. I can’t make that call.”
“Then what is your suggestion, General?”
The Gemini Effect Page 20
