The Plague Years (Book 1): Hell is Empty and All the Devils Are Here

by Rounds, Mark

  “Hell, we need to trash the whole thing!”

  “Whose idea was this anyway ...”

  “Ok folks, settle down,” said Dr. Riley. “This isn’t helping.”

  “The reason,” said Macklin continuing his briefing, “this information was withheld was that there were more delicate issues to deal with. We need to minimize a panic response. At this time, there are over two thousand infected individuals restrained in hospitals, isolation wards, and private sanitariums all through California and Nevada.

  “The disease has a period of three to seven days where it is symptomless. Then the patient develops dementia, a reduction of liver function that results in the build-up of heme in the blood, and a ravenous hunger which we think is the body’s reaction to the lack of nutrients in the blood. As it progresses, the patient becomes adverse to exposure to bright lights, irrational, and calorie requirements increase to ten thousand a day and more.

  “Even with a diet in excess of ten thousand calories they lose weight, suggesting some form of intestinal condition where they lose efficiency in reducing food nutrients. They also slough off tissue at an alarming rate, and become more and more irrational. Paranoia and violent behavior are common as is the desire to eat any meat proteins, including human. Unfortunately, they often attempt to bite their care givers and this often transmits the disease. Here is a slide showing the spread of the disease.”

  The map on the screen started out in the Sierras but subsequent slides showed the incidence of new cases tended to follow interstates and rail lines. The growth rate was accelerating.

  “We have reason to believe,” said Macklin, “that there is an untreated indigent population of homeless, migrant workers, undocumented aliens, and other individuals who, for various reasons, wish to avoid official notice. We believe this is how and why it has spread so fast.

  In the last two weeks, epicenters have appeared in New York, Miami, London, Paris, Saigon, Moscow, and Tokyo. These we believe came, ironically, from an allied academic conference on disease control that was held at the University of California at Davis, not far down the road from Sacramento, three weeks ago. Several prominent researchers are among the first fatalities.

  The best data we have, all the data, has been loaded onto your network for you to begin your work of charting where it will show up next.”

  “What is the survival rate on this disease?” asked Dr. Riley anticipating everyone’s question.

  “No one has recovered to date,” said Macklin. “Many patients have died due to injuries sustained in attempting to escape their restraints. Others simply stop eating and waste away.”

  “Are there any effective methods to control the spread of the disease?”

  “The vector is confusing,” said Macklin. “We think the pathogen may have mutated several times since it was initially observed suggesting a virus, but that is pure conjecture. Exchange of bodily fluids such as sexual activity, biting, or ingestion of waste products are very effective means of transmission. Coming in physical contact with the infected or touching surfaces previously contaminated by some form of bodily fluid excreted by the infected have a lesser but not negligible chance of passing on the infection.

  “What the department needs from your group is an analysis of the infection rate and the potential effect of possible counter measures. Dr. Riley will personally supervise the first which will begin work on the effect of various counter-measures.”

  “If there have been no cases of remission, what counter measures can be of use?” asked Dr. Jurgen.

  “We are looking into various quarantine methodologies and other forms of segregation,” said Dr. Riley before Macklin could answer. “We have proposed various forms of ring quarantines but they have been put on hold by Homeland Security for now.”

  “Gunter,” Riley continued, “You will head up the secondary group which will focus on the real time secure data feeds and tell us where the current cases are and the most likely locations of the non-symptomatic sufferers.

  “Your personnel assignments follow the current groups with these exceptions”, said Riley as he flashed up a slide with a very short and fat org chart. There were just three groups. The two groups Dr. Riley had outlined and the Security Group.

  “The third group is the security group headed by Dr. Rousseau”, said Macklin. “In order not to create a panic, we need to keep all data very well controlled. Effective immediately, no one works from home, not even over a VPN. Everyone will check in and out through the check points Mr. Burnside is having erected even as this meeting is going on.

  The last thing we need is rumors of this work leaking out. There could be pandemonium. Mr. Burnside will also be enacting a series of protocols to monitor your behavior so that others will not be able to piece together what is going on.”

  There was a rumble at that. Research groups are often very trust based and didn’t take well to government monitoring and control.

  “Mr. Burnside, would you brief the staff on exactly what that entails?” said Macklin.

  Herb got up and headed to the podium. He had been in the Military Police for over twenty-five years in the Army, but he had also grown up in the area. This job was his way of returning home to watch over ailing parents. He also coached Little League in the spring and AAU Swimming in the winter and was known as a soft touch for every kid selling anything for any cause.

  “Well folks” said Herb in his down home southern way, “I just found out about this new security protocol this morning but expect it to be up and fully functional by tomorrow morning. We will be monitoring your credit card purchases, large cash withdrawals, excessive internet or phone usages, in short, anything that would tip us off that you were talking out of turn or making a bunch of purchases that might get people talking.”

  “This is like something out of a bad spy movie…..”

  “Who Ok’d this ….”

  “Now before you get all excited about this,” said Herb keeping his voice deliberately calm. “It wasn’t my idea. You can thank the folks from the other Washington for this. But make no mistake; I will enforce this to the letter of the law.”

  The rest of the briefing went on for another hour and half saying basically the same thing over again in great and glorious detail. Chad got back to his office at 12:30. He had three cups of coffee at the meeting along with two doughnuts and his stomach was twisted in a knot. He figured that since he was going for a late lunch with Dave at 3:30 anyway, he would hack out a preliminary estimate. The data was in standard formats and he was able to get his first map overlays completed in half an hour. He spent the next hour checking them and then he did a preliminary run and a forecast. The results were sobering.

  Chad sent an e-mail to Dr. Jurgen asking for an appointment as soon as possible to go over his preliminary results. He got a response back almost immediately that he should come at 2:30, forty-five minutes from now. So he quickly typed out a memo detailing his results and printed a couple of maps he would need to explain his point.

  At 2:30, he walked down the hall to Dr. Jurgen’s office.

  “Well Chad,” said Jurgen, “what have you got for me?”

  “Well sir, I went forward with the basic assumption that the primary vector was the transient population of undocumented agricultural workers, drug users, and others who wish to be invisible and who are moving along the roads and rails via hitch hiking and riding freight trains. We are at the end of the pruning season for fruit trees and vineyards so the migrant workers are on the move.

  “Add to that the fact that Washington State and the other local universities and colleges either just graduated or will be graduating their senior classes, we are going to have a lot of traffic on the roads that are predisposed to picking up hitchhikers. They have been moving all over the area for the last week.

  “My best guess at a ninety five percent level of confidence is that the first case of pre-symptomatic infection is already in this area. My best guess is that we will start seei
ng symptoms in the area in the next three to ten days.”

  There was a long pause while Dr. Jurgen read completely the memo that Chad had written and examined the maps.

  Finally, he looked up from the maps.

  “Are you sure Chad?” Dr. Jurgen asked looking over the top of his half glasses. “If what you say is true, we will have to activate a bunch of security protocols in the next couple of days, not in the weeks we thought we had.”

  “If anything, I am being conservative sir,” said Chad.

  “Um well, I am going to have to give this to Dr. Riley and the Homeland Security team. Tell me, have you had lunch today?”

  “Uh, No I haven’t. I was going out to the Inca for a late lunch with a friend. I thought I would crank this before I left.”

  “Ah … The Inca, they make the best Mexican food around here and that’s saying something. Look, could you bring me back a chile relleno? Theirs are the best, and I suspect I won’t get much to eat this afternoon once this gets out.”

  “Sure, you want the red or the green tomatillo salsa with the chips?”

  “Green please, I’ll pay you when you get back.”

  Chad pondered that as he walked out to his car. His relationship Dr. Jurgen was professional and collegial, but not friendly. Dr. Jurgen didn’t mix all that well with the rest of the staff, following the old German professorial model. It didn’t fit, him asking Chad to bring him lunch, and Mexican food of all things. He had a legendary dyspeptic stomach that would have made actually eating a chile relleno with green tomatillo salsa verde treacherous.

  And then there was the way Herb had said that the security monitoring protocols were not in full effect until tomorrow. Herb was a professional, and if he had been tasked with securing an ice cream stand on the moon in four hours, he would have it done.

  Then it clicked. Herb was telling everyone to take care of anything that would arouse official suspicion today. Dr. Jurgen was giving him a reason to be out of the building before the restrictions went into place. He had at most, two hours before the security parameters change.

  He drove by his credit union on the way to the restaurant and made a snap decision. He made some quick mental calculations and withdrew slightly less than fifteen thousand dollars in cash. It came from their savings, Connor’s college fund, and the car maintenance fund. Mary was going to kill him if this was a paranoid response but they paid Chad to be an analyst and figure out patterns. This had to be it.

  Chad pulled up at the Inca’s parking lot to see Dave Tippet’s white 2014 4x4 Dodge pickup with the Cummings diesel, towing package, and rifle rack over the rear window of the King Cab. He got out, shook hands with Dave.

  “”Hey Chad, what’s up?” said Dave. “You look like all the worlds troubles just landed on your door.”

  “They may have Dave,” said Chad. “Do you have some paper with you?”

  “Yeah, I always keep a notebook in the truck to write down mileage, maintenance, and stuff like that.”

  “Ok write me out a bill of sale for your truck for $14,750. Date it today.”

  “What?”

  “Look, I can’t say a lot without crossing that NDA line we discussed this morning and I can’t talk about this at all once we get in the restaurant so I only have a few minutes before things look suspicious so let me talk and you listen.”

  “OK, shoot.”

  “The story is you and I have been negotiating over this truck for a month. It’s too big for you, being on your own and all, and I have been talking about buying a boat.”

  “Didn’t you once say that the definition of a boat is a hole in the water to throw money into?” said Dave.

  “I did. Remember, I owned that eighteen foot Bayliner for years? I know of what I speak, but let’s say I have the bug again. But somebody is going to be watching my purchasing starting tomorrow. I think I can convince them, if you back me up, that we have been negotiating this for a month and we finally came to terms.”

  “Then I want you to take this money and buy whatever you think we would need if, say you thought the fecal matter was going to hit the rotating air circulation device. The truck is still yours. I’ll square it with Mary … somehow.”

  “This is serious shit isn’t it?” said Dave as he wrote out the bill of sale and handed to Chad.

  “God, I hope I am wrong but yeah, serious.”

  “Can you give me any more intel on what I am preparing for?”

  “If I did, I’d have to kill you.”

  “Funny guy, can I ride along on this one with some of my own funds?”

  “Shit, if I am wrong, you’d have a bunch of survival stuff sitting in your garage and me to thank for it.”

  “You mean a bunch more survival stuff”, said Dave with a smirk. “Look, you did four years active and some reserve time in the Air Force as an enlisted intel analyst right?”

  “Yeah, so what?”

  “And then you went to college, finished a Bachelor’s, got the bug and finished a Doctorate in statistics with a minor in Operations Research in four years right?”

  “Yeah?”

  “And you are risking your personal tranquility at home by betting fifteen thousand on this? You are one of the smartest people I know. You are not only book smart, but real life smart. I think this is a hunch worth riding on. No one is going to point a finger at me for buying survival supplies as I have been doing it for years. Here, take this,” said Dave as he reaches into his truck.

  Dave handed Chad a Colt 1911 New Agent with the 3 inch barrel in .45 ACP with a shoulder carry rig.

  “I can’t carry this into what will be a secure facility!” said Chad. “They are setting up metal detectors and the works tomorrow.

  “Don’t,” said Dave. “Smuggle it back to your office today, before the metal detectors and such are in. Hide it in your file cabinet or something. If you were going to stay home all the time, I wouldn’t do this, but I figure you are going to work some long hours before it gets ugly and chances are, you will have to travel home from work one time when it’s greasy. This might save you. If the bad stuff happens when we are home, abandon it. It’s only a gun. I have more,” said Dave with a laugh. “Now, with your permission, I think I’ll go spend a bunch of your money.”

  Chapter 2

  May 5th, Friday, 03:25 am PDT

  Interstate 82 is a lonely place after the bars are closed and the drunks are all home, thought Washington State Patrol Sergeant Chris Vaughn as he pulled on to the interstate eastbound from Benton City. He was back on the road having just finished booking an attorney with an over-inflated view of himself and a breath alcohol level of 0.13. Normally, administrative work kept him stuck to his desk but getting a drunk off the road was his favorite excuse to play hooky.

  ”Kennewick - local patrols; County requesting back-up, eastbound I-82 at I-182. Priority” said the dispatcher over the radio.

  “299 en route from Benton City,” said Chris into the microphone as he stomped on the accelerator and activated his emergency lights. His brand new Chevrolet Caprice was significantly faster than the high-mileage 2011 Ford Crown Victoria he had recently turned in. As a former driving instructor, he knew the Caprice was ‘scary fast’ but exactly what someone would need at a time like this.

  “299 – Kennewick, I’ll be there in about four minutes. What do we know?”

  “A Benton County Deputy with unknown number of subjects, one tased, not in custody.”

  “Crap,” Chris said under his breath. “That can’t be good; a deputy in the dark, all alone in the middle of nowhere with a bunch of bad guys not playing nice.”

  Chris had now accelerated to nearly one hundred and fifty miles per hour and was praying a deer wouldn’t jump out in front of him. He’d totaled a patrol car that way once and he couldn’t afford to do that right now.

  Chris spotted the lights on the Sheriff’s SUV, slowed down and took a chance to close by heading the wrong way down the exit and off onto the rough ground between th
e Interstate and the exit.

  “299 – Kennewick, out with County.” Seeing the deputy’s body language and drawn pistol, Chris ignored his AR-15, opting instead for the Remington 870 pump shotgun loaded with #00 buckshot. In the dark, he wanted the 870, figuring that brute firepower trumped accuracy.

  Chris exited the car and took cover behind the fender.

  “Deputy, how can I help?” Chris shouted.

  “Over here!” she said without turning.

  Chris ran up to where the deputy was standing. He knew her. Hoskins was her name. She was a good deputy, steady, especially for being just twenty-four and she was not what his ex-wife would refer to as ‘an ornament.’ She was attractive with a lean athletic build, short dark hair, and soulful blue eyes. More than one of his troopers had commented on it.

  “You OK? How many?” Chris asked.

  “Yeah, just one, he went down there under the overpass. I sure as hell wasn’t gonna go alone.”

  “Radio said you tased him.”

  “Six times! He’s gotta be on meth or PCP or something. After the sixth ride he stopped trying to come at me and somehow managed to break the Taser wires. Six full five second rides and he never dropped, just sort of staggered a bit and wandered off. Like I said, I wasn’t gonna follow him by myself. Now he is back down there below the overpass doing something I can’t make out.”

  Can you see him?” asked Hoskins.

  “Yeah, let me get a light on him,” said Chris.

  Chris pulled the Streamlight flashlight from his belt and lit the dark area under the bridge.

  “My God!” said Hoskins. “It looks like he is eating someone!”

  “Here, keep the light on him,” said Chris as he gave her his light and brought the shotgun to bear. He chambered a round and looked over at Hoskins who had adopted the text book stance left hand reversed holding the flashlight and her Glock Model 22 .40 braced on top of that.

  “Stand up and move this way!” shouted Chris. “Get your hands where I can see them!”

  “I’m eeeevil!” shouted the shape under the bridge. The voice was raspy, vaguely recognizable as male, and it sounded like every word hurt. There was a liquid flutter with the all the hard consonants.