Masked

by RB Stutz

  Once the patient was stabilized, they took a blood sample and found the virus in the sample was no longer active. With this news, they worked to produce as much anti-virus they could and administered it to the infected as it was ready. They gave the treatment to the infected in all stages of progression, initiating the cardiac arrest, so that there would be less organ damage due to longer exposure to the virus.

  The treatment worked in about 72% of the patients it was administered to. For the other 28%, the virus was neutralized, but they were unable to be resuscitated, their bodies too weakened by the infection. Most of the patients the treatment was successful with were younger than their mid-twenties. All of the patients who had a successful treatment were left in comas.

  Almost immediately, after the anti-virus was first administered, new cases of infection ceased. It seemed the virus had stopped spreading. The CDC reported there had been over ten-thousand people infected, all of whom were in the U.S. The virus never spread beyond domestic borders. Of the over ten-thousand people infected, only the last one hundred and thirty-four were able to be treated.

  To the amazement of the doctors treating the now comatose patients, they saw the patients bodies begin to heal and repair the physical damage caused by the virus. He told us we were five of the only ninety-six people who they were able to treat successfully. Others had woken before us, but there were still forty-two who slept.

  None of us said a word as the horrifying facts were laid out before us. It was all I could do to just sit and listen, as they told a story too incredible and disturbing to be true. I’m sure my jaw was resting on the table.

  While waiting, I had played out different scenarios in my head, of why I was there and what might have happened, but nothing I’d imagined was anything close to the fantastically nightmarish tale Caldwell told. It was impossible to believe, to fathom how any of it could be real, yet there I was.

  James sounded unconvinced. “So you essentially killed us via heart attack and brought us back from the dead?”

  “That is correct,” replied Dr. Roberts. “Once the body stopped taking in oxygen, the virus completely became inactive.”

  “So…, how long have we been in a coma?” Rachael asked the doctor.

  Dr. Roberts looked to Caldwell. He nodded. “The first person to regain consciousness woke after approximately two months. The five of you were unconscious for approximately nine months.”

  Alex pounded on the table. “We’ve been asleep for nine months? Why the hell didn’t any of you think to tell us this before?”

  “We’ve really been here that long? Asleep?” James added, again more unconvinced than angry.

  “Yeah, why would you hold this from us? What the hell kind of people are you?” shouted Rachael frantic and panicked.

  “Where are our families, our friends, does anyone even know we’re awake? Does anyone even know we’re alive?” I questioned, anger quickly stealing momentum from the shocked state I’d been in.

  How could I have been asleep for nine full months? Even though I didn’t remember what I had before, the fact I knew I’d lost so much time of whatever I did have was extremely upsetting. Nine months was a long period of life to sleep through. Did I have parents, a family, mourning over me?

  Sara had a look of utter shock on her face, no anger, just a sad despair.

  After the round of outbursts, Caldwell patted the air with his palms. “Settle down. Please. I know this news is not pleasant to hear and is a lot to absorb, but we have more to discuss with you. Please just settle down.”

  “You didn’t answer Michael’s question. Does anyone know we’re even alive? Our families?” Sara asked in a quiet, solemn tone.

  The room was quiet for several seconds before he responded.

  “No one knows you are here and there are reasons why that is so. Please, just let me continue to explain.”

  No one else responded, but we all settled back into our seats, showing our willingness to have him continue. He took our cue and proceeded.

  He went on to explain in as early as the first tests performed, they were able to determine the virus had been manufactured. A non-stop search began to determine where the source was. All known terrorist groups, both domestic and international, were under watch. All government agencies with operatives in the field were looking for evidence that could link any of these groups to the virus.

  Caldwell’s team was the first to get any lead. They found a trail of documents supporting the purchase of certain materials needed to manufacture such a virus. The document trail lead to a minor subsidiary of a large conglomerate, Labyrinth Technologies, which was mostly involved in consumer technologies research, but also had several weapons contracts with the Department of Defense. Upon further investigation, they found a prominent U.S. senator with significant influence in the defense arena had a controlling interest in this subsidiary.

  Caldwell’s group, for the previous several years, had gathered intelligence on a group they knew existed, but remained hidden. They believed this shadow group was masked within the U.S. government, but operated outside of its laws and governance. Evidence suggesting this group existed had been found, but there was no tangible proof on who was involved and what their agenda was.

  Based on what Caldwell’s team did know, the shadow group had powerful people in the U.S. Government involved in order to have the influence implied. Caldwell’s group could only speculate what their agenda was. The shadow group was most likely lead by individuals who were unhappy with the way the country was governed and their ultimate goal was most likely to first take control of the U.S. Government and then exert their influence for a more global agenda.

  There were leads in the past Caldwell’s group had followed and they always came to a dead end. One of the leads from years before was the Senator. His activities were monitored for some time due to suspicions, but nothing concrete was ever found against him. Once the connection was made to the transactions and his controlling share of the subsidiary of Labyrinth, suspicions rose again.

  One of the scenarios worked up as to how this shadow group might be able to gain control in the government was the orchestration of a national emergency on a large scale which they could use to put the final pieces into play for power. Creating a super-virus to unleash on the country was a likely candidate to cause such an emergency. With the right people in the right positions, a large national emergency could give a group like this the remaining power they would need.

  Once Caldwell’s group was able to put those scattered pieces together, they were at once reorganized and refocused. They operated under the cover of a specialized research and intelligence arm of the U.S. Army. A General at the Pentagon oversaw their operations and outside of him, their actual activities were unknown to anyone else. His team’s directive was that they were to penetrate the secret government and stop them from carrying out any further atrocities against the American people as well as stop them from gaining any additional power in the government.

  After telling us this, he paused to clear his throat before going on. I couldn’t help but wonder why he was telling us so much. If what he was saying was true, it was highly classified knowledge was being poured out to a group of ex-comatose teenagers. There had to be a reason why he was telling us so much and my mind could only find two possible scenarios. Either, we would never be allowed the chance to repeat anything we were told or we were somehow integral to what he was describing. Just the fact we were victims of their virus was not enough to warrant full disclosure of classified secrets.

  I didn’t say anything and neither did anyone else. For whatever reason he was telling us the whole story and I was intrigued and ready for the punch line.

  It turned out I didn’t have to exercise any additional patience because the punch line was delivered.

  “When you were ravaged by this virus and taken from you families and friends, you were as good as dead. Everyone knew there was a 100% mortality rate. Those who cared for you
were required to turn you over to attempt to stop the spread of the virus. As far as you family members and the rest of the world still know, you’re dead.”

  “Why wouldn’t you tell anyone?” Alex shouted, outraged.

  I couldn’t hold it in anymore, his message was so blatant. “So get to the point. We’re officially dead and you plan on keeping it that way. What is it you want from us,” I blurted out, anger controlling my tone. I didn’t care if I was young and out of my league, that he was some high ranking military official. We were stolen and being kept from our lives. That pissed me off. I was growing tired of the slow procession to the point.

  “So are we prisoners here then? We can’t go back to our lives?” Rachel shouted.

  “Is what Michael said true?” said Sara, more anger in her voice this time.

  “Settle down, settle down,” Caldwell said in reaction to our protest. “Please just let me continue. I’m going to explain everything. You are not prisoners here, but I do have more to tell you. Please, just let me continue.”

  We all settled down. Everything he was saying as well as what was left unsaid filled me with a fierce sense of unease. I thought having to run through an hour-long presentation of facts before being able to just explain what’s really going on didn’t leave much room for trust. From my perspective, it all seemed to just be a crescendo of crap was and whatever was at the top would probably smell worse.

  “Everyone who had a successful treatment was in a coma. Vitals were good, but we had no idea if the coma was temporary or permanent and what kind of permanent damage the virus had done,” the colonel started again.

  He went on to explain they decided to keep the existence of a successful anti-virus quiet. The reasoning for this was they simply didn’t want the group that had developed the virus to know there was a cure. If they did, they might abandon their plans and move on to something else that couldn’t be anticipated or countered.

  If this shadow group remained ignorant to the fact, and decided to carry out their plans, there would at least be some ammo against them. In anticipation of this, massive supplies of the anti-virus were manufactured and stores of it deposited all across the country.

  Even with sufficient supplies of anti-virus though, there would still be thousands of casualties if the virus was re-released into the public. In order to try and prevent any further attack, Caldwell and his group remained focused on identifying this group in order to be able to stop them before they could do anything further. Public knowledge of the virus was simply that it came and killed a lot of Americans and it stopped spreading due to the efforts of the CDC quarantining all those who had been infected.

  News of the anti-virus developed by Dr. Roberts and her team was quickly stifled; even from reaching to the company they were with. Caldwell convinced Dr. Roberts and her team to join their group to continue the research on the virus and head the production of the anti-virus reserves.

  James sneered. “Ok, so what happens when we show up again after being dead for nine months? I expect there’ll be a few questions. Hello mom, I don’t remember you but I wanted to let you know I’m not dead. Can you show me to my room?”

  “What about the others that woke before us? What’s happened to them,” I said.

  “It’s like you said before Mike, it won’t be an issue. They have no intention of letting us go or know who we are,” interjected Alex in a calm voice.

  I guess he had decided he could call me Mike. It seemed no stranger than Michael at the time. Both names were new.

  “Is that true?” Sara shouted. “Are we really not going to be allowed to go home or even know who we are?”

  “You just can’t take away our lives like that,” Rachael added as she stood up, outraged.

  “Please, please, please. Let me explain,” said Caldwell shouting to be heard over the angry group of five sitting before him, “Please. You need to listen. You need to understand all of the facts.”

  “You keep asking us to let you explain and that you will give us answers, but please just cut the crap and get to the point. What the hell do you plan on doing with us?” I blurted out frustrated and angered at his dancing around the issue.

  “You are all dead to the world. A disease swept through this great nation of ours and you are the casualties. Your families, your friends, they have all dealt with the pain of their loss. As you think about what we tell you, please consider your families and friends you were taken from. You may not remember who they are, but know they are there. They have suffered through enough emotional pain and torment. Hopefully, by now, they have started to move on. Hopefully, by now, they are working towards being happy again. And what if they are? What if they have moved on? Do you really want to upset their new found path towards trying to be happy again?

  “Also think about their safety. Think about the safety of everyone in this country. If you show up, alive and cured of the effects from the virus, then the people behind this vicious attack will know we have the cure and we may not be able to anticipate what their next move will be. Exposing yourself as alive could be fatal to so many more thousands of Americans, including those you have left behind. I am sorry for all you have lost, but I am not sorry for saving your lives.”

  He said the last part, raising his voice some at the end and paused for a few seconds. Everyone was quiet.

  “You, as well as all of the other survivors thus far are in a unique position to help us stop something like this from happening again. You do not exist except to those who are working diligently to stop the group behind this atrocity. What we want to propose to you is what we have proposed to the others before you. We want you to work with us to help stop this group. We want to train you to help us infiltrate this organization and stop any further atrocities.”

  “What exactly are you proposing?” I asked. “You want us to work in this facility? In what capacity? Are we even qualified to help you? It doesn’t look like any of us are old enough to have finished high school.”

  “We want to train you to be field agents to help carry out our mission. We will provide you with the knowledge and skills you’ll need.”

  James laughed. “Just because we don’t exist doesn’t exactly make us qualified black op material.”

  “Surely you’re kidding, right?” I added, finding it hard to believe what he was telling us. “You’re going to take a bunch of post comatose teenagers from various backgrounds and train them to be secret agents? Aren’t there certain skill sets and proficiencies one must possess in the first place? Don’t we have to be eighteen to join the military?”

  No one else responded to the colonel’s proposition, but waited for him to respond.

  “Well, your qualifications do extend beyond being officially dead.” He said.

  He went on to explain when the first few people started to wake up, they weren’t sure yet what they were going to do with them. The best course of action they saw was to give new identities and a new life somewhere outside of the U.S. Of course, they would need to be monitored to be sure they didn’t attempt to find out about their past life and blow the cover of the operation. The problems with that plan were the uncertainty of whether the memory loss was permanent or not and once everyone woke from their comas, there would be a lot of people to keep track of.

  They held the first few for a while. There were tests performed to ensure the virus was still benign and to identify any long term effects of the exposure. What was ultimately revealed was their DNA had been altered. They were unsure whether the alteration was a result of the virus itself, the anti-virus, or a combination. Either way though, a survivor’s DNA was definitely different than of normal human DNA. It was just shortly after that discovery the survivors started to exhibit the effects of the change.

  CHAPTER 7

  “What do you mean by altered?” James asked. There was a pause. “Do you mean mutated? What does that mean to us?”

  “So we’re not human anymore? Is that what you’re telling us?” Sa
ra interjected.

  Dr. Roberts stood up, stepping beside Caldwell. “Yes, you are still human. You still have human DNA. The virus has just… changed it slightly.”

  “You said the first survivors began exhibiting effects from the change? What’s going to happen to us?” Rachael demanded.

  For me it was complete information overload. My emotional switch moved between fear, anger, sadness and worry. There was a lot of disturbing information to take in, we had died, were essentially resurrected, in a coma for nine months, can’t go back to the lives we had, probably will never remember anything from our pasts, are going to be secret agents, oh yeah and have somehow been mutated. I think that was everything. I guess it could have been worse, the list could have ended at we died.

  Of course the good doctor didn’t answer our questions, but left us hanging on her words. A simple explanation wasn’t going to be enough.

  “We’re not going to answer that, but take you to meet some of the others who have been awake a bit longer. You will better understand if you can see for yourself,” Dr. Roberts explained.

  Masters and Batton stood to join Caldwell and Dr. Roberts. “This way please,” Batton directed us to the door.

  I looked at the others. We all gave what looked like a coordinated shrug of the shoulders in a silent expression of “what choice have we got?”

  We stood and followed Batton out of the room.

  It was a short walk through a series of plain grey corridors, much like the trip earlier that morning to the conference room. We passed numerous doors; each identified by a four digit alphanumeric combination, but saw no other people. Batton led us to a door marked “TC15”, opened it and walked in.