Evacuation (The Seamus Chronicles Book 2) (4 page)

The warm sun on my face feels so good that I want to roll over, pull up the covers and go back to sleep. I know I can’t do that; I have something more pressing to do. For a second I can’t remember what it is and even that makes me feel good. I crack my right eye to look at the clock radio and check the time. Blank.

If we lose power, it will hurt me on so many levels. While I had run a number of long-term simulation models, this is the first real-world test of my reactors’ longevity. If it fails, I am a failure. Even the investigation of the issue will be arduous and take time away from figuring out if leaving the planet is our only chance for survival. We could build a new reactor in maybe three days, but I would need help from Cassandra.

“Morning sleepyhead,” Sofie says from where she stands in my doorway.

“Good morning.” I feel a broad smile across my face.

“I unplugged your alarm last night.” She’s returning my smile. “I talked with your Dad and he agreed that you needed the sleep. Please don’t be mad.”

Mad? How can I be mad at her? In the few days that I have been doing my chores, I have seen much more of Sofie. It’s still in passing, but we exchange a few words and have an easy repartee. I really like
her.
Her personality, her sense of humor, her intelligence, and yes, her looks. Very much her looks. We would have hit it off when we met no matter what the circumstances.

“I’m not mad.” Still can’t lose my goofy smile. “Thank you, actually. I guess I did need the sleep.”

“I brought you coffee,” she says and crosses the room to sit down on my bed.

The intimacy of having her on my bed while I am in it causes a physical reaction. As a kid I would go to my room to read, think and sometimes listen to music. When I wanted to be safe, I got in my bed. If I were scared of monsters or bad guys at night, I would pull up my covers and trust that the cotton and polyester would protect me from all harm. Sofie is nearly in my last refuge.

“Wow. What did I do to deserve this?” My surprise is genuine and I’m starting to get a little confused.

“You’re going to think I’m crazy, but please hear me out,” she says. Her smile is not goofy, but is maybe optimistic. “I want you to come to the beach with me today.”

I feel the smile drain from my face. “I really would love that. But-”

“Wait. Your dad helped me load a ton of files on an iPad and Liam put a ton more on a Bluetooth portable drive.” She’s talking fast. “You can come with me and still read though the database. You don’t have to stop working. Unless you want to.”

“I don’t know.” I cannot go with her. There is work to be done and it is not trivial. Can you imagine getting to heaven and having everyone look at you and say, ‘That’s the guy that went to the beach instead of saving the human race?’ But Dad and Liam at least are onboard. I wonder why she isn’t taking Liam to the beach. “Why don’t you see if Liam wants to go?”

“Seamus, I love Liam.” She is serious now and this may not work out in my favor. “He is thoughtful and kind and funny. But he’s basically my brother. I thought you and I had a special connection,” she says.

“What the hell? Let’s go to the beach!” I pronounce. I’ve always been irresponsible, but not this way. I feel like I’m going to regret this. The quote ‘Live like you were dying’ comes to mind; maybe we are all just going to die.

“Yeah!” She gives a little clap and hops up. “I’ll go pull a car around. Meet me downstairs in five.”

The door closes behind her and I get out of bed. I cross to my dresser and pull out some jeans and a   t-shirt. Probably should bring a bathing suit, but I’ll have to find it first. It’s hard to believe this is happening. A girl asked me on a date and I am passing up research to go to the beach. I wonder if Dad and Liam have a bet about whether I go or not. I slide on my flip-flops and head for the door.

Just as I hit the sidewalk Sofie pulls up in a white Jeep with the top down. It is loaded with a cooler, umbrella and radio. This was not a spur-of-the-moment idea. I wonder if she involved everyone else in her plan?

“Hop in!” she says. I am seeing a new side of Sofie now.

The ride to the beach takes almost an hour. Only for one minute did I want to reach back and get the iPad out to read. The rest of the time was spent just being. The wind and road noise were too loud for us to talk but it felt right sitting there next to her. I felt like we were both really happy.

At the beach I carry stuff down to the sand and do my best to set up. I’m really not sure how a day at the beach works; I’ve never done it. Sofie spreads out a blanket and pops the umbrella before sticking it in the sand. Now what?

              “I’m going to go explore. You can stay here and maybe get some snacks ready.” She has to keep brushing the hair out of her face because of the wind.

              As she hops and skips down the beach, I dig into the cooler and pull out some cheese, cured meats and a box of crackers. I notice a bottle of wine, but don’t think she’s ready for a drink at 11:20 in the morning. With nothing left to do, I sit down on the blanket. I wonder if she is expecting me to dig into the database? Was this all a big ploy to get me working in a different environment to see if it would help figure things out? I doubt Sofie would do that. If she wanted me working, she would have suggested it or even asked. She has never been anything but straight with me; it’s not fair for me to question her intentions.

Not being expected to work makes me want to work. I lean back and grab one of the iPads from the bag. The puppy wallpaper and Style Savvy icon make it clear that this is not the one intended for me. I put it back and open up the other one.

Late yesterday I started a new train of thought. I began looking at the database as if I were responsible for building it. How would I organize things so that it was useful? I think about a business database that would contain huge volumes of data. Prices, model numbers, component lists and on. Any business function that needs to track something can add one or more fields to the system. It could get large and complicated fast. But not complicated enough.

Then I think about the human genome project; massive amounts of data relating to the DNA of humans. Decoding one tiny segment requires millions of pieces of data. This is a more similar scenario. The person interested in the gene for hair color needs a significantly different portion of the database from someone interested in the gene that defines how your pancreas grows. But they all go together somehow to create a human.

In my case, we have a database that contains information on the alien impact of artifact dating. I always laugh at this and imagine a little green Martian in a fedora tiptoeing into a lab and stealing a sample. The truth is actually cooler, though. From reading, I have learned that gamma radiation from space alters the molecular structure of organic material. It can cause statistically significant variances in the carbon dating process.

On the other hand, we have information on the way aquatic organisms consume oxygen around undersea lava vents. The research is inconclusive but it seems that they use the heat from the lava to process seawater and separate the hydrogen from the oxygen. Because they are so small and so scarce, there is almost no measurable impact on the environment surrounding them. The process, however, could be revolutionary.

It’s almost as if they were trying to figure out how to build another planet. The search for the origins of life is well-documented. The desire to use that information to build some sort of Frankenstein planet is less well-known. Frankly, it’s quite shocking. However, I feel like I’m starting to get a handle on the intent of this database. What I don’t see is how it relates the survival protocol for a global catastrophe.  

Short of nuclear Armageddon, none of the global catastrophes would completely destroy life on this planet. So why is it that these scientists were directed to this source for addressing the spread of a virus? I guess it doesn’t really matter. Maybe we should just try and figure out the nuclear winter survival protocol and follow that.

I type “Nuclear winter” into the query box and get more hits than I had imagined. Having a query and an idea is refreshing. The volume of text to parse is a bit overwhelming. The back of my mind can start working on solving the puzzle, too; how would mankind survive a nuclear winter?

The first several links are interesting but not immediately helpful. Calculating the spread rate of a nuclear winter, determining the length of a nuclear winter, identifying the end of the nuclear winter. There are also some chilling and not at all interesting links. Things like a nuclear winter based on a first strike and nuclear winter based on a counter strike. I suppose a survival protocol would need to vary based on the timing of a war, but it is revolting to think this would be considered so academically.

The link at the top of the second page of results immediately grabs my attention. The title is “Managed Nuclear Winter.” They have envisioned a reason for intentionally plunging the planet into a nuclear winter and wiping out all life forms. This must be a humanitarian entry. There will be a brief apology for destroying the planet and a long document on the history of mankind.

If I were on my stool in the lab, I would have fallen off. Last sentence, first paragraph. “This is to be considered a low success rate last option for the response protocol in the event that the sore loser virus is deployed.” Sore loser virus is linked. This feels like what I have been looking for but I don’t want to click on it. I know that if I am right, I will be led back to the page I am on. The page I am on gives me a low success rate last chance. Because of the virus, but not in the way that Jane and Cassandra see it.

Click.

The sore loser virus is a biological weapon. It was designed in a lab and not only causes the killer cold but adapts to survivors. This much we learned from Jane. It is a relentless microscopic, parasitic organism that can only be killed through intense radiation. The theoretical use was for combating an invasion of human-eating aliens, though from linked phrases, I can see that there were discussions about using it as a component of biological warfare. Regardless, if America was not going to survive, the virus would be used to ensure that no one survived. 

There are two links near the end of the document. One is titled “Response to Localized Release”; the other is “Response to Global Release.” We have seen the global impact of this virus. It was not a localized release. I know which link I need to select and I can already envision one of the documents it will take me to.

Selecting the link lands me on a single page. The title is basic, but one we never would have guessed: “Sore Loser Virus, Response to Global Release.” There is an ordered list of steps and topic headlines. Each headline presumably linked to the detailed instructions for that topic. At the bottom of the list, the final instruction reads “Initiate Managed Nuclear Winter” with the link color indicating what I already knew—it is a page I have previously visited.

We have to irradiate the whole planet and wipe out life on Earth.

Jane was right. If we want to survive, we need to leave the planet. What isn’t clear is how to initiate the managed nuclear winter, or how long it will last. Perhaps we can tough it out on the International Space Station until the radiation drops to a survivable, if not comfortable, level.

What do I do now? I’m not a leader. I don’t like standing up in front of people and telling them about what I know. My mind was at once critical of the response protocol. Clearly it was constructed after the virus. How could it not have been a requirement that any biological weapon have a safety valve? You don’t build something that can destroy all humans and then try and come up with a way to survive its accidental triggering.

More disappointing is the fact that this virus was built in the last ten years. At some level, it would be understandable if this thing had been stumbled upon in the 1940s. There were no computers then that could have been used to simulate the impact of an accidental release. Manufacturing it would have been the only way to prove it was possible. No, with computer simulations and the technology available today, this virus should have been left on a computer.

I have to let go of the past, though. Any thought cycle spent on what they should have done is a wasted cycle. Moving forward is the only thing left to think about. But how do I move forward? I don’t want to keep information from anyone the way Jane kept the database from us. At the same time, I’m not sure what good a presentation of my findings would do if they are not coherent and are full of more questions than answers. My Dad is about to see how average I can be.

Sofie, on the other hand, continues to be way above average. She came back from her walk and sat on the blanket with me. I gave her a few extra minutes of ignorance. Knowing what we have to do is a weight that cannot be lifted. After finally telling her what I found, she closed her eyes, breathed deeply and then found the bottle of wine. But rather than getting drunk, she had one glass while quietly looking out at the ocean.

It was weird to convince her to stay at the beach. She was ready to pack up and head home so we could share my findings with everyone. I needed time, though, so she read and built sand castles while I organized my thoughts and validated some assumptions developed in my reading. All together if felt like what a nice day at the beach is supposed to be. I guess that’s good since, it is the last time that will happen on this planet for the foreseeable future.

Now that we are finally back home at Ames I have to stop thinking and start doing. Sofie agreed that I should sit down with Dad first and figure out how we proceed. I thought Mom might be better, but Sofie has more history with Dad and sees him as more of a guidance counselor than my mom. I’m just about across the parking lot and to the shed where Dad and Liam were last seen. I hope that they are just throwing darts or playing video games and not emptying the beer fridge. If Liam is there I’m not going to ask him to leave. He can hear it at the same time as Dad.

It’s quiet but not silent in the shed. From the space that serves as the conference room I can hear Dad and Liam talking. When I finally see them, Dad is standing at a whiteboard and Liam is sitting in a chair by the table.

“I don’t know what to do now.” My statement is not a greeting. I guess I don’t have to worry about false confidence.

“You found something Jane didn’t understand?” Dad is looking at me with hope in his eyes.

“Not really. I confirmed her understanding, and there’s more. But I’m not sure where to begin or how to move forward.” I haven’t been this nervous since I was forced to do an oral report in the fifth grade.

“Is there a cure?” Liam asks, cutting right to the chase.

“No.” I have no need to couch my answer. “We have to irradiate the entire planet.”

“Like with a nuclear bomb?” Dad is quizzical. While his generation has grown up with chemotherapy, they still think of radiation as something that comes from a bomb.

“Actually yes, a number of bombs or, more specifically, warheads,” I reply. I suppose Dad was right after all. But he probably doesn’t understand that we don’t have to destroy anything. The warheads will be detonated in the atmosphere and the fallout will cause the damage to life forms.

“What happens to us?” Grace’s voice is coming from behind me. She walks into the conference space and stands next to Dad.

“Well, there appear to be a few choices.” This is what I have been trying to understand for the whole ride home. “Basically, as Jane said, we have to leave. Either the virus will kill us or the eradication of the virus will kill us.” It sounds overly simple, but that is the truth.

“We have to leave Ames?” Liam has not followed the logic this far.

“No, the planet,” I say. If there were other options, I would have struggled with my answer.

“Okay. Let’s go over to the lab building and get everyone involved in this. Maybe we can hide out in a fallout shelter,” Dad says, already walking to the door. “I don’t want there to be any secrets and we can’t afford to rely on ideas from just one person. No offense, Seamus.”

“Please tell me there is a spaceship waiting for us.” Grace asks when we are about halfway across the parking lot.

“Grace, let’s save our questions and comments for the conference room,” Dad says. He probably needs some time to think. “Liam, go round everyone up. Let them know that Seamus has some answers and we are meeting to discuss them.”

Liam turns and starts to walk toward the dorm.

“Oh, and Liam?” Dad calls after him. “Attendance is not optional.”

In the conference room, Dad is totally in charge. He starts moving all the chairs to one side of the room and making space at the whiteboard. “Seamus, bring up the database on the overhead. I trust you, but you need to
show us
what you’re talking about.”

He drops a legal pad and some pens on the table. “Grace, you’re here. I want you to write down open questions, unknowns and any weird comments. Our gut reactions may provide insight that future over-analyzed thoughts might miss,” he says.

“What are you going to do?” I ask, as if he weren’t doing anything.

“I’ll get some waters and snacks. We may be round tabling for a while,” he says, and he is out the door. 

When he returns with a cart full of snacks and refreshments, Liam is in the room along with Sofie, Mom, William and Randy. Grace is at her station but I am standing alone at the side of the table. Leaving his cart in the back, Dad comes to me and physically escorts me to the front of the room. He surveys the gathering and is thinking about who is missing. There are ten adults at Ames, and Dad suddenly can’t remember all of them.

“The Crenshaws?” Dad is back on track.

“I told Cassandra she could have a few minutes to try and get her mom out of bed. I guess she hasn’t been eating or doing anything since… the other day,” Liam says, nervous about his answer. “She’s smart. I thought we could use all the brains we could get.”

“Fine, but we are going to start without them.” Dad pauses to survey the room. “Seamus, the floor is yours.”

“Ummm. Jane was right that we have to leave the planet. But it’s not just because of the virus; we have to detonate a bunch of warheads and plunge the planet into a nuclear winter.” I was hoping for a Hulk-like transformation that would give me presentation skills and confidence. No such luck.

“Buddy, why don’t you take a step back and tell us what you found,” Dad says. He’s in dad mode now. I wonder if this is something unique to him or if it’s a skill all parents possess. A minute ago he was a drill sergeant; now he’s a calm supportive therapist.

“Right.” I turn and look at the projection. “I found something called the ‘sore loser’ virus. The U.S. government, under the auspices of deterring an alien threat to our planet, engineered it. Its goal is to leave no humans alive on earth. The information isn’t new, but now we have a name.”

“Does this mean we survived an alien attack?” Mom has the first question.

“I don’t know.” Not having the answer is hurting my brief burst of confidence.

“I suppose it doesn’t matter,” Grace says, looking back at the room.

“It may matter, but we can’t spend time worrying about that with no evidence.” I have the floor again. “On the wall is the response protocol for the ‘Global Release of the Sore Loser Virus.’ It’s short and you will notice that it is not called a survival protocol.” This nuance of language is just hitting me.

“Are you sure that the pandemic was caused by the sore loser virus?” Mom asks, looking at Randy and William.

“No.” William responds first. “We
think
it was but there is no one to validate that assumption.”

“Understood.” Mom makes it clear that we do not need a conversation.

“Let’s assume Seamus is right; he usually is,” Dad says. “Do all those steps tell us what to do so we can survive the nuclear winter thing?” Dad wants to net it all out.

“No,” I say, wishing I had another response. It’s not my fault. That is the honest answer.

“Do you think Jane knew about this nuclear winter aspect?” Randy asks, an anguished look on his face.

“My mother did not know about a nuclear winter.” Cassandra is now in the doorway. Jane is not with her.

“Then what part tells us how we survive?” Dad is still not really speaking to anyone in particular.

“For that, it seems we have to freestyle a little bit.” I don’t know what words to use. We have to make something up.

“Which is why you told me we have to leave the planet,” Liam says. At least now he seems to see the end game.

“So that means that my mother was right and you really need our help,” Cassandra says. She has taken a seat, but she is not with the others.

The room is silent. I’ve had several hours to digest this information. Everyone outside of Sofie is hearing it for the first time. The rest still have to go through doubt, sadness, anger and acceptance to move on. It’s not just Jane and Cassandra we need.

“The truth is, if we are going to pull this off, we need everyone.” I don’t like ad-libbing or lecturing but I seem to have their attention. “I’ve had some time to digest not only the information, but also what it means to us. Why don’t the rest of you take the night to read through the protocol and come up with your own thoughts. We can meet back here tomorrow at, say, 9 a.m.?”

“If we had to start tonight, what’s your plan?” Cassandra wants to know the idea she needs to improve upon. She is used to winning.

“Simple really. Step one, leave the planet. Step two, find a place to live for the next five hundred years.” It’s the same as Jane’s. It’s smug and blunt, but that really is the basic plan.