O-Negative: Extinction (32 page)

About 6.30 the following morning she heard running on the stairs and she twisted round in her sleeping bag to see if as expected it was Eddy coming to tell her everyone was dead.  Instead she saw it wasn’t Eddy it was in fact Brian.

“Tessa Tessa it worked its only God damn worked.  O neg blood plasma seems to do the trick.  Everyone is alive downstairs.  Even those who were pretty far along when we injected them.  Those brilliant Brits must have injected O neg blood plasma – they’ve actually found a way of curing or at the very least keeping those with the disease alive”.

“Brian that’s fantastic.  Jesus we need to see if we can get this news out to others.  I wonder how we could go about doing that…” She was overjoyed that Brian and the team had been saved but as she was babbling on about getting the news out to others she realised that in fact all this good news probably wouldn’t do a great deal of good.  The virus had already taken hold worldwide and unless you were sitting pretty in a bunker or possibly in the middle of nowhere - and had a freezer facility stocked with O neg blood plasma - you were screwed.

“Tessa I can read your face and yes I know it’s too late for most people but at least this will give those who made it into the bunkers something to use on all the non O negs who made it in there.”

She nodded.  “You’re right Brian you’re right.  If only we could have come across this sooner damn damn and double damn”.

Eddy had by this time awoken and on hearing the good news had jumped out of his sleeping bag in excitement.  He passed her his hand.  “C’mon Tessa time you let Mr McGovern and the others know the good news”.

She accepted Eddy’s hand and walked with him down to her office.  However she didn’t immediately talk to ‘Facility 1’.  She did something she knew Chad wouldn’t have wanted her to.  She broadcast on an unsecured frequency wide setting.  She wanted everyone to know that O neg blood plasma transfusions seemed to reverse or possibly even cure the disease.  Even if she didn’t love everyone in North America or in fact the rest of the world she still didn’t want everyone to die needlessly.  She got Brian to record the message explaining what he and the team had done and then put it on a loop for a couple of hours.  When she and Brian came back to her office after having a celebratory breakfast of dry crackers there was someone calling her on the radio - from a frequency she didn’t recognise.

“User 7456 on frequency 657 MHz I say again come in over.”

She wasn’t sure of the call references utilised but she responded as if she were ‘user 7456’.  “This is user 7456 can I help over?”

“User 7456 this is US Army Headquarters Virginia.  Where are you calling from over?”

Though she had made the transmission about the plasma transfusions she wasn’t sure she wanted to get too pally with whatever remained of the US Army.  And she was damn sure Chad wouldn’t either.  “Virginia I hope you’all understand that I would prefer not to reveal that information over the airwaves.  I can however confirm that a team of scientists I’ve been working with have trialled O neg blood plasma transfusions with positive results”.

“User 7456 can you confirm your location over?”

She sighed.  “Negative Virginia.  All I can say is that we are a pharmaceutical laboratory and that we went into lockdown shortly after the initial signs of a pandemic.  I am happy to let your people talk to my Chief Scientist briefly about the transfusion procedures if that would help but all questions must be kept to a medical nature.  I’m sorry Virginia but the world’s changed and I don’t yet know whether you’all on the same side”.

There was a pause from the other radio operator before he came back on.  “Understood 7456 am putting our Chief Medical Officer Ernest Fellows on the line.  Please do the same with regards to your Chief Scientist.  Even if we aren’t on the same side our thanks for letting us know about the plasma transfusions over”.

An older voice then came over the radio and she waved Brian in to her chair.  Before she let him transmit though she told him to avoid using names and simply talk medical procedures.  He nodded in agreement with her.  He knew as she knew that revealing too much additional information might cause problems for them.  As he sat down she flicked a switch that broadcast the conversation on all frequencies.  She knew Chad’s people would be able to hear what she was doing but felt like now wasn’t the time for politics, now was the time to save as many as could be saved.
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It wasn’t long after Brian had finished speaking with his counterpart in Virginia when the call came through from Cinco Ranch.

“Facility 1 to Facility 5 come in over”.

She initially indicated to Brian that he and Eddy should leave the room but then changed her mind and mimed for them to stay but to be quiet.  “Facility 5 to Facility 1 receiving over”.

“Facility 5 could you switch to your secure channel over?”

“Switching to secure now over”.

After she said these words she heard the timbre of the operator’s voice change and knew Chad had come on the line.

“Facility 5 we couldn’t help noticing that you’all just made two all channel broadcasts despite being previously instructed not to do this over?”

“Chad I’m sorry I just had to.  I couldn’t keep this to ourselves.  Whether anyone who heard has the same politics as ourselves or not I just had to put it out there.  So many have already died.  I don’t think I could have lived with myself if I hadn’t”.

“Facility 5.  I know this is a supposed to be a secure line but it is still a radio transmission.  It’s still crackable so please no first names ok?  And yes you did the right thing.  Whether or not I would have done it is immaterial.  You did it and I agree with you that you should have done it.  It is just heart breaking however that such information took so long to obtain.  We’re monitoring things here worldwide and I’m not going to sugar coat it for you, it looks like billions have died.  China has been wiped out, firstly by the metallic creatures and then by the disease.  There are some reports they did manage to form some sort of O neg units who had some success against the structure that landed in the inner Mongolia desert.  Something about O negative miners but we lost touch with them a few days ago.  We haven’t been able to raise anyone in East Asia since.  Most of the people we’re still in touch with in South America, the Middle East and Europe are O neg military units – but they are largely leaderless.  I’ve told the guys here to begin transmitting a recording of your Doctor’s report but unless people have been living in a bunker I’m not sure how many non O negs will have survived all this over.”

“God Facility 1.  I knew things were bad but this sounds apocalyptic.  Do you’all have any sort of plan of action over?”

“Our plan of action at the moment Facility 5 is to survive.  We’ll test out the blood plasma solution over in facility two and if it works we’ll initiate it here at facility one.  After that who knows.  For the meantime I’m suggesting you’all shift yourselves to facility two. Do you have any transport? Over”.

She looked over at Eddy who said “I’m sure we can find some transport Tessa.  Though I have no idea where facility two is”.

“Don’t worry I do.  It’s up on the Mississippi Louisiana border.  A big old nuclear missile base.   Sounds delightful don’t you think?”  Eddy and Brian shook their heads as Tessa sent a final transmission back to Chad.

“We’ll do as you say facility 1.  Let them know we’re coming.  I doubt we’ll have any problem finding transport, after all everyone else is dead over.”

Chad didn’t quite let it end there “Not everyone facility 5.  The Eastern seaboard still has plenty of assets undercover and they won’t be happy with what I’m about to do over.”

She felt her pulse quicken.  “What do you mean to do over?”

“I’m declaring the New Confederacy an independent nation.  That was the point of our little group pre crisis wasn’t it?  This isn’t exactly how I wanted it to happen but I’m afraid neither I nor the other folk here in Dixie want to be controlled by Washington.  We want to control our own destiny moving forwards and so that’s we’re going to do over.”

She winced slightly but then shrugged her shoulders before replying.  “Not exactly the best timing facility 1 but hell I guess no time would have been – if you’all going to declare independence now’s about as good as any.  I guess we’all going to have to get used to living in a Brave New World.  God bless the New Confederacy hope to see you in facility 2 soon. Over and out.”