Vampire's Day (Book 1): Epicenter (4 page)

16. Operations Centre

“Time?”

“Two minutes, ten seconds. Right on schedule.”

Two men, black and white, carefully look on the big screen, where a fat black man could be seen lying on the floor in a pool of his own blood, his arms and legs twitching. Behind him were a few more bodies covered in blood, also struggling in their death throes.

“Two minutes, forty-five.”

The convulsions weakened with each passing second; fingertips made their last few movements and froze. Finally there was a cessation of breathing, and heart failure.

“Two minutes and fifty-five. Flat-line.”

“Ten, nine, eight, seven, six…”

On the count of “two” the fat man opened his eyes.

“Ready!”

After taking a few breaths, the wounded raised his head, trying to sit up. The same thing happened to the café seller in an apron and cap, lying a small distance away.

“It is a pity that there is no audio.”

The fat man rose to his feet with great difficulty, his left hand instinctively reaching for a deep wound on neck.

“Parameters?”

“Quickly accelerating. The body temperature is about forty degrees, breathing sixty per minute, pulse generally a hundred per minute.”

The object of observation remains still.

“See, here and here, you see his clothes? He quickly lost weight during the moments while he was “dead”.”

“Yes, since the attack he has lost twenty-five to thirty pounds. The fat tissue just burned away. I am sure that the transformation will take longer for thin man.”

“Five minutes.”

Stupor left behind, the wounded man now stood to his full height, looking from side to side. The camera showed his eyes for a split second. Then he saw or heard something, hesitated a moment, and started running, slowly at first, then faster and faster.

“He's ready. He is alive, the heart beats, the lungs pump air, but he's no longer human.”

“Call and tell them that we have confirmation.”

The data was being updated every second. The infection had escaped beyond the international airport and rapidly spread to the nearest urban areas. The first emergency calls featured fights and unmotivated aggression, quickly replaced by reports of rioting, looting, arson and shooting. The crossroads were taken first, then large public buildings like hospitals, which would take in the first victims, then urban transport, and finally police stations. Raised by the alarms, police, fire and medical crews reported attacks on people, committed without weapons, instead with bare hands and teeth. Radio, television and the net were filled with panic.

“All of these videos, which appeared a few seconds after the alarm started - they are all fake. Islamic terrorists, explosions, shooting, dead bodies, burning aircraft - everything was shot and edited in advance to lay out exactly the right situation, intensifying the panic and confusion. Well, there was this girl with the camera – she had the first real footage. Why aren’t the phone and net disconnected yet?”

“We are working on it, give us five more minutes!”

New message.

“There has been confirmation in Mexico, from the airport where Flight 263 took off. Now there are reports of riots in several other cities on the coast, but the data is contradictory. Some people are talking about cases of desertion with the army and police.”

“Contact them immediately to warn them what they are dealing with.”

“We didn’t plan to tell them about what is happening at this stage.”

“Plans change. What is happening at the border?”

“The checkpoints are closed and the staff alerted.”

“Don’t allow anyone to pass. I repeat, no one, no matter what their documents show.”

New data. The approximate loss of the city police is at twenty-nine percent, firefighters and doctors twenty-five.

“There are cases of attacks on civilians by police and medics, now, and firefighters too. The number of emergency calls are increasing. Two crews reported that they exchanged gunfire with men in uniform. In less than an hour we lost a third of our personnel. Damn, how they do it? Such speed should be impossible in the case of infection!”

“It's not infectious. This is war.”

The door opened and a nervous girl looked in the room.

“The weapons are here.”

“All right, let the fighters take whatever they need from the arsenal. Reinforcements and…”

“No, you don’t see! It is their weapon, the weapon of attackers, one of the patrols managed to take the trophy - unknown type air rifle!”

“Get this rifle here!”

The girl left the room, and Jones and Smith looked at each other.

“Air rifle? The police reports talk about these rifles.”

“That is why we are so rapidly losing our people. The bastards have a great weapon.”

17. Ark 2

“Does anyone have the internet? Anything?”

Usually, Miss Gloria was irritated with all the electronic devices of her young passengers. She had suspected that, through these toys, kids were able to learn something new in the fascinating world of drugs, pornographic art or violence. But now she appreciated all these phones, smartphones and tablets, it was giving her the opportunity to see what was happening in the city. She was happy until "No Access" suddenly appeared on all the screens.

“Doesn’t at least one news site work? Urban news, helicopter cameras, anything?”

“No, Miss Gloria, silence.”

“Nothing works.”

“Asked the parents to buy…”

The driver didn’t even ask about phone calls, she was convinced that it was useless. First, even while they were still sat in a traffic jam, the city services repeatedly informed her that all lines were busy, and she needed to wait for an operator, which never came. The kids, meanwhile, tried to call parents or friends, usually with the same negative result. The few numbers that still worked soon died.

“Radio, does the radio work?”

“No, there is strong interference.”

Her own radio hissed and crackled like a rattlesnake. There was snatches of conversation in several languages, idiotic modern music, shots - that's all she managed to hear in this sea of interference. One time someone said the word "vampire", but she didn’t pay any attention to it. She paid attention to the short message, which came up on the police frequency - "General evacuation to the north." Nothing more was heard, but Miss Gloria agreed with the idea. So they headed north, very slowly with thousands of other cars, stopping very often. There was an army roadblock ahead.

“Go, you fool!”

Mighty Ark’s horn woke up the car driver ahead, and the bus started moving again. And then Miss Gloria heard the approaching buzz of a powerful engine, next to which the Ark’s engine seemed like a child's toy.

“What is it?”

The buzz grew, and she turned her head to find its source, but a kid was faster.

“Right, look!”

“What… Jesus!”

She saw it for a few seconds before the collision. 747 came down in an emergency landing on the highway, the far right engine in flames, thick smoke billowing.

“Get down!”

The Ark shook and the sun disappeared for a moment, shielded by a giant shadow. Miss Gloria fell forward on the steering wheel, shielding her ears in a vain attempt to block the noise. It lasted for only a moment, and then sunlight struck again through the shattered windshield, and the rumble continued.

“Miss Gloria!”

“Don’t get up!”

The woman raised head slowly, her eyes staring at a huge ragged hole that had been cut through the school bus roof, like a can opener. She looked in fascination at the hole, and the plane, which cut this hole with its heavy wheel, continued to lose altitude, ripping cars on the highway. Another second and the plane fell down; left wing falling aside, kerosene, gushing from ruptured tanks, immediately set alight by sparks to create a huge pyre. Miss Gloria didn’t pay attention to it - she was only thinking about how to start the stalled Ark’s engine.

18. Operations Centre 2

“Your conclusion?”

“Although it’s home-made, this is a high quality gun. The rifle has been made by specialists with modern equipment and excellent materials.”

Jones and Smith bent over the table, where the disassembled air rifle was laid, listening to the old gunsmith’s comments.

“Semi-automatic rifle, forty rounds, rate of thirty shots per minute. Have a look at the cartridge.”

With the utmost caution, the gunsmith held it up to the lightbulb.

“Here it is. We have not yet dismantled it, but we already know what's inside. Unfortunately for us, this thing works.”

“Range?”

“At least two hundred and fifty meters. The rifle itself is light, no recoil, no flash or noise when fired too. Even an unqualified shooter could achieve good results using this barrel.”

“But the energy of this bullet is extremely small.”

“This is by design, excess energy is not needed here. Seriously injuring or killing with this rifle is almost impossible, but a small wound would be enough for the infection to spread. In a state of panic, people wouldn’t even realize they were wounded.”

“Thank you, Bob. You’ve explained to us what we did not understand.”

Smith went to the window and looked at the city spread out before him. Megapolis had changed dramatically in the few hours that had passed since Flight 263 landed at the international airport. When he arrived here in the early morning, Los Angeles was still waking up and hadn’t realized what was going on in the suburbs. In the traffic jams, hundreds of thousands people hurried about their urgent business, listening to the first confusing messages on the radio. And now the dazzling white sun was lost in a column of smoke from fires, with no one to extinguish them. Numerous accidents paralyzed traffic on the roads; the sidewalks were full of columns of refugees anxiously looking around when they heard the sound of shooting.

“Give me the link to the city services.”

Smith made a few short calls, and gave a series of orders before the red phone rang.

“Pentagon.”

“What? No, I insist on this: we don’t need the army. Don’t enter the city, I repeat, no reinforcements! According to the plan in the event of biological warfare, we need a complete cordon, a hard quarantine. What? Of course, civilians are dying, we’re losing a couple of thousand people per minute, and if there is not a quarantine zone, the death toll will be higher. I don’t know who needs to sign the orders! If there are attempts to break the quarantine area, avoid hand to hand fighting, use aviation, artillery and armor instead. I repeat - no infantry, don’t send soldiers. They can infect our people at a distance, using poisoned bullets. Don’t give them this opportunity!

“I ordered the rest of the police units, firefighters and doctors to leave the city. Permission? I don’t need any permission, the mayor is dead or missing. Now I am running Los Angeles – or what's left of it.

“Try to understand - our own police are now a prime target for the enemy. In the case of the riots we use the police to overcome them. Next to the police are firefighters and medics always. Our best men: well-trained and equipped with transport, communications, weapons, and all that they may need. We know this, but enemies also know, and they have prepared for this in advance. They provoked riots in the suburbs, and waited for people in the force to shoot them first. Now, almost half of our best men are on their side. Infected civilians are just cannon fodder, they will throw them at our cordons, but trained professionals are what they really need.

“They are still weak and want to increase their army at our expense, but I'm going to stop them. No, no guarantees, I don’t know if it will work or not, but we must prepare for this option…”

19. Gus

Flying at low altitude, Gus was, as usual, considerably shaken, as though he was not a plane, but an SUV at full speed on a bumpy road. Angel didn’t pay any attention to shaking; it's only the background of his work. Of course, seven hundred forty-seventh didn’t shake like this, but this heavyweight can’t land where Gus can. Let shakes, Gus didn’t fall apart, Gus will survive.

Angel appreciated Gus, as much as a shepherd appreciates his dog, knowing that four-legged friend would not let him down in any situation. He could rely on this plane, even though it was built before the birth of his father. In Russia Gus was built with a huge margin of safety, so that it could continue to work hard when other aircraft would burn out on the ground in a kerosene fire. This huge biplane had rattled and sliced through the sky over different countries and continents. Gus had carried different loads and belonged to different owners, until it was purchased by Angel in a pretty shabby condition. The new AN2 owner made substantial repairs, installed new navigation equipment and painted on the rudder a fat goose from some old cartoon, and the biplane got a proper name. Angel believed that the name and mascot would make the plane lucky; his work would require all manner of luck.

They took off with the sun’s first rays, following the usual route of agricultural aviation. Angel flew and worked over these lands for the past two months, studying the terrain and allowing US border guards to become accustomed to his presence. Gringo had seen Gus so many times with their drones, helicopters and ground observation posts that they had stopped paying any attention to it – another old plane flying to pollinated maize field with chemical muck, nothing interesting. To maintain this state of indifference, they flew with removable chemical tanks under the wing, except that today the tanks were empty.

They reached the right point, knowing a signal would be received soon. This area is no different from others on the map, but Angel knows by memory that this is the weakest place in the border line.

He doesn’t know exactly how his bosses have access to classified information, but their knowledge builds his respect. They have learned everything - ground radar viewing angles and frequency, drones’ duty rotas, spy satellites pass graphics and more.

All this valuable information was used to identified the weak spot based on his own past experience. He chose this site, called it the “corridor”. Angel knew perfectly well the possible issues; he has repeatedly crossed the border by air, carrying in light airplanes dope to one side and weapons to the other, playing Russian roulette with border guard airplanes and helicopters. Then he had no additional knowledge, but he survived where many others were killed.

And now, having access to classified information, he was confident of success. He had tested this data many times in observation flights, memorizing all the necessary points. He knows not only this part but also the continuing route behind the barrier. Angel had also visited the United States on a false passport, under the pretext of a visit to relatives. He travelled around, taking photos and memorizing many facts, understandable only to him. This reconnoitering by car was not enough, and he also made a few hang-glider
flights
, assessing the path ahead and confirming his preliminary calculations. His bosses were definitely right in their assumptions – this is a weak spot in the boundary.

Short message: weather forecast in a deserted mining town, somewhere on the other side of the country.
Data is valid.

“Come on!”

Angel turned off the radio and navigator, shouts passengers didn’t dare to use radios and mobile phones, and then shifted the wheel - Gus briskly changed course while losing altitude. A few seconds and they were on the other side.