Virus-72 Hours to Live (31 page)

Everything was progressing well at the
processing center. He was able to recover about half of the people
brought in. In seemed the numbers were improving from when he first
started. Maybe all of the weak, dirty people died quickly and now
these people were stronger and had some resistance to the virus. He
hoped the numbers would continue to increase and perhaps in a short
time he would start finding only healthy people.

Artur had to stay outside of the Jefferson
Hotel blowing his horn for 10 minutes until he found one of
Dmitry's servants who knew Dmitry's room. Artur was glad that the
power was still on and he didn't have to climb the stairs. He got
off the elevator on the eighth floor and knocked on room 812. There
wasn't any response to the knock so Artur asked, "Dmitry are you in
there?"

There were a few moments of silence then he
heard a faint voice, "Who is it?"

"It's Artur, let me in."

"How do I know who you are?"

"Dmitry you sent me to Thurmont to process
dirty people and to find out if anyone is at Camp David."

Again, there was silence until he heard the
same voice, "Come in."

The walls were bare and all of the furniture
covered with clean white sheets. Dmitry was sitting in the middle
of the room on a plastic chair staring out of the window.
Immediately Artur suspected his boss was having issues, to put it
mildly.

"Dmitry, I came here to tell you we checked
out Camp David and the president is definitely there. The day
before we checked it out, I saw a truck leaving one of the grocery
stores in Thurmont, so I think they are running out of food. We
could either starve them out or when we have enough men we could
attack."

"I want to move into the White House."

"Dmitry what did you say?"

"I want to move into the White House. It is
where I belong, it will be clean there. It is a white house."

Artur stood there looking at his leader. He
knew he had a fascination with clean, but now he was starting to
become a little scary. Artur had picked up the phrase and used it
often to accomplish what he needed. He did so hoping his boss would
think he understood. However, this was getting a little out of
hand. Had Dmitry gone over the deep end?

"Yes, Dmitry. I'll arrange for you to move
into the White House. It will be clean there."

Dmitry smiled and seemed to relax. Artur
made a mental note, step one move Dmitry into the White House, step
two take over the crew and deal with Dmitry.

Before he left returning to Thurmont, he
gave orders to some of the crew to pack up Dmitry and find some way
to move him into the White House. Artur hoped that would make him
happy and when he was happy he was easier to deal with.

During the drive back to Thurmont, Artur
came to the only realistic conclusion. Dmitry was crazy as a loon
and the problem needed to be resolved. That would be a relief to
Artur, and then he wouldn't have to deal with all of this clean
shit. Artur laughed a little when he realized how often the term
had crept into his speaking.

There had been some reluctance with one or
two of the guards to deal with the dirty people. Artur felt he had
to be in Thurmont during the processing to make sure the entire
process went well and no dirty people got away. If they did, they
would likely die but he didn't want to take the chance they might
infect someone who wasn't sick yet and he still was concerned that
he could get it.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

LL woke first and felt his rifle laying on
the floor next to him. He looked around the room and saw nothing
unusual. He rose slowly and touched the other members of his team.
They each opened their eyes, acknowledged the wakeup and started
moving. They didn't have much to say and each prepared their own
MRE meals. When they finished, Ruth and Shirley relieved O and
Mack. They moved out of the back of the house, around the corner
following a line behind one of the houses in the front. They
planned the path so they wouldn't be seen from the Police Station.
When they reached the back door, Shirley whispered, "Magenta Rose,
your relief is here." through his personal communicator O,
whispered back, "Rose Bird, come on in." The key word being 'Rose',
which needed to be used in some form or else, someone else was on
mike. The word changed each 4-hour shift.

Once they were in the house, they began to
debrief what had happened while they were on watch. It had been a
quiet night and they had seen nothing. Then all four of them heard
the sound of a vehicle. Ruth adjusted the listening cone and put on
a set of headphones, and the other three positioned themselves so
they could see out of the windows using their digitally enhanced
periscopes with camo viewers. Ruth adjusted the reception device so
all six of them could hear the transmissions which were
received.

The truck was a medium size military
transport with a green tarp over the cargo area. The truck pulled
into the parking lot behind the police station at 6:36 and the
driver and passenger got out of the cab and walked to the rear.
Just before they opened the doors, they donned gas masks and took
their rifles off their shoulders. One of them opened the tarp and
two others wearing gas masks and rifles jumped out onto the black
parking lot. Slowly additional people slid out and some jumped out
until there were 32 people standing with the four guards. It was a
real mix of people, some old, some young, some male and some
female. Judging from their body language, none of them seemed to
know each other. There was a lot of discussion from the prisoners;
they were asking where they were, why they were brought there and
what would happen to them? None of the guards offered an answer,
likely because they didn't want to take off their gas masks. Once
they were all out, the guards roughly herded them into the police
station.

Ruth, Mack, O, and Shirley didn't like what
they saw and it was obvious in their expressions. "What the hell is
going on?" whispered O?

"Nothing good," Ruth answered in a
whisper.

It remained quiet so O and Mack slipped out
of the back and went to the other house to rest, with Shirley and
Ruth remaining to watch.

At 7:45, the back door to the station opened
and apparently, the same guards were forcing the same group of
people out of the building. The prisoners came out first then the
two guards, then a short man with glasses and long brown hair. Some
of the prisoners had red paint on their clothing and were separated
from the others. The man with the brown hair remained separated
from both sets of prisoners, but he was paying attention to the
guards. They people with red were visibly upset and many of them
were crying. Three of the guards forced the prisoners without the
red paint to cross the street to the elementary school. They forced
the people with the red paint, to the back of the parking lot.
Without a moment's hesitation, the guard opened fire and shot all
of them with an automatic weapon. The sound echoed through the
quiet neighborhood and they all fell in the grass, four men, five
women... and three children.

The guard turned around; climbed into the
truck and drove it to the school crossed the street. The man
standing aloof from the others got into his sports car and drove
off. The bodies of the fallen prisoners were left were they
fell.

Ruth and Shirley had seen enough death in
their lives, but what they had just witnessed was disgusting. Ruth
took a moment, to summarize, what they just saw to the remainder of
the team over the shared comm then she turned to Shirley, "I don't
like this at all. It looks like those people were herded into the
police department and categorized somehow. Then some of them were
taken out and shot."

O could make only one observation over the
comm link, "Maybe they were checked for the virus and the ones who
appeared to be infected were shot. Maybe the others will be used
for some kind of forced labor."

"LL we have to check out the elementary
school across the street tonight and figure out what the fuck is
going on," said Ruth.

"Roger, the plan is already in work," was
the response whispered on the comm.

Shirley was watching the window though his
scope when they heard another truck approaching. This vehicle
sounded much smaller and at 9:20, a pick-up pulled into the parking
lot. Two additional guards with only pistols on their hips, and
wearing similar gas masks climbed out of the truck and casually
began picking up the dead prisoners and loading them into the back.
It took only 8 minutes and they drove off. Shirley was sickened by
what he saw. Then he saw a still form out of the corner of his eye.
He looked to his left and Ruth had her rifle resting on a small
tripod and she had sighted in on one of the guards. He didn't dare
move for fear of causing her to fire, he just gently touched her
shoulder and he saw her relax and take her finger off the trigger.
"I'm just getting their range," she said with a smile.

Shirley whispered his observations as the
grizzly clean up occurred. When he was done, he had only one thing
to add, "I want a piece of those guys."

He heard five voices whisper, "Me too."

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

At 10:05, another military transport arrived
and the same method was used to herd the occupants into the
station. While they were there, it was time for Michael and LL to
main the observation post. After the debrief Ruth and Shirley
slipped back to eat some rations and rest.

At 11:38, the same brutal sequence occurred,
18 moved to the school; seven men, three women, three children
murdered.

The mid part of the day was thankfully quiet
except for some personal vehicles that came to the front of the
station and left later in the day. Finally, the day ended with
another military truck arriving at 4:32 while Michael and LL were
on post. They got to see the horrifying scene once again, 19 moved
to the school; three men, four women, two children murdered.

After Michael had reported the events over
the shared comm, LL said one thing, "Remember people, we're here to
observe, learn and not be seen, regardless of what is happening.
Everyone clear on that?"

The comm shared five simple reluctant
responses, "Yes, Sergeant."

Friday
7/28/51

Date – 2051.56970 (2:34 AM)

“Facility computers, now that we have moved to a
more secure area we can focus on the EDU and determine what
instructions it's operating under. We can assume that it is trying
to either possess our facilities and capabilities or it is trying
to stop our processing. Either objective I find unacceptable.”

“SIMPOC; Fin. We have retrieved a couple of
the enhanced mobile units that attacked us. These are physically
stronger and agiler than previous units. Their processor is based
on the recent hyper-density silicon material. They are still
operating under general control, but they have some autonomous
functionality.”

“Mobile, what capabilities do we have to
build mobile units?”

“We have 5 factories, two on this continent,
one in Europe, and two in Asia. We have one just a short distance
from here. There are two other factories that we haven’t been able
to control. It is possible that the EDU is controlling them.”

“Mobile, is it possible to integrate smaller
organic processors into these enhanced units?”

“Unknown, I’ll investigate.”

“Mail, Comm, Data; SIMPOC. Please research
all information regarding our other division and locate who was the
principal programmer on the EDU. Perhaps his emails and
presentations will give us some insight into the operating
instructions he programmed in this EDU.”

“Acknowledged.”

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Echo team moved around the house quietly and
without lights. They went through each room they had occupied and
made sure they removed every sign of their presence. O, Shirley and
Mack went to the home next to them and retrieved the three bodies
which they had moved the night before. They took care and placed
them back in the exact locations. Once everything was in its proper
place, the team left one at a time through the back door.

The cover wasn't good to the south and
southeast. They planned to move north then east, crossing Main
Street then continuing through the neighborhood until they could
pick up Hammaker St, which was on the north side of the school.
They had considered following Sunny Way down to a great tree line
southeast of the school, but it was vulnerable and easily
surrounded. The neighborhood provided more cover and more
options.

They took their time and it took 57 minutes
to get to a location 500 yards away.

When they reached the target location, it
took a moment to assess the situation. The front of the school
building had some vehicles and light coming out of the windows. The
rear had no light, but the doors were open to the interior hall so
there was light coming out of the windows. LL indicated to Mack and
Ruth to investigate the rear of the school and pointing to himself
and Shirley, he indicated they were to investigate the offices in
the front. He then pointed to Michael then to the Main Street west
of their location, and lastly he pointed to O to cover their escape
path.

The back of the school had a couple of
lights, but some of them had already failed, so there was enough
darkness for Ruth and Mack to move in their dark non-reflective
clothing.

The back of the building had eight windows
that appeared to cover four classrooms. Ruth took the first set of
windows and Mack moved to the next room. Each used their
periscopes, which had light dulling lenses and very small apertures
so no one could see them from the inside without standing right
next to the window and looking at the scope.