Virus-72 Hours to Live (39 page)

The other six crewmembers were worried,
tired and the remnants of a great group of people. It was sickening
to know that a virus wiped out almost the entire human population,
all of his friends, family, and innocent victims, gone. It was hard
to get your head around. The only good news was his wife; Joan was
sitting next to him as his copilot. She was a highly decorated
pilot with almost as many hours flying as he. The time on Oasis was
supposed to be a fantastic assignment. In a way, it would have been
like a second honeymoon; after all, he met her on a space mission
many years ago. This trip would have been their third trip to Oasis
and the first where both of them were in command positions. It was
going to be a homecoming, but it turned into something horribly
different.

As the incandescent glow faded in the
lifeboat’s windows, Tom could feel the wings reposition themselves
and as he reached for the stick, he punched off the auto landing.
There was the momentary bump as the controls became manual and he
adjusted the trim to his liking. Tom looked through the heads up
display on his window to pick up the runway in the consortium
facility. It was easily found and after checking his energy level
and glide path, he settled into the joy of flying. Although flying
may be the wrong word, after all, it was more like a piano with
wings and it flew like that.

Alpha looked up as he heard two sonic booms.
He wasn’t sure what it was, but there were many things he didn’t
know. All he could focus on were his immediate objectives. His
internal timer said the humans were landing in about 6 minutes, so
he directed the mobile driver units to drive their truck containing
the electrical discharge weapons to the landing site.

The five units with the discharge weapons
were already in trucks, so Alpha climbed into his command truck and
they began racing across the field to the landing site. After
creating a large cloud of dirt and holding on through a couple of
big bumps, his com traffic picked up as a large number of OUs
emerged out of the trees moving towards the same site. That
appeared to be the main force intending to intercept the humans at
the landing site, he thought.

Tom’s alignment with the landing site
brought him over the top at 80,000 ft., he made a wide sweeping
turn to downwind then another turn to final. He made the necessary
adjustments for wind indicated by his display of computed flight
path. On his turn to downwind, he could just make out the landing
site and all he could see was a dirt cloud on the northern side,
nothing else gave him an indication of the conflict below.
Conflict, between two computer or robot armies, was downright
weird. Regardless they were on a path that brought them right in
the middle of it.

Alpha monitored the incursion force growing
on the northern side while used his one telephoto eye to pick-up
the landing craft. He saw it pass overhead and begin a slow turn,
which would cause it to land coming from the south. It was
descending at a very high rate and should land right on schedule.
Given its speed and landing direction, Alpha could only estimate
where its stopping point would be, so he headed his vehicles in
that direction.

Tom rolled on a 10 mile final and for the
first time he could see the entire airport in front of him. It was
clear that something messy was happening on his right and as he
approached 5 miles, he dropped the skids and could see a group of
vehicle approaching from the left. Who is on his side?

The skids clunked down and the fuselage
shook a little, but Tom was preoccupied with lining up on the
centerline and beginning his flair. In that type vehicle, the flair
was quick and low; one quick movement to get the nose out of the
way then, bang it’s on the ground. The landing slide was
uncontrolled; Tom had directional control for only a few moments
until he slowed down and lost rudder effectiveness. At that point,
they were along for the ride.

Alpha looked to the east and saw the craft
approach and plow into the soil as it skidded it threw up a giant
dirt cloud. He tried to adjust his direction and speed to meet the
vehicle as it stopped. He heard over the com link that OUs broke
through the defensive line and were making their way towards the
landing site. Alpha directed all available mobile units to converge
on the landing site to provide additional support.

As the lifeboat was skidding the last
hundred meters, Tom pointed out to Joan that the conflict on the
right appeared to have defenders on their side of the conflict and
the others must be the attackers. He could only assume that the
group of vehicles approaching from the left was friendlies. He
announced to the passengers to evacuate the craft as soon as it
stopped and move to the left towards the approaching vehicles.

The craft came to an abrupt halt and the
cloud of dust overtook it, obscuring it for a bit. Alpha saw eight
humans emerge from the cloud running in his direction. He directed
the five trucks with the electrical discharge weapons to create a
perimeter around him and the humans until he could get them
loaded.

Five of the six vehicles didn’t slow down
and seemed to be maneuvering around Tom and his group. The
remaining vehicles slowed to a stop in front and he yelled for
everyone to climb in the rear. As the last of them got in, the
vehicle accelerated and moved away towards the buildings on the
south side of the facility.

Alpha glanced through the window at the back
of the truck. Once the humans were in, he directed the driver to
head for a large hanger towards the middle of the parking ramp
while his other five vehicles maneuvered and lined up following
them.

Unfortunately, Alpha gauged the attacking
force incorrectly and had his mobile units too dispersed to fully
repel them. They broke through and he had to get to a defensible
position so he could concentrate his remaining units until the
others on the facility could converge and provide a protective
wall.

While bumping across the grass, Alpha
remembered what little he knew about humans. There was very little
loaded in his memory. He knew he must protect them and that they
were different from him. When they got to the hanger, it would be
interesting to meet one face to face and talk with them. So far,
Alpha’s communication had been through com links and he hadn’t a
chance to use his vocal systems. Should be interesting he
thought.

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

“SIMPOC; Alpha. We have picked up the humans
and we are moving to a defensible position. We are engaged in a
full-scale action with the uncontrolled units. At the present time,
we are outnumbered but once we are in a defensible position, I'll
have the remainder of our units move to defend us.”

“Alpha; SIMPOC. Excellent, keep us
informed.”

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

Tom could see out of a small opening in the
truck that they were approaching the main hanger at a very fast
rate of speed. When they passed into the building, the driver
slammed on the brakes throwing them forward with considerable force
as they screeched to a halt. The military in him told him to jump
out and prepare for action, so he climbed over the other passengers
as they tried to reorient themselves and jumped onto the ramp to
see what he could do.

When the vehicle stopped, Alpha jumped out
to get a view of the surrounding area. He wanted to give immediate
tactical direction to his units and as he rounded the rear of the
truck, he ran into a human. The result was harder on the human than
Alpha, he was mostly metal and wire and the human felt soft and
bounced off and skidded on the concrete after the impact. Both were
stunned and looked at each other.

Tom tried to get up, but the time in space
and the painful collision made him slow getting to his feet. Tom
and Alpha looked at each other and made note of what they saw.
Alpha appeared to be over 6 feet tall and had two arms and two
legs. He was wearing a loose fitting overall. His face had all of
the features of a human but was definitely a robot’s face. The
eyelids were unusual, the nose was much smaller and the mouth was
just a small opening in the lower part of the face. There was no
hair or ears, although there were small openings on the side of the
face.

Alpha barely felt the collision; after all,
he weighed approximately 565.3 lbs. He watched as the human got up
slowly taking a long look at the wall he just bumped into. The
human was a little smaller than Alpha and was wearing a green space
crewman’s flight suit. He had dark brown hair and brown eyes. His
face was covered with flesh and his eyes jumped around taking in
all of Alpha.

The two of them looked at each other for a
moment then Tom reached out his hand. Alpha was confused for a
moment, then he remembered the human tradition of shaking hands, so
he reached out and the human grabbed it and moved it up and down.
The human’s flesh was soft and Alpha had to be careful, not to
squeeze too hard. After a moment, the human smiled and said, “My
name is Tom Herl, I was the senior staff engineer and senior
military officer on Oasis.”

Alpha took a moment to form his words and
said, “I am Alpha.”

Tom smiled again and said, “Ok, Alpha what
are we dealing with?”

“Mr. Herl there is a large number of mobile
units moving into this area. We presume they want to either capture
you or kill you. I am here with a large number of mobile units
under my control and I am tasked with protecting you and also
maintaining control of this facility if possible.”

Joan had slowly lowered herself out of the
truck, keeping her eyes on Alpha the entire time. She said as she
approached her husband, “And who do we have here.”

Alpha moved his attention from Tom Herl to a
smaller human who approached from the side. She was a couple of
inches smaller than Tom and her hair was shoulder length. Her
facial structure was softer and her overall body shape was very
different from the other. After a quick review of human anatomy,
Alpha recognized the differences as belonging to a female member of
the human race.

“My designation is Alpha.”

“My…..designation is Joan, I am the Oasis
commander,” She said with a smile. “I see you’ve already met my
husband, Tom.”

Alpha sorted quickly on the term, 'husband,'
and recalled that 'husband' was a human designation of one of two
humans matched for life as a team. The other partner was called
wife.

“Yes…Joan. We just met.”

Alpha sent an electronic com message to the
five trucks with the electrical pulse weapons, telling them to
dismount from the trucks and set up a perimeter. They were told to
defend the facility as needed until more of the local mobile units
arrived.

“Tom Herl, Joan, I suggest we move to a
safer place while my mobile units prepare to defend this area.
There is a second floor to this structure where we can observe the
unit’s movements and better direct our defense.”

“Where should our other crew members go?
They were in space longer than we were and likely don’t have all of
their strength back," Joan asked.

“Please have them go to the briefing room in
the engineering offices and my mobile units will guard them.” Alpha
said as he pointed to the main office space.

Joan shouted to the other Oasis crewmembers
climbing out of the truck, “Go to those offices and wait for us,
we’re going on top of the building to see what’s happening
outside.”

“Ok, let’s go…which direction?” Tom said
firmly to Alpha.

“Follow me,” Alpha said moving quickly
towards a metal staircase.

As they ran, Joan smiled as she ran past a
CH-47F Block 2 helicopter. Not a pretty bird but one she enjoyed
flying for over 3,000 hours. Her momentary diversion had to stop
and she needed to run harder to keep up with Alpha. His movement
was very fast and they had to work to stay with him. Moving up the
stairs 2-3 steps at a time, Tom noticed the metal creaking and he
realized why the collision hurt so much.

At the top of the stairs, Alpha encountered
a door and lowering his shoulder he went through it, with a loud
explosion of noise and dust. They entered a room about 20X20 full
of old cabinets and files, which hadn’t been used in years. The
walls were all made of glass and this appeared to be an old
observation room, used many years ago to watch traffic in the
parking area in front of the hanger. For observing the battle
around them, it was ideal.

All of them moved from window to window to
get a feel for the area and what was happening around them. They
could see their craft and between them and the craft was a very
large number of moving mobile units; Tom could only estimate the
number to be almost 5,000. Between those advancing units and their
locations, was a smaller force of units doing their best to slow
the larger force. From other directions, smaller groups of units
were moving towards their area but they weren’t positioned yet to
engage the larger force.

Joan could see the five trucks, which
followed them, had stopped and two mobile units from each had
set-up positions. One of the units was carrying a large device that
was connected to a rifle looking device being held by the other
unit. They appeared to be defensive weapons, and obviously a kind
with which she wasn’t familiar. As the three of them looked around,
there wasn’t much to be said. The entire conflict was laid out
before them and words couldn’t describe the moving picture in front
of them.

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

“SIMPOC; Alpha. I am with the humans and we
have established a defensive position. The electric pulse discharge
weapons will be involved shortly. We will have difficulty for a
short time until the rest of our units arrive. I will let you know
the outcome.”

“SIMPOC; Fin. We have a problem. A large
number of uncontrolled units have massed and are moving towards our
area. We erred by sending all of our electric pulse discharge
weapons to the Space Consortium facility.”