The Fractured Earth (10 page)

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Interlude—USAMRIID—Frederick, MD

"I don't understand this," said Dr. Allison Brovina. She was looking through an old fashioned microscope at a slide. "It's breathing. You can see the skin contracting and pores pulling in air."

"And we can assume from the tests that it's actually getting oxygen from the air and distributing it directly to the tissues," added Dr. Tell Charles. "It's part of the reason it's so hard to kill them."

Dr. Brovina sat back in the stool and swiveled around to face Dr. Charles. "But is it a virus or some other agent? We sure didn't create it, at least not to my knowledge. And the EMP didn't cause it either." She paused and shook her head. "Without an SEM or a tunneling microscope, we might never know."

"But it's gone, why is it gone? The original vector seems to have disappeared!"

"Which points even more to an artificial agent. It's certainly widespread, at least as far as we can tell. Without communications, we can't even talk to the CDC—or anyone else, for that matter."

"I thought our gear was hardened against this," said Dr. Brovina, shaking her head.

Tell put his hand on her shoulder. "Allison…" he said, but didn't know what to say. He wanted to tell her it would be alright. He wanted to tell her that she would be able to get back to her children. That her ex-husband was fine and the kids were too. He wanted to tell her about his feelings for her, even though she was his subordinate.

Maybe that didn't matter anymore.

He sighed.

"Allison," he repeated, "tell me again the symptoms and what we've learned so far." It was the typical way they worked—talking through what they'd done. Often a problem solved itself just by talking about it.

"Okay…" she said. "People began showing some of the symptoms of a typical cold virus, such as coughing, at apparently the exact same time as the EMP."

"Exact same?"

"Well, no, more like an hour afterwards. The EMP hit at 5:25in the evening, and the first ... full blown infected ... appeared almost exactly one hour and ten minutes later. We have seen that from the time of the first coughing symptom to dementia-like activity is about five minutes, and full blown infection is five minutes after that."

"What about the initial vector of infection?"

"Absolutely no correlations between the infections we've seen here, but it's obviously a very small sample size."

"And how many infections here?" asked Dr. Charles.

"At least seven initial vectors, and twenty-five secondary infections. Three initials are still in quarantine, and seven secondaries."

Dr. Charles shook his head. "An unknown agent that modifies the biology of a human, and
only
a human as far as we can tell. None of the experimental animals here have been affected. There's no differentiating factor, such as ethnicity or age. It modifies at the cellular level, creating vast quantities of various Vitamin K compounds, hardening the cell walls of almost all organs, creating a brand new network of capillaries that deliver oxygen through the skin."

He paused, then added, "We assume it re-wires the brain somehow, given the behavior patterns of the infected."

Tell removed his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. "We know that bites are a vector of infection. It's like a tailor-made zombie virus, deliberately spread here, and who knows where else."

"But that level of bio-chemical knowledge is beyond the U.S.," protested Dr. Brovina. "Who could have created such a thing?"

"Only a highly technological society, or else it is some sort of natural system in our bodies that was realigned by the EMP. Some kind of high-electron atomic structure we've never seen?"

Allison laughed. "That we've never encountered after tens of millions of MRI’s? Surely those would have affected such a structure in the same way."

Dr. Charles shrugged. "Maybe. We haven’t done full body scans. And unfortunately we have no way of correlating scans to infected to see if the initial infection is only in people who've never had an MRI scan." He paused. "Seems pretty unlikely."

"What if we—" Allison stopped at a banging outside of the lab door.

Tell walked over and turned the knob. "Sounds like something fell out..." He didn't get a chance to finish. The door swung open and a man fell into Tell. As the man looked up at Tell, who was trying to pick himself up, he hissed and bit his arm. Tell yelled out and fell backwards. Allison screamed.

The man turned his attention to the scream and saw Allison scrambling backwards, knocking over the only manual microscope in the entire facility, shattering it on the floor. She turned and tried to climb onto a counter, but the creature grabbed her leg and bit her.

She screamed again and yelled for Tell, looking back to him for help. When she saw what was happening to him, she screamed again.

—————

Interlude—Boreling Empire—Plannel 6

Grodge the Merciful kicked his doglard and grumbled as he watched another's pick get moved into a top spot. It had a caption underneath that said “Highest Tech Nation-Group, Biology Warfare Center ‘USAMRIID.’” It was super funny and ironic. If only it had been his pick.

He grumbled and kicked again at the doglard, who had scrambled out of the way, and looked away from the feed as dozens of the bio-creatures began eating the two humans in white smocks. They didn't bother to kill them first.

He just
had
to find something to move him up. Even one level would be the start of his induction into the Planners. He wanted to be in the boardrooms, laughing and chewing down drinks while females brought them stimulants. Just
one
level would put him into the lowest level meetings.

Or
, he thought to himself,
I could replace Pactain the Virulent … if he messed up.

Grodge flipped through the channels deftly, looking for anything he could exploit. He saw a triple red flash zip by as he was fast forwarding several channels, so he halted the play and zoomed back until he spotted what had happened. A red bar was placed in a production assistant's playback whenever there was an unexpected technical glitch in the active or passive infiltration systems. In this case, it was a very interesting development indeed. Some human had a working set of medical equipment and was examining one of the bio-creatures.

That shouldn’t be possible. The tiny machines should have disabled all medical equipment in addition to simulating the EMP. He recalled a report that the humans had some bio-research facilities that the regular solderbots could not penetrate due to pressure differentials. Those facilities had been targeted with enhanced nanomachines that could penetrate the pressurized rooms.

Somehow this human had kept a bio-research facility hidden from the advance drones.

Grodge activated a secondary monitor and zoomed in on the location. Just a non-descript building where multiple humans lived. No wonder—it wasn’t a regular medical building.

Grodge leaned back and considered the situation. Red-flagged issues could lead to purple flags, and purple flags could lead to a Grodge promotion. He knew of one junior assistant technical monitor who’d failed to catch and report the destruction of ten drones within the prescribed ten kilometer radius on the now broken and lifeless planet of Land. 

These stupid primitives and their planet names … they were only good for entertainment.

Well, maybe he could hide this guy in his oddly-placed bunker and let him conduct his research. It’s not like it would go anywhere. If he played it right, the blame would be fixed on his supervisor, and he'd move right up.

He added an annihilation-exclusion zone, then tasked some systems to try to find a way to make the animals in that zone particularly violent—an experiment usually performed by junior assistants, but nothing unusual.

Finally, and this was the tricky part, he scripted a login using a very old admin account that he'd seen Pactain use once, and set it to mark any reds coming out of that entire zone as investigated. He attached the script to auto-execute every time Pactain signed off on his normal account, then deleted the activity logs and history, and finally the old account.

He had a couple of others from random workers, and all of the logins of anyone who had ever used this terminal, so he could make other plays if they came up.

He leaned back and smiled, reaching down to pet his doglard. It fawned on him, desperate for praise. He laughed out loud, thinking of how stupid the thing was.

He looked back at the guy in the bunker, who was now just sitting around and puffing on some sort of stim-stick.

Grodge laughed again. "Humans are stupider than a doglard," he quipped, and then laughed at his own joke.

He clicked his thumbs and reached over for a Stim-Stick, ready to become the best senior assistant producer in Pactain's group.

He switched the feed off of bunker guy and put it in a queue relegated to boring stuff, nothing happening. It meant no one else was likely to ever see it. Then he worked steadily to make his channels the best they could be.

—————

Erin

Against my instincts, I found myself liking and trusting this huge black Army guy. Or whatever service he was in. Didn't look like he was in the Coast Guard anyway, and I doubted he could fit inside a submarine.

Camo Joe.

I followed him back to his toy room. He was still carrying his rifle swinging from a cord of some kind. I stood in the doorway, then thought of something.

"I'll be right back," I told him. I turned and went back to the front door, closed it and locked it. When I turned around, he was peeking at me from around the corner. I nodded. He nodded. I guess that was the way they communicated in Army land. Nodding.

Seemed efficient.

We went back to the room and I stood in the doorway again. Camo Joe opened a big metal safe and fiddled around inside for a minute. He put a pistol of some kind on the counter, as well as a scary looking gun of some kind. He picked up the pistol.

"This is a Smith and Wesson M&P 9mm," he said, as though I understood what he meant.

"Nine millimeters of what?" I asked.

He smiled and said, "That’s the size of the bullet. You're small but strong, and a nine is about the smallest gun with a decent amount of stopping power. It'll punch through clothing and do plenty of damage—at least with the right bullets." Then he reached back into the safe and pulled out a couple of boxes.

"These are ballistic rounds. They have a tip on them that keeps the bullet from spreading on contact with clothing, so it penetrates better than plain hollow points."

"I've heard the term 'hollow points' before," I said.

"Yeah, they're the typical round, and I have a case or two in there, but the ballistics are really the best. I also have some…" He reached into the safe again. "Some range rounds, 125’s. They'll punch through a wall and still damage the target on the other side. Not safe for home defense or crowded places, but we'll take a box anyway."

I thought about using them on crazies. Multiple crazies. Maybe kill two with one shot. "Three boxes of range rounds, two ballistics," I told Camo Joe.

He looked like he was about to protest my decision to change his recommendation, but instead he shrugged and reached back into the safe, rummaging a bit before bringing out the boxes.

"There ya go, Erin, one hundred fifty rounds of range, one hundred ballistic. Will that be cash or credit?" he said with twinkle in his eye.

I smiled. "Definitely credit," I answered.

He laughed and then rummaged around in the safe again, pulling out three somethings that looked like the inside of a gun or something.

Turns out, that's exactly what they were. "These are magazines for the M&P 9," he said. "I'll show you how to load them in a second." He put them on the table next to the gun, then picked up the scary looking one. "Now the pistol is really just for a last-ditch defense. This puppy is your real protection."

The gun was about an arm long and looked like it had three barrels or something. There wasn't much else other than a trigger, a grip, and the thing you rest against your shoulder. I didn't like it, it looked too big and heavy.

But I'd let him finish his happy spiel and let him down easy.

"This bad looking boy is a Kel-Tec 12-gauge. It holds fifteen rounds and has the shortest legal barrel you can get. It only weighs about six pounds with the shells, and it'll take a guy’s head off, or blow a hole the size of a bucket in him. Just pump and shoot. Easy."

He handed me the gun, and I must admit it felt better holding it than looking at it.

"It holds more rounds than anything else I have by a long shot—eight rounds is the next closest."

I hefted it, then put it up to my shoulder. 

"Shooting this with it braced against your body works okay, as long as your wearing enough clothing or a pack of some kind. It packs a wallop, but fortunately the business end really takes out the bad guys."

"Alright," I said, "looks like you have another sale, Camo Joe." He smiled and took the gun back and laid it on the counter. He reached into the safe and pulled out more boxes. Ammo for the gun, I assumed. He also laid a strap with loops on the table. I looked a question at him.

"A bandolier, it's for holding shells."

"Shells, rounds, twelves and nines," I said. "I hardly understand any of this stuff."

"It's okay, Erin, I'll show you everything, including the SCAR," said Camo Joe, tapping the rifle still dangling in front of him. He detached it, then with a couple of quick motions dropped a piece of it out into his hand and launched a bullet sideways out of it, catching it and putting everything on the table.

I smiled at his obvious display of showmanship, but he just looked thoughtful as he examined the weapons on the table. So not showing off, just a thing he did without thought.

Like my martial arts.

He picked up his own rifle and looked at me, all serious-like. I echoed his expression. 

I knew when I was about to get lectured, but this was a lecture I wanted to attend.

"There are like thirty-five rules when it comes to gun safety, but really it boils down to just three. Always assume the gun is loaded. Always keep the business end pointed in a safe direction. Always keep your finger off the trigger.

"Until, of course, it's time to shoot the bad guys. People get hurt, or hurt other people, when they do stupid stuff like test if the safety works or swing it around at you like a dumbass vice president.

"When you pick up, keep your finger like this." He held up the gun, and his finger was straight on the side of the trigger rather than inside of it. "You see anyone pick up a gun and stick their finger in there, stay well away from them, because they are a dumbass who doesn't have a clue about proper gun safety."

I reached out to the table and picked up the pistol, holding it with my finger like his, straight and to the side, pointing it away from him at the wall. I looked up at him. He looked a bit startled, like he didn't expect me to grab a gun so fast, but then he swallowed and nodded.

"Right," he said. He put down his rifle and stepped over to me, keeping out of the line of the pistol barrel. "You need to use both hands, although it's a good idea to practice with just one hand, and both of them at that."

I put my left hand up to my other one. "Like this?" I asked.

"No," he said. He started to reach around me to show me how to hold it.

"Stop. Remember my rule."

He spread his arms and backed away. "Damn, I'm sorry, Erin. Really, I forgot."

I looked him in the eye. He seemed sincere. I nodded toward the gun safe. "You gotta another one in there?"

"Yep, several," he said, walking over to it. Camo Joe reached in and pulled out another pistol. "This one's a revolver, but you hold it the same." He held the gun with both hands. "This is how you're holding it." I nodded. "Now watch my left thumb." He moved his left thumb from behind his right thumb like I had mine, and put it beside the right thumb instead. I moved mine the same way.

"Like this?" I asked.

"Yep," he said. "Ironically, you can hold this gun that other way, but not that one you're using, so it's best to develop the right habits no matter what gun. Then you won't take a big chunk out of your thumb when you fire. The top part, called the slide, slides backwards really fast and with a lot of force. That action loads the next round and you can just keep pulling the trigger to keep shooting. If you did that with your left thumb back there, it would slam into it and cut it up."

"Okay," I said, "thanks for the tip, Camo Joe. Bloody thumbs avoidance, got it." I put the gun down. "Show me the rest."

Camo Joe proceeded to tell me all about guns and ammunition, and I hoped I'd remember it all. Here's how to drop a magazine out of the gun. I dropped it. Here's how to load it back. I loaded it. Here's how to chamber a round.

That one took me a few tries—it's tricky to pull back that slide.

Here's how to release the slide when it locks back. Here's the safety. Here's where to look at a gun to see what ammo it can take. Always use the right ammo. Here's where you can look on the ammo for what type it is. Here's how to load the shotgun—now tell me what kind of round it takes. The wrong round in a shotgun can cause it to explode, 

That's bad.

“Here's my rifle. This is a selector switch. I'm military, so it has multiple positions: for off, for the safety, single round, or burst, which fires three bullets at a time.”

We spent a half hour cleaning them, first with something called a "bore snake.” Some fluid goes on it and you pull the snake through the barrel. Camo Joe showed me how to take the guns apart for a more thorough cleaning, but we didn't actually do it right then.

He told me stories of his Army buddies, cracking jokes at the expense of the jarheads at the next table over and getting into bar fights. He told me about learning to swim and the first time he had to jump out of an airplane.

After an hour and a half in his house, I felt all decked out and dangerous. I ended up with the pistol he first showed me, a smaller shotgun that held seven rounds plus one, but I liked it better, and an AR-15 that looked a lot like his gun. He ended up swapping his "SCAR" for something that looked almost the same, but he said it used the same ammunition as my gun, and it was better to have a common ammunition.

Sounds like he assumed we'd be traveling together.

"Listen…" I said, intending to tell him I appreciated all the help but I'd rather be on my own. I didn't get the chance to finish as there was a crash from the front room. I looked at Camo Joe, and he looked at me. I picked up the shotgun and chambered a round, grabbed another one and added it to the magazine, then swung the bandolier over my head.

Practically in unison, he pulled his rifle and slammed in a magazine, chambered a round, then dropped out the magazine and put in a fresh, full one. He pocketed the magazine that had one less bullet and then held up a finger to his lips.