2022 (13 page)

“What about the water tanks, are they just
for supplying the village?”

“That and to provide stabilization for the
power generation. There is nearly always wind over that hill for
the windmills, but if it dies down, water out of a few of the tanks
is released and goes through a turbine to generate electricity. It
is not much, but enough to run essential equipment for quite a
while.”

They started to pass a group of plain looking
buildings connected by covered walkways.

“This is the manufacturing hub. Each of these
buildings will be designated for making certain items, like
woodwork, fabric, paper, and metalwork. There are more rooms
underground. But the buildings were the easy part. What required
even more work was setting up the machines and tools inside them.
Most had to be redesigned to use simple parts and be easier to
repair.”

“Why all the underground stuff?”

She said that despite its greater building
expense, it would all last much longer and with lower maintenance
cost. “There’s also the temperature aspect—underground rooms stay
close to ground temperature, around fifty-five degrees Fahrenheit,
so it takes very little energy to warm them up.”

They approached a chairlift platform with a
sign that said
Greenhouse
, and he asked if that was
something still to be built.

“No, the structure is done,” she replied.
“It’s another underground structure. Let’s stop here and I’ll show
you.” They disembarked from the Air Chair and walked down a curved
path that sloped farther into the ground. She opened the door and
they entered a brightly lit cavern.

“This lighting is all provided by
ultra-efficient grow lights. They’ve divided this place into
several sections, depending on the amount of light and temperature
needed by the plants. They’ll grow outdoor crops too. This is to
only to provide greens for the winter and specialty fruits and
vegetables.”

She pointed to one corner of the cavern.
“Over there is where they’ll be setting up a special composting
system so that they can farm bugs.”

“Bugs! You’re not going to say what I’m
thinking, are you?”

“Yup, they’re not a big component, but bugs
will
be part of the diet. Usually, ground up and mixed with
other things, but a high-protein food source like that can’t be
ignored.”

“I can ignore it just fine. The thought makes
me sick,” he said as they returned to the Air Chair platform.

The next stop of the tour was the outdoor
sports area which consisted of a few baseball diamonds, soccer, and
football fields. The earth had been contoured to have gentle hills
near each playing area to allow for spectators a place to sit and
watch the events.

Spencer gazed over the open expanse of green
playing fields. “I suppose you’re going to tell me that they mow
this with an old fashioned push mower.”

“Don’t be silly,” Hope replied, “The grass
that’s planted on the playing fields is a variety that only grows
to about two or three inches. No mowing required!”

After a few more stops to view the other
infrastructure, they arrived back at the platform where they had
started and walked to the Town Hall Center.

“This is by far the biggest above-ground
building in the village. It’s a combination of auditorium, indoor
sports facility, lecture theatre, church, nursing station, offices,
and library, plus, of course, the Research Laboratory.” She opened
the door to the lab and was pleased to see Olivia.

“Spencer is a special guest for the next few
days,” she said. “He works for the DIR and has come over to learn
what we’re all about.”

Olivia extended her hand. She intended to get
back to work but looked into the deep blue eyes of the handsome man
in front of her and gave herself an extra minute to speak to him.
“Quite a ride out here, isn’t it?”
I must look horrible with no
makeup and these awful coveralls.

He shook her hand and smiled. “The ride here
was nothing compared to the earlier part of the trip.” He described
the previous few weeks, telling them about his interrogation,
creating details along the way that added notes of drama and
personal danger.

“Someone obviously thought he was a corporate
spy or something,” Hope said, interrupting his mounting tale of
peril. “Olivia, I need to run an errand. Could you please give
Spencer a tour of the lab and show him where the cafeteria is?”

Olivia’s smile widened. “Sure, I can do
that.”

“I hope you enjoy your time here, Spencer,”
Hope said. “I’ve arranged for you to stay in trailer sixty-six.
Olivia can show you where that is, and if you need anything, just
come back to this center and ask for me. They’ll know how to get in
touch with me.”

After she left, Olivia showed him the main
areas of the lab and told him about the equipment that eventually
would be set up.

“Why all the focus on biology and chemistry?”
he asked.

“The purpose of this village is to work out a
way to live in harmony with the planet. Of course, that’ll involve
some physics, but being easy on the environment is mostly about
biology and chemistry.” She smiled brightly and gazed intently at
him.

“Makes sense.” He had noticed that Olivia
seemed attracted to him. “What about all of this equipment?” He
pointed to the biohazard suits and refrigeration units. He also saw
several pieces of equipment he knew were designed for handling
dangerous pathogens.

His question caught her off guard “Um…we need
to be equipped to handle anything here. Once construction is
finished, there’ll be no contact with the outside world, so I
thought it would be a good idea to have some of it around. They’re
multi-purpose, too; for instance, the biohazard suits can be used
for protection against radiation.”

“I’ll have to investigate this area later
tonight,” Spencer thought as Olivia suggested that they go to the
cafeteria.

They took their time over dinner, enjoying
each other’s company and afterwards took a pleasant evening stroll
through Percipience. Though he was a few years younger than her,
the combination of his humor, charm, and good looks had Olivia
entranced and she let out a long sigh as their walk neared its end
when they approached her trailer.

“I am going to be here for most of the day
tomorrow, perhaps you could take the day off and show me around?”
Spencer asked as he held her hand.

“Yes, I would like that very much,” Olivia
said, pleased that he seemed to be as interested in her as she was
in him.

“Great, you can stop by my trailer when
you’re ready in the morning,” he said with a wide smile. He then
leaned towards her and gave her a short kiss that left her in a bit
of a daze as she opened the door to her trailer.

Diane and Hope were still up when Olivia came
in. “Hope filled me in on your new friend,” Diane said teasingly.
“Is he even half as handsome as Hope is making him out to be? Does
he have a brother?”

“Very amusing,” she said as she smiled at her
roommates and got ready for bed.

As soon as Spencer left Olivia, he returned
to the lab and easily picked the lock to the entrance. He examined
the equipment already there and then noticed some crates stored in
one corner. From the shipping label on the top crate, it appeared
that they had arrived the day before from the foundation’s main
laboratory.

He carefully opened one and saw hundreds of
metal cylinders, some glass bottles, printed materials, and a data
thumb drive. He examined the metal cylinders and read the
bold-faced biohazard warnings. He took a couple of the cylinders
and glass bottles along with the drive and rearranged the contents
to appear as if the crate was still full. Then he resealed the
crate and went back to his trailer.

He plugged the thumb drive into his personal
phone, copied the data file and started to read through it. It was
soon apparent that the document was a manual and that he had
stumbled onto some kind of lethal virus called Virtuesh and its
vaccine. The metal cylinders alone were scary. There was a
biohazard warning label and a red button with a cover over it. He
dug through the online manual and found that the cylinders
contained the live virus and that the button was a failsafe. If the
button were pushed, a chemical would be released inside the
cylinder that would instantly kill the virus. Skimming through the
rest of the manual, he learned that the glass bottles contained the
vaccine, and the rest of the manual contained detailed instructions
on recreating both.
Why on earth would they need something like
this?

Olivia stormed into her trailer late in the
afternoon.

“What’s wrong? What did Spencer do?” Diane
asked.

“This has nothing to do with him; we actually
had a very nice day. This is all about Mikhail.” Olivia fumed.
“Yesterday, I received the first shipment of the Virtuesh virus
vaccine along with some other items from the lab at the foundation
headquarters. After I saw Spencer off this afternoon, I went over
to the lab and examined the crates and discovered that whoever
packed it made a few mistakes, like shorting me on the amount of
virus and vaccine that they were supposed to send. They also sent
me the original printed version of the instructions from the Asia
lab instead of the electronic version that I requested.”

“What does this have to do with Mikhail?”

“I flipped through the printed notes and
found information that’s not on the electronic version I’ve been
working from. There’s mention of a developed second strain of
Virtuesh—one that’s stronger and is airborne. Mikhail is the only
person that I can think of who could have altered the electronic
version to leave no mention of it.”

“You didn’t know about the second strain?”
Diane asked.

“No, and if everything that I read today is
accurate, and I have no reason to believe it isn’t, this is a
species killer.”

Diane was silent as she absorbed Olivia’s
information. Then she asked, “Should we go to the police?”

“I don’t think so. Like I said, Mikhail must
be behind this and I’m sure that he has covered his tracks well,
and if we report it now, they’ll most likely find nothing. He’s
already had several months with it and God knows what his plans
are.”

“But it could be Richard, too, or maybe both
of them.”

“Maybe, but at least Mikhail
has
to be
involved since he worked so closely with me on this whole thing.
He’s one of the few people with access to altering the electronic
version and the microbiology background, and to alter it in such a
way that I would not know that anything is missing.”

The trailer door opened and Hope entered,
covered from head to toe in dirt and mud.

Diane’s mouth fell open. “Wow! What were you
doing today?”

“This is
your
fault,” Hope said,
looking at Olivia.

“
My
fault! What did
I
do?”

“Since you were with your new friend today
and didn’t need help in the lab, they had me and a few others
finish digging out a cold room for one of the clan huts. Everything
was going well until someone broke a nearby waterline and a foot of
water flooded into the hole I was working in. I’ve spent most of
the day shoveling mud.” She moved gingerly from one foot to the
other. “Can you wait on dinner until I get cleaned up?”

“Sure,” Olivia said. Hope went into the
bathroom and shut the door, creating a brief hiatus in the
conversation.

Then Olivia turned to Diane. “What’s a cold
room?”

“It’s usually a well-insulated room in the
basement of a house. It’ll stay close to ground temperature year
round but won’t freeze. Very handy for storing food and seeds. They
keep longer in the cold.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a house with
one,” Olivia said.

“Some older houses have them, but you’re
right. They’re rare in new homes and cost more to build. Most
people don’t have a clue about growing and storing food anymore
anyhow.”

Hope had stripped her clothes off in the
bathroom, turned on the shower, and reached into her overall pocket
and pulled out an earbud that she placed in her ear. Through her
phone, the earbud was connected to a bug she had placed in the
bedroom area. She would listen to their whole conversation later
but was curious to hear what they were talking about now.

Hearing that shower start, Diane went back to
their previous discussion, “What should we do about this second
strain of Virtuesh?”

“Mikhail is at the foundation this week. I
called and told him that I need to spend some time in the lab there
since the assistants working for me had made mistakes. He knows I’m
not impressed with them and will send the helicopter to pick me up
in the morning.”

“What are you going to do there?”

“I need to make some of this new strain,
called Virtuesh-B and then use that to make up a batch of vaccine.”
Olivia said. “While I am there I will also see if I can find any
other information that is in printed records and not on the
electronic versions.”

“How long do you plan to be there?”

“Probably about a month to make a small
batch. I just hope I can make up enough excuses to Mikhail for
staying that long. He knows that I like my creature comforts, like
a big place to live, nice clothes, and restaurants, so he should
understand my wanting to be back there for a while.” Olivia paused
for a moment and appeared to be lost in thought before she finally
added “Maybe I can even get away for a day or two and visit
Spencer.”

Hope let the warm water wash away the mud and
grime.
Interesting—now I have another vaccine source if Mikhail
decides to double-cross me.

She got dressed and the three women went to
the cafeteria for dinner.