Final Dawn: Season 1 (The Thrilling Post-Apocalyptic Series) (33 page)

Leonard McComb | Rachel Walsh | Marcus Warden | Nancy Sims

9:41 AM, April 5, 2038

“Got it!” Rachel threw her arms up in the air, then gasped and grimaced as waves of pain circulated through her chest. The other three looked at her as she turned the laptop toward them, showing them the file folder that was open. Inside the folder sat several different files: a video, a few images and several text files.

Rachel went through the text files first, confirming that they had indeed come from David. At the top of each file was David’s full name, the date the files were saved and a brief summary of their contents. They were full of rows of numbers, abbreviations, chemical names and mineral names all arranged in a comma-delimited format for easy sorting and manipulation.
These look like inventory records from the lab. Why would David have put these on a drive?
Several rows were marked with asterisks, but Rachel wasn’t sure what they meant.

“What’s all that?” Marcus gestured at the screen, speaking over a mouthful of food. Thanks to Leonard’s quick thinking and the combination of food from everyone’s sacks, they had enough food and water to last for a while inside the armory, and they had all gone to town on the supplies, having the first relaxed meal in a long time. Bathroom facilities would have to be sorted out soon, but that was a topic that no one had wanted to broach thus far.

“I think it’s a bunch of inventory logs from the lab I worked at in Washington. I just can’t figure out why David would want someone to read these.”

“David was your husband?”

“Oh, no, David was a coworker and a good friend. He was one of the several scientists in charge of the lab, including myself.”

“What kind of lab was it, Rachel?” Leonard was walking around the room, inspecting the weapons. Occasionally he would pick one up, hold it up and pantomime shooting it, seeing how it felt in his hands. His favorites so far were the grenade launchers, equipped to fire smoke, tear gas, armor penetrating and explosive rounds.

Rachel stopped typing long enough to look at him as she responded. “We were a skunkworks lab, tasked with advanced research in a whole bunch of areas. I helped manage and coordinate all the projects along with David and a few other people.”

“I guess it was pretty big to warrant that many supervisors. What kind of projects?”

Rachel let out a long breath, shaking her head, thinking about all the work that had crossed her desk in the time she had been there. “Just about anything major that’s come out in the last twenty years, our lab probably had a hand in it. Advanced medicine, genetic testing, weapon design, alternative energy research. You name it, we worked on it, either for secret purposes or for commercial entities.”

Marcus let out a low whistle. “Wow. And all that was going on in D.C.?”

“Yep, right in the heart. Our main building was just a few blocks from the White House. The folks at the top liked to keep us where they could get to us easily. Made them feel important, being able to drop in and ‘check up’ on everything. We didn’t really care as long as they stayed out of the way. Well, except for one. He was… odd.” Rachel trailed off, thinking about the mysterious “Mr. Doe” who seemed to instill fear into nearly every person in the facility despite no one being completely sure of who he was.

Rachel opened the image files next, with the others still watching on behind her. The first image was a satellite view of a snow-covered area, with a body of water off to the left. A red circle highlighted a section of the water just off the coast, and as Rachel zoomed in she could see a small speck in the center of the circle. The view was wide enough that Rachel couldn’t tell what the speck was, so she skipped to the next image.

Like the first image, this one was also a satellite view, but of a very different area. Instead of a featureless white land mass, this one was green, with a river curving around through half the image. Rachel could see roads and bridges in the area, along with buildings and rolling fields. A circle on this image highlighted a grey square in the center of a green field directly next to a bend in the river. The square looked new compared to the other buildings in the area, and it was foreign to Rachel.

“Do you guys recognize this?” Rachel turned to the three behind her, pointing at the square on the screen. They all shook their heads, having never seen it before either. “Whatever it is, it’s massive; at least a couple miles on each side. It must not be here in the US, then, or I think I’d have remembered a news article about it or something.”

Instead of showing another satellite view, the third image was a schematic. Several cross-section views were present, along with measurements and descriptions of materials. Rachel immediately recognized the object on the screen, but said nothing about it. Marcus tried to ask what it was, but Rachel shook her head and closed the image.

“Just this last file, the video, then I’ll explain everything.” Rachel double-clicked the file before anyone could object, maximized it to fill the screen of the computer and turned up the volume to its highest setting.

Undisclosed Location

March 25, 2038

The first sign that something is seriously wrong comes just before eight o’clock. The laboratory complex, while operating under normal conditions, is suddenly placed under quarantine. Mr. Doe is informed of this development in less than a minute after it happens by a phone call from one of the panicked staff. With a cool, calm voice he tells the staff member to place their superior on the phone, who he then interrogates for information. Midway through the conversation, before he can extract very much useful information, the call is cut off.

In less than two minutes from the first word of the quarantine, Mr. Doe is off the phone, striding down the hall towards the elevator. He motions to his secretary as he walks by. “Call an emergency meeting.” The secretary nods and immediately picks up her phone, foregoing a response to shave precious seconds off the phone calls. She makes several short calls in rapid succession, speaking in a hushed tone through each brief conversation.

“Mr. Doe has ordered an emergency meeting. He didn’t say what it was about. Yes, goodbye.”

Seventeen minutes later, Mr. Doe is assembled with Mr. Johnson, Mr. Richards, Mr. Smith and Mr. Jones in a conference room in the lower levels of the building. The projector is already on when they enter the room. It displays live camera feeds of the interior of the complex as the men watch. A speakerphone in the center of the table is on, transmitting sound from the cameras to the conference room. Mr. Richards is speaking with staff members on another line, collecting their reports to find out the cause of the quarantine.

Minutes pass with no new information, then Mr. Jones points at one of the cameras. A faint mist forms in view of the camera, like static or fog. The mist becomes more well-defined, turning from a pale grey color into a silver one. The silver mist coalesces into tendrils that snake down the hall in pursuit of a woman who runs from them. On the other end of the conference line, a scream passes through, and Mr. Richards pulls back from the table, looking to Mr. Doe. The others turn to face Mr. Doe as well, who still sits silent at the head of the table, observing what is unfolding.

“Sir, this is—”

“I know what it is, Mr. Smith, thank you. Kindly allow me to think for a moment.”

Mr. Doe’s icy voice does not waver as he speaks. He swivels his chair away from the men to face the wall. Screams continue to echo through the conference line for several minutes, while more cameras are filled with images of the silver mist, flowing through the halls and rooms of the laboratory complex.

“Activate Bertha.” The command comes while Mr. Doe is still facing the wall. The four men look at each other, then Mr. Richards disconnects the conference line. He redials, connecting to another facility.

“Authorization code?” The challenge comes with a military precision honed from years of practice.

Mr. Richards responds to the question with a series of letters and numbers. There is a pause, then the man on the other end of the line replies. “Challenge accepted. Deploying Bertha.”

Mr. Richards leans back in his chair, wiping sweat that has accumulated on his brow. He looks at Mr. Doe who has turned back to face the men in the room.

“Gentlemen, I recommend that you return to your offices. I will update you with further information.” The men nod and leave quickly. Mr. Doe does not return to his office on the top floor, however. He exits the conference room and enters a small elevator at the end of the hall, just large enough to fit one or two people. He presses a button inside the elevator and the doors shut. The elevator barrels downwards, past the lowest levels of the building, deep into the earth.

Undisclosed Location

March 25, 2038

In the laboratory, David positions a video camera on a tripod, looking nervously at the door to the lab. From outside, in the corridor, horrific screams echo through the walls. A few scattered individuals run past the windows, not paying enough attention to notice David. David tries to ignore the screaming and finishes setting up the camera, ignoring the people in the hallway.

Deep rumbles sound from overhead, the room shakes and the lights flicker. David staggers with the shaking, holding on to the tripod to keep it from toppling over. He runs over to check a computer that is still on in the corner. The computer is receiving a live data stream from the complex. While the stream is incomplete, it gives David insight into the conditions in the rest of the laboratory.

David pulls up a schematic of the laboratory on the laptop, rotating the model on the screen to view a flashing indicator from several levels down. A large ‘B’ flashes red on the screen and David touches it. A dialog box appears and prompts David for a password. He holds his finger to the screen, allowing his thumbprint to be scanned and the dialog box changes to show a status of the area he is examining.

Unit: BERTHA

Status: Non-functional

Diagnosis: Undetermined

Details: Unit reports activation at 1946. Failure in main detonation chamber reported. Self-diagnosis routines are offline. Please check back later.

David wipes a trickle of sweat from his brow as he reads the status report on the screen and whispers to the empty room. “If Bertha’s gone, we’re screwed.” The laboratory has many safeguards against a contamination failure. One of the last is the activation of Bertha, deep in the heart of the facility. It is a failsafe measure, designed to be a method of extreme last resort, only when all other options are gone and when contamination with the outside world cannot be allowed.

David rotates the model again, examining more of the facility. Much of the diagram is green, though scattered sections turn red before his eyes. All of the red sections are on the lowest parts of the facility, where the most people are gathered. Seconds go by and more sections turn red, moving up into the higher sections of the laboratory.

Through the windows into the hall, David can see movement as people run, trying to escape the complex. Wisps of silver smoke trail behind the people, enveloping them and extinguishing their screams. The complex has been shut down for hours now, though, and their attempts at escape are futile. David shakes his head and sits down in front of the camera, seated on a stool in front of the lab tables. He turns the camera on and speaks, staring at the red light that blinks softly in the dimmed light of the lab.

“My name is David Landry. I’m a researcher in Laboratory Victor. This message is for any who receives it. Bertha has failed. Containment has been breached. I don’t know how long I have before they reach this room. I’ve prepared a compressed data stream and attached it in this video. It has a complete summary of the events of the last 24 hours, including as much information as I’ve been able to gather on my own.”

David taps on the keys of a computer behind him. The video screen goes blank, then is filled with static. A thrumming sound accompanies the static as massive amounts of data are fed to the video and encoded. The automated system logs, the video surveillance, production graphs and more are all embedded in the video, stored for safekeeping. The feed finally completes and David addresses the camera once again.