The Demon Plagues (27 page)

Christine went by the kitchen for tea then
back to her room. The internet was spotty but liberal doses of cash
had gotten them reconnected to a server in Albany, thankfully
undamaged on the Day of Death. She clicked back on the feed from
the alien spaceship, fascinated by the strange amoeba-like
creature, something under a microscope grown to human size.

A knock came at the open door. “The post,
ma’am.” A letter lay on a silver tray in the butler’s gloved
hands.

She waved him in and took it. “Thank you,
Wilkins. You’re looking well.”

He smiled. “As are you, Miss. I just had my
injection yesterday. Already I feel ten years younger.”

“Good for you! Aren’t you afraid of the alien
plague?”

“I’m almost eighty now. I’ll take the risk. I
wanted to before but…”

“Yes, the Unionists.”

“What about you, ma’am?”

“I got it before the Demon Plague showed up.
I guess I’ll just have to be careful.”

“Please do, ma’am.” Wilkins withdrew,
smiling.

‘Department of the Navy’, the envelope read.
She raised an eyebrow, reaching for the seldom-used letter-opener
on her desk. Not that much real hardcopy mail came these days,
certainly nothing for her, a just-released political prisoner.

Activation orders. And promoted to full
Commander. Dear Lord, is this a joke? God, You sure have a sense of
humor.
Well, I did ask for something worthwhile to do, and I
guess this is the answer. Be careful what you pray for, eh?

The official papers told her to report to
General Travis Tyler, US Army, at Butts Army Airfield, Ft. Carson,
Colorado. She looked it up on her computer.
Looks like it’s
closer to Colorado Springs…but that took a nuclear strike. Who
knows, I guess I’ll find out when I get there.

She threw down the packet and thought for a
moment, then picked it back up, exiting her room into the wood
paneled hall. The scent of pine oil and wood smoke reminded her of
her childhood visits here.

Turning left past the library, she opened the
door to the smoking room where her aunt Adelia Jenkins sat, staring
out the window at the rain. Ashes from her forgotten cigarette fell
like snowflakes beneath her hanging hand.

“Better watch it, Auntie, or you’ll burn your
fingers.” Christine took the smoke from the old woman,
unresisted.

Adelia’s watery eyes turned to Christine’s as
she sat down on the sofa beside her. She blinked, focusing, then
reached for the glasses on the chain around her neck to peer
nearsightedly at her niece. “You look very well, Chrissie, on the
outside. How do you feel on the inside?”

“Better now that I’m not being interrogated
every blessed day. Just because the prison wasn’t a concentration
camp doesn’t mean it wasn’t my own kind of hell. Thanks for getting
me out; when are you going to accept the Plague?”

The old woman waved a vague hand. “Just like
that? Soon enough; I still have some hard decisions to make. I
don’t want my mind clouded.”

Christine disagreed, “Your mind will be
clearer, not clouded. I worked with infected people, I got them out
of the country, I know the real story, not that propaganda they
were feeding you.”

“But there’s no one else to run the company.
The whole Jenkins family, wiped out by those goddamned Australian
missiles.”

Christine didn’t bother to debate the origin
of the missiles. She put her hand on her aunt’s. “I’m still your
niece. And as soon as you take the Plague, you will be young and
immortal and, dare I say it, fertile. If you feel that the family
name is important, that is. Either way, the Plague will give you
time.”

“What about you?” Adelia’s tone jabbed at her
niece, surly. “Why don’t you get a husband and pop out a few?”

“I’m sure I will, when I find the right man.
I have time too. The Unionists are out of power and the donkeys and
elephants are too shellshocked to bicker much. By the time things
start fracturing again, the Eden Plague will be a fact of life for
all North Americans. With your money and power, you can make sure
that happens. The sooner you start, the better. Just like the evil
queen said, one little prick and it will all be over.”

Adelia pulled her hand out from under
Christine’s “That’s supposed to be reassuring?”

Christine sighed. “It was supposed to be
funny, but I’ve never been that good at comedy. Just…just trust me,
Adelia. Look at me. Last week I was forty-two. Today, I’m
twenty-five in the body, but the same in my mind.”

“Sure, you’re the same because you already
were a goody-two shoes tomboy, going into the ministry and the Navy
and so on. I’m a nasty old bitch and maybe I want to stay that
way.”

Christine stood up, placing her hands on her
hips. “You’re afraid. You lived through the last ten years of these
fearmongers and you saw what terror does to a society and you are
still afraid. It’s easier to stay afraid and defend what you have
than be brave and take a leap of faith.”

The old woman licked her lips. “I’m not
ready.”

“Well, you’ll have to be soon.” She waved the
papers in her hand. “I just got reactivated and promoted. I’m back
in the Navy. If that isn’t proof things have changed, I don’t know
what is. But I have to report in a week, so you’ll have to decide
soon.” She turned to go.

“Wait, Chrissie, don’t leave me.”

Christine spoke over her shoulder. “I’m not
leaving you yet, auntie. I’m just leaving you alone. I have too
much to do to sit here while you wallow in self-pity. There are
people out there who lost everything, living in refugee camps. Poor
little rich girl. Snap out of it.” She walked out, feeling her
aunt’s eyes burning holes in her back.

Lord, give me strength and guidance. I hope
tough love was the right thing. She needs to start living and
working again. This country needs industrialists like her – like
she used to be, before she got scared – to rebuild.

Back in her room, she logged on to a secure,
hidden corner of the internet and wrote a quick update to her usual
report. Though she had been caught – by old-fashioned physical
police work – her network, her underground railroad smuggling Edens
out of the UGNA had never been dismantled. And someone in that
network, deliberately unknown to her, was connected to the loose
organizations of resistance in the USA, networks that had not
disbanded just because the Unionists were out of power. Someone in
the resistance was connected to the Free Communities, and would
pass her report to the right people.

Once she put the uniform back on, these
reports would have to cease. She couldn’t serve two masters. Her
final missive would explain. She was going back in, and maybe, just
maybe, she could do more good inside than out.

-34-

Skull looked out over the Painted Desert of
Arizona from the tiny window of the regional-airline turboprop. The
brilliant reds and yellows blazed in the afternoon sunlight, a
convincing lie of America the Beautiful. Skull knew better.

Though he felt nothing for the men who had
died at his hands, his steel-plated heart ached for his beloved
land, brought to her knees by the impossible pounding of atomic
destruction. That the fire had also scourged the evil that had
seized power, had scraped the wounded people almost clean of the
neofascists and their police state, was the only thing that gave
him hope, for he was flying, business casual, to the center of what
remained of power in the prostrate United States.

Denny had given him a word, a whisper in the
dark, before they had parted in Mexico City. The SS was pulling out
of Mexico, but in an orderly fashion; any hint of running and the
jackals would come out in force.
Ironic that much of America’s
remaining organized ground forces was occupying Mexico and Canada
two weeks ago. Sorry,
‘advising and assisting’ them
. He
chuckled to himself.

Pueblo.
Might be a codeword, might be
someone’s name, but Skull had done his rotation in Intelligence
before the Corps had forced him to retire. He knew how to put the
bits and pieces together.

Pueblo, Colorado was just outside the zone of
nuclear devastation; it was the best piece of infrastructure
standing anywhere near NORAD’s headquarters at Cheyenne Mountain.
Now it was the nation’s provisional capital, home of the United
States Government.

What was left of it.

Pueblo was also within easy reach of a number
of national laboratories and their offshoots and annexes. When
Skull had asked about Tiny Fortress, the word that came back was
‘Pueblo.’

“Please lock your tray tables and put your
seats in their full upright positions.”

After doing as the stewardess instructed, he
closed his eyes. He didn’t much care for the sinking feeling as the
airplane descended into Pueblo Memorial. He never liked flying, or
jumping either. It wasn’t fear, exactly; just…unease.

He felt better immediately upon stepping out
on the bright hot oil-smelling tarmac of the runway, settling his
sunglasses and striding for the terminal. SS troopers watched with
bored expressions from their air-conditioned vehicles. The
so-called Unionists were dead or discredited, but their
bureaucratic structures lived on, the proverbial Hydra. He ignored
them, a wolf among dogs.

Skull found the Homeland Security office
inside, a clean modern space full of the trappings of civilization,
complete with hot and cold running suspicion. He stared back at the
uniformed sergeant behind the desk until the man squirmed and gave
up trying to intimidate him. Eventually Skull’s cold eyes wore him
down.

“Can I –"

“Yes, Sergeant,” he snapped, preemptory. “You
can get someone in authority.” Skull pulled out a leather folder,
showing him his impeccably forged US Marshals Badging and
Credentials, called ‘B’s and C’s’ by those that used them. “Right
away please.” His tone denied that it was a request.

The man rushed to comply. Less than a minute
later Skull was being shown into a glass-fronted office with
‘Special Agent Carlos Adams, FBI’ freshly painted on it. A young,
stocky but fit man looking fresh out of training, he crushed
Skull’s hand in one meaty paw. “Glad to meet you, sir.”

The ‘sir’ was purely for his age, Skull
suspected, since a US Marshal was roughly equivalent to a Special
Agent in any of the government agencies.
Fine, I’ll push it as
far as I can
. “Likewise. Craig Demming, US Marshal. I need some
information, if you could help me out. I’m out of the Santa Fe
office but our computers are still screwed up, and I figured I’d
just come on up and see if you are doing any better. I’m looking
for a man named Raphe Durgan. Medical doctor, biologist. Might be a
program manager at one of the labs around here.”

“Sure, Craig, let me get one of my people on
it right away.” Eager to show off his little empire, Special Agent
Adams handed him two printouts within ten minutes. “You got his
standard security cover there and his current assignment details.
Applied Computer Technology Labs, subsidiary to Los Alamos. Well,
it was.” He looked sheepish; Los Alamos National Nuclear
Laboratory’s main campus had taken a direct hit.

“Do you have his home address and phone
number? Getting cleared into these labs, you know…pain in the ass.
I’d rather just look him up after hours.”

“Sure, sir, it’s on the second page there.”
Eager as a puppy.

“Outstanding. You’ve been a great help. This
is all classified, so please don’t even talk about my visit with
anyone not specifically authorized.” Skull stood up, put on his
best ‘we’re all buddies’ smile, and shook hands manfully. Then he
got the hell out of there before Murphy showed up.

His credentials couldn’t stand even the most
cursory electronic check; hopefully the widespread computer issues
since the strikes would cover him for long enough. He rented a car
with cash and a fake driver’s license and a generous bribe – or
‘tip’ – up front, another remnant of the police state that would
take a while to root out.

Unaccountable power corrupts everything it
touches. More power, more corruption.

Thirty minutes later he was parked in the
cul-de-sac that held Durgan’s McMansion. Its rear deck looked out
on the 18-hole golf course running through the high-end gated
desert community, and its front yard was stunningly over-landscaped
with desert plants and faux Southwestern Native American designs.
Everything was orderly and ordinary in this heavily-controlled
desert area.

They must be keeping the refugees from the
nuclear strikes away by force, otherwise this little paradise would
be overrun.

Skull watched as Durgan’s Lexus pulled into
his driveway, the garage door rising smoothly in response to a
signal. He got out of his rental and walked fast down the sidewalk,
reaching the closing door in just enough time to duck under it.

Durgan nearly fainted from shock when he
stepped out of his car inside his own closed garage and almost ran
into the tall thin sniper. “What…who the hell are you?”

Skull already had his B’s & C’s out,
flashing the badge. “Craig Demming, US Marshal. Can we go inside
and talk for a few minutes, Doctor Durgan?”

Durgan looked at Skull uncertainly, then
nodded. A minute later they were drinking iced tea at Durgan’s
enormous teak dining table. No one else seemed to be home; in fact,
Skull could see no signs that anyone else occupied the house at
all, except for a black and white cat that peeked out at him from
between the stair’s banister struts.

“What’s this about? I can’t talk about my
work, and I don’t…I haven’t had anything…I mean…” He trailed off
uncertainly.

Skull laced his fingers together in front of
him, almost as if praying. “Doctor, I first heard your name in some
interesting company. I was sitting in an SUV on a Virginia highway
ten years ago, leaving the Norfolk area…listening to Elise Wallis
tell me about the Eden Plague.”