The Shift: Book II of the Wildfire Saga
Read The Shift: Book II of the Wildfire Saga Online
Authors: Marcus Richardson
MARCUS
RICHARDSON
© 2015 Marcus Richardson.
All Rights Reserved.
1st Printing, September 2015.
This is a work of fiction.
The people and events in this book have been written
for entertainment purposes only.
Any similarity to living and/or deceased people
is purely coincidental and not intentional.
No part of this book may be reproduced
or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without prior written consent by the author.
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[Books by Marcus Richardson]
THE FUTURE HISTORY
OF
AMERICA
Book I:
Alea Jacta Est
Book II:
Sic Semper Tyrannis
Book III:
Dux Bellorum
THE WILDFIRE SAGA
Book I:
Apache Dawn
Book II:
The Shift
Book III:
Firestorm
Other books in the WILDFIRE series:
False Prey
(Novella)
The Wildfire Bundle
(Books I-III)
For the Operators.
The silent, shining tip of the spear—those who never sleep,
never rest, and never relent until
every threat is destroyed.
Antigenic shift:
an abrupt, major change in the influenza A virus, resulting in a virus that is so different from the same subtype in humans that most people do not have immunity to the new virus.
While influenza viruses are changing by antigenic drift all the time, antigenic
shift
happens only occasionally.
When a shift happens, most people have little or no protection against the new virus.
C
HAPTER
1
Boston, Massachusetts.
Prior to Apache Dawn.
D
OCTOR
M
AURICE
B
OATNER
REMOVED
his glasses and sighed in relief as he rubbed his temples.
The springs in his ancient office chair creaked as he leaned back.
He opened his bleary eyes and blinked at the three computer monitors at his workstation.
Boatner glanced disapprovingly at the microscope assembly to his right.
No matter how hard he tried to identify the antigens he needed, this particular strain of swine flu was proving difficult to nail down.
Part of him hoped he would make a big discovery, like any scientist would.
Another part wanted his colleagues to be included, if possible, in any simple fix that might assist with next spring's vaccine.
The only sound in his laboratory was the steady tick-tick-tick of an analog clock mounted on the wall above the only exit.
The white-walled room, empty now this late at night, housed more than a dozen microscopes hooked up to computer monitors for teaching purposes.
Located on the second floor of the Harvard University Advanced Immunology Center, it was a professor’s dream workspace.
Unfortunately, Maurice Boatner thought of himself as a virologist first, professor second.
He longed for his real lab, deep under the Child Services Building—where he could get
real
work done.
He looked around the empty lab and sighed.
The upperclassmen virology students he normally taught three days a week were hopefully in bed.
He chuckled to himself as he stood and stretched his aching back.
Who was he kidding?
It was Friday night.
The kids would be out partying.
His eyes found the long window on the east side of the lab and strolled over to have a look.
The campus was quiet and deserted.
Where normally he’d see dozens of students heading off to bars or to meet up with friends, he saw no one.
He shook his head.
He’d never understand students.
Back to work.
The virus wasn't going to identify itself.
He glanced up at the clock again.
10:23 PM.
Where did my life go?
All alone on a Friday night—in a college town.
I still feel as young as a 30-year-old, yet here I am, hunched over a microscope trying to identify a little bug for a friend at the CDC.
The thought, one he'd been entertaining more frequently as he approached 50, was answered for him by looking at the image of the virus on the screen.
He'd lost his entire family during the Great Pandemic ten years earlier.
Maurice Boatner had been a rising star in the field of virology—graduated top of his class from Columbia and instead of going into practice, had gone right into research.
He'd been fought over by more than a dozen labs and facilities across the United States.
When the Great Pandemic had erupted across the globe, he threw himself into his work a such singleminded determination to find a cure.
He almost didn't notice how many of his friends and family had gotten sick, until it was too late.
He forced down the dark memories of ten years ago and tried to clear his head.
Fresh air.
I need fresh air.
He headed toward the door and snatched his coat on the way.
He couldn't help but marvel at the subtle differences in the antigen structure on the curious new strain of the swine flu Taylor had asked him to identify.
His mind wandered back to the dark days of The Pandemic as his footsteps echoed down the empty corridors of the Advanced Immunology Center Research Building.
The long hours, the isolation in government quarantine, soldiers in the streets—soldiers in his lab.
He paused at the elevator and waited for the doors to open.
Why am I
thinking about this?
Boatner leaned against the back of the elevator and closed his eyes.
The
ding
of the doors opening jolted him awake.
He blinked and stepped out into the deserted hallway.
Boatner stopped at the roof access door, relieved the lock still hadn’t been repaired.
He smiled when felt the first blast of crips, late autumn air smack him in the face.
He braced himself and stepped out onto the widow's walk that graced the top of the building, then took a deep breath of
the cleansing, cold air rolling in from Boston Harbor.
In the distance, he could see the lights of ships out in the Bay, coming in from the open Atlantic or heading out—he couldn't tell which.
The sounds and lights of Boston enveloped him like a blanket.
The glowing lights of the never-ending stream of traffic coursing its way through the streets of Boston soothed his troubled thoughts.
A jet roared through the sky overhead, turbines whining on its way to Logan International.
Boatner leaned on the weathered, wooden railing and gripped the crackled paint.
He closed his eyes and took an invigorating, deep breath of the salt-tinged air.
The breeze off the bay was stiff tonight.
He was lost in thought, staring at the twinkling lights of the city when he felt his phone vibrate in his breast pocket.
He pulled it out, glancing at the number.
"Albert Daniels!
I haven't heard from you, since—”
"Sorry to interrupt your Friday night, Professor, but we have a situation."
When Albert Daniels, perhaps the closest thing to a rival Maurice Boatner ever had in his career as a virologist says 'we have a situation', most people pause.
Boatner knew Daniels better than that.
He was a general now.
Daniels had been rapidly promoted through the ranks for his role in helping to end the Great Pandemic.
He was one of the best virologists the military had and he held the ear not only of the Pentagon, but was a close friend with the Director of the Centers for Disease Control.