Extinction Level Event (Book 1): Extinction

by Newman, AJ

  Then it hit him to try his emergency weather alert radio. He thought, Surely, they would have a warning. If not, I could tune to a regular radio station.

  He hadn’t been in contact with anyone for two weeks and wanted the solitude, so he didn’t listen to the radio. He waved and said hi to a few people, but had no real conversations with them. Anything could have happened in a week. The on button only yielded static on the weather channel. He turned the dial through the entire range and merely heard a couple of stations with garbled noise so bad he couldn’t tell if there was a human voice. He knew he was between mountains but always could hear at least one or two channels. This was bad. He tried his cell phone again, it turned on, and all the apps showed up, but there wasn’t any internet or phone service. There were zero bars, which wasn’t odd for this part of Oregon, but he was getting more nervous by the minute.

  Next, Jon came to a Forest Service Station and a small campground. He peeked into the front window of the office and saw two men who lay in their own blood. A bloody hand hit the window in front of him. Jon fell backward and squirmed away from the window. A man peered over the windowsill and mouthed the word ‘help’ before his head dropped out of sight. The man was dead but just didn’t know it yet. Blood flowed freely down from his eyes and mouth.

  The campground was worse. Flies were everywhere, and Jon hated flies. There were dozens of bodies spread around. A couple of women begged him for help, but he knew they were too far gone to help them. They also had horrible and deadly symptoms. Flies buzzed around the blood on the faces of the dead, and animals had been chewing on them. He quickly moved away from the corpses and covered his mouth and nose with his wet handkerchief. He felt terrible about leaving the survivors to die but had to make sure he didn’t become contaminated any more than he probably was now.

  The campground was only trail access, so he had to travel downstream to get to his rental car. Jon borrowed a canoe from a couple who obviously didn’t need it anymore and scavenged some water and food from several of the campsites. He used a trash bag to pick up the cans and packages and placed them in another container. He consciously tried to avoid contamination by wrapping his spare t-shirt over his nose and mouth while near the dead. He loaded the boat and paddled downstream.

  He looked back and thought the scene would do justice to a horror flick. A woman was dead on the beach with dark crimson blood-stained sand around her head. An older man and woman died in each other’s arms, and a dog lay beside a teenage girl, waiting for her to rise and play with him. Jon felt sorry for the golden retriever.

  This was the first time Jon was sure the deaths were caused by a virus or germ. There were too many people from different lifestyles to have eaten from the same contaminated salad bar or can of meat. It hadn’t dawned on him yet to question why he was still alive. He shoved the canoe away from the beach and hummed an old Beach Boys tune to keep from thinking about the deaths.

  Chapter 2

  Russian Bioweapons Lab “Vector” – Novosibirsk, Siberia

  May 2038 - 30 days earlier

  Viktor stole the vials of the HB3 Virus after he moved a large box to block the camera’s view. He fumed while he thought back to when he was kidnapped and sent to the lab. He was on his eleventh hour of a twelve-hour day working at the Russian top secret bioweapons lab in Siberia. He’d graduated at the top of his class with twin Master’s degrees in immunology and electrical engineering. He was a genius and caught the eye of his superiors. Before he could get a job and marry Svetlana, his childhood sweetheart, the KGB swept him away to Siberia. They promised he’d be given a week off every month and could go home to his hometown south of Moscow. It was actually two years before he was allowed to make his first phone call to his family and another year before he made his first and only trip home. His mom and dad had died right after he disappeared. Everyone thought he’d been killed by the KGB.

  Svetlana married his best friend and had two kids. He hated her, his job, and that the Russian government had stolen his life. He worked twelve hours a day and spent the rest of his time with ten fellow workers in an underground bunker near the lab. They only had lights on for four hours and then had to lie in a dark room until their shift started. Once a month, the workers were treated with a visit by a dozen prostitutes. That was the only thing worth looking forward to in his miserable life.

  A week after he found his parents were dead and his fiancé had betrayed him, he came up with his plot for revenge. He’d had a year to develop a method to smuggle the virus out of the lab. In his spare time, he reconfigured the electronics that controlled the failsafe protocols that would isolate the lab and the complete complex. The protocols would also spray the entire complex with a disinfectant and then spray a highly flammable liquid to incinerate every germ, virus, and living being in the lab and complex.

  Viktor received a medal for his creation of the HB3 super virus that was spread like flu but killed like Ebola and was ten times more contagious. The officials didn’t notice being sprayed with the atomized virus from the vials he’d stolen and had flown back to Moscow and several other major Russian cities. That afternoon, he disabled the failsafe controls and spread the virus to everyone in the lab and complex without telling them. He then killed his supervisor and made several phone calls. He told each of the infected officials to get out of Russia before the virus infected them. His next move was to warn all of his fellow workers the virus had escaped the Level 4 lab and they should flee to save their lives. Riots broke out, and the men killed the guards before fleeing into the city to find transportation home.

  In the next few days, dozens of Russian dignitaries suddenly had important meetings in England, Canada, France, and China. The others on the planes were annoyed at the coughing and sneezing but knew better than to complain to officials who could have them sent to Siberia or killed. The Russians disembarked from their planes and promptly spread the virus to hundreds of people at over a dozen major airports. They thought they’d escaped the infection, but they were actually the carriers that Victor counted on to spread the disease to the entire world.

  Victor felt the blood run down his face and knew the pain would soon start. He took a scalpel and slit his wrists, thinking about Svetlana and her bastard kids dying in agony. He died with a smile on his face.

  The virus spread at an alarming rate since there had been no warning given, and hundreds of infected Russians traveled freely in all of the major countries. The symptoms were the same as the flu until the start of the third week, and then the bleeding started. After that, the pain started. It was a horrible death. Millions were infected by the highly contagious virus before the world knew doomsday had arrived on their doorstep.

  Every country in the entire world had most of their population infected before the first person started bleeding from their eyes, nose, and ears. By then, the quarantines were too late to save the country; however, senior Russian dignitaries told their counterparts about the virus, and they secretly went to bunkers, ships on the high seas, and remote locations around the world. The President, Congress, and senior military leaders of the USA were all safe in their bunkers while the USA died.

  ☣☣☣

  The CDC – Atlanta, Georgia – June 2038

  Back to Now

  Doctor Marcus Green watched as the Marines wheeled the self-contained biological hazmat containers into the lab. He stood safely behind an inch of glass while watching the men risk their lives wearing their biohazard suits and breathing apparatuses.

  “Doc, my men did their part. We delivered three of the so-called immune people from Russia. They are bruised up a bit. The bastards wanted to come to the good ole USA until they figured out they’d be lab rats. There are ten of the infected and sixty more that show no signs of the infection who will be delivered tomorrow.”

  “Colonel Gage, I thought they were supposed to be volunteers.”

  “Doc, they volunteered when we told them we were leaving, and they could go with us to the
USA where the disease hadn’t spread to yet. Anyway, you have ten contaminated and three of the immune people. You have sixty left to help develop the vaccine. Good luck. The head guys out in Colorado are counting on you to save the world. I’m heading to a nuclear sub in the Pacific.”

  “Wait!” Doc Green shouted. “We need some of your men to guard the subjects and control them.”

  “Sorry, I forgot. Sergeant Nixon has a platoon of grunts outside going through your field decontamination tents. He will control your guinea pigs.”

  “Thanks, this could have been a disaster.”

  “Oh, Doc, many of the Russians think they can gain immunity by receiving transfusions from an immune person. That’s why we had a hard time finding only three of the immune. The damned Russian leaders had them gathered up and were milking their blood in hopes of keeping themselves from getting sick.”

  “Colonel, I doubt if that will work. We’ll need to find the reason for the immunity, duplicate it in large quantities, and then share with the world.”

  “Doc, that’s good thinking, but I hope you’re wrong because two of the Russian immune donated their blood for my transfusions.”

  Doc Green was horrified. “Don’t let that get out to the public. It won’t save them and would kill off our supply of immunes to study to make a cure.”

  The Colonel laughed. “Doc, the shit has hit the proverbial fan outside of this laboratory. People are dying. It’s every man for himself. Grow up and live.”

  Later that day, Doctor Marcus Green watched Sergeant Nixon’s men run off all the people gathered outside the CDC complex. The men fired their weapons into the air at first, then had to kill dozens before the others ran away. Green saw his family running away, and he wasn’t the same after watching them run away to their certain death.

  Chapter 3

  The Rogue River – Foster Boat Ramp - June 2038

  The water was cold, and Jon could see to the bottom in still water. The scent of pine was always present, but there was an unusual odor in the air. It was a bit unpleasant, but it was so faint he couldn’t recognize it. The canoe hung up on a couple of sandbars, and Jon quickly got out and pulled the boat past the obstructions. The trip wasn’t very long, and he paddled the boat around a bend only to see several boats and canoes tied up. He pulled the canoe up on the beach, hoping to see some healthy people. He was greeted by a dead man lying on a raft but didn’t see anyone else. There were a dozen boats and about three times that many cars and trucks in the parking lot. There wasn’t a sound besides the birds chirping and a dog barking upstream. No one was around. He thought, No one living anyway.

  He walked up to the campground and saw a woman sitting on a picnic table with her head on her arms. Even though she looked so peaceful, he knew she was dead but looked like she’d just fallen asleep. He walked past her and opened the nearest tent flap. A family of four lay peacefully in their sleeping bags. They could have been mistaken for worn out campers trying to get some rest if it weren’t for the blood-soaked pillows around their heads and the grotesque scowls on their faces.

  Jon didn’t know anything about germs, bacteria, or viruses, but was sure this bug killed its victim slowly enough to spread to other people before they died an agonizing death. After peering into a few more tents, he was confident that many of the ill people became sick very fast and didn’t have time to drive for help. Others appeared to have been able to tend to their loved ones before dying. Besides the blood from every orifice, most of the victims had suffered from vomiting and horrible diarrhea just before dying. Flies were everywhere, dining on the blood, vomit, and excrement. The gross scenes made him gag, but he kept going. He held a water-soaked handkerchief over his mouth and nose as a precaution. Now, he knew what had caused the faint scent earlier in the day.

  Only one of the cars at the far end of the camp had been wrecked. The driver was slumped behind the wheel. He tried not to think about his own mortality, but down deep inside, he was scared he would die like the others. The license plates on the vehicles in the parking lot gave him a clue of how the virus spread. There were plates from Ohio, Florida, New York, and Nova Scotia. Four cars were rentals, which probably meant the owners flew into a local airport as Jon had. They could be from anywhere on the planet. Then he remembered the Japanese tourists.

  The dead Forest Ranger lay on a cot in a room at the back of the building, and bloody handprints covered the wall behind him. Jon breathed deeply through the wet handkerchief and walked into the room. He found some hand sanitizer on a desk and soaked a rag so he could clean the Ranger’s pistol belt. He saw it had a Glock 9mm pistol and two loaded magazines. He wiped the belt, gun, and extra magazines before placing the pistol belt over his shoulder. He turned his attention to a gun safe behind a filing cabinet. The small safe was locked and bolted to the floor and wall behind it. He tried shoving the safe back and forth to no avail. Jon was now out of breath and ran out of the room.

  The candy and snack machines were full, so he broke the glass and piled the food on the ground in front of the campground office. The supply room at the office yielded a jug of bleach, and he made a solution with water. Next, he needed a vehicle. His rental was a small Ford sedan parked among 4x4s, SUVs, and Jeeps. The first several cars and trucks he found had bloodstains on the seats and doors. He shied away from them and eventually found a clean-looking Jeep pickup parked in front of a small tent. He placed the handkerchief over his mouth again and walked over to the shelter. He was in luck and saw the key fob to the Jeep on the picnic table.

  Jon swabbed the key fob and everything a person could have touched on the Jeep with the diluted bleach and placed his tent over the seat before loading the Jeep with his booty. He told the Jeep to start, but the Jeep’s AI voice said, “Please add your profile to the memory card.”

  Jon spent a few minutes searching the Jeep’s menu and adjusting the controls to match his body. He ordered, “start,” and the Jeep fired up but had to be reprogrammed to obey his voice commands, and the gas tank was almost empty. A water hose at the Ranger station supplied him with a siphon hose, and after a few mouthfuls of gasoline, he was able to get the gas flowing. The Jeep soon had a full tank, and after drenching his mouth with an orange drink from the soda machine, he got most of the gasoline taste from his mouth. He was ready to roll.

  Jon walked up to the vehicle and saw the seat and outside mirrors adjust to fit him. He said, “Start,” and the engine started.

  The Jeep inquired, “Jon, where are we going today?”

  Jon said, “Let’s go to Gold Beach. I believe 2034 and later Jeeps have the self-driving mode. I’ll get some sleep while you drive.”

  The Jeep apologized, “Sorry, I’m not obtaining a GPS signal. The mountains may be interfering with the signal. I can drive by myself but not without a GPS signal. I’ll try again later.”

  “I guess the GPS satellites aren’t working either. Call 555–330–1976 and store the number under the name ‘Mom.’”

  The Jeep said, “The cell service is also down. There isn’t any signal strength.”

  Jon asked, “What good are you if you can’t get the GPS or phone signal.”

  The Jeep replied in a sexy voice, “My engine starts, I can inflate my tires when they need air, I can display holograms, I have facial recognition, I can communicate with other AI vehicles, and driving is better than walking.”

  “Smartass!”

  The Jeep replied, “I’m not sitting in a Jeep talking to a computer.”

  “You are a wise-assed car. Who the hell programmed you? Hey, do you have a female kinda sexy voice?”

  “I’m a 2037 Jeep Special Edition Pickup. I’m not a car. I have AI and a limited personality.”

  Suddenly the voice changed to a young lady’s voice with a slight Australian accent. “Is that better? I can mimic a thousand voices and sixty-eight languages.”

  “That’s a lot better. I like your voice and sassy attitude.”

  “It’s not hard to outwit
a human who talks to a machine.”

  Jon was amused but getting pissed. “If you don’t stop screwing with me, I’ll drive that green Subaru.”

  “You’ll end up walking if you take that cheap piece of foreign shit,” protested the Jeep, but with a sexy voice.

  Jon couldn’t argue with that, so he placed his phone in the cradle and set it on the dash. Then he realized the GPS and Maps feature didn’t work anymore. He shut the engine off and returned to the office. He ripped the area map from the wall and took it back to the Jeep. He gazed at the roads, which would take him back to Grants Pass, where he’d started his journey in Oregon.

  He was looking for a better route to Grants Pass, but found he had to drive south to Crescent City, California, and then over to Highway 199 and on up to Grants Pass. He stopped long enough to remember his mission was to drive to Mobile, Alabama. He needed a road atlas to plot the shortest and safest route to his home.

  He was deep in thought when he became aware of someone moving around the Jeep. He drew the pistol, opened the door, and confronted the intruder. His pulse raced, and he could feel his heart in his throat when he recognized the golden retriever. The dog rose on his hind feet and placed his paws on Jon’s chest, sniffed him, and then sat beside the vehicle.

  Jon didn’t think about becoming contaminated because he was just glad to have company even if it was only a dog. The dog’s collar had Bo etched into a brass plate. Jon opened the door and called out, “Bo, get into the Jeep.”