“Hello, Doctor Hopkins, I’m National Security Advisor Neal Perryman. Thank you so much for coming here today, especially with what’s going on out there right now.” He too had noticed her battered condition. He worried that she wouldn’t be able to provide the answers they needed, but he knew that they needed to hear at least something about what was facing them. He decided to gingerly ease into the questioning. “Now Doctor Hopkins, you were initially sent to Kazakhstan—along with Doctor Michael Robinson and Major Conrad Roberts?”
Irene pivoted in her chair to look over at the beleaguered-looking man who was addressing her. His wrinkled shirt and loosened tie, along with his blood-shot eyes gave him a real tired look. The sweat on his balding forehead showed his nervousness. He looked as fatigued and frazzled as she felt.
“Yes sir,” Irene said. “And you can just call me by my first name if that’s okay.”
“Okay Irene,” Perryman said. He smiled at her to show her his appreciation for her dispensation with formalities. “Can you tell us about your expedition?”
Irene placed her hands on the table and gazed at her fingernails. They were dirty and she realized just how unkept she must have appeared to the cabinet. After a brief moment of silence, she looked up at Perryman. She tried to smile back at him, but the bruise on her cheek kept her from doing so. In a raspy voice she said, “Doctor Robinson and I were recruited by Major Roberts under the pretense of traveling to Kazakhstan to investigate an outbreak of a new form of rabies. We were—”
“That’s what Jenkinson had told us, Mister President,” Washington said as he interrupted Irene. He was trying to save face and he was using the doctor to validate his argument that he had been duped by the renegade admiral.
Haddock flashed a scowl at Washington and the general realized that the president was unhappy with his interjection. “Please Irene, continue,” Haddock said.
Irene could sense the tension between the two men. She looked at both of them and said, “Okay…as I was saying,”—agitation at being interrupted could be heard in her voice—“we had been recruited to assist in an investigation in Kazakhstan. At first, neither Michael nor I found anything odd about being recruited. Being in the C.D.C.’s Epidemic Intelligence Services, it was common to get requests like that. It wasn’t until we were actually on the plane headed to Kazakhstan when the major told us about the connection to the accident in Russia.”
“What exactly did he say about Russia?” asked Chambers.
“He said that there had been some accident at a military complex in Russia, near the Kazakh border. We went over some reports that he had furnished us, but everything was very secretive. We had to give up our cell phones, there was no Internet connectivity, and we weren’t allowed to try to contact anyone back home. That’s when he started telling us that there was a possibility that the rabies outbreak was connected to the accident at the military complex.” Irene abruptly stopped talking and coughed to clear her throat. She looked around and asked in a pleading manner, “Can I please have some water, my throat is so dry.”
“By all means,” Haddock said. “Would you like anything to eat?”
“No sir, just some water please.”
“Neal, please ask Stan to get Doctor Hopkins a bottle of water.”
“Sure thing. Be right back, Irene,” Perryman said as he stood up and hurried past her.
“I’m sorry,” she apologized, “it’s just that I’ve been through a rough time and my voice is kind of going hoarse.”
“We understand…no need to explain anything. We would have postponed this interview if things weren’t so bad, but as you well know, we’re facing—”
“We’re facing the end of the world, Mister President,” Irene said in a grim tone. She sat back in her seat and began to look at everyone around her, making sure to look at each one of them in their eyes. “What we are facing here has the potential to change the world as we know it.”
Perryman came back into the room and handed Irene a plastic bottle of water. She unscrewed the cap and took several long drinks. After putting the cap back on her bottle, she said, “Forgive me for putting it so bluntly, but that’s the only way I can surmise it.”
“Well, if anyone knows what’s really going on, it would be you,” Haddock said.
“At first, Major Roberts tried to tell us that the rabies being reported was a weaponized version that the Russians had manufactured,” Irene said as she continued to recollect her trip. “He told us about some of the stuff that was being reported—like acts of violence and even cannibalism. He attributed all of that to this weapon version of rabies.
Once we got on the ground, we were met by a team of Kazakh doctors. They too were under the presumption that something had been released from the military complex. I think the name of the city was Ozersk or something like that—where the accident had occurred. The Kazaks already had several infected subjects under quarantine. We were able to run some simple tests on them, but due to their violent nature, we couldn’t interact with them too much.”
“Now, were these subjects alive…or were they zombies—like we keep hearing about?” asked Chambers.
“Zombies...now that’s a word that I never thought I would hear being used in a serious conversation,” Irene said as she looked down at her hands again. They were trembling. “No, these subjects were alive. From what we were able to determine, they had all been infected through transdermal exposure—primarily through bites and deep scratches—although one subject in particular had been infected by being exposed to the projectile vomit of another infected person.”
“Did these people respond to any kind of treatment?” Haddock asked. He was scribbling down notes on a legal pad.
“No, not at all. We really couldn’t formulate a diagnosis or a treatment plan. Their temperatures were extraordinarily high, but their blood work didn’t show any presence of rabies or other foreign bodies. One subject was placed in a tube of ice in an attempt to bring down the fever, but his body heat simply melted the cubes. Several different antibiotics were given to another subject, just to see if we could produce a notable reaction or change, but nothing. One thing we did notice though was that all of them were exhibiting a very low level of radiation.”
“Radiation?” Washington asked.
“Yes, radiation.” Irene unscrewed the cap again from her water and took another drink. This time, she left the cap on the table next to the bottle. “We couldn’t figure out what was behind the radiation reading. I mean, it wasn’t like the specimens had come from any radioactive site that we were aware of. Anyway, it wasn’t until we got back here that we kind of figured out what it all meant.”
“So, these people were alive—the ones you were examining in Kazakhstan,” Haddock said. “Then where did this whole ‘zombie’ notion come into play?”
Irene drew in a deep breath and sighed. She then reached over to her satchel and began to dig through it. After a few moments, she retrieved her laptop. After flipping it open and powering it on, she said, “I know ‘zombie’ is an over-the-top reference that is more for science fiction and horror, but I really don’t know what else to refer to them as.”
“When did you first come into contact with them?” Perryman asked.
“There at the hospital where we were conducting our investigation at. In the lobby. Some poor farmer brought in his wife. She was suffering from multiple wounds—looked like bite wounds on her lower extremities. The emergency room staff went to work on her right away, but she had lost too much blood already. She was convulsing, she was going into shock, and then she passed.” Irene fell silent as she stared at the wall, looking past everyone in the room. Her jaws tightened and she began to breathe rapidly. “She…she was dead, and then the next minute—” The trauma of having to relive the horrific event was breaking her down and her eyes began to tear up. “And then the next minute, she was back—she had come back to life.”
“So what you’re saying is that she never really died?” C
hambers asked in an astonished tone. He was having a very difficult time trying to comprehend what Irene was telling them. There was no way this could actually be true. No way at all.
“No, she died. We had monitors on her. She had no vitals, and then she came back. She was clinically dead and then she came back.”
Haddock looked over at Perryman. The president’s eyes were wide open in disbelief. “And you’re sure of this?”
“Yes, I’m sure of it. And that wasn’t the only time I was to see a reanimation—that’s what the Major called it.”
“A reanimation?” Haddock asked. He furiously scribbled away on his note pad.
Seeing Haddock writing, she tapped her laptop with her finger and said, “I’ve been able to save most of my notes on here and can download them for you sir.”
Realizing that taking notes made him look like he was paying too much attention to the task and not enough attention to Irene’s words, he placed his pen down and said, “Thank you very much. That would be kind of you to do that for me.”
“Naturally, the Kazakh doctors were just as shocked as I and Michael were,” she continued, “but Roberts…he didn’t seem to be shocked at all. He knew what was going on. Then, in secret, he told us that what we were seeing was ‘reanimation.’ He said that the Russians had developed an agent that would bring back the dead—some kind of super weapon or something—and that we were witnessing it firsthand. He didn’t want the Kazakhs knowing anything about it. He also said that the United States had been working on the same thing, and that the Russians had beaten us to the punch on it.”
“Mister President, I have no knowledge of the military working on such a weapon,” Washington blurted out. He wanted Haddock to know that he never would have willingly been a part of any such weapons research or development. “We’ve been abiding by the chemical weapons treaties that are in place, and no research of that sort has been going on under my watch.”
“Well, apparently someone under your watch knew about it,” Haddock said in a sarcastic tone. “The Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff damn well knew about it—enough to where he sent out someone to go on a snooping hunt. I just wonder general, when he did confirm that the Russians had been successful in their efforts…what was he going to do with that knowledge? Was he going to tell us about it, or was he going to roll it into some defense program?” Haddock could see confusion and desperation on Washington’s face, and he really began to think that the general was truly in the dark about Jenkinson.
“I don’t know, Mister President,” Washington said. His voice was quivering and the man found himself wishing that he wasn’t even present at the meeting.
Looking back at Irene, Haddock asked, “Did Roberts say how this was supposed to be used as a weapon?”
“He did.” Irene ran her hand through her hair and took a deep breath. “He said that the weapon was designed to be used on the cities and the civilian populace. He said that the mass chaos and panic that the weapon would create would force an enemy to withdraw his forces from the battlefield to deal with the reanimated.”
“What a truly horrible weapon,” Haddock grumbled. “Pure madness. A perversion of science and everything we know. What happened next?”
“The woman, the reanimated woman…well, she infected a nurse through projectile vomit and then she bit one of the orderlies, and so we had to secure both of them,” Irene said. “When she bit the orderly, she actually devoured the portion she had torn off of him. I mean…she literally ate his flesh. Shortly after that, the lead Kazakh doctor decided that we needed to evacuate to another hospital.”
“Evacuate?” Chambers asked.
“Yes, evacuate. The city we were in was falling apart by then…it sounded like the military was bombing things, and there was trouble in the street. Lots of gunfire and explosions. The Kazakh doctors arranged for a helicopter to pick us up and take us to the airport in their capitol—Astana. We also took the reanimated woman with us. We thought that we were going to another facility to continue our investigation, but when we landed at the airport, an American plane was awaiting us, and we and the patient were snatched up and we were flown back to the States.”
“And the Kazakh doctors?” Haddock asked.
“We...we left them behind,” Irene said as her eyes welled with tears again. She could envision Mamani’s face and the sad expression she wore as they said their farewells. “I’m sorry, I just hated leaving them behind. I am sure they’re all dead now.”
“How do you know that?” Perryman asked.
“When we were nearing the airport, I could see that the city was in trouble.” Irene wiped at her eyes and nose. Perryman stood up and handed her a tissue from a pack that he kept in his pocket. He then touched her shoulder in a reassuring gesture. “From the air I could see that there were lots of fires burning and it looked like they were shutting down the airport.” She looked up at Perryman. “Thanks.”
“No problem.” Perryman walked back to his chair and sat down.
“What happened then?” Haddock asked. He feared that he was asking too many rapid questions, but he felt like he was right in the middle of a good mystery novel that he couldn’t force himself to put down. In a macabre way, he was feeling a little excitement with the telling of her story.
“When we got onboard, Roberts told us that we were heading to Maryland to continue the investigation. He also said that while we had been flying to Astana, the Russians had dropped a nuclear bomb on the facility where the accident had happened. I guess they thought that they could destroy whatever it was by blowing it up. In reality, all they did was spread it all over the world.”
“Well, we’re glad that you were able to make it back home safely,” Haddock said. He looked down at his notes and read over them. He was about to ask her another question when Chambers cut him off.
“So, while you were over there, were you able to learn anything about how or why it’s spreading so fast?” Chambers asked.
“Not really.” She took another drink from her bottle. “It wasn’t until we got to Maryland when we really started to learn things.” Irene sighed and looked down and away. “That’s when we were able to learn about transmission rates, the absence of incubation periods and reanimation times.”
“How did you learn about all of that?” Haddock asked.
Irene tensed up. She knew that sooner or later, the whole truth going to come out. She hesitated briefly because she feared that what she was about to say wasn’t going to go over very well with the president and his staff. She half-way expected that by the time she finished with all of this, she’d be leaving the White House in handcuffs. Taking a deep breath she said, “When we got to the lab at Fort Detrick, there were several…‘test’ subjects there.”
“What do you mean by ‘test’ subjects?” Haddock asked in an alarmed tone. He was looking directly into her eyes.
“People,” Irene said. “They had people there for us to work on.”
“What do you mean when you say you had ‘people’ to work on? You mean you had cadavers to work on? What happened over there, Irene?”
Irene apprehensively looked about the room, as if she was seeking the approval from the men who were sitting around her. “It wasn’t my decision, Mister President. I swear it wasn’t. I didn’t feel right about using live people, but Roberts said that they were criminals and dregs, people that no one cared about. Am I going to get into trouble?”
“Uh, are you saying you guys experimented on live people?” Perryman asked with disbelief in his voice.
Haddock looked over at Perryman and raised his hand in a gesture to get him to hold off on his questioning. “No, my dear, nothing is going to happen to you.” Haddock tried to calm her down and reassure her. He didn’t need her to clam up out of fear of being implicated in anything illegal. “We just need for you to tell us everything you know. I promise you, you have done nothing wrong. We don’t want to hurt you. We need you to help us fight against this—whatever
it is.”
“Roberts…he coordinated everything,” Irene said, feeling a little relieved. She believed the president and she felt safe in telling him about everything that had been done at Fort Detrick, no matter how bad it was going to sound. With her apprehension dissipating, she felt that she could speak more freely now. She pushed aside her emotions and decided that it was best to speak with an official tone. She knew that the men in the room were used to direct, to the point briefings with no frills. She felt that maybe she had come off as being weak, almost pathetic, and she didn’t want to portray that anymore. She focused herself and began to speak as if she was giving a lecture back in Atlanta. She figured the men would respect that approach more.
“Michael and I were against using people, but when we protested, Roberts threatened us. We first started by letting the reanimated Kazakh woman bite one of the subjects. We then observed the reaction and saw that the male subject started exhibiting the same symptoms that the subjects in Kazakhstan had exhibited.”
“So, he remained alive?” Perryman asked.
“Yes, he did. He had to be restrained because he was acting very violent and aggressive. He had the same high temperature and we also detected the same radioactivity that was present in the Kazakh subjects. From the time he was bitten to the time he turned, it was approximately four minutes. We then repeated the same test with another person, this time a homeless elderly woman. When she was bitten, it took her just under a minute before she turned.” Irene closed her eyes as she replayed the frightened screams of the old lady. After she recomposed herself, she opened her eyes and looked back at the president.
“So, there’s no standard transformation time?” asked Haddock.
“No, there isn’t. We don’t know what contributes to the different times, but there is no one set transformation time.”
A Glimpse Of Decay (Book 2): Staring into the Abyss Page 8