"What if I...I don't know what to think...I'm not sure what is happening," says Dr. Black, swirling in dizzying thoughts.
Walter tries to ground her, "Dr. Black, the hybrid agent spawn program is defunct. The Greys are killing them, so no more agents will undergo your surgical transformations. If you stay here, your duties will be limited to staff medical doctor. But the Barge needs your expertise. You biological and medical knowledge of humans, hybrids and Greys is necessary to continue the Barge's research and progress in those areas."
Burt is hurt, "What about me, Walter? Why didn't you ask or bring me? Don't you think I could help?"
"You are always a help, but I'm taking a big risk. Just because I sent a sign back from the future, it doesn't mean that I will succeed in creating something to use against the Greys. The people here need you. They need your leadership, and your compassion. You are actually giving people an option to leave or stay. I wouldn't do that. Of those who stay, they do it knowing you will be leading them. Who knows, it might be you and the Committee, not me and the Barge who end up making the difference with humanity's survival. We can't put everything into one basket. I believe in you Burt, as much as I believe in myself. With me there and you here, one of us will come up with a solution. You assisted me for decades knowing you will take charge someday. That someday is now, and the place is here."
Everyone around the table is quiet, each having their own reaction. Walter is waiting for a response. Sandy is wondering what will happen. Burt struggles to accept Walter is right, and it is his time to take charge. Dr. Black stares overwhelmed, while Dr. Diamond and Dr. Lost are engulfed in the drama playing out before them. Major Reese wants a decision made. Mr. Axus wears a nervous smile not knowing how to respond.
Burt takes a deep breath, "Walter, I remember when they made you head of the scientific personnel, and I didn't understand why you agreed to do it. You told me 'there is a time when a person must lead, so that others will have guidance while they flourish.' Dr. Black, Dr. Lost, or Dr. Diamond don't realize what you gave up to bring them together here and create the hybrid program, but I do. Being your assistant for so long, I got used to doing my research while you gave up most of your time to manage the Committee scientists. It is time you got back to your research and I do what you trained me to do, take the reins.
Burt then turns to Sandy, "Sandy, I ask that you not hurry off and be patient. Dr. Black, what say you? Do you stay or do you go?"
Dr. Black expresses her resignation, "I don't see a choice. Granted, I feel cornered, but that might be a gut reaction. My instinct is telling me, whatever I do, I'm to do it with Walter."
Burt accepts her decision, "Then it is settled. Dr. Black, Walter and Sandy, you have the rest of the day to prepare for departure. Sandy when we finish here, I'd like you to stop by our communication center. We will set up a simple shortwave call and response signal between this facility and the Barge, to confirm we are still here and you are still there. Since any extended communications could allow the Greys to locate us, we must formulate other modes of information transfer as a backup. Dr. Black, approach your subordinate staff with these folders and offer to each of them the option to leave if they wish."
"Do you think that is a good idea? If I am leaving, don't you think that might give them the idea they should leave, too?" asks Dr. Black.
"That is exactly why you should be the one. What better way to make them aware that this offer is sincere and there will be no ramifications for leaving if they know you are."
Burt passes folders to Dr. Diamond, Dr. Lost, Major Reese, and Dr. Black. Burt hands the remaining folders to Mr. Axus, "Ask the service and maintenance personnel if they wish to stay or go. And if you are going."
Mr. Axus takes the folders, "My family is here. I will be staying."
Dr. Lost calls out, "The mental health of this facility would collapse without me."
"I'm not going anywhere," adds Dr. Diamond.
"This place needs security more than ever," says Major Reese. "I can't leave my post right when the war is heating up."
"Glad to hear it. Now, there are two more orders of business to take care of before we adjourn this meeting. The first is we need to declare our new mission for the facility, and what the individual roles for each of you will be, so we can focus and serve the greater good."
Burt points at the major, "Recon", then to Dr. Lost, "Analysis", toward Mr. Axus, "Shelter and necessities," and Dr. Diamond, "Health assessments."
"Let me elaborate. Mr. Axus will make sure this facility has power, grows food, maintains fuel reserves: everything we need to survive. Major Reese and his subordinates will do recon, and with that I will include communications with other Committee facilities. Since any airwave transmissions can be intercepted by Greys and sending of messages by code or encryption will not matter since they are only interested in pinpointing transmission and reception locations, we will need to have a method for the physical delivery of information. Human couriers and long-range drones. Drones will also be able to survey human populations and check Committee facilities to make sure they are still intact. Human messengers will make direct contact to gather information. We will need to reopen the mountain base transfer tunnels where we will launch and land messenger drones out of view."
"Can't the Greys track our drones?" asks Dr. Diamond.
"I don't think they will. It's a low-level transmission that isn't message based, they are small, fly close to ground, and contain no life forms. Major, you will need to come up with a routine to send patrols for incoming messenger drones sent from other facilities. You will also send out patrols to populated areas to monitor and assess the status and conditions."
Major Reese nods, "Understood. Seeing what Sandy presented here, I will authorize an occasional vehicle, but most patrols will be on foot or bicycle."
"Bicycle?" asks Burt.
"Yes. I'll order armored assault vehicles to drop off cycle patrols outside population areas. With power gone and fuel reserves depleting, vehicles driving in these areas will attract attention and may even become targets. People will become desperate in the coming days and weeks, and recon will be moot if patrols find themselves car-jacked, or returning to a transport vehicle that has had the fuel siphoned. Leaving someone to guard a transport will only verify that particular vehicle is valuable. I will need to rethink how we maneuver agents in the field. This may no longer be friendly, peaceable, domestic territory. It might be necessary to treat recon like incursions into hostile zones."
Burt concurs, "I hadn't thought of that. I think you're right. Put a proposal together, we'll review it, and then I'll sign off so you can get those patrols and messengers out. Major, it will be your responsibility to locate Greys: patrols, habitations or sightings.
"Dr. Lost and Dr. Diamond, you both will manage dual tasks. First, you will need to be working from the information brought back from these patrols. Dr. Lost, I need you to develop psychological profiles of the populations out there, and track the mental and emotional state of personnel in here."
"Evaluating the psychology of the masses under such societal and cultural distress intrigues me. Being shrink to the staff, not so much," expresses Dr. Lost.
"Dr. Lost, I need you to put on your best bedside manner for both me and the staff. Dr. Diamond, your work will be similar in that you will evaluate the health conditions of both the outside population and the internal staff here. With the outside, we need to determine medical conditions, the rise and spread of any diseases or viruses, shifts in life expectancy, and survival rate for injured. You will absorb Dr. Black's personnel to assist you with the medical analysis and staff treatments. If the three of you can perform these missions, we will grasp hold of what is happening, and use what we learn to aid humanity in this assault against our species.
"My mission will be information, to relay between each of you, approving messages we send out on drones to other facilities, and how to use and distribute any information coming in from oth
er Committee facilities and posts. I will also prepare this facility to be a waypoint for any Committee member that becomes displaced or personnel whose posts fall to Greys. That means we need to make room wherever we can find it to absorb incoming personnel. Dr. Lost and Dr. Diamond, isolate anyone who comes into this facility and give them a complete physical and psychological exam to make sure they are stable, not carrying anything contagious or irradiated, and aren't implanted with Grey tracking chips. I recommend setting up the lab areas where we use to house and dissect the skin spawns. Those areas contain ample dampeners to suppress any tracking signals while we determine their state.
"So, from the two doctors, I'll need two proposals each. The second proposal, Dr. Diamond and Dr. Lost, you can hold off on, for they will deal with evaluating the outside populations, and you will first need recon footage and reports from Major Reese before you begin. But the first proposals I'll need as soon as possible, and they will cover evaluations and monitoring of the Committee staff here, medical supplies in storage, and how to handle any outside Committee personnel who might emigrate to here...Oh, we want to isolate and check any messengers that arrive here from other facilities. Make arrangements with Major Reese. Reese, once you set up the communication network, I want any messengers that arrive in person to go through a screening. Couriers may contract a virus or disease in transit we can't expose to the staff. Is everyone clear on what to do?"
General nods and agreement arise around the table.
"Good. So first give staff options to leave, then begin the proposals. Dr. Black, after you talk to your personnel, take time to pack up your belonging and research. Sandy, I'll schedule your craft to leave tomorrow, so that Dr. Black and Walter have time to finish any business here and gather personal effects. Meeting adjourned, and Sandy and Walter, I'd like a moment."
Everyone but Burt, Walter and Sandy pick up folders and leave. Once it's only the three of them, Walter says, "It will take me five minutes to pack my stuff. Everything I had was at the Grey Valley Bunker."
Sandy injects, "Burt, I prefer to leave as soon as possible."
Walter explains, "Sandy, give Dr. Black this time. She is confused. She accepted going, but I hired and observed Dr. Black since she joined the Committee. Dr. Black can do amazing things if you give her respect and the freedom to go at her pace. Burt is great at managing people. He dealt with my ego for decades, so give him the day. We'll be fine till tomorrow. Bring your crew in for a meal, rest, and shower if they want."
Sandy agrees, "Fine. I'll tell my crew once we finish here. Burt, anything else you want to discuss?"
"Whenever the three of us get together, it results in the most stressful circumstances. This time, you and Walter are leaving me to conduct research that will save the world. It's been great working with you, Walter, I will miss you."
"I'll miss you too, Burt."
"One last thing." Burt takes off a metal bracelet. It is plain without decoration or engravings, just a series of squares descending in size, starting with the largest being a one-inch square, and getting progressively smaller until the last one, an eighth inch square. He lays the bracelet flat on the table.
"I want you to take this. I think you will need it."
"Thanks, Burt. I'll wear it for good luck."
Walter reaches to grab it, but Burt stops him.
"I don't want you to wear it for luck. Remember the long hours I spent in my workshop, and you'd ask what I was doing, and I'd say I was working on 'Profugus.' You'd ask me what I meant and I'd say..."
"...friends who can make friends," responds Walter.
"Right. This is Profugus."
Burt refers to the bracelet. Sandy and Walter aren't sure what to say.
"It's...nice."
"You made this...and named it...well that makes it that much more special," says Sandy not sure of the significance.
Burt takes a pen and pokes a tiny button on the side of the largest square. The squares disconnect from each other. Legs pop out of the large square in spider formation. The rest of the squares break into four smaller squares from which legs then pop out, smaller and smaller versions of the one-inch square. The last ones are only a sixteenth of an inch square, splitting apart from the eighth inch square. They arrange themselves from larges to smallest behind the biggest one as the lead. Sandy and Walter watch with astonishment.
Burt explains, "This is project Profugus. The Greys use nanobots, so I thought we should, too. What I created was a replicating nanobot that can make a duplicate of itself, only smaller. That duplicate can then make a smaller version of itself, and so on. I got them building down to a size that I could only see under magnification. These are the ones I kept because they were large enough for me to handle. They possess the capacity to work independently, but right now they are chained by commands to the largest one so I can test and manage them."
"What do they do?" asks Burt.
"Besides building other nanobots, whatever they are programmed to do. They contain code to deconstruct items for the resources needed to reconstruct duplicates. That is their base operation, but their memory has stored the ability to do all kinds of things, or construct variations. I had experimented with flying and aquatic ones. That code exists in the memories of these bots, though currently shut off. I want you to take my research. I won't have time to work on this, and you might find a use for them when you're doing research on the Barge."
"That's amazing Burt. Why did you never show me before?" asks Walter, astonished by what he sees.
"Because I never figured out what to do with them. I always believed we had a need for nanobots, I just never decided what that need was. To have bots able to create micro versions of themselves, and not assembled by people using very costly precision equipment, make them utilizable. So, I focused on that, and figured the purpose for them would come later. Now, it may be up to you two to find a purpose for them."
"It is a tremendous piece of technology that may be invaluable. Give me the research for them before you leave."
"Not necessary." Burt grabs the larges bot, and using the pen, presses a different button on the side. He then sets it down by the embedded table computers. On the monitors in the table, a console panel pops up and begins displaying volumes of text, blue prints, coding scripts, and schematics. "I keep a copy of the research on this one. This guy will tell you everything you need to continue research on Profugus."
Burt then lifts the largest one, and using the pen, presses the first button again then sets it back on the table next to the others. They come back together in squares and interconnect, becoming a bracelet. Burt picks it up and hands it to Walter.
"So that's it. Get a good night rest you two, then go off to save the world."
Burt and Walter smile. Walter holds out his arms, and Burt hugs him. They then open one arm each, making room for Sandy to join the hug.
"Want in?"
Sandy smiles and joins in as the three share a hug.
Off-Road
Chapter 28
A Lone Country Dirt Road, Georgia.
Floating around his ears gliding on the wind, deer flies buzz and swirl around the sleeping Mr. Nix. Sunlight shining on his face draws sweat beads from his forehead, causing tiny droplets to drip into his bushy eyebrows. A lone drop runs between his eyes, over his nose bridge, to the tip of his nose. A deer fly lands on Mr. Nix's nose, sips at the wet sweat streak, then bites into his flesh.
With his eyes closed, Mr. Nix's hand reflexively slaps his own face. The impact causes his head to jerks backwards, smacking against the inside edge of an open SUV hatch. His eyes shock-pop open. Mr. Nix looks around, rubbing the back of his head.
He sits on the tailgate of an SUV pulled off the side of an overgrown dirt road, marked only by two parallel tire ruts through the climbing weeds. Lush trees flank him on both sides, their leaves rustling in the wind. The morning sunrise shines on him through a break in the trees. His hair is stringy and ragged from days of being unwashed. A nea
rly empty plastic jug of water rests next to his leg. He takes the cap off and drinks until satiated. After recapping the jug, he sets it inside a cardboard box of scant edible supplies.
Nix takes in the isolation and silence, collecting his thoughts. Unable to avoid any longer what he must do by his own protocols, he presses controls on his wrist communicator and activates a recording device.
"Nix entry one. It's zero seven hundred hours. I'm on an unused dirt road off a state route, hidden, so I could get sleep and eat without problems. An unsettling sleep. I am alone. Kaliber is presumed dead. Drowned after being struck by our boat as it capsized. Eighteen was killed in a Grey implosion attack while gathering with skin spawns at the Scherer Power Plant.
"My own protocols state I was to start this audio journal as soon as I missed my rendezvous and lost connection with communication central. I put that order in place so that when we rescued or found a field agent, we had a real-time account of what happened and what they went through, and not just a remembrance put together when they got back. What I didn't realize is how difficult it is to begin this journal. What seemed like a logical command is much more emotional when you are the one in the field. By starting this journal, I was admitting to myself my circumstance is fubar and out of my control. I'm sure everyone at the Committee has a better idea of what has happened than I do. Side note, I need to talk to communications and propose shortwave capabilities be added to the wrist communicators. If it had that, I could have arranged an alternate pickup instead of being stuck here.
"To catch up with missed journal entries, I need to start where Colonel Kaliber and I were observing the Sherer Power Plant from a fishing boat on Lake Juliette. We were expecting a Grey ship to arrive and either pick up or drop off skin spawns. Instead, we encountered an implosion bombardment that destroyed the plant and violently disrupted the lake water, causing it to capsize our boat. Colonel Kaliber never surfaced. I swam my way out of Lake Juliette in the middle of the night, then worked my way to the destroyed power plant hoping to find emergency personnel onsite investigating, but there were none. After walking until midday along access roads, I hitchhiked a lift to a nearby town. I was unable to get assistance from the local police, so I went to a motel and rented a room after buying supplies at a convenience store purchased with my remaining cash. Unfortunately, greed did not disappear when the power did, so I was price-gauged on both the room and supplies, burning through the cash I brought on what was to be a short mission. I ate and slept through the night, ten hours, recouping from the previous events.
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