The Pilgrim Strain

by Edgar, C. P.

  THE PILGRIM STRAIN

  This is an original work of fiction by C.P. Edgar, and all rights are reserved including sole rights to the characters and concepts herein.

  Cover Art by Austin Huerta

  austinchuerta@yahoo.com

  Author’s Note:

  The Pilgrim Strain is a work of fiction and is a product of the Author’s imagination. While the Author included the use of geographical locations, weapons, and systems that describe actual places and things, this was only intended to lend authenticity to the story.

  Additionally, the Author occasionally referenced public organizations and publicly recognizable people in an effort to give context and feeling to the plot. Other than those circumstances mentioned above; any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Author’s Acknowledgements:

  This book would have not been possible without the help of Wayne Coster Cooper, Austin, Parker, and many others that have read through pages of manuscript and supported me on this project with their honesty, recommendations, and wisdom. Thank you!

  Dedicated to Sandra, my blood oath.

  Table of Contents

  CHAPTER ONE

  The day of the Pilgrimage.

  Washington, D.C.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Three months prior to the Pilgrimage.

  Grenoble, France

  CHAPTER THREE

  One month prior to the Pilgrimage.

  Marseille, France

  Papua New Guinea

  Washington, D.C.

  Sudan, Africa

  British Virgin Islands

  Sudan, Africa

  CHAPTER FOUR

  One week prior to the Pilgrimage.

  Washington, D.C.

  Kuwait City, Kuwait

  Ginger Island, British Virgin Islands

  Kuwait/Iraqi Border

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Twenty-four hours prior to the Pilgrimage.

  Ankara, Turkey

  Flight # 237 Istanbul to Washington, D.C.

  Flight # 1202 Dubai to Washington, D.C.

  Virginia

  Flight # 237 Istanbul to Washington, D.C.

  Washington, D.C.

  Ginger Island, British Virgin Islands

  CHAPTER ONE

  The day of the Pilgrimage.

  “The Pilgrim movement can be but imperfectly understood if treated as an isolated event in the world’s history, without reference to the conditions which preceded it and made its success possible. Looking at it broadly, it was part of a great world movement, and its relation to that movement must be considered in order to understand its meaning and appreciate the result.” Arthur Lord, 1920.

  Washington, D.C.

  There it was again. Definitely closer this time. Much closer than the last time he heard it. It sounded almost like a guttural bark or some sort of gross coughing, but it was intentional not involuntary. He could hear the others in the area responding with their own disgusting versions which filled the air with the freakish chorus.

  “Shit, they’re communicating,” he whispered to himself. Normally talking to himself in any capacity would have made him feel weird, but given the current circumstances this seemed completely within reason. He was alone and in the dark, and he was scared. They were communicating, weren’t they?

  It sounded to him as though when one would hack or whatever you called it, others were beginning to respond in unison. It reminded him of a documentary he once saw about silverback gorillas and the way they would grunt at one another in a defiant and clearly violent way in order to define the hierarchy of the order. Gorillas have unusual physical strength too, didn’t they? He tried to remember but was having difficulty having complex thoughts. His mind was rambling and he believed he was dangerously close to having an outright panic attack.

  Besides feeling alone, he was desperate for water and he was beginning to get cold. The power had been out for the past three hours and it had been freezing this morning, a chance of snow in the forecast for the day. The air was stale and heavy with the acrid smell of burning materials. No longer circulated by the heating and ventilation system, the smoke was now just hovering low to the ground, thick and menacing.

  Even though it had been cold, he had been sweating profusely. His shirt was stuck to his skin and he could feel himself leaving a trail of wetness on the slick concrete as he silently dragged himself along the floor. He had lost his jacket at some point, it had been ripped from him. He panicked suddenly at the thought of his jacket. My truck keys!

  He rolled onto his side and patted frantically at the front pockets of his pants only to find instant relief when he confirmed the keys lay low and safe within his right pocket. He rolled back onto his stomach. I need to get to the truck. He started pulling himself forward again, staying low of the smoke curling above his head like a wraith.

  Inch by inch he crawled. When the lights went out he had only been able to continue to run for a few steps before he hit something blindly and took a nasty fall. He could still feel droplets of blood dripping down the left side of his face which at the moment was plastered to the ground. The bleeding had slowed although his head continued to throb.

  Somebody screamed in the distance but it was further away than the last one and muffled like it was encased in the walls. It was the first scream he had heard in over an hour and it was a man’s scream this time. He hated these types of screams. They weren’t like the screams you hear in the movies. Contrived and full of dramatic emphasis. These were the kinds of screams he had never heard before. The kinds of screams that he could only imagine a man would make during some sort of crazy industrial accident like having your arm sawed off by some huge machine or a vat of molten metal poured onto a leg.

  They began barking, coughing and huffing again, and they were closer. From somewhere he heard something heavy being slowly pushed across the floor making a low, sickeningly screeching noise.

  He needed to get out of this goddamned subterranean facility and find Ed, and he feared for Merissa. His chest began to throb and pound, adrenaline poured out of his glands again at the thought of them. There had to be a way out of this place.

  He remembered falling down the stairwell after they had managed to pry open the only door they could find to escape the rush of attackers. He hadn’t so much fallen or tumbled down the stairs as he had gone down feet first like sliding over a cliff, landing hard at the bottom. Hard enough to knock the wind out of him and cause him to bleed and throb from basically his head to his toes it seemed.

  Suddenly there was an angry crash of equipment against the ground right behind him and he froze hugging the floor. He hugged it so tightly he felt as though he might be able to melt right into it. He heard movement, heavy breathing, and a wet sound which made him think of a dog lapping at water. Was there a dog down here too? He remembered the police K9 that he had seen running along with him and the others, the nails of its feet clicking along the tiled floor with every bound. He believed that dog had been one of the first killed, but maybe it had survived and was now close to where he was.

  A phone started to ring suddenly, piercing the dark with its brilliant and completely inopportune sound. He froze, not moving a single muscle. It was one of those custom ringtones and he registered that it was some kind of hip-hop beat.

  He turned his head slightly trying to look back over his shoulder to see where it was coming from. He would have laughed at the absurdity of listening to Lil Trigger or somebody like that rapping about money over bitches if he wasn’t so afraid. Maybe I can get to that phone. He had lost his own phone somewhere during the chaos, probably in his jacket. Lost my damn gun too.

  The ringtone continued to play and he could see it w
as coming from the area where the dog should be. The sound of licking continued, only now he could see that it wasn’t a dog.

  The phone was in the possession of a teenage boy ostensibly wearing an airport uniform of some form. He looked to be about eighteen years old and the kind of kid that probably drove an older model Honda Civic with an annoyingly large muffler and a spoiler on the trunk that seems out of place and of no real use. The phone, which appeared to be situated in the boy’s breast pocket, illuminated his face and the area surrounding him. The light poured out into the darkness.

  The boy was on all fours feverishly smelling and then licking the floor. He was licking at the blood which was smeared across the concrete in a long twisting line right up to where David now lay in horror. He’s licking my blood.

  The boy allowed himself a moment of pause to raise his head and to breathe the air. A long string of saliva and blood emanating from his mouth had attached itself to the floor and was dangling precariously from his savage grin. David could see the boy trace the trail of sweat and blood with his gaze and then theirs met. One of his eyes seemed to be completely filled with blood and held no signs that it functioned. The other eye held pure hate.

  The boy didn’t stand but he immediately began to run at him on all fours like a deranged, malformed animal. The phone tumbled out of his pocket and landed on the floor skidding face down under some equipment. Everything once lit was blackened again.

  Now in total darkness, the boy began to scream. He sounded so close and it was an awful scream. David heard others in the area start thrashing their way toward the sound. They obviously understood its meaning and importance. The boy was screaming to announce his find, his new prey.

  David jumped to his feet and ran in the general direction of the exit he had once seen before the backup power had failed. The one he had been sliding toward on his face and belly for the past eternity in the pitch black. All the while, the screaming continued. Echoing against the walls. Seeping in through the vents. Vibrating the floors. The screams were now coming from more than just the boy who was still moving toward him with great effort, bumping and bashing himself into objects strewn between the two of them. Announcing his approach as he gained ground.

  David ran blindly through the darkness and the smoke, it also trying to claw at him. He made it a few steps more before he was floored unconscious by some unforeseen, massive explosive force.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Three months prior to the Pilgrimage.

  Grenoble, France

  He placed his finger on the corner of the page preparing to flip to the next. He had purchased the book years ago, at a secondhand bookstore close to his apartment at the university. It had and continued to enthrall him. The original binding smelled old and musty like a cobwebbed attic. It smelled of wisdom.

  “In the settlements which marked the beginning of the seventeenth century two material factors must be considered: first, the grounds by which the colonists based their right and title to their possessions in the New World; and second, that other factor which contributed so much to the result; namely, the early and successful adventures were under the management and control of chartered companies who brought to the solution of the problems, which had so often resulted in the destruction of the infant colonies of the preceding century, business experience and enterprise, initiative and ample means.”

  “The title which the settlers acquired in the New World was based upon one or more of these five grounds: first, prescription or discovery; second, possession and occupancy; third, purchase; fourth, treaty stipulations; and fifth, conquest.”

  He closed the book again savoring the words. His finger caressing the embossed title “Plymouth and the Pilgrims” by Arthur Lord. His eyes were closed. He could taste the salt on his tongue. He could feel the swells of the ocean under his feet. The New World ahead on the horizon. Fresh, reclaimed Earth.

  “I’m going out. I don’t have time to wait around for you to be ready to do something. Call me later if you want to meet at the club for dinner,” she said, throwing a sweater over her bare shoulders as she left the bedroom. Her high heels clicking on the marble floor of the foyer as she departed.

  James hated it when Judith talked to him like he was a child. Baiting him to respond or to turn his attention to her. He wasn’t a child. He was a powerful man who could have anything he wanted. Perhaps everything.

  James was one of the wealthiest men alive, which of course she was aware of because that was the only reason why she’d married him. Deep down and from the very onset, he knew she was a tramp and a manipulator. He knew this and he had been powerless against it.

  Someone had taught her long ago how to gain unrestricted access to the simple mind of a man. A seductive look. A subtle lick of her lips. A brush of her body against a man or an exaggerated sigh which gave rise to her breasts. These were the tools she had used to win him. She used her lack of sexual inhibitions and her devious spontaneity to control him.

  Judith was classically refined, educated, and stunningly beautiful. All tools in her arsenal but it was her subtle manipulations of him and her ability to make him feel small and weak which were most devastating. She could sleep with whomever at her leisure and didn’t even bother to try to hide it from him anymore. James believed she found pleasure in his pain.

  A door slammed breaking the viscous trance she had cast upon him once again. “Witch”, he muttered as he brushed her curse off himself.

  James Robert Sandean inherited most of his wealth from his grandfather Robert Sandean. The elder Sandean had secured his place in history through blood, sweat, and mostly Texas oil. Tons and tons of the wretched liquid. By the time the old bastard died, he had accumulated wealth defined in the billions, and tangible resources scattered across the globe.

  Now James ran the entire diversified organization and his wealth was defined by the same measurements. He hated everything about it. Mostly he hated that he had to perform each day as if it mattered any longer.

  He cast a gaze toward the large double doors through which Judith had just left to make sure she wasn’t there silently staring at him. Of course, she wasn’t. She had slammed the door for drama’s sake, its echo reverberating throughout the glamorous suite. She was probably already being whisked away in some chauffeured Mercedes sedan to shop and drink. And drink. And drink. Then she would probably be screwing some American celebrity, an actor who splits his time between here and Los Angeles, by noon. For some reason, this retching thought made him aroused. She was a terrible wife, an even worse mother, but God she was good at sex.

  James got out of bed. He had a big day ahead of him and Judith wasn’t going to derail it with her usual bullshit. He walked out onto the balcony. He could see small boats navigating the river Isère already. From his suite, the view commanded the whole of Grenoble, France. It was a beautiful part of the country.

  His breakfast had been laid out already by some invisible servant and looked to be enough for four or five people. He guessed he had paid a handsome price for the luxury of throwing away almost all the food before him. He only wanted the coffee. Who knows, maybe the hotel provided it to him on the house. He was fascinated by how stupid this scenario might be. He made more money in a day than this hotel made all year. Possibly more than they made in a decade. Yet they would give him things for free. Although for all he knew he may actually own this place. He certainly didn’t know but he made a mental note to ask Douglas this. If he didn’t already own it he would instruct him to buy it.

  James laughed heartily with a wide grin but it only remained a moment. His face contorted as if gravity itself had taken hold of his mood and begun to pull it downward. He whispered to himself, “No, I won’t,” and he stood motionless for a moment staring at the floor and then it was gone. “Coffee,” he said aloud in an upbeat and overly cheerful manner.

  A servant materialized and provided him a cup and poured the hot black liquid two thirds of the way to the top. The man, older and obviou
sly, a career hand, placed two sugar cubes into the hot beverage and stirred. The staff would know how he took his coffee without asking. James didn’t notice him leave as he began sipping at it.

  He decided over the rim of the coffee cup that the view was awesome. He stared at the French Alps that hovered above the city. How long before people were around did these mountains begin to rise? How long after people are gone would they still rise? He reached for the satellite phone which was on its own china between the fresh fruit and the crepes.

  ***

  James sat in a high back leather chair and stared at the ornate clock set into the wall above the ancient fireplace. It was two in the afternoon and they had been talking about nonsense for the majority of the day including all through their lunch service. He was tired of listening to these people talk, and talk, and talk.

  The Federal Reserve Chairman of the United States currently held the floor and was discussing the unified markets and progression toward a stabilized investment trading environment.

  James whispered mockingly, “environment.” He looked around the room at the group, but none had heard him and disappointing to him shared in his insider joke. These were the most influential and powerful people in the world. And not one of them gave two shits about the environment in the purest sense of the word. Not unless that environment could be squeezed and squeezed until every penny came squirting out, or unless it could be bargained away for power. Yes, power is what they all coveted.

  James had been a member of the Billingsmore Group since his grandfather passed. The senior Sandean had willed his fortune and his seat within the secret society to his only heir. It was like receiving a membership in the local country club through inheritance, only this club was as elite as it got.

  He remembered when he attended his first secret meeting. It had been held in Istanbul, Turkey. He had been ordered by his deceased grandfather to attend his first meeting as an observer only. Well not quite, James hadn’t literally heard his grandfather speak those words. He had been instructed by Douglas to watch and learn. Douglas had told him, “Your grandfather believed that it would be in your best interest to keep your mouth shut and learn how the group works.”