by A. R. Wise
“Isn’t there someone else we can trust?” I asked. “Someone else that can take the blood?”
“No,” said Hank. He was pitiful and weak, which was exactly why he’d worked out so well for me in the first place.
I knew that Gabe was waiting outside the door for me. The last thing I needed was for his curiosity to compel him to open the door.
“Give me the blood,” I said in desperation. “I’ll figure something out.” I left my stall and then went to his. I opened the door to take the blood from him and saw the horrible condition the man was in. His skin was pale, and his hair looked greasy as it clung to his sweaty forehead. Dark circles hung from his eyes, and I was certain he hadn’t slept all night. I muttered a curse in shock when I saw him.
“I’m sorry,” he said as he wiped away his tears. “Just make sure my girls are okay. You’ve got to…”
“Yes, I will,” I said as I held my hand out. “Now give me the blood, quickly.”
He had a bag beside the toilet that he opened to reveal the various blood bags and vials that he’d stolen from Levon’s room. “They’re all here.”
“Why did you take so many?” I asked, dumbfounded.
“I took some of the oldest samples. I wasn’t sure which stage you needed. His infection has been mutating. Here, take the whole bag. Take it all.”
“I can’t take all of it, you idiot. Just give me the oldest sample.”
Hank searched through the bag until he found a plastic pouch of blood that had been drawn when Levon first arrived. He handed it to me and I struggled to figure out where I would hide it. The pouch was large, and wouldn’t fit in any of the pockets on the tight slacks that I’d been given to wear. I settled on clamping the bag beneath my arm, under my shirt.
“I need your badge and your key.”
Hank looked distressed. “I need my badge to get back to the upper floors.” His badge activated the elevators and the doors in the lower levels of the facility, without it he would be trapped on this floor.
“Hank, you’re not going back up.”
“But my family. I want to see them.”
“You want to risk infecting them?” My question sounded like an accusation.
This brought tears to his eyes. Apparently he’d thought he might get a chance to say goodbye.
“Hank, we don’t have time for this. Give me your badge and the key to Levon’s LiMM.” I held out my hand, palm up, and waved it expectantly.
Hank did as he was told. He unclipped the badge from his shirt pocket and took the small key out of his pocket that would allow me access to the LiMM chair that Levon was bound to. I pocketed them both.
“This is what you’re going to do next.” I pointed down at the satchel with the rest of the blood samples that he’d stolen. “You’re going to pour that blood all over you. Soak yourself with it.”
“Why?” he asked, confused by my instruction.
“That way they’ll have to burn your body.”
He winced and started crying again. He hadn’t come to grips with how his failure would lead to his death, and I’m certain thoughts of his family plagued him.
“If they find your badge missing, then they might deactivate it. We can’t risk that.”
“I don’t want to die,” said Hank.
“And what about your family?” I asked sharply, intent on ending any doubt festering in him. “Do you want them to die? You saw what Covington’s planning. If we don’t stop him, then your family is as good as dead. This is the only way to save them.”
“Okay,” said Hank, utterly defeated. He nodded as he looked down at the bag of blood beside him.
I reached out and touched his shoulder as I said, “I’ll make sure your family knows what you did. You’ll be remembered as a hero.”
He took comfort in that.
“Wait until I leave, and then get across to the men’s restroom. Smear the blood on yourself there, otherwise they might suspect me. And clean up any blood in here. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” he said before coughing again.
There wasn’t anything left to do, and Gabe was waiting for me. I closed the door and left the doctor behind.
Hank had made a mess of the plan, but I was confident that I could make the best of it. When Hank hadn’t reported in, I immediately asked to meet with Levon as soon as possible. That gave me the opportunity to get in here, where Hank and I had agreed to meet if anything went awry.
“I need to speak with Covington,” I said to Gabe when I met him in the hall.
He shook his head and said, “Nope. Not going to happen.”
“Perhaps you should leave that decision up to the General.”
“He’s in with his Dawn,” said Gabe as he walked towards the elevator.
That was a revelation. I knew that Richard’s condition confined him to this floor, and he rarely left his LiMM. Gabe hadn’t said that Richard was meeting with his Dawn, which I could’ve mistaken for meaning that he was conferencing with the Dawn, the same as I did with Cobra. Instead, the phrase that Gabe used suggested that Covington was physically meeting with his Dawn. That meant Covington’s Dawn was here somewhere, on this level. That was an intriguing development, and another thing that I might be able to utilize. It made sense, too. If I were in Richard’s place, I would want Cobra as close to me as possible.
“Then let him know I’d like to meet with him today, if possible.”
Gabe shook his head as he waited for the elevator. “I don’t have contact with Covington. You’ll have to go through Jerald.”
“And where is Jerald today?”
“He’s monitoring the Pack. They’re out collecting the other Sons of Reagan.”
“Sons of Reagan?” I hadn’t heard that name before.
Gabe nodded as the elevator chimed and opened for us. He ushered me in as he explained, “That’s what we used to call them, back before we knew they called themselves the High Rollers. Some of us still call them the Sons of Reagan. It’s a reminder of how they were teamed up with that terrorist scum.”
I held my arm at my side, trying my best not to appear suspect as I clenched the bag of blood at my side. It was cold, having sat in Hank’s bag beside ice packs for the past several hours, and I could feel condensation dripping down my skin, wetting my shirt.
“So is Jerald with his men?” I asked.
“No, he’s monitoring from here, but he doesn’t want to be disturbed.”
I would have to concede for now. I’d hoped to antagonize Jerald into leaving to accompany his men in the field, but that hadn’t worked. I wanted to get together with Richard alone, but that might still be an unreasonable goal. I had to work harder at breeding distrust between the two of them, and to cement myself as the only one they could depend on. Driving a wedge between the two of them was the trickiest part of my scheme.
“I’m supposed to monitor my Dawn later, will I still be allowed to do that?”
“We’ll see,” said Gabe. “It depends on how long it takes to round up the Sons of Reagan.”
It was an odd coincidence that Gabe and his fellow soldiers referred to Levon’s friends as the Sons of Reagan considering that the man pulling their strings was inhabiting the body of a clone of Charles Reagan’s actual adopted son. Of course, Gabe and the others were probably ignorant of that fact. Their decrying of the sins of the Sons of Reagan held a double meaning that this poor soldier was unaware of. It was clear to me that Jerald was manipulating these men with selective information, allowing them to know only so much as he needed them to so that he could earn their trust. Despite how he’d convinced himself of how much he cared for these men, he still wielded his knowledge as if it were power; which it most certainly was.
Manipulating the will of others is the gift of all true leaders.
18 – Out of Order
Jerald Scott
I was in contact with the team that headed out to the water tower to collect the scum that had been hiding there. Normally I would
n’t allow wireless transfer like this except at night, but I’d temporarily activated the system so that I could monitor this particular mission. A lot was riding on tracking down the High Rollers.
My men had met little resistance when they stormed the water tower, which was the first thing that concerned me. They gathered everyone they could find and brought them down to be taken prisoner. I watched from the viewpoint of a camera mounted to a soldier’s helmet as he searched the motley den, looking for any sign of someone hiding there. He was in the process of kicking through a box of supplies when I instructed him to go back down to ground level.
It was clear that these weren’t the Rollers. We’d discovered a drug den, replete with evidence of a miserable existence. Still though, there was a chance that they might know where the Rollers were hiding.
I adjusted the microphone stand, pulling the thin cord closer to me as I spoke to the soldier whose camera I was watching through. “Ask them if they know where the Rollers are.”
The soldier did as I asked, but was being rough with the new prisoners. He grabbed a thin man by the neck and threw him to the ground while shouting down at him.
“No, no,” I said. “Let him up. Don’t treat him like that.”
“Sir?” asked the soldier.
“Treat him well,” I said. “Tell him we want to help. Tell him we’re looking for the Rollers because we have their friend, Levon.”
The soldier relayed my message. We could always resort to torture if the kind approach didn’t produce results. Doing it the other way around was a bit tougher.
After a while longer of timid interrogations, I grew tired of waiting. The soldiers had also earned the attention of zombies in the area, so I ordered them to leave. The soldier I was communicating with asked if I wanted them to search the grounds, since they’d only cleared the water tower, but I was fairly certain these pitiful addicts had no knowledge of the Rollers whereabouts. Even still, we would torture each of them upon their arrival, just in case.
I flipped off the monitor and cursed as I sat alone in my room. Finding the Rollers had been my last hope. Without them, there was no chance of developing a cure that could save the multitude of soldiers and families that depended on me. Three levels above, hundreds of men, women, and children resided. They were the families of my soldiers, and Covington had decided they, along with my men, were expendable.
I didn’t agree.
I had to meet with Covington alone. I had to speak to him without the snake spitting her venom in his ears. I left my room and marched through the facility to confront the man I’d once trusted implicitly.
General Covington had inspired me to join him in his revolution against The Electorate nearly two decades earlier. Even though I was entrenched in their machinations, fulfilling my fealty without question like a dutiful knight of a long lost age, I was seduced by the General’s words. It was him that freed me of that drone’s existence, and gave me the right to demand more of my life than a soldier’s grave.
His predictions proved true, and The Electorate had been quick to send their assassins, despite how they placated me. While they smiled and conceded when I argued with them, they held their knives behind their backs, ready to cut me down at their first opportunity. They used their failed experiments as weapons, and the first nearly finished the job. One of the clones of Ben Watanabe had tracked me during a trip south, and attacked in the middle of the night. If not for the men that were loyal to me, he would’ve succeeded.
The assassin was caught, and would’ve been executed had I not recognized him. He looked nearly identical, if not a slight bit older, than the Dawn that Covington was hiding in this facility. We brought him back and underwent a long process of determining if this was the real Ben Watanabe or just a clone like the one Covington was raising. Unfortunately, he turned out to be a clone, but he proved to be a more than adequate soldier. The Electorate had perfected their eugenics program, and Ben (who we eventually nicknamed ‘Bear’) was proof of it.
Covington had decided it would be best for me to act as if I had no idea that The Electorate had turned on me, and we continued our charade for several years. We knew that we were sitting on a treasure that The Electorate wouldn’t be willing to lose. The Dawn program was too important to them. As long as we controlled the children, we were protected. That gave us time to try and prepare for what Covington had learned was coming: The Noah Initiative.
But time had run out, and now Covington’s former revolutionary zeal had been usurped by his fear of death.
I was one of the few people in the facility that had access to Covington’s room. There were a couple of doctors that were allowed in, but only in the event of a crisis. Covington’s health was tenuous at best, and he needed constant attention from the medical staff. How he managed to stay sane while locked up in this room for so long was a mystery to me, although now I was questioning whether or not he’d retained his sanity at all. He had to know that The Electorate would turn on him the first chance they had. Accepting their bargain wasn’t a way to save ourselves. It was, at best, a short lease on a life that would end at the first opportunity the snakes had to strike.
I passed my badge over the pad beside his door, causing the circular entrance to yawn open. The short hall before Covington’s room trapped me momentarily as the sanitizers hissed. I was granted access, but an empty chair and the whir of machines was all that greeted me.
Covington had retreated to his Dawn’s room, and I walked over to the console on the wall that would signal to Richard that I needed to speak with him. While I could’ve interrupted him if necessary, I knew that he would never forgive me. The only reason anyone other than himself had access to his Dawn’s chamber was in case he became ill while in there and needed assistance. Any other interruption would incite Covington’s rage.
It took several minutes, but the wall finally hissed as the hidden separation revealed itself, pushing wide until a hall was revealed behind it. Covington stepped forth, his weight reliant upon his cane.
“Jerald, what’s wrong?” asked Covington, surprised and concerned by my uncharacteristic interruption. He assumed something terrible had happened because I’d only summoned him from his Dawn’s room a handful of times.
“I need to speak with you about Beatrice, and your plan for dealing with The Electorate.”
His shift from concern to anger was evident in the scowl that formed on his burned face. “Jerald, we’ve already spoken about this.”
“I know, but this is important. You’re asking me to sacrifice the lives of my men and their families. The reason I sided with you in the first place was to save them.”
“And you did save them,” said Covington as he passed me on his way to his LiMM chair. “Without you, they would’ve died years ago.”
“But now we’re just going to sacrifice them?” I couldn’t believe that this was his plan; that he hadn’t concocted some other devious scheme to get the upper hand.
“We all die,” said Covington as he pulled himself back into his chair. He began to focus on reattaching the tubes to the ports drilled in his side.
I countered, “Not all of us.”
He was amused by that, and gave me a rare grin. “Transferring to a Dawn is the same as dying, Jerald. All we’re doing is passing on our memories.”
I had to stop myself from arguing with him. My purpose here wasn’t to change his mind, it was to discover if his mind had already been made up.
“I’m worried that The Electorate’s just waiting for an opportunity to kill us without putting their Dawns in jeopardy.”
I saw a mischievous spark in Covington’s eye that gave me hope. I’d come here hoping that my confidence in his wile would be affirmed. I was positive he couldn’t have bent to The Electorate’s will so easy.
“There’s more going on with The Electorate than you or I realized.”
I took a step closer, as if my curiosity compelled me forward. “What is it?”
“We�
�re not just fighting for our lives anymore, Jerald. We’re fighting for the lives of every Dawn on Earth.” He spoke with a pompous grandiosity that he assumed would inspire me. I could see it in his expression as his brow raised and his lips curled in a smirk.
“The Dawns?” I asked, dumbfounded that he thought this would erase any doubt I had about our plans.
“Yes, Jerald. You see, there are a good amount of members of The Electorate that are pushing to end the Dawn program entirely. They’re using our insurrection as an example of how they need to sever ties with the program. They’re willing to trash decades of work on eugenics. That’s why I have to tread carefully with them. This isn’t just about securing my transfer, it’s about saving the lives of thousands of Dawns in facilities all across the world.”
He expected more than capitulation from me; he was expecting a passionate accord on my part, which I was unable to deliver. I couldn’t match his zeal for this path, and my loyalty suffered a final break. This man before me wasn’t the General Covington that I’d followed for so many years. He was right when he said that transferring into a Dawn was the same as death. For all these years I’d held onto the belief that when Covington was murdered by Charles Reagan, he’d been transferred into the clone that sat before me now. While it wasn’t technically the same man, this version of Covington proved himself to me time and time again; until now. I realized that his interest in saving the Dawn program was a result of him being a product of it.
I was being asked to kill my men, and their families, so that the Dawn program could survive.
I did my best to feign complacency, but I’m not a good liar. “Okay,” I said with little spirit.
“You understand why this is so important, right?”
“Yes, of course.” I nodded as I backed away. “It makes sense now. You’re right, we have to protect the Dawns. That has to be our priority.”
“Good, I’m happy you understand. We’re running out of time to set things right for us.”
“Yes we are,” I said as I turned to leave.