The Event Series (Book 3): The Archive and Beyond

by Thomas Larson

  We sat for a while, and then Momma snarled at the cubs, stood up and walked toward the ledge. She easily climbed the rocky crags and plunged into the woods on the top. Ceil followed right along, Elizabeth rubbed her face in mine one time and then bounded up the hill to catch up.

  I was quiet the rest of the day. I told Code about the encounter.

  (Matt) Tanya and I talked more last night and we are going to do another pilgrimage, the plan this time is simply to visit Helen at the college. I am going to check with Mom and see if she will let us take Black Olive and Strawberry. Horseback seems to be the way that we should go. I know that she will not be happy about us going gallivanting again, but it is needed.

  Today we spent some time preparing our room at the Archive, I am not sure our hearts are into it because I think we are both looking at the trip more than the move, and somehow I think we both know that this is a trip we may not return from. Not because of bad things happening, but because there is a call, a reason for us to keep going west from the college. But we shall see.

  September 12th

  As Del and I were packing things up, I took a couple of tries at reaching the Pittsburgh, or Cheyenne or Fort Knox, it was odd, there seemed to be interference with the signal. There was a crackling and static.

  In the course of moving things I came upon that video camera I had set up. I had not seen any activity or noticed any before but I did see where the auto sensor had kicked in. I have set up the auto sensor after I kept forgetting to turn it on when we left in the morning. I rewound the tape and began playing it back. Del and I were….. I am not even sure how to describe it.

  Going back to a couple of days after the almost war with the Otis folks there was the first video. At first it was hard to say who it was, we heard the door open and someone walked in, they were in army clothes. It took a couple of rewinds to figure out that it was Lt. Mills. He headed to the Sat-Comm and fired it up.

  “Agent 3 to Kentucky Home, Agent 3 to Kentucky Home,” He said into the transponder.

  A female voice answered, “Kentucky here, I will fetch the General.”

  Moments later a southern accented voice came on the speaker.

  “Mills, this is General De Soto, what is your report.”

  Mills cleared his throat, “It has been quiet here. The Mass Militia is the real deal, and they have found the underground. That black bitch you sent knows her shit, but she isn’t sharing it. I can’t tell if they found the weapons cache or not so I am not sure if they found any of the chemical weapons that you think are stashed up there.”

  “I see,” replied the voice. “You have not been discovered?”

  “No, and I really do not like it here, they treat me, like, well, like a regular soldier!”

  There was a laugh from the speaker box, “Well, what did you expect Colonel, you have been brass for too long to remember what it was like.”

  “Yeah, right, I would like to give a little shit to that doctor, Major Barkley, he, never mind.” Said Mills

  “In time you may get the chance, but for now, I need to know if there are the chemicals and if so, how much, we need them to un- friend some folks,” said the voice.

  “Yes sir, and if I find them?” asked Mills.

  “You take control of the situation however you need to you. You take them and get them back here. You should have control of Sgt. Brown, ‘the black bitch’ I think you called her. She is a good soldier, and will follow orders.”

  “I assume deadly force is authorized.” Mills replied.

  “You do what is necessary, if those chemicals are there, then I want them, Mass Militia be damned. I must have them!” came the reply, just a little too enthusiastically.

  There was a little sign-off thing that happened and then Mills left the room. Now that I think of it the day matched a day that I smelled the Old Spice.

  I had Del go get Tom and we played the tape for him. I watched as he became redder and redder.

  “Has anyone else seen this?” he asked.

  “No, just you,” I answered.

  “Good, keep it that way, and one question, did you and Sgt. Brown find these chemicals that he is talking about?”

  “No, but it was funny, Washa asked me what I thought of Mills, said something about he seemed wrong, seemed not who he claimed to be. I guess she was right.” I told him.

  “Do you trust her?” he asked me.

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Okay,” Tom said, he was thinking, what is the old saying; you could see the wheels turning.

  After he left I turned to Del, “Some shit is gonna hit the fan, we best keep armed, I don’t trust him anymore.”

  “Mills, or Tom,” she said.

  I gave her the look.

  (Tom) It started as a quiet day, just another same old, same old, working on the move. Then Lance showed me a video tape of our LT Mills talking to Fort Knox about some secret weapon or chemicals that were or may have been stored at the Archive.

  I sent Steven up to the Archive and had him bring Sgt. Brown and the Major back to the main camp. We talked a little while. I believe that Brown did not find whatever it was that was thought to be there.

  The Major was furious, and had I not stopped him would probably have hunted Mills down and at least, the very least beat the shit out of him. But I prevented it.

  Instead, we decided that we would do a little kind of sting operation. I had Asuna go find Mills and tell him that we were meeting in the dining room to discuss a find, something that was unexpected and dangerous.

  When he arrived, it was the Major, Brown, and I at the table, McManus was kind of guarding the door, which I explained as important to keep prying eyes out of this. In the middle of the table was a silver cylinder about 2 feet long and 10 inches in diameter.

  I had Brown tell us all about how in the course of her most recent search she had found the weapons locker that was hidden behind the bookcase, she told it exactly as it had happened with her and Lance. But, I had her kind of embellish on it a little and she continued by telling how when they had gone to replace the LAWS rockets after the almost war she discovered a secret panel with something strange inside, canisters of some kind.

  She said she was not sure what they were, but the marking clearly showed they were bio-weapons and dangerous ones. She even suggested that until we could dispose of them that it would best to move out the Archive. It was an academy award worthy effort on her part and a nice bit of improv about the move. I see know why Lance likes her.

  Most eyes were on her, mine were on Mills. He was clearly interested, almost smiling.

  “Commander, if I may, I did a little time with a unit that handled IEDs and WMDs. I think I might be able to help,” offered Mills.

  The fish took the bait and was off running.

  “Lt, I did not know that was your field, I thought you were more an Admin guy,” said Major Barkley. “Or at least that was what General De Soto told me.”

  Mills stutter stepped for a moment then came back with “Well, I was transferred to Admin after my tour in Iraq.”

  “Ah!” said the Major.

  It was then that Lance came in, with laptop in hand. “Major, Tom, I got some stuff on the canisters, it looks bad. Let me set this up in the projection TV and show you,” He said.

  Initially Lance did show a clip about some Vietnam era chemical weapons that were ‘similar’ to the ones we found. Mills was almost wetting himself in the excitement thinking that we had found what he was looking for. Then, the video changed, to the one that was from inside Lance’s cabin.

  Mills’ mood changed, he looked like a cornered animal.

  “Well, Colonel, is it Mills or something else?”

  “Mills” he said softly, then stronger, “what are you going to do with me? I am the only one who knows how to handle those canisters.” He pointed at the one in the middle of the table.

  “I see, well, I have thought about that. Personally, I think Major Barkley would like to stick th
at canister up your ass. But I am not going to let him. So for now, tell me what the canisters we found contain,” I said.

  He looked at me; he already had his ‘escape’ figured out. “They’re a nerve gas, Sarin, and what we plan to use them for is to neutralize the foreign subs. We planned to plant canisters in supply shipments where they would ‘leak’ and get to the point where only our subs, US subs would be left.”

  “So this is about world domination of the seas? Are you fucking kidding me?” I said, incredulously.

  “Yep, America being America,” he said, with a misguided sense of pride.

  “Well, Agent 3, we are not going to let you do that.” I told him.

  He pulled out his sidearm and seized the canister. “You can’t stop me, keep your hands were I can see them.”

  “Well, let me see, the way I see it, you maybe get one of us, but that is about it.” I replied.

  “No, I get all of you, I don’t shoot one of you, I blow the canister, you all die.” He hissed venomously.

  “Really? And what about you? Suicide mission?” I asked.

  “No, I’ll have enough time to mask up, but I will enjoy seeing you die. Do you know how horrible is it to die from chemical weapons?” he said, starting to feel in control and maybe a little cocky.

  “Okay, let’s all just slow down a little here, there is plenty of time for dying. Let’s talk a little, since we are all going to die, want to tell us the details, it is kind of like the old spy movies, the bad guy always has to tell the good guys his plan.”

  “I am fucking serious here, stop with the stupid bullshit,” He screamed.

  I put my hands down on the table, “Look Colonel, I want to know who is behind this, it is you, and whatever dumbass general in Fort Knox, or is that also Cheyenne.” I suddenly had a bad feeling about McManus.

  “Fucking Air Force pussies, no, they have no clue, hiding in their little rabbit hole! Fuck them; this is the real military doing this.” Mills spat out.

  “I see” was my answer. “So one more question, if you were in my place, what would you do?”

  Mills looked at me for a couple of seconds; the question caught him completely off guard. “I, what? Are you crazy? I am gonna kill you, all of you.”

  “Nope, not crazy, figure that if you break open that canister there and we all get some of it, well, we may die from diabetes in a couple years, insulin is hard to find. Read the side of the thing.” I said in a calm tone, but beneath the surface I was a storm of anger.

  The embossed Coca Cola logo was still readable. Mills looked, no glared, at it, then me. He began to raise his 45, but McManus who had silently crossed the room while Mills reading the side of the canister, crushed his skull with a single mighty swing of his M-16. It was over. This one we would leave for the vultures.

  “Mac, I had a moment of doubt there, I wasn’t sure if, well, you know.” I said shifting my gaze from McManus to the crumpled body on the floor.

  “No problem Boss, I was nervous that Osgood or Welles might have been players myself,” he replied.

  There were never any canisters, it was a ruse. After it was over I had Lance contact Cheyenne. I spoke with General Osgood personally and filled them in on the events. He was grateful and said he would take care of it, Fort Knox, on his end. I also had Lance contact Captain Katzung and fill them in with the same information.

  (Matt) Wow, just heard about the incident with Lt Mills, it is sad that there are still people out there with stupid ideas, misguided control issues and fools who follow them.

  (Margo) At Vespers tonight we heard about the canisters and the actions of Lt Mills. Why, that is all I can ask, why.

  I can’t beat that for the day.

  September 13th

  (Matt) I did not realize at the time, yesterday, that Mills was not going to be burned or buried. Tom had his body just dumped in the woods to let him rot, or be picked over by the bugs and animals. We talked about it, it is unacceptable to me.

  Tom and I had a discussion that was brief and not a pleasant one. I tried to point out to him that as bad as Mills was that no one deserved that treatment. He was human, a bad human, misguided, but still human, and even in death there should be dignity shown.

  He tried to explain to me what he was thinking and it was a weak argument, but he can be stubborn. It is on one hand what has made him a good war chief, and helped keep us alive. But he also sometimes gets a bee in his bonnet and can’t let it go.

  I did my best to show him the light, but in the end, I had to walk away. It was going nowhere, according to Tom, Mills would rot and that was that. Tanya and I will take a walk out to the dump site later and cremate him; I will say a few words.

  (Lance) The place is kind of weird today, that whole thing with Mills has kind of freaked some of us out. The government or military doing what they were trying to do, especially in this state of the world. We need all those left, the survivors, to work on a rebuild, to be in unity, not playing power games. The wars are all over, there are no more borders, nations, and really for that matter even races. We are humans trying to scrap by.

  McManus cleaned up the mess from where he had hit Mills, it was a shock the way it ended. But I think that had the soldier not stepped in that Mills would have shot Tom. He, Mills was insane, I think that is the only way I can describe it.

  Tom had the body dumped into the woods for the vultures. I can kind of see not putting him into the cemetery, but I am not sure I agree with the idea of just dumping him. Maybe Del and I will sneak out early tomorrow and throw some dirt on him.

  Skipped fire pit tonight, just was not feeling it.

  (Margo) Code and I headed up to Hinsdale early this morning. We needed to do some ‘shopping’ to set up our room.

  “What would be cool is if we could find like a Japanese place. Can you image what we could do?” Code said.

  “Huh?”

  “Anime, we could do our room in a like Anime design, something out of like Bleach or Kill la Kill,” he explained.

  I thought about it for a minute, simple designs, matts on the floor, the low table, I kind of like it. As we get old, it may not work but for now, I kind of liked the idea. “You think we can find a store like that?” I asked.

  “Well, I bet if we find a futon shop we could have a good start,” he said.

  “And can we get like Kimonos and Happy Jackets and those funny little socks with the separate big toe so we can wear the clog things?” I asked.

  “Well, I guess, I hadn’t taken it that far,” he replied.

  We found a Futon store and were able to get a sleep matt / mattress, the kotatsu table, some comforters and blankets and a couple of room screens with Japanese designs painted on them. The clothes thing didn’t work out, but it was a start.

  We dropped the stuff off at the Archive and then came back to camp for dinner. We will leave the furniture from the cabin there at camp, with the new stuff we won’t need to move it.

  Vespers were weird tonight, seemed strained at first, then it got really weird. I can’t even explain it except to say there was something going on between Matt and Tom.

  (Tom) I am still absorbing what took place yesterday and now I am concerned about what will happen with Fort Knox. I wonder if Cheyenne is actually in league with them. I wonder if when Knox gets they figure out about Mills if they might not strike out at us. Or for that matter, if the Pittsburgh is involved whether they might not send a Tomahawk our way.

  As I was walking across the camp, Matt caught me.

  “Hey Matt, what’s up,” I asked.

  “It is about Lt. Mills, I heard a rumor and was wondering if it was true.”

  “Well, yes he is dead, he tried to, or threatened, to kill us, a few of us and he was a kind of spy with a plan to do harm to a lot of people.” I said.

  “I heard that part, what I am curious about is where he is now.”

  “Ah, well, we dumped the body in the woods,” was my response.

  “I don’t
think that is right, I think he needs a decent burial,” Matt replied. “Why would you just dump him?”

  I looked at Matt, I knew where he was coming from the Sky Father, Earth Mother, spiritual thing. “Matt, I know that you will not agree with me but there are some things that make a person underserving of even the basic human kindnesses. What he did, what he was working on, what he tried to do, fit that category in my mind.”

  “Tom, he was a human being, evil, or not, he was a human. He deserves at least that much dignity.”

  “Think back, when we have had deaths in the past there were two ways we disposed of the bodies, the empty shells. Our own we buried, family, friends, part of the clan, we buried them in our little cemetery. Then those we didn’t know we burned, and why did we do that?” I began.

  Matt looked at me for a moment, “I understand, because family is family, and they deserve it, and in the case of the burning we were a little less gentle.”

  “Part right, we buried family because it helped those of us left behind to deal and cope with the loss a little better, we put them in the ground because it was what we, humans have always done. It gave us a place to go, to visit, to remember.”

  “Okay, shouldn’t we bury them all?” Matt asked.

  “How could we, no, some we had to burn. Either way we had to, the virus in them and then for hygiene sake we burned the rest. I think you can understand that.”

  “But why is Mills being left in the woods?” he asked.

  “Because he was what he was, and doesn’t deserve better!”

  “Are you sure? He was a fellow human, evil or not, he was still human, he is dead now, how are you punishing him, by letting animals ravage his body?” was Matts retort.

  I came back with, “I don’t care, I don’t want him in our cemetery, I don’t want him to find peace, and I don’t care. You have made your point, and I will consider it, but don’t get your hopes up.”

  I sat down by the lake for a while, looking over the water. As I sat eyes closed, Asuna sat down in the Adirondack chair next to me. I could tell it was her by the smell of her soap. Funny, how we still catch such things.