It wasn’t a steady spread each day, as would be experienced with a normal virus. It was more like a steep, short Bell curve. To think that the number of infected would double each day was simplistic, ill-conceived math, and completely inaccurate. This wasn’t some screenwriter’s idea of vampirism, where each infected individual infected another. Over the course of a day, each one infected thousands, who immediately began infecting thousands more.
By the end of the first day of Soo Yim’s exposure, helped along by the modern wonder of air travel, millions were carrying a lively strain of Trident. They passed it on through physical contact, the surfaces they touched, the air they expelled from their lungs.
Day two – still a week and a half away from outbreak – was a mathematical nightmare. The millions already infected passed it along, and upwards of a billion people had caught it by the time day three arrived. By the end of that twenty-four-hour cycle, the vast majority of the earth’s seven billion people had been exposed. Day four saw the rate of new infections drop sharply, simply because there were fewer people who hadn’t contracted the virus. By the time Trident went live on October twenty-eight, there were less than a hundred thousand people worldwide who hadn’t come into contact with it, primarily because they lived in or were visiting remote locations. That too would soon change, as eventually Trident would seek them out in their isolation, often carried on something as simple as a puff of wind.
Using a simple and obvious model, based upon what they knew and what they’d seen, medical professionals across the globe agreed that there was a ten day incubation period – ten days from exposure – before Trident became active in a victim, the aggressive Phase-Three stage that Doctor Rusk and others had classified. It was also quickly determined that many of the infected would not have to wait ten days before undergoing the change, because every non-fatal attack, every bite and wound passed along activated organisms that seemed to “switch on” still-dormant organisms in the victim, bringing on the transformation. In these cases, the Phase-Two symptoms of disorientation and sickness lasted less than a minute before the victim – assuming they survived the attack – became a Phase-Three; loss of rational thought (it was guessed,) violence, hunting behavior.
A dangerous killer with a driving need to consume flesh.
Humans are especially skilled at deceiving themselves, and even those learned men and women in the medical research profession are not immune to that flaw. They went at Trident with the understanding that it was a virus, because it looked and acted like one, and assumed that it would continue to look and act like one. A biological mystery, certainly, but one which could eventually be understood through reason and adhering to the rules of science. And of course the ridiculous idea that it was not a virus, that it was the manifestation of a dark and ancient Indonesian God, never came up.
They were wrong on many levels, such as the assumption of a ten-day incubation.
Dead wrong.
Albion, Nebraska
The sun was up. Well, Jim Springer thought, it would be if it wasn’t hidden behind a storm sky. The rain was coming down steadily, sliding off his plastic poncho and turning the brim of his cowboy hat into a waterfall. Like Jim, the other men and one woman standing in the bed of the dump truck did their best to ignore the weather and keep their eyes on the road leading into town.
There were three main ways into Albion, all two-lane country roads cutting through empty cornfields and into the tiny collection of houses and silos, small town shops, barns and a railyard. The other two were similarly blocked by trucks and manned by local farmers, all of them armed.
To Jim’s right, a deputy sheriff sneezed and tipped his hat forward to let the water spill off. The man to his left was motionless and silent. That one hadn’t picked up a gun yet, but Jim wondered.
The news had shown them that what had begun as pocket outbreaks on Saturday had, during the overnight, turned into a full-blown crisis as sickness and violence swept the globe. Death tolls were climbing faster than news broadcasters could report, and the government – something for which Jim and his neighbors had little use – was falling apart. It was clear that there would be no help from that direction, which suited Jim just fine. He would take care of his own.
He glanced back over his shoulder toward the rail yard, where a few corn silos and a string of cattle cars sitting on a siding were still visible through a gray curtain. The deputy did the same.
“At least the rain muffles the sound,” the deputy said. “I can’t hear ‘em anymore. You?”
Jim Springer shook his head. “That goddamn laughing is the worst. Excuse me, Reverend.” The silent man on his left said nothing, just stared outward.
The deputy nodded in agreement. “I wonder if that was the right thing to do with ‘em, though.”
Springer gave him a hard look. “What, we should have let them wander around loose and end up like Genoa?”
The deputy just shrugged.
The cattle cars had been Springer’s idea, and even after what had happened he was still convinced it had been the right thing to do. Albion hadn’t been immune to the infection, of course, but after the first killing (the local barber had gone over and slaughtered his own family – Springer shot him down in the street) precautions had been taken. Anyone showing symptoms, that confused and drooling state right before they turned, had been collected and hurried off to one of the unused cattle cars on the rail siding. Maybe two dozen in all, so far. Of course that had gone badly, once those locked inside succumbed and turned on the others. Now all of them were raging against the steel slat walls, reaching through and howling, giggling in their madness.
Jim Springer shuddered, told himself it was just the chill of the rain. Two dozen wasn’t so bad, as long as you didn’t think about who they’d been before they became monsters. Friends, family…
Before communications started to break down, they’d heard that Omaha had turned into such a nightmare, but on a city-wide scale. Thousands had become crazed cannibals, killing thousands more, fattening their ranks and quickly overwhelming the population.
Also during the overnight, surviving refugees from Omaha had been welcomed into Genoa, the next community over from Albion. They’d brought the madness with them, and in no time the small Nebraska town had turned into a slaughterhouse.
The reverend’s mother had lived there.
Jim Springer looked at the young man to his left. Until last night, the reverend had been an optimistic and lively young man. Now he was gray, his features stony, as if all the warmth and charity had gone out of him.
“Look,” said the deputy, pointing through the rain. “Here they come.”
Springer saw the headlights, a string of cars and trucks stretching back along the road and headed this way. More refugees. Around him, the bolts and slides of rifles and shotguns racked live rounds into chambers. Neighbors or not, Albion wasn’t going down like Genoa.
“Jim?” the reverend said, extending a hand but not taking his eyes off the approaching cars. “If you please?”
Jim Springer nodded, and handed the reverend a loaded revolver.
Memphis, Tennessee
An obese woman carrying an armload of sequined jackets bustled out through the gates of Graceland, heading for a nearby minivan with a HEARTBREAK HOTEL bumper sticker. Others were emerging from the estate behind her and loading cars with clothing, framed photos and gold records, even furniture. Squeezed into a bloody white jumpsuit off to the left, a pudgy, middle-aged Elvis raced down the sidewalk toward the obese woman, slavering and silver-eyed, fingers hooked into claws. The woman froze and screamed, but didn’t let go of the sequined jackets.
A thirty-caliber machinegun rattled, the bullets catching Elvis on the run, cutting him down before he could reach his prey. Specialist Stu “Stewie” (he hated that nickname) Goldman, standing in the turret of his Humvee, looked over the barrel of his weapon to inspect his work. Yep, Elvis was dead. In fact had been for more than thirty years before Ste
wie was born. The soldier shuffled right, rotating the machinegun as he searched for more targets, maybe even another Elvis. He’d heard about these guys, obsessive impersonators that infested this city like fleas on a stray. Stewie thought it was retarded, didn’t see what the big deal was. His musical taste ran more toward Kanye and Jay-Zee, even the old-school stuff by Snoop and Tupac.
No more Elvis’s, only looters, and how weird that he and the men in the two Hummers on this patrol should be doing nothing about that. But the rules of engagement had been clearly explained before they rolled out of their garrison; protect life, not property.
The obese woman loaded her jackets into the minivan, then gave a longing look back toward the gates of Graceland. Apparently she thought better of making a second trip, and the young soldier watched her drive away. He laughed. It didn’t really matter where she chose to die, did it? Here was just as good as someplace else, and he would have bet a considerable portion of his meager paycheck that fatty would be dead by the end of the day.
The two Humvees started rolling, the Tennessee National Guard unit in front and Stewie’s regular Army Hummer following.
The city had turned into a complete shit show. Blocks of buildings were on fire, police and military units were collapsing from within as first-responders and soldiers were overwhelmed by aggressors or the infections in their own bodies, quickly turning into inhuman killers and swarming through the streets, hunting down prey. Their numbers grew at an alarming rate, and Stewie had turned his weapon on more than a few of these monsters in uniform. He didn’t feel bad about it.
Only this morning he’d been anticipating the recoil of his thirty-caliber, wondering if he could really do it, fire a machinegun at another person. By now he was well past the wonder, and his weapon was getting more and more work as hostiles seemed to appear from everywhere. At least they couldn’t shoot back, though they looked like they would scramble right up the side of the Hummer if they got close enough. Stewie didn’t let them get close.
Civilians or not, armed or not, it was combat, and although it wasn’t how he’d imagined it would be, he loved it all the same. Combat was what he’d signed up for when he enlisted, turning his back on the family deli and breaking his parents’ hearts.
“Nice Jewish boys don’t join the Army,” his mother said, sobbing when he’d showed her the enlistment papers.
“Israeli kids do it all the time,” he responded.
“You’re not an Israeli!” Her shrill voice was half the reason he’d signed up. “It’s just not what our people do!” She’d been inconsolable.
There was no way he was going to spend his entire life living and working on the Chicago North Side, stinking of cheese and pastrami and waiting for his parents to die so he could inherit a deli he’d have to share with his brother and two sisters. Unfortunately, by the time he was old enough and finished infantry school, most of the heavy stuff was over in both Afghanistan and Iraq, and he had never deployed. He did, however, have to eat shit from guys around his age who’d been there, and treated the un-blooded members of the unit no better than they had the Hajis.
But this! No crazy desert heat, no snipers or IEDs…safe up in his turret with a shitload of belted ammo standing by and permission to use it. This was the best combat of all, better than any video game he’d ever played. Now he only needed a cool nickname. His war name. Maybe Elvis.
Stewie’s Humvee coasted to a halt in an intersection on Elvis Presley Boulevard, drifting into the side of an abandoned delivery van and stopping with a soft crunch. He swung his machinegun in a slow circle, searching for the reason they’d stopped, while the Tennessee Guard unit in front kept going.
Nothing. No targets, no looters or refugees. Why were they stopped? He called down through the turret opening, “Corporal, what gives?”
Teeth sank into his legs and hips, arms wrapped around his waist and fingernails dug painfully into his sides. There wasn’t even time to scream before Stu “Elvis” Goldman was pulled inside, pulled down to the teeth.
Dallas, Texas
His name was Ibrahim Farhad, but his friends and professors at the university knew him as Jamal Samir, or simply Jimmy, a native of Morocco studying in the U.S. Not that many of them knew where Morocco was, or that it was even an Islamic nation. Most American students, he had found, couldn’t name their own states and had little understanding of their country’s history or system of government (though they all knew who the Kardashians were dating.) Soft and lazy in his eyes, they accepted “Jimmy” as, if not actually one of their own, then very similar; a laid-back twenty-year-old interested in girls, beer and partying. And although these things were forbidden by his culture, Ibrahim publicly partook of them all.
“Meet their expectations and you will become invisible,” his handler had said. Ibrahim did, and he was. With no trace remaining of his Iranian accent, he was just one of the guys. Some of his classmates even thought he was Mexican.
The charade ended today.
Today he was no longer Jimmy Samir, or even Ibrahim Farhad. Today he was simply the Sword of Allah, about to cut down the enemies of Islam. How fitting that it should be Sunday, the supposed holy day of this land.
He walked from the apartment. It had been selected intentionally because it wasn’t far from his destination, and now he had only a few blocks to travel before he reached the walkways and vast parking lots around the target, a mighty white structure with a dome arching into the blue, midday sky. The real temple of these godless people. The thought made him smile.
Ibrahim was dressed in an untucked, long-sleeve plaid button-up, skinny jeans and work boots, and a knit cap to complete the hipster image. Beneath the cap his head was freshly shaven, and his skin smelled of the flower-scented oils in which he’d bathed, all part of the rituals of a morning spent in prayer.
The blue nylon pack on his back carried the stuff of bad dreams.
How many years had his people endeavored to obtain such a device, and how careful had they needed to be to smuggle it into this country and into Ibrahim’s destiny? His handler said it had been a lifetime of work to come to this point in history. The wires ran from the interior of his backpack through a hole in his shirt and inside down the sleeve to his right hand. The trigger, a cylinder the same approximate shape and size as a roll of mints with a button at one end, was concealed in the palm of a fingerless knit glove, yet another affectation of the hipster.
It was armed. A simple movement of his thumb (possible even if he was shot many times, his handler said) followed by a millisecond of white heat, and he would be standing before his god, a blessed martyr in the Jihad. It made him tremble in anticipation to know that today he would meet Allah. In his wake he would leave their temple in ruins, a gravesite for 70,000 incinerated infidels.
Something was wrong, and he noticed it even as he made his way to the wide, concrete walkway. The vast parking lots…they were empty. Not just a little, like being very early, but empty. Where were the cars, the swarming crowds of people in their jerseys, the fools who painted their faces blue and silver? As if for the first time, it occurred to him that the streets along his approach had been empty as well. Was he so intent upon his mission that it hadn’t registered?
The plague…of course. Allah’s wrath was already sweeping the city of unbelievers. Ibrahim and his fellows had been so involved in their preparations however, that no one had bothered to turn on a local news station.
Wait. Not completely empty. Two policemen stood a ways ahead of him along the walkway next to a large flashing sign, the kind used along highways, this one bearing a single message. The sudden fear that he might not be allowed to complete his mission caused Ibrahim to stumble a step.
In addition to the handler, there had been three of them in the apartment, the other two young men Ibrahim’s age, both attending university as he was, with similar cover stories. Because of their race it was assumed they would come together, and their association raised no alarms. None were on watch
lists, and none did anything to draw unwanted attention.
They’d left the apartment one at a time, Ibrahim going last because he had the shortest distance to travel. The first was headed for a pre-positioned car bomb left in a parking lot. He would drive it into the center of a crowded restaurant and shopping district. The second wore a multi-pocket vest beneath a light jacket, each pouch filled with rectangular blocks of C4 studded with steel ball-bearings. This one was headed for the food court of a busy mall.
But it was Ibrahim who had the honor of carrying the most glorious of the three weapons. At a predetermined time, all three would detonate simultaneously.
Now that plan was in jeopardy.
GAME CANCELED, flashed the sign. Ibrahim came to a halt and stared at it, even as one of the policemen started moving slowly toward him. The other stayed back, holding the leash of an all-black Shepherd that stood very still, staring intently at the young man.
Was this the kind of dog that could detect explosives? Or just an attack animal?
The two policemen looked like soldiers to Ibrahim, dressed all in black with their trousers tucked into boots, fearsome with their helmets, body armor and MP-5 submachineguns. Fearsome aliens, he thought, as they watched him from behind the round lenses of their gas masks. There was no one here but them, no relief from their boredom except perhaps the boy with the backpack. He needed to disengage, but not so quickly that it would appear suspicious.
The first policeman approached and stopped about four feet away, gesturing at the big, blinking sign. “Not clear enough for you?” he said, his voice muffled behind the mask.
Arrogant and superior. Just like policemen back in his homeland. Ibrahim shrugged. “I have tickets. I was hoping.”
The cop shook his head at yet another dumb college kid. “That’s too bad,” the cop said. “You shouldn’t be outside. The city’s in a state of emergency.” The dog barked behind him, and Ibrahim forced himself not to flinch. “Where are you from?” the cop asked.
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