Washington Deceased

by Stephen Jones

  “We exchanged emails an hour ago. You agreed to see me. You do remember that, don’t you?”

  “Jesus, Steele, of course I remember.” The door buzzed open and Steele entered.

  When she’d last been in the large open room with multiple workstations that Gillespie had claimed for the CIA, it’d been an orderly space with bulletin boards on the walls displaying printouts and photos, and Gillespie’s glassed-in office at the other end a hive of electronic activity with numerous monitors and computers.

  Now, however, it was anything but orderly. The walls were covered in layers of printouts and copies of pages from old files; they were taped over each other without apparent reason, and when Steele flipped a few pages up, she realized they were at least six sheets deep in places. Parts of the prints were circled or highlighted; a few had large exclamation marks in the margins.

  Every story on view was either about Thomas Moreby and the HRV epidemic, or paranormal events from the past. As Steele walked slowly along the walls, taking it all in, she saw reports and articles on hauntings, lake monsters, Mothman, telekinesis, clairvoyance, chupacabras, vampires, Bigfoot, strange sounds heard around the world, the “Slender Man”, shapeshifters, UFOs and a race of serpent people living beneath the streets of downtown LA. In some cases large black arrows had been drawn between articles, linking a supposed ghost sighting in Japan to a mysterious death in a small town in Alberta, Canada; articles on time travel were allied with an old cemetery in London, England; cattle mutilations in Wyoming were connected to crop circles in rural France.

  And on one wall, cases of possession surrounded printouts on Bob Delancy.

  “So, do you get it, Steele?”

  Steele almost jumped – she’d been so intent on the lunatic collage surrounding her that she’d forgotten about its maker. “No, I don’t. Explain it for me.”

  “It starts here . . .” Gillespie jogged to a far corner of the room, lifted pages and gestured at an article that looked like a copy of a newspaper page. “This is when crews in London excavating an old church came upon Moreby instead. They released him, and – and—” Gillespie broke off, frowning. After a few seconds, he spun to the right, made his way along the wall, and stopped at a stack, sorting through the taped pages. “Or maybe it really starts here, in 1803, when we have accounts of Moreby and The Well of Seven performing a ritual to call forth the demon Anarchon—” Again, Gillespie stopped abruptly, but this time his eyes went wide in revelation. “Holy shit – of course! Anarchon could be who’s possessing Delancy . . . Jesus, it was so obvious, how did I miss it before?” Gillespie began tearing down pages, running them to the area on Delancy and taping them there.

  “Aaron . . .” Steele barely knew where to start. “When did you start working on all . . . this?” She waved a hand around the room.

  “Maybe two weeks ago. I think I’ve made excellent progress, don’t you?”

  “How long has it been since you’ve slept?”

  Gillespie turned to her with a shaky grin. “Sleep? We don’t have time for that any more, Steele. None of us do.”

  Curious, Steele walked past him. Gillespie was so intent on drawing marks around parts of the newly rearranged Delancy wall that he ignored her as she entered his office.

  There was a half-full vial of pills on the desk. Steele raised it to read the label: “Dexedrine.”

  She put the container down and glanced into the trash can by the side of the desk; it was nearly full of empty vials. She didn’t need to pick them up to know: their intelligence chief had been doing massive amounts of amphetamines for at least two weeks, probably more, and was suffering psychosis as a result.

  Steele left the office and returned to Gillespie, who finished drawing symbols with a Sharpie and stepped back to examine his work. “This all makes sense: Moreby enacts a ritual to allow Anarchon to possess Delancy, thereby gaining entrance to our facility, and . . . oh my God, what if our attempt to retake Washington was nothing but a giant sacrifice to Anarchon? Dear God, Steele, what if we were set up all along?”

  “Aaron, where did you get all the Dexedrine?”

  “Our medical stocks down here are quite good, you know. There’s still plenty left.”

  “Do you think you should be taking this much of it?”

  Gillespie turned his red eyes on her, and the force of his fear and paranoia was almost a physical sensation, like a rat sinking teeth into an exposed ankle. “Steele, we should all be taking this much of it. Every one of us who are left, who are still human. We can only beat them if we think our way out, and we can only keep thinking if we stop sleeping. They don’t sleep, you know, and it’s a luxury we can no longer afford. And before you tell me I’ve taken too much Dex and I’m not thinking straight, let me ask you: Is anyone else down here coming up with anything better?”

  Steele held his gaze for a few seconds, and asked, “Just answer me one thing, Aaron: were those transcriptions of Moreby’s and Delancy’s phone conversations accurate?”

  “I swear they were. Think whatever else you will, but I will never falsify evidence like that.”

  Steele nodded. “That’s all I need to know for now, Aaron. Thank you for your time.”

  She turned and left. When she reached the hallway and heard the door close behind her, she exhaled and realized she’d been holding her breath until she’d escaped the madman’s room

  [Transcription of security camera footage from main gate at Bolling Air Force Base]

  18:58

  [A jeep is seen approaching the gate. It pulls to a stop before the guard booth, and a uniformed soldier steps out. A single man is seen in the jeep; he hands an ID to the guard, who eyes it and almost does a double-take.]

  GUARD: Good evening, Mr. Vice President.

  DELANCY: ’Evening, soldier.

  GUARD: What can I do for you, sir?

  DELANCY: You can open the gate. I’ve got urgent business to attend to.

  [The guard peers into the jeep, then returns his attention to Delancy.]

  GUARD: Sir, you don’t have anyone with you, not even Secret Service . . .

  DELANCY [laughs harshly, then]: Don’t get me started on the Secret Service. And it’s all right, soldier I’m meeting extremely secure forces just a short distance from here.

  [The guard glances out past the gate; strong spotlights are trained on the area just outside and reveal that the exterior perimeter is clear, as is the road leading away from the field.]

  GUARD: Are you sure, sir? We keep the immediate area clear, but you won’t go very far before there’ll be swarms of them . . .

  DELANCY: Soldier, don’t make me bring the word “insubordination” into this. Open the goddamn gate now. GUARD [salutes]: Yes, sir!

  [The guard hits a button, and the heavy chain-link fence topped with barbed wire that serves as Bolling’s main gate begins to roll back; the soldier steps out of the booth and stands ready with a rifle to take out any of the infected who might appear. Delancy waits until the opening is barely wide enough for his jeep, then guns the engine and roars out into the night. The soldier reverses the gate controls, stands his ground until it is again secure, then returns to the guard booth where he writes the encounter down in a log, then picks up a phone.]

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  THE PRESIDENT PUSHED the tablet away in disgust. “Jesus Christ . . . this happened last night! Why are we just now hearing about this?”

  Ty and Steele exchanged a look, and then Steele said, “It’s my fault, ma’am. Colonel Marcus from Bolling did contact us promptly last night, but unfortunately . . . his message went to Aaron Gillespie. I’ve now corrected the mistake, and all incoming communications for the CIA or Gillespie will go through me.”

  “Has Gillespie officially been relieved yet?”

  “Not officially, no. There’s no real point in doing that until we can find a replacement, is there?”

  The President looked from Steele to Ty. “Get to work on that. If we have to fly someone across
the country, Ty, I want somebody here overseeing intelligence in a week. It’s too much to ask us to take it on – we’re already stretched so thin we’re making mistakes. We can’t afford too many more.”

  “On it.” Ty began tapping out notes on his computer.

  Rising and pacing, the President said, “So, Delancy . . . we think he met with Moreby last night, is that correct?”

  Steele answered, “Yes. I think we can assume that part of Gillespie’s report was accurate.”

  “Is Bolling on security alert now?”

  “Yes. The drones are flying surveillance, but they’re all ready with Hellfires in case Delancy shows up at the head of Moreby’s army. The Bolling perimeter is in good shape.”

  The President paced a few more steps. “Opinion, Steele: would Delancy really try to sell us out to Moreby?”

  Steele thought it over . . . for about one second. “Truthfully, ma’am . . . absolutely I believe he would. If Delancy thought he could gain power by allying himself with a housefly, he’d do it.”

  “I agree. I guess we wait, then.”

  So they waited.

  From:

  Landen Jones

  To:

  NWP Board of Directors

  Sent:

  MON, Nov 04, 8:01 PM

  Subject:

  The solution to Human Reanimation Virus

  Gentlemen and Ladies: I am very pleased to inform you that my team has finally been successful in engineering an antiserum that combats HRV. We realized a short time ago that our search for a vaccine would ultimately prove fruitless, and so I directed my people to consider other alternatives. Working from the notion that a zombie bite might be treated in the same fashion that a snake bite is, we created an antiserum that counteracts HRV completely, and we are ready to begin producing the antiserum. Due to limited resources, production will necessarily be slow at first, but we expect it to increase quickly.

  I’d like to suggest now how we might best serve our species while maximizing NWP’s position, and I’m going to make a rather radical proposal: given the country’s current wartime situation, with two governments (the United States of America and the so-called New Zombie Order) both claiming control and resources either split between the two or simply gone altogether, I believe it’s time for NWP to rethink its profitmaking strategies. Put quite frankly, we now live in a world where the oncealmighty dollar is essentially worthless. I believe the new system may rely not on the gold standard, but on the power standard.

  What I am suggesting is this: our HRV antiserum will shortly be the most powerful bargaining chip in the world. I suggest we offer it to neither the U.S. government nor Moreby’s nation, but distribute the drug ourselves in exchange for signed loyalty agreements. In other words: We will create our own country. Our citizens will be protected from HRV, and they in turn will protect us and our interests. As we solidify and expand, we will continue to arm and feed our people, further ensuring that they feel comfortable as citizens of New World Pharmaceuticals. We will create history’s first true corpocracy, and we will spread our influence and product around the globe.

  If any of you are hesitant to consider this bold plan, I’m currently working on a more complete proposal that will include realistic timelines, production estimates, and potential profits.

  Ladies and gentlemen, you will no longer be merely Directors of a corporation; under my plan, you will be Rulers of a world.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  KEVIN HAD SPENT nearly four weeks strapped to the bed.

  Granted, they allowed him – under Joker’s baleful eye – to get up twice a day and walk the length of a corridor. Rebekah took expert care of him; he was fed and bathed and his bed pan was changed promptly; and he was allowed to choose the movies he could watch on the room’s flat-screen television. But as long as Joker was present, he and Rebekah almost never spoke . . . and Joker was always present.

  Kevin also spent two hours a day watching his blood drain away.

  They pumped him full of supplements, but he felt his energy and strength diminishing with his blood. Each day it was a little harder to get out of the bed and walk, even a short distance. They kept assuring him they wouldn’t drain him, that soon he’d be freed, and he’d be a wealthy, protected citizen under the upstart government of New World Pharmaceuticals; but Kevin also guessed they’d gleefully bleed his life away for whatever their version of a buck would be, and feel no shame or guilt whatsoever.

  He also knew he wasn’t alone. Sometime during the first week, he’d heard a scream of agony from a room near his.

  The scream had belonged to Singh.

  Later on, he’d broken the silence and asked Rebekah what had made Singh scream like that. “Oh,” she told him, not meeting his eyes, “he’s really okay. It was just . . . well, one of the other nurses missed the vein.”

  In the background, Joker stood by, mute, watching, listening.

  Then there was the day Rebekah had arrived with a new patch sewn on the breast of her white nurse’s uniform. The patch had the letters NWP framed by the Earth seen from space, with the motto A NEW WORLD FOR ALL scrawled across the bottom.

  “What’s that?” Kevin had asked.

  The young nurse glanced at the patch and said, “I’m not sure, but we all have to wear them now, even the doctors.”

  Rebekah might not have been sure, but Kevin was when he took his afternoon walk, and saw the new flag placed behind the nurse’s station. It was a larger version of the patch, and left no doubt in his mind: New World Pharmaceuticals was trying to take over the country – or maybe the entire planet. What he didn’t know was whether they’d already succeeded or not.

  Then one day, as Kevin got out of bed in the morning, the world darkened and spun around him, and only the sure hands of Rebekah kept him from collapsing. She lowered the bed rail and got him seated on the edge of the bed.

  “I’m getting so weak,” Kevin said, waiting for his vision to clear.

  “Maybe we should get you up three times a day.”

  The world around Kevin sharpened and he saw Joker standing six feet away. “Rebekah . . . they’re going to kill me, you know.”

  Rebekah shot one nervous glance at Joker and said, too loudly, “No one’s going to kill you, Mr Moon. You’re in good hands here. The best hands.”

  But something in her look told Kevin she knew it wasn’t true.

  Three nights later, Kevin was re-watching Avatar – a movie he didn’t especially like, but had seen fewer times than the other movies that were available via NWP’s own streaming media – when the door buzzed open and Rebekah entered pushing an empty wheelchair.

  Joker was noticeably not with her.

  Kevin muted the sound and sat up straighter, eyeing her curiously.

  “So you had a little accident in the bed, Mr Moon? Well, let’s get you cleaned up.”

  “I didn’t—” Kevin started to say, but her fierce look cut him off.

  She took the remote and unmuted the sound, then turned up the volume. Kevin let her pull him forward, and she whispered, “Play along. You’re leaving tonight.” Her eyes shot briefly towards a corner of the room, and Kevin realized that what he’d always taken to be a smoke alarm was probably a camera.

  No wonder she’d never spoken freely here.

  “Yeah, I’m really sorry. I just kind of lost control . . .”

  “Here, let’s get you into the wheelchair until I can get this cleaned up.” Kevin took a seat in the chair, and Rebekah positioned herself between him and the camera. She deftly unplugged his various tubes and sensors, and leaned forward again to whisper, “There’s a bag with your clothes under the chair.” She pretended to strap his wrists to the chair arms, but she left the straps so loose he could easily pull free. She stepped away and said loudly, “I’m going to have to push you out of the room while I strip the bed. Don’t try to get up, Mr Moon – you’re strapped to the chair for your own safety.”

 
“I’ll be good, I promise.”

  Kevin’s heart began to hammer as she rolled the chair towards the door – was she really doing this? She pulled the door open and moved him out into the corridor, which was empty this time of night. Leaning forward to set the brakes on the chair, she said with soft urgency, “There’s a supply truck that makes a delivery from Washington on Saturday nights; they should be arriving any minute. I can hide you in the back of the truck while they wheel in the drop-offs, then it’ll be up to you to figure out what to do on the other end. Can you walk?”

  He nodded.

  “Okay. I’m going back into the room. Where you’re at right now is out of any camera range, so change your clothes. There’s also a white doctor’s coat in there – put that on. Then when I come out again, I’ll walk you out to the truck.”

  She turned to go back into the room, but Kevin pulled his hands from the straps and grabbed her wrist, causing her to turn back. “Rebekah – I’m not leaving without Singh.”

  Rebekah’s gaze darted away, guilty. “You have to, Kevin. He can’t even walk.”

  “Then I’ll carry him. But I won’t let him stay here to die.”

  For a second he thought she’d argue, but she finally said, “Okay, just get dressed. I’ll be right back.” She went back into Kevin’s room, the door shutting behind her.

  Kevin reached under the wheelchair, found the bag, stood up, and had to throw a hand out to brace himself against the wall as he nearly blacked out. When he was steady again, he yanked on the clothes and the lab coat just as Rebekah re-emerged, carrying an armful of bed sheets which she threw aside. She slid her card through the slot for Singh’s room, and nodded at the wheelchair. “Bring that, he’ll need it. And act like a doctor.”