by Frank Tayell
“She’s gone to sleep,” Helena suggested.
Tom skipped forward. The woman was only gone for two hours. When she returned, she wiped the boards clean and ripped down the sheets of paper she’d pinned to the walls. She began writing again.
“It has a forty-eight hour battery,” Helena said. “So it kept recording after she left. Skip forward to then.”
The writing and erasing continued for another eight hours. Dr Ayers stopped.
“There!” Helena said. “Is there sound?”
“No.”
There didn’t need to be. Ayers looked out the window, and then at the door. Her expression was confused. She smiled at the camera. It wasn’t a happy expression, but one of resignation. She turned to face the door and raised her hands as if she was shouting at someone. Two figures came into view. Both wore Army fatigues and carried assault rifles. A third man came into the room. Like the others, he was dressed as a soldier, but Tom knew he wasn’t military. Even before the camera caught the man’s face, Tom knew from the shock of white hair whom it was. Powell.
Ayers was escorted outside. Powell lingered in the room. One of the soldiers came back in. Tom paused the video.
“What are you doing?” Helena asked.
He skipped back a few minutes. “There. That soldier. He’s one of the two who took her outside.”
“So?”
“So there are only three of them. If there were more people, they’d leave more to guard her.”
“So?” Helena repeated.
Tom didn’t answer. He let the video play. The soldier collected the computer tower. Powell picked up the laptop. They left. The video continued playing, but there was nothing more to see until it recorded the door opening once more, and Helena and Tom walked into the room.
“She was taken away seventeen and a half hours ago,” Helena said. “Maybe eighteen since we arrived, give or take.”
Tom stood up.
“Where are you going?”
“To find the other cameras.”
There was one, at least he only found one. It was outside, on the opposite side of the door to the decoy alarm box, hidden within a bird feeder.
“Attached to a motion sensor,” he said. Helena shrugged and walked over to the whiteboards. Tom plugged in the camera, and skipped through the footage of deer, of Dr Ayers arriving, leaving, arriving, more deer, and then he saw it.
“It’s a BearCat,” he said staring at the four-wheeled armored car on the screen. “Painted green, but it has no markings.” He watched as the doors opened. Three people got out. He watched Ayers being brought out of the house. The vehicle drove off. He skipped forward again, until he found the footage of himself and Helena arriving, and then went back to the footage of Powell.
“There were three of them,” he said. “Only three. And in a vehicle with no markings.”
“It’s a military vehicle, though?” Helena asked, half turning around.
“What? No. I mean, yes, the military use it, but so do law enforcement. This one has no markings that I can see. It means wherever they went has to be within driving distance.” Maybe it was nearby. Maybe he could find Powell, and perhaps he would find the other conspirators. It was a beguiling idea that filled his mind with fantasies of revenge.
“So what’s the range on one of those?” she asked.
“I don’t know.” The fantasy was popped. It would be hundreds of miles.
“Oh. I’ve read books,” Helena said. He looked up. She was standing by a whiteboard, running a finger down the mathematical inscriptions. “Popular science, I mean. You know, the kind that always comes out before Christmas. I’m not a scientist, but I’m not stupid. I don’t think I could differentiate an equation, but I know what the symbols look like. These? They’re not even Greek. Is there a scientific equivalent of shorthand?”
“I don’t know,” Tom said, turning back to the screen. He replayed the video, looking for some clue he’d missed.
“Not even Greek,” Helena repeated. She sighed loudly enough for Tom to look up again. She headed into the kitchen.
If Powell had arrived here eighteen hours before, so at about the same time that they’d arrived at the filling station, then when did he leave New York?
“There’s food here,” Helena said, looking in the fridge. “Mostly salad. All of it fresh. None have plastic wrappers. She must have gotten it from somewhere nearby. Somewhere with a hot-house.”
Tom was about to start the video from the beginning, but forced his hand away from the screen. Watching the same clip over and over wouldn’t help unravel the meaning within all these disparate threads. He put the tablet down, walked over to the armchair, and collapsed into it.
Powell had been dressed as a soldier. So had the two men with him. He’d had time to change, and presumably catch a few hours sleep. Tom envied the man.
“There are steaks in the freezer,” Helena said. “Nothing else, just steak. I don’t think she had a varied diet. We might as well eat. I… I guess I’ll be cooking?”
“Hmm? Oh, yes. Thanks.” Ignoring her exasperated sigh, he returned his attention to Powell. Give or take a few stops, he’d come here straight from New York. He would have flown out on a helicopter to the location where they’d collected that BearCat. It meant Powell’s orders had changed. He wasn’t looking for Tom anymore. And that meant—
“How did you know Dr Ayers?” Helena asked.
“What? Oh. I didn’t. I thought I said.”
“You said you came across her. You didn’t say what you were looking for.”
“Suspicious activity among scientists,” he said, almost automatically. “Money had gone missing from a few budgets. I was chasing it, and got caught up in a bit of a rabbit hole.”
There was the sound of a cupboard opening, water running. It stopped.
“Let me ask you something else,” she said. “Who’s that man with the white hair?”
“A soldier.”
“No. Really, who is he?” Her tone had changed. It was calm, measured, though with a dangerous edge. He turned to look at her. Her teeth were gritted, her jaw clenched. “He was outside that block you said you lived in,” she said. “I saw him. He was there. Now he’s here. Who is he? Who are you? And what the hell is really going on?”
After he’d confirmed the house was empty, he’d left the shotgun by the couch, some ten feet from where he now sat. It wasn’t there. Helena’s hands were hidden below the counter of the island workstation, but it wasn’t a stretch to imagine the pistol held in one of them.
“His name’s Powell,” he said.
“And who is he?”
“I don’t know. Not exactly. Over the last month, he’s passed himself off as a cop, a Fed, and now as a soldier. I doubt he’s any of those, not any more. And it’s unlikely Powell is his real name.”
“Like how Tom Clemens isn’t yours?” she asked. “You called yourself Thomas Dennis when they asked for your name in that town. You said you were an analyst, but you act like you’re on the run. You’ve got contacts in the White House, but can’t call anyone to help us. You know things, and have access to the kind of data that no ordinary person would. And now we’re here, in the home of some scientist who’s been working on God knows what, and who was taken away by three soldiers, one of whom was obviously looking for you a couple of days ago, and would have caught you if there hadn’t been zombies in the streets!” Her voice rose to a scream. “The country’s being torn apart! What the hell’s going on?”
Could he trust her? Probably, and what was the alternative? He could disarm her easily enough, but then what? Wasn’t the whole point of his original plan to expose the conspiracy to the entire world? So maybe he should start with that, one person at a time.
“It’s a long story,” he said, “and it begins years ago. The short version is that there’s a conspiracy aimed at seizing control not just of our government, but also of nations across the world. I tried to stop it. Powell is the triggerman, but h
e works for Farley.”
“Farley? The secretary of state?”
“There are others. He’s not running this alone, but he’s one of those at the top. Farley ran for president to secure the cabal’s grip on power. To stop him, I persuaded Grant Maxwell to stand. I… I made sure he won. He’s a friend, but he’s also an honest man, and I thought that if he defeated Farley, it would mean an end to the conspiracy. I was wrong.”
“And this… this cabal, are they behind the zombies?”
“No. I don’t think so.” He looked around Dr Ayers’s home. “It probably wasn’t created in the U.S, but by Russia or China, or someone else. They learned what this group was planning, and pre-empted it with something truly horrific.”
“What do you mean? What were they planning?”
“It began in Britain with research into biological warfare during the early days of the Cold War. Someone realized that they needed a defense against the virological weapons that were being developed in the Soviet Union. Research began into a universal anti-viral.”
“Did it work?”
“Not really, but it used up a lot of funding. When the Soviet Union collapsed, the research was put on hold. A few years ago, the cabal resurrected it. As I say, I still don’t know the names of all those involved. There are Brits and Americans involved, all with their eyes on the highest—”
“Yes, yes,” she said dismissively, “but this anti-virus, did it work? I mean, can we use it against the zombies?”
“I don’t know. But it did work. At least, I found proof of trials that show it was effective against HIV, Ebola, Marb—”
“So it won’t?”
“No. Not without being modified.”
“Well, maybe that’s why they came for Dr Ayers.”
Tom stared at her. He’d been so consumed with Powell’s presence, he’d not really considered why the man had come here. “Probably. Almost certainly.”
“So that’s more proof they weren’t involved in making it,” Helena said. “I say ‘more’, but you’ve not actually given me any yet. All you’ve said is that a group of politicians planned to take over the world through a scheme that would see all diseases being cured. To be honest, that doesn’t sound… well, it doesn’t sound all that bad.”
“Firstly, the election was rigged. I might have helped Max win it, but they’d moved the finishing line before we’d even entered the race. That speaks to their character; they’re consumed by a self-righteous belief in their right to rule the world. Democracy means nothing to them. And,” he added, seeing Helena was about to interrupt, “they’ve killed to keep their conspiracy secret. The real villainy isn’t in what they’ve done, but in what they intend. They aren’t going to give the vaccine away. And they’re not going to sell it, not for money at least. They want favored nation status, special economic trading zones, and the imposition of Western democracy anywhere they give the vaccine. And that might not sound too bad until you consider that your idea of democracy is markedly different from theirs.”
“Fine. But that would be better than millions of people dying from disease, wouldn’t it?”
“That would depend on how they got sick.” He leaned back and closed his eyes. “There’s a lot I don’t know, and too much I can’t prove. I suspected they were putting a plan into place whereby they would infect the populace of recalcitrant nations with resistant strains, and that was why I began investigating Dr Ayers. What I do know is that there are some nations who will not be cowed. The kind with their own labs, who would take this vaccine, synthesize their own version, and thus negate the conspiracy’s scheme. They called this part of their plan Prometheus. It’s a pre-emptive tactical nuclear strike on any nation that would never sit back and let them win.”
“You’re not serious? Nuclear war?”
“They’re insane. Didn’t I mention that? I have the targeting data. The problem is that so do the Russians and the Chinese. Well, why wouldn’t they? If I was able to discover all this with my meager resources, is it any wonder that they did, too?”
“Then why didn’t the FBI or the NSA discover this?”
“Because someone high up in those organizations is working with the cabal. There was a demonstration in New York on the twentieth. I think that was when Farley was due to make his final threat. Russia or China or someone guessed what was going to happen, so they released the virus. That’s what I think happened. I know that the cabal had people working in foreign governments, but… but like I said, there’s a lot of gaps. Because of that demonstration, I was in New York. I thought I could get proof of all of this, and release it to the world before Farley had a chance to begin the apocalyptic part of his plan. Unfortunately, it looks like someone else beat him to it.”
“That doesn’t explain Powell,” she said.
“I decided to wait until after the inauguration to tell Max what I’d discovered. As president, he’d have the power to do something about it. As president-elect, he might have felt duty-bound to refuse the oath. Before I could tell him, I was framed for murder and… do you remember the bombings on the day of the inauguration?”
“Of course.”
“I was blamed for them. There was evidence found on a journalist’s computer. The journalist was murdered in my house. Shot with my gun, by Powell. I didn’t get to speak to Max, and I’ve been on the run ever since.”
“That’s some story.”
“I have the video.” He walked over to the tablet and found the footage of Powell shooting Imogen Fenster. He pressed play and placed the tablet on the counter. Helena watched it.
“That’s the man with the white hair. It doesn’t prove anything else you’ve said.”
“I’ve some files I can show you.”
“Well, go on, then.”
He pulled them up. He didn’t store many on the tablet, just enough to remind him of what he was doing and why.
“I… I see,” she finally said. “I have no way of knowing if any of this is real.”
“True. I could have faked it. This is one of those times where you’ll have to decide whether to believe me or not.”
“I don’t know if I entirely believe you,” she said. “And I don’t think what you believe is the entire truth. You’ve admitted as much, even if you won’t admit it to yourself. But you seem like a decent guy, Tom Clemens.” She raised her arm. Sure enough, the pistol was in her hand. She placed it on the counter. “Is that even your name?”
He relaxed. “Names are complicated, but for the last thirty years or so, I’ve called myself some variation of Thomas more often than anything else.”
“And before that?”
“Thaddeus. That’s what my mother named me.”
She nodded to herself, seemingly satisfied, and sparked the stove. “You mind if the meat’s tough? I’m too hungry to wait for them to defrost. Right, so if the Russians are behind the zombies, there’s no reason to think there won’t be another attack? Something worse?”
“It’s possible, but not likely. The zombies are already everywhere. I doubt that was planned, but no one will have the resources to launch any more attacks.”
“That’s another theory, right?”
“An educated one.”
She opened the drawers until she found a knife. She savaged the steak’s packaging. A gust of smoke and steam erupted from the pan as she threw them in. “Okay, let’s say you’re right. That means we’ve just got the zombies to worry about.”
“No. There’s still Powell, Farley, and the conspirators. You’re right; kidnapping Dr Ayers has to be part of a plan to adapt the vaccine.”
“Good.”
“What?”
“Well, someone has to do something to stop the zombies. It seems like that might work.”
“You saw how the police were called back from Manhattan, but how there was no federal support in New Jersey. They had a quarantine and they destroyed your boat, but they didn’t stop us crossing the bridge. You saw the military on the interstate.
All of that is evidence of conflicting orders being given, all so the official response is slowed down. It can’t be stopped, but they don’t need it to be. They don’t want it to be. They just need enough time to get the vaccine ready. Farley will take the credit. That’s what he wanted all along. It’s what Archangel was all about. These are petty men who want history to remember them.”
“But you don’t know their names?”
“Not all of them, no. I knew some. They died. Killed by their comrades to protect the conspiracy. I have my suspicions about the director of the FBI. In fact, suspicion isn’t a strong enough word.”
“Okay, but do you know anything? I mean, is it all just suspicions and hunches?”
“I’m certain that there aren’t more than a hundred and fifty of them. I suspect it’s around seventy. That’s people who actively know what the cabal’s ultimate goals are. That Powell came here with only two goons confirms it. Of course, when you have the secretary of state, and the director of the FBI as part of the inner circle, they can call on a lot of resources without ever having to explain why those orders are being given.”
She flipped the steaks. “It’s not a virus. That’s what she wrote.”
“I wish she’d said what it was.”
“Well, she’s not here. Any idea where they took her?”
“Not a clue.”
“The steaks are done,” she said, slapping them onto plates. She carried hers over to the table and sat down. He went to collect his plate.
“There’s one other thing,” she said as he stared down at the charred meat. “What did you mean, the elections were rigged? The really short version,” she added.
“The candidates the cabal picked for the primary were so unelectable that Farley was the only choice until Max entered the race. In part, and by comparison, he was a breath of fresh air. I hacked Farley’s email account and sent some messages from him to people I knew would leak them to the press. That did most of it. I set up a Super-PAC ostensibly supporting Farley, and which made such an outrageous attack on Max that the media jumped onto it, using it as an example of how dangerous those ads were. Farley had to come out and disavow it, and from then on, despite the money behind him, he was on the defensive.”