Extermination Day (10 page)

The final station was for drying and getting their robes before they’d go to individual quarantine cubicles. As they were dressing, Paulson couldn’t help but glance at Melinda’s naked and nubile young body. He was old, but not dead, not yet anyway, and he remembered very well the torrid affair they’d enjoyed a
year ago.

“See you on the other side,” Paulson said to the others as they crawled into the cubicles.

“We’ve made it this far, we’ll get through,” Melinda said, offering a tight smile.

The cubicle roof closed down around Paulson, like an old-style tanning booth. Several automated devices emerged from the side walls of the cubicle, like mechanical spiders, to monitor his vital signs. He felt a slight prick on his arm as blood was drawn.

“Quarantine time set for one hour,” the computer said.

Well
, Paulson thought.
I’ll know pretty soon whether I was infected or not. Damn, I was tragically wrong thinking that the whole virus was a hoax.

The weight of what had happened finally hit home. The videos, at least those from the U.S., were real. Everyone was dead. The President, members of the government and military, millions of Americans, his wife, children, and grandchildren, all gone. A tear dripped down the side of his wrinkled face.

“You’ve sustained substantial injuries,” the computer said emotionlessly. “Inducing sleep.”

He felt a warm current coursing through his veins, slowly forcing his eyes closed in the small, silent space. In the last moments before falling asleep, he thought of his beautiful Gretchen, their long years together, and how much he was going to miss her.

2:00 am local time, January 16, 2038

Project
Chronos

Jeff gently touched his throbbing nose as they walked back to the control tower. The bleeding had stopped, so he pulled out the blood-caked tissue he had jammed in there earlier and shoved it into his pocket. He cast a sour glance at Chen. The man was an asshole, but a genius.

Jeff thought about the situation they were in. They had a chance to change events, to rewrite history. He didn’t completely understand all the nuances and paradoxes associated with time travel, but it sounded like the past
could
be changed. They could send back data on this holocaust and prepare their defenses, fight whoever was responsible, and save everyone.

Jeff couldn’t help but wonder, however, what would happen to the people left here after the time jump. Would they change instantly and never know the difference? Or would they continue in this timeline, population decimated, trying to fight an unknown enemy whose advanced technology far surpassed theirs? Or would events change to where he’d be sitting in the House chamber while Vice President Paulson was in the spot where Jeff now stood? Could he save his son and daughter, get them to a secure location before the attack happened? There were just too many unanswered questions.

“Doctor, if we send the data back, will that be enough to change the outcome here or should we send a person back to help coordinate the defense? You said yourself you had a hard time convincing government officials that the video from the future was real.”

Chen shook his head. “It would make sense to send a team back, but we’ve never sent a human through the vortex before. This morning was going to be our first test and with the pilot dead, we have no one to replace him.”

“You don’t have a backup, someone on your staff who is qualified?” Jeff asked.

“We did have a backup pilot, but he was off base with his family when the virus h
it. I’m sure he’s dead as well, but
hmmm
. . . ” Chen had stopped walking and tapped his chin. “There may be other possible candidates on base now. However, both test pilots had been thoroughly vetted and had been training in preparation for the time jump.”

“But all the person needs to do is step or jump into the vortex, right?” Jeff tried to work out what the drawbacks would be.

“Basically that’s it, but the physical trip through time can be jarring, as we saw in the animal trials. The test pilot had been going through physical training and specialized conditioning to ease the impact of the time jump.”

“But wouldn’t someone in top physical condition be able to do it?” Jeff asked.

“Yes, theoretically,” Chen said, walking again. “If you peel back the layers, anyone with the right physical properties and minor training could travel through the vortex. However the real story behind having a test pilot is that the general assigned to oversee Project Chronos wanted to have a military professional make the first jump, thereby exerting military control over time travel. It was more of a power-play decision than anything else. I suppose we could just as easily find someone on staff who meets the physical requirements to survive a jump.”

Jeff laughed. “The question of control is pointless now, don’t you think?”

Holly grabbed Chen’s arm. “I think it’s time we call a senior staff meeting to discuss all of this. We need to decide who to send back with the data drive and how far back we need to go to warn ourselves about this virus. To prepare the defenses of the United States against a foreign attack, especially one using such highly advanced technology, would require a time jump of more than a few years, I would think. Plus we may have more people who feel as Dr. Conner did.” Holly looked over her shoulder, no doubt remembering what had happened to Conner and the Secret Service agent. She shuddered and turned back around. “We should address their concerns before things get out of hand again.”

“Good idea. We don’t want a revolt on our hands,” Chen said. “And perhaps it would be a good idea to keep quiet about the video you just saw.”

“Don’t worry,” Jeff said. “We won’t damage your holier-than-thou reputation, Mr. Genius.” Jeff fingered his broken nose, still throbbing in pain.

Chen glared at him. “You might want to get that checked out.” He pointed at Jeff’s nose.

If Chen wanted to throw down again, Jeff was ready. But instead he turned, bumping Jeff in the shoulder. Jeff and Holly followed him as he spoke into his portable to call the meeting. A scattering of people working in the area checked their portables at the same time and then started moving toward the tower. When Jeff, Chen, and Holly got there, others had begun to gather in the main conference center on the first floor.

Minutes later
five researchers were seated around the conference table looking exhausted, both from work and the stress of personal losses in the wake of the viral attack. Chen stood at the head of the table. He introduced Jeff to everyone, then said the other's names. There was Max, a very young man with a boyish face, Nelson, another young man with curly blond hair, Jing Wei, a middle-aged woman with long dark hair and delicate features, Howard, a middle-aged bald man with a paunchy white face, and Rohit a middle-aged dark skinned man.

“Thank you for coming so quickly. First of all I want to thank you for continuing with your work despite the tragedy we’ve suffered over the last several hours. Most of our staff has been presumably lost, over two hundred souls. I think it would be appropriate to have a moment of silence for those who are gone. If everyone could bow their heads, please.”

Jeff looked down and thought of Amanda and how he’d never see her grow up. He pictured Aiden who, because of autism, had never spoken during his five short years. Jeff would never admit it to others, but he was embarrassed that his son had the disease. He always wanted a high achiever, an athlete, and Aiden would never be that. Now he’d never even get the chance. A wave of anger laced with bitterness flooded his thoughts. Jeff was angry at his insecurities over Aiden and angry that this damned virus had taken him away. He couldn’t imagine Aiden and Amanda coughing and dying with blood pouring from their little faces, their mother frantic and helpless. It was a horrible thought and enough to drive anyone crazy. He hadn’t cried yet and despite how much he wanted to, he held it in. Now was not the time. Now was the time for action.

Chen lifted his head.

“The viral attack is killing people all over the world. We have reason to believe that the virus was engineered somehow, but government officials tell me at this time that they can only guess who is behind the attack. Dr. Samuel
Bellany of the CDC says that the death rate from the virus in the general population will approach ninety-nine point eight percent in the next forty-eight hours. As you’ve seen, most of the United States government and its defense forces have been destroyed. Whoever is orchestrating this attack has left us defenseless.”

“Who could have done such a thing?”
Rohit asked.

“Like I said, the government has their suspicions, but they have no firm data to support a conclusion. Besides, if they did know, I doubt they would tell me.” Chen frowned, rapping his knuckles against the table.

“Data we received from the CDC shows that the virus has both organic and technologically designed inorganic components.” He met the eyes of everyone at the table. “Someone made the virus,
programmed
it. I’ve seen the data, and it’s like nothing anyone has ever seen before. Far more advanced than anything we could have created.”

Chen pressed his portable and showed a video on the conference room’s main screen—the virus attacking and destroying some type of cell.

“I received this video from a member of the president’s staff, who received it from the CDC. These are human blood cells, which the virus is designed to attack and destroy. They tell me that each engineered viral cell has the equivalent computing power of the average laptop on the market today.”

Several people gasped and everyone shared the same look of astonishment.

“But that’s impossible,” said Nelson. “That’s in complete defiance of Moore’s law, which has held true for decades.”

“We probably have the most advanced computing technology on the planet here at
Chronos," Jing Wei said. "And yet we’re at least fifty years away from being able to shrink down that much computing power to a viral level. And to integrate that with organic components is something else entirely. I wouldn’t even know where to begin on that.”

“It’s possible that the technology could have come from the future,”
Max said solemnly.

The conversation stopped and everyone gawked at
the young man.

“But we’re the only ones with a functional time machine,”
Howard said, uncertainty in his voice.

“That we know of,”
Max responded. “It’s possible other governments have developed the same technology.”

“The Chinese.”

Jeff was startled because several said the words at the same time.

“We could be looking at a temporal war here,”
Max continued. “Weapons from the future sent into the past to destroy adversaries before they pose a threat. Everyone here is smart enough to see that possibility.”

“I’m sure the government was thinking about this when they placed addi
tional oversight on the project,” Jing Wei added.

“The government has always felt that time-travel technology was a threat.” Chen jumped in, obviously agitated by the mention of government oversight. “They’ve always wanted to control every aspect of this project. But as for this temporal war that Max mentions, I find it doubtful that anyone other than this group could’ve built a time machine.”

“I seem to recall something like that being said about the atomic bomb in the late 1940s,” Jeff said sarcastically, “just before the Soviets detonated a nuclear device.”

Chen glared at him and the others around the table nodded. And turned to look at him, faces showing their curiosity.

“What the congressman says is true,” Max said. “Even though we may think or hope that we’re the only ones to have developed time-travel technology, history has shown us that technological advancement is a very, very difficult phenomenon to keep bottled up.”

“Once the genie’s out of the bottle, there’s no putting it back in,”
Jing Wei said.

“At this point, all of that is just speculation,” Chen said. “We have no data or proof, but we need to do something now. So what do we do?” He eyed them one at a time. “We were preparing for our first human launch, but we lost both men. We’d planned a forward time jump of ten minutes. We now have to look at sending information about this attack into the past to warn everyone so that a defense can be planned. Perhaps even some offense. The questions now are how far back do we send the information and do we need to send a person back as well, to corroborate the evidence on the data drive?”

“Send someone back,” Jeff muttered. “Send a couple of someones back.”

Chen glared at him again before turning to the others. “You are all highly intelligent and the tops in your respective fields, and that’s why you’re part of the
Chronos Project. I want your opinions so we can decide on the best course of action to save this country.”

Everyone sat silently for a few seconds. It didn’t take long, though, for
Howard to speak up. “But how can we fight an enemy that has such advanced technology? We don’t have anything that can stop them.”

Rohit
was shaking his head. “Howard, we would have foreknowledge of their exact attack method. We’d be able to study the virus and develop a countermeasure. As we gather data about our adversaries’ capabilities, we could keep updating the data we send back, allowing the planning of an even better defense. And we know the exact date and time of the attack, so we’ll be ready with a surprise attack of our own.”

Max jumped back in. “Yes, even if whoever has done this has much superior technology and weapons in comparison to our own, if we know exactly what they’re doing and what they’re capable of, we take away the element of surprise and equalize the battlefield as much as we can. The United States does stand a chance, and we’re it. We need to warn people, scientists and the military, in the past and prevent this from happening.”

“I wasn’t saying that we didn’t stand a chance,” Howard said. “I just think that merely sending a warning back a few months or even a year wouldn’t be enough time for us to prepare.”

“So how far should we go then?” Jing Wei asked. “And how far can we go? Rohit, how much fuel do we have now?”

Rohit
started furiously tapping away, running the numbers on his portable. “Assuming a small portable hard drive of mass one point three six kilograms and using the gathered fuel material that we’ll have in place by oh nine hundred hours, we’d be able to send it back, oh, sixty point eight years, maximum.”

“Since the object will land in the exact spot of the vortex, we’ll need to keep it as close as we can to when we actually had a base here,” Chen said. “Construction started about twenty years ago, in 2017. The cavern where the base is located was sealed, and they needed to drill down to it. I would have to check my records for the exact date of the drilling. Anyway, the bottom line is that we’ll need to stay within a twenty-ye
ar timeframe, beginning in 2017, otherwise whatever is sent back will just be sitting there until construction crews find it.”