Authors: David Berardelli
“What is all this?” I asked.
“Welcome to the New Order,” my escort said, turning to face me.
Totally unbelievable. Nothing I’d stumbled across during the last few days
“Moss, you are indeed hallucinating if you think everyone is gone. Yes, there
are millions dying every single day, but do not for one moment think there will be
no survivors.” He waved an arm at the window. “This is living proof.”
At that moment I knew he was out of his mind.
“But they’re robots—or some form of perverted human clones.”
“We call them Technologically Advanced Beings—TABs, for short.”
“They’re robots.”
“They are just as real—just as flesh and blood—as you are.”
“I bleed. They don’t.”
“TABs are superior, humanized clones made up of genetically-processed
material that is tougher, more durable and more flexible than any known metal
alloy. They do not feel pain, are incapable of injury, and are three times stronger
than the average human. They can reach running speeds of forty miles an hour—
as fast as the average full-grown horse.”
“That sure will come in handy if they see a horse wandering around and
decide to arrest it.”
He ignored my comment. “As I said, they are stronger and faster. They are
also ten times more intelligent. Their brains are New Age computers.”
“And you’re crazy.”
He cracked a slight smile. “Yes, there has always been a fine line between
genius and insanity.”
”Yeah, I’ve seen evidence of that a few times before. I saw it in the Army,
mostly. I also saw it when I invested a great deal of my money in the stock
market then lost most of it in three months, when we were told our economy had
taken a slight dip. I know all about crazy people and intelligent people, and you
know what? I’ve always had trouble telling which is which. But that doesn’t seem
to matter now. Nothing means much anymore.”
He gestured toward the door where we had entered the hall. I turned and
walked toward it. He and his guards followed. One of them opened the door, and
once again I found myself in the tiny alcove surrounded by my three escorts.
Once inside, he resumed talking. “You are wrong, Moss, dead wrong.”
“So are you. No matter what you or your cronies think, you can’t repopulate
the country with robots.”
“As I have stated, they are highly-sophisticated, superbly generated clones.
They are superior to humans in every way. They will soon turn this planet into
what it was meant to be.”
That clinched it.
“What the hell are you talking about? ‘Meant to be?’ By whom? And just
what would that Utopia be? A giant video game operated by a handful of powermad fools?”
“Why are you skeptical? You have seen what they can do.”
“Yeah, I’ve seen. Apparently, they can also run down a moving car, pull the
people out of it, and snap their necks like a twig. That’s just what this dying
country needs—an army of robots running around, killing what’s left of
humanity.”
“I do not know what you are referring to.”
“Oh, you haven’t dispatched some of these … what do you call them …
TABs? You don’t have them out among the rest of us?”
“We have several units policing certain key areas.”
“‘Policing?’ You mean like picking up cigarette butts and candy wrappers?”
“They are gathering data. We need to know the numbers of victims, damage
spots, cleanup estimates, and power analyses. They observe what they see and
photograph it with cameras built into their visual program. The data are
transmitted to our servers, where everything is copied, stored, and transferred to
our command center. We need these vitals to help us decide where and when to
restore power. But none of the TAB programs authorize killing.”
I wasn’t surprised. Like most high-level officials, this jerk had no idea what
was actually going on. “Well, guess what?”
I saw a brief startled look in his eyes. The guards remained impassive.
“I assume you are referring to some sort of isolated software error that can be
adjusted. We can comb the data recordings and see if any of our TABs has
malfunctioned. If so, we can transmit a reboot order and then upload corrected
programming. It would not take long. So far, we have dispatched only two TAB
platoons. One is monitoring the Washington, D.C., area, and the other is
overseeing the Breezewood section. They represent our first wave. Of course,
there will be glitches in everything new.”“Glitches?” My gut tightened. “That
should be reassuring to the people who are dead because their necks were
snapped by mistake.”
“Unfortunate, but necessary.”
“Killing innocent people is never necessary.”
“Collateral damage has always been a hazard of war. You were active
military. You have heard the phrase before.”
“It always seems to come up whenever computers or other expensive hightech devices malfunction and civilians end up dead.”
“Computers can and will malfunction, Moss. They are built by humans, and
they process what is programmed into them. If the programming is faulty…”
“Sure, it all comes back to human beings and their shortcomings—except it
always seems to be other human beings that have to pay.”
“As I said, unfortunate but necessary to achieve our ultimate goal.”
“And what would that be?”
He stared at me, as though he was carefully weighing his response. “What is
the ultimate purpose of a computer?”
“To serve humanity; to perform tasks that are too mundane, time-consuming
or dangerous for people.”
“No, Moss. The ultimate purpose is to replace humans. Anyone who thinks
otherwise is foolish.”
“And what happens to humans once they’re replaced?”
“Moss, you should know more than most what humans are capable of.”
“In other words, these creatures have been designed to make the world a
safer, warmer place?”
“People have been struggling to extinguish one another since the beginning.
This country has been slitting its own throat for a long time, ever since we
became multicultural, pitting one group against another, classifying everyone
according to which group he belonged to. Sooner or later, ethnic warfare had to
start—and it did.
“You saw it happen, Moss. You were stationed in Brighton, I know. If it were
not for the national emergency, the Latinos there would have killed off all the
Pakistanis, or vice versa. Then the winner would have attacked the blacks, the
Arabs, the Iranians, and so forth. All would have died eventually.”
“So it’s better to kill everyone off all at once and be done with it.”
“We had nothing to do with that.”
“Really? This damned plague was just a coincidence?
“As difficult as it might be to believe, yes. Though it was not entirely a
natural occurrence.”
“What does that mean?”
He hesitated, his gaze momentarily lowering. “Things got out of hand.”
I just stared at him.
“We did not know what it was … at first. We thought it might have been an
accidental release of an experimental biological agent, such as one of those they
had been working on at Fort Detrick. But our investigations failed to track down
the source.
“Then the National Security Agency picked up a peculiar conversation
between a Chinese diplomat and his home base. It took a while, but we finally
determined what was happening.”
He paused again.
Am I crazy? Is he stopping to receive some kind of radio message?
“The Chinese had secretly been imbedding a biological agent into all of their
paper and cardboard products. It was so subtle our best instruments could not
detect it. The substance stays inactive until it comes in contact with human flesh.
Then the microbe jumps into the pores of the skin. Once it enters the human
body, there is no stopping it. It was brilliant.”
He sounded downright admiring.
“Brilliant? They’re on the verge of killing nearly half a billion people, and
you think it’s brilliant? That’s not brilliant. That’s genocide.”
“No, not really,” he said quietly.
“How could it not be?”
“Moss, China could not have accomplished this if the American people had
not met them halfway.”
“Now what are you talking about?”
“People have been sleepwalking through life for decades. The computer age
has been a godsend in many ways. It relieved a lot of uncomfortable
responsibility. People were no longer required to make decisions, analyze,
remember, or learn. Computers began doing it all. People wasted no time letting
machines take over their lives.”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“For quite a while, this country has been declining on the global intelligence
scale. By the turn of the last century, our average IQ had dropped below 100.
That means half of the national intelligence quotient was 90 or lower, with many
close to retardation. In the years since, the national average score has dropped
another ten points.”
He was taking too long to make his point.
“So we’ve become a nation of dunces. So what? Does that give China the
right to wipe us out?”
A quizzical stare from my captor. “How many Americans would you guess
have taken pharmaceutical drugs?”
“I’d say just about everyone.”
“And what percentage has taken antibiotics?”
“Fifty?”
“Eighty-seven point five, at last calculation.”
It came to me in a flash. Antibiotics. Flu epidemics. What Fields told us.
What I’d feared all along.
“Do you understand now?”
“The doping? That nationwide vaccine drive last year?”
“Where did the vaccines come from?”
“I don’t believe it. I can’t. I won’t.”
“When people began exhibiting strange symptoms, our Centers for Disease
Control went to work studying possible causes. They could not find anything
immediately, so they sent out bulletins asking other countries for data on similar
cases. It was China that sent us the most useful information—including the
formula for a so-called effective vaccine.”
This was becoming more and more difficult for me to accept.
“It became a simple matter of telling the nation to visit neighborhood
pharmacies and free clinics for a vaccination. Moss, when you have spent the last
hundred years instructing a population to take medications for everything, the
process eventually becomes an essential part of their lives. They assume that
taking a particular drug for depression will make them feel fine. If they have
trouble sleeping, they take another. For an ear infection, another. For the flu, yet
another. So when the epidemic started, they assumed they needed to be
inoculated. Everyone did it—an overwhelming majority. That vaccination drive
was more successful than even the Chinese had expected. The vaccine actually
boosted the microbe’s effectiveness. People died within days instead of weeks or
months.”
This was incredible—totally mind-boggling.
“So ... you’re saying the Chinese committed biological warfare against us, but
they couldn’t have done it without our help?”
“They provided the biological agent, and we complied by using it.”
I could barely grasp what he was telling me. “Un-fucking-believable,” I said,
barely above a whisper. Then, as I forced myself to recover from this horrific
news, I uttered the most important question: “Why?”
“Because China owns us.”
I didn’t want to believe him. I’d heard all sorts of things over the years. I’d
learned most were false, and the particularly depressing ones were always fueled
by fear. But right now I wasn’t as sure. Too many frightening things had
happened in so little time. Even so, I refused to believe our country belonged to
China.
“How can anyone buy America?”
“I did not say China bought America—I said China owns America.”
“What’s the difference?”
“This is what happened. It was done gradually, in steps, so no one noticed
outside of those directly involved. China started growing into an economic
powerhouse because of cheap labor and a government that decided they could
keep iron-fisted control over their people and society while still doing business
with the rest of the world. They used both to great effectiveness—at least at first.
American companies found out they could have their products manufactured in
China for much less than it cost here, even with the large transportation distance
involved. Pretty soon, China was awash in cash—American cash—and they
started investing that cash in the best place on earth to do business: the United
States.
“At the same time, our government went on a spending binge, to the point
where it could not meet its obligations just from tax revenues. About forty years
ago, during the bailouts, when so many insurance companies and banks and the
auto industry were either bought or went bankrupt, in many of those cases, China
provided the financial relief. And by the second term of Barack Obama, the
country was borrowing 40 cents of every dollar spent—much of that from China
as well.” Another pause. “Eventually, the government ran up so much debt that it
could not even cover the interest payments. We tried to negotiate more favorable
terms with the Chinese, but they refused—and the United States defaulted. You
know what happened next.”
We stood there for a moment, staring at each other.
“Okay,” I said in resignation. “The Chinese decided to wipe us out so they
could claim what is now rightfully theirs. Meanwhile, you’re preparing this TAB
army to … what, take the country back?”
Silence.
“Fine. Whatever. But if you’ve built the Brave New World, what do you want
with me?”
He actually smiled. “You really do not know?”
I got it right away. “Ah. It turns out your little clone army isn’t immune to the
Chinese bug—but I seem to be.”
“Yes, Moss. It turned out that the concoction the Chinese sent over was not a
vaccine at all. It was an antibiotic that became particularly toxic when mixed with
certain antibiotics already present in the bloodstream.”
“What kind of antibiotics?”
“Strange as it seems, the ones in most common use—including those found in
antibacterial soaps. The human body has a tendency to accumulate them in the
fatty tissues. When people received the Chinese chemical cocktail, it traveled to
those same tissues, combined with the residual antibiotics, and disabled many of
the body’s vital functions.”
“So the doping campaign was the final nail in the coffin.”
“Yes—except that it seemed to work only with people whose immune
systems had already been weakened or damaged by years of antibiotic misuse.”
“In other words, people who hadn’t taken antibiotics on a regular basis
wouldn’t suffer the more severe effects of the doping?”
“Even so, the mixture would retard other bodily functions. After several
weeks of intense study, our research department was about to discover the nature
of the discrepancy—as well as the exact mixture of chemicals—when three of
five of the panel members slowed down and died. After that, we discontinued the
study.”
Discrepancy
.
Research
. This was beginning to make deadly sense.
“So this is why I’m here.”
“Yes, Moss. As I said, you are government property.”
“I became my own property when I was discharged twenty years ago.”
“You would like to think that,” he said, almost sneering.
“That’s what my discharge papers say.”
“There was a disclaimer on your DD-214, stating that in the event of a
national emergency all previous arrangements made regarding your discharge
would be deemed null and void.”
“Bullshit. I’ve been out for too many years.”
“That does not matter.”
“It matters to me.”
“Moss, you do not have the option of leaving.”
“What do you intend to do?”
“We are going to study you to find out why you remain unaffected.”
“I’ll tell you why. I never took antibiotics, and I didn’t get the shot. Now can I
go?”
“You never took antibiotics? I find that difficult to believe.”
“The last time I took anything like that was when I was in high school. I don’t
know what the Army gave me, but I haven’t taken anything since I got out, just
vitamins and mineral supplements. I hate meds, period.”
“You were given a heavy regimen of vaccinations and boosters during your
three-year stint.”
“As well as that chip you stuck in my arm?”
“The chip was part of the program at the time, yes.”
The urge came on automatically. I knew it was hopeless to resist, but the
panic—as well as the anger and the frustration—took over. I raised my right arm,
but as soon as I did, one of the clones grabbed my wrist and elbow, imprisoning
them in an excruciating, viselike grip. My arm instantly grew cold then numb.
My shoulder felt as if a blowtorch had been placed directly beneath it. I gasped,
cringing under the pressure.
A moment later, the pressure vanished, and my arm, now a useless piece of
flesh, dropped limply to my side. The guard then grabbed me around the waist,
lifted me up, took two steps back, and set me back down. A moment later, the
barrel of an automatic pressed snugly into my lower spine.
“Was that really necessary?” My captor regarded me curiously.
I massaged my tingling shoulder. The flickering fire in it gradually ebbed. “I
needed to vent.”
“What did you think would happen?”
“Watching you drop to the floor with a broken jaw or bloody nose would have
been highly entertaining.”
“You actually thought you could outmaneuver the TABs?”
“Like I just said, it was just an urge. You pissed me off. I wasn’t thinking
straight.”
“Those demonstrations you saw in the hall, they did not register?”
“It doesn’t matter. I’m not going to submit to your tests.”
“Then this conversation is over.” He nodded to the TABs, one of whom
nudged me with the gun barrel.
I led the way out of the alcove and down the corridor. I didn’t think they’d
shoot me, but I had no illusions of resisting further. Being picked up and handled
as if I’d been a small child was humiliating. But at least now I fully understood
my predicament: If I couldn’t escape this nightmare, I’d die in this building.
A doorway awaited us at the end of the corridor.
Beyond it, that same staircase we had descended before descended farther
into a black abyss. A small-watt bulb leaking slim strands of yellow light above a
doorway sliced the darkness, and I gripped the metal banister on the way down.
The foot of the stairs, pitch-black as the inside of a cave, gave no evidence of
light beyond it.
The next corridor, damp and murky and smelling of mildew and vomit, made
my insides churn. Tiny overhead bulbs positioned at wide intervals barely lit our
path. At the end, a narrow metal door opened to yet another dark corridor. The
strong, sour smell grew in intensity, adding to my nausea.
Despite the gun poking my back, I proceeded slowly, barely lifting my feet.
While the TABs were obviously equipped with infrared vision, I was forced to
feel my way. The passageway was clear, but the unevenness of the black concrete
floor made my journey difficult.
Tiny bulbs flickering from the areas we passed reflected vertical bars on both
sides of the corridor. Some sort of prison, obviously. I’d no doubt remain here
until they came and took me away for their tests.
A cell awaited me at the end of the corridor, on the left. The bulb in the center
of the far wall splashed a flimsy illumination over the dirty cot beneath it. The
shadow of a toilet and small sink jutted from the western wall. The floor was
bare.
The gun poked me one last time.
By now, I had become much too tired and sore to resist, but for some stupid
reason I decided to take a whack at it anyway.
Just spin around and kick one of them in the crotch. Or let both of them have
it in the jaw. It doesn’t matter that you haven’t done any serious physical training
in years, or that they can break your neck like a twig, or pull a mirror off the side
of a van without breaking a sweat. Just spin around and hope for the best
.
I realized that any effort I made would be laughable. They’d just pick me up
and set me back down again.
Bad boy. Naughty, naughty
.
But somehow I needed to communicate to them that I was a fighter. Anyway,
I was sick and tired of letting them lead me around.
Just as I started to turn, one of them shoved me inside the tiny cell, nearly
knocking me over. Before I could regain my balance, they slammed the heavy
door loudly behind me, echoing in heavy waves down the corridor.
The two of them contemplated me for a few seconds then turned and marched
away briskly, their boots echoing sharply on the concrete.
“How about breakfast?” I called after them, figuring it was worth a try.
No reply.
“I like eggs, bacon, and toast. Coffee would be nice, too. And if it’s not too
much trouble, bring me a toothbrush and some mouthwash.”
I heard only the slamming of the door at the end of the corridor.
Silence followed.
Loneliness, isolation, claustrophobia, and panic stabbed at me all at once,
though my strongest sensation was relief. The gun poking my back had grown
tiresome. The TABs had grown tiresome as well. Their silence, lack of emotion,
and bored manner terrified me. I didn’t want to accept the awful fact that the
world I’d known and loved all my life had been taken from me ... to become
theirs. But as bleak as everything seemed, I couldn’t give up, or submit to defeat.
I checked my cell door. It held fast. The sink spigot produced a trickle of cold
water. The strong sulphurous smell irritated my sinuses, but at least it was wet. I
cupped my hands beneath the slender stream and splashed my face. Despite my
aching joints and the nausea filling my gut, its tingling chill invigorated me. I
took a little drink.
The toilet worked. A small roll of toilet paper sat on the dirty floor beside it.
I kicked the bottom of the cot. Hopefully, anything living inside it would be
scared away. I yanked the frayed blanket from the slender mattress and shook it
vigorously. Nothing but dust and dirt. It was the same with the filthy pillow. After
picking up the mattress and shaking it as well, I flipped it over and replaced it on
the metal frame. Weary from my efforts, I sat, rested my elbows on my thighs and
my head in my hands, and tried to make sense of what I’d learned.
If I believed what I’d been told, America had been destroyed by the Chinese.
But had the Chinese survived? Had the rest of the world?
One thought kept coursing through my brain. Nothing would ever matter
again.
My only concern at the moment was that these people—whoever they were—
decided they had some use for me. It was my only hope. My only way out of this.
If someone needs you, it gives you an edge. A bargaining chip. The trick was to
make sure I remained useful while I planned my escape.
I had to find Reed and Fields, get us out of here, and drive home see my
mother before it was too late.
Reed and Fields were still alive. They had to be. I couldn’t let myself think
they’d been killed. If I suspected it even for a moment, I knew I’d give up. But I
couldn’t give up. I couldn’t let these psychos beat me.
Despite the fears weighing on my mind, I had to view my predicament more
objectively. They’d brought me here because I’d been in the military. They
believed they still owned me and had a use for me. Reed wasn’t in the military.
Neither was Fields. But since Reed and Fields were still functioning, these people
might want to study them as well. If they needed lab specimens to monitor the
effects of the doping, three cases would be much more reliable than just one.
Fields was a nurse. She would be considered valuable. Reed was involved in
software and was also a high school teacher. They might consider his expertise in
education useful for their research.
If they had plans for me, they had plans for Fields and Reed. They might be
keeping them in a wing not far from here. Judging by the intense silence, I
suspected I was the only one in this dark, foul-smelling tomb. I couldn’t see
anything moving in the darkness. But with only the single bulb barely lighting
my own bed, I was lucky I could see anything.
I decided to try a long shot.
“Anybody else in here?”
Nothing.
“Reed? Fields?”
Silence.
I had to find some way to escape—I had to.
Get up and check the cell bars again.
I sat up, but my lower body remained molded to the cot. I could feel myself
growing more exhausted by the second.
Get up and pace, dammit.
Ideas came easier and clearer when I was up and about, burning energy. I
could also do a few pushups to get the blood flowing, and pump more adrenaline
into my system.
Then the urge to lie down took over. Exhaustion set in, and sleep nudged me.
The lump on the back of my head began throbbing again. I obviously needed rest.
It had been a very long, stressful day.
I closed my eyes and let the darkness take me to quieter places.