The Doomsday Infection (34 page)

CHAPTER 49

TIME ELAPSED SINCE LAUNCH: 00. 00.01 - 00.00.59

TIME LEFT TO RETALIATE: 00:09.59 - 00.09.01

Within the first minute of the launch, Russian satellites would detect the missiles in flight. This information would pass to
Early Warning Center Staff in Moscow, where the operators would relay the information to the General Staff Command Post located in Chekhov, who would analyze the information.

“I’ve found a cure!” Sophie shouted down the phone
to Quinn, when she heard a distant boom. She glanced out of the window and saw missiles being launched from out in the ocean. She gazed open-mouthed, as the missiles climbed into the sky. She turned her attention back to the telephone call. “I did a total blood transfusion on a patient, and he is well on the way to a full recovery and is completely free of the virus.” She glanced at Luke, slumped in a wheelchair and she saw the first signs of him regaining consciousness.

“Are you sure?” he asked, unable to believe the news.

“I’ve checked and double checked, plus he’d had a blood transfusion two days ago, due to an injury, and I myself had a full transfusion after a recent auto-wreck,” she told him. “There is no mistake. The patient may have only just caught the decease - less than a day I would have said - judging by the spread of the virus, but it looks as though a quick exchange of blood, seems to flush out the system and replace the virus before it has a proper hold.”

Quinn went through an array of emotions, and absorbed the information. “That’s fantastic
!” he exclaimed. “Finally, at last, our troubles are over, we can start to -” a gunshot from inside the Oval Office stopped him dead in his tracks and he dropped the cell phone in alarm.

TIME ELAPSED SINCE LAUNCH: 00:01:00 - 00:01:59 

TIME LEFT TO RETALIATE: 00:09:00 – 00:08:01

The Russian operators at the General Command Post check on the reliability of the report. If they decide it is valid they then send out alerts to the President and the Strategic Rocket force that control the Russian Federations nuclear missiles. The President then has to send out the authorization launch codes to the missile silos.

“Hello? Professor Martell? Are you still there?” Sophie felt frustrated with the break in communications then looked from the window as more jets roared away. She collected Luke in his wheelchair, “Come on, we need to get out of here.”

__________

The young uniformed guard unlocked the Oval Office door and Quinn pushed
passed him. President Hamilton Parker perched on the edge of his desk, literally holding the smoking gun. Vice-Admiral Reed lay dead on the floor, blood still pumped from the bullet hole between the eyes.

“
What have you done?” gasped Quinn.

“What have I done? What have I done! Only taken control of our destiny, that’s all! No more prevarication. I’m done with procrastinating like that useless bag of shit.” He pointed using the pistol at Vice Admiral Reed’s lifeless body by his feet. He scratched his crotch, which Quinn noticed. “What is the point of an admiral who is unwilling to defend the country, I ask you, what is the point? Claiming his conscience would not let him be attached to plan Z.”

Quinn watched the President’s behavior, his posturing and boastful manner almost bordering on manic. He looked terrible, sweat soaked his shirt and he could not stop fiddling with his crotch. “You cold-bloodily murdered the Vice-Admiral, because he didn’t agree with you?” Quinn asked stupefied.

“He was a traitor, and that’s punishable by death. I’ve just saved the tax
payer a lot of time and money on a lengthy court martial. He would not take action for the benefit of the country.”

“We’ve found a cure, Mister President.”

“What!”

“We’ve found a cure, sir, no need to initiate plan Z.”

“Hamilton Parker, lit a huge fat Cuban cigar, blew out a satisfying lungful of smoke and smiled, “Well, I wish you’d told me that earlier, Quinn” he said sarcastically.

“Excuse me?”

Because it’s already too late.”

TIME ELAPSED SINCE LAUNCH: 00:02:00 - 00:2:59 

TIME LEFT TO RETALIATE: 00:08:00 – 00:07:01

The Russian General Staff Command Post turns on a special communications circuit, connecting the post to all missile silos and mobile launchers – the Topol 14 wheel-based missile launchers, the RT-2 train car ICBM Launchers and the ever-present nuclear submarines. The crews make preparations to counter-launch.

Lieutenant Carrington could hardly believe that
he was heading to Florida again, scrambled for the second time in twenty-four hours. This time on a mission beyond imagination. As one of the volunteers to fire nuclear warheads, he’d had to undergo a battery of rigorous tests to show that, in a crisis he would do his duty and actually fire the doomsday weapon. He’d passed the psychological tests with flying colors, but nothing could have prepared him for how he felt now, right now, actually in the arena of combat, whether or not they would have the fortitude to fire the weapon. It’s not like he would be firing on a foreign power, an enemy of the state, but fellow Americans, not the disease-ridden carriers, but healthy, law abiding individuals, who had committed no other crime than to live in the wrong area.

The results
of peacetime nuclear strike tests had been buried, concluding that not all the US weapons would be fired. The military personnel had failed at the last moment. In fact, less than half of the missiles had not launched, and these were only tests. The personnel, not what the military consider the ‘best of the best’ were mostly young, at their first posts and finding the monotony mind-numbingly boring. Yet at the last moment unwilling to fire, reluctant to be responsible for the sheer numbers of deaths of Russians or whoever, and the counter-strikes leading to multi-million deaths of American citizens.

Lieutenant C
arrington had no such qualms and was in fact, looking forward to the destruction. He banked the F-18 Tomahawk and headed directly to his target in Orlando, chosen as the optimum strike point. He contained a smile as the culmination of all his training had finally come to fruition. He was determined and ready for all they could throw at him. He knew of all the tricks they could play, sending him messages telling him it was a mistake, or a false alarm, but his training had taught him to resist all such subterfuge. He savored the notion. Do your worst, he urged, do your worst.

TIME ELAPSED SINCE LAUNCH: 00:03:00 - 00:3:59 

TIME LEFT TO RETALIATE: 00:07:00 – 00:06:01

Within the forth minute of missile launch the President of the former Soviet Union, would confer by telephone with his Chiefs and early warning centers to confirm that the missiles are heading for Russia.

“What do you mean, ‘too late’?” Quinn whispered aghast.

“I have ordered nuclear strikes on Florida; three F-18s are speeding towards Florida as we speak.”

“Three?”

“We’ve calculated that two spineless cowards are expected to chicken-out and not fire on their own countrymen. It’s pathetic. Our military personnel are an embarrassment.” He scratched furiously at his crotch.

The significance of the scratching and the sweating of the armpits finally dawned on Quinn. “Have you – have you been to Florida recently . . .?”

“Not me, no.”

“The Secret Service arrived at the door and drew their weapons alerted to trouble by the sound of gunshot. They saw that the
President held a pistol. Quinn held up a hand for them to stay where they were.

“Have you been in contact with anyone who has visited Florida recently?”

“No, I swear.”

“Not interacted with anyone other than staff and family?”

“Nope. Cross my heart,” he teased.

The young guard coughed. “That’s not completely true . . .,” he said. He felt himself backing away from the
President as if he radiated death. “There was that young blonde.”

“Hey, what’s the point being the
President, if you can’t have a mistress?” he joked. “I’m hardly up there with Kennedy, on that score. It’s only the one . . .” He spread his arms wide as if to say, ‘come on guys’.

“I recognized her from Sports Illustrated. She was April’s center spread,” said the guard nervously. “And a former Miss Miami?”

Hamilton Parker grinned. “So what if she was? I sneaked my mistress out of the zone. She was checked over first and given a clean bill of health.”

“Open your shirt,” said Quinn.

“No way!”

The surgeon general went to grab the
President’s shirt when Hamilton Parker pointed his pistol at him. “I don’t think so.”

When the
President fully extended his arm towards him, Quinn could see the tell-tale signs, his finger-tips had blackened. “My God, you’ve got the Bubonic Plague . . . you’ve brought the Black Death into the White House . . .” he gasped as his blood ran cold.

The guard ba
cked further away and pulled his decorative neckerchief up over his nose, and hoped the thin piece of silk cloth would help.

“Back away,” Quinn waved the staff in the doorway back. “Seal the office off,” he said, but the Secret Service would not leave there posts.

Hamilton grinned, hoping to win them over. “I’m fine, seriously. You don’t -” His eyes flipped open in shock, as a bullet from the guard’s sidearm pierced his heart. He dropped to his knees. “What the f -” then fell forward.

Hamilton Parker III, the 46th President of the United States of America for all of forty-eight hours was dead before his face hit the floor. A cacophony of sound erupted as the Secret service men emptied their chambers into the young guard as if the sheer number of bullets wou
ld make up for their lack of action which resulted in the President’s assassination on their watch.

TIME ELAPSED SINCE LAUNCH: 00:04:00 - 00:04:59 

TIME LEFT TO RETALIATE: 00:07:00 – 00:06:01

During the fifth minute of launch, the incoming missiles are now in reach of ground-based radar centers. These centers confirm the satellite reports.

Submariner Pete Williams opened his eyes, and through blurred vision saw the three jets on the radar screen converge and move down from the north of Florida. Ha! Got you first, he thought and slumped to the floor and sucked in a lungful of foul tasting air. He smiled to himself as he thought through the minutes left until detonation and the frantic Commies running around the missile silos preparing to retaliate
, hoping to send their rockets before their own destruction. They would not doubt for a moment that the Americans’ knew the location of every one of their nuclear missile silos and that they’d be knocked out in the first wave of missile launches in an attempt to prevent them from responding to the unprovoked attack.

“You sure this will work?” Sophie asked Luke from the dockside of Miami Beach. He sat in his wheelchair holding the control-bar of a motorized hang-glider, the small engine puttered as they faced the ocean.

“Nope. But it’s our only chance.” He looked along the jetty and made a calculation, knowing that they needed to reach between fifteen and twenty-five miles an hour before the jetty ran out.

“By the way,” she added, “You haven’t forgotten that I’m afraid of heights?”

“So, you want us to escape to the Bahamas on this hang-glider flying how high exactly?”

She held her hand up to her shoulder, and her brows knitted in what she hoped would be a hard to refuse look. “Can you do it?”

“Sure,” he said. “Let’s go!”

She ran down the dockside pushing Luke in his wheelchair and the hang
-glider with all her might, the edge of the dock loomed up ahead. She increased her efforts and they started to work up a reasonable speed until they ran off the jetty, the wheelchair fell away hitting the water with a mighty splash and they plummeted towards the ocean . . .

TIME ELAPSED SINCE LAUNCH: 00:05:00 - 00:5:59 

TIME LEFT TO RETALIATE: 00:05:00 – 00:04:01

With five minutes gone and with less than five minutes left before detonation, the Russian President must now make the decision if he wants to launch a counterattack. He will transmit the permission codes to the General Staff Command Post, to Air Force and Navy command posts and to the Strategic Rocket Forces command post.

Quinn stood with his hand raised, swearing the oath, unable to take in the surreal events. “Mister Pres
ident,” said the senior court Judge, and the senior secret service man handed Quinn the briefcase containing the nuclear launch codes. The brief ceremony watched by video-link by the chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon war room, as Quinn Martell was hastily sworn in as the 47
th
President of the United States of America.