The Emerald Virus (8 page)

    
As Will settled in he caught a movement off to the left, about halfway up the
west wall of the canyon. When he looked closely he didn’t see a thing, but
still he felt a chill go up his spine. He hoped it was for a good reason. He
would continue to use the binoculars to scan the entire canyon, but he would
pay close attention to the west wall.

    
Now that he was settled in he began to think about the pending crisis. He still
couldn’t get his arms around the thought that the entire world was in jeopardy.
How could something like this happen? How could every hope and dream he had for
himself and for Sam suddenly go away? How could God let this occur? And yet he
knew as a Christian that God did not owe him an explanation and would not
provide one. Still he couldn’t help but wonder.

    
After a couple of minutes he put these thoughts away and, as always, focused on
the practical side of the problem. He knew from early reports about the Emerald
Virus that there would be survivors and it seemed some of them had to be from
this part of the country. He thought the only thing to do was to help prepare
these survivors for whatever was to come. He also wondered who the lucky ones
were; those who would die from the Emerald Virus or those who would survive.

    
He was deep in thought when a movement to his left brought him back to the
present. It was twilight now. The sun had dropped below the horizon but there
was ample light to see. Sitting about a hundred yards away, on the west face of
the canyon, sat a large black wolf. The wolf seemed to be pure black, although
there might be a hint of grey fur on its chest. What Will could clearly see was
the light reflected off the slate canyon walls behind the wolf helped surround
the animal in a distinct blue aura. Or maybe it was the light on the wolf
itself. There was no way to say for sure from this distance.

    
Will was shocked almost to the point of flinching, although he managed to stay
still. The wolf was sitting and looking at Will just as Will was sitting and
looking at the wolf. Will thought the wolf looked imperial, and he thought that
was exactly how the blue wolf should look. He believed that this animal had to
be a descendent of the blue wolf the first Will Klein had seen at this site.
Will thought it was ironic that he would see this descendent on his last visit
here.

    
He wondered how many generations had passed between the first wolf and this
one. While Sam was the sixth generation of his family to live here, it must be many
more generations for the wolf. He smiled at the thought as he and the wolf
continued to look at each other.

    
Now the wolf looked away toward the canyon floor and Will followed the gaze
until he too saw the grey female walking toward the west wall. She walked
purposefully to the wall and began her climb on trails that were ancient and well
used.  She weaved in and out of various rock outcroppings as she disappeared
and reappeared. She joined the blue wolf and sat and looked up at Will. Wolves
mated for life and these two looked like they had been created for each other.
It was one of the more magnificent sights Will had ever seen.

    
Neither wolf seemed concerned about Will’s presence in their world, but he knew
the second he moved both animals would disappear. He thought the wolves were simply
waiting for him to leave so they could continue their current mission, whatever
that might be.

    
As the light dimmed and the aura around the blue wolf began to fade, Will knew
this memory would stay with him for whatever amount of time he had left. He
felt that seeing the male and female together was a good omen, although what
good might be left in the world was hard for him to imagine.

    
It was time to go home. Will stood up and began to pack his belongings onto his
horse. When he looked a last time at the wall both wolves were gone.

    
On the ride back to the ranch Will thought about his daughter Sam and the sheer
joy she had brought into the family. Sam had been born 32 years ago and from
the time she started first grade she insisted on being called Sam rather than
Samantha. It took some months for Will to discover that there was another
Samantha in Sam’s first grade class and Sam did not care for her, hence the
change to Sam.

    
Contrary to the plan, Sam was an only child. Katie had a difficult delivery and
for some reason could not conceive again. However, Sam was such a handful as a
child that Will and Katie quickly gave up on their plans to have four kids and
focused on trying to keep up with the one with whom they were blessed. Will had
to laugh to himself when he thought of his favorite quote. He could not
remember who the quote was from but he loved the humor and truth of, “If you
want to make God laugh, tell him your plans”.

    
Sam loved living on a ranch. She learned to ride starting at age five and had
loudly disapproved about having to wait so long. There was nothing about
ranching she could not do. She worked as hard as any ranch hand and was better
than most of them with horses and cattle. Her father had taught her how to
shoot over the years starting with small caliber rifles as a child and moving
to larger caliber rifles and hand guns in her teenage years. Will thought she
was probably a better shot than he was. She could use a lariat, drive a tractor
or a truck; brand cattle and horses; repair fence lines and do about anything
else needed on the ranch.

    
Sam was as tough as any boy during grade school and that did not change in high
school. Some were larger and some were stronger, but none were tougher. Sam
wasn’t even aware of this; it was simply part of her life.

    
Will knew when Katie died of cancer during Sam’s sophomore year in high school
his world was about to fall apart. Sam made sure he was wrong. Although grief
stricken over the loss of her mother, she understood what was needed.  Will
knew at that point how special his daughter was, not just as a daughter or as a
ranch hand, but as a person.

    
That understanding changed to a conviction as he watched her continue to grow.
She finished high school at the top of her class and went on to Montana State
University where she attained a B.S. degree in Civil Engineering, a degree she
planned to use in modernizing the ranch which had grown to almost three
thousand acres over the years.

    
Sam returned home from MSU and worked the ranch with Will for two years. Together
they honed Sam’s knowledge of ranch management and running the business and
came to the conclusion that Sam should pursue a Master’s degree. She returned
to Montana State and completed an M.S. degree in Land Rehabilitation. Now, the
goal was for Sam to take over the ranch in the near term.

    
Will had hoped Sam would be married by then and that he would be a grandfather.
Sam had dated a little in high school; and Will knew she had dated a couple of
young men while at college, but nothing that ever seemed serious. Sam, at five
foot seven inches with a slender build was attractive. She had an unusually
light complexion, at least for Montana, with green eyes and raven black hair
that Will thought would lighten over time but never did.  However, last year as
she completed her Masters she met a young man that might be the one. She hadn’t
said too much about him but she invited him to the ranch one weekend to meet
her father and some friends and neighbors they had invited to a typical ranch
barbeque. Will was surprised Sam had invited a man to the ranch, and even more
surprised that he liked Ned.

    
Ned was an even six feet tall, and was a bit lanky; he had straight dark hair
and a nice smile. In general he was a quiet and studious kind of person.  

    
Will thought the two of them could make an interesting couple, but he knew
better than to act too curious. Sam, if nothing else, was as stubborn and
independent as any person he knew. The more he asked the less likely she was to
tell him, at least in the beginning.  

    
It was late when Will reached the ranch, but Sam was waiting up for him. She
had the news on the TV in the background and was working with her laptop in her
living room recliner. She got up when Will entered the house and asked what she
could do for him. He smiled and kissed her and told her he didn’t really need
anything. She insisted on making tea for both of them and told him to take his
boots off and wait in the living room for her. Will smiled inwardly at this;
while he had never been a tea drinker he had come to enjoy the nightly cup of
tea Sam always prepared for him. He thought he enjoyed the conversation with
Sam more than the tea but at this point he wasn’t ready to give up either.

    
Sam returned from the kitchen with the tea and a snack for Will and asked him
how his trip had gone. He told her about the blue wolf and she was as excited
as he had been. She had seen the blue wolf twice, but both times from a
distance and only with binoculars.

    
Sam asked, “Dad did you come to any conclusions while you were on the north
ridge?”

    
Will replied, “Not any real conclusions but some thoughts for the next step.
I’ll tell you about them in a minute, but first tell me if there is anything new
on the air.”

    
“A guy from Homeland Security published a couple of bulletins containing
information about the Emerald Virus and the role his team is playing, and
explaining why the virus affects some and not others. I’ve printed them out for
you to read; they’re on your desk. They also set up a web site where they’re
going to post all pertinent material for both victims and survivors. I think
we’ll get some good information from him, his name is Jack Sweeney and he seems
to be a no-nonsense kind of person. One of the bulletins talked about how many
survivors he thinks there might be. He’s guessing between 2,500 and 4,000 total
in the United States.”

   
“Good Lord. I don’t even know what to say. How will those folks live?” Will sat
in shock for a minute and said, “My thought riding back in was that we need to
set up a meeting with ranchers and townspeople to decide how to help any
survivors from this area. I’ll start that process first thing tomorrow. Let’s
spend time in the morning talking about what the group needs to do.”

    
“Good idea Dad. It’ll feel good to be doing something, even if we won’t be the
beneficiaries.” She smiled at Will, trying to make him feel better in the face
of the virus.

    
Will agreed and headed off to bed. He knew Sam would stay on-line for hours as
she had each night since the news of the virus in Europe was first announced.

    
Jack’s next meeting was at ten o’clock with a group of senior engineers and
officials from the Department of Energy. He had asked Irene to invite experts
in petroleum engineering, nuclear engineering and electrical engineering.

    
He was able to fill in a lot of missing information from this one meeting. The
attendees were not only experts in their fields but included an Assistant
Secretary of Energy who was highly motivated. They were all anxious to help in
any way they could.

    
These people accepted the responsibility for briefing the senior staff at Energy
on what needed to be done and on how quickly that must happen. They were also
sure that the Secretary of Energy would brief the President and secure approval
for whatever actions they agreed to take.

    
To start with the group briefed Jack on the national power grid. He learned
that the power grid in the northeast U.S. was a combination of coal plants,
nuclear plants, oil-fired plants and gas plants. There was almost no
hydroelectric power in the Northeast.

    
Power in the Southeast was also mixed, but with substantially more
hydroelectric power, especially in the Tennessee River Valley. The Southeast
relied on nuclear power to a greater extent than did the Northeast.

    
The Midwest had some hydroelectric plants, especially in the northern plains, a
couple of nuclear plants and a smattering of coal, oil and gas-fired power
plants.

    
The Southwest, especially Texas, was largely powered by gas and coal. Arizona
was powered by hydroelectric and nuclear plants, while California relied on
gas-fired plants.

   
Energy in the Northwest was almost all hydroelectric, with a few coal-powered
plants in Wyoming and Montana, and a couple of nuclear plants.

    
Jack talked to the group about shutting down the coal, oil and gas plants. At
first no one seemed to think it possible since plant closures had only been
done selectively for maintenance purposes. Once Jack talked to them about the
likelihood that all of the people involved in fuel delivery and plant operations
were going to die, the group decided that closing the plants could be done.
They just needed to get the right people to agree. Jack assured the group that
the President would support this effort if asked, and the group agreed to make
sure a plan was created and executed.

    
The difficult piece would be to decide when to shut down the plants. If they
waited too long, they risked these plants going off-line unintentionally, due to
a loss of fuel, with possibly disastrous results such as fire and explosion.  However,
if they moved too quickly to shut down these plants, they could cause an overload
in the power grid that would shut down power in multiple states. Jack
remembered this happening only a few years ago in the Northeast.

    
The group promised to send Jack and A.J. a copy of the plan as soon as it was
complete. The shutdowns would be triggered by Jack’s team who would keep the
Energy group updated on the impact of the Virus in the various regions. Energy
would then shut down the oil, coal and gas plants on a staggered basis with the
hope that they could maintain a balance in the power grid that would allow the
nuclear and hydroelectric plants to continue to operate.

    
If they were wrong and overloaded the grid, the nuclear plants would receive
the message from the power grid itself and would automatically shut down.
However, the hydroelectric plants would continue to operate until they were
manually turned off, or until the equipment failed.

    
The engineers assured Jack that both hydroelectric and nuclear plants were
highly automated and could operate indefinitely under the right conditions.
They also assured Jack that if something did go wrong, the nuclear plants were
programmed to take themselves off-line automatically. There would be only a
slight risk of a core failure that would result in a meltdown with released
radiation.

    
On the other hand, when the hydroelectric plants failed, they would simply
cease to create electricity; and the waters would flow over the spillways
instead of through the turbines. While there was the possibility of dams
collapsing and flooding occurring downstream, this would only affect people who
chose to live below the dams.

    
The group agreed that with the limited power requirements of the future there
should be enough operating hydroelectric and nuclear plants to provide
electricity to a good portion of the country.

    
While overlap had been built into the power grid, so that if one plant went
off-line other plants would cover that area, there were limits to this process.
The experts did not think there would be power in the Ohio River Valley or in
large areas of Texas, but they weren’t sure. These parts of the country had
little or no hydroelectric or nuclear power plants; and all of the coal, gas
and oil plants had never been off-line at the same time. Only time would tell
what affect closing fossil fuel plants would have.

    
Jack knew that in addition to the power plants, the delivery of electricity to
survivors would depend in large part on the life of the infrastructure beyond
the power plants. As storms knocked down power lines, transformers burned out,
and transmission stations and sub-stations failed due to mechanical issues,
electricity would fail in those areas.

    
But there was nothing that could be done about that now, and Jack refused to
worry about the things he couldn’t control. There were too many other issues to
worry about. 

    
Jack followed the Energy meeting with a noon meeting of communication experts.
He was especially interested in any information he could glean about ham
radios. Jim Bosh and John Needle joined him for this meeting. Jack considered
this preparation for the afternoon meeting with Kathy Green, Dale Johnson and
Jerry Barnes. Following this meeting Jack was as prepared as he could be for
the meeting with the high-tech group. 

    
When Jack entered the conference room at two o’clock, Jim, Gene and the team
members were already at the table and A.J. walked in immediately after Jack.

    
Jack welcomed everyone and asked Gene if they were ready to start.

    
Gene said, “Operator, please conference in the other numbers.” 

    
When the connections were complete Jack let the visitors know who was in the
conference room with him and then said, “Kathy, can you let us know what
progress you and your team have made?”

    
“Of course, I think our chat translator is ready to go and we believe this will
help survivors from different countries communicate with each other. We have
been working on this software program for some months and we think it’s ready
to go. We’re just completing beta testing and so far it’s working well. In a
nutshell this allows anyone who logs onto your web site, and enters the chat
room, to communicate by typing in their native language and have the words automatically
translated to all others in the language each person selected when they logged
on. We have the world’s eight most utilized languages ready to go.

    
 “Another project my folks and Jim’s folks are working jointly is creating a
list of what each survivor should possess in terms of technical equipment. We’ll
post that list on your web site in the next day or two, and it will include PC
and Mac laptops, needed peripherals and cameras that will allow survivors to
see each other on the laptop screen as they talk to one another. While seeing
one another isn’t critical, we think it is important in establishing
relationships.”

    
“Based on Jim’s comments we’ve included ham radio sets on that list, both base
models and mobile models, along with peripheral equipment.

    
“Lastly, we’ve concluded that cell phone infrastructure, especially cell towers,
won’t last long without constant maintenance. Therefore we are adding satellite
telephones to our list of required equipment. We will also include peripherals
and power needs. I hope that cell phones will last though. Satellite phones are
more complicated to use and maintain, they almost never work indoors, and if
you are around hills or mountains satellite phones can be fickle.

    
“Of course handbooks are going to be required for all of this equipment. But,
survivors are all going to be alone. They won’t know each other and may not
even be close to any other survivor. Getting help to those who don’t understand
the handbooks isn’t going to be easy. We think the best hope is to have
survivors register their names, locations and cell and satellite numbers on
your web site. This will allow people to ask for help from others. It also
makes sure that no one feels totally alone. They will have a large group of
other survivors to call. Large being a relative term of course.”

    
Jack responded, “Thanks Kathy. I like your ideas, especially asking survivors
to register on the web site. I’ll work on making sure that happens. The tough
part will be to make sure those who register are actually survivors. I agree
with using satellite phones, and I have a couple of folks working on that now. Since
I have some familiarity with sat phones from my field work, I’ve asked my folks
to recommend LEO systems with mobile and mast antennas, good pelican cases and
solar chargers. I’ll have them send their equipment list to you and you can add
whatever else you think is important.”

    
Kathy responded, “Of course we’ll do that, and we’ll focus on Low Earth Orbit
systems. We’re also working on a couple of other ideas, but nothing for sure
yet. Most of my firm’s projects are extremely high-tech and won’t be usable in
the future world since we want to keep this simple for survivors.”

    
“Thanks Kathy. Dale and Jerry, can you add anything?”

    
Jerry spoke up and said, “Everyone we’ve talked to in both the ISP and cellular
business has pledged whatever support they can provide. No restrictions at all.
The one question I’ve been asked though is what happens if this Virus just goes
away or you find a vaccine for it and America ends up being okay?”

    
Jack responded, “We’ve actually discussed that. The President has agreed to
sign an executive order informing everyone in the country that the government
will make good on any money spent unnecessarily.  That E.O. should be signed in
the next day or so. Do you think that will satisfy everyone?”

    
“I think that will be more than enough. I’m not sure anyone even needs that
level of assurance, but it can’t hurt. Getting back to what Dale and I have
found, the experts have assured us they can open their ISP and cell systems to
everyone.

    
“The ISPs will simply remove all restrictions when you tell them to. In the
meantime, my team is preparing instructions to all survivors on how to access
the internet using each of the providers, starting with the largest system.
We’ll make sure these instructions are also published on your survivor web
site.

    
“The only requirements for cell phones are that the person has a cell phone and
chip compatible with each system, and that the chip has been activated. That
has to be done by each cell service provider.

    
“We believe that each survivor should be provided at least one activated cell
phone from each cellular firm in order to ensure the best coverage. This means
that each survivor will need at least ten cell phones, ten numbers, ten
chargers and probably at least one back-up for each one. I hate for it to be
that complicated but there is simply no way to tell which systems will stay
active the longest.”

    
Jack asked, “Does anyone have a better idea? When no one answered Jack said,
“Okay, if that’s what we need to do we’ll do it. Kathy, can you add those
components to your equipment list?”

    
“Of course, but going back to your last question, I’ve hesitated to say
anything, but I may have an answer to the ten different cell phones. I need to
talk with my folks about this so I can’t make any promises now, but I’ll know
by tomorrow.”

    
“Okay Kathy, anything you can do to make life easier for the survivors will be
appreciated.

    
“It looks like we’ve done as much as we can in terms of making sure survivors can
stay in contact with each other using cell phones, satellite phones or email, and
will be able to connect to the internet for as long as power supplies remain
viable. And of course we hope they will all have ham radios to use when they
lose power in their respective areas.

    
“There should be enough batteries available to last for years. The shelf life
of a modern battery is anywhere from five to ten years depending in large part
on storage conditions. Cool weather helps.”

    
Dale asked, “Jack, how are survivors going to get these supplies? Some of them
won’t have a clue how to use some of these things. How can we help them?”

     
“I’m glad you asked, Dale. I’ve asked one of my teams to focus on the supply
problem and other related problems as well. As soon as they make their
recommendations, I’ll let all of you know. In the meantime, I’d appreciate any
ideas this group has about those issues. Let’s talk again tomorrow at the same
time. Gene will place the call to these same numbers. Thanks again for your
help.”