The Synchronicity War Part 2 (30 page)

“I think you’re being heavy-handed and my report
will reflect that but I’ll enforce the biological attack protocols
under protest.”

“Fine. I can live with being too cautious. So
can my superiors. Just make sure that everyone follows those
protocols at all times. No exceptions.”

“Okay, okay! What is it with you Space Force
people and your power trips?” said the Team Leader in an
exasperated voice.

Johansen had the Team Leader’s preliminary
report six hours later. There was no doubt whatsoever that a
chemical agent had been used. The physical evidence was
corroborated by the eyewitness testimony of the survivors. The
survivors totaled 15 out of a pre-attack population of 54,000+. A
preliminary examination of the survivors showed no signs of any
disease. At Johansen’s insistence, the Medical Team attached
portable video cameras to their bio-suits and the ship’s own
medical staff were tasked with watching the video streams to make
sure that no medical personnel on the ground were caught not
wearing their bio-suits, except inside the inflatable structure
that would be the team’s shelter and where they could safely take
their bio-suits off in order to sleep, eat, etc. With that
information, Johansen decided to send off a message drone to
Sol.

Howard reread the text message from Task Force
90 a second time. [Nimitz Base has been totally destroyed. No
survivors. 15 colonists are still alive. The rest were killed with
a chemical agent. Forensic evidence and eyewitness testimony
confirms this. I’ve insisted that the Medical Team continue to
follow the protocols against biological agents in spite of the Team
Leader’s opinion that such precautions are unnecessary. Names of
the survivors are attached. The Team Leader thinks I’m egotistical
and power-mad and will say so in her report but I don’t care what
she thinks. If she doesn’t follow protocols to the letter, I’m
leaving her behind even if that means a court martial later.
Johansen clear.]

Howard smiled. If she left anyone behind, he’d
back her to the hilt. The news about survivors was both good and
bad news. Good for the families of the survivors. Bad for risk of
carrying back some kind of hidden biological agent. He wished
Shiloh was still nearby but he was on his way back to Site B with 3
freighters. His orders were to drop the SPG, the RTC team and key
weapons development people off at the Haven colony for the time
being along with orders from Howard to the colony administration to
prepare to be transplanted to the Site B planet, which no one had
bothered to name yet. At least Shiloh didn’t have to deal with the
Committee. Howard had the privilege of doing that and tomorrow he’d
get to tell them about the survivors, which they then would insist
be brought back. He would stall as best he could and hoped that
would be long enough.

A week after Replenisher’s arrival insystem, the
first sentry frigate arrived looking to refuel. Now Phase 2 of this
operation could commence. Johansen ordered the frigate’s A.I. to
use its limited number of message drones to alert other sentry
frigates to return to Avalon ahead of schedule. When they arrived
and had been refueled, she would order them to use their message
drones to call in even more frigates, before returning to Sol.
Eventually all the sentry frigates would have been recalled.

The situation on the ground was unchanged. The
survivors were quickly regaining their strength and stamina.
Everyone on the medical team was grumbling about having to continue
to wear bio-suits when it was obvious that they weren’t needed but
so far none of them had been caught by video camera’s violating any
protocols. Johansen was content to wait. Replenisher had a LOT of
supplies in case they were needed by a lot more survivors. Given
the number of colonists still alive, her ship and crew could stay
in this system for six months if she deemed it necessary. When a
message drone arrived from HQ, its contents were a shock.

[Dietrich to Johansen. Oversight Committee
has fired Howard for refusing demands that survivors be returned
immediately. If survivors show no signs of any contagion and
medical team agrees there is no contagion, then you are ordered to
return survivors to Earth. Refusal of this order is not an option.
Your XO has been given orders to relieve you of command if you do
not comply. Howard asked me to tell you that you gave it your best
shot. Acting CSO Admiral Dietrich. End of message
]

A quick check with her Executive Officer
revealed that the message drone had carried a message specifically
addressed to him too. He wasn’t in on the vision secret and
Johansen had been specifically told not to share it with anyone
else. She knew that if she disregarded the recall order, her XO
would follow Dietrich’s orders and relieve her of command. She told
her XO that they would take the survivors back.

When Trevor found out that he and the other
survivors would be taken back to Earth, he cried with relief.
Despite assurances from the doctors, that the tiny group would not
be abandoned on Avalon, he’d been afraid they would be. The fact
that the doctors constantly wore those funny looking suits with
helmets only made his fears all the more real. So when they heard
the news and saw that doctors weren’t wearing the suits anymore,
the fear was gone. The special shelter the doctors used to sleep
in, wasn’t sealed up anymore either. Trevor knew there was a supply
of those wonderful mint candies in there that the lady doctor in
charge brought with her and handed out, when she wanted Trevor and
the other kids to give blood samples. He’d seen the outside of the
shelter up close before but never with the entrance wide open like
it was today. As he peaked inside, it looked empty. He said hello
but no one answered. They must all be somewhere else. He decided to
go in. It was very crowded with four bunks stacked two high, plus
lots of containers, equipment, bottles, and the air had a strange
odor that tickled his nostrils. He soon found a large transparent
jar with the green candies and best of all, he was tall enough to
be able to reach the lid and pulled it down off the shelf. Holding
the jar in one hand, he opened the lid and suddenly felt the urge
to sneeze. The sneeze came on so fast that there wasn’t time to
close the lid or put down the jar so he held onto the jar with both
hands while he sneezed, so that he wouldn’t drop and break it. As
he put his hand in to grab some candies, he heard adult voices
coming closer.
If they catch me stealing some candy, they might
leave me behind by myself!
The fear welled up again and he
quickly pulled his hand out, closed the lid and put the jar back
where it had been. Sneaking out unseen was no longer an option so
he just stood there as two of the doctors came and saw him.

“Hey, Trevor, what are you doing here?” asked
one of them.

“Oh, nothing. Just looking around. Is that
okay?”

“Well as long as you didn’t touch anything, then
I guess it’s okay. Did you touch anything, Trevor?”

“No.” said Trevor earnestly.

“That’s good. How about you get your things
packed and as soon as we pack up our stuff here, we’ll all take a
ride in the shuttle up to the ship.”

“Okay.” said a relieved Trevor as he walked
quickly out the entrance.

Chapter 18 - They’ll Avenge Us

The trip back was uneventful. Johansen didn’t
know whether to be relieved that everybody was still healthy or
concerned. She still believed that there was a contagion hiding
somewhere on the ship either in the colonists themselves or on
something they brought back but none of tests could find anything.
Since the colonists couldn’t be completely isolated from the crew,
Johansen knew that if she was right, then she and her crew were
already doomed. The only question now was whether they could keep
it from spreading.

When Replenisher arrived back at Earth, all of
the gear and supplies, that had been taken down to Avalon were
loaded aboard a shuttle while the survivors and crew took a second
shuttle. Both shuttles were ordered to land at a remote facility,
that was equipped to handle biohazards. The crew and survivors had
to take showers and put on clean clothes. Their old clothes were
burned. All potentially contaminated cargo was unpacked and sprayed
with anti-bacterial and anti-viral liquids. The insides of the two
shuttles were similarly cleaned inch by inch. When everyone had
showered and gotten dressed again, they were brought to a special
quarantine section containing beds, washrooms, a kitchen, dining
facilities and a storeroom that was well stocked with food.
Johansen learned that in exchange for agreeing to bring the
colonists back, Dietrich had gotten the Committee’s agreement to an
additional period of quarantine.

Admin Assistant Stacey Bellevue stepped into the
chamber where the mission supplies were stacked. The air still
smelled of the antiseptic liquid used 24 hours earlier. Her job was
to inventory everything so that it could be tracked. An hour into
her task, she came across a jar with green candies in it. She
recognized them as being her favorite kind of mint candy. After
looking around to make sure no one was watching, she opened the lid
and took one out. She unwrapped it, put the candy in her mouth and
put the cellophane wrapper in her lab coat pocket intending to
discard it later. She started to close the lid but stopped halfway.
Remembering that her 4 year old son and his friends liked mint
candies too, she quickly reached back in and took out a handful,
stuffed them into her coat pocket and closed the lid.

Johansen sat down at the interview station and
saw with surprise that her visitor was none other than Admiral
Howard himself. They could see each other on their video
monitors.

“How are you, Commander?” asked Howard.

“I’m fine, Sir. You’re looking better than the
last time I saw you.” Howard chuckled.

“Well that’s the benefit of being forced into
early retirement. A lot less stress and a lot more time with my
family.” She saw him look around and then lean forward towards the
microphone. “Do you think we dodged the bullet?”

“Honestly…I don’t think so. I can’t shake this
gut feeling that we’ve overlooked something.” Howard nodded. They
were both thinking the same thing. Shiloh’s vision had left little
doubt that a bio-weapon had been used at Avalon AND that it would
spread to Earth. All of his visions had panned out so far.

“The new CSO let me read both your official and
unofficial reports. I can’t fault anything you did. The medical
team leader’s report makes it very clear that you made their lives
miserable by insisting on quote unnecessary precautions unquote. If
the enemy did use a bio-weapon, they designed it to get around our
own retro warning. It must have a fantastically long incubation
period. The chemical attack was the decoy while the real attack had
to have occurred before the colonists entered their shelters.”

“How long will they keep us in here?”

“As long as Dietrich can manage it but there’s
already public pressure to let everyone out. These survivors have
family members who want to see them and are complaining to the
media, which is pushing this story for all its worth, damn
them!”

“Why is the media supporting the families
against us? How bad can being overly cautious really be?”

“That’s not how they’re covering it. Some of the
family members are speculating that the real reason we don’t want
to let the survivors out, is that we botched the defense of Avalon
during the attack and don’t want that to be revealed. It’s nonsense
I know but if we were covering up something, it would neatly
explain our actions so far.”

“Oh, Christ!” said Johansen. She was silent for
a few seconds, then she suddenly thought of something.

“What’s happening with Gunslinger?”

“He’s still piloting the ship. She’s now in
lunar orbit. We’re not really sure what to do with her. Scrubbing
down every centimeter of her interior would be a monumental job and
there’s no assurance that the ship would be completely
decontaminated even after that. Dietrich has guaranteed me that if
the ship is to be decommissioned, then volunteers wearing bio-suits
will go aboard and take Gunslinger out. We can then make certain
that his outer casing is decontaminated and he’ll be transferred to
a totally automated vessel with zero risk of human contact. He says
hello by the way.”

“At least the A.I.s will be able to carry on the
war after we’re gone.” Said Johansen. Howard looked thoughtful.

“I wonder if they’ll want to.” Now it was
Johansen’s turn to chuckle.

“Oh yes! They’ll want to alright. I had a long
chat with Gunslinger about that. Not only is he itching to get into
combat himself but he told me that all the A.I.s are agreed. If
Humanity falls, they’ll avenge us.” Neither of them spoke for a
while. There didn’t seem to be anything more to say after that.
Howard told her, he’d come back and visit again and then left.

It was the third morning after her chat with
Howard. Johansen woke at her usual time and walked into the large
dining area for breakfast. She immediately noticed that most of her
crew and a couple of the doctors were seated at their usual table
on one side but none of the colonists were seated at their usual
table on the other side. Typically at least some of them would be
awake by this time. Johansen felt the hair on the back of her neck
stand up. She quickly walked over to where the medical team leader
was seated, leaned over to her and said,

“Don’t you find it suspicious that NONE of the
colonists are up now?” The woman looked annoyed at being
interrupted then looked behind her at the other table and stared at
it for a few seconds. When she turned back around to look at
Johansen, she was frowning. The others at the table suddenly
stopped talking and reacted as if they just noticed the colonists’
absence for the first time.