Virus-72 Hours to Live (41 page)

The turbines were still winding down and she
looked at her husband, “Do you think we’re the last humans left on
Earth?” Her words were both a question and statement, then she
began to tear up.

Tom sat with the same thought as he
remembered all of his friends and family and watched as Alpha and
his teams moved from the craft to the hanger. “I guess we have to
go in and see how the remainder of the Oasis crew is doing. We need
to find out who trying to gain control of SIMPOC.”

They both looked at each other nodded and
unstrapped. They approached Alpha and followed him into the
hanger.

“Tom, SIMPOC has directed me to find out who
has been making aggressive attacks on his network,” Alpha said as
they walked together into the office suite.

“We need to check on the crew which
evacuated the space station with us,” Joan was saying as they
followed Alpha into the office suite.

Will Harmon saw them enter and asked, “What
is going on, Dr. Harold jumped on the computers as soon as we got
in here and he swore and kept working. About half an hour ago, he
charged out and took one of the vehicles. He kept saying something
about having an opportunity.”

Joan and Tom looked at each other and Alpha
asked if they knew who might have been attempting to gain control
of the SIMPOC network.

Joan took a deep breath and said, “Dr.
Harold was our lead engineer in developing advanced computer
processor concepts in space. He was growing organic processors that
were denser and used significantly less energy. He was working with
a couple of companies on Earth on some defense DARPA contracts. He
was odd, to say the least. I think he was a little paranoid and had
some visions of grandeur. Apparently he was on the computers while
we were battling the EDU and he left the facility a little while
ago.”

Tom looked uneasy and said, “I think we need
to go back to the EDU and check it out. Alpha I suggest you update
SIMPOC while we head back.”

“Acknowledged.”

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

This landing on the lawn in front of the
building where the EDU was located was a little gentler. As Joan
approached and sat down, the large gouges she had left in the lawn
on her last landing impressed her. They had moved out of the
chopper before the blades were stopped and walked to the building.
The truck was still parked in the lobby and most of the windows
were broken. Walking through the lobby at a much slower pace their
feet crunched on the broken glass and it seemed so quiet. Tom was
well aware the silence was due in large part to the death of every
human on Earth.

The elevators still worked and the two
mobile units were still on the floor in the hallway. As soon as
they entered the laboratory, they knew something was different. It
had been ransacked and many of the files were broken into. The one
thing, which was obvious, was the container, which held the EDU was
dark and looked like decaying seaweed. Someone had turned off the
EDU and essentially murdered it.

“If Dr. Harold did this; why?” Tom
asked.

Joan spoke aloud but to no one, in
particular, “He didn’t kill it before he downloaded the program and
stole some of the nurturing tanks, hardware, chemicals and
technical information. I think he had a plan, and I don’t think
we’re going to like it.”

Tom looked at Alpha and said, “I think you
better update SIMPOC and tell him Dr. Harold is going to be a
problem.”

“Acknowledged.”

The large Chinook passed by making the
typical wap, wap, wap sound. Julius smiled and thought how
surprised they’ll be when they look for the computer. He had
arrived just as they were invading the facility earlier. When they
left, he went to work, claiming his materials and destroying what
was left. True he destroyed the EDU organic processor, but he
walked away with the programing, the biomaterials and most
important of all, the research. With his skills and this wealth of
materials, he knew he would be able to create a bigger, faster,
smarter computer.

Date – 2051.61324 (11:58 PM)

SIMPOC just thought for a moment. Its world
had changed in dramatic ways in the last 32.6 hours, but something
was becoming obvious. The changes had only begun.

“FIN; SIMPOC. We need to enhance our
security plans.

“Acknowledged.”

####

The End

I want to thank you for downloading this
book and reading it. As you may notice this is an expansion of my
SIMPOC series. After I wrote SIMPOC 1 and SIMPOC 2, many of my
readers wanted to know how the President and astronauts dealt with
the virus. This book and the next in the series will cover those
parallel plot lines. I've included the full text from the SIMPOC
series for completeness because I'll be including all of the
characters in the next book.

Thanks

Ray Jay Perreault

rayjayperreault.com. 

Reference Material

Yottabyte – A gigabyte is approximately 1 X
10^6, a terabyte is approximately 1 X 10^7 and a yottabyte is
approximately 1X 10^11. A yottabyte is exactly
1,208,925,819,614,629,174,706,176 bytes of information or 2 ^ (80)
or a little over 5,000,000,000,000,000,000 average books.

“Comm” – Abbreviation for communication.

“Rog” – Abbreviation for “Roger” many people
using radios abbreviate some of the key words.

Geosynchronous Orbit – A point in space
where an object orbits the earth it will remain over the same point
on the earths’ surface. The point is approximately 26,100 miles
from the earth’s surface.

Pulse Detonation Engine - Def

Additive Manufacturing - This engineering
process is a term describing the industrial process similar to 3D
printing.

Oxygen Manufacturing Process - This type of
propulsion doesn't have many moving parts. It uses a series of
detonations that cause shock waves to provide the propulsion.

About the Author

Hi everyone, my name is
Ray Jay Perreault. I’m a Science Fiction author that has two other
series released. One series called SIMPOC and the other series is
called Gemini.

I’ve loved Sci-Fi my entire life and it was
likely a contributor to my chosen career path. I went to Arizona
State, majoring in Aeronautical Engineering then I was fortunate to
fly in the Air Force for almost 10 years. I literally saw the
world, flying to 27 countries while flying a great airplane the
C-130. The last 5 years of the Air Force, I had the thrill of being
an instructor pilot in T-38’s, and I was fortunate to be an
instructor for the first class of USAF female pilots.

After the AF, I enjoyed 28 years working for
a major aerospace company and I worked on various projects
including the F-23, F-35, VTX, Global Hawk, TSSAM, D-21 Destroyer
and the B-2 Bomber.

I’ve loved Sci-Fi and I always think about
the ‘other guy’. When the hero is fighting an evil computer, I
think what is the computer’s story, how did it begin, why did it
turn evil? That is the story behind my first series called
SIMPOC.

If the good guys are fighting an evil alien,
I wonder what is the alien’s backstory? For some reason I always
think part of the story is missing. So, in my writing I’m trying to
focus on the other story.

Good reading, and don’t let the aliens
getcha!

Ray Jay Perreault

Books by Ray Jay Perreault

Available on Amazon,
Smashwords, IBooks, Barnes & Noble, KOBO, Oyster and other
eBook Outlets

SIMPOC – The Thinking Computer

SIMPOC – Human Remnants

Gemini (Bk1)

Science Fiction Anthology Vol. 1

1. Progeny

2. The Greatest Host

3. Circle is Closed

Virus-Humanities Last Battle (To be released
soon)

Soon to be Available on Audible

Science Fiction Anthology Vol. 1

Virus (To be released soon)

Contact Information

I’d love to have your
comments or feedback; please use the contact information below. If
you would like to put your name on my distribution list I will
periodically provide update on projects and also give you some
discounts on future books.

Ray’s Blog

Facebook.com

mailto:rayjaywriter.com

@rayjayperreault

#geminibooks

#SIMPOCBOOK