DCD Headquarters, Constitution Hall Sector
1132 EST
"What the hell is he thinking?" muttered Ryckmen to himself.
"You mean Peace?" Tarvey asked as he tested the door to the DCD research laboratory. "Well, seeing as I'm not psychic and he hasn't exactly cried on my shoulder, I'd only be guessing. But if I was guessing," he continued as he drew his sidearm and shot a junction box next to the door, "I'd say he's just a little bit upset with you."
"So he bolts on us because he doesn't like the fact I'm not convinced he's got something."
"I wouldn't say he bolted," Tarvey drawled as he pulled open the door and started down a short flight of stairs. "I would say that he got up early, grabbed a little help, and went to go prove you wrong. It's not like he's doing it out of spite, Lobo. He's trying to help you."
Ryckmen growled wordlessly as he brought the MDR to his shoulder. "Kelso, Lobo. We're in the ground floor lab. Outer sentries have been neutralized."
"Copy that, Lobo. You should be approaching the master control valve for the gas lines to the labs below you. Check and make sure it's still open."
"Copy. Out of curiosity, what biohazard level were the DCD's labs built for?"
"They were capped at BSL-3. Didn't want something too dangerous getting loose inside D.C. Certainly not a stone's throw from the White House."
"Oh, yeah. 'Cause SARS and West Nile are just the sort of cute and cuddly infections that should be allowed inside the District," snorted Tarvey.
"Behave, Ricky," Kelso admonished. "Besides, you know a mosquito infected with West Nile wouldn't bite a member of Congress. It'd be a breach of professional etiquette."
"Thanks for the heads up, Kelso. We'll see about shutting this place down right." Ryckmen tapped his watch. "I tell you, Ricky, scariest thing I ever saw in New York was Amherst's lab. I mean, I'd seen JTF troops tortured to death, I saw civilians who'd been burned alive, but nothing scared me as much as that bodega hot lab. It was definitely not certified BSL-4. I had nightmares about that place for a few weeks after I found it, and there was hardly anything in it."
"I can well imagine."
The two agents split up, each covering one side of the large BSL-2 lab area. Standing above the work spaces were pairs of Outcasts, roaming around, almost bored. Ryckmen would have called it sloppy if he hadn't taken Kelso's earlier briefing to heart. They are not going to let death slow them down, she'd warned him. Do your absolute best to avoid touching any of their corpses once you kill them. Do not give them a chance to get back up if they appear to go down. If you haven't been keeping up on your Mozambique drills, take an hour or two down at the range. He'd assured her he was perfectly prepared to expend the necessary ammo. A small part of him had to wonder if they could realistically survive more than a couple 7.62mm NATO rounds. The rest of him remembered some of the more hairy fights he'd experienced, seeing a few truly extraordinary Taliban fighters in Afghanistan soak up over a dozen hits that should have killed them stone dead. Making a mental nod, Ryckmen shouldered his MDR and took a bead on the nearest Outcast.
"Engage at will." Both agents were using battle rifles, keeping their rate of fire restricted to reduce the chance of accidentally releasing a pathogen. When working up their loadout and their tactics, Tarvey had jokingly put on a Scottish brogue and stared earnestly at his comrade. "Be careful what you shoot at, Ryckmen. Some things in there don't react well to bullets." It had been a moment of badly needed levity to help clear the mind and focus on the mission. The roaming Outcasts never realized what hit them, the match grade ammunition drilling through and causing massive amounts of hydrostatic shock as they exploded out the far sides of their skulls and torsos. With the room cleared, Ryckmen stayed put as Tarvey went over to the controls and opened the line up. Moving over to the elevator shafts, the two agents used quick ascenders to make their way up to the next floor and stepped out into a short corridor.
A small shiver passed through Ryckmen as he approached the doorway, seeing where two sets of doors mandated by BSL-3 standards should have been mounted. The Outcasts didn't seem to be interested in maintaining those standards or those doors. His hand went to a case on his belt and pulled out his breath mask, putting it over his face and making sure it was snug. He and Tarvey had made sure to wear long sleeves and jeans, taping down the cuffs with black duct tape to help reduce their exposed skin. Tarvey put on his mask as well. ISAC hadn't warned them about any contagion lingering in the air, but both men were firm believers in the principle of "better safe than sorry."
Drawing their sidearms, the pair crept up behind a worktable, each of them taking a bead on an Outcast. On Ryckmen's subvocalized mark, they fired, dropping their targets without a commotion. Tarvey make a quick round of the lab, inspecting various isolation booths, noting the equipment laid out with decidedly nonclinical sloppiness.
"This is not good. They've got three centrifuges set up here, and all of them look like they've been handling blood samples of some sort. Kelso, didn't Hayes say something about infected Outcasts trying to play the kissing game with civilians in the area?"
"Yeah. Sick bastards, literally. Thing is that they know it's a suicide mission and they do it anyway."
"ISAC," said Ryckmen quietly, "is there a record of Emeline Shaw testing positive for Green Poison?"
"Negative," ISAC responded after a moment. "No records exist regarding positive test for Green Poison infection in subject Emeline Shaw."
Kelso jumped back in. "Doesn't mean much, Lobo. Quarantine procedures put the healthy and the sick together in the same area. And there wasn't exactly a stringent testing protocol in place at the time."
"So it's entirely possible that instead of Typhoid Mary, we've got Variola Emeline." Ryckmen shook his head briefly. "Come on, Ricky. We need to find out where their blood bank is and burn it." They made their way out of the BSL-3 lab, pausing only to remove the weapons from the dead Outcasts and activate the incineration protocol for the lab, destroying the samples of tainted blood. They moved out of the first lab complex and over to a secondary building. The unrelieved concrete floors and bare I-beams spoke of either renovation or complete rebuilding efforts.
"Kelso, what happened here? Annex off the main building, looks like somebody stripped it down to the frame."
"That was supposed to be a new lab and cold storage facility. They wanted to put some distance between it and the old lab building. Think there was some talk of building it to BSL-4 standards, but there was no indication they were going to be horning in on Fort Detrick."
"And Green Poison probably put the kibosh on the construction. Lovely."
"Hey, guys, since you're probably going to be passing through DCD's research library, would you mind snagging any data they have on broad spectrum anti-viral research? It'd really help for when we get those samples."
"Sure." Ryckmen absently tapped his watch. "Figures. Every time I get asked to pull something off a computer, Peace is never around."
"You feeling a little sore at our resident IT guru?" asked Tarvey.
"Why should I be sore? He just ran off like a damn fool."
"And he's got Bunny backing him up," Tarvey soothed. "Besides, if he took off like that, I gotta think he thinks it's pretty important." He cocked his head slightly. "What's eating you, Lowell? You're not exactly the type to carry on like this."
"I can't believe the President is somehow tied into the Hyena supply problem," growled Ryckmen. "Besides having been stuck in a bunker for most of the last eight months or so, he wasn't part of the Waller Administration. Sure, as Speaker of the House, he was next in line of succession after Mendez, but you can't convince me that he was part of some cabal behind the scenes prepared for something like the Dollar Flu. It's crazy talk!"
"Admittedly, if some random joker came up to me and told me that story, I'd be seeing if the tinfoil hat was on a little too tight." Tarvey paused, whipping his rifle to his shoulder and dropping an Outcast who'd been looking the wrong way. "But this is Paxton we're talking about here. Now, I'm not going to skip reading the weather report just because he tells me the sky's blue, but I'm not going to automatically reach for an umbrella, either. And I'd point out that Ellis was the lower form of politician. The sort of guy who never stopped campaigning, and I never did feel terribly good about guys like that being in office. Feel like the man went a bit flabby after he left the Navy. He reminds me of too many wonks from Foggy Bottom who got butt hurt when the Teams were doing their jobs and nobody told them about it." He chuckled a little bit. "Don't tell me you enjoyed catching a rocket from some junior assistant undersecretary at State because you upset one of their little diplomatic games."
"Smile when you say that, partner," warned Ryckmen with a feral grin. "I think we got chewed out by some dweeb from State about once a month because they were trying one idiotic stunt or another." His expression grew more grim. "Point is, it's going to take some serious proof for me to be convinced. And until I am convinced, Ellis is legally the President, and rocking the boat right now is dangerous as hell. Once we get the District cleaned up, we can start dealing with the irregularities."
* * *
Near The White House
1137 EST
"You always bring me to the most romantic spots," deadpanned Bundmeister.
Gregory ignored the jibe as he moved deeper into the parking garage. The Wrapper Three ECHO was here, and he'd cursed himself a little bit for not hitting this one earlier. By now, Gregory was beginning to get a very interesting and ugly picture of the mysterious Bardon Schaeffer. Whoever he was, he'd done a workmanlike job of keeping a very low profile. In an age where social media accounts and paywall news sites created a digital footprint, Schaeffer had somehow managed to keep himself from generating much of a trail before Black Friday. All the more impressive, really, given who some of his clients had been. He couldn't avoid getting photographed completely. But the moments where an image was captured prior to Black Friday were oddly telling, if one knew what they were seeing.
"ISAC, activate ECHO Wrapper Three, and slug to Agent Bundmeister."
The ECHO dutifully played out over the AR-enhanced shooting glasses. Two men in badly worn suit pants and rolled up dress shirts stood a good distance from Schaeffer. From Gregory's perspective behind the two figures, there seemed to be something peeking out from behind a column off to Schaeffer's right.
"It's done?" the digital ghost asked the two figures.
One of the two figures in front of Schaeffer spoke. "Yeah. He never saw it coming. Pistol's not one issued by the Secret Service, so nobody's going to think we had anything to do with it."
"And while nobody's really got any time to do autopsies these days, it looks pretty much like a suicide. Nobody will ask any questions," said the other figure.
"I'm very pleased to hear that. Now, as to the matter of your pay, I have it right here." There was a brief pause, then the distinctive sound of two suppressed pistol shots, along with the clatter of brass. "Very nice. Make sure the bodies get found in the right positions."
"Not my first dance," growled a new voice. "Good thing the water level's coming in a little bit. It'll help if anybody does any serious forensic work."
Gregory and Bundmeister stood slackjawed for a moment, then shifted position to stand behind Schaeffer's outline. Pressed behind the column stood a fourth figure, carrying a suppressed pistol by their thigh. "Unbelievable," muttered Gregory. "Somebody actually suborned Secret Service agents to assassinate the President."
"It's a first, to be sure."
"And then they got themselves killed once the job was done." Gregory shuddered heavily. He didn't know what Schaeffer had promised the treacherous Secret Service agents, but it would have had to have been something astoundingly important. Something more than mere money. Sanctuary for family members, perhaps. Possibly even a dose of the rumored broad spectrum anti-virals. Whatever it had been, it should have been too good to be true. The Secret Service would have a hard time bouncing back from this revelation, even if the agency was fully rebuilt.
"Where do we go from here?" asked Bundmeister slowly.
"Wrapper Four is the only one we haven't hit yet. It's kinda out of the way. Northwest of the Arena. I'm a little leery about trying to view that one."
"It'll be fine. Between the beating Odessa gave them the other day and Roach's unexpected demise, it's likely they'll keep their horns in long enough for us to sneak a peek."
The pair made their way along New York Avenue, ducking into an alley only once to avoid a Hyena patrol. ISAC's geolocation tag sat in the middle of a construction site, one which hadn't advanced particularly far before the outbreak, and which was mildly inconvenient to walk around in. Once they were in the right spot, Gregory squared his shoulders. "ISAC, activate Wrapper Four, and slug to Agent Bundmeister."
The ECHO began to play, and Gregory's jaw dropped further than it had inside the parking garage.
* * *
The Theater
1535 EST
"Honestly, Paxton, I thought you and Lowell were comparing notes," said Odessa Sawyer, a faintly plaintive note in her voice.
"There's currently a difference of opinion on where the trail leads right now," Gregory said with massively restrained understatement. "Being completely fair, I didn't tell him I was tracking down information relating to Bardon Schaeffer today. And in hindsight, it might actually have been for the best." A faint frown creased Gregory's brow. "He loves you, Odessa, and I don't want to do anything which gets him thinking I'm looking at you funny. Anything you can tell me about this guy would be helpful."
Sawyer nodded and leaned back in her chair, pouring some whiskey into a tumbler and taking a small sip. "I told Lowell that Schaeffer had tried to recruit me for what I figured was a PMC, possibly even as a double agent. I wasn't sure what his game was when he approached me at the construction site. But I was reasonably certain it was a game I didn't want to play. It wasn't the first time I'd met him, though."
"When was the first meeting?" asked Bundmeister quietly.
"Iraq, during the occupation. You gotta understand, Paxton, it was like the Wild West, but with about half the amenities," she said, tilting her glass towards him briefly. "Hell, Mogadishu wasn't nearly as crazy as Baghdad or Basra in those days, and that's saying something. There were all kinds of shady deals happening all over the place. For every one that my team and I were sent in to shut down, a dozen others were happening that nobody knew anything about. I began to notice a subset of the schemes we squashed had the same guy acting as a completely deniable cutout. Guy's name was Bardon Schaeffer. I operated on the assumption it was an alias. Because the people he was tangled up with weren't what you'd call solid citizens even under the bad old days of Saddam Hussein."
Gregory nodded slightly. "So who was he to those guys?"
"An errand boy. A bag man. The guy who was supposed to get caught if something went sideways. You know, like a mixed Delta-DIA team looking for crooks to bust. But Schaeffer wasn't your typical errand boy. Not nearly polished enough to make me think he was somebody who got RIF'd from Langley, and not enough tattoos to make me think he'd worked for the Russian Mafia. Or the KGB, which was pretty much the same thing not long after the Wall came down. He was a very cutthroat cockroach. It wouldn't surprise me if he'd done a few tours in the sandbox, but I'd be wanting to look at his 201 real bad. My guess at the time was that he'd started out in corporate espionage, and he'd ridden the coattails of the multinationals into the country when Baghdad became a gold rush. And oddly enough, no matter how many clients he screwed over, it never splashed back on him personally. He farmed out a lot of work to locals who got caught when we brought the hammer down, and when a few of his clients expressed their displeasure at his antics, he kept himself alive so smoothly, it was hard not to be impressed. There was one instance where he left two of his clients high and dry, they both sent out kill teams to eliminate him, and he finagled them into taking each other out, including the clients themselves."
"Sounds like Yojimbo on steroids," Bundmeister snorted. Sawyer nodded vigorously, then took a long sip of whiskey.
"Exactly. Think that was our particular cryptonym for him, as I remember."
"All right, so he stabs half of Iraq's mugs and thugs in the back, probably makes an obscene amount of money in the process, and then what? He just goes poof, disappears till he shows up in the States?" Gregory's arms were crossed tightly across his chest, his frown very deep.
Sawyer shook her head. "No, I think he was the sort of guy who flitted about, never staying in the same place twice, always in motion. The couple face-to-face contacts I had with him, he always seemed like he had someplace else to be, and he was doing you a favor stopping long enough to talk to you. He probably got a lot of frequent flier miles, and I'm reasonably certain he knew the right people in the right places to avoid getting put on the no-fly list, not to mention avoiding an Interpol red notice."
"So if he was here in the States, then somebody must have hired him," mused Gregory. "Even knowing that he might screw them in the end."
"Or maybe they figured they had a situation where even he couldn't betray them." Sawyer swirled her whiskey slowly. "Anybody underneath him, though, was and probably still is cannon fodder."
"But did they hire him before Green Poison got turned loose or after?" asked Bundmeister semi-rhetorically.
"Before, I'd say," replied Gregory. "But not formally working for them. Probably had him on an annual retainer, and when the outbreak happened, they told him it was time to earn his pay. Remember, Bunny, we have an ECHO of him meeting somebody in that restaurant near the White House. That happened after Black Friday, but before things really got out of hand around here."
"You think he might have been involved in how it all fell apart?" asked Sawyer, eyes narrowing slightly.
"Not likely," Gregory said, a razor thin smile on his face. "If his activities in Iraq were any indicator, he probably does his best work after things have completely fallen apart."
Sawyer nodded, a grimace twisting her face. "Was that helpful enough, Paxton?"
"Yes and no, Odessa. It's helpful, but not exactly like I was expecting." Gregory sighed as he stood up. "For right now, I'm going to have to shelve my investigation until something new comes along. There's a linchpin to this whole thing. I just need to find it, and fast."