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The Plague Part 3 (Finale)
Posted By: monitor101<wasup1989@hotmail.com>
Date: 7 October 2003, 10:53 PM


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(New Bisson 2. New Bisson system, ONI facility C23, Deforma river valley, 0400 hours AM)
A faint sound blared in the back ground somewhere. Webber awoke for a quick second and fell back into sleep but the sound continued. He guessed it was a drill; suddenly a knocking woke him up and the door to Webber's quarters burst open. A tech officer stood in the door way.

"Dr. Webber there's been a breach in the level 4 lab," the Tech said.

"Damn it," Webber grunted as he got out of his bed.

Five minutes later Webber, the Tech, and staging area supervisor Will Harding were standing in the staging area/control room of the level 4 biological laboratory. Webber saw what was happening.

Dr. Brooks, Dr. Sarah Peterson, and Dr. Jim Hatchet were in HEPA suits doing an autopsy on an infected Monkey, when all of a sudden Hatchet had accidentally cut himself with a knife that was covered with infected Monkey blood.

"Harding have you vented the atmosphere?" Webber asked.

"Yah I followed all the containment procedures, Dr. Hatchet has begun to crash. I sprayed the entire lab down with bleach from the overhead sprinklers and vented out the atmosphere and I sprayed it down with water. But Hatchet is going into the final effects of the infection, Brooks and Peterson have been tying to slow down the viruses progress by pumping Hatchet full of morphine, and some other shit and putting him on an IV drip," Harding said.

"Brooks you have to isolate Hatchet and make sure you or Peterson get infected," Webber said as he keyed the intercom.

"Web you better get us out of here quick, Jim is going nuts he could try and kill us, oh shit hold him down Sarah," Brooks said through the intercom link.

"Wait what the hell does he mean by nuts?" the Tech asked.

"The virus can cause its victim a serious case of insomnia," Webber said and he ran out of the control room. He went over to his personnel quarters and snatched his M6D pistol.

Brooks held Hatchet by the neck. He knew that Hatchet would soon go insane and try to kill both him and Peterson. He looked through the big view window at Harding and the Tech who were standing in the control room. "Damn it where the hell is Web?" Brooks shouted.

Suddenly Hatchet became conscious. He grabbed Webber's arm with a free hand and wrestled if off of his neck.

"Shit Sarah get back!" Brooks yelled.

"C'mon Jim lets talk about this," Peterson tried to reason with him.

"Noooooo...letttssss...not," Hatchet said his voice slurred and distorted. He staggered around a table he was lying on, and snatched a scalpel. The end of the blade was slick with infective blood from the Monkey. Hatchet turned around to face Peterson.

Peterson screamed never taking her eyes off the blade. She flung here arms up in front of her face and neck to protect her.

Hatchet was about to strike when a pair of tweezers smacked into his faceplate. He turned around to see Brooks holding a razor in one hand, the other motioning for him to come over to him.

"C'mon over here, Sarah make a run for the door and get outta here," Brooks said. He knew he was in no physical shape to take on the much more strong and agile Hatchet.

Hatchet lunged at Brooks who narrowly dodged a swing from Hatchet's scalpel. Brooks fell to the ground as he missed another swing. He sat up and saw Hatchet hovering over him. Hatchet brought the scalpel back and shoved it forward at Brooks.

Brooks closed his eyes and prepared to die when all of a sudden four gunshots rang out. Hatchet's chest exploded as blood sprayed from four bullet holes. Hatchet plunged to the ground and the scalpel fell from his hand.

Brooks opened his eyes and took a deep breath. He looked around to see Webber at the lab door in a HEPA suit, holding a smoking M6D. Brooks sighed and got to his feet. "Holy shit that was close...shit," Brooks muttered as he shook off the shock.

"You're welcome now come on lets get you decontaminated," Webber lowered the M6D and left the lab.

Brooks shook his head and looked at the lifeless body of Hatchet, lying on the ground in a pool of blood. The inside of Hatchet's faceplate had blood on it and rivers of blood streamed from the holes in his chest. Brooks wiped away some of the blood that had sprayed onto his suit. He left as a clean up team came in.

A day later after the mess was cleaned up and Brooks and Peterson were showered with bleach and checked for signs of contamination (which proved negative), Webber and Brooks stood along with Hood in the tank, with General West, Lt Ackerson, and Admiral Cole on the line.

"So what the hell happened?" West asked anxiously for anything that he could use as an excuse to shut the project down.

Brooks and Webber explained that incident in detail. West listened with full attention anxiously awaiting the ending.

"And so you see that this was a little accident that can be corrected," Webber finished.

"A little accident ha, this just proves the instability of this whole project I'm afraid that I am going to have to pull funding," West said trying to muffle down the excitement, building up inside him.

"WHAT?" Webber shouted.

"What was that do you have something to say to a superior officer, because I really don't want to get into another debate with you about the virus and it's potential, I really won't? I don't care if you have a PHD as well as an MD this is my final decision," West said with a tone that obviously dared Webber to challenge a man as high-ranking as West.

"Sir I have nothing to argue with about your decision even though I disagree," Webber said flatly. His palms began to sweat and fear surged down his spine, for the first time in his life he felt fear. His serious features on his face turned to a look of mild fright. Webber tried to shake away the fear coursing through him but failed.

"Good this is my finale decision, LT what do you think?" West asked.

"I totally agree 100%," Ackerson said through the screen. He knew that he was in a position where if he was to screw around with a higher ranking official as West he would be thrown out of spec ops.

"I agree as well until further study can be carried out and until you find a cure or vaccine then I suggest you scrap this project," Cole said.

"We will let you continue your study with this germ but we are facing a twenty million dollar lawsuit by that doctor's family. The remaining fund money will be directed to pay for this lawsuit, now get some sleep tomorrow you guys ship out back to Reach HQ, I will see to it that all the paper work is done, West out." The picture of General West snapped off as did the others.

"Well so much for this, two years of research and fifty million dollars down the drain," Webber said as he left the tank.

Nosliw stood in front of a group of high ranking Elites, in a waiting room that was just outside of the Council of Masters chamber.

"Grunt this is a very unusual story but there is proof to back it, a Banshee pilot had video recording devices mounted on his Banshee and was able to shoot the footage of the events you described," a red Elite said.

"But you say that this...plague came from the humans...no from a human grenade, this seems highly unlikely," the Elite laughed. Others behind the Elite laughed as well.

"Yes Excellency it was from a human grenade I swear on my life it was, the humans ambushed us and opened fire then the grenade came. The human fled as did I but my remaining 12 comrades were engulfed in a vapor and fell to the ground," Nosliw said.

"Ha humans using biological warfare against us the idea is absurd, humans wouldn't be that smart," the Elite laughed again as did the others.

"Excellency I think you underestimate the interlopers," Nosliw said.

The Elite stopped laughing and rose from his chair. His face was wrinkled with anger. One hand was clutching his Plasma rifle. "Grunt do you have any respect for authority?" the Elite demanded.

"Yes Excellency no disrespect intended," Nosliw stiffened.

"Good you should learn the chain of command; this event will be put into the interplanetary archives and will be known as a natural disaster not a human made weaponization of a disease. It shall be known as the Plague."

The End of Part 1 in the Virus series
Next the Virus





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