“So, Captain Najarian, is it true what the captured truckers said?” Dixon Hawes, former Senator of Texas and one of the richest men in the world, asked.
“I rarely trust the word of a prisoner being tortured, but it does seem that they were telling the truth,” The captain answered.
“So the mythical Dr. Hugh Mann’s suitcase is real. I never thought I’d see the day when that would be discovered. How is Doctor Baker doing?”
“His research is going well. I don’t believe that he has caught up to our team yet, though.”
“Should we bring him into the fold, Captain?”
“I don’t think so, sir. From what I can tell, he’s approaching the problem from a different angle. I don’t know who’s right and who isn’t, but to have him see our progress may alter his way of solving the problem.”
“Agreed. Have you got copies of the contents of the case?”
“It took two valiums in the good Doctor’s dinner to do it. He never leaves the suitcase. It has all been copied and brought to the main research facility.”
“He has no idea the true purpose of this place?”
“No, sir, he believes it to be what I told him.”
“Would he come on board if he did know?”
“Doubtful, sir.”
“What about using this Porkchop as leverage?”
“I would prefer it didn’t come to that, sir, but possibly.”
“Just a few more months, Captain, and we would already be in power. That’s how close we were to a vaccine. I don’t know what that idiot Deneaux was thinking.”
Winston Deneaux owned the facilities that had housed the viral agent. It had been his sole job in the whole process to safeguard it and then distribute the weapon when he was told to.
“He lost focus when he started screwing his secretary,” Dixon said, his large jowls turning a shade of angry red.
Captain Najarian had heard this rant before and stayed quiet. He did not remind Hawes that it had been the senator’s idea to send Lori Stanton to spy on Winston. The captain was impressed that the old geezer could even get it up to do her. Had to be pills, he mused. Even with Deneaux’s screw up, the captain had been sent to retrieve Winston once the zombies came. When he got to the house, someone had beaten him there. The old man was sitting in his armchair with a neat bullet hole drilled through his head. Looked like a professional hit. The poor bastard hadn’t even seen it coming.
“What about this Michael Talbot? Has there been any luck in finding him?” Dixon asked.
“Sir, it’s a little difficult to spare the resources looking for this man right now.”
“I want him found, Captain. The man and his family were in possession of the suitcase for over seventy years, we need to know if they’ve discovered any secrets to the doctor’s research. We cannot afford any loose ends, do you understand me?”
“Loud and clear, sir.”
“Then I want you to make this your first priority. Send up those drones and have those little video game players find him!” Spittle was now coming down the senator’s chin.
“Sir, if he’s out there, the pilots will find him. If not, I can assemble a team and we’ll go up to his brother’s house in Maine.”
“No more loose ends, Captain. We’re so close I can taste it. We will run this world the way it was intended. With an iron fist!” he shouted as he brought his hand down on the table they were seated at.
Absolute power corrupts absolutely, the captain thought. But he was not complaining, he had been promised complete control of the military, and once the zombies were eradicated, he would rebuild an army that the world would quake at. Looks like I caught a little of the fever. In theory, he liked everything the Triumvirate stood for. It was an equality of all those below the ruling class.
Crime would be wiped from the planet, because to commit one was tantamount to suicide. Justice would be swift and final. Man would be free to practice whatever faith they desired so long as it started with a solemn prayer to the Triumvirate. People would earn their keep or they would be denied the protection and vaccination they offered. As quickly as the senator and his party could give, they could take away. Even if a person had received the vaccination there was a way to override the produced antibodies and reintroduce the zombie virus. All those that did as the ruling class dictated were safe. A populace that had to capitulate or die, that would ensure their complicity.
The Captain had always considered himself a patriot and now he was on the side for Socialism. ‘Wouldn’t the world be better off with one leader, one direction. All striving for the betterment...of what.’ He paused. ‘Dixon.’ Was the only answer he could come up with. Dixon had approached him with such lofty ideals when the plan was in its infancy. A world without wars, hate, drugs, crime, the worst of humanity wiped clean from the planet.
‘We’ll be the new Noah’s Ark.’ Dixon had promised.
On some level the Captain knew the fallacy, less people meant less war, hate, drugs and crime but certainly not the eradication of them. It was the power Dixon offered that truly intrigued him, no matter what Dixon’s words said, it was the implied meaning that spurred them both on.
“Sir, we are having problems with the zombies.”
“Don’t get bitten, seems like a safe enough problem to avoid,” the senator said peevishly.
Easy enough for you to say, you haven’t left this place since the outbreak, the captain thought. “It’s more than that, sir. It appears that the zombies are getting smarter.”
“How smart can a brain eating zombie get? I don’t care, Captain. Once we can secure the vaccine, none of that will matter.”
The captain saw it differently, but it was useless to argue with Dixon. The man was so fixated on being Supreme Commander as to be blind to everything else. He wondered how long it would take until he got the command to take out the only remaining member of the Triumvirate. With Deneaux’s death, there was only Dixon and Harry Wendelson, the largest land baron in the United States, the man who owned the land they were now residing on. Captain Najarian would do it because he knew which side his bread was buttered on, and then there’d be nothing between Dixon and the asshole he was sure to become.
“Leaders always die,” the captain said as he walked away from the senator. “And then who knows how high a lowly captain can climb.”
His first stop was to the pilot’s room, which, in retrospect, did look a lot like a basement filled with PlayStation playing gamers. Then off to see Doctor Baker. The drones had proved an invaluable tool in finding him, there was no reason to think they couldn’t do the same for this Talbot guy.