He leaned back in his chair. Though there were days it was hard to be here, he was comfortable with it now. It was an old glove. It was also easy and it gave him time to catch up on a lot of TV shows that he had missed over the years.
“Everyone pay attention to this,” commanded the lieutenant, with his get-serious tone. He was fairly used to people zoning out during the morning briefings and wanted them all to get this. He looked at some papers in his hand, “There is a virus on the Eastern Seaboard and that is causing severe sickness and aggression. We have been warned by local law to watch out for symptoms like this. It’s been spotted here in Carolina so be on the lookout. It’s a Sunday, after a holiday, so there shouldn’t be many people coming in, don’t let that be a reason to not pay attention on post.“ He looked through a few papers and then started talking about something else.
The meeting continued on as Kyle’s thoughts drifted. He wasn’t too worried about this new disease. He knew there were dangerous ones out there, but there had been so many scares and they all came out to nothing. In any case, there was nothing he could do about it.
The meeting ended and he took a quick look at his posts for the day. “Not too bad,” he thought, as he stood in line for the sidearm. The daily ritual of picking up your gun was a time for rough jokes and friendly banter. It was something Kyle enjoyed unless it was aimed at him. He received his gun, pepper spray, and extra magazines for the weapon, and headed to his first post.
There were twenty-five different posts in various positions in the plant. Some of these were patrolling posts, while others were in a small little rooms whose paint job was taken from
The Smurf's
vibrant skin. The plant was a maze of razor wire, delay gates, and security doors. It took Kyle five minutes to get to his post. It should have only taken a minute or two, being that it was only fifteen feet away, but the delay gates did their job and slowed him down. Not really the job they were intended for. The idea was simple and effective. Anyone attacking the plant had to either blow the things up or take their time to unlatch all of them as they went through, which gave the defenders more of an opportunity to take them down. It seemed to work during the drills they had.
Kyle arrived at XR-12. It was a small little side room, under some metal emergency stairs, which was desired by all the officers. Simply put, it was a hideaway that had a small TV. You could watch as long as you scanned your cameras every five minutes. Kyle opened the door and greeted the outgoing officer that he had seen a few times.
“Morning," he called out, "everything good?” He dropped his bag on the floor.
“Yeah man, there are some movies in the drawer of the desk if you want,” he responded, as he handed Kyle the radio. He nodded at Kyle and was gone.
Kyle sat down and did a quick check to make sure that he had everything he needed; he looked at the guns and decided he would check them in a bit. For now, he was tired. He leaned back in his chair and thought again of his brother before he closed his eyes. He was tired, maybe a short nap in a bit.
“XR-12 is 10-12,” he called in to the command center to let them know he had arrived and everything was good. At least he hoped his guns were in good working order, though he didn’t hope enough to actually check them. He was tired.
“Copy that XR-12, you’re 10-12,” the voice answered. Now the nap. Kyle's eyes closed and he drifted off to sleep.
A door slamming shut brought him out of the chair in a fright. His eyes jumping open to the person standing in front of him.
“Gotcha that time Professor,” he laughed. “You came right awake boy.” He kept laughing as he dropped his things and walked to the microwave at the back of the room. The officer was short and bulky, with unruly black hair that seemed to have spread like a virus all over his neck and arms. He was still laughing as he popped a microwave meal in and set the time.
“Morning Eric. Thanks for delicacy,” Kyle said, his heart, just now slowing down. He didn’t like to sleep that deeply while on post, but the first few hours sometimes got him.
Eric laughed heartily again, “Couldn’t help it, I looked in the window and saw your mouth all hanging down and drooling. Never seen you looking so un-professor like. Thought I would get your heart pumping. Besides, I think I owed you one.”
Kyle laughed, “That’s true, though I think you came off a little better than me.” Eric had only been at the plant for about six months and during his training Kyle had given him some advice that had led Eric to showing up for work on a day where he was supposed to be off.
“Hardly, I’m still getting if from people on the other team. They keep asking me if I’m going to switch teams this week. You need to get one of the new guys in training.” Kyle didn’t feel too bad for him, especially after his wake up call.
“Don’t sweat it, somebody will do something stupid soon enough, and that will cause everyone to forget about you.”
“Says the guy who caused it,” though there was no malice in the words. The two had become good friends quickly after, both of them having a love affair with the University of North Carolina basketball team.
Eric was also a county local, though he wasn’t quite like Tim. He could tell and swap stories more than anyone Kyle had ever met. He seemed to epitomize a good old boy in almost every aspect. He also found out, to his amazement, that Eric could fix or build anything he wanted. The guy was a Michelangelo of machines with a southern accent.
“Everything is good here, though I haven’t check the guns yet,” Kyle said, standing.
“Don’t worry, I’ll look ‘em over.” Eric sat down in the chair that Kyle just got up from. “Gonna call my folks and tell them to be on the lookout for people that are sick.”
“Couldn’t hurt,” Kyle answered. “All right man, I’ll catch you later.” He walked out and to his next post. XR-8.
XR-8 was the officer’s spot inside the command center for security. It also always had one sergeant manning it, usually with the roaming officers popping in and out all the time. As Kyle walked in to the post, he saw Neil was manning the sergeant’s station and groaned. Neil was a slim, tall man of about thirty to thirty-two. He had calculating brown eyes and solid black hair that was perfectly manicured, so much so it appeared almost fake. Vain in his appearance, he was the sort to worship his betters and condescend to his subordinates, of which Kyle had recently become.
Neil seemed to have been a decent guy, though a ridiculous stickler for the rules, but then he became a sergeant. Since his promotion, Kyle had had a few run-ins with the guy, usually over some nonsense in Kyle's view. The guy was just unbearable to be with sometimes. He had drunk the Kool-Aid. Power brings change, even a little he thought.
“Morning everyone,” Kyle called out, as he stepped further into the command center.
“Bout time, I couldn’t stay awake much longer,” the officer manning his upcoming post grumbled. Kyle really didn’t know the guy that well, at least for him to be complaining to him yet. Rookies had to earn their complaining like everyone else. He listened as the guy told him what was going on in the plant and signed for his rifle that was being passed on. The rifle was a Remington AR15, which looked very similar to an M16, and was widely used among civilians as well. Kyle began to check the magazines and the action on the rifle, something he was always supposed to do but it became quite redundant.
“All right, good to go. Have a nice one,” the departing officer called out, now seeming to be in a much better mood.
“Yep, see ya,” Kyle returned, and the guy swiped out, the heavy door slamming shut behind him.
“What’s up Neil?” he asked, still getting his equipment situated. He was supposed to check all twenty-something of the cameras, but he just took a quick look at the monitor and leaned back in his seat.
“Make sure you check all your stuff well,” came the commanding reply from Neil. Kyle clamped down on the response he wanted to give.
“Yes, sir,” he answered with sarcasm, he knew he sounded like a child but this guy made him crazy, even if he was right at the moment, something Kyle decided not to think about. This caused Neil to lean back and look at him.
“I’m not being difficult Kyle, but the lieutenant will be coming in a few minutes and he might check your equipment.” Kyle listened to Neil and wanted to call bullshit on it but knew that wouldn’t help anything. He wondered if Neil even realized that he was talking nonsense. The lieutenant never checked equipment, and no one ever used the guns except to clean them. Neil used to be the same way, but he had bought in to everything the director had been offering and so now was on the dark side. Neil didn’t say anything else as he turned around. The phone rang. Kyle took a minute and started pulling out the magazines from the extras and looking to make sure they were full. “Good enough,” he thought, as he finished a few, and again leaned back against the chair.
The heavy door to the command center opened and a young guy in his thirties walked in sporting a yellow mohawk. He was shorter than Kyle, with a broad chest for someone his height. He face was one of those that you looked at and you wanted to be friends with. He was followed by the lieutenant, a man in his late fifties or early sixties, who was bald on top and had a slight stoop to his walk. Years in the sun, or smoking, had left deep lines in his kind face.
“Smalls,” the younger guy called out, as he dumped himself heavily on a seat toward the back of the room. He pulled out a sandwich and began to eat. “Missed you on Sunday, we were at the bat cave and had some monster juice.” Pat was that fun loving guy at work who still loved all things superhero and
Star Wars
. He was a great guy and one of Kyle’s closest friends at work.
“Yeah, sorry man, my brother is in town and we went surfing and then had some steaks on the beach,” Kyle answered, leaning back further in his chair to look at Pat.
“Should have brought him by, I liked the guy,” he mumbled, mouth full of tuna sandwich.
“Morning Bill,” Kyle greeted, as the lieutenant walked in, and Kyle swiveled in his seat away from Pat. “How’s everything?”
“Good morning Kyle,” drawled the lieutenant. The lieutenant was the only person he worked with who called him by his first name. He was an air force vet some thirty years ago. Kyle liked the guy, if he had drunk the Kool-Aid, he only sipped because he was a laid back guy. “This virus has me concerned, I have family in upstate New York.” Kyle looked at the lieutenant, not being able to detect any extra worry there, but he wasn’t a mentalist so didn’t keep thinking about it.
“Have you talked to them?” Neil asked, not bothering to turn around as he held the microphone in front of him. “All units, radio check.” Neil turned down the speakers as the arriving Bravo team started to report. “XR-1 10-20, XR-2 10-20, and XR-3 10-20... and so it went.
“Na, we don’t talk much. They're Yankees after all,” he said, winking at Pat. Pat was also from up north and some of the predominantly southern team members gave him a hard time about. Pat, for his part, didn’t even understand what they were talking about at first. He would just smile, pull his shirtsleeve up, and show them his
Star Wars
tattoo, while humming some song from the movie. They didn’t understand what he was going on about, so it all came out even in the end. “I’m just pullin your leg, Patrick. I ain’t got nothing against any Yankee.” Kyle wondered if he always used the word Yankee when he was referring to people from up north. Pat gave the lieutenant a big smile and then continued to eat.
The room settled into a peaceful quiet, soft beeps from various computers and the low voices of officers on the radio filled the silence. Kyle leaned up in his chair and started scrolling through his cameras. He pulled up the camera for the entrance to the plant, a quarter mile away, down a small road that led all the way to the main street. There, Kyle could see the small non-descript building that he came through earlier this morning. He could see an officer, Jerry he thought, looking under the car with a mirror. That post was a boring place to work and he was glad he wasn’t there today. He then switched cameras to another one positioned in the woods facing the plant. The main part of the plant was really two massively tall concrete buildings. They were the very picture of dreariness created by some boring engineer. Surrounding those buildings were other various smaller buildings, also beauty challenged. There were yards full of related work materials and large equipment stashed everywhere in between.
All in all, the plant was a depressing sight, with no hints to alert anyone to the danger that lingered inside. Kyle didn’t care for going into the main reactor buildings if he could help it, though he knew he picked up more radiation from the sun than he did from the reactors. His imagination was another matter. Also, going through the process of decontamination wasn’t that fun either.
Kyle’s eyes were starting to get heavy when a call came from one of the tower posts in the front of the plant. He greeted the call after looking at the post assignments for the day. “What’s up Roy, thought you would be catching some z’s?” He winked at the sergeant, letting him know he was joking. He wasn’t.
“Just finishing my breakfast and saw something in the tree line, can you check?” he sounded as if he still had grits in his mouth. Kyle's position in the command center allowed him to control all the cameras in the plant, and he could take them away from others’ control if needed to. He never had.
“Looking now,” he responded, phone still to his ear. Neil had turned and was looking at him from his console. “Zooming in,” letting Roy be aware of what was going on. He zoomed the closest camera in on the tree line, waited for the focus to clear up, and started scanning the area from left to right. The sun hadn’t fully risen, making it difficult to find something with a black and white monitor, everything appearing to be grey. He stopped moving the camera. What was that? It wasn’t the shape that gave it away, it was movement. He zoomed in a little closer on the object. A silhouette of a man suddenly stumbled fully out of the woods and onto the grass.