Pox

Avalon Prequel Invasion of Memories Happy Hill part 4 of 6

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

 “Come.” The Princess said as she cracked the door to check the hallway. She had to step over to grab Nancy by the hand, but as soon as they were out the door, David and Goldman followed. “I’m not allowed out of the school without my teacher.” The Princess teased, as she kicked open the door to the emergency stairwell and climbed to the third floor. She stopped there and turned to David.

“Glen?” David asked.

“Still me.” The Princess responded.

“Princess.” Goldman identified her. He huffed and puffed a bit.

“Out of shape.” The Princess slapped him in the stomach with the back of her hand, but not hard, and she smiled.

“No one is in your shape,” he responded and turned to David and Nancy. “She works out most of the time, and with those weapons, too; but hunting and tracking and sneaking around buildings are her specialties.”

“Hush.” The Princess quieted him. “Which way, David?” she asked in a whisper.

David had to think for a minute before he pointed. They were by chance on the right floor, but they had some hallways to navigate. The Princess went first in that armor of hers to sniff out the way. She kept Nancy close at hand, but behind her as much as possible, just in case. David had picked up a gun from the floor and Goldman had his out of his holster and in his hand. Both men hoped they would not have to use them.

By chance or good fortune, or the skill of the Princess, the halls were empty and they quickly reached the laboratory rooms they were searching for. The Princess got ready to enter the first door she found, but David pulled them along to the second door. He pointed at the first and said, “Quarantined.”

 “The pox room,” the Princess said, and David slapped himself in the head for not realizing that sooner. That slap seemed a very dangerous thing to do with a gun in his hand.

“Pickard.” David called as they entered the second room down the hall. The man sat on a high stool against a lab table that might have come out of any high school science room. He looked up. There were chalkboards on the wall, the start of an equation on one, and file cabinets against one wall with some other chairs and a few end tables. A second man sat at the lab table opposite Pickard, in the midst of his own project, and every open space, including a good bit of the floor, looked covered with equipment of one kind or another.

“David.” Pickard recognized his friend.

“Check him.” The Princess turned to Goldman who raised his gun and walked to where the two men stared at him with unbelieving eyes.

“Put your head down and hold still,” Goldman said. Pickard looked at his friend, but David assured him.

“Just do it. Everything will be all right. Rupert, you are next.”

Pickard complied while Goldman and Nancy examined the back of his neck and checked through his bushy brown hair. Rupert ran for the door. He did not get far. The Princess’ long knife shot across the room and pinned the man’s lab coat and probably his shirtsleeve as well to the chalkboard with the equation. Rupert looked like a pinned butterfly as David and Goldman ran to grab the man. David had to hold him, which was not too hard since David was young and Rupert was old. Goldman had to look hard to find the thing.

“He’s clean as far as I can tell.” Nancy said of Pickard.

“Got it.” Goldman announced at about the same time, and as he separated the little thing from Rupert’s neck. Rupert collapsed into unconsciousness. The Princess raised her hand and her knife vacated the chalkboard, like it had a will of its own, and sprang back to her hand. As soon as she put it away, she traded places once again with Doctor Mishka so she could examine the man on the floor. Rupert lay, out cold, but the Doctor saw no sign of serious trauma or permanent damage. It appeared as if he was asleep, and she wondered if he had slept since receiving his little brain modifier.

“He should be all right after a while,” she said, and thought, I hope; but she did not say that part out loud. Instead, she went away again and let the Princess return.

“Look. What is this all about?” Pickard started to ask, but he paused as the Princess began to examine the things on the table.

“A piece of the engine, useless in itself and no great technological wonder. Navigation system with everything of real value removed. Broken weapons array, but these are just fancy switches. Junk, junk, junk. Who said you would get anything out of this?”

David and Pickard looked at each other. David spoke. “The Director got very excited that first day and said there was no telling what we might discover.”

“You know what these things are?” Pickard sounded amazed. He saw the Princess in her armor, an unusual enough sight. He just saw her change to the Doctor and change back again to the Princess, though his eyes glossed over that sight because his mind told him people did not do such things. But as for her knowing what some of this alien equipment was; now, that was impressive.

“We clear the hall and then head for the Quarantine room.” The Princess looked at the others. She meant it as a question, but it came out like a statement.

“Sounds like a plan.” Goldman said.

“I’m in.” David said, though the Princess feared the man might shoot himself if he ever used that gun.

“Can I come?” Pickard did not want to be left out.

The Princess looked at Nancy, but Nancy looked surprised. “Me? I’m not letting Glen out of my sight.” It was settled.

Seven identical rooms later and there were eight people sleeping things off. They had also gathered a crowd of five more like Pickard. The Princess pronounced everything she saw junk, and she assured everyone that the only things they might get out of their work were things that would be discovered in the next three to six years anyway, including the laser.

“But isn’t that exciting? An actual working light accelerator.” At least Pickard got excited. The Princess smiled for him, but as she tried to hustle that whole crowd back to the quarantine room, she was not surprised to see several gunmen guarding the door. She backed everyone up to the laser room before they were seen and took a much longer look at that piece of equipment. She studied the simple laser reader, like for a disc or some such thing. She turned it over, opened it, and decided it could be adapted in the right pair of hands.

Avalon Prequel Invasion of Memories Happy Hill part 3 of 6

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

The security guard seemed pleasant enough. “Morning Doctor Shakowski. Missus.” He even touched his hat before he looked hard into the back seat. “No visitors. I’m sorry Ma’am, you won’t be allowed in.”

“She is with the government people.” David began to lie, but Mishka interrupted and handed forward a slim billfold, such as the FBI sometimes carry. It had some kind of identification in it, one that even had a picture attached. The picture looked like Mishka, a bit older, but who can really tell with such pictures? Mishka, accent and all, said flatly that she worked for the National Security Administration and she reported directly to the President.

“I am here to investigate yesterday’s incident.”

“Yes ma’am, er, Colonel.” The security guard appeared impressed with her and her credentials, as well as the fact that she knew about the incident. Of course, there were local police and firemen all over the place yesterday, but somehow the security guard had the idea that the incident was a secret, like so much else at the Labs. He handed back Mishka’s billfold and waved them through.

“National Security Administration?” David asked, as soon as they were clear.

“Agency, I think, in this country. I have a long history of working with the Men in Black.” David and Nancy did not know what that was, but Teacher Nancy had another question.

“Colonel?”

“Soviet, but it was just window dressing for the war.”

“The First World War?” David asked as he parked.

“No, Second,” Mishka answered. “The one where I was at Stalingrad.” She smiled and asked her own question. “Shakowski?”

“Polish,” David said. Mishka started to say something in a foreign language, undoubtedly Polish, but David shook his head. “Fourth generation,” he said.

The security at the front door seemed much less accommodating than the man at the gate. One guard took Doctor Mishka’s credentials and stepped behind a desk to make a call while the other blocked the way.

“What is the problem?” Nancy asked David, and quietly, but the guard in front of them answered her all the same.

“Someone from the NSA already showed up this morning,” he said, and with that, the guard at the desk hung up his phone and three men in suits, two gray and one black, approached the front door. David knew the two in gray suits. They were internal security and government men. Mishka knew the other.

“Goldman!” Mishka ran to hug the man. He looked surprised, like a man being hugged by a complete stranger, before something triggered in his mind.

“Doctor? Mishka?” He backed up a little to look at her. She nodded. “But you are so young, and pretty, if I can say that.”

Mishka grinned and took the man’s arm. “You can always say that, but I do get around in time, you know, or did you forget.”

“But how did you get, you know, younger?” He paused and looked pale for a minute. “I heard you died.”

“Ah!” Mishka had to decide what might be safe to say before she spoke. “After I died, Lady Alice revived me. I regenerated and got to go into cold storage until needed.” To Goldman’s curious look, she added, “I believe the current science fiction name is suspended animation.” That helped a little. “David. Nancy. This is Goldman, one of the Men in Black I was telling you about.” She made the introductions, and without a breath, she asked Goldman “Is young Jax around?” Then she added one more thing before breathing. “Goldman saved Churchill’s life in the second war, just to be sure which war we are talking about.”

“Hold it,” Goldman said, as he finished shaking Nancy’s hand. “I helped, maybe a little.”

“Ma’am.” The guard at the front door returned Mishka’s identification papers.

“These gentlemen were just taking me to Doctor Thompson’s office when you arrived.” Goldman continued.

“Good idea. Start with the director.” David nodded, and the two men in suits turned without a word and began to lead the way. Mishka, still holding the man’s arm, turned Goldman and followed while David and Nancy brought up the rear. When they arrived at the director’s office and went straight inside, Mishka asked another question.

“How about Mister Smith. Is he around?”

Goldman shook his head. “It is borderline, since the Reichgo have visitation rights in the treaty. Ultimately, that is for the Kargill to decide.”

The door closed. The director sat behind the desk; his face covered in a deep, red rash. He said, simply, “Hold them.” The two men in gray suits pulled their guns.

Someone else stepped into Mishka’s eyes, to take in the scene and make a quick assessment. Then Mishka no longer stood there. Diogenes came, dressed in full armor and weapons, and he spun and caught the hand of the man nearest to him. He turned that hand just so, in order for the bullet to enter his comrade’s middle. That comrade also fired, but his bullet hit Diogenes in the shoulder, bounced off the armor, and left only a small bruise. As Goldman made certain of the man on the floor, Diogenes let his hands work over the man beside him. It required short work. The man slumped to the floor, not likely to rise for some time.

David and Nancy stared when Diogenes turned and flashed his awesome smile in their direction. He shrugged, went away, and let Doctor Mishka return to Glen’s time and place. Mishka kept the armor though, and David and Nancy watched it adjust automatically to this new shape and size. Doctor Mishka stood a couple of inches shorter, though still a tall woman at a bit over five-foot-eight, and she certainly had a different shape, but no one would think the armor was not made for her.

“We need an ambulance here.” Goldman said from the floor.

“Wait. Don’t touch him.” Mishka ordered, and while everyone thought she was talking about the man on the floor, she noticed that the Director had gotten up. He sweated from fever, and the rash looked more extensive on his face than anyone had ever seen. He staggered around the desk, held on to keep from falling, and he did not look happy.

Everyone backed up when they realized what was happening, but when Mishka returned, she returned with her black bag, and she opened it. The Director just let go of the desk to stand before her as she pulled a spray bottle from the bag and sprayed it inches from the Director’s face. The man paused. Doctor Mishka sprayed a second time. With the third spray, the man went completely limp and collapsed to the floor like a rag doll.

Mishka turned quickly. “David. Please phone for an ambulance. Don’t tell them what happened, just say an ambulance is needed stat—immediately.”

“Right.” David started for the phone but paused when Doctor Mishka handed him an old-fashioned handkerchief.

“Contact is the way this appears to spread and even immunized it is better to be safe.” Mishka looked again at the Director. His case looked like the worst she had seen, and she revised her estimates as to how virulent the disease might be in humans.

“Doctor.” Goldman spoke from the floor where he and Nancy knelt beside the unconscious man. They had turned him over and Goldman held something in a pair of tweezers. “It came from the back of the neck, just under the hairline,” he said.

Mishka reached into her black bag and pulled out what looked like an old-fashioned magnifying glass, such as Sherlock Holmes might carry. Teacher Nancy watched as Mishka touched something and the lens on the glass illuminated with a small, white light. She moved in close when Mishka twisted the handle and examined the little thing.

“Very sophisticated. I would guess designed to interfere with brain functions, maybe sending continuous signals that would be nearly impossible to resist. I can see to the viral level with the glass, but I see no sign of infection which may be why these two men were not broken out with the pox.”

“Viral?” Nancy widened her eyes. “That would be very small.”

“Da.” Mishka said, and she put the magnifying glass and the little thing into her black bag.

“Medical team on the way.” David hung up the phone.

“Now we must move,” Mishka said. She vanished and the Princess came to stand in her place. The Princess smiled for everyone and again they saw that the armor had adjusted to a woman that was an inch or so shorter and a figure that looked near perfection. To be sure, Doctor Mishka was very pretty, what some might even call beautiful; but she was not the Princess.

************************

MONDAY

Mishka and company have to find and source of the disease and end it, but in the process they find another way the Reichgo are toying with the human race. Until Monday, Happy Reading

*

Avalon Prequel Invasion of Memories Happy Hill part 2 of 6

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

The following morning, a Friday morning in October, Glen arrived at school to find Mister David and Teacher Nancy waiting for him. The Teacher had gotten what she called a substitute to cover the class, while she paced and looked terribly nervous. She looked as if she thought that maybe what they were contemplating, and what she agreed to, might not be such a good idea after all. David kept reassuring her, saying that everything would be all right, but that just made her more nervous. When Glen came into the nursery building, they took him straight into the office and Glen did not object. He expected as much. Once the door closed, Teacher Nancy squatted down and gave Glen a big teacher hug, which they could still do in those days. When she backed up a little, without letting go of Glen’s shoulders, she spoke gently.

“Glen. We need your help. We just need to ask some questions, but you don’t have to answer if you don’t want to.” Teacher Nancy wanted to make that perfectly clear.

Glen looked at his teacher and up at Mister David, and nodded, but what he said surprised them. “We need to go to the Labs.”

“What?” Teacher Nancy looked up at David, but he just smiled. She looked again at Glen. “Are you sure? You don’t have to go anywhere.”

“It’s Okay,” Glen said. “I talked with my Doctor Mishka last night and she said she would go for me.” That threw them. Neither adult knew what he was talking about, or how to respond, so he kept talking. “She says right now we have to go outside to get away from people.” He walked to the door and wrapped his little hand around the doorknob to give it a turn. Teacher Nancy and David were slow to react, but caught up quickly enough, and Teacher Nancy took Glen’s hand as they walked outside. She wanted it to look as normal as possible, in order to avoid too many questions from the staff or the other children. Once outside, Teacher Nancy stopped and stopped Glen as well.

“We are outside. Now what are we doing?”

Glen shook his head and dragged them toward David’s Hudson and as far from the school as possible. Then he stopped and looked up at them, first taking in one face and then the other. He held out his two hands and Teacher Nancy quickly took them both, but Glen pulled one hand free and David reached over and wrapped his big hand around that little paw.

“Doctor Mishka says you have to promise,” Glen said.

“Promise what, dear?” Teacher Nancy asked.

“Don’t let go, no matter what.”

“Oh, Glen. I won’t let you go.” Teacher Nancy squeezed his hand and smiled down at him with as much smile as she could muster.

“Promise,” Glen said.

“I Promise,” David responded without hesitation.

Teacher Nancy looked at David and then back at Glen before she spoke again with a more serious expression and without the smile. “I Promise,” she said, and Glen closed his eyes. It only took a second before Teacher Nancy let go and threw her hand to her mouth to stifle a scream. David held on, but it looked like he got shocked motionless. Glen had vanished utterly from that place and a full-grown young woman with Glen’s hair color and Glen’s same blue eyes appeared in his place. This woman came dressed in a full-length Victorian style dress, and it leant some credence to what followed.

“Doctor Nadia Illiana Kolchenkov.” The woman introduced herself as she switched David’s hand from her left hand to her right so she could shake it properly. “I am sorry. I am Russian, but I died in 1953 if that helps any.” She said that because she knew her English always came with a bit of a Slavic accent. She paused, put a black doctor’s bag up on the hood of the car, and began to rummage through it, and since neither David nor Nancy appeared inclined to say anything, she continued. “My friends all call me Mishka. You must call me Mishka, also. There, I hope I have everything I am going to need.” She closed-up her doctor’s bag. “Now you had better get in the car before you do anything rash. I will explain on the way. Shall I drive?” She said that with a smile, but her hand reached for the back-door handle. That question shook the other two out of their shock long enough to move. They got into the car almost without thinking about what they were doing.

“Quite right,” Mishka added a thought. “Glen is much too young to drive.” She grinned at her own joke.

“What happened to Glen?” Teacher Nancy’s first concern was for Glen, once the doors were shut. She had some panic in her voice. David backed up to the end of the drive and stopped.

“All right, but the quick version,” Mishka said. “Glen has lived any number of lifetimes and I am his most recent previous life. I was born in St. Petersburg in 1889. I saw my city become Leningrad, but then I died in the Gulag.” The woman paused before she spoke again. “Curious, to remember your own death. I suppose it is only because from this vantage point, it all happened in the past. Anyway, there are other lifetimes Glen has lived, so don’t be surprised if I call on one of them at some point.”

“Has he – has he, Glen, you – have you, Mishka, done this before?” David asked, as he began to pull out very slowly into the road.

“Glen? No. This is very unusual circumstances. Usually I do not do this until I am older, but in this case, don’t you smell it? It smells like chickenpox, or maybe smallpox everywhere, and there is like a darkness all over the neighborhood. Glen, young as he is, sensed it coming from the building, what you call the Labs.”

“Bell Labs,” David confirmed with a nod.

“Da-yes. Little children are sometimes very sensitive to such things.” Mishka took in Teacher Nancy’s eyes. The teacher had turned completely around in the front seat to stare at her. “Don’t worry. Glen will come home once this is settled, only keep in mind, he probably will not remember any of this, so it would be best if you did not discuss it in his presence.”

Teacher Nancy broke eye contact and shook herself like a person waking from a dream. “But what is it?” She paused briefly to get her bearings. “I have to admit that I have been feeling edgy for a week, like I sensed something, but I thought it was just—you know.”

“Such as women know?” Mishka laughed. “No Teacher Nancy, and you can trust me. I am a doctor.”

“Doctor?”

“University of Paris. A surgeon, actually, but I got my first real experience on the Russian Front in the World War.”

“Really?” David perked up a little. “Were you at Stalingrad?”

“Yes, but I was referring to the First World War.”

“Oh.” David swallowed. “Of course.”

“Wait. We are getting off subject.” Teacher Nancy got David to drive to the side of the road before they went up to the gate. “What is this we are dealing with?”

“Yes,” David said, and he turned off the car so he could turn around in his seat as well. “Glen said the word Reichgo and I thought nothing of it until yesterday when I overheard two of the government men use the word.”

“What is a Reichgo?” Teacher Nancy asked.

“Who.” David and Doctor Mishka spoke together, and David quieted so the Doctor could speak.

“Extraterrestrials.” She began to explain, but she changed her description when she saw that Teacher Nancy did not know the word. “Space Aliens. Little green men, and I am guessing they want their toys back. After all, this is only 1957 and Roswell is not yet big business.” Mishka amused herself with that thought. “I am also guessing that is why those toys were sent back east, so maybe the government could claim they were lost or destroyed in the crash and then maybe learn something valuable through reverse engineering, as your Perkins called it.”

“Pickard.” David corrected her. “And you assume pretty good.”

“But how did you know? How could little Glen know about the Reichgo?”

“Bobby Thompson,” Mishka said.

“Ohhh!” Teacher Nancy’s eyes got big as she drew out the word and David turned to face her so she could explain. “Measles. But it did happen very fast. In one day, he had breakouts everywhere.”

“Doctor Thompson’s kid.” David put two and two together and then added a note for Mishka. “Dick Thompson is the Director overseeing the crash project.” Mishka merely nodded before she spoke.

“Glen took a sample and I analyzed it. It is not the measles. It is not from this earth. I know something of the history of this time, so it was not hard to piece things together and figure out where it came from. Now, roll up your sleeves so I can give you your immunization shots. The disease is not spread easily, but this is a precaution.”

David, who had his arm draped over the back of the seat to turn a bit further into the conversation, pulled his arm back, quickly. “Will it hurt?” he asked while Mishka opened her black bag.

“Oh, you big baby,” Teacher Nancy said. She already had her sweater sleeve pushed up. Doctor Mishka pulled out something that looked like a small pistol, or maybe a glue gun. She turned Teacher Nancy’s arm, not interested in the shoulder, and began to rub around the inside of her elbow. When she found the vein, she touched it with the gun tip and pulled the trigger.

“That’s it?” Teacher Nancy seemed surprised. She felt nothing.

“Come,” Mishka said, and David extended his arm for the treatment, but he kept a watchful eye on the Doctor in case she pulled a fast one. Mishka touched the gun, which made a click-click sound, and then she shot David’s arm and it was over.

“So how long before it takes effect?” Teacher Nancy asked, thinking that vaccinations usually took seven to ten days, at the least.

“Immediate,” Doctor Mishka said, as she put the gun back in her bag.

“It seems these Reichgo are not the only ones with advanced technology,” David said.

Mishka nodded. “So, did you hear the early morning airplanes spraying the neighborhood this past week?”

David and Nancy looked at each other. “I thought it was for worms or caterpillars of some kind,” David said.

Mishka shook her head. “A counter agent. This alien disease will not spread but it is imperative that I locate the source and neutralize it.”

“I see.” Teacher Nancy turned to face the front of the car. “God, I can’t imagine if an alien disease got loose in the world.” She thought of a worst-case scenario, but Mishka assured her.

“All pox is originally alien in origin, and mostly not Reichgo in origin. Some pox, as I am sure you know from your history, was very virulent and did get loose in the world, but fortunately, this particular infection is like the Reichgo version of the common cold and it does not appear to be deadly. There are spots and a high fever for a couple of days and that is it. Shall we drive?”

David jolted. “Oh, yeah. Right.” He started the car again and brought them to the gate.