The Infection

Chapter 24

Two Year Earlier

Office of Mark Hamill, P.H.D. and Doctor Gary Oldman, P.H.D.

"This is too good to be true," Mark said, as he pushed his glasses up his nose and stared at the computer screen. "It's true," Gary confirmed. "A virus infects the entire base, our military gets in with gas masks so they don't get infected and clean out the bodies. It'll be like nothing ever happened."

Mark patted Gary happily on the back. "When can we send it out?" Mark asked. "We can make millions of of this, Gary." Gary looked back at his friend and told him, "No, not yet. There's still some tweaks I need to fix. If we send it out before I fix these them...it could be chaos."

**

One Year Later

Gary Oldman. The best scientist the military could hire. He had the brains of Bill Gates, he could do anything and be a billionaire for his studies and findings, but he just wasn't that type of person. He put his family and his county first. 

It was for that reason that he didn't tell anyone about the airborne infection he had created to take out any enemy base in any country without any detection that it was the United States. If something goes wrong with it, things can go horribly wrong for him. 

Technically, he was supposed to tell his lieutenant when he was finished with it and since he is (just making improvements), he could get fired and dishonorably discharged. That would look awful, especially since his step-son just got dishonorably discharged from the Navy. 

He went into work today thinking that this might actually be the day he figures out what's wrong with the infection. He was up all night putting together formulas and math problems, getting little to no sleep (much to his wife's annoyance). 

As he walked into the office he shared with his friend, Mark, the first thing he noticed was that he had stepped on paper. He looked around and saw scattered paper everywhere. Without looking up from the ground, he quickly asked, "Mark, what's--." 

He stopped when he saw a group of marines digging through his desk, practically tearing it apart. Another group was digging through his experiments, not being shy to break them if it wasn't what they were looking for. 

"Hey! Hey what in the hell are you doing!" He shouted, but was ignored. "Who are you!" He continued to yell as he approached the soldiers. Suddenly a hand was on his shoulder and he got pulled away from the soldiers. 

He was turned and faced with his lieutenant who looked incredibly unhappy. "Lieutenant, what in the hell is going on! These men can't just destroy my work!" The lieutenant didn't look like he was sympathizing any, as a matter of fact he just looked more upset. 

"Doctor Oldman, you had direct orders to bring me that virus," he said, "and when you disobey my orders, I do not take that lightly. Not with my men and certainly not with you." Gary looked around and saw the mess, the chaos all around him. 

"Who...who told you?" He asked. The lieutenant just gestured behind him. As he called, "Keep searching!", Gary turned around and saw Mark. He was standing with his hands behind his back and a cool composure on his face. 

Gary felt completely betrayed. His partner for twelve years in this field. His best friend. His brother. "Why?" He softly asked. Mark walked up to him, then said, "An entire year of keeping this a secret, Gary. I've tried to make my piece with it, but it's genius and it needs to get out there and help our men and women that serving this country."

Suddenly, a voice in the cool storage shouted, "Found it!" Gary's eyes widened and he started to quickly walk over to the solider that was holding one of the many viles up. "Let's move out!" The lieutenant shouted. "This needs to be shipped in 0100 hours!"

The soldiers started taking crate after crate of the infection out of the lab and all Gary could do was just stare. A moment later, he sharply turned to Mark. "What have you done?" He asked. "What have you done!"

Mark just stood in the same position he was in and watched the crates be taken out. "You have to listen to me!" Gary shouted at the men. "This will be dangerous! You can't do this!" But they wouldn't listen. They all walked out until every last crate was gone. 

"This will be shipped to a special ops team in Afghanistan for further testing," the Lieutenant said. He then pulled out an envelope and slapped it to Gary's chest. "Your services are no longer required, Doctor Oldman."

**

Ben was frozen in shock. He had lowered his gun at some point during the story and he couldn't help but do anything except listen. What he heard was not who he thought Mark was. 

"Ben," Mark pleaded, "don't listen to him. I only wanted what was best for county and for you--ah!" Gary hit him over the head. "Shut up!" He shouted, then looked back over to Ben. "The plane those crates were on crashed the next day. Had it reached that special ops team, they would have become one of these...monsters!"

Ben gulped and looked idly around. "Which team was it?" He asked. "The number." Gary didn't need to think, before saying, "Two, two, five, zero, delta, one." Ben shut his eyes and sighed. That was his and Cassie's team. He remembers getting a call that a package was being delivered to them. He also remembers the call that said the plane it was on crashed somewhere in upstate New York.

That's where the infection started. 

"My team...my men, myself...Cassie...we could have all been infected that day," he said. "We could be dead." Mark shook his head and cried, "I am so sorry." Gary looked straight into Ben's eyes as he said, "Sorry doesn't make up for loosing my family...my job...for anything."

He cocked back his gun and shot Mark in the head. 

Ben jumped and gaped at the lifeless body. His eyes carefully went back to Gary. Thinking he was next, he started to put his weapon down. "Don't," Gary said. "Keep your weapons. Keep your camp. Keep your lives. I just want you to know that I did not do this, I did not cause this world. He did. Not you, not Cassie, not your friends...him."

Richard piped up behind Ben and said, "But you killed our people." Gary looked to him and said, "I did. Like I told you, only the ones who fought. Not many of them did. But we did kill Sharon. I'm sorry that Cassie has no medical attention now, but it had to be done. He needed to know the pain I went through when I lost my sons, my daughters, my wife...Sebastian was the only one left. I blame that on him, too."

Ben was slightly confused as to what was going on, but he had a feeling he was going to live. For now.

"Go," Gary told them, as his army of men lowered their weapons. Ben cautiously looked at Richard and Rob, then nodded. They started to slowly make their way around Mark's bloodied body when Gary said, "Oh, and Ben."

Ben looked to him. Gary took a deep breath and said, "Enjoy every minute you can with her. You never know when she or your little one will be gone." Suddenly, Ben was paralyzed in fear. He was as stiff as a board and his eyes were as wide as they could possibly be. 

"I...I'm sorry?" He quietly asked. Gary looked at him curiously. "You mean you didn't know?"