Al-Qa'im, Iraq

Abdul al-Vasir knew that the time of his rise to power had come.

No more listening to others, and blindly following the commands of those who were unworthy of his God's grace.

Ever since their leader disappeared, close to a year ago, he did everything he deemed necessary to take the reins of their organization in his hands. It was liberating in a way, not having to listen to the endless rhetoric on how their attacks needed to be moderate and calculated, so those big world powers would not be too provoked. Abdul hated the previous leader; it was as if he were more concerned about making money, than following God’s will.

Abdul did not just want to provoke those great world powers—he wanted to destroy them. To bring them to their knees and listen to their sweet screams while they suffered the punishment for their false beliefs. The power over life and death over others was a thing people understood on a primal level, and he worked long and hard to become powerful. That is how he emerged as a new leader, by being utterly ruthless; not caring if men, women, or children died as a consequence of his actions, or commands.

If someone impartial were to describe Abdul al-Vasir’s personality, the words he would use would be extremism, hatred, greed, sadism, fanaticism, megalomania, and disregard for human life.

He hated them all, the infidels that had infected this beautiful world; The Christians in all their varieties, Hindus, Buddhist, Atheists, and even those that claimed to follow the ‘One True God’, but didn't have enough faith to give theirs and their children's lives to the fight and glory of God.

Well, he will fight that infection with one of his own; in the end, only those faithful will be left in this world. Only those whom God, in His infinite wisdom found worthy enough would survive. Abdul al-Vasir genuinely believed he was a messenger of a divine will.

Even if he had to make some compromises, no matter how much he did not want to. In the past months, his organization had suffered heavy losses, and his influence and ability to act were diminished. Those damned bounty sites had destroyed his network of sleeper agents, and many of his holy warriors were now in prisons, all over the world. It was the fault of those heretics that had escaped Earth and decided to live in space. Because of that, he had to reach out to other organizations that shared some of his beliefs; it was a necessity if his grand plan was to work. They had connections, and skillful agents of their own he needed, to ensure the maximal effect of God’s wrath.

The big space station those unbelievers built in the heavens was the final straw that made him act on his plan. As soon as the news about it reached him, he knew he had no more time to waste. They bragged about occupying a place that was forbidden for mortals; and so many had already traveled there, wanting to escape God’s wrath and punishment they so rightfully deserved.

He knew that the Russians had biological super-weapons, for years. It was a valuable piece of information he extracted long ago from one of their biologists his warriors captured, while he was with Doctors Without Borders mission. He did not even try to ransom that group, just killed them all when he realized how valuable that information was, and how it could advance his plans.

Abdul al-Vasir just needed to wait for the perfect moment. Once he took the power of the organization, he was free to act on his dreams. The deadly bioweapons were easily acquired, his agents only needed to target the weakest link in security. Afterward, those initial attacks were swiftly executed, without anyone being the wiser. Now, the undesirables will suffer and die, and he will have the pleasure to watch it all on TV. It would not stop there, he would not be satisfied until every one of them ceased to exist.

The heretics’ technology was the problem, it was the reason his people were being hunted. That is why he forbade the use of computers anywhere close to him, or to those involved with the plan. He felt vindicated with the righteousness of that decision, there was no one to discover the plan and stop them at the last minute.

Abdul yearned for the simpler world, when God would be respected and honored; when those who were beneath himself, a divine emissary on this world, would bend their knee in supplication.

***

Transporter 001

Destination: Russia, Moscow

The medical aid effort was well underway when Michael and the team got their first tangible lead. They all knew it was a matter of time, as Max had most of the world’s communication under his control. At least satellites and undersea Internet cables; he also had access to all net-connected cameras, and phones—all over the world.

From the moment they became aware of the situation, the AI started scanning all available video footage from the time of the break-in. Unfortunately, the bioweapons storage facility cameras only recorded men under masks, without any way to identify them. In spite of that, he managed to find a tangible lead they were looking for in an old ATM camera, close to the facility.

The thieves were driving a black nondescript van, without any plates and with shaded windows. Nevertheless, one still frame managed to capture a driver’s face. The face recognition programs identified him as one Pyotr Amagov; at least, that was his birth name before he changed it into Abdullah Mohammad when he converted to Islam. His family was of Chechen heritage, currently living and working in Russia. The interesting fact about him was where his father was employed.

For the last twenty years, he worked as one of the guards at that same bioweapons storage facility from which the weaponized strains were stolen.

That was why Michael, Tyron, Pete, Al, and Alice were now sitting in a transporter above the apartment building in Moscow, where Pyotr, a.k.a. Abdullah was living—with his parents. It was the middle of the night, but the city was still very much active.

As the family was living on the top floor of the apartment building, it made it so much easier for the team to come in from the roof. They disembarked from the transporter and entered the unlocked roof access stairways. Breaking into the Amagov family apartment was a child’s play by using a monomolecular edged knife on a lock, and then the team silently sneaked in.

Michael and Tyron did not waste any time and tranquilized all the people inside in a matter of seconds. They were asleep and didn’t even manage to fully wake up before tranquilizers put them under. Michael thought that it was quite strange to see Christian Orthodox icons and a cross in the parent’s room, and a big calligraphic representation of the words ‘One True God’ in their son’s room.

While they’ve left the parents to sleep in their bed, they took one thirty-year-old amateur terrorist and carried him back to the transporter.

“This idiot dyes his hair,” Alice said while looking at the man that Al had roughly thrown on the floor.

“What?” Pete asked.

Alice pointed at the young man’s head, which was covered with dark hair. Underneath it, half an inch of a blond root showed.

“Well, perhaps he wanted to fit in better with his new friends,” Pete replied and injected the man with a concoction that would negate the sedative.

Meanwhile, the transporter lifted a few miles up, holding the position until, hopefully, their captive would divulge where next the team needed to go.

In a few minutes, the young man started to wake up; confused, and looking at the strange place he was in, obviously not his room where he fell asleep.

“Mr. Amagov, I don’t suppose you would be willing to tell us everything we want to know about the break-in at bioweapons facility?” Michael said as soon as he saw the man was conscious enough to understand, while Max was translating his words. “It can save us so much time—and pain.”

The man looked at him from his place on the floor. “My name is Abdullah Mohammad, and I will tell you nothing, you infidel pig.” He said that in Russian, and then switched to Arabic and started to pray. He prayed for strength to the God of the religion he converted to.

Michael murmured, “Well, that is unfortunate,” and motioned for Tyron and Pete to place the interrogation helmet on the man’s head.

They sat in the transporter for the next thirty minutes, watching as the man experienced pleasure and excruciating pain. By the end, Pyotr was begging to tell them everything. He gave up the names and location of his friends, explained how they managed to break into a highly secured facility using his father’s stories about his job. The man even told them things they had no wish to know. For example, how he cheated on his girlfriend with a nice Iraqi boy; the same boy who introduced him to new terrorist friends, convinced him to convert, and recruited him for the cause.

It seemed that the guards at the facility often disabled alarms on one of the emergency exits, so they could sneak out from time to time for a smoke. It was an example of how addicts will always find a way, even if it means compromising national security. His father was foolish enough to tell that to his son, who in turn bragged about that security lapse to his new friends. The consequent events followed the natural course of cause and effect.

His friends happen to belong to a local ISIL cell that was living in a safe house on the outskirts of the city. The transporter immediately flew in that direction, while Abdullah was again safely asleep, after receiving a second tranquilizer dart.

The transporter arrived at their destination; Michael and the team disembarked in the backyard of the small house, under full camouflage. They moved through the unkempt garden, overridden with trash. It would seem that ISIL members were not big on property upkeep.

“Shall we knock?” Al asked when they approached the back door.

“It would be a polite thing to do, but I’m not feeling particularly polite right now,” Michael answered and lifted his foot to kick the doors in front of him.

“STOP!” The AI’s voice screamed in their implants. “Back away from the house!” He commanded a second later, in the same tone of voice.

Michael and the team reacted out of the gut reflex, integrated into them while in the military, obeying an order given with such voice inflection.

“Max, what is it?” Michael asked when they moved some fifty feet in the same direction they came from.

“Your suit sensors detected viral particles in the air. Only a few, but if my suspicion is correct that would have changed in an instant. If you opened that door, this whole area would be contaminated. Your battle-suits would protect you, but the people in the neighborhood would be affected.” The AI replied.

Michael looked at the ordinary-looking house, now feeling as if it was a live mine. “Well, damn… things have been going too easy… so, what now?”

“I already alerted a decontamination team we put together, and their transporter will arrive in half an hour. They need to neutralize the virus before you can enter the premises. The Russian authorities have offered to assist us and will block a one-mile radius perimeter around the house. We also need to test the surrounding houses for the infected.” The AI responded. “The best thing you can do is wait and not get in the way.”

Michael and the team returned to their transporter and did as instructed. Half an hour later, one big transporter landed at the nearby intersection and fifty people in hazmat suits exited. By that time, the police and military have already arrived in great numbers, blocking all traffic and movement. To Michael, it looked as if they kicked the hornet’s nest.

He approached one of the members of the decontamination team, while his colleagues were busy taking samples of air and earth, and were wrapping the entire house in cellophane.

“How long is this going to take?” Michael asked.

“Sir, we will be done in an hour. As soon as the house is secured, so no more viruses can get out, we are going to fumigate with the caustic agent to neutralize the virus.”

Michael and the others returned to the transporter and waited until the professionals were done with their jobs. It was always one of the most disliked parts of the missions, also known as hurry up, and wait. Another transporter came with the doctors, and they were soon joined by members of the Russian police, and they went from house to house, checking for any signs of infection.

“I’m bored,” Al said. “Can we at least go and grab something to eat?”

Tyron looked at him. “If you take off that helmet, I promise you, you will not be bored. In fact, maybe you should do it, and go to the house before it is cleared. That way we can see what effect this new disease has on our upgraded bodies, and how our nanites are actively fighting it.” Tyron replied.

“Ah… I think I just lost my appetite. I’ll pass.”

Michael rolled his eyes and returned to the thing he was doing before. The present crisis didn't mean his other job, being the Leader of the Solarian union, could be put on hold. Using his CEI, he went to the last batch of documents he had to read and digitally sign. He remembered when Max excitedly explained that with the implant, he could always be connected, and far more productive. From this point in time, he was not so sure about that particular selling point anymore.

“It seemed we were lucky for once,” Max’s voice emanated from the speakers, an hour later. “The house was well sealed due to the cold, so not enough viral particles got outside to infect anyone. You can go inside now; the virus has been neutralized.”

They approached the wrapped house, while several people in hazmat suits were using portable sprayers to saturate the outside grounds with a fine mist. There was now a portable plastic airlock mounted in front of the house entrance.

Michael was glad that his helmet prevented him from smelling anything outside, everything was covered with a neutralizing agent, even the four decomposing bodies in the living room. Luckily, they were already placed in taped up transparent body bags, prepared for transport.

“Those are the thieves that went into the facility with Pyotr,” Max said.

“Well, I don’t think they committed suicides,” Pete said, pointing at gunshot wounds that riddled their bodies.

“Especially this one,” Al replied, standing in front of one body bag. “Those are exit wounds on his chest, so it would be quite a feat to shoot himself in the back—unless he was double-jointed.”

“Get serious,” Michael said, “and start searching the place, there must be some clue of what happened here.”

The inside of the house was a mess, and it didn’t get that way because of the decontamination team. There were containers of takeout food remains all over the place, and some were starting to get moldy. After an hour of intensive search, they couldn’t find anything that would give them the next clue. The four terrorists were obviously killed by some other party, and all traces of the perpetrators were gone.

“Whoever killed them, cleaned up the place of any evidence,” Michael muttered.

“They could have at least taken out all the trash, this place is a pigsty,” Alice said while moving old newspapers with a stick.

“The trash…” Michael murmured and went inside. He needed to wait a minute for the decontamination team to cover him in neutralizing mist, as per the procedure. Then he immediately ran to the big dumpster down the street.

“You don’t think the killers would be that stupid?” Max asked through his implant.

“Never underestimate the laziness of people.” He said and opened the metal covering.

It took some time to rummage through disgusting contents of the dumpster, but among the rotten remains of food, and a few big rats that quickly scattered away, Michael found what he was searching for. A big black garbage bag that held something heavy; he opened it and looked inside. There were remains of four broken phones and one used plastic protection suit.

“I guess they were stupid after all.”

The garbage bag was brought to the house and sprayed by a neutralizing agent.

“Can you pull something out of this?” Michael asked Max, making sure that his camera suit picked up all the pieces of electronics that were broken into little pieces.

“Bring it to the transporter, and we shall see.” The AI replied.

They hurried to their spacecraft, and following Max’s instruction, Michael put all the smashed electronics into a mini nano-factory that was part of their emergency gear. The metallic goo crawled all over it, concentrating on a few small bits of the printed circuit.

“He broke the memory card, but he didn’t damage the chip itself.”

“He?” Michael asked.

“Yes, it seemed five people were living in that house.”

The holo-screen on the transporter lit up and showed the picture of five smiling men, sitting in the backyard of the house they had just left.

“The fifth one is missing; I’m running facial recognition as we speak—it may take a few minutes.”

Exactly two minutes later, Max’s face appeared on the screen. “I found him, one Amir al-Vasir. He was in the country on a student visa, but last night he left it. He boarded the special medical aid flight to Washington D.C. Nine and a half hours ago, and will be arriving at the Ronald Reagan National Airport in exactly one hour.”

“Can we get there in time?” Michael asked.

“Yes, with a sub-orbital flight—I suggest you fasten your seat-belts.”

The transporter started rising rapidly into the air, and Michael and the others hurried to their seats, after securing their prisoner with a few ties.

“Michael, one more thing,” The AI said. “I managed to retrieve one additional image from the phone. It’s a weather map that centers on the White House, and air currents of this time of year are superimposed over the image.”

There was no need to reply, they all knew what that meant.

***

Washington, D.C.

Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport

It was one of the fastest and most turbulent flights they have taken in the transporter. There were usually safety limiters that prevented the governing MI from going over the g-force limit that inertial dampers could counteract, but Max disabled them. Consequently, during a few stages of their flight, the gravitational forces were extreme, which was evident by their bound passenger, whose body was beginning to leak gases and fluids.

“Will he be alright?” Michael asked, indicating their prisoner while holding onto his armrests.

“He should be, I’m almost 70 % sure. Don’t worry, I will fix him if he gets broken,” the AI replied.

Transporters were quite different from the Excalibur, which had a greater percentage of its internal space dedicated to unseen machinery and could achieve far greater speeds without its passengers being the wiser. As their name said, they were created for transport, not coming even close to the maximum speed the spaceship could achieve.

“How are we on time?”

“Good, we will be on the ground five minutes before the plane lands, and we broke another speed record.” The AI answered. “You should be extra careful with apprehending him. This particular virus strain is quite different from the one used for the widespread attack. The contamination team analyzed it, and the Russians shared all data on it. This one is ten times more dangerous and virulent. Right now, we are barely managing the numbers of infected victims; if this new plague gets out… we’re going to fall behind, and that means a hell of a lot more casualties.”

Michael nodded. “Okay, we need to be fast and inconspicuous; as soon as you spot him, engage. We need to get him and the virus out of there before people start to panic.”

“And you cannot have your battle-suits on for this operation without causing a panic. The camouflage will be a disadvantage in crowds. While people may not see you, they will bump into you. There are sweatsuits in your emergency gear; I suggest you put them on.” Max informed them.

Trying to dress while being pressed into their seats by g-forces was not something any of them wanted to try, so they waited until the transporter slowed down for the landing, and then rushed to discard their equipment and get into new clothes.

The transporter was under full camouflage so they exited it close to the maintenance entrance, avoiding security checks that would have taken too much time. Michael put a baseball cap on, that was for some reason part of the emergency gear; hoping that no one would recognize him since now he was a public figure with his face plastered too often over the TV screens.

Ronald Reagan National Airport was one of the transportation hubs for the US, and normally a beehive of activity, but these were no ordinary times since people were scared to travel and there was a ban on most flights. This one was different since it carried medical professionals that were part of an international effort to stop the spread of the disease.

Michael and the team rushed to the airport, making sure not to draw too much attention to themselves, and arrived in time as the people were starting to disembark from the plane for Moscow.

Max used their CEIs and ocular implants to scan the faces of the newly arrived passengers; looking for the man in the picture they retrieved from Russia. In less than a minute, the man was spotted, and a red halo was superimposed over his body.

Amir al-Vasir was smiling as he was exiting the gate. There was nothing unusual about him, just a normal young man walking out from a long flight.

Michael didn’t know if it was a newly installed decontamination station waiting for the passengers, or the intense scrutiny he and his team were giving him even while trying to be inconspicuous, that alerted the man. Maybe it was some instinctive feeling that prey gets when entering the trap; no matter how—he made them. His whole posture and body language changed in an instant.

The entire capture plan they made was scrapped at that moment, there was no time to waste.

“Get him!” He sent through his CEI comms, as his body suddenly exploded into action.

The time slowed down as he activated his Boost, and started running, unnaturally fast, towards the man. All the chemicals coursing through his body were enabling him to leave Olympic athletes in the dust, yet even that was not fast enough to stop the alerted man to quickly reach into his pocket and throw the small container into the crowd.

Michael could not change his direction and go after it since his body had already gained too much momentum to reach it in time.

“Catch it!” he screamed through the link, hoping that others would be in the right place to intercept the container’s flight before it reached the ground and broke.

He was already in front of the man, and saw the fear in his eyes, just before he delivered a measured punch that knocked a young terrorist out. Michael immediately looked in the direction the container was thrown, only to see Alice catching it, a few inches above the floor.

“Create a distraction, we need to get lost,” he sent, and in the next moment all of them started moving toward the exit where the transporter was parked. He supported the man from one side, and Tyron from the other, while people were starting to react to the alarming situation. A few airport security agents were running toward them when a loud voice screamed, “He’s got a gun! Run for your lives!” It was Pete’s voice, creating the distraction they needed to make a successful extraction.

It was a stampede, with people going in all directions from the epicenter of the warning. Michael and the team took advantage of the situation they created, while airport security was trying to make heads and tails of what was happening. Not a nice thing to do, and it clashed with what one was allowed to yell in public places, but under the circumstances, they really didn’t have time to explain themselves. If people were inconvenienced and scared, well, it was a small price to pay considering they were almost victims of a biological terrorist attack.

A few minutes later, an invisible transporter lifted-off into the air, while the whole airport was being subdued by many TSA agents.