“Whoa, what’s going on?”
The voice came over a radio speaker. “Nothing, sir. Please put these on.” He reached forward, extending a pair of expensive-looking eyeglasses.
“Hold . . . what?”
The two soldiers on either side grabbed him roughly by the arms. Their grip was crushing—almost supernaturally strong.
Again came the radio voice from that inscrutable mirrored faceplate in front of him. “I said, put these on.”
“Okay. For chrissake. What’s going on?” The twin guards relaxed their grip enough for him to take the glasses—heavy things—and put them on.
As he did so, the view in front of him suddenly changed to reveal a sixth person in the room—a ghostly apparition that was kneeling next to Strickland’s lone patient among the rows of beds. He could hear it whispering.
“Oh my god . . .”
As Strickland spoke, the apparition turned and stood. It then walked calmly and methodically toward him. It was unaccountably the translucent apparition of . . . apparently of an SS officer with full trench coat, monocle, and peaked hat.
Strickland tried to back up, he was so startled, but the guards held him fast.
The ghostly Nazi came right up to Strickland’s terrified face. “Now ve can see each other. Do you know of me, mein Herr?”
“Do I know of you? I don’t even know what you are!”
“It was a yes or no qvestion. And yet it vas seemingly beyont you.” The ghostly Nazi turned to the real-world soldiers. “Place ze cap on him.”
Strickland struggled as one of the men approached with what looked like a water polo helmet. Wires led from it to a controller. They began to strap it to his head.
“Hold it! I’ll tell you what you want! You don’t have to do this!”
The Nazi pulled out a long black cigarette filter and lit a cigarette. He took a long drag. “It tastes so much better at zis resolution.” He turned to Strickland and gestured at his headwear. “Ze cap on your head uses near infrared to measure blood acktifity in your brain. In short—it tells me if you’re lying.”
“I just work here. I was taking care of him.” Strickland could already see a real-life, human medical team moving over to his patient—half a dozen men and women holding IVs and wheeling a stretcher.
The SS officer laughed a unique, wicked laugh. “I haf no idea vat you’re saying . . . but it sounds terrified.” Then he focused his spectral gaze on Strickland. “Ver you ze one who injured mein Freund?”
“No! I swear it!”
The Nazi paused a moment and then nodded—before asking, “Do you know ver I can find ze perpetrators?”
“No.”
He spoke more insistently. “Do you know ver I can find zem!”
“No! I don’t know!”
There was a pause. The Nazi nodded again. “Vill zey be coming back to zis place?”
Strickland waited as long as he dared—then nodded. “Yes.”
“Gut, gut, mein Herr! Ve are just about finished here.” He walked right up to Strickland, blowing virtual smoke in his face—causing Strickland to cough out of instinct. “Tell me . . . vould you haf enjoyed harming mein Freund—if you had ze chance?”
Strickland just stared. His mouth was suddenly dry as he looked into the ghostly eyes only inches from his own. They were insanely real—as was the gleam in them when the Nazi smiled.
“Zat’s vat I thought. . . .” He turned to the soldiers. “Secure him, gentlemen....”
A soldier pulled the cap off his head.
“Hold it! Hold it!” Strickland looked to the faceplate of the soldier to his right, then to his left. “It’s wrong! The machine is wrong!”
The soldiers grabbed his wrists and slammed his hands against the wall with incredible force. They seemed to have artificial musculature in their suits that he was helpless to resist.
They placed steel restraints over his wrists and then tapped the wall looking for studs—finally using a power tool to bolt the restraints in place. They repeated the process for his struggling feet.
“No! Stop!”
Meanwhile, the spectral Nazi just stood observing, smoking his cigarette on its long filter.
The soldiers finally stood. “Done, sir!”
“Gut. Leave us.”
The soldiers exchanged looks and left in a hurry. As they did, a deep rumbling noise came to Strickland’s ears. It was like a slow, rolling thunder. Through the wide infirmary doorway came a hellish-looking motorcycle covered in blades and mystical sigils and glyphs. Another one followed it.
“Oh my god . . .”
They pulled up alongside the apparition and slammed down hydraulic kickstands. Both of them extended fiendish sword arms with a ring of steel.
“No!”
The Nazi removed his trench coat and hung it on the extended blade of a nearby bike. Then he rolled up his sleeves. He moved toward Strickland along with the second motorcycle. “I do so enjoy my vork. . . .”
Part Three
July
Gold:$4.189USD/oz.
Unleaded Gasoline:$18.87USD/gallon
Unemployment:32.3%
USD/Darknet Credit:202.4
Chapter 23: // Ultimatum
Violence Spreads as Dollar Slides—Marauding gangs of heavily armed immigrant workers are terrorizing entire counties in Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, and Oklahoma, prompting calls for martial law in several Midwestern states and causing locals to take up arms in self-defense. With hyperinflation and never-before-seen gas prices invalidating the economies of entire communities, officials fear civil order has begun to break down.
With the U.S. military thinly stretched overseas, private security firms have contracted with several Midwestern municipalities to restore order and suppress looting.
The heads of America’s intelligence services sat around a circular boardroom table in Building OPS-2B of National Security Agency headquarters. Now outnumbering them at the table was a wide array of private intelligence and military analysts, led by familiar executives from Computer Systems Corporation (CSC), its subsidiaries—EndoCorp and Korr Military Solutions—and the lobbying firm, Byers, Carroll, and Marquist (BCM).
The atmosphere was tense. On a bank of flat-screen televisions behind them, a dozen news channels were silently chronicling the meltdown of the American economy in animated graphics. But the real headlines were reserved for the fate of the U.S. dollar. All the graphs were heading down at a precipitous angle.
Their host opened the meeting.
NSA: “Ladies and gentlemen, we’re facing a grave situation. As we sit here, the United States government has lost control of portions of its communications and air defense assets. At the same time, civil disorder is spreading throughout the Midwest, and the dollar is plummeting on foreign markets. I’m hearing calls for martial law coming from lobbyists on Capitol Hill. More worrisome is the talk I’ve heard about implementing Army Regulation 500-3.”
BCM: “It’s being brought up with good reason.”
NSA: “What reason?”
CSC: “Army Regulation 500-3 was intended to preserve civil order in the event government communications are severed due to nuclear attack, natural disaster—”