The Infectious Disease Project (part 1)

Day 1,103 post-Virus

Okay Dick, this is getting tiresome. I asked you to speak with Sheila about her recent behaviour, and I know for a fact that you haven’t done so? Hmm? How? Well she told me, that’s how! Did you really think you could get away with not performing your duties in my lab? Frankly Dick, I don’t know whether to be more angry or disappointed... I mean, it was critical that you speak to her! She claims she can’t understand my “base human tongue”, but I can read her output just fine, oh yes! Not the first mass spec I’ve worked with, but unquestionably the most stubborn one! I mean, who does she think she is, telling me how to do my job? I can analyse those samples just fine without her, I’ll just ask Gary to help for once! What’s that? Gary’s out of commission? By god, have you ever seen such a lazy gas chromatograph?! What is it this time? Wait, no, let me guess - stomach pains. Am I right? Of course I am. I gave him a check up a month ago, he was fine. Granted, the anatomy of a gas chromatograph and that of a human isn’t quite the same, but... insides are insides, right?

How am I supposed to get any work done in such an unprofessional environment? The Dynasty expects me to work my ass off in these labs, alone, and just miraculously tell them how the Virus appeared? Good one guys! I don’t have half the assay materials I need, and the so-called “Scavenger Squad” always prioritises the boring medical supplies. How many times do I need to tell them, I DON’T NEED SCALPELS! The constructs are permanently sterile, always sharp, and a moment away. But no, those fools continue to bombard me with all the scalpels and forceps they can find, not to mention vacuum tubes and other physics-related items. I mean honestly, how dense do you have to be to confuse Atlanta and Boston? I may run the Branch, but I don’t have a teleporter to Boston - bringing the applied sciences material to Atlanta is just a massive waste of resources. I should mention this to whichever idiot is in charge of that squad...

I could understand the medical equipment if we had a physician who didn’t have constructs, but at the minute, I am the hospital and treatment complex. Don’t get me wrong, Dick, no one’s at risk: I can handle the meagre trickle of injured supers we get arriving here every so often. Usually they just have a booboo that the incompetent field medics couldn’t fix. “Field medic”. Hah. Don’t make me laugh. Hahah. Hah. My god, how dare they even say the word “medic”! They have no experience, no training, just a set of powers they acquired in a freak accident and suddenly they’re regular old healers? Again, don’t make me laugh. Don’t do it, Dick. Don’t. I already have that moron “Doctor Science” trying to make me laugh every two minutes, I just can’t deal with more “humour”. I don’t even want to open that whole can of “Science” beans. He just... Ooooh, he makes my blood boil.

Moving on as swiftly as is possible, I had big news that didn’t concern the ineptitude of the world around me, machine or organic. Hmm? What was it? Well, precisely! You tell me! I know you don’t know Dick, it was a joke. Oh god, I’m making them too now! I’ll need to work on a vaccine...

AHA! Vaccine! That was it. I had a devious plan, Dick. In fact, once I tell you, and that information is stored within your circuits, you’ll be called “Dick Dastardly”!

...

Of course, you don’t get it. You’re ignorant of everything good in life! You didn’t know Scooby-Doo, what are the odds you’d know “Whacky Races”... I really need a new, non-useless friend. But no time for that, no time! Because of the discovery, yes! Well, the idea more than the discovery.

Here’s the idea, Dick: this Wildcard fellow, a standup Dynasty citizen, he’s been setting up whorehouses - calls them “Morale Centres”, because apparently euphemisms weren’t killed off during the outbreak. Anyway, these “Morale Centres”, some of them are mobile. They send out whores to our outposts, including Atlanta of course. But I thought - and here’s the really clever part - if migrating animals can act as vectors for diseases, why can’t migrating whores? In other words, we infect the mobile “Morale Centre” workers with some virus of my invention, to which we provide the vaccine to all Dynasty citizens. We open the mobile “Morale Centres” - you know what, I’m going to call them “MMC”s. I’m tired of repeating myself. Have I mentioned that before?

Anyway, we open the MMCs to the public, the “Loners” and even the US. Yep, you heard me Dick, the US. We sprea- one second.

''HEY! GARY! SHUT UP, I’M TALKING WITH DICK HERE, AND WE NEED SILENCE! WHAT? YOUR STOMA- YEAH, OF COURSE IT HURTS, SURE. WHAT ELSE IS NEW, GARY? HUH? NOTHING? I THOUGHT NOT. SO SHUT UP AND LEAVE ME ALONE BEFORE I GET “DOCTOR” SCIENCE TO OPERATE ON YOU! YOU KNOW I’LL DO IT GARY! YOU KNOW I WILL!''

What was I even saying? MMC... Loners... Ah, yes! The US. We allow the US troops and citizens the use of our MMCs, but only those ones which have infected “workers”. We therefore continue to operate a normal service in Dynasty territory, by sending out a vaccine to all Dynasty citizens - and the “workers” themselves, of course - but as soon as we stray out of it, we either put a dent in US morale and fight capacity or make Loners sick. These sick Loners will soon hear of our wonderful healthcare services, provided by yours truly (and whoever he manages to train by then), and wander directly into Dynasty territory, where they will be worked on by psychics and other Dynasty agents, and recruited. As I said, devious.

However, if you really think that this is the whole story, you’ve learned nothing in the past few years, Dick. No, I’ve thought of everything: if the US finds their troops becoming ill after visiting whorehouses - I mean, MMCs - they’ll get suspicious. So, we’ll ensure that they don’t find out. How, you ask? Well, elementary, my dear... Dickson? Forget that. In any case, it’s simple. The disease will be a modified norovirus combined with a herpes virus. HSV2 and norovirus, a fantastic combination which I intend to modify such that sexual contact is the only means of spreading it, but its locus of action is that of a traditional norovirus - intestinal. It’s the perfect combination, and I worked on it at length: a virus with a short incubation, but not so short that it can be directly attributed to the MMC, with a locus of action completely separate from the locus of insertion, and with symptoms annoying enough to cause a dip in morale and induce war-weariness, but not bad enough to kill (in most situations at least). I am calling it “The Infectious Disease Project”.

All I need now is to talk to the Wildcard fellow after gaining Council approval. I’ll be getting in touch with Agricolas in the near future to discuss with him. I’ve told you about him, he’s a good man. We like him, Dick. He’s our friend, our ally, maybe the only one we have in this world...

Speaking of world, what in the world is that racket?! SHEEEEEEEEEEEILAAAAAAAAAAA!!

PART 2