Beethoven Virus Ch. 02

This story is part of an ongoing series. The chronological order of my stories is listed in WifeWatchman's biography.

Feedback and constructive criticism is very much appreciated, and I encourage feedback for ideas.

This story contains graphic scenes, language and actions that might be extremely offensive to some people. These scenes, words and actions are used only for the literary purposes of this story. The author does not condone murder, racism, racial language, violence, rape or violence against women, and any depictions of any of these in this story should not be construed as acceptance of the above.

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Part 6 - Swamp Frogs At Work

"He likes me. He really likes me." I said in the silence of the room.

It was 9:35am, Tuesday, March 30th, and we'd just heard the real ransom demand from the brutal bastard whose virus had locked University Hospital down. At that moment, Teresa Croyle burst into the I.T. Room. "Okay, it's all set... uh, what?" she said as she took in Amelia crying and the somber looks of everyone else in the room.

"The passphrase didn't work." I said. "Mary, can you get that video to play again?"

Mary said "I can try." She put the eight word passphrase in again. The video played again, and this time both Myron and I recorded it on our cellphones.

"Wow." said Teresa. "Such hatred..."

"I'm sorry." Amelia sobbed. "He duped me. I was just trying to help my brother, and now he's going to die, and you're going to lose the endowment."

"No." Teresa said, patting Amelia on the back. "We're still going to help your brother."

"You will?" Amelia asked forlornly.

"Of course." Teresa said. "He's innocent in all this."

"And we're not going to be blackmailed out of that trust fund." I said with determination. "Is that not so, Mr. and Mrs. Milton?"

"Let's get back to work." Mary said...

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

Amelia was taken back to the office room used for interrogations. Her hands were still cuffed in front of her, and one ankle cuffed to the desk. I was in the breakroom that was being used as a 'command post'. Also present were Sheriff Griswold, Chief Deputy Sheriff Cindy Ross, Police Chief Moynahan, EMS Chief Cordell, Deputy Police Chief Tanya P. Muscone, Commander of Operations Teresa Croyle, Sr. Detective Joanne Warner, FBI Special Agent In Charge Jack Muscone, DEA Supervisory Special Agent Dwight Stevens, and Hospital Administrator Seth Warner.

"It doesn't make sense." Jack Muscone said as we watched Amelia on the monitor screen on the table. "She readily came in with Dwight, gave us no trouble arresting and disarming her, even though she had to know we were onto her."

"It was almost like she wanted to be caught." Tanya added.

Not letting that 'we' Jack was using bother me, I said "She did. Like she said to me before, she had to deliver the ransom, and the email system is not running. And from the way she looked at me when Teresa was disarming her, I'd say that she was even confident about it. And she stayed confident... until Teresa said the Hospital would not have rejected her brother based on insurance. She started getting shaky, unsure of herself after that."

I continued: "And then, when the passphrase didn't work, she broke down, thinking we would not honor the plea deal, and would let her brother die. But I think it was more... when she saw that slug on that video, I think she began figuring it out, and seeing that she was being hung out to dry."

"So what now, Mis-ter Crowbarrrr?" asked Chief Moynahan.

"I need to talk to Amelia some more." I said. As I got up, I said "Oh, by the way, I'm expecting a young man named Cameron Wakefield to come here to see me. Please come get me when he arrives..."

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

As I walked down the hall, Teresa walked with me. She said "The Court in Midtown denied the State Right To Life Committee's lawsuit to stop the disconnecting of the life support of the donor of Tommy Hillman's liver. They're going to cut off the machines at eleven o'clock. The life flight helicopter will take off with Amelia's brother Bobby within the hour, and should be up there shortly after eleven."

"What if the kid doesn't die right away?" I asked.

Teresa said "Bobby Sedgwick is in pretty stable condition, so they'll take him in and keep him in an E.R. room, then load him back up with the donor liver and fly them both up here. But if it starts getting to be too long, they'll just have to bring Bobby on up and get a second life flight for the liver."

"Good." I said. "Excellent work on your part. Okay, let's go talk to Amelia..."

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

We went into the 'interrogation' office, and I had Teresa uncuff Amelia from the desk but leave her hands manacled as I sat down on the other side of the desk.

"Your brother is going to be flown up here sometime today or tonight." I said. "He'll be admitted and evaluated, and his treatment will begin tomorrow morning."

Amelia made a little choking sound, then said "Thank you. I know you could rescind the plea deal..."

"Oh, despite rumors about her to the contrary," I said, "Commander Croyle has one of the greatest hearts I've ever had the privilege to meet. No way she was going to let your brother die, at least not without a good medical fight. Having said that, I need to tell you two important things."

I continued: "First, I'm honoring the plea deal, provided you truthfully answer some questions. And second, the plea deal only applies to the State level. If someone brings Federal charges against you, you're not protected. I'm seeing what I can do to get the U.S. Attorney to provide something, but you need to understand where you stand."

"And I do understand." Amelia said. "But the Federal charges won't be a problem."

"Why not?" I asked.

"Because I was ordered to do it. In writing." said Amelia. I heard Teresa gasp slightly as she peered at Amelia, who continued. "I was told that the purpose was twofold: to get my brother the medical help he needed, and to test the Hospital's response to the lockout."

"Why test us this way?" I asked. "Why not come in openly, and ask us to cooperate in a test like that. We work with FEMA on things like mass casualty situations."

Amelia said "The National Security Agency believes that the Red Chinese would target hospitals with cyberattacks in the event that the United States went to the aid of Taiwan when the Communists invade the island... or more likely nuke it out of existence when the Taiwanese use nukes to repel the Communist invaders. Taiwan does have nukes, as I'm sure you know."

"I try not to think about things like that." I replied. "But you were saying?"

Amelia: "The NSA believes that the Chinese would attack hospitals as well as core needs, such as the electric grid, the railroads, and the airports. So they wanted a real-time test of one or two hospitals, then would develop an NSA 'white paper' on preparing our hospitals when the balloon goes up for real."

Amelia: "They chose your University Hospital because, like you said, you've worked with FEMA in the past. You also may or may not know there's a bunker under the Hospital that could be used in the event of a nuclear attack on America, so this Hospital has been part of the Federal Government's Nuclear Emergency Plan for some time. And last, I was told we could kill two birds with one stone, and get my brother into treatment."

"O-kayyy." I said. "You got a copy of that letter?"

"The original is in a safe deposit box." said Amelia. "I've got copies in several places, including in my cellphone... which you confiscated from me."

"Joanne," I said to the camera, "bring in Agent Sedgwick's cellphone." To Amelia, I said "Who signed that letter?"

"Euclid Hollingsworth." Amelia said. I was shocked.

"I thought he retired." I said. "In fact, I forced him to retire." (Author's note: 'Riverboat Gambler', Ch. 02.)

And then it hit me: "Did you actually meet him, or speak with him on the phone?"

"No." Amelia said. "He did (air quotes) 'retire', like your wife (air quotes) 'retired' from the CIA. The NSA scooped him up; he's a good paper-pusher. And before you ask, the person I talked to and got the jump drive from was a woman. She only gave her name as 'Pamela', which I knew was a fake name."

"When did she give you the jump drive?" I asked as I fished out my Police iPhone.

"Right after I got the rejection letter." Amelia said. "First week of March."

I nodded. "Was this her?" I asked, showing a photo on my iPhone. Amelia looked at it and gasped.

"Yes!" Amelia said. "That's her! How... how did you know?"

"Ohh," I said, as I showed the photo to Teresa, then to the camera, "I happen to remember she was around these here parts during that time."

The photo showed the face of Dr. Robin Isley, who'd been in the City at that time, working her ass off to frame Wes Masters. (Author's note: 'Who Watches The Watchers'.)

"Okay, Amelia," I said, "I'm not going to ask you any more questions. We're going to take you to Police Headquarters, pending your hearing to have the Judge sign off on your plea deal. I suggest you get a really good lawyer, and have him contact U.S. Attorney John Jones to try to get a plea deal with him, too."

Amelia said "Why do I need that?"

I replied "Amelia, the Swamp Frogs have duped you. They got you to do their dirty work for them, and now they plan to pull the rug out from under you. I think you're going to find that that order from Euclid Hollingsworth is not worth the paper it's printed on. Again, for your future, get a good lawyer, have him contact U.S. Attorney John Jones..."

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

10:30am. After Amelia Sedgwick was taken away by Uniformed Officers, Teresa and I went back to the breakroom 'command post', which was now a beehive of renewed activity.

"I tried to call Hollingsworth." said DEA SSA Dwight Stevens. "His phone went straight to voicemail. I've also called around to see if anyone knew where he was. All I kept getting was 'He retired, didn't he?'."

Jack Muscone said "I called U.S. Attorney John Jones for you. He's on his way up from Lexington. He'll probably give Amelia some kind of deal or even immunity, if she'll give him everything she knows about all this."

"The only thing she could do is pick Robin Isley out of a lineup as the 'Pamela' that coordinated this with her." I said. "After that, it's 'she said, she said'. So we got nuthin."

I then added: "And guys, just so you know... I fucked up today. Bad. Real bad." That got everyone's attention.

"What?" Tanya asked. "You identified Amelia as a suspect, you took her into custody without a fight, got her to cooperate, and it wasn't her fault the passphrase didn't work."

I said "Where I went wrong is that I gave Amelia the plea deal without considering the possibility of Federal charges. I should have told her ahead of time that she needed both, and gotten John Jones up here to work the Federal deal with her. I don't think that's going to come back to bite me in my fourth point of contact, but in another situation it could have been a real issue------"

*KNOCK!* *KNOCK!* *KNOCK!* *KNOCK!*

The door opened to reveal a Uniformed Officer with a college-aged teenager, who had long dark hair being worn in Carole's style: straight bangs, straight hair framing his face. He also had glasses, and was wearing a concert t-shirt, khaki windbreaker, and jeans.

"This guy said he was called here by Commander Troy." said the Officer.

"Yes, yes he was. Thank you, you can go." I said. The Officer exited and I said "Everyone, this is Cameron Wakefield...

Part 7 - Wakefields At Work

10:45am. I went into the I.T. Room, followed by Teresa and Cameron Wakefield. "How's it going?" I asked.

"We're battling, sir." said Mary Milton. I knew that meant things were 'not good'.

"Well, I brought you some help for the battle." I said, then raised my voice and said to everyone: "Everyone, this is Cameron Wakefield. He is the first person in this State to score a perfect 1600 on the SAT." (Author's note: 'Shipping & Handling', Ch. 03.)

I continued: "He's in his second year at State Tech, on a combined undergrad/graduate degree program, majoring in computer systems. And he's here to help us."

"Hi Cameron!" Mary Milton said, getting up and giving young Cameron a warm hug, snuggling her 'baby bump' into him.

"You know him?" Myron Milton asked.

"Yeah, Cameron was at the cyber-security conference that Ashton Cardigan gave last Autumn." Mary said. "Here, Cameron, sit between me and Miltie, so we can see what you're doing and help you." They sat down, and Mary got Cameron's computer going.

I watched as they went to work. Myron began bringing Cameron up to speed, while Mary brought me up to speed.

"Sir," she said, "we've attempted some inroads, but the virus just sees every attempt we make and attacks it. I think it may be learning what we do as we do it."

"Yeah, it is." said Cameron Wakefield as he began typing.

"You ever see anything like this, Cameron?" I asked.

"Uh, not really, sir." Cameron said. "But my brother's code group showed me something that was really advanced, that may be the base code for this..." His voice trailed off as he began concentrating hard, and typing furiously. "Mary, if I may call you Mary, check the kernel code. Myron, check the pathways..."

"Why don't you go check on the life flights?" I said to Teresa, seeing that she was bored watching the furious typing and jumbles of symbols on the screens. She did not argue at all as she swiftly exited the room...

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

I received a text asking me to report to the O.R. areas on the second floor. I went upstairs and was met by four doctors: Dr. Jerry Hinton, Dr. Chris Hinton, Dr. Leonard R. Cordell, and Dr. Laura Fredricson.

"We have a problem." said Dr. Cordell. "All of the O.R. equipment was part of the computer systems, mostly for monitoring purposes, but some for fast testing. Now it's all shut down."

"We can't possibly operate on that kid coming up for the liver transplant?" said Dr. Jerry Hinton.

I said "Do y'all have any old equipment? Did you keep anything after you replaced them with the new stuff?"

"Yes." Laura said. "But most of it was sent to the Hospice wing, and was wired to the systems, though."

"Anything in a storage area?" I asked. "In a storage closet somewhere?"

I saw my wife's face change as something dawned on her. She said "I need to borrow Teresa for a moment... and a couple of Officers to seal off Wing 1-4."

That meant the southeast wing on the first floor, and I knew what she was thinking. That was where the underground shelter was, and there were several O.R.s worth of equipment down there. I grabbed my Police radio and called for Teresa...

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

12:10pm. I went back into the I.T. Room. The Miltons and Cameron Wakefield were working well together, but were not making much progress.

"You guys want pizza or Subway subs for lunch?" I asked. Subways were the overwhelming consensus. I made a call to order them.

Twenty minutes later the subs arrived. An orderly in lavender scrubs, wearing a surgical head covering and mask, came in with them. He had curly black hair, a handsome face that was a bit 'swarthy', and a fit body.

"Oh, hey!" Cameron said when he looked up as the orderly handed him a Subway sandwich... and a jump drive. As Mary and Myron were handed their sandwiches (by me), Cameron plugged the jump drive into the laptop he was using.

After distributing the rest of the sandwiches, the orderly left. I'd paid him, and as he was about to leave, Teresa caught his eye. Then she looked at me as he left.

"Who was that?" Mary asked Cameron.

"He's my------"

*CLAP!* It was my hand on Cameron's shoulder that had stopped him from talking further.

"Just don't say any more, Cameron." I said. "He put his life on the line to bring you that jump drive."

"Who is he, sir?" Mary asked.

"Lieutenant," I said with authority, "don't ask questions *I* don't want you to know the answer to. Is that clear?"

"Uh, yes sir." Mary said...

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

12:30pm. Teresa and I went into the command post room. The people in there were enjoying the Subways I had sent to their room. I ate my own sub with some Cherry Coca-Cola Zero and felt much better.

Afterwards, I said to Teresa "Let's go check and see if the O.R. is prepped for Tommy's transplant operation."

"We just got word on that." said Chief Moynahan. "Chief Soltis called me. The donor kid died, and they were removing the liver. By now it should be on the way, along with Bobby Sedgwick."

"Good. Thank you, sir." I said, then nudged my shoulder for Teresa to follow me on out. We went down the hallway, and I said "Let's step outside a minute, and get some fresh air."

We went through the lobby and out the front door, seeing the Eternal Flame in front of us. The rest of the Hospital was down, but that Flame still burned brightly. To our left, at the edge of the south parking lot, we could see the awning of the Police tent, and bitterly angry reporters being kept from accessing the Hospital.

Teresa said "That orderly's eyes looked just like Cameron Wakefield's. And he looked very familiar, but I can't quite place where I saw him before.."

I said quietly: "You're right. He's Cameron Wakefield's older brother, Donovan Wakefield. He's one of the top computer programmers in the nation, if not the world, and Cameron is going to be even better than he is. And I'll bet you can figure out what was on that jump drive he gave Cameron."

Teresa thought about it, then said "Ohhh... Cerberus and Charrington!"

"Yes. Excellent!" I said, happy that Teresa was on it. "And yes, the guy looks familiar to you because he is Porlock!" (Author's note: 'Price No Object', Ch. 04.)

Teresa said "Ohhh... and they used Cerberus and Charrington to get past the Hospital's cyber-security and damage all our systems. And Porlock just gave Cameron the Cerberus and Charrington codes."

"Parts of them, anyway." I said. "And I hope it's enough that Cameron and the Mighty Miltons can defeat the Swamp Frogs and their nasty virus. But my bottom line is that both Cameron and Donovan came through, and now I think we have a chance of beating this thing."

"Good." Teresa said. "Because I was going to have them liquidate the trust to pay the ransom. It's not worth the lives of these kids, and them suffering."

"I am not going to let you do that." I replied. "That endowment will save untold numbers of kids through the research it pays for. We can get these current patients to other Hospitals if we need to. And it will be a cold day in Hell before I let that despicable son of a bitch Brendan Chapel steal your inheritance..."

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

The second floor O.R. wing was very quiet. Nurses were silently working on their tasks. As Teresa and I came up to the nurses station just outside the restricted areas, Laura came up to us, wearing lavender scrubs. She had us step into the nearby waiting room... a waiting room I'd spent entirely too much time in over the years, waiting to hear if fellow Police Officers would live or die. But I digress...

Laura said quietly "I brought up as much of the equipment as I could from the underground shelter. It'll be enough to do the transplant on Tommy Hillman. But we can't hook it up to the systems, and there's some equipment we really should have that we won't have in there."

"But you can operate." I said.

"Yes." Laura said. "But liver transplants are among the most complex and toughest transplants to do. Heart transplants have become all but routine... not to diminish the skill needed to do them, but they've become straightforward. But liver transplants are more rare, and more difficult to do. And this one is going to be that much tougher with the limited equipment we have available to us."