Chapter One
Working at his computer, watching over all of the programs and systems for Division, Birkhoff was surprised when a chat came up from Medical. He clicked into it and was surprised what he found. Reading it over a couple of times and tempted to dig out his glasses from storage to make sure he wasn't seeing things, he final pushed the talk button on his ear piece. "Mikey, Nikki, I think you need to come down here." He reported.
"What's going on Birkhoff?" Michael asked back.
"Come to my office. I'll explain." Birkhoff replied.
Once they had both agreed, Birkhoff rubbed his temples. He didn't want to insight a panic but this was not good news. It was something Division had never prepared for, at least not that Birkhoff had ever been aware of. It would make sense- Amanda would know right where to attack them. It all added up far too well for his tastes.
Nikita and Michael came into Birkhoff's office. "Shut the door." Birkhoff startled both of them. Normally he would never have asked them to shut the door behind them.
"What's going on Birkhoff?" Nikita asked the uneasiness clear in her voice.
"I just got word from the lab on Agent Humenz." Birkhoff gestured for both of them to have a seat.
"On why he's been so sick? What Amanda gave him?" Michael asked for clarification as he sat on the couch beside Nikita.
Birkhoff nodded, handing a tablet to Michael so he and Nikita could look it over. ON the tablet was the lab report from medical. Reading through it for a while, Michael asked, "What does this all mean?"
Grabbing the tablet from Michael, he replied, "What it means is Amanda has infected our agent with some, so-far unidentified virus. So far medical has not been able to identify the disease. It looks like a hybrid-mixture of a bunch of infective diseases smallpox is a main player. It is very highly contagious."
Michael and Nikita both turned ghostly white. "What?" Nikita questioned, "Meaning we all will be exposed?"
Dejectedly, Birkhoff nodded. "By now it could be spread through all of Division. We have to lock down and try to treat everyone- keep it from spreading. Medical has already locked down agent Humenz."
"What's the prognosis?" Michael hesitated to ask, not sure he wanted to hear the answer.
"It's a mixture, nothing that has been seen before. Therefore there is no treatment we know will work. We are already working on cures." Birkhoff replied.
"Is there anyway to tell who has it?" Nikita questioned.
"So far" Birkhoff scratched his head in nervousness, "No, not until they become symptomatic."
"Is anyone else symptomatic?" Michael went back to business.
Shaking his head, he replied, "Not yet. But Humenz was with Amanda for three days and became symptomatic only two days ago. It could take three more days at most for anyone he came in contact with at division to show symptoms."
"So who has Humenz been in direct contact with" Nikita hoped the list was small considering he would have mostly been confined to quarters since he was sick.
Walking over to his computer, Birkhoff worked to bring up the folder on Agent Humenz's kidnapping. "Oh now." Was the first thing he said after reading the file.
"What is it?" Michael could tell by Birkhoff's body language and tone that something really bad was in the folder.
"So far the only other person who has seen him besides medical is Sonya- the debrief agent." Birkhoff stuttered, his hand fisted on the desktop.
"Sonya?" Michael had to double-check she heard it correctly.
"Oh Nerd, I'm so sorry." Nikita instantly knew this would not be good news.
"Get her to Medical, right away." Michael told Birkhoff.
With a nervous nod, Birkhoff checked the location of Sonya by her tracker. She was in Operations. As he headed off, Nikita commented, "We had better go brief Ryan."
It didn't take Birkhoff very long to get to Operations. For a moment he stood on the edge of the room, watching as Sonya and the others worked. He wished thing should just remain the same- okay that wasn't entirely true. While he was dreaming he supposed he could instead dream of them being free- never having to pimp for Division again.
Snapping back to reality, he realized that he had to fill Sonya in on what was going on. He walked slowly over to her station where she busily monitored all things Division. "Hey Sonya?" Birkhoff greeted her.
Sonya looked up at Birkhoff with a huge smile. "Seymour! What's going on?"
Trying to smile back so she wouldn't suspect anything, Birkhoff replied, "Hey, can I get your eyes on something?"
Nodding, Sonya stood up to follow him. She could tell there was something off about the way he was acting, but she just couldn't put her finger on it. It was likely he was scared and nervous, but about what she didn't know. When they got back to his lab, Sonya finally asked, "What's going on Seymour? You're acting strange."
"You have to go down to Medical." Seymour turned back towards her.
"What?" she was completely confused by his sudden announcement.
Agent Humenz is really sick. They determined that he was infected by Amanda." Birkhoff nervously explained.
"What?" Sonya gasped, falling back into the chair.
"It's some kind of mixture of deadly diseases like Smallpox." Birkhoff explained.
"Smallpox?" Sonya swallowed hard.
"That's why we have to get to Medical now- you had direct contact with Agent Humenz." Birkhoff continued.
Sonya was completely in shock. She couldn't move, paralyzed by fear. "I could have smallpox?" she repeated.
"Maybe." Birkhoff emphasized. He wanted to comfort her but for his own safety and not spreading the virus, he knew he had to avoid direct contact with her. "We'd better get you to Medical." Birkhoff commented finally.
"What?" Ryan shouted in complete disbelief. "Tell me you are kidding- that this is some kind of sick, late April fool's joke."
Michael shook his head. "I'm sorry Ryan, but this is not a joke."
Ryan suddenly grabbed a remote from his desk, shutting the blinds so no one could see in. "You're telling me that we have a smallpox outbreak?"
"Worse than smallpox. A mixture of deadly disease that is very spreadable and very hard to treat."
Ryan rubbed his temples as his brain tried to rapidly make sense of what Nikita and Michael were telling him. "We've got to go on lockdown. We have to shut down the ventilation- find out who Humenz was in contact with." He blurted out what his mind was rapidly processing.
"Ryan- calm down," Nikita announced, "We have already gotten Sonya- the only person directly in contact with him, down to Medical for isolation. Once Birkhoff is back from taking her to Medical, he will shut down the ventilation system. Then we have to come up with something to tell the agents."
Ryan nodded. "That sounds like a plan." He shakily agreed.
In all his training with the CIA, Ryan had never had to deal with this kind of issue at the CIA, the CDC would handle that part of things. Now they were stuck in an underground bunker with a potentially very deadly disease. Amanda had hit them exactly where it hurt. "There is no testing for this." Michael explained, "We have the lab techs working to try to develop a cure, but they've already said it will take a while. We could suffer terrible losses if we don't get this controlled."
"I have to give Amanda credit for one thing- it's a perfect strike." Nikita replied, "Hits us exactly where we aren't prepared."
'This is an utter nightmare." Ryan replied, "But obviously we need to beat Amanda- and save everyone we can."
No one was arguing that fact. They all sat in shocked silence until the door opened and Birkhoff rushed in. He looked more in shock than they were. They knew something was wrong when he didn't say anything. He just stood there, shaking. "Birkhoff?" Michael asked, getting no reply. "Birkhoff? What's going on?"
D…d..dead." Birkhoff stuttered.
"Who's dead?" Nikita panicked.
"Humenz." Birkhoff finally replied. "He just died."
Ryan, Nikita and Michal just looked back-and-forth. The death had come so quickly. They were going to have to act-and quickly. "What? How?" Ryan asked.
"I think we have to talk to Amanda." Nikita advised, "See what she will tell us or hint us."
Michael cocked his eyebrow. "You really think that she will give us anything?"
"She has to." Nikita replied, "You know she wouldn't want to kill us that way. She probably just wants to dwindle our numbers."
The group looked back-and-forth again. No one wanted to take the step of admitting defeat, but it would be the only way to get answers- even if it gave Amanda the power she was looking for. "Nikita's right. We have to call her."