Chapter 70

The next five days were filled with women and girls on their backs with their knees up. In the sex department it seemed I had become the converse of a Queen Bee. My specific function seemed now to be reserved for fertilizing females, many of them.

I also spent hours each day greeting hundreds of followers, shaking their hands and trying to say something clever in the fifteen or twenty seconds I spent with them. My right hand was swollen from all the handshaking.

Mike now had thirty people out checking on cattle, hogs, chickens, and turkeys. He had found the people he'd sought in East Texas. They had indeed been tending chickens and turkeys. They even had brooder houses in operation and two large laying houses.

His last report to me said we had thousands of dozens of eggs and over sixty thousand chickens and turkeys, some nearing maturity. They would soon need processing. Margaret told me a processing plant near Mt Pleasant had been earmarked for our use and we would have enough knowledgeable people to operate it.

Other reporting followers were trained to harvest the standing crops which were salvageable and they were already working on it. Hundreds of abandoned hay meadows were being given a last cutting and food stocks seemed now to be the least of our worries.

After learning of my fetish for Ranch Style Beans, Margaret, who seemed to have information on every available bulk storage facility in the states, dispatched trucks to retrieve pinto beans from scattered warehouses all over. The main place for canning Ranch Style Beans was indeed in Ft Worth and Margaret intended to process the pintos until we ran out of cans to put them in.

Frank was all set up to transfer data now. He was already going all over Dallas/Ft Worth with his uplink team, portable generators, and fuel trucks. He'd even gotten one of the major ISP's servers running and all the newsgroups were back online via these servers. Of course there was nobody left to post to them. Oh well, at least now when I got on ASSD I could finally get in the last word on Desdmona.

We had Hawkeyes in the air all the time now and though they had located a few smaller groups and were keeping tabs on them, they hadn't discovered anything which looked like an immediate threat.

Margaret told me within a few days we would get members in who would know how to access the spy satellites still whirling away overhead. She predicted soon we would get an idea of what was going on all over the world. These upcoming arrivals would also have people who would be able to check on the ballistic missiles I had been worrying about. She expected to be able to launch them soon even though she couldn't foresee any need for anything of the sort.

Billy's group had been located and had been contacted. He didn't want to have anything to do with us. His entire group wasn't of the same mind though. Two more of his men had slipped away to join us and brought six women with them. After the nurses checked the men out they were faithful followers. After these men spent a night or two with their own women, those women's loyalty was assured too.

Billy's group now stood at eight men and around forty women. We had them located and basically surrounded. We only allowed them a small area for operations. I felt sure sooner or later he would just give up. We kept plenty of hardware and personnel around him to make sure he was contained.

What could go wrong now? I was sure I would be one of the first to know. I hoped it wouldn't be anything devastating, but I knew something must be coming to upset the works.

It arrived from the most unexpected direction. Aimee returned to me tonight and we were alone in my bedroom. I didn't tease or role-play forced sex with her this time. I treated her like the wonderful jewel she was and concentrated on letting her know I loved her and wanted her to have my child.

I wasn't trying to trick Aimee. I didn't think she really needed to be turned back to me. She explained her feelings to me and I just assumed Johnny hadn't really been able to complete the trick on her.

When we made love though, Aimee did lose consciousness. She went out like the proverbial light and she stayed out. I didn't really worry about it for nearly an hour - after then though I began having doubts. I hadn't preformed the procedure at all but she was still unresponsive. I had been in her as deeply as I could get, but that alone had never caused anything like this.

Fifteen minutes later with no change I put on a T-shirt, some pants, and went looking for Karen, Diane, and Janet. Nancy was with them and she came also. When we got back to Aimee she was unchanged.

The doctors checked her pulse and respiration and found nothing wrong. We were just about to have Henny warm up a Huey and put Aimee on a stretcher to take her to the hospital. We had put one into service in anticipation of later need. Then Aimee moved and moaned.

She seemed to be talking in her sleep. She didn't come around right at first, but seemed to be dreaming now, tossing and turning and mumbling nonsense. I couldn't decide if I was relieved or not. I stayed right by her on the bed and put my arms around her.

Aimee's eyes opened and at first she looked frightened. Her eyes were wide and she didn't seem to be focusing on me or on anyone. She gasped as if in horror. It was like her eyes were open but she was still dreaming.

"The virus. Wah wa we all have it," Aimee said, stuttering.

"What did you say Aimee?" I asked, but got no response.

She closed her eyes again then and lay back limply. She tossed and wiggled every now and again, but was obviously still out. I was worried. We were all worried. She'd said we all had the virus. What virus? Did she mean the one which caused all the deaths? It was the only thing I could think of. How did she know it was a virus?

I didn't know what to think. Was Aimee just having a nightmare? It was the most likely thing. If it was a nightmare why did she slip back to sleep? Was it sleep or another form of unconsciousness? What was wrong with Aimee and how could we help her?

I sent for Seven and when she arrived I told her the whole thing. She called Margaret right away and explained it to her. Margaret headed to the house and was bringing two of the doctors who had come in a day ago. One was a psychiatrist and the other had been one of the researchers Carlisle had hired to work on the trick.

Aimee was unchanged when they got to us about forty minutes later. They huddled together with Seven, Karen, Diane, and Janet discussing what we knew about Aimee. I noticed no one mentioned the trick by Johnny which hadn't worked. Maybe they didn't know about it.

I told them about it and explained how it had happened. Most of them were surprised that even though the physical trick had appeared to work, Aimee hadn't been changed by it.

Of course Karen, Diane, Nancy, Janet, Margaret, and Seven were surprised the most. The researcher, Marc, had an inkling of what the process was. Lester, the psychiatrist was nonplused and clearly didn't believe it. I hated taking time to explain it to him and was short on time for convincing him it was true.

I just opened Marc for instructions and made him jump through a few hoops. Then I did the same for Lester. When I closed them I released the command which kept them from remembering the procedure. Explanation over.

Marc and Lester were both amazed. Seven went on to explain to them everything she knew about the trick. It all seemed for nothing. Neither of them had any idea how to help Aimee. Then Aimee opened her eyes again. I got back on the bed with her and took her in my arms.

"We all have the virus Jack. It talked to me," Aimee said.

How could I respond? I didn't have a clue about what to say. We were all going to die if it was true. Everything we were doing was for nothing. We were dead.

"It's in everyone Jack, everyone. It talked to me and I can talk to it. They killed all those people on purpose. We weren't developing like they wanted and so they just killed most of us," Aimee said, and then slumped back.

She didn't go back under this time. She just lay there looking up at me. I lay down beside her and held her and told her everything would be all right. I sure as hell didn't know it, but it was all I could think of to do.

Everyone else was speechless. They were stunned. Of course they were stunned. We all knew what the sickness had done. Now Aimee was telling us it was a virus and we all had it. It didn't make sense she claimed to be able to talk with it. None of the rest of it made sense either. There was nothing to do but wait and see if she would say more.

I asked everyone to leave us alone. I promised them I would call them back if anything else surfaced. I felt like Aimee needed some time to rest. Even if it had been a nightmare, a nightmare like it would be very unsettling. I didn't really think it was a nightmare though. I had a feeling there was something to it, but I couldn't figure out how there could be. I hugged Aimee closer to me and just held her.

I guess I'd drifted off to sleep. I woke when Aimee stirred.

"I need to pee Jack."

"Need any help?" I asked, wondering if she could get up and walk after her ordeal.

"I've been going to the potty by myself for quite a while Jack, I think I remember how it works," Aimee said, teasing me.

"OK Nancy, uh Aimee, I just wanted to make sure you could navigate. Do you feel alright now?" I asked.

"I feel a lot better now, but I have some strange things to tell you later," she said.

They couldn't be any stranger than what she had already shared. I wasn't sure I wanted to know any more about it. That wasn't the truth though. I was dying to know. I had been beating myself up for weeks wondering about the sickness. Now it seemed Aimee might have some answers. Trouble was, I was pretty sure I wasn't going to like them.