#annlake

“Damnit Keiko!  Where the hell is that damn dress shirt?!” Captain Joe Montgomery was ripping clothes out of the closet, off the hangers.  “I need that shirt!”

Keiko stood behind him, freshly ironed dress shirt in hand, tears streaming quietly down her face.  “I ironed it for you Joe.”

Joe sighed and snatched the shirt from Keiko.  Ever since that damn coward Dr. Vector committed suicide, his irritation level had skyrocketed.  There was just too much going on and now to have the damn brass coming down to check things out.  Hell!  

Joe put the shirt on, took a couple of breaths, and gave a wry smile to Keiko.  “Thanks Babe.”  He lovingly cupped her cheek, kissed her forehead, and walked out to the living area.  He stopped long enough to slide his feet into the god forsaken dress shoes and grab his hat on the way out the door.  While he was placing it on his head, he thought how thankful he was that at least it was on the warm side so he didn’t need a jacket or coat.  

Joe started to walk up the street.  Military housing had it’s benefits, he guessed.  Close to work, no real need for a car, especially with a place as small as Ann Lake was.  He just wished he didn’t have to wear the damn dress shoes.  Fucking brass and their damn inspections!

Over at Captain Bernard “Bernie” Mickelsen’s house the scene appeared more chaotic, though it’s flow was smoother.  

Penny had laid out Bernie’s dress uniform on the bed while he was in the bathroom shaving.  Bernie still used a straight razor even though all sorts of “new fangled” options were available.  “Nothing gives you a shave like a straight razor” he said as he rubbed his very smooth chin and neck.

Penny was in the kitchen, putting together breakfast for their 5 kids.  Summer would be here soon and the kids were getting stir crazy.  It was noisy and things appeared slightly messy or out of place.  

“Bernie!  It’s almost 7, you better get a move on!  You know Joe is already in a fit, you being late will just make him even more cross!”

“You know Penny, you don’t have to yell.  It’s not like I’m on the other side of the base.”  Bernie kidded his wife.  It was their long standing thing.  Penny’s voice was as big as her heart and as loud as her personality.  Definitely one of the things he adored about her.  

“Bernie, if I were yelling, you’d know.”  She said with a smile.  She handed him his hat and held the door open for him.

Bernie caught up with Joe on the sidewalk.  

“Hey Joe.  At least the walk will be nice”

The only thing post will add to the story at hand is the names of the main characters.  Having them in writing will help me keep track of them.  

Captain Joe Montgomery, WW2 vet, middle man on the totem pole, olive complexion, dark hair and eyes, medium build, about 5′9″

Keiko Montgomery, Capt Joe’s wife, immigrant from Japan, he met her shortly after The War and brought her back to the states with him, pale skin, black hair, dark eyes, 5 foot nothing, tiny, petite, no children

Dr. Albert Johnson, ranked Colonel but prefers title of Doctor, Doctor in charge of R&D, took over when Dr. Vector died, blond, blue eyes, athletic, “jock” material, 6′2″

Beverly Johnson, wife to Dr. Albert, beauty queen runner up, sweet, soft spoken mom of 2 boys ages 5 and 7, blonde, blue eyes, shapely build, tall “for a woman” at 6′

Major Michael Crackson, first black resident of Ann Lake, first black Major in the area, Direct supervisor to Captains Joe and Bernard, Dr. Albert’s assistant, athletic build, college football player until injury forced him to stop, 6′, black hair, brown eyes

Carol Crackson, wife to Major Michael, 5′6″, shapely, black hair, brown eyes, long fingers, plays piano, teacher at local elementary, teaches music and 2nd grade, 3 kids, all girls

Captain Bernard “Bernie” Mickelsen, WW2 vet, middle man on totem pole, served in same unit at Captain Joe, drinking and poker buddies with Captain Joe, 5′10″, slim build, red hair, blue eyes, very pale skin

Dr. Timothy Vector was in charge of Research and Development at Ann Lake.  He wasn’t a military doctor.  He hated the military.  In order for him to be able to make a home for his family in the US, he agreed to the project.  He was fully aware of what the government wanted from him, what they would do with it.  

Dr. Vector didn’t start out as Dr. Vector.  Long ago he was someone else.  That man was dead now, so it didn’t matter who he was.  His wife only knew him as Timothy Vector.  The people on his team only knew him as Timothy Vector.  He wasn’t sure how many in government knew who he used to be, but he had a feeling it was very few people.  After all, the fewer people that know a secret like this one, the less likely it was that anyone would find out who didn’t need to know.

Dr. Vector had earned his degree legitimately, he’d been in the US that long.  The government payed for him to attend Harvard Medical with the sole intent of studying human biology and the ability to develop a weapon that would target people, people the government said that shouldn’t exist any more.

Dr. Vector’s program was developing a biological weapon that could be added to a water source, a poison type thing that would kill off a population slowly without being traced to the source.  At least that is what he told the government lackeys that checked in on him.  

More on that in a moment.

Before you condemn Dr. Vector completely, he was a loving man.  He had a beautiful wife, 3 adorable daughters.  He doted on his family, worshiped them.  He knew they were his true salvation.  He also knew that the government wanted to kill them, to kill everyone at Ann Lake, to show that this weapon could work.  Dr. Vector couldn’t allow them to die.  They didn’t deserve it.  The only mistake his wife had ever made was agreeing to be his wife.  He knew that the only way he could keep his family alive was to alter the weapon.  To make it work, but only in a certain way.

Back to the weapon.  

Dr. Vector hated the men in charge.  He hated the men in government.  In every government, not just the ones in the US.  He knew that all they would ever do is cause war after war because of some arbitrary need to control everyone and everything.  Those men would kill so many innocent women and children for no real reason.  He hated them because they expected him to kill his family, his innocent lovely family.

Dr. Vector did something to the weapon.  We are only now beginning to understand what that was.  It was groundbreaking in it’s ingenuity for the time.  He altered it so that it would only affect men, men past the age of puberty.  By making a tweak here and a little tweak there, he forced the weapon to zero in on the y chromosome.  It would begin to go into effect only with the increase of testosterone that a boy gets as he enters puberty.  It wouldn’t take full effect until that boy reached full physical maturity at about age 20 or so. 

The intent was that it would kill them like cancer very rapidly once it took full effect.  What he didn’t count on was the human body’s ability to adapt and modify and accommodate changes in it’s own molecular structure.  By the time Dr. Vector realized what he had done, it was too late.  Ann Lake had already been dosed.  

He killed himself when he realized that he had just sentenced his family to death, the opposite of what he had wanted to do.  He left his notes in a safe deposit box in New York City, left the keys to the box with a lawyer who had instructions to get them to any family he may have after 60 years had passed, and threw himself in front of a subway train, making sure to touch the 3rd rail as he lay there.  

Everyone always wonders why the US is so damn big.  What the hell do all of us Americans need so much fucking space for anyway?  Especially considering that a lot of it is just land, empty land.  Or at least that it what it appears to be anyway.

The middle of this country has a lot of space and very few people.  They are gathered predominantly on one shore or the other with a few by those giant lakes in the north or around the gulf at the bottom.  Lots of empty space in the middle.  What better place to have a secret military base where medical experiments are done than the middle of no where?  

The government likes that kind of thing, secret bases to do stuff they “don’t actually do”.  Top secret stuff.  Human experiment let’s see what the fuck happens for shits and giggles type of stuff.  This military base doesn’t exist.  Only those with the highest clearance work there and not even all of them fully know what is going on, what experiments are being done on them and their families.