A Novella

Michael McBride

The Calm Before the Swarm copyright © 2011 by Michael McBride

Previously published in the collection Quiet, Keeps to Himself copyright © 2011 by Michael McBride, from Thunderstorm Books

Cover photograph copyright © 2011 by Konkolas

All Rights Reserved.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from Michael McBride.

For more information about the author, please visit his website: www.michaelmcbride.net

THE CALM BEFORE THE SWARM

For Paul…the ultimate publisher/collector

Special Thanks to Paul Goblirsch, Jeff Strand, Gene O’Neill, Leigh Haig, Bill Rasmussen, Brian Keene, my family, and all of my loyal readers, without whom none of this would be possible.

THE CALM BEFORE THE SWARM

Every great advance in science has issued from a new audacity of imagination.

 

— John Dewey

 

 

Cursed is the man who dies, but the evil done by him survives.

 

— Abu Bakr

 

 

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

 

— Arthur C. Clarke

CHAPTER ONE

I

Lithium Springs, Georgia

Dr. Lauren Allen pulled up to the barricade in a wash of red and blue lights and rolled down the window of her Sahara Silver Audi A5. A uniformed officer accepted her proffered badge jacket without a word and compared her identification against the list on his clipboard. His upper lip glistened with a liberal application of Vick’s VapoRub. She could smell it even over the divine scent of the Mongolian beef in the Styrofoam container on the seat beside her. The call had come in during dinner, forcing her box up more than half of her meal. Had she known what the night would bring, she would have gone for the shrimp with lobster sauce. The onions and peppers were murder on her digestive system.

“Thank you, Dr. Allen.” The officer passed back her credentials. “Pull into the lot to the left and follow the first row to the end. You’ll be able to see where to go from there.”

Lauren nodded and rolled up her window. The officer passed through her headlights and dragged aside the barricade long enough for her to pull through. She turned into the dirt lot as she’d been instructed and followed the uneven rows of older model cars, dirty pickup trucks, and a smattering of tractors toward the logjam to the east. Half a dozen vans were parked at the edge of the lot and in the weeds beside a path that led down into a copse of sycamores. The large Ford Econolines were stenciled with the names of their official offices, lest the drivers forget which one was theirs. Fulton County Coroner. The Evidence Collection Team from the Atlanta Police Department. Fulton County Sheriff’s Department. The two unmarked vans were designed to be inconspicuous, but instead only drew attention to themselves. At least she now knew that the FBI had commandeered the investigation, which meant that, with any luck, she’d be home by breakfast.

She parked behind one of the ECT vans, confident that they wouldn’t be leaving anytime soon, and walked around to her trunk, which she popped with the tap of a button on her keychain. Her positive-pressure personnel suit was folded neatly next to her oversize briefcase. She slipped the baggy gear over her smart skirt suit, sealed the plastic shield over her face and shoulder length blonde hair, and grabbed the plastic case. Perhaps her attire would prove to be overkill, but people tended to shy away from her and let her do her work in peace when she wore it, as though she were the one who was contagious.

The sodium halide glare from the east guided her through the sycamore grove. She intentionally walked in the grass beside the path so as not to disturb any potentially important footprints and strolled down the emerald knoll toward the source of the glow. She smelled the telltale stench of the early stages of decomposition and adjusted the flow of air through the suit’s filtration device.

A lone Lithium Springs Police Department cruiser was parked at the bottom of the hill. Poor rube must have been the first on the scene. Beyond it, the fairgrounds were littered with the trappings of a low-rent traveling circus. The obligatory red- and white-striped big top. Games of chance. Rickety rides more rust than metal. The entire inner grounds swarmed with law enforcement officers and forensics techs from every county, state, and federal entity. All of them wore masks, gloves, and generic yellow isolation smocks over their uniforms and suits. Silver-domed stadium lights were mounted to trees, tripods, and even the surrounding claptrap booths, all of them directed toward the massive tent.

Lauren encountered the first remains fifty yards out from the ticket booth, amid a scattering of trash. The body lay prone in the grass, arms pinned beneath it. Height, build, and apparel were all definitively male. A small fluorescent pink flag with the number one was staked into the ground near the man’s head. The weeds were tacky with blood and bodily dissolution. The smell was malodorous, but definitely fresh. He hadn’t been dead for more than three or four hours. The back of his head was lumpy and misshapen. His shaved scalp was only now beginning to stubble.

She crouched and inspected the soft tissue swelling over the base of his skull and his neck. Each knot was roughly the size of a half-dollar. She pressed the center of one, which dimpled under the slightest pressure. It took several seconds to resume its normal fluid-filled appearance after she removed her finger. In the middle of each one was a tiny black dot from which purplish-red striations originated like forked bolts of lightning. She lifted the collar of his shirt. More wounds covered his back, although in nowhere near the same concentration. The brunt of the attack had been confined to his head.