The Victor Project

CHAPTER 1

     It was already day two of the trip.  Only two hours had passed since Rick had left the overnight post and in approximately one more hour his vehicle would be approaching Zone 5.  He hadn’t seen the convoys of trucks on the road like he had the day before.  This morning the road was vacant and uninviting.  At each crossroad stood the same firmly erected barriers allowing only one direction for travel, straight ahead.  If only the highway ran along a scenic mountain ridge or crossed some vastness of water, something to at least make his head turn, something that would at least appear to have changed since the last excursion.  The road between the zones even lacked a detour as simple as a gas station, there simply wasn’t a need for one.  Zone 5 stretched a mere seven-hundred-twenty-seven miles from his origin of Zone 3 and the hydrogen cell that powered the vehicle still had an abundant fifty-four thousand miles left. 

     The government always provided the top of the line vehicle for his trips, it was the least they could do.  The XK3 was a mammoth of a transport and flaunted every lavish comfort of home.  This model had the upgraded holograph that intermittently checked in on the passengers, much like a persistent waiter in a fine restaurant.  Rick had found on other trips that the holographic assistant could be somewhat bothersome though, so it was shut off as soon as he pulled away from the gates of Zone 3.  The XK3 also came with a state-of-the-art voice activated service, massaging chair, single birth bed and EarthNet Uplink.  Rumor was that the government had modified the XK3 model with a bullet-proof glass that even the newest laser couldn’t penetrate.  Rick thought all it needed was a call girl and a bathtub and he would have made the two day trip every week.

     The one reservation Rick had about the XK3 was the steering module.  The model didn’t allow manual steering, which contributed greatly to the boredom of the trip.  In the latter part of the twenty-first century, driving had truly become a privilege.  For the most part the only vehicles that were still around that could actually be driven were the antiques and they required a special license to obtain the old fossil fuel needed to power them. 

     Rick flinched as he bumped his calf against the seat cushion.  The nurse that drew blood from him that morning must have been a javelin thrower in her previous assignment.  The bloodwork was a regular thing during the trip outside the zones.  The first sample was taken in the zone you were exiting, the second at the CVD-Post which was midway through the trip and a third, passing through quarantine at the arrival zone.  When he first became a Traveler, the blood tests made him nervous almost to the point of nausea, now it had become just another annoyance.

     It was almost six years ago to the day when he made that first trip as a Traveler.  Back then no one was really sure what they would find in the bloodwork, even at mid-post.  There had been so many diseases, so many plagues and so many mutations of strains over the past few hundred years that the government was frightened to the point of extreme paranoia.  It was from this terror that the numerous disease control protocol evolved, but over years, the fear that once gripped the government settled and nothing more was learned from the holes poked in his body except better protocol. 

     What little countryside he could see from the windows of the XK3 was still beautiful.  In every direction there seemed to be masses of green forests and luscious foliage.  Every once in a while his vehicle passed a lake, its surface spotted with birds, ducks and geese.  The sky was just as the television had shown, although the satellite picture didn’t present the true color of blue that his eyes were now seeing.

     Rick Mallory had lived in Zone 3 all thirty-six years of his life.  Those first thirty-six years had been spent as a regular Joe fulfilling the everyday role of urban survival, a role which he had grown quite accustomed to.  After college he had landed a job as a Satellite Technician.  A Satellite Technician (ST) was just another name for someone who read a one inch book of complicated directions and translated them into a simple task of assembling a leg with four screws.  The next rung on that corporate ladder was Senior Satellite Technician, or SST.  After that, it was still one more promotion before he would be able to work the day-shift.  If he was lucky, that promotion would have come within the next ten years. 

     The annual salary that an ST earned didn’t land him in the highest echelon of society, but it did keep him in warm clothes with a roof over his head.  What the job lacked in diversity, it made up for in a complete void of fascination, so when a friend told him of the position opening for a Traveler, the career adjustment was an easy choice. 

      It was then, in the year 2335 that he had become known to the government as 5354B.  Shortly after being assigned the number, Rick had discovered that the second digit in the stamp represented the zone of residence, but other than that, the numbers were obscure as molecular physics.  The rest of the masses had equally been labeled by a TTN number, which might as well have been tattooed on their foreheads.  In his field of work, it was required that identification be possible under any circumstance.  You would never see the 5354B, unless he took off his right sock.

     Even though his job kept him away for days at a time, he still had friends in Zone 3.  He hung out with them on occasion, but outside of the zone there was almost no one close to him.   Much like all the other zone residents, they weren’t allowed to leave.  All of his family, his mother, father, and brother were all still living in Zone 3 and would most likely be buried there.  He was one of the few human beings that was afforded a glimpse outside of a zone, one of the perks of the job. 

     There were currently seven purified zones in the United States and to the best of Rick’s knowledge, there were another twelve located in various hemispheres of the world.  The best he could guess was that each zone contained approximately three million people.  The zone acted much like any city of the old days.  Most were at least one hundred miles in circumference and contained the total infrastructure necessary to maintain social balance, including schools, utilities, parks, politicians, you name it.   Even more appealing was the fact that these zones were void of smog, litter, crime, guns, cigarettes, drugs, homeless, corruption, etc., the government saw to that.  From that perspective, they were the perfect city, an urban utopia for the masses.

     The price that was paid for this utopia was freedom.  Not that the inhabitants were part of some strict indigent feudal system of the fourteenth century, nor were they forbade the simple freedoms of everyday living.  It was more like the zone inhabitants had been denied the true concept of freedom.  That rarely used freedom of being able to radically change your overall way of living.

     There was still one United States Government, the same democracy that had existed for hundreds of years.  Officials were still elected and like the days of old, most of them were corrupt in one aspect or another.  At each zone level there were elected officials that governed the cohesiveness and framework of the zone, although the lack of crime, substance abuse and weapons combined to form a pretty cohesive community anyway.  All the basic concepts of fiscal policy, inter-zone banking, stock exchanges, real-estate investing, bond appropriations and even Euro-dollars were still apart of everyday life.

     Within each zone there were government-mandated standards with which the masses were to abide.  Any given consumer product that was available for purchase was controlled by the government.  The refrigerator, car, television, wristwatch or lamp available was all predetermined and screened by big brother.  Any item or product that had been deemed a possible health threat in any way shape or form was carefully re-tested and re-designed, then made available to the common man by the government.   It was all mandated and controlled to insure safety and security for the zone inhabitants.

     The most discerning factor between a zone and a city of old was that no one was allowed to exit or enter, at least not without government approval.  Anyone attempting to exit a zone without authorization was shot, no questions asked, which translated to don’t ask any questions.  Encircling each zone are stationed air sampling posts, one approximately every one-hundred yards.  Each sampling post had four machines strategically placed at varying heights, with the highest standing around one-hundred feet.  Each machine had a separate and unique function, but as a unit the four were able to detect even the tiniest unwanted microbe.  Some zone inhabitants felt strongly that the machines were all show and that the government had conveniently made them visible for the purpose of providing a piece of mind for the inhabitants.  For Rick it worked well.   

     There was really no need to leave the zone anyway.  Inhabitants could vacation anywhere they wanted inside their respective city.  Every type of recreation was available, given the climate.  There was no need to visit family or friends elsewhere, there simply wasn’t any blood relation outside the zone you lived in.  After the first two hundred years, everyone had forgotten the idea of enjoying an activity or pleasure outside their zone.  Snow skiing, ocean sailing, vacationing on some remote beach, or traveling to
Europe just weren’t a part of anyone’s thoughts.  The travel brochures certainly didn’t offer such trips.

     Zone 1 was naturally the first and was constructed in the year 2024.  Its creation was simply the construction of a barrier around the city that was once called
Kansas City.  The first zone was originally part of an experiment, but soon became a necessity.  Back in the year 2022, an epidemic struck the entire planet killing millions.  History states that it was a mutated virus that eventually killed six-hundred-twenty million worldwide.  Many still say it was a warfare experiment gone awry and not a virus or plague as told, but no one will ever know.

     The population of
Kansas City had been devastated beyond belief, leaving less than two-hundred-thousand terrified souls in the city.  Soon after the disease had taken fifty percent of its population, the city ceased to function effectively.  The government had already intervened to keep the peace, in addition to supplying the needed medicine, food, water, etc.  The next logical step was to make it the host for their newest biological/social experiment.  It was billed as a “limited germ-free all inclusive resort city”, which sounded like a dream come true after all of the death and mayhem that had plagued the United States.

      Some ten years later, the government introduced a well-timed auspicious super-antibiotic-vaccine that a would rid the human race of disease.  Only one year after its introduction, it became mandatory that all newborns be inoculated with the wonder drug.  Upon inception it showed immediate promise and over the following years, all was calm on the epidemic front.

    The epidemic of 2102 killed eight-hundred-seventy million worldwide.  The official cause was linked to a disease spread by chimpanzees.  To eradicate the virus, three different breeds of primate were wiped from the face of the earth.  Toward the end of the epidemic, Zone 2 had been constructed and the fortunate city selected was then called Washington DC.  Zone 1 had long been a reported success and had virtually existed and survived untouched from the last epidemic, which was fortunate for the United States Government, because its popularity with the masses had been sliding.  Zone 2 now offered welcomed reassurance for a terrified and confused public searching for a sanctuary.

     DC’s population had been vanquished on a scale equal to
Kansas City, except for the government sector.  It was reported that almost the entire legislative body had been transported to the safety of Zone 1, shortly after the epidemic was discovered.  The reasons that DC had been selected for the site of Zone 2 became quickly apparent to the general population.  Upon the news hitting the public, applications for Zone 2 residence swamped the new Zone 2 legislature.  “Forget freedom” was the common saying, the masses just wanted to stay alive.

      The epidemic of 2190 killed another nine-hundred-seventy million across all seven continents.  This time the carrier of the virus was supposedly the common house rodent.  Last reports were that a rat had not been spotted in any government zone, much less anywhere on the planet in over 100 hundred years.  Early humans had written that the rodent species could survive a nuclear holocaust.  That may have been true, but no Rodentia could survive the scientist of the twenty-second century.  A few years after the 2190 epidemic, another super-vaccine was introduced and mandatory inoculations were again instated.

     Zone 3 was right on the heels of this epidemic, although the government really didn’t need the propaganda or hype of another epidemic for the public to gain acceptance.  Atlanta was selected this time, mainly due to the fact that the Center for Disease Control was located in the city and had grown into one of the largest federally funded agencies.

     Like the other zone societies, all current city residents were automatically inducted as members of the zone.  And like the other societies, all property and possessions owned by current residents remained theirs.  A lottery was held for anyone not holding a permanent
Atlanta residence and wanting acceptance into Zone 3.

    Ironically, during the next ninety years when the zones were gaining in popularity, there still remained staunch anit-zone groups, all of them located in the cities and towns not yet designated.  And what non-zone cities that remained beyond the larger ones like
Chicago, Los Angeles and New York, existed with scarce population, most barely functioning on a municipal level.