Down: The Fall

Chapter Six: The Capitol

Location: Washington D.C.

  They had done everything to prepare for every kind of cataclysm imaginable. This was the un imaginable, this was insane, this was a Saturday morning cartoon special gone wrong.

   At first they didn't know what to make of the green mist that was moving quickly across the world, growing as it went. All the scenarios were put on the table biological warfare, poison gas, terrorists using one of the two, some kind of massive unknown chemical spill, or even global warming.

  If terrorist attack ,which organization , someone usually took credit.If a chemical spill where had it happened, who was responsible. Nothing about this made sense , until someone mentioned a connection with the big meteor shower a couple days ago .

  Could this be some extraterrestrial attack or some unknown extraterrestrial contaminant.

   Finally an American scientist working in Africa was able to get a sample . He discovered that this mist was a cloud of micro machines . The technology he said was mind blowing to see under the micro scope. The call was cut off quite abruptly as the nations chief science officer heard the phone clang to the ground. No one ever heard from the scientist again.

    As the scientists debated on theories the mist continued on its course. The white house began loosing contact with world leaders at an exponential rate. Alies as well as opponents. Soon they began to loose contact with the western half of the country. Military bases with no one to answer Washington's calls. No governors to answer private lines direct to the president. Not even any reports from local news stations on what was taking place.

  Surveillance drones were launched from seemingly empty military bases. Surveillance cameras were accessed. High tech government spy satellites were used to scan for signs of life. Nothing was turning up but empty cities, abandoned cars, and stray pets running loose in the streets.

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No one could figure out what to make of the situation. That is until one of the computer technicians caught a glimpse of something unusual.

  He was about to go from one camera feed set in a grocery store to another in a school. He caught movement at the corner of the screen. To his amazement a tiny woman just slightly smaller than an action figure walked out.

As he continued to watch more of these little people began to come out. They all looked like they were coming out of a deep sleep. Just as shocking as their size was they fact that they were naked. They idea was they'd shrank but their clothes hadn't.

On every screen they looked , through every camera, they began to see tiny, naked, panicked people.       This was the mists effect on the people it came in contact with. It was then they realized these same mists were heading towards them. Panick insued, no one new what to do. There was nothing in place to help the government make it through this disaster. " We're all gonna die" one technician said as she passed out at her computer. "I can't live only being eight inches tall" said a very short man at another desk.Many of the computer techs began babbeling, screaming, and crying(this group was not made up of very adventurous people mind you) wondering what they were gonna do.

  Only one of the technicians was level headed enough to realize they needed to inform their superiors. His name was Frederick Laten, a fairly new analyst shoes just graduated from college.

  Fredrick soon had his boss on the phone and had sent him the pictures over the computer ."If I wasn't seeing this footage myself , have fired you for goofing off during a national security crisis" Fredricks boss Heath said."This is insane , how is this possible?" Heath said. " I don't know boss but i guess the president needs to see this soon". " Your right I'll contact him now, you guys need to keep at it, see how far along this is closer to us in the hot zones" Heath said.

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   " How long do we have before it reaches us?" Gerald Delany asked the army general next to him." With its current speed, and taking into account that it increases by half its speed every two hours, it will be here within twelve hours Mr. President." Well that's not much time to do anything , he thought." We need to prepare the best way we can and  I need to address what's left of the nation, at least warn them of what's coming ." Another thought came to his mind as he stood to go and he said to his aid Sheila,"Sheila send some one a toy store and tell them to buy up all the doll clothes they can."With that said he turned and started walking towards the White House conference room for his address to the nation.

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      People sat glued to their television sets unable to stop watching the footage from out west. No one new what to do, how could you prepare for this.

  Streets became clogged as people left jobs to get home to their families. Some fled the cities hoping that only the major cities would get hit first.

   Twelve hours after the president had made his address the mists arrived. Many had sought shelter in the presidential bunkard many including the president himself wore completely sealed hazmat suits with oxygen tanks and face masks. They hoped being completely contained from the atmosphere around them would save them. It would be what almost killed them.

  The nanites were small enough to find their way through into most spaces. Those few places they sensed humans that they couldn't squeeze into they ate their way into. When the mists arrived the nanites would simply burrow through the rubber in their masks . Their was no escape for anyone.

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   The mists arrived in Washington on schedule. The nanites did their work just as everywhere else , not caring who they shrank.

  The mist soon afterward finished its journy around the world out in the middle of the Atlantic ocean. One last group of people huddled together on a large fish processing ship. They had heard all the reports up until the radios went silent they knew the mist was coming.