by Rob Horner
“The boy was right though. Some go crazy before they technically die. Some hold out until the infection reaches their brain. Then…boom! Dead for a few seconds, then up and raging, like your Ragan. So far,” the older man’s voice dropped to a softer tone, “no one has been able to resist the infection.”
It took a minute for the sergeant’s words to sink in.
Jesse raised his bandaged hand. “You mean this?”
“Yes. That. Even without the spreading lines, we wanted to keep you restrained in case you woke up…different. Just because everyone else had them didn’t mean there couldn’t be exceptions.”
“Yet you gave orders that I could be released when I woke up?”
“Only if you woke up…straight.”
The bandages surrounding his hand looked cleaner than he remembered, and each finger was wrapped separately.
“I hope you don’t mind,” the sergeant continued, “but it looked as though there might be some infection setting in. The normal kind,” he hastened to add. “You got a couple of shots in the backside while you were out.”
“More peanut butter?”
The sergeant laughed. “Military Grade. Nothing but the best.”
Despite everything that led to this point, Jesse couldn’t resist the older man’s congenial tone and honest smile.
It felt good to laugh.
“Now then,” Harding said, “what had you so ready to race out of here when I came in?”
Get this to…
“Sergeant Harding,” Jesse began, “I have a CD with Ragan’s CT images on it. It’s in my plane.”
“The one given to you in the hospital?”
“Yes. That one. I was told to get it to the CDC. That’s where I was going when I heard a Mayday from this—” He looked around. “Um, are we still at John C. Tune?”
“We are. You won’t be for long, though.”
“You’re going to let me take my plane out of here?”
The sergeant stared at him like he was weighing options, trying to figure out how much he could reveal.
“Mr. Franks…this thing…it spread. It spread like wildfire. We have no idea how many people are affected, and no clue what to do to stop it. With as many National Guard units as we have, we’re barely able to control the small sections we establish in.”
“What’re you saying?”
“Before you…well…we haven’t had a single soldier get scratched or bitten who didn’t get right back up and go Section Eight on his own squad. We’ve had to put down a lot of our own.”
Jesse hung his head. There was a world of pain in the sergeant’s voice. He couldn’t imagine having to turn a weapon on the members of his own unit; they’d been like brothers. Hell, he kept up with some of his old friends more frequently than he ever had his own family. Sergeant Harding remained silent for a moment, maybe allowing Jesse to share his grief, maybe just saying a quick prayer for the fallen.
“We ran some tests while you were out, of course, but nothing about your blood seems abnormal. I’m telling you this because…well…you need to know what’s coming.”
“I need to get to—” Jesse began, but the sergeant held up a hand, forestalling his objection.
“You’re going to DC. Okay? But not just because of a CD. And not in your own plane.”
Jesse didn’t say anything.
“I wanted you to know everything so you can be right in your mind with what’s going to happen. Maybe the people in DC already know why you’re immune, and this won’t matter more than a cow fart in a sewer. But I don’t know that. All I know is you’re something special. Or there’s something special about you. Hell, you might be the key to us figuring out how to stop this whole thing. Isn’t that the way it’s always shown in the movies?”
“You’re telling me I don’t have a choice, aren’t you?” Jesse asked.
“I’m afraid that’s the case, soldier. I don’t have any manpower to spare, but I will send you under guard if—”
Jesse waved him off. “That won’t be necessary, Sergeant.”
“Thank you. Something told me, just in the few minutes we’ve been speaking, that I could count on you.”
The older man offered his hand, which Jesse took after setting his tray aside.
“You should probably know that Mark was immune, too. At least, he didn’t come back when he died.”
“Who’s Mark?” Harding asked. “A friend of yours?”
Jesse shook his head. “No, just another of the poor bastards who worked here. His body was in the men’s locker room.”
“We’ve already cleared that building. Found a couple of dead bodies. Which one was he?”
Jesse tried and failed to keep the mental images from filling his mind. “Don’t know how tall. He was against the wall in the locker room. Maybe mid-thirties, dark short-sleeve shirt. Spine was stove in; he said the big guy from the terminal squeezed him and broke it. There were…bite marks everywhere back there, whole swathes of skin torn away like windows onto his innards. No lines, though.”
The sergeant nodded. “I remember one of the men telling me about him. I’ll have PFC Patrick collect some samples and send them with you.”
Jesse nodded, feeling a companionable silence fall over the tent. It was strange, considering all he’d been through in the past seventy-two hours, that he’d end up feeling like he’d found a long-lost brother in the affable sergeant.
Or like a long-lost commander.
Did it speak to something he’d been missing all these years? Was the adage about never really leaving the military true?
After a few minutes, Jesse looked up. “So, when do I leave?”
* * * * *
The old whistle gave its haunting toot as Seaman Wilson concluded his tour with the feisty oldsters in the hallway outside their cabins. Leaving them to “freshen up,” he spared a thought for Mrs. Young, the woman who kind of reminded him of his grandmother. She’d hung back at the beginning, letting everyone else talk and ask questions. She had the same kind of smile as his ‘G-Maw.’ It wasn’t sly or mean-spirited, but it spoke of someone who found enjoyment in watching others do something silly or listening to learn while not giving away your own ignorance. She used to say the world would work better if more people listened rather than spoke, and it was the reason politicians are so inefficient. Any man or woman who thinks their words are more important than their actions are fools of the highest order. It’s better to be thought a fool than to open your mouth and provide proof.
The look on the old woman’s face troubled him. She was a big lady, yes, but that didn’t mean sickly. It wasn’t just something going on with her stomach; Chris was convinced most of her distress was not wanting to embarrass herself in front of the others. Pausing outside the door to room 102, he considered knocking and asking if she was all right. After a moment’s deliberation, he decided to leave her be. If she caught a good case of the trots, she might still be on the toilet.
And if it was something viral, he certainly didn’t want to catch it.
The deck shifted underfoot, a slight movement which spoke to greater changes outside. The ship was moving; they were underway. The higher floors and the spaces at the extreme starboard and port sides would feel more of the sea’s motion, but even that would be minimal. The Belle was state of the art as far as mitigating wallow.
By the end of the day, Sick Bay would be inundated with complaints of nausea as landlubbers scrambled for Dramamine. By the end of the day tomorrow, anything viral brought on by the three thousand passengers from all walks of life would be making the rounds. Gastroenteritis, the bane of modern cruise ships, would be in full swing. If that’s what Mrs. Young had, best he not get it, too. The fewer “patient zeroes,” the better.
And if it was something worse…
Chris Wilson wasn’t a medic, but he had grandparents who spent their final years in a nursing home, and he knew about C.Diff.
Well, that was about the same as saying he knew about c
ancer. He knew of it and had a general idea what it was but couldn’t say how it worked or spread. All he knew was if one resident got it, the whole nursing home unit was quarantined. It caused nasty diarrhea and nausea.
These guys came from a retirement home and didn’t seem to need much in the way of nursing care, so maybe it was different for them.
Still, it wouldn’t hurt for him to play it safe.
He left the door without knocking and made his way back to his workstation on deck two. Throughout the cruise, sailors would draw duty as wandering question and answer guides, ready to give directions or recite restaurant opening times or which artists were performing in which theater or club.
Looking through the available routes, he saw one which led past Sick Bay. Taking the little magnetic tile with his name on it, he placed it beside the route, then headed out. Once he got to Sick Bay, he’d try to convince one of the medics to go check on Mrs. Young.
Chapter 32
Chelsie Young wasn’t the only person to get a healthy dose of what would come to be called Avaxx while she waited to board the ship. A dozen ships’ crewman patrolling the decks, three dockworkers, and two of the other oldsters waiting with her were also exposed. In keeping with the ratio of Type-O blood in the general population, roughly a third of all those exposed were immune.
Lucky them.
Chelsie’s sudden onset of symptoms was unusual, but who could say what other health problems she had which contributed to the rapid development of violent diarrhea, debilitating nausea, and raging stomach cramps?
Priya Anand didn’t care about the small, cramped cabin she’d been assigned, or that it didn’t have any windows—portholes?—opening to the outside. It didn’t bother her that all the other old farts from Southside Seasoned Citizens had rooms close by, or that the walls were so thin she could hear their arthritic hips creaking as each explored their little square of heaven. (It bothered her a little that Chelsie’s room was on one side, and the big woman was moaning and yacking loud enough to send a small thrill of nausea through her own insides.) She liked the older woman; Chelsie was good people with a good head on her shoulders and a quick mind despite her age. The two shared similar views on a lot of issues.
But Priya wasn’t going to let anything ruin this trip.
She stayed in her cabin only long enough to make sure the lights worked and there were no little red bugs crawling under the sheets. Then, with her tiny purse slung over one shoulder, she set off to explore.
Like most of the residents in the retirement community, Priya was there of her own volition. She wasn’t sickly or frail, just tired of everyone thinking she was. She suffered no daily aches or pains, and none of the blood pressure or sugar issues suffered by so many Americans. She didn’t know if that came from her heritage or just living by the adage of all things in moderation, but she blessed her life and thanked the gods of Christianity and Hinduism, whichever kept her body healthy and mind intact.
If her son was willing to foot the bill for her cushy lifestyle, she was willing to let him. His overabundance of guilt at taking a Cardiology position in Boston was her windfall.
Smiling, Priya passed her friend’s cabin, where a smell like curry-tinged diarrhea—a smell she knew all too well from her childhood—drifted through the thin door. Muttering a quick prayer that the burning dast would depart and take all its evil with it so Chelsie might enjoy the trip, Priya hurried to the elevators, eager to visit the shopping and dining areas pointed out by the handsome sailor.
She made a mental note to check in on her friend later, unless she found a handsome young man to spend some time with.
She might be almost seventy, but she looked fifty. She could lie and live a little, maybe get herself a forty-year-old to play with instead of the wrinkled prunes in the adjoining rooms.
* * * * *
Richard Davis didn’t need to stay on the bridge while the exterior washdown systems sprayed decks and hull; the hardest part of his job ended once the ship cleared shallow wake territory and nosed out to sea. Now all he had to do was keep her bow pointed away from bad weather and toward the first port, and he had two junior navigators to help with that.
But something held him in the room, staring out the large windows at the sparkling pools which rivaled the majesty of the deep blue sea. The Island Belle was a beautiful vessel from stem to stern, packed with every amenity imaginable. Her current census of three thousand was just over half the passengers it could handle, which meant shorter lines for everything. Fewer people chose to cruise down to the Caribbean in late summer for fear of hurricanes. There’d been only one named storm so far, and it had veered wide to the east. There was always a chance for something to develop, but Davis didn’t think they’d be troubled by any weather.
No, what had him worried were the scattered news stories coming from all along the east coast.
Outbreaks of stomach flu everywhere from Georgia to Maryland.
Patients becoming violent, attacking doctors and nurses, even paramedics and police officers. The violence seemed more widespread than the illness, and while no one was linking them yet, not on CNN, MSNBC, or even the Home of Rightwing Propaganda, the Fox News Channel, Richard didn’t think the two were coincidence. The scariest story only crossed a few minutes before, where the National Guard were being mobilized in the nation’s capital.
Richard wasn’t a conspiracy theorist, unlike those on both sides of the political aisle. He called himself a Democrat but didn’t think Trump any more or less corrupt than any other man to sit in the Oval Office, certainly less so than Nixon. Neither did he subscribe to the Aliens probed my butt and I’ve got pictures crowd who unanimously pulled the lever for the elephant. But when so many reports across such a wide swath of America began cropping up in a short span of time, only an idiot would believe they weren’t connected. Add in the Guard in DC, and you got an alarm blaring for anyone with a brain to hear.
Someone fucked up.
Flashes of The Stand by Stephen King came to mind, though the fictional outbreak of a souped up influenza bug took much longer to bring the country to its proverbial knees.
Maybe it wasn’t connected. Maybe it was just a coincidence.
Maybe he was very glad to be going out to sea for a week, where they’d be away from whatever crazy shit was happening long enough for it to settle down.
Maybe.
And what drove Richard “Dick” Davis to this sudden, uncharacteristic dive into the murky world of conspiracy?
It was a news report of an explosion, multiple camera angles showing the same plume of black, inky smoke staining a cloudless sky over southern Georgia.
And it was a blast of dirt and debris laden air showering his ship minutes before it was to leave, while a late-arriving bus of senior citizens waited to board.
Maybe.
Those thoughts kept Navigator Davis at his post long after the ship entered international waters. While the sun blazed above and the blue seas spangled back in crystalline brilliance, and while crowds of Hawaiian shirt garbed, pot-bellied men pretended to admire the ocean while ogling the bikini clad sunbathers, Davis wondered about the dirt, and the riots, and the sickness.
* * * * *
Chelsie Young wondered, too. She wondered if she was fated to die in this tiny closet of a bathroom while her life poured out her ass and pain wracked her knees from where they pressed against the tile molding outside the standing room only single shower. The vomiting had stopped, thankfully, and she’d lost count of how many times she’d contorted herself to flush the commode. Her feet were pins and needles, and she worried that, even if she managed to get rid of whatever poison she’d ingested, she wouldn’t be able to wear a bathing suit for the permanent toilet ring tattooed to her backside. Brett called it being branded by the toilet bowl. Well, this wasn’t a branding, this was a fucking insertion.
The sweat pouring off her had probably adhered her ass to the seat, so even if she did manage to stand up, the seat would
pull her back down.
The place stank, but she didn’t care. What was a little ass-aura when your life was literally swirling down the drain?
Was it going to the bilge? Isn’t that what they called the shit tanks on a boat? Or was there some little tube sticking out of the ship, somewhere way in the back, where all the muddy water was going right into the ocean?
Hah! Let the sharks get a taste of that!
The train of her thoughts alarmed Chelsie. One complaint flowed into another.
This wasn’t like her. Not at all.
She needed to get some medical attention. It couldn’t be safe, losing so much body fluid, not even for someone like her with more than a little extra fluid to lose. These boats always had cases of diarrhea and nausea; it was one of the many things which prevented her from taking a trip like this sooner—all those complaints of stomach upset. But it should work in her favor. They had to have tons of medicines designed to put a stopper in her ass. And if they didn’t…well…she’d have to find a real stopper.
Even if they couldn’t get the leaking to stop, they ought to be able to give her some fluids or something.
Somewhere on the wall by the door was one of those red “Call” buttons, but she wasn’t sure she could hit it without face planting half-in and half-out of the crapper. And wouldn’t that be a sight for some poor young sailor to see?
An event that traumatic might even be enough to turn a straight boy to the other team.
She giggled, and realized she was becoming delirious, close to passing out.
She had to try for the button.
* * * * *
Chris Wilson made the rounds, nodding, shaking hands, welcoming passengers aboard the Belle. Whenever possible, he provided detailed answers to singular questions, like “How do I get to the casino?” or, “When can we go sunbathing?” If a passenger had multiple questions or seemed to be the type of guy who wanted everything spelled out like a line-item checklist, Chris politely referred him to the detailed passenger guides available in every room, and reassured him that a “You are here,” board could be found on every wall in every passageway.
