They both laughed briefly, and Larsen joined them at the window.
“This’ll do fine,” said Larsen. “Though I’m a little worried about the military presence in Rushville. I didn’t like seeing HUMVEEs last night.”
“I don’t think it’ll be a problem. We saw a grand total of five military vehicles on the way in,” said Rich. “All at the hospital except for one parked behind the county administrative building. That’s probably a military liaison team working with county and state officials. They’re too busy to worry about a steady trickle of cars headed in this direction.”
“I expected to see more soldiers,” said David. “More activity on the roads. I don’t know if that’s a good or a bad thing.”
“Good, if I had to guess. Most of the military units are concentrated on the quarantine boundaries,” said Rich. “Based on what I saw in Russia, they’ll have to clear Indianapolis block by block, building by building—room by room. Every soldier not assigned to guard a hospital or key infrastructure point is probably massing for this attack right now. The longer they let this fester, the worse the outcome.”
“I can’t imagine the military sweeping the streets like that,” said Larsen.
“Sounds like they’re going to let the Air Force clean up a little before they send in the troops,” said Rich.
“They should just lock down the city and give this a week or two to run its course,” said Chang.
Even Rich looked surprised by the scientist’s statement.
“I know that sounds counterintuitive, but the more violent or irrational their behavior, the less they can take care of themselves. Basic functions like eating and drinking vanish at the high end of that spectrum. Within the span of a few days, the most violent will start to die of dehydration.”
“They won’t eat each other and drink each other’s blood?” said David, half joking.
“No,” said Chang. “They’re brain damaged to the point that they’ve lost most executive function. It would be in the government’s best interest to wait this out.”
“The Russians didn’t wait it out,” said the driver.
“No. They didn’t,” said Rich. “But they didn’t have experts to advise them on the matter. Not that we can drive Dr. Chang to Washington for a chat with the administration.”
“Not if we ever want to see him again,” said the woman in the front passenger seat. “We need to get rolling.”
“Yes. We do,” said Rich. “The sooner we reunite Dr. Chang with Dr. Greenberg, the better. With the two of them brainstorming the science side of this, we can tackle this nightmare from more than one angle.”
“I think we’re beyond fixing what happened out there,” said Larsen.
The SUV remained silent for a moment, each of them presumably flooded with emotions about the unspeakable attack. David found himself both sad and angry at the thought of anyone unleashing something this hideous—especially against regular people. Millions infected. An unfathomable number of families had been literally torn apart, like his own. Just the thought of it made his blood rise.
“Yeah. We’ve entered a new phase,” said Rich. “Retribution.”
“I hear that,” hissed David.
“I hope you get there,” said Larsen. “We all do.”
“I hope you get back to your family,” said Rich. “And I mean that sincerely. All of you. Safe travels. I assume you have a plan?”
David nodded. “My dad is headed up from southern Indiana. Should be quiet down there.”
“I’m headed west from there after I rest up,” said Larsen.
“I’m going to give them my phone,” said Chang, holding his satellite phone in front of Rich.
“I’m not giving them my number,” said Rich. “This is farewell.”
“Look for Greenberg in the contacts, just in case,” said Chang. “Never know.”
“Never know is right. Thank you,” said David, taking the phone before nodding at Rich. “Do some good—or whatever it is that you guys do.”
“Good is a relative term,” said Rich.
“I bet,” said Larsen, patting the side of the SUV. “See you on the other side.”
A few seconds later, the two vehicles sped south, leaving the seven of them in the middle of an empty road. David looked around at the ragtag group. Larsen pretty much looked the same as the moment he’d met him, except he was dirtier—and bloodier. The creek bath had only served to wash the outermost layer of filth and gore away. He still wore his tactical vest and thigh holster, rifle dangling from a one-point sling. The only thing missing was his night-vision-goggles-equipped helmet, which was in the very indiscreet military-style backpack strapped to his shoulders. The moment he stepped foot in town, there was no doubt that the police or military would arrest him on sight.
His two “colleagues” looked just as conspicuous; neither of them having abandoned any of their military-style equipment. At least one of them had made an attempt to clean up. The woman looked and smelled worse than Larsen. She could ride in one of his dad’s neighbors’ vehicles. He’d come across roadkill that smelled better.
The Harpers looked like—the Harpers—just a little grimier. How the two of them had survived the past twenty-four hours was sort of a mystery, but here they were. Jack still kept his grandfather’s pistol tucked into his pants, even though he’d expended the last of its ammunition during their “last stand” at the fence. David would replenish Jack’s supply when they got to Evansville. His father was a retired police officer who’d never transitioned to a semiautomatic pistol. He had plenty of .38-caliber ammunition in the house.
And then there was Joshua, standing tall next to the Harpers, the long M1A1 rifle held low across his hips. Somehow he was both a capable adult and helpless child at the same time in David’s eyes. He knew it didn’t make much sense, but two days ago, his son had been a pizza-eating, baseball-game-watching teenager. Today, he was a battle-tested, rifle-carrying warrior, having endured the unthinkable last night when they were overrun by crazies.
He hoped his son could go back to being that sleepy, junk-food-eating kid after this. That they could return home to the house and neighborhood they’d called home for more than a decade. That he could reunite Joshua with his mother. He still hadn’t told his son that his mom was alive and uninfected. Temporarily detained in a quarantine camp at Grissom Air Reserve Base. David didn’t see any reason to get his hopes up when there was nothing they could do right now to effectively help her.
Major Smith was right. Heading up to Grissom on their own was far too risky. Once the virus burned out, like Dr. Chang suggested, and the situation stabilized, David would travel to Grissom to find Meghan. Until then, he’d sit on that information. The last thing he needed was a newly emboldened Joshua Olson driving off in the middle of the night, with some kind of wild notion he could rescue his mom. David was done with wild ideas for now. The past forty-eight hours had been full of them.
“We should get off the road,” said Ragan.
“Yeah. Be our luck to have a state trooper drive by right now,” said Larsen.
David laughed. “Could you imagine?”
“I didn’t come this far to let a state trooper put an end to my trip,” said Ragan, a deadly serious look on her face.
“Then we better get out of sight,” said David before glancing at Larsen. “These are your friends?”
“I never said they were my friends,” said Larsen.
“My bad,” said David, wondering if he’d made a mistake inviting everyone to his parents’ place.
Chapter 2
Karyn Archer, Incident Zone Four’s commander, typed furiously on the tablet velcroed in place on her lap, oblivious to her surroundings. She needed to set a few things in motion before turning her attention to the mission at hand. The automated report containing Larsen’s card-swipe information hadn’t floated around in the digital cloud for five hours before finally registering in the integrated data network (IDN). The data had been pur
posefully withheld, and she needed to know how and why. More importantly, she wanted to know who.
She’d start her investigation with the military unit that originated the data. Specifically, a universal card reader terminal registered to Special Purpose Force (SPF) Bravo, 2nd Battalion, 151st Infantry Regiment—one of several Indiana National Guard units assigned hospital-evacuation missions inside the primary quarantine boundary. A few more keystrokes would activate an Ajax contingency protocol designed to handle more sensitive missions. The kind that couldn’t be solved with a GPS-guided bomb or a small team of loyal operatives.
Archer would let the Colonel figure out how to handle this one. She didn’t have the authority to put an entire infantry company under house arrest. Even if she did, Archer didn’t have the resources to back up that authority. An entire battalion of National Guard soldiers stood in the way.
SPF Bravo, commanded by Major Nick Smith, was assigned to Provisional Operating Base (POB) Greenfield, a massive, hastily assembled collection of tent-cities set up to accommodate military units delivering infected citizens to the quarantine detention and disposal center a few miles east of town. The disposal aspect of the facility was a secret—even to military commanders and local government officials carrying out federal orders within the incident zone (IZ).
She checked the last few boxes on the tablet screen and sent the report to Cooper. Hopefully she’d have some actionable intelligence before he responded with a plan of action. According to the pilot’s last update, they’d arrive over their destination in less than fifteen minutes.
Archer had no idea what to expect on the two-lane road north of Rushville. The location was odd, to say the least. An out-of-the-way road that Major Smith didn’t have any business travelling, from what she could tell. Then again, for all she knew, Larsen might have hijacked one of Smith’s vehicles somehow and randomly swiped the card during his escape. That was the least likely of scenarios she’d run through her head.
Most likely, Smith had somehow met up with Larsen in the city. Maybe at the hospital—a likely place for Larsen to seek help if he was injured. He’d probably persuaded Smith to smuggle him out of the city, filling the soldier’s head with enough conspiracy theories about the outbreak to convince him to disable his vehicle’s digital transmitter. For whatever reason, Smith had run the identification card through the card reader on the road outside Rushville. Maybe he was suspicious. Who knew? Maybe Smith booted him from the vehicle after running the card and seeing that the badge was crap.
If that was the case, she might have a chance to wrap this up quickly. He couldn’t get very far on foot in five hours. Especially starting off at night.
“Jesus. Check this out!” said Ecker, who sat across from her in the Black Hawk’s troop compartment.
Archer turned her head left toward the half-closed port-side cargo door. Jesus was right. She leaned forward to get a better look. An Apache helicopter raced past them, headed directly toward the hazy city skyline, gray puffs of smoke trailing behind it. The sharp crack of 30mm gunfire echoed through the compartment a few seconds later.
“Pilot!” she said through her headset microphone. “Are we clear of the kill box?”
“Yes, ma’am. We’re a mile out,” replied the pilot. “Not sure what the hell was up with that? Maybe had some targets close to the quarantine line.”
“That can’t be good,” said Ecker. “Hate to think the infected are ranging out that far.”
“Pilot, take us five miles south of the quarantine line—so we don’t get shot down by some overeager Apache pilot,” said Archer.
“Copy that, ma’am,” said the pilot. “It’ll add some time to our trip.”
“I’m good with that,” she said.
Without warning, the helicopter banked hard right, pressing her into the operative to her left, who remained rigidly upright on the bench. A few seconds later, they were headed away from the quarantine line, dropping altitude and picking up speed.
“Like the Wild West out here,” said Ecker.
“Something like that,” she said, not in the mood for any conversation.
Unfortunately, Ecker didn’t take the hint.
“What’s the plan when we reach the target destination?” said Ecker.
“Same as yesterday. If Larsen is on site, we take him into custody,” said Archer. “If he’s compliant.”
Ecker nodded slowly, the grimace on his face acknowledging what she didn’t want to say over the helicopter communications net. Larsen was a dead man as far as she was concerned.
Chapter 3
Rich closely watched the soldiers standing next to the HUMVEE for the slightest irregularity. Cigarettes and Styrofoam cups in hand, they stood in a semicircle around the rear driver’s side door, taking a break from whatever was going on inside the limestone building. The soldiers never glanced in his direction.
“Looks like we’re clear,” said Rich before closing his eyes and leaning his head against the headrest.
The SUV picked up speed, heading east for the town limits. A few minutes later, the small town of Rushville faded away, the vehicle swallowed by cornfields on both sides of Route 44. He’d been on the ground here for less than twelve hours, and he was already done with cornfields. Why anyone would live in the Midwest was beyond him. He turned to Chang and Dr. Laura Hale.
“Did you guys eat yet?”
“I haven’t been very hungry,” said Chang.
“I could eat a horse at this point,” said Hale.
Rich reached over the seat for the box of MREs behind him.
“A little to the left,” said Scott Daly in the back of the SUV.
Rich lifted himself higher to get a better view of his wounded operative. Scott lay diagonally across the cramped compartment, his torso leaning upright at a shallow angle against a rucksack in the far back corner. Hale, putting her emergency-room skills to good use, had taped a wide bandage around his abdomen, but dark blood was already peeking through the white outer wrapping. Ideally, they’d have him lying flat on a stretcher, but this was as comfortable as they could make him with the addition of Chang and Hale to the crew. He got the distinct feeling Hale would have her hands full on this ride.
“How are you doing back there?” said Rich, the answer written on Scott’s face.
“I’ve seen worse,” said the operative.
“Say the word if you get uncomfortable,” started Rich, the operative raising an eyebrow. “Significantly more uncomfortable than you are now.”
Scott laughed at his joke, quickly cutting it off. “Damn, that hurts.”
“Good thing I’m not a comedian,” said Rich. “Seriously. Don’t suffer in silence.”
“He won’t,” said Daniel from the driver’s seat, igniting another quick round of laughter.
“Fuck. You guys are killing me,” said Scott. “Literally.”
Rich grabbed the first two MREs his hands touched in the box and smirked at Scott before sitting forward in his seat. He took a quick look at each bag.
“Let’s see what the chef prepared for you today,” said Rich, grimacing as he read the choices. “Beef stew or chicken chunks.”
“That’s some bad luck,” said Jessica from the front passenger seat.
“Bad luck for all of us,” said Daniel.
He dangled them in front of Chang and Hale.
“Neither really sounds appealing,” said Hale, glancing over the seat. “Any other choices?”
“Sorry. There’s kind of an unwritten code surrounding MREs. You get what you get, and you don’t get upset,” said Rich. “Chicken or beef?”
“What if I’m a vegetarian?” said Hale.
“Then you’re entitled to a vegetarian MRE,” said Rich. “If we had any.”
“I’ll take the beef,” said Chang. “Chicken chunks sounds pretty bad.”
“Chivalry is dead,” said Jessica.
“Sorry. I’ll take the chicken,” said Chang.
“Chicken is fine,” sa
id Hale.
He handed over the thick plastic bags. “Eat up and get some shut-eye. We have a long trip ahead of us.”
“Where are we headed?” said Chang.
“For a rendezvous with your colleague Dr. Greenberg,” said Rich.
“Where—as in location,” said Chang.
“Allegheny Mountains,” said Rich. “Maybe eighty miles from Charlottesville. Seven hours away if we don’t run into any complications. We’re going to get off the interstate by Dayton and take some back roads until we get into West Virginia. Cincinnati and Columbus have the same problem as Indianapolis.”
“I can’t believe other cities are dealing with this,” said Hale.
“Twenty-four that we know of,” said Rich.
“Does the government have any idea who’s behind the attacks?” said Hale.
Jessica turned her head and gave Hale a funny look.
“That’s a tough pill to swallow,” said Hale. “Our own government killing millions of its citizens. For what?”
“Who else could pull off a coordinated strike this big?”
“It’s not the government. This is something working within the government or alongside it,” said Rich. “Has been for a long time.”
“True America?” said Chang. “Greenberg made a comment a while back, but backed off it pretty quick. I didn’t push. Everyone has heard some kind of rumor about the mess back in 2008.”
Daniel looked over his shoulder at Chang.
“2007, actually, and the rumors were true. But that was just the start of it,” said Rich. “Turned out to be little more than a distraction. True America was the distraction—and the vessel.”
“If True America isn’t behind this, who is?” said Hale.
“That’s a complicated question,” said Rich. “We’ve cut the head off this snake twice already, but it keeps growing back.”
“We have a long drive ahead of us,” said Chang. “I’d like to hear the full story.”
“You’re not going to believe it,” said Rich.
“Try me,” said Chang. “The past forty-eight hours have been anything but normal.”
The Zulu Virus Chronicles Boxset (Books 1-3) Page 62
