David’s shoulder brushed hers as he leaned in to watch.
Her skin tingled at the contact. Get a grip. Get some distance. After angling the laptop to give him a better view, she pushed out of her chair.
He looked up. Crimson light washed over his features. “Aren’t you going to watch?”
“No.” Yanking her jacket off the back of her chair, she stuffed her arms into the sleeves. “I need to prepare for the day.”
Wood scratched tile as David stood. “What are you doing?”
Great. Mavis tugged her hair out from her collar and winced as strands were plucked from her scalp. She wanted space; he wanted to help. “Today is trash burning day.”
“I thought that released toxins into the atmosphere.” When he lifted the lantern, the shadows shifted.
“It can if you burn plastics and other chemicals.” Opening the pantry, she removed the keys from the hook inside the door. Metal tinkled in the silence. “But the main reason behind that announcement was to prevent the fires from getting out of hand. The Rattling Death may have killed thirty-five percent, but it infected almost everyone. With that many people out of commission, there was no one left to put out fires. The Politicos feared the valley would become one big fire pit.”
Mavis released the locks on the arcadia door before sliding it open.
Although moving soundlessly, she felt David follow her outside. “I can see their point. We don’t have enough marshmallows for everyone.”
“Yeah.” She shook her head. Jack had done that as well—made absurd comments in horrible situations. “But that sword is double-edged.” Mavis flicked the switch for the floodlights. Nothing. Stupid rolling blackouts. “All that garbage piling up for months is bound to be infested with rats.”
David tapped on her shoulder before handing her the lantern. “You don’t strike me as the kind to be afraid of rats, D—Mavis.”
“It’s not the rats.” Holding the lantern high, she crossed the patio to the RV pad taking up most of her backyard. “It’s the diseases they facilitate.”
“They can’t be as bad as the Redaction.”
“Think again, Sergeant Major.” Mavis skirted the charred metal garbage cans arranged on the concrete slab to reach the double-wide gates. “You can get the Hanta Virus and a kind of typhoid from rat waste and let’s not forget Plague from their fleas.”
“Plague? As in the Plague?”
She unlocked the gates, lifted the drop rods, and then pushed them open. “Yes, the very Plague that wiped out a third of Europe in the Middle ages.”
Metal rattled as he lifted a garbage can in each hand. “But isn’t that Europe?”
“It’s indigenous to Northern Arizona.” Pocketing the lock and key, she hung the lantern from the orange tree limb, grabbed two cans and followed him out to the middle of the cul-de-sac. “There were only a few cases in the last decade, but with the rat population explosion…”
The cans clattered to the ground. “So how can I protect my men?”
“Wear the bunny suits, keep the masks on, and isolate the sick.” God that sounded so callous. Here he was risking his men for her safety and she just basically told them they were doomed. “Prayer might help.”
She dusted her hands on her slacks before returning for another couple of cans.
Fabric swished as he raced to her side. “What about antivirals?”
“Yersina pestis causes the plague. It’s a bacterium, so you’ll need antibiotics.” She latched onto two more cans. Should she add the possible outbreak to her equations and watch the numbers reach a hundred percent? “You should know that antibiotics don’t always cure the disease.”
David stacked the remaining four cans then lifted them and followed her. “How effective are they?”
“If it’s caught early enough, usually only one in seven will die, but that was when our health care system worked.” Mavis dropped her cans and stepped back so he could set his next to hers.
“So the Redaction’s return might be the least of our problems.” He set his hands on his hips.
“No, the influenza is still our biggest problem.” She threaded her hand through his crooked arm and dragged him toward the house. God, this was a depressing topic. But unavoidable if they wanted to survive. “It’s just not our only problem.”
“So what are our chances?”
“In total?” She squeezed his arm. “One in a thousand.”
Chapter Eighteen
Shoving his hands into his pockets, David followed Mavis back into her house. Only one in a thousand would survive? He jingled the Humvee’s keys. Of the two million people remaining in Phoenix that meant only two thousand would survive. “How can that be? I thought the new Redaction only had a seventy percent mortality rate.”
Like seven in ten people dying wasn’t bad enough. He dropped the keys and set his hands on his hips. He might not be good at math, but even he knew those numbers didn’t add up. Somewhere in there was something he could do, people he could save.
Mavis slid the arcadia door closed behind them, shutting out the chirp of crickets. Sighing, she dragged her fingers through her loose hair. “Seventy percent will die from the new strain of influenza, but nearly everyone will get sick. We’re already surpassed our infrastructure’s tensile strength.” Her hands flopped to her sides and her shoulders bowed. “Now it will break.”
Tensile strength? He scratched his chin; stubble rasped against his fingers. What exactly did that mean? And, how did it affect keeping his men alive? Pausing inside the great room, he clasped his hands behind his back. Ignorance was a death sentence. “English, Mavis. Small words. One or two syllables for the enlisted men.”
She smiled and shook her head. “I’m sure you’ve gotten the concept, but I’ll break it down. Knowing what’s coming might keep you and your men on the front lines alive.”
Finally, someone understood. Colonel Asshole seemed to think he and the rest of the enlisted men were nothing but monkeys to be directed. Power hummed through the house as electricity once more flowed through its copper veins. Lights blinked on along the bottom of the forty-two inch flat screen television and the black Blu-Ray player on the shelf underneath it. Soft white light diffused through the open kitchen from the recessed CFL above the sink.
Turning off the lantern, she crossed the great room and flicked the switch so the modern brushed chrome and frosted glass chandelier came to life. Returning to the dining table, she sat down before the laptop and pulled out the seat next to her. “Let me show you what we’re up against.”
We. Two little letters, but put together they had a profound meaning.
“Much obliged.” David quickly joined her. Nice to know he’d gotten the right bead on her character. With her keeping him in the loop, his men had a chance to survive the coming shit storm.
Brushing her hair off her shoulder, Mavis angled the screen so they could both see it.
Black covered the entire map of the United States, the Hawaiian Islands and most of Alaska. Ninety-nine-point-nine flashed on the screen. Obviously that was the death rate, but surely there was some wiggle room involved in the calculations.
“The first influenza took out the young and healthy.” Mavis cleared the map and brought up two colored pie graphs and pointed to a large blue slice. “This wedge here represents those Americans age fifteen to sixty-five before the Rattling Death. This one is after.”
David inhaled cool air between his teeth. Christ Almighty. He’d been there—picking up bodies off the curb, emptying houses of corpses, and filling truck bed after truck bed. Yet to see the nation-wide impact…
“The wedge shrunk.” Big time. Yeah, dip shit, any moron could see that. Still. About a third of the blue slice was gone. A third. Nationwide. That had to translate into millions of people. Millions of corpses.
“Exactly.” She clicked on the pie to break it down into age groups. The bars for those over forty dwarfed the ones for the people between fifteen and thirty-nine. “This
demographic went from sixty-seven percent of the population to about forty-six. And the only reason it’s still so big is because most people over forty survived.”
“At least, the old folks and kids are intact.” That was good. And not just because he was among that number. The younger generation was the future, and there were enough of his age group to raise them up. The right way.
“They took a hit as well, just not as big so their numbers appear larger.” She backed out of the screen and the post-Redaction pie filled the screen. One more click and the black map of the US emerged like a pesky ink spot. “No one will be safe when the new strain of the Rattling Death reaches our shores.”
What he wouldn’t give for a bottle of white-out. Too bad it wouldn’t change anything. David curled his hands into fists and stuffed them between his thighs. Still, there had to be something he could do to nudge the odds in his favor. “What can we expect?”
She zoomed in on the map until the state of Arizona supplanted the continental US. Blue dots marked Luke Air Force Base, Fort Huachuca, Davis-Monthan, Camp Navajo and the Yuma Proving Grounds.
“First, containment measures will quarantine the infected areas.” Red dots popped up in Phoenix, Tucson, and Flagstaff, shortly thereafter scarlet circled the cities and black lines crossed the interstates. “Given that other states will be experiencing their own outbreaks, we can rely only on stocks we currently have on hand.”
David winced. Except for women’s shoes, their base didn’t have much to spare. The government supplied them with enough rations for two weeks. He’d thought it was because their base was slated to close in a month.
But now…
Now, he wondered if they’d held back because they’d known the Redaction was coming back like a bad case of Gonorrhea. God only knew what their distribution warehouse held. But God and he would both find out when he returned to base.
“What about drop sites?” He gestured to the non-quarantined areas. Some of the regions along the Colorado River were prime farmland. “Sure, we can’t go into the area, but they could airlift supplies in.”
“The fighting for those goods will increase in proportion with the death rate.” As if hearing her words, mortality statistics mushroomed all over the states. “Panic and greed will set in, leading to hoarding. About week two, supplies will run low. Rations will be cut for everyone. Then the rumors will start. Peacekeepers have more, are getting more than their share.”
“Like Seattle.” David adjusted his copper memorial bracelets. He’d known a few Marines stationed up there. They’d been good men and women, but their names weren’t on his bands. There just wasn’t enough room. And he refused to wear three bracelets.
“Seattle. Dresden. Hamburg. Hiroshima. Any place people are fighting to survive and you’ll have normally law-abiding citizens rise up and kill soldiers, police, anyone that stands between them and what they want.” She scrubbed her hands over her face. “And, God help us if some entrepreneur starts selling rations.”
Or trading them for sexual favors. The CO needed to be stopped. David sighed. And he needed to not think about how many people could have been saved if he’d stopped the asshole sooner.
Red bled along the roads, while the quarantine zones kept expanding. The death rate soared.
Mavis set her hand on his forearm and squeezed. “Based on what we currently have on hand, we run out of medicine in week three.” With a few clicks, she switched to the bar graphs detailing the population by age groups. Here the red bars started to rise. “Whether or not they get the new influenza, we’ll lose the old first.” She pointed to the over sixty groups. The crimson bars rose like mercury on a summer day. “Five out of six of them need drugs to survive.”
And they won’t be able to get a damn aspirin. He flattened his fists on his thighs. The numbers continued to rise as the infection engulfed the whole state and swallowed large swaths of the population. Around ten percent mortality, they began to level off. That was good, wasn’t it? It was a hell of a lot better than ninety-nine-point-nine. Suddenly, they jumped a point then began climbing, slower but still increasing.
Still heading for extinction.
“What happened?”
“The wolves are moving among the sheep, picking off the weak of the herd, despite the best efforts of the dogs.”
Wolves. Human predators. “That’s kind of cynical.”
But was it? He’d already seen it in South Phoenix with the rise of gangs. How long before they challenged the Marines for territory, weapons and supplies?
“It’s realistic. Classifying the populace into one of the four categories will help you avoid traps and keep your men alive.”
“Four?” David raised a finger for each group. “Sheep.” The majority of the population that went along with everyone else. “Wolves.” Predators who usurped rights and lives for their own purposes. “Dogs.” Soldiers like him who were willing to make the sacrifice to keep the sheep free. Three groups, not four.
Mavis eased his pinky out from under his thumb. “Lobos are a cross between wolves and dogs. Usually, they present as one until an inciting incident pushes them firmly into the other camp. They’re the most dangerous of all—the spies, the traitors, the bait for traps—because you expect them to be one thing while they’re actually the other.”
Staring at his pinky, David rocked back in his chair. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end. He’d never heard it put that way before. Lobos. Damned dishonest bastards. “Well, I’m definitely a dog, guarding the flock. Same as you.”
Mavis’s lips thinned and the sparkle left her eyes. “Not the same as me. I’m a lobo. Dogs will sacrifice themselves to protect their flock. I’m only willing to risk so much for the stupid sheep.” She set her jaw and frowned at the darkness. “And if they turn against me or those I love, I’ll pick and choose the best of the flock and gut the rest.”
David blinked. He believed her. Every word. It was good to know where he stood with her. Kind of. Maybe not. What was he saying? She’d never turn on him, because he planned to protect her and her niece—just like his men. His gaze fell to the swell under her sweater. Okay, maybe not just like his men. Clearing his throat, he glanced at the screen. The numbers had climbed to twenty-five percent. “But this is all based on multiple infections, right? What if just one person got sick?”
She slid her index finger over the mouse pad then clicked to a new screen. “This is just one person or household. Chances are someone came back from a hot zone. Patient zero would have used a toilet somewhere, gotten gas, a drink, food, rolled down their window. Depending on the surface, the virus could remain alive and infectious for days after contact. How many people touched the door knob after he did?”
David rubbed his forehead, but the ache remained. He didn’t want to think about touching door knobs. “People will stay away from someone coughing.”
He hoped. Prayed. Bartered with God.
“Sure, but he’s a carrier for two days before symptoms begin and bugs hitchhike on words.” She gathered her hair behind her head. “People talk to each other out there, don’t they?
“Yeah.” And his men talked to them. Handed out food and supplies. Lots of people. All over the valley. Hell, they may already have met Patient Zero on their rounds today. “What about masks?”
“Most people don’t have any left. And again, since no one is presenting symptoms and the government hasn’t warned people of a possible outbreak… Just one uncovered sneeze and the virus is spread all over the food bags and packages, most people won’t wash their hands before touching their mucous membranes, um, eyes, nose, or mouth so the virus has an easy in.”
Had anyone sneezed or coughed? None of them had worn masks. None of them had known. He rubbed his stomach hoping to ease the cramping. “So day twelve and we’re still only at fifty percent.”
“Watch the numbers change as the infection reaches the total population. There’s no one around to make sure clean water gets through. Add in
no electricity to cook, heat their homes, or boil water. Food and water-borne illnesses rise.” The numbers jumped in whole percentages. Quickly climbing into the sixties. Seventies. Eighties.
“The weak get weaker. Those who have recovered from the influenza now are attacked by other diseases. In China, India, Nepal and all the ‘stans around the country, entire cities are devoid of people.” Mavis shifted to pictures of the region. White studded parts of the red landscape. “Satellite IR images have no heat signatures other than fires. Nothing is left standing.”
“Damn.” One in a thousand is much better than none. His skin itched. There had to be something he could do to bump it up to two in a thousand. Three would be nice.
“Children under three with no care givers are gone.” Mavis hugged her torso and rocked in the chair. Her eyes lost focus as if she were staring in the distance, or the future. “Older kids have a chance if they can find a teen or adult to help. But without food, clean water, and shelter, they’re extremely vulnerable. The wolves that survive will be fighting each other for turf and resources. Anyone who gets in their way will be removed permanently or wish they had been.”
David scratched his scalp. A grim picture indeed. He set his hand over hers. They’d find a way to survive. There were things they could do. “Add in the Plague and Hanta Virus and only one in a thousand survive.”
“Actually I hadn’t figured that into my calculations.” Mavis flipped her hand over and wrapped her fingers around his palm. Her cold skin quickly warmed. “And because we live near a nuclear power plant, we get an added bonus.”
Shit. David rolled his shoulders; felt them pop as tension released its bite. For once, he didn’t want a bonus.
“With coal and fuel shipments being unreliable, Palo Verde has been the only thing supplying us with power.” Mavis set her free hand over his. “But seven to ten days after the end of power and water, those spent fuel rods will be exposed to the air. It’ll be just like setting off a nuclear bomb in our backyard. Only the affects will last longer and reach farther.”
Redaction: Extinction Level Event (Part I) Page 16
