by C. E. Martin
The helicopter banked and turned back toward base camp- a large elevated patch of raised land in the Everglades where several tents, tables and cargo containers had been set up. There was still enough room for the Blackhawk to land, but when they arrived it instead lowered the men, and resumed a hover, forty feet above the ground.
As Eddie Cooper unhitched his sling, a dark form hurtled down from above, landing heavily. It was the Colonel, wearing a combat vest over his BDUs. He had a large submachinegun strapped to his right thigh and an ammo carrier on his left. Across his back was slung some kind of rifle with an underbarrel grenade launcher.
The Colonel gestured towards one of the tents, then gave the helicopter a series of hand gestures. The crew aboard hauled in the sling lines, then waited for the team to get clear before settling down.
"Hello, Colonel!" Dr. King greeted as the Colonel led the way into the nearby tent.
"The men are deploying to Nigeria," Kenslir said over the noise of the helicopter. "I'll want you back at the Tower monitoring their progress. Grab your stuff."
"Sir?" Commander Smith asked, stepping up. It was hard to tell due to the water and mud, but he and the rest of the team were wearing black combat BDUs, sleeves rolled up to reveal their thick stone arms. "Can we clean up?"
"Stow your weapons and rinse off- but make it quick," Kenslir said. "We're taking Raven flights out as soon as we get to the airbase."
"What's up, boss?" Lawrence asked. He had already stowed his dummy rifle into a nearby rack.
"We're going into a quarantine zone," Kenslir said. "Category Ten."
"Ten?" Lee asked. He only remembered the scale reaching five.
***
Dr. Morava Nizienko checked the seals on her teams suits and patted them each on the back.
"We'll be watching your progress live," Dr. Nizienko said to her men. They each gave her a thumbs up, then walked out to the small military jeep the Nigerian Army had provided.
Morava watched the men drive away, toward Gwasera a mile away. After a few moments, she turned and walked back into her United Nations tent.
The past twelve hours had been a whirlwind for her. She was the closest doctor to the site, and her team, studying the Ebola virus in the Congo, had been rushed to Nigeria with all haste.
After the oil company's people had continued to vanish at Gwasera, a Nigerian police patrol had been dispatched. They had radioed in when they reached the site, then broadcast something about an illness. Then they had gone silent.
The Nigerian Army had responded with a drone- something little more complicated than a radio controlled airplane with a camera. In the waning hours of daylight, the plane had flown through the small boomtown, and over the oil field- revealing a ghost town barren of any sign of life.
Then the drone had suffered some kind of internal malfunction and crashed. It was this crash that raised alarm bells. The plane had crashed down on the edge of the oil field, almost at the feet of a dying cow. Before the camera on the drone went out, it broadcast a horrifying image of the cow lying on its side, the flesh eaten away from its bone in patches as it thrashed and kicked in pain.
The World Health Organization had been contacted and Doctor Nizienko found herself and her team meeting the military and being rushed by truck to a checkpoint on the lone road leading to Gwasera from the main highway.
Dr. Nizienko settled down in the tent at a table with monitors- one for each of her team. The biohazard suits the men wore all contained a camera and broadcast unit to relay real time what they found.
They stopped their car inside the main compound of the town, then hurriedly began discussing the car's tires. Dr. Nizienko was surprised to see the rubber of the tires melting and flowing off, revealing steel belts and rims.
As one of the team began to take samples of the dissolving tires, another excitedly pointed out something on his biohazard suit.
The Doctor leaned forward in her seat, a cold chill racing up her spine as she watched. The rubber gloves the men wore were failing- bubbling and liquefying just like the car tires had. The gloves were vanishing before her eyes.
Then the men began screaming. They clawed and scratched at themselves, then fell to the ground, writhing in pain. Their helmet cameras showed the awful truth of the matter- the men's flesh was being consumed inside their bio hazard suits. Dissolving into nothingness, just like their blood. In only a few minutes, they were reduced to piles of bones.
Dr. Nizienko rewound the footage she had been recording and slowed its playback. She paused several times and watched the stills with a horrible pit in her stomach.
Dr. Nizienko then grabbed her satellite phone and made a panicked call to WHO headquarters. This was an outbreak like nothing she had ever seen. If it spread, the loss of life would be beyond imagining.
When she finally reached someone, she was told not to worry. A team had already been dispatched and would be there within the hour. She and the Army forces were to retreat to a safe distance of five miles.
"You do not understand!" Dr. Nizienko shouted into the phone. "This- this is like a flesh eating bacteria. But like nothing I have seen before! It's consuming whole men in minutes!"
A calm voice on the other end of the phone spoke quietly. "Please follow your instructions, Dr. Nizienko. I have been assured everything is under control."
***
Eddie Cooper didn't like not being in control. In fact, he was feeling just a little panicked right now. The tactical visor was displaying his altitude in rapidly scrolling numbers- counting down to zero much faster than he would have cared for.
He was lying on his back, the aerodynamic metal tube he was enclosed in pointed down at about a forty five degree angle, the plane it was attached to plummeting to the earth at supersonic speed.
Cooper had been prepared for parachuting from helicopters and planes when he first volunteered for pararescue years ago. The idea of leaping out and pulling a ripcord hadn't bothered him in the least. But being put in a streamlined coffin and strapped to the bottom of something resembling an SR-71 Blackbird was as far from that as he could imagine.
The MA-12 Raven multi role aircraft he and Colonel Kenslir were attached to had lifted off from Homestead just a few hours ago, accompanied by a sister plane that held Commander Smith, Robert Lee and Tim Lawrence in similar underbelly transport tubes. The two craft had climbed to thirty thousand feet, performed an air-to-air refueling operation then shot away toward Africa.
Cruising above the earth at 80,000 feet, the two planes had made the journey in a surprisingly quick time- barely long enough for the Colonel to brief the men on their mission.
Then, as they reached the African coastline, the two Ravens had pitched nose-down, diving toward Nigeria. Cooper had stopped smiling.
At thirty thousand feet, his transport tube shook and Cooper knew he had been ejected from the Raven's belly. Sure enough, the TTV showed the purple marker for each plane pulling up and turning away, heading around in a long slow circle that would take them back over the Atlantic for another air-to-air refueling.
Cooper looked left and right, trying to see the icons for the rest of the team in his augmented reality view. They were all plummeting together now, like guided bombs. ANTAEAN- the Colonel, ATLAS- Commander Smith, PERSES- Lawrence and CRONUS- Lee's call sign.
Cooper knew his own call sign was now HYPERION- chosen for him by Doctor King, who had given all the men pseudonyms, much to the Colonel's consternation. Dr. King had explained that the names were that of the Titans of Greek mythology- mighty beings even the Greek Gods had feared.
>>>PREPARE FOR DROP<<< Colonel Kenslir sent out over his tactical visor. Being flesh and blood, the Colonel was able to use his TTV's cybernetic controls- tiny electrode-like pickups around the rim of the goggles, reading electrical impulses from the skin of his face. Cooper and the rest of the stone soldiers had to rely on keypads- strapped to the back of their forearms, over the woodland camouflage sleeves of their Battle Dress Unifor
m.
Cooper closed his eyes and held his breath- not that he even needed to breath in his stone body. A tone sounded from the TTV and then the transport tube blew apart.
Breaking into two sections, the tube deployed parachutes so that it was pulled away from Cooper as he continued to the ground, now moving at subsonic speed. A second later and he was swung around in the air violently as his own braking parachute deployed. If not for the straps on his M-60E2 machine gun, the weapon would have been torn from his grasp.
His speed plummeted to less than two hundred miles an hour, his stone body resisting G-forces that would have killed a man of flesh and blood. Well, most men of flesh and blood. The Colonel seemed to have recovered and was just fine, steering his own parachute by the risers he held in each hand.
Cooper gathered his wits and reached up for his own risers. It was still night in Nigeria, with dawn several hours away. The TTV lightened Cooper's view, the double plastic lenses displaying a green-tinted, augmented reality view of the world in brightened detail.
The ground was coming up swiftly, their altitude continuing to decrease from their EHALO drop. When the altimeter reading showed one-hundred feet, Cooper released his risers. An automatic breakaway triggered and he was released from the braking chute.
He fell quickly, but kept his wits- bracing his legs and holding his arms out in front of him, fists balled tightly just as he'd been taught. When he struck the ground, despite weeks of training, he fell forward. His fists tore up the soft ground, but the tight fists kept any of of his fingers from being broken off.
Cooper quickly got back on his feet and checked his M-60- it had survived the drop unscathed. He quickly transferred the bulky machine gun to a shoulder strap and held it tight against his shoulder. Equipped with a pistol-style front grip under the barrel for stable firing and a side-mounted ammo box full of belted ammo, the machinegun was capable of taking out mass quantities of targets. Turning in place as he checked the surrounding area for hostile targets, Cooper resisted the urge to drop to one knee.
Around him, the rest of the squad was similarly scanning for hostiles, their M-60s pressed tightly to their stone shoulders. The team was in the middle of a vast savanna- with long, green grass that reached almost to their waists. A sliver of crescent moon hung low in the sky. The only movement was that of the tall grass rustled by a faint breeze. They were alone.
>>FORM UP<<< Colonel Kenslir directed.
The men moved together, this time crouching in a semi circle around their commander. Each saw the beacon on their TTVs marking their destination three miles away.
In addition to the TTVs and their green, black and brown camouflage BDUs, the men all wore combat vests bulging with equipment and ammunition. They had large sidearms in low slung holsters on their right thighs and over-sized Bowie knives on their left thighs. The stone soldiers also carried several large packs of M-60 ammo on their belts- bulky boxes of belted ammo.
"Wide line, ten meter interval," Kenslir said quietly to the men. He was dressed similarly, but carried an auto shotgun with an underbarrel grenade launcher as his main rifle. On his right thigh a small submachine gun rested in a holster, while his left thigh supported magazine carriers and a lethal-looking tomahawk, strapped in, head-down. Two massive Bowie knives hung in sheathes on his back, blades up, the handles just reaching his belt. Where the men carried packs of M-60 ammo the size of large breadboxes, he wore three canteens, lined up in the center back of his belt.
Kenslir rose to his feet and turned, the soldiers fanning out on either side of him, Smith and Cooper to his left, Lawrence and Lee on his right. Satisfied the men were ready, he took off.
***
When they were men of flesh and blood, the four soldiers running alongside Mark Kenslir would never have been able to keep up. Even stripped of the nearly eighty pounds of ammunition and equipment they carried, the pace was far too swift. They were moving slightly faster than a peak Olympic sprinter could manage. And they were maintaining it.
When they were within a half mile of their target, the Colonel slowed the pace.
>>>EASY NOW<<<
Their quick run slowed to a stealthy walk and the men hunkered down in stooped stances as they walked through the tall grass, rifles held tightly to their shoulders, pointed ahead wherever they looked.
After another thousand feet, the Colonel held up his left arm, his fist balled. >>>HOLD!<<<
Each man lowered to one knee, their heads just barely peeking out of the tall grass.
"What the hell?" Lee asked. Just over the top of the grass, he could see that another fifty feet out, the grass disappeared.
Looking back and forth, the men used hand signals to spread their line out and creep forward. When they reached the edge of the grass, they stopped.
Gwasera Oil Field had been discovered in the middle of the savanna- a vast oil deposit far beneath the surface. As construction on the oil field had begun, a boom town had formed- called Gwasera by the locals. Time, people and trucks had worn the grassland down in and around the small town. But now a ring extended around the site- a zone of destruction devoid of any plant life, right down to the soil.
Lee crept forward, toward the edge of the tall grass and reached his left hand out, his right still holding his M-60 up, ready to fire. It was as if there was something there- the air seemed thick and almost spongy.
"Something ain't right, Sir," Lee announced quietly.
Colonel Kenslir looked left and right, watching the stone soldiers tentatively touching the edge of the barren circle. Each seemed to be touching something that wasn't there.
Kenslir crept forward and extended his hand. Green light glowed faintly, then quickly faded. The Colonel took another half step forward and again green light flared then flickered out.
"What the hell?" Lawrence said. He and the others were now moving closer to the Colonel.
"Magic," Kenslir said.
"Is it a ward?" Smith asked, looking back and forth nervously, ready to fight.
"No... something else."
Kenslir gestured for Lee- indicating the stone soldier should push his hand where the Colonel just had.
Lee moved closer and did as he was instructed. Again, his hand felt a slight resistance- like pushing on a pillow. Kenslir reached out beside him and the air flickered green briefly then seemed to lose all its resistance.
The Colonel reached up and activated a light attached to the end of his rifle- bathing the air in front of him with purplish light.
"What is that?" Lawrence asked as the air glowed purplish-white in the ultra violet light.
The rest of the team activated their own UV rifle lights, revealing a wall of fluorescence surrounding the town. The wall suddenly retreated, racing away from the men and causing a small breeze to sweep past the team.
"Colonel," Dr. King said over the audio channel of the TTVs. "I believe there is some kind of airborne microbe present- something possessing etheric energy. It would explain why the ghost walker was unable to see the site."
"Well, whoever is in there knows we're coming now," Kenslir grumbled.
>>>STAY ALERT!"<<< he texted over the TTVs, stepping forward and leading the way. The men fell into step behind him, forming a long line behind the Colonel, their rifles aimed to either side as they watched for any sign of life.
After several minutes they reached the main gate- an opening in the fenceline around Gwasera as wide as the two lane dirt road that connected Gwasera Oil Field with the highway leading to Kaiama.
Kenslir stepped through slowly, switching off his UV aim light as he moved. Just inside the gate the team found a large transport truck stopped, its tires missing. Kenslir knelt by a wheel, running his hand over shining steel belts hanging loosely on the rim. All the rubber from the tire was gone- dissolved away.
Kenslir stood and stumbled for a moment. He looked down at his boots, lifting one foot slowly. The hard rubber sole of the nylon and leather jungle boots was worn away, nearly half g
one. As he watched, the sole continued to dissolve- as did the leather of the boots. Green light crackled, flashing briefly as the boots fell apart, literally dropping off his feet in pieces.
"Sir?" Cooper asked- like the others he too was experiencing his boots dissolving.
"Doc?"
Dr. King appeared as a hologram now beside the men, projected by the TTV. "I believe you have encountered some kind of bacteria, similar to pseudomonas putida. Except that it is consuming rubber and plastics instead of oil. And at a much accelerated rate."
"What about the leather?" Smith asked, pulling what was left of his boots off.
"Hmm, that could be a variant of the strain necrotizing faciitis- flesh eating bacteria," King guessed. "The two bacteria could have formed some kind of symbiotic relationship- but I've never seen any bacteria that could work so fast."
Kenslir pulled off the remnants of his own boots then pulled off his socks. "Barefoot from here, guys."
"What about our gear?" Lee asked. He was checking over his pouches and vest pockets.
"You should be all right- most of your equipment is made from nylon and kevlar and other synthetic and semi-synthetic compounds. The bacteria should find them quite unappetizing."
"Colonel- over here!" Lawrence called out. He was crouching beside a Nigerian Army jeep that was resting on its rims as well. Beside and around the jeep four piles of plastic biohazard suits and helmets were on the ground.
Kenslir crept over, still watching the nearby buildings out of the corner of his eyes. He knelt by one suit, rolling a large helmet over. Inside, there was a skull, all the flesh removed.
"What is that on the bone?" Dr. King's hologram asked beside Kenslir.
The Colonel laid his rifle on the ground and opened the mask. When he wiped a finger across the skull, green light flared and a thin coating parted.
"Some kind of film."
Dr. King's hologram disappeared. "I believe that is a kind of biomat... strand-like formations of bacteria. Most peculiar- neither putida nor faciitis form like this. I'll need to examine the bacteriological database. Just a moment..."
