by Darrell Bain
“Marker, Guiterrez!” Doug shouted. “The main stairwell! Get there quick and disperse the patients!”
Captain Presley had been standing nearby. “I’ll give ‘em a hand,” He ran off, unslinging his rifle as he went.
Doug thumbed in the numbers of the guards at the main entrance, then those at the back, and ordered them to move inside and to the stairwell, and to shoot if it was necessary to get there. That was the only access to the roof. He thought that somehow the patients had learned that helicopters were coming for the Americans and either resentment over their leaving or a desire to go with them had spurred the agitation. Whatever, they had to be kept back.
A bullet spanged off the abutment of the old television aerial nearby. Doug ducked reflexively even as he heard an answering shot from one of his guards.
“Everyone down!” he yelled. “Get down! We’re taking fire!”
Some of the civilians appeared reluctant to stretch out in the trash and debris that layered the rooftop until another bullet chunked into the chest of one of the standing figures. The woman’s mouth opened in a wide
“O” of surprise, then she crumpled into a heap, blood geysering from the wound.
“Down!” Doug yelled again. This time, everyone obeyed. There was nothing to do for the woman. She had taken the bullet directly in the heart.
CHAPTER FOUR
By crawling to the edge of the roof and peeking around a decorative cornice, Doug could see that the crowd of supplicants and demonstrators they had dispersed were returning, this time with a sprinkling of soldiers among them—except that the soldiers were no longer under any kind of discipline. They were mingled with the growing throng in no particular order, distinguishable only by their uniforms. As before, some of the people were helping others too sick to stand or walk by themselves.
He felt sorry for the suffering that was plainly evident on many faces, even from this distance, but there was nothing he knew to do about it. There wasn’t a cure, nor did palliative measures help much. Amelia and June had told him that the only thing to be done for the patients was handing out pain killers—or injecting them once the oral analgesics were no longer effective.
Another jet came over but did nothing to reduce the number of Nigerians converging on the hospital.
Doug sprayed a full clip of warning shots into the dust in front of a group working their way around the shot-up truck, where the wire barrier had been broached. That halted them for a few minutes, but he knew it was only temporary. The soldiers who had been their guards only this morning knew exactly how thin his forces were.
Doug felt a hand on his leg and turned half sideways, careful not to bring his body into the line of fire from below. June Spencer had crawled up to him.
“Doug, are you going to have to shoot those poor people? Most of them are just scared.”
Doug thought she looked angry, perhaps concealing the fright she must be feeling. What did she expect him to do if that crowd out there rushed them? He bit back a pithy comment and simply said, “I know, June, but we’ll shoot to save our lives if we have to. It’s something you’re going to have to get used to if somebody doesn’t get this bug under control. When people feel threatened, they become irrational. Even back home, the blacks are blaming whites for starting this thing. Please go back, June; it’s dangerous here.”
She searched his face for signs of rancor, then seeing none, she nodded and retreated. He turned back to his duties. He could see that a lot of the ones in the crowd would be dead soon anyway. A bullet might be a merciful release, he thought grimly, though that would be small consolation if he had to order his men to fire on them. Doug began making the rounds of the guards. He had three of his men on the roof and the rest guarding the stairwell below. Whatever else happened, he couldn’t allow it to be overrun.
“Doug!”
He edged back toward the center of the roof to where he could stand up here and not be seen from the ground—though if the soldiers happened to think about it, they could simply climb up a few stories in the neighboring buildings and slaughter them all by firing from windows there. He walked over to where Amelia was standing.
“What is it?”
“The embassy is cursing at me because you diverted the first helicopters to us.”
“Are they on the way?”
“Yes, so they say.”
“Well, don’t feel bad about it. Your data and specimens are probably worth more than the whole bunch of them—and us too, for that matter.” He forced a grin. “But they have to rescue us to get them. How soon?”
“I don’t—” Both of them looked to the west as the unmistakable thwacking sound of a helicopter came to them.
“Help me clear everyone away from the landing pad! June! Martha! Get the folks away from the landing pad!” Doug felt like a damned fool for not having already taken care of that. He ran with the two women and began herding everyone toward the far side of the roof, cautioning them in a loud voice to crawl, not walk. The sprawled body of the dead woman, laying in a pool of blood amid buzzing flies, was a very visible inducement to do as he ordered.
They were barely in time. A big troop transport chopper lowered itself to the roof. Two crewmen jumped out, ducking low, and motioned for the loading to begin. Doug was nearly overrun by the civilians before June and Amelia got them under control, then they came near to panicking again as the explosive noise of a machine gun in the chopper cut loose, returning fire from the ground.
The two crewmen were counting. When the helicopter reached its limit, they both shouted “No more!
No more! We’ve got another one on the way!”
Doug used his body and his voice added to those of the crewmen to help stop the bodies pressing forward. He turned his rifle sideways to help push them back. At the same time, he heard shooting from below the stairwell.
As soon as the two crewmen were aboard, the helicopter rose and swept off to the west, punctuating its departure with another round of machine gun fire and a cloud of debris blown about by its blades.
“Get back! Give the next one room to land!” Doug shouted as the remaining medical staff began pressing forward again. His voice was getting hoarse from trying to be heard over all the noise. More shots came from below.
“Hold them back!” He yelled at Amelia and June, and ran to the stairwell hatch. He was just in time to help Martha up the last steps before she collapsed in his arms. There was a bloody spot on her left side, just below where her armored vest ended; one arm dangled useless from a wound that had broken the bones of her forearm. It was bleeding copiously.
“June!” Doug called, but she had seen what was happening and she and Amelia were already there. They took Martha from him just as Buddy backed out, firing spaced shots at something below. He was unwounded but his face was nearly white despite the normal darkness of his skin. He kneeled down and flipped the stairwell cover closed and shot the bolt that held it in place.
“Where’s the others?” Doug asked, already knowing what the answer must be.
“Dead. Just like we’re going to be if we don’t get out of here soon. Goddamn bastards.”
The other chopper came in, hovered, then moved sideways to the landing pad. As before, two crewmen jumped out, already waving frantically for the people to hurry and get aboard.
Doug felt numb. Almost his whole squad, gone. He swept his gaze in a half circle as he backed toward the hovering chopper, holding his rifle ready. He fired two bursts at the stairwell hatch when a cascade of automatic rifle fire burst the lock and it started to open. A head that had showed momentarily disappeared in a spray of blood. When he heard the almost hysterical voice of the crewman yelling at him again to hurry, he turned and ran. June was just being hauled into the opening; she had waited until all her people were inside before leaving. He passed the crewman and rushed to the hands waiting to haul him inside. The crewman was hot on his heels. He barely made it before they were in the air, then almost fell out before another of
the crew could get the door closed and latched.
Seconds later they were out of range, but not before several rifle rounds punctured the side paneling. It wasn’t until a sudden, relative quiet fell despite the noise of the rotor blades that he realized the chopper’s machine gun had been firing almost steadily the whole time they were on the roof and as they departed.
When he had time to look around he saw that Martha, Buddy, Guiterrez and one other man were all that was left of his squad.
* * *
There was a three day wait on the carrier, endurable only because Doug was able to enjoy a few intervals in the company of June despite the hours she was working and despite the grief he felt over the loss of so many from his squad. It was also tempered when word came from sick bay that Martha was going to recover from her wounds. Otherwise, he had little to do but wait, and avoid the embassy personnel when they arrived, still mad over playing second fiddle during the helicopter pickups. Other expatriates were brought aboard in a steady stream by helicopters, picking them up wherever they were in the most peril. Even communications with the CDC command structure was out of his hands. His phone was dead and he hadn’t been able to find a replacement battery aboard ship. Amelia did keep him informed, though.
The second day out was the first time June was able to take a break and ask Doug to meet her in the recreation room of women’s quarters. It was only about a quarter occupied and those who were there looked weary from overwork.
“You look sleepy,” was the first thing he said to her.
She straightened up from where she had been slumped in a chair, trying to finish a cup of coffee. She smiled wanly. “I am. I just wanted to see you a few minutes before going for a shower and a little sleep. I wanted to apologize for questioning you back there on the roof of the hospital. My only excuse for not doing it sooner is that I’ve been working so much. I’m dead on my feet.”
“Thanks, but I didn’t take it amiss. Are there that many ill among the refugees?”
“There’s enough to overwhelm the carrier’s sickbay, so when we offered, they put us to work. It’s mostly children with the usual things they come down with and black expatriates and embassy personnel who have contracted the disease here. Plus some wounded marines are beginning to come in, too.”
“You said they contracted the disease here. Do you mean you’ve discovered the vector?” Doug pulled out a chair and sat down with the cup of strong black coffee he had drawn.
“Oh no, sorry. I phrased that wrong. They got it because they’re black or dark brown, not necessarily from being here. I understand from the news back home that we’re beginning to see a pattern of how it spread from Nigeria, but it’s not following a traditional vector pattern.”
“How so?”
“Well, look—we have one member of a family that comes down with it and not another. We may have roommates where one is ill and the next perfectly healthy. So far, at least.”
“No pattern, huh?”
“Oh, I’m sure there is one. We’ll find it soon, simply from letting the computers crunch the numbers and data. That wasn’t really what I wanted to talk to you about, though. Besides apologizing.”
“An apology wasn’t necessary, June. Really. And I’m open for whatever else you need to say. Go ahead.”
“Doug—I’m sorry you lost so many of your crew. I know it must be hard on you. And I wanted to thank you.”
“Thank me? For what?”
“For saving all our lives. The hospital was overrun and looted right after we got away. The poor patients were slaughtered.” She dropped her gaze as if not wanting to think about what the scenes must have been like. Doug had heard about it, too.
“June, we were just doing what we signed up for. But why did the mob kill the patients? Weren’t there a lot of sick ones among them, trying to get admitted.”
June shrugged and stood up, abandoning her coffee with half of it left. “Lord knows. Probably a rumor got started that the way only way to stop it was to kill everyone showing symptoms.” She shuddered.
“People can be so cruel and unreasonable sometimes.”
Doug nodded. “As I said on the roof, they get scared and then irrational. And I know you must have been frightened back there on that roof. Hell, I was, too, and believe me, an apology wasn’t necessary.”
He saw that June was getting ready to go. “Are you leaving already?”
She covered a yawn with her hand. “I have to or I’ll fall asleep in my chair. I’ll try to get away and see you the same time tomorrow, okay? Maybe I’ll be a little fresher then.” She ran her hands through her hair, hanging in pale greasy tresses but still wavy. “And maybe this will look a little better after it’s washed.”
Doug wouldn’t have minded and said so. Even like this he found her attractive. Her figure beneath the thin material of her tropical uniform more than compensated for the battlefield grunge. He told her so, indirectly. June kissed him on the cheek with a tiny humorous twitch that displayed her amusement at the way males think, then left him there. He would have been surprised had he known how many questions she had asked Amelia about him after their rescue.
* * *
The third day aboard the carrier, a decision was made somewhere up the chain of command to ferry the CDC contingent back to America—and to give them seating priority on one of the first government-chartered commercial jets to fly into the Port Harcourt airfield after the marine commander pronounced it secure.
Like most military missions Doug had ever been involved with, it was a ‘hurry up and wait’ proposition.
First they were grouped together near the huge carrier’s helicopter landing area where they waited for what seemed like hours to leave. The constant noise of military jets idling, taking off and landing made conversation impossible. Doug spent most of the time kneeling next to Bob Handley’s stretcher and talking to him, even though he knew he couldn’t be heard. There was little else he could do for his old friend. Bob was in obvious pain despite the narcotics, and his mind wandered. He mumbled words sometimes, but it was incomprehensible with all the noise. Doug suspected he wouldn’t have understood what he was saying anyway. Probably it was something about his family. He had a wife and four children.
Whatever the words were, Doug intended to tell Flora, Bob’s wife, that his last thoughts had been of them. He doubted Bob would make it home alive, or live much longer even if he did.
Once the big transport choppers finally took them off the carrier and deposited them near the partially burned airport terminal, there was more waiting, but little talking. A squad of shirtless, sweating Marines were collecting the last of the bodies from the crazed mob that had overrun the airport, hoping to find a way out of the country. No black or dark skinned marines were participating in that detail. Despite the lack of planes coming and going, it was still noisy with the sound of bulldozers clearing away the rubble of two burned out commercial jets, and there was still the intermittent sound of gunfire in the distance. The constant noise of Marine choppers going back and forth, along with the intermittent sound of jets circling above the choppers in a protective pattern, added more decibels to the mix.
There were almost three hundred people waiting for the first flight out from the airport. A cheer went up from most of them when a big commercial jet came in and touched down. Neither Doug nor June joined in; both were lost in their respective thoughts.
If those waiting thought they would be taken straight aboard when the plane landed, they were quickly disillusioned. It took another three hours before they were allowed to board, despite the plane having been refueled in less than an hour. Fortunately, the underground tanks of diesel fuel hadn’t been torched like so many of the buildings had in the orgy of wanton destruction.
“That’s us!” June fairly shouted when the portable stairs were finally wheeled out to the plane. She looked up at Doug’s still grim countenance and felt sorry for him. It wasn’t like losing a spouse, but Amelia had spoken to her th
e previous day about how military units bonded, something she already knew but had to be reminded of.
“I sure hope something comes from your work here,” Doug remarked to June as she came back from checking on the patients going with them. She had seated herself beside him. Every seat in the aircraft was taken, but first class was being used for the ones who were too ill to sit, like Bob Handley and a few others.
“I do, too, Doug. For all my time with the CDC, I’ve never been in a situation quite like this one. Bob is resting comfortably, by the way. We’ve got him pretty well doped up.”
Doug sipped at some coffee, grateful for the stimulating effect. “Is that all you can do for him?”
“We’re giving him anti-viral medication with the morphine. It has seemed to slow down the progression of the disease a little, but it’s no cure. And we’re giving him and the others on the plane with us the last of it.
We left most of our supplies behind.” She reached and touched his chin. “Your beard is growing out in all kinds of colors. I even see some red in it.”
“Uh huh. Just ignore the gray, please.”
She laughed.
The idling jet’s engines whined louder and it began to move. Shortly they were roaring and a minute later the big plane lifted off. It circled around and headed east, still climbing. This time they were taking the shorter route, across Africa and to a military base on the other side of the continent and from there across the Atlantic Ocean.
“Next stop Atlanta,” Doug said when they lifted off from the base in Sudan, where an air mobile army brigade left over from the war there was still hunting down members of a new terrorist organization and destroying their supplies and training camps. When he got no reply to his comment, he turned and saw that June’s eyes were closed. Her head rolled with the motion of the banking plane and came to rest on his shoulder. He was sleepy himself, but he didn’t move, not for a long time.
