by David Spell
The natural protective feelings that he had for his daughter meant that he normally hated any guy that came within ten feet of her. He also knew that eventually she would meet the right guy and Chuck would have to be civil towards him.
“Oh? Tell me about him. What's his name and birthdate? I’ll run him through NCIC.”
Melanie laughed. “His name is Brian and he's also studying to be a teacher. He wants to teach high school math.”
“That’s impressive. Anybody that can hold the attention of high schoolers, especially in a math class, has to be a good teacher.”
“Well, he's pretty funny. That helps. Another thing that I think you’d like is that he's a gun guy and a hunter.”
“On a university campus? I assumed all the college boys here were liberal, gun hating, mama’s boys.”
“No, Brian breaks that stereotype. On our first date, he took me shooting. He was surprised that I knew so much about guns and I even outshot him with his Glock. He asked me where I'd learned to shoot so well and I told him about you. He was pretty impressed and he wants to meet you.”
“He’d better want to meet me if he's going to date you.”
The server brought them their food and they paused to take a few bites.
“We’ve only been out once, Daddy. This weekend, he invited me to go to church with him. He works with the youth group at one of the churches in town.”
Chuck saw Melanie’s eyes sparkle as she talked about Brian. Good for her. Maybe he’s the one. He liked what he had heard so far about the young man.
After they finished their lunch, McCain paid the bill and he and Melanie walked outside.
“Can you come over to my truck for a minute?” he asked her. “I have something for you.”
They climbed into his Silverado and Chuck reached under the driver’s seat. He pulled out a square plastic gun case and handed it to Melanie.
“I want you to have this. I’d feel better knowing that you can protect yourself.”
She opened the case and saw a 9mm Glock 19 pistol. There were three fifteen round magazines and one hundred rounds of hollow point ammunition in the case.
“Wow, Daddy, thanks! But, I'm not supposed to have a gun on campus, though.”
“I know, but I’d rather you have it and never need it, than to need it one day and not have it. There's a lock in the case so you can keep it locked up when you’re not around. I'd recommend carrying it in your purse. No one is going to know you have it unless you need it.
"If you do decide to carry it in your purse, just leave the chamber empty. That way you won't have any accidents. Whichever way you decide to carry it, I just want you to be able to take care of yourself. And a Concealed Weapons Permit is pretty easy to get. I'll even pay for it.”
“Ok, Daddy, I'll think about the best way to carry it.”
“If you decide you want to keep it on you, we can get you a good holster to carry it concealed.”
“Thanks, Dad. I've got to go. I have a class in less than an hour. I love you.”
“I love you, too, Sweetie.”
CDC HQ, Atlanta, Friday, 0900 hours
“Here's the preliminary synopsis from the Clean Up Team for the house Team One cleared two days ago,” Rebecca Johnson said.
Both teams were in the briefing room. Most of the men had a cup of coffee. A couple of them were holding cans of energy drinks.
“As best we can figure,” she continued, “Fatemah somehow got infected first. We aren't sure how. Maybe the autopsy will give us some insight. Her DNA was on the heavyset Mexican guy, Jose. Her saliva was in the bite wounds on his arms and hand. Her husband, Mostafa, also had her saliva and DNA in the bites on his arms. She managed to chew both of them up significantly.
“Based on the blood splatter near the front door, she probably attacked her husband first, and then Jose. One or both of them were able to get her restrained in that bedroom. Jose seemed to turn pretty quick and then he attacked the other lawn guy, Juan.
"Jose's saliva and DNA was in the wounds on Juan’s throat and neck. He probably hadn’t been laying there long after having his throat ripped out when Team One got there. This thing seems to be fairly fast-acting.”
“But what about Mostafa?” Chuck asked. “He hadn’t turned yet or given any indication that he was infected.”
“That we don't know,” said Rebecca. “There's so much we don’t know about this virus. It seems to affect different people in different ways. One of the scientists upstairs thinks it may have something to do with an individual's immune system. The stronger their immune system is, the longer it is before they turn into a, well, a violent, infected person."
"Come on," said Scotty. "Say 'zombie.'"
Everybody, including Rebecca, laughed.
"We've already sent several kinds of samples from the victims to the lab here to be examined and to see if we can get some answers. We need to develop a vaccine as quickly as we can. The results from the autopsies should be in tomorrow.
“Our best guess is that Fatemah turned and then attacked her husband and Jose. They were able to muscle her into the bedroom. Jose turned and then attacked his partner and left his body laying in the yard. Then you guys showed up.
"Mostafa was probably close to turning himself, but he saw you guys and decided to kill himself. Maybe he didn’t want to get arrested. Maybe he knew he was infected and didn’t want to turn into one of those things.
“I’ve given everything we have so far to the local US Attorney. He’s reviewing it now and doesn’t see any problems with anything that we did on the scene. I know we were all concerned about how the use of deadly force was going to play out. The US Attorney's preliminary judgment is that deadly force was clearly justified based on the threat of infection by a virus for which there is no cure.”
Rebecca made eye contact with each of Team One’s men. Her eyes lingered on Chuck.
"As for me, I think you did an incredible job. I wish I could say that we won’t see anything like that again, but in reality, I think we’re just getting started.”
Over the next few days, the CDC teams and the local police were able to recover several packages containing tainted drugs. UPS and FedEx were quick to cooperate when they found out they were being used to deliver death throughout America.
Local police were asked to help when the CDC was unable to get a team there in a timely manner. These law enforcement officers did not know what they were retrieving from their potential victims, they just knew that the Department of Homeland Security was asking for their help.
Reports were also starting to come in of people receiving their medicine in the mail and taking it, with disastrous results. Some of those victims became sick and died without any type of reanimation, unlike what Team One had experienced. In other cases, though, the person took the medicine, died, and then came back with a vengeance. Local police officers in several cities had been forced to shoot them. The police learned quickly that the only thing that seemed to put these “zombies” down for good was a bullet to the head.
So far, no police officers had been infected but it was just a matter of time. The CDC quietly sent out information about the severity of this bio-virus to police departments throughout the nation. The Department of Homeland Security also sent out briefings to local police departments urging them to add mandatory head shots in their firearms training programs.
Because the tainted drugs were being sent all over the country, the media still had not started putting the incidents together. The feds had been able to stay out of the news but that would not last. Eventually, this story would break.
CDC HQ, Friday, 1600 hours
Azar Kasra was staring at her computer screen in the CDC lab. The autopsy reports were coming in from the incident that McCain’s team had been involved in. She did not know all of the details but she had pieced some of them together. The enforcement branch of the CDC did not make public what they were doing. Even so, she had overheard some conversations be
tween some of the officers and some of the CDC scientists.
The autopsy reports also told a story. As an epidemiologist, she had access to all of the reports and the samples taken from the bodies recovered at the scene. The CDC Enforcement Officers had shot three infected people. The fourth body, Mostafa Alamouti, appeared to have died by his own hand. A martyr.
The name and picture on one of the autopsy reports caused Azar’s eyes to well up with tears. Fatemeh Alamouti wasn’t her real name. Azar knew it was one of the cover names that Fatemeh had adopted. They had gone through their training together. They had become like sisters.
The Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and Security had recruited Azar during her last year of university. Her background in science was exactly what they were looking for. She and Fatemeh had met and roomed together during their training. They came from very different backgrounds but their friendship had grown as they were prepared for their mission.
After their training was finished, the two women went their separate ways. Even though they knew that their missions were related, everything was compartmentalized so they had no idea what part the other might be playing. The autopsy report was the first time that Kasra had known for sure that her friend had been part of the same mission that she was also involved with.
Azar had been able to get the job she had hoped for at the CDC. The previous Presidential administration had done all they could to allow people from high-risk nations to get work visas and had even helped many of them find jobs within the government. Even after working at the CDC for over a year, she was still amazed at how naive the Americans were. She could not imagine a country that welcomed their enemies with open arms and gave them jobs in strategic positions.
The autopsy report said that Fatemeh had been infected, possibly by an injection or by ingestion. It also showed that she was shot in the head with a 9mm bullet by Chuck McCain. Azar had heard some of the stories about McCain.
He had been a police officer in America but had then gone to Afghanistan and worked with the American Special Forces. He was responsible for the deaths of many martyrs in Afghanistan. Her handler, Amir al-Razi, had asked her to put together a file on McCain and any of the other CDC Enforcement Agents that she could get intelligence on. That information might be useful later on. These were all very dangerous men but McCain might be the most dangerous of all.
For the time being, her job at the CDC was to gather all the intel that she could about the government’s response to the terror-virus. Azar had just been assigned to the team that was trying to develop a vaccine for the virus. She would try to do whatever damage she could to the research without being be too overt.
Azar had used her smart phone to photograph all the documents related to the incident at Mostafa and Fatemeh's house and passed them on to Amir. While not detailed reports, the autopsy and toxicology reports gave him some idea of what had happened out there with two of his agents.
She had also been told that when the time was right, she would strike a blow against the CDC Enforcement Agents and the key leadership of the CDC. This would hopefully slow down their response to the bio-terror attacks. Amir had told Azar that she would have a very special role in the upcoming Jihad.
And she had special plans for Chuck McCain. He would be one of the first ones to suffer and die. He would pay for preventing Fatemeh from fulfilling her destiny as a warrior of Allah.
Two Days Later, Sunday, 0945 hours
Chuck had not been to church in a few weeks. The morning service at the Hope Center Church started at 1000 hours. He got there a little early to catch up with his friends. Everyone was happy to see him.
“Hey, Chuck, good to see you.”
“Chuck, we've missed you. How's everything going?”
“What’s up, Chuck? How's Melanie?”
The men shook his hand and gave him a bro hug. The women just hugged his neck. It was nice to be here, he thought.
Pastor Rick was standing near the front of the auditorium, glancing over the schedule for the morning service. He saw Chuck come in and walked over smiling.
“Chuck! It's great to see you. I'm so glad you're here. How's the new job?”
They shook hands and hugged. “It's, well, there's a lot going on,” McCain answered. “I was hoping I could catch you for a cup of coffee one day this week.”
“How about coming over after church for lunch? Cathy and the kids would love to see you. We could have lunch, watch the game," he lowered his voice and looked around, "and have a beer or two and chat.”
“That's the best offer I've had all week. I’d love that.”
Pastor Rick preached on “Defeating Your Giants.” Chuck thought it was a timely message considering what he was dealing with at work. There were some giants that needed to be defeated.
Rick’s wife, Cathy, did not like to cook after church on Sunday. Chuck understood. She was a great pastor’s wife and after talking to people and hearing their problems for a couple of hours, she really didn’t feel like cooking. She stopped on the way home and picked up a bucket of fried chicken and a few sides. It was a great lunch.
Chuck and Rick sat on the couch in their living room. The Falcons were beating the Panthers on television. Both men were holding a cold bottle of beer.
“So, tell me about your new job,” Rick prodded.
The men had known each other for over ten years. They knew each other well and Chuck felt comfortable telling Rick almost anything.
“Man, this is like nothing that I’ve ever done or seen before.”
Rick look surprised. He knew most of McCain’s resume. “Wow. That's saying a lot for a well-traveled warrior like you.”
Chuck shared the events of the past week and told him a little about the bio-terror threats that they were investigating. He knew that Rebecca had said not to talk about it but Rick was his pastor and anything Chuck said would go no further than this room.
“So, when you think of it, pray for us. We need a little Divine Intervention in catching some bad guys and to try and keep this thing from spreading,” Chuck said.
“I'll do that, buddy. I think of you and pray for you often. And you know, if you or any of your guys need anything spiritually, just give me a call.”
“Thanks, Rick, I really appreciate that. There's one more thing I wanted to talk to you about,” Chuck said. “Let me tell you about my boss.”
The next week, Thursday, 1100 hours
Chuck and Eddie had been working hard over the last several days to get better protective equipment for their men. FedEx had delivered their new “uniforms” the day before. Each man had received a pair of gray kevlar-lined pants and a black kevlar-lined jacket. These were often worn as protective clothing by motorcyclists. The kevlar lining in the clothes was not very thick but should serve to protect the men from bites.
The plan was to wear the kevlar pants as part of their uniform and keep their kevlar jacket in the car with them. “POLICE” had been sewn on the backs of the jacket. A badge was also sewn on the front, similar to the one that was on their uniform polo shirts. Each man was also issued gloves that had a kevlar lining.
The team leaders were in Chuck’s Silverado and were on their way to pick up the team’s rifles. All of their M4s were being fitted with suppressors. They were going to pick up the guns and have lunch.
“Who's this guy that's been working on our rifles?” Eddie asked.
“He’s a good guy. Gunny Powell. His name's actually Robert Powell but he was a Gunnery Sergeant in the Marines. I’ve done a lot of business with him over the years. He's one of the best Class 3 guys in the country.”
“And you really think we need our rifles suppressed, Chuck?”
“I do, for two reasons. First, if we encounter any of those zombie things in a highly populated area, like a neighborhood, a school, or a mall, we need to be as low-profile as we can. The public isn’t going to understand what's going on. They’re only going to see us shooting an unarmed sick person and we just
don't need that kind of publicity.
“Number two, I think those things are drawn to sound. Last week, after Scotty shot the first one, it was just a couple of minutes until the second one found us. When I tapped on the door of the room where the female was, she heard it and starting smashing through the door.”
“Ok, that makes sense,” said Eddie. “What about suppressors for our Glocks?”
“Eddie, I like the way you think. That was one of the things that I was going to talk to Gunny about. It's actually an even easier process to do for our pistols. We just need to get threaded barrels for them and then buy the suppressors. The barrels just drop in and we could carry the suppressor on our belts until we need it. Then we just screw them on. Let’s see what Gunny says, but I think we should pursue that as well.”
As they drove, Eddie asked Chuck, “Man, I got to ask you about this Smith guy. I was in the gym with him yesterday and I'm not a little guy. I’m usually one of the dudes in the gym lifting a lot of weight. But this guy of yours is on another level. He was doing leg presses with over fifteen hundred pounds for reps. He was a little upset because there were no more plates to add to the machine. He'd used them all!”
“Yeah, Scotty’s a beast. I'm glad he's on our side.”
“What's his story? Where did he come from?”
“He was an Army Ranger,” McCain said. “He was in the army for a while, made sergeant, and saw quite a bit of action in Iraq. As big as he is, you’d think he’d be the heavy weapons guy.”
Marshall nodded. “That would be my guess.”
“Nope, he's a sniper. They sent him to sniper school and evidently he has a lot of confirmed kills. Anyway, his Humvee caught an IED explosion. He got busted up pretty good and thought that would be as good a time as any to get out. When he was a little kid, he had dreamed of becoming a fireman. Sounds kind of weird to me, but, hey, to each his own.”
