“Don’t shoot. It’s him,” Joseph instructed.
She pulled the carbine to her chest.
The man sobbed, holding the bodies in his arms. “Why? Why did you shoot them?” Tears streamed down his face.
“They were infected,” Joseph managed. Kevin knelt nearby and put pressure on his wound.
“Why were you keeping them?” Kevin said to the man. “They were infected.”
“They were only sick,” the man retorted.
“Kevin, please. That’s him. Patient Zero,” Joseph said.
“This guy? No way.”
“Keep pressure on it, Kevin, but prop me up.”
Kevin helped him upright. The man matched the photos. His hairline stampeded for the back of his scalp. His belly bulged over his pants, and he’d grown a patchwork beard of mixed grays and browns.
Gwen ran back in. She took out a tourniquet and placed it as far up his arm as possible. She quickly cinched it closed spinning the windlass rod and sliding it underneath the rod-locking clip.
“That hurts, but it should.”
“We need to get you a doctor,” she said, her eyes clouded with worry.
Joseph could care less. “I’ll be fine. What’s your name?” he asked.
The man looked at him with tear-filled eyes which were almost white, but not. His eyes had a whitish hue, but still held some pigments of brown.
“My name is Richard Thompson. Why are you doing this to me?” he screamed. Kevin helped Joseph to his feet. His legs felt weak and wobbly. Lost some blood.
“Because, Mr. Thompson, you are Patient Zero, and I need you if we are going to create a vaccine for the virus from hell.”
STEELE
Youngstown Airfield, Youngstown, OH
The men hugged the wall, heartbeats flying a mile a minute. To the man, they had all voted to make a break for freedom. They all knew they could die, but to forsake vows that they had sworn to their country would have been worse than death. So they planted their backs against the wall and prayed.
Steele’s breathing came fast. His body and mind knew it was the calm before the storm. Any minute now they would be fighting for their freedom and lives. Master Sergeant Hunter had explained things succinctly. Blow the door. Overpower the guards. Race to helicopters. Fly away. He had made it sound like it was something he had done a hundred times before.
Master Sergeant Hunter banged fists up and down with Sergeant Lewis.
“Sins and Skins.”
“Sins and Skins, baby,” Sergeant Lewis said, smiling evilly at Master Sergeant Hunter.
“Hug some wall and cover your balls,” Master Sergeant Hunter grunted at the prisoners.
Sergeant Lewis molded some dough-like explosives around the hinges. His fingers pressed it down like a master pizza maker creating a handmade crust around the hinge.
“Keep your head down,” Steele said from the side of his mouth. Ahmed tried to melt into the wall, his hands grasping for anything to steady himself.
Sergeant Lewis took his place near Master Sergeant Hunter, and the seconds dragged out. Hunching his head, Steele covered his ears, waiting for the explosion.
The wall reverberated as the door blew outward with a bang. Smoke and dust filled the room. His hand on the shoulder of the man in front of him was the only thing guiding him. They rushed into the hallway. Dust clung to the air. The bodies of the guards lay in the prone position on the floor. Neither of them are Mauser.
Hunter and Lewis snatched up M4s and Sergeant Lewis handed Steele one of the soldier’s sidearms.
“Make ’em count,” he said.
Steele press-checked the M9A1 Beretta. He felt the extractor with his finger, trusting his fingertips more than his eyes in the smoky haze. One round in the chamber. He was ready for combat. Not very effective versus soldiers with M16s and M4s. He pushed the thought from his mind, letting it lay in the background, knowing he was at a disadvantage in a gun fight. He didn’t have a choice.
Steele’s eye caught the handle of his tomahawk sticking out from the dead soldier’s belt. He snatched it up on his way by duel wielding both handgun and melee weapon.
“Stay close,” he whispered to Ahmed.
The men followed in a single quiet stack, checking corners as they moved down the hallway. They flanked up a stairwell. Steele scanned up and around the next flight of steps, cross-checking the stairs above them as they moved.
“Clear,” Master Sergeant Hunter shouted as he bounded, Sergeant Lewis close behind. Their guns pointed different directions. Combat boots pounded down the steps from above like a stampeding herd.
“Move faster. Beat them to the chopper,” Colonel Kinnick called from the middle of the line. A large glowing red exit sign hung over a door. Master Sergeant Hunter kicked the door open, and their eyes adjusted easily to the early morning light. Fire burst from Sergeant Lewis’s gun, lighting up the stairwell, and Steele ran outside. He covered the edge of the building with his handgun.
“Follow me,” shouted a voice. The prisoners sprinted for the helos parked on the other side of the air traffic control building. Master Sergeant Hunter reached the edge of the building and cut the corner, using the angle to expose as little of himself as possible while getting a good shooting vantage of anyone who might be on the other side. Gunfire banged from the building.
“Keep moving. They’re onto us,” Colonel Kinnick shouted.
They ran across the concrete helipad to nothing. Over twenty plus men stood in the open, panic washing over them.
The escape depended on speed and surprise. A minute after the door blew, the surprise was over, as the enemy soldiers began to comprehend what was happening. Because the helos were gone, any edge they had quickly dissipated into the thin air. Their fragile plan unraveled thread by thread every second.
“Where are the helos?” Master Sergeant Hunter yelled. Dirt sprang up from the ground. The single crack of a sniper rifle sounded from the blockhouse air traffic control tower. An escaping soldier dropped to the ground. Master Sergeant Hunter aimed skyward, putting rounds into the tower that looked like a modern medieval keep.
“Back to the building,” someone called out. In a mass, the men ran for the cover of the tower’s walls.
Steele sprinted with them.
“To the other side. Stay close to the building,” Kinnick shouted. They moved at a crouch and circled to the other side. No helos.
Soldiers ran from the civilian side of the camp. Men pulled pants on as they emerged from tents. From the other end of the airfield, dust rose from Humvees speeding back for the air traffic control tower. The opportunity for escape narrowed.
“Steal a truck?” Steele said. Master Sergeant Hunter seemed to eye the tower and dust rising at the same time.
“Would love to if those Humvees weren’t going to beat us there.” The dust cloud was close to the other parked vehicles. Their time was up. Death sentences awaited them. In a matter of moments, a fifty-caliber machine gun would open up on the escaping prisoners, shredding them. Wait. A billowing tarp on the far side of the runway captured Steele’s attention.
“There,” Steele shouted, pointing at the little black mounds of airborne freedom.
“Get to the choppers,” Colonel Kinnick shouted with a wave of his arm.
“I’ll hold them,” Sergeant Lewis added. He lined up his sights on the door behind them, ignoring a look from the master sergeant. He put a couple of rounds on the door frame. Every few seconds, he would repeat the process to keep the soldiers inside.
They took off for the helicopters. Steele was swept up into the group of men. A disorganized mass of scared men that ran for escape because they couldn’t ask for forgiveness now.
Their feet pummeled the pavement in wild gaits, but none of them could hear because of the pounding of blood through their veins. Steele’s lungs screamed for more oxygen. Concrete disappeared beneath them and the helicopters grew closer. Why are the helicopters so far away?
“Stay in fron
t of the pilots,” Kinnick shouted at the men, and a small uneven wall of running men took their place around the vector of escape.
The sniper in the tower took shots at them. Ricochets of bullets echoed as they cracked the air and struck the ground at their feet. One whizzed past his ear and the man in front of him fell, grabbing his back, and they left him facedown on the tarmac unmoving. To stop was to die.
The pilots dove into the cockpit of the helicopters. Their fingers flipped switches. Their eyes darted from control to control. The rest of the men huddled around the other side of the choppers, encouraging them onward.
Ahmed panted next to Steele, supporting his shoulder by holding his elbow. The rotors slowly spun around and around, gaining speed with each rotation. They whirled above them like a giant ceiling fan, driving cool air with thundering uniform precision.
Steele snuck a look through the helicopter doors. A large blur ran for them across the airfield. Sergeant Lewis. A Humvee barreled down on him. He ran faster than a man of his stature should allow. His head twisted over his shoulder, determination settling on his face.
“Get in,” Kinnick called at the men. “Get these choppers in the air,” Kinnick shouted at the pilots.
Steele took his seat.
The man ran, but not faster than the Humvee gaining on him.
“Sergeant Lewis,” Steele yelled. Lewis’s face was flushed red, his arms swinging wildly.
“Master Sergeant, gun,” Steele shouted. Master Sergeant Hunter threw him an M4 with an ACOG scope. The Humvee closed the distance on Sergeant Lewis; the distance of a simple elementary school math equation of when two speeding trains would meet, except Lewis was trying to escape, not collide. The fifty-caliber-mounted machine gun sprayed bullets into the side of the helicopter. The men flinched, hunkering down. The helicopter was a fat wild turkey trying to fly.
Fire blazed out of the barrel of the fifty-caliber machine gun. The gunner raked the side of the helo, punching holes in the skin of the aircraft. Steele ducked for a moment, not wishing to be the recipient of such large rounds. The gunner cut back and forth, swinging his fifty between the two helicopters. It was as if he wished to give both choppers an equal taste of pain.
Steele took a deep breath and sighted in on the tan Humvee. Its speed changed, forcing Steele to shift his sights backward then forward. He tuned everything else out. He zeroed in on the gunner turret. The soldier swiveled over, pointing the weapon directly at Steele. The fifty didn’t blaze, but remained silent. The gunner called down for a reload, and he made eye contact with Steele through the sights of their weapons. Reddish beard. Red hair hung near his eyes. Tattoos covered his arms. Mauser. Mother fucker.
Steele shifted his gun down and squeezed the trigger. Bullets punched through the windshield. Bang. Bang-bang. The windshield webbed and the Humvee rapidly decreased speed, veering to its left. Steele set his sights on Mauser again. His friend shouted, brow creasing, but Steele couldn’t make out what he said. The angry man dropped below the machine gun turret and disappeared.
“Bastard,” Master Sergeant Hunter uttered.
“Take us back down,” Steele shouted over the heavy swoosh of the blades. Nobody listened. “Take it back down,” he shouted again, leaning into the cockpit. The pilots ignored him, taking the bird higher in the air.
“We can’t leave him.”
Why aren’t they picking Lewis up?
“Steele, man. It’s okay.” Master Sergeant Hunter leaned back, his head resting on the metal seating compartment. “Hawkins. Put it on the list.”
The Asian sergeant nodded his affirmation.
Steele didn’t understand. He looked out over the airfield. About fifty yards behind the Humvee lay the body of a large man. Blood poured out from around him, outlining his lifeless form. Steele had been too late.
The helos rose steadily in the air, and Steele closed his eyes. Just another person he had failed to save.
GWEN
Grand Haven, MI
Gwen and Kevin wrapped their arms around Joseph, hauling him to the living room couch. Richard walked dejectedly in front of them. Gwen pointed the barrel of her gun into Richard’s back, and she pushed him ahead with her carbine.
“Just take a seat over there,” Gwen commanded. The man sat down, holding his head in his hands. Little sores covered his hands.
They gently set Joseph down on the leather couch.
The wound had stopped bleeding, plugged by the knife and sealed off from the rest of the body by the tightly wound tourniquet.
“Is the knife through the arm?”
“Yes, I can see the tip sticking out the other side,” Gwen said.
“Okay, the blade has gone through the brachialis and deltoid muscles with the tip piercing the lateral head of the triceps.” Joseph knew that the major neuro-vascular bundle was medial, the inside part of the arm, but smaller muscular branches and very vascular muscle tissue would bleed profusely upon removal of the blade.
“Keeping the tourniquet on, I need you to remove the blade and fill the wound with the hemostatic agent and then gauze. Keep shoving gauze in until it stops bleeding, through both sides,” he said. She nodded, removing the supplies she needed from a red med kit.
“Why are you here?” Richard said. He stared through his fingers.
“We are here for you. You are Patient Zero,” Joseph said. He grimaced as Gwen messed with his wound.
“I don’t understand.” Richard blinked, trying to digest the words. “Patient Zero. What does that mean?”
“Ahh,” Joseph said, as Gwen put a bunch of gauze into the wound in his arm. “You are the first known human case of the disease,” Joseph said, gritting his teeth.
“Keep the tourniquet tight,” he told Gwen; his fingers were numb. He couldn’t risk bleeding out from a loose tourniquet. It had happened to often in the field.
Richard stared at him. “What do you mean the first? I don’t have like AIDs or anything?”
“Unfortunately, no. We could handle that,” Joseph said.
Richard’s mouth twisted into a grimace. “I remember getting bit by some sort of fucking monkey on my hunting trip to Africa, but when I got back they said I was fine.”
“As Dr. Anderson confirmed.” The pieces were falling into place.
“Yeah, I met him in Chicago.”
“When did your wife and daughter turn?” Joseph asked.
“About a week after the riots and protests started in D.C.”
“How did they contract the disease?”
“I dunno. I woke up one morning and they were acting all strange.”
Joseph frowned. “Nothing happened? They just woke up sick?” Gwen wrapped white gauze around his arm.
Richard gazed downward, rubbing his hands together.
“I don’t remember.”
“Did you do something?” Joseph probed.
Richard squeezed his temples as if he could grind out the memory with his hands. “I can’t remember. I blacked out. One minute I was there, the next I was gone. When I woke up, there was blood all over the bedroom. Gloria was in the corner screaming. She locked herself and Helen away for days. Then one day they wouldn’t respond when I spoke to them, but I knew they were okay because I could hear them moving around.” He looked at them hopefully.
“Do you remember the airport in Washington or the hospital in Chicago?”
“Yes. But, I can’t remember anything bad.”
“You don’t remember assaulting all those people?
“No,” he said. Richard put his head in his hands. “Why are you telling me this? I didn’t do anything.”
“Did you watch the news before your power went out?”
“Yes. Some sort of virus. Riots. Military.”
Joseph nodded. “Your family contracted a mutated form of the virus that you appear to have successfully fought off. I believe it is a variant of Monkeypox, but I can’t be sure at this point. I was researching Monkeypox in Africa for the CDC when this new vir
us spread out of control,” Joseph said.
The man’s lip quivered. “I have what all those crazy people have?”
“Yes. But you are the only case I’ve seen that hasn’t died and that exhibits normal human function.”
Tears formed in the corners of his eyes. “Wait. Are you saying I caused this?” He pointed with a loose finger at the boarded-up front window.
“Yes and no. That isn’t important now. What’s important is that you may hold the key to fixing all of this,” Joseph said.
Richard knew better. “All those people.” He shook his head, wiping the imagined blood from his fingertips on his pants. Then he changed.
“That bitch SHOT MY FAMILY,” the man said, standing up. Foaming at the mouth, he lunged at Gwen, trying to bite her. Kevin was already there though. He punched Richard in the jaw, sending him to the floor.
“That’s for Jefferson High,” Kevin said with vindication. Kevin pulled Richard’s arm behind his back and Gwen helped him keep him down.
“We should get him tied up. He doesn’t seem stable.” They tied his hands together behind his body.
Minutes later, Richard came to. Straining at his bonds, he growled at them spitting onto the floor.
“What’s wrong with him?” Gwen asked.
Joseph watched the man flail, pull at his bonds, and groan in pain. His jaw snapped together.
“He is reminiscent of the infected, but different, I need blood work and a lab. Argh,” Joseph groaned as he adjusted his arm.
Richard stopped, squirming body relaxing beneath his rage.
“He’s stopped,” Kevin said.
The middle-aged man’s body shook. Sorrow filled his eyes. “What is wrong with me?” he sobbed.
We don’t have enough time.
“Why did you tie me up?”
“Because you can’t be trusted,” Gwen said.
“Time is still the enemy,” Joseph said.
“And we need to get you to a doctor,” Kevin said.
Joseph looked down at his arm. Eventually I’ll need to remove the tourniquet and gauze and get someone to repair the wound. He gave Kevin a nod.
The End Time Saga (Book 2): The Breaking Page 38
