by Howard, Bob
“It was always our weakest point,” said Tom. “We can’t have it both ways. We could try to protect the helicopters at the fort, but we would run the risk that they would penetrate the shelter through the hidden emergency exits. By sealing the exits we can protect the fort better, and the big door at the back entrance is impenetrable. I hope we don’t lose the helicopters, but better to lose them than the shelter.”
******
Across the Harbor from Fort Sumter
Marshall Sayer was in the worst mood he could remember since the beginning of the disease that had brought the world to its knees. It was officially known to his organization as CEL Day, or Contagion: Extinction Level Day. Since that day he had a firm grip on the throat of every problem to cross his desk, and he couldn’t understand why he lacked so much information on this particular day. Information was what made governments rise and fall, so why were his people having so much problem giving him answers? That was the question he kept asking himself.
Thirty years in the government had caused his hair to thin, but it hadn’t taken a toll on his health the way it seemed to on politicians. Everywhere he looked, he saw politicians getting fat and lazy while the people of the health and research community, or Secret Society as he had named them, stayed fit and ready. He had risen quickly through the ranks of the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, or USAMRIID, by always keeping his eyes on the goal, and that was to be the best at his job. He was ruthless and mean by nature, but he calculated when it was time to be either way, and when it was time to put on the politician’s face. He didn’t reach higher rank by climbing over the backs of the people ahead of him, he moved them out of his way. He was good at his job, and despite losing his blonde hair, he had a youthful, smooth face.
Today he wasn’t feeling very likable because no one knew what had happened to the patrols. There were seven patrols in the field, and none of them had checked in. He had even sent one of his planes to see what was happening, but other than spotting the Fort Sumter executive helicopter close to the lighthouse, there wasn’t anything worthwhile to report. They got some new pictures of the horde, but that wasn’t exactly news.
Ted Atwater opened the stateroom door as he knocked on it. He was the only person who Marshall trusted enough to let him do that, and he didn’t abuse the privilege. It had to finally be something important enough for him to do it now.
The stateroom had been the captain’s quarters on the Yorktown. It had been restored and nicely furnished when the World War II aircraft carrier was a tourist attraction at Patriots Point. It was also highly defensible from attack. For one thing, they had lived up to their reputation of being secretive, and as far as he knew, no one knew that the former Director of USAMRIID was the person behind the operation of the base at Patriots Point. He had control of a large swath of land from the Arthur Ravenel Bridge all the way to the State Ports Authority on the Wando River. He had supplies, men, trucks, weapons, and almost anything else he wanted or needed. That’s why he found it so hard to believe that the Senator had helicopters. Every time he saw one take off from Fort Sumter he would ask Ted why the Senator had helicopters and he didn’t. It didn’t make him feel better when Ted told him the Navy VH92A’s had been delivered to the Charleston Air Force Base by CIA operatives working for him and had been originally intended to be delivered to Patriots Point. Somehow the Senator had stolen them away from him.
Marshall constantly told Ted he would trade almost any intelligence to find out how that old Senator Harold J. Thornton III had gotten to the helicopters first. All he could figure was that he had brought some good people with him when he was evacuated from Washington DC on CEL Day One. Maybe it was because he was in the Presidential line of succession, and he had been at the White House when they evacuated. Marshall didn’t plan to let Senator Thornton take over the Oval Office, so he could have his helicopters for all he cared.
“What have you got for me, Ted? Make it good, because right now I don’t feel like the Director of USAMRIID. If I was, I would know a lot more than I do.”
Ted had been his assistant for five years before CEL Day, and had been the one who suggested Patriots Point to him when they moved their operations out of DC. He had handled all of the logistics, and Marshall didn’t ask him how he did it. They were so quiet when they took over their new home that they didn’t even draw the attention of the military. Of course there were some issues with the locals.
On CEL Day One it had been total chaos everywhere, so it was no surprise that the Yorktown had been used by the locals as a place to hide. Almost two hundred men, women, and children had hidden in the ships at the Maritime Museum, so USAMRIID had to engineer a peaceful takeover. Ted had not only kept it peaceful, he had made it seem like the federal government had rescued the unprepared survivors. The only issue that arose was what to do with people who had been bitten, and Ted had devised an ingenious plan for them. He had a hospital set up in the destroyer that was parked next to the Yorktown, and bite victims were taken there. Families were not allowed to stay with the victims, but by separating them, there was less conflict when the victims died.
The entire operation was coordinated by Ted because he had placed operatives in the State Ports Authority in advance. The international health community had received a warning of some form of disaster from foreign assets and set plans in motion before it was too late. Trucks were dispatched from the ports into a designated area where they were used to set up the defensive perimeter around Patriots Point, but they weren’t empty. Not only were they used to close off the area, they carried weapons and supplies that were enough to get them all through the early days of the infection. Once they were in place they went quiet, and they stayed that way until they could expand without resistance from the military or survival groups like the ones that were constantly showing up at Fort Sumter. The survivors who had been at the Yorktown on the day the infection began were put to work. If they wanted to stay and they wanted to eat, they didn’t complain.
Ted had the smile on his face that he got when he had good news.
“That redneck from Fort Sumter finally gave us something useful.”
Ted paused for effect. If he had a fault that Marshall didn’t like it was his tendency to stretch out the drama. He tried unsuccessfully to keep the impatience out of his voice.
“Don’t make me ask for it.”
“The Senator isn’t in charge over at Fort Sumter, or at least it appears he’s not.”
Marshall almost came out of his chair, but he stopped himself in time. Ted was too good at his job to yell at him over something so trivial.
“How is that useful to us, Ted? So we’ve been wrong about who’s running things over there. We know there are military and civilians working together. We know they have helicopters that belong to us, but I really don’t care who’s in charge.”
Ted was always ready to bounce back if something made him look bad, so he also tended to keep something in reserve. Since his information didn’t get Marshall excited the way he had expected, he didn’t skip a beat.
“Some of the patrols are checking in. The big horde is still moving this way, but that’s not a surprise. It’s just good news that the patrols are alive.”
“How many have checked in, and was there anything they learned that we didn’t know?”
Ted knew Marshall wasn’t going to be happy with the answers to both questions, so he avoided the subject by going back to what was happening at Fort Sumter.
“Most of them have made radio contact, and that’s nothing new, but the redneck says he heard his guards talking about the food and what they were showing at the movie theater one night, so the shelter at Fort Sumter must be bigger than we ever expected.”
It almost worked. For just a moment Marshall forgot the original question. He had a movie theater on the Yorktown, and the food wasn’t bad, but before CEL Day it was common knowledge around DC that the shelters had been much more extravagant than the taxpaye
rs would have appreciated.
“Ted, if you can’t give me anything useful from our patrols the next time you come to my office I suggest you don’t bother to come at all. Now go get me something, and while we’re talking about your failures, have you heard anything from your people on the inside?”
Ted had almost made it back to the door, and he stopped without turning around to try to find an answer that wouldn’t sound worse than the truth, which was indeed another failure. He hadn’t heard a word from his spies, which wasn’t necessarily bad news. It just wasn’t good news.
“Forget I asked,” shouted Marshall.
Ted knew when it was a good time to get out, so he did.
Marshall waited for a few minutes and then decided it was time to go down and see the redneck himself. He went out through the same door as Ted, but he immediately went down through the decks. The brig was down in the storage levels well away from the populated parts of the old aircraft carrier. It was also near the labs.
Each deck that Marshall passed through was more and more in need of restoration. The lower decks gave the appearance that they were as they had been when the ship was towed out of mothballs years ago, and there were no plans to make it suitable for tourists. That was just part of the disguise, though. When they had decided to set up a secret base inside the Yorktown, they had to make it appear to be for a different reason than research on highly infectious diseases, so they had FEMA stockpile their equipment and other supplies in the lower decks as if it was a relief center. If there was a hurricane and someone tried to access the crates of supplies, they could easily claim it was a government mixup of some sort.
Marshall reached the lowest habitable deck and crossed through a maze of passages until he came to a watertight door that gave the appearance that it hadn’t been opened since World War II. When he pulled it open, the rusty corridor was bathed in brilliant white light. He stepped through the door into pristine labs that were filled with all of the modern equipment needed to do delicate research. It was almost silent despite the fact that there were at least thirty people working at their stations. They were all wearing starched white lab coats with the exception of two who were just about to enter the biohazard lab. They were dressed in state of the art protective suits that would allow them to work with a series of dangerous pathogens that USAMRIID had on site.
The researchers hardly even noticed Marshall Sayer as he passed through the labs, not because they didn’t respect their boss, but because they had been trained to believe distractions led to careless handling of dangerous materials. If he found one of them to be more interested in him than their work, he would have them removed. Besides, Marshall didn’t come down to see them in the first place. He was looking for the Russian scientist they had brought into their fold on CEL Day.
Anton Mikhailov had been visiting the American labs when the infection began because there had been reports of a new pathogen in Central America. The Americans had accused the Russians of introducing the pathogen into the river basins of Venezuela when they had boldly stationed troops in the country during political unrest. Ever since that time the US had been trying to pry them back out of the country. When the CDC had been called in to investigate a strange virus that spread quickly through the area, they were surprised to find the Russians were already there investigating the same thing.
The Russians uncharacteristically welcomed the intervention by the CDC and even USAMRIID. They claimed they were not responsible for the virus, but they were eager to find its source, especially since some of their researchers had already been exposed and quickly died from it. In their typical fashion they failed to mention that some of the infected workers had returned to Russia before becoming ill. The Americans quietly closed the Russian labs in Venezuela and transported everything back to the main research facilities at Fort Detrick, Maryland. Unknown to anyone except themselves and select people at the CDC, they brought back everyone they knew of who had been exposed to the pathogen, even the ones that appeared to have died and then become reanimated.
Doctor Mikhailov didn’t know what his fate would be after the Americans arrived because he had discovered there were secrets within USAMRIID that were being kept from the US government. He was surprised by the lack of oversight because he had seen how dangerous the pathogen was. He was even more surprised when Marshall Sayer, the USAMRIID Director, had informed him of secret bases operated by the research facility in populated areas. Mikhailov went along with Doctor Sayer because he had no choice, but his eyes had been opened to the fact that there were secrets in the American government similar to those found in his home country. It was fortunate for him that he did, because he was evacuated first when the infection raced around the world.
“Where is Mikhailov?” Sayer asked one of the lab techs who was only noticed when things went wrong. The man nervously pointed at the biohazard lab, and he realized he had just missed the Russian as he had entered the sealed chamber.
Sayer walked over to the observation window and saw that the Russian and an American were working with one of the infectious subjects they had brought aboard to study. They were removing tissue samples and body fluids to attempt to identify locations in the body where the infection was present. So far they only knew the same thing everyone else did. A bite was the primary means of transmission. They suspected that there were instances when the infection was spread through the food chain, but they couldn’t explain why it was only in certain species. Crabs could pass along the infection, but they hadn’t identified any fish that could, even though they fed on the bodies of the infected just as the crabs did.
Inside the biohazard chamber, Mikhailov went about his work as if he didn’t know he was being watched, but he had seen the Director enter the labs. He had hoped he would get inside the highly restricted area before Sayer arrived, and he was satisfied that he was going inside just as Sayer walked into the labs. The man wouldn’t expect him to come out soon, and a small smile appeared on his face when he saw Sayer leave only minutes later. Mikhailov believed the man was dangerous and that he would get them all killed with his obsession to control the infection.
CHAPTER SIX
Colony
Present Day
Six Years After the Decline
People found ways to survive if they had a few things going for them. The biggest thing was luck. No one doubted that close brushes with death were the new normal, and anyone alive could recount the many times they had almost died. After surviving close calls, the way to survive the next one was to take what you had learned from the near miss and put it to good use.
The last close call had driven the colony out of their previous sanctuary, and even though they knew it before, they knew they would have to find a way to be sure the infected couldn’t reach their new home. They wanted to help the other groups search for the supply depot they thought was somewhere near Murrell’s Inlet, but they had to postpone what they wanted in favor of what was more important.
The island Jed was searching for was originally connected to land. It had been an oxbow in the Cooper River south of the Pinopolis Lock, and over the years the river had eaten a straight line through the narrow strip of land until it broke through to the other side. There was a shabby old foot bridge that appeared ready to fall down under the weight of the next squirrel to cross it, but it was where Jed and Ben wanted to go. They had searched for this island before, but it didn’t show up on any maps until satellite photos became available on the internet. They tried to find it just for fun in the days before the infection. Now they were searching for it to help their people survive. The beauty of this location was in the fact that the oxbow could only be entered by crossing the Cooper River first. It was shaped like a thumb pointing upward, and the infected would only find the old bridge if they decided to go north. The dead didn’t seem like they were interested in going north anymore.
Jed went over the bridge first, and he could feel it swaying under his feet. He wondered what was holding
the bridge up and his unspoken question was answered when he spotted the ropes that were wound through the boards. The bridge looked more shabby than it was. It was deceptively reinforced by the ropes, and the swaying just added to the deception. Jed made a mental note that they would need to rig the bridge to be able to fall if a horde tried to cross it. The river was about twelve feet below him, and the current was swift enough to keep the infected from climbing back onto land if they fell in. This island was just what they were hoping it would be. Ben followed Jed across, and as he caught up with his best friend, he pointed at the far end of the bridge.
“All we have to do is block that end. The infected would never know we’re here. We could even have campfires and clay ovens cooking without them seeing us.”
Jed nodded his agreement. Swift current, steep banks, thick trees, limited access, and way off the beaten path. The island had everything they needed if they could get enough supplies to it.
There were no real roads that had been cut through the forest, but the legend of the island was that it had been a hiding place used by survivalists. A trail about as wide as a sidewalk meandered through trees from the base of the bridge and came to a dead end in the middle of nowhere. More accurately, it came to a dead end in the middle of the island. When Jed and Ben stumbled onto the path and literally disappeared only a few feet from the view of the bridge, Ben asked Jed if he was thinking what he was. Jed had nodded.
“You still marking the trees? Can you find this place again?” asked Jed.
“You bet. We’re not going back for the others yet, are we?”
Jed shook his head from side to side.
“We need to find out if this is the place we heard about.”
