End Zone

by D C Alden

  On the streets below the infected still funnelled between the buildings, tens of thousands of them, perhaps more, squeezed together by their sheer mass. Marion had witnessed the same phenomenon across the river, and the scene had frightened her. Shanghai was lost. Her options were non-existent.

  Not just hers.

  She placed her hands on the glass and looked out across the city. Night had fallen and fires still raged, huge pockets of red flame against a black landscape that stretched towards an unseen horizon. She craned her neck and looked up into the sky. She thought she saw something up there, far above her, the wink of a distant light, a disturbance in the clouds.

  An object falling silently to earth —

  The pulse of light was brighter than a thousand suns, and it blinded Marion instantly, scorching her eyeballs, melting the glass beneath her hands.

  Then she felt nothing.

  Ray Wilson shuffled to the huge kitchen table and sat down. He was dressed in jogging bottoms and a Houston Texas sweatshirt, and he wore slippers on his feet.

  Around the table, most of the other thirteen chairs were occupied by a member of the Hayden family. Ray had learned that they were a hard-working bunch, horse and cattle breeders, and business had clearly been good over the years.

  The ranch house was huge, constructed of stone and thick timber beams and decorated with a nostalgic mix of Tex-Mex furniture, rugs and artwork. It was a home in every sense, warm, comfortable and inviting. Ray couldn’t remember the last time he’d been made to feel so welcome. He’d always been a little sniffy about the South, with their overt and often uncomfortable expressions of patriotism, their unyielding support for the Constitution, particularly the first two amendments, but the Hayden family had changed his mind. He decided his previously ingrained metro-liberal attitudes might just benefit from a little readjustment.

  ‘Eat up now.’

  Alice Hayden, the no-nonsense matriarch, smiled at him as she set down a plate of bacon and eggs. There was coffee and juice already on the table, and the other Hayden children and grandchildren — their ages ranging from teens to mid-forties — were at various stages of breakfast. People came and went around the table. A working ranch needed a working kitchen, he guessed.

  ‘How’re you feeling this morning?’

  Joe Hayden sat down opposite Ray, nursing a mug of black coffee. His skin was deeply lined and permanently tanned by several decades of Texan sun, and his hair and neatly-trimmed beard were snow white. Ray figured he was seventy plus, but there was solid muscle beneath his checkered shirt, and Ray felt a twinge of envy. He was out of shape, a condition that could’ve cost him his life.

  ‘Much better, thank you,’ Ray answered, lifting his own coffee mug in appreciation.

  The youngsters drifted away from the table, some to school, some to the fields and pens in the surrounding acreage. Coats and cowboy hats were lifted off the pegs as people went about their business, and once again Ray was struck by the sense of family, of history. It made him a little jealous.

  ‘The doc tells me you’re okay,’ Hayden said.

  Ray nodded, swallowing a mouthful of eggs. ‘Much better, thanks. And I’ll be out of your way as soon as possible.’

  ‘That’s not what I meant, Ray. You’re welcome to stay as long as you wish. We’ve got plenty of room and besides, it’s not often we get a big-city reporter in these parts.’ The smile faded. ‘Though with this China thing happening now, you’re probably itching to get back to DC.’

  Ray took another sip of his coffee. ’What d’you mean?’

  ‘They had a virus outbreak in Shanghai, same as here. Chinese government dropped a nuke on the city last night.’

  ‘Those poor people,’ Alice Hayden said as she plucked dirty dishes from the table.

  It took several moments for Ray to recover. ‘A nuke?’

  Hayden stood up and cocked his head. ‘Bring your coffee into the den.’

  Ray followed him through into a log-walled room that had a lot of chairs and sofas arranged in front of a huge TV. Fox News was playing, the anchor sandwiched against a graphic of eastern China. He was talking about fallout and blast radius. And casualties. Ray watched the ticker at the bottom of the screen and his blood froze; four million estimated fatalities, another three million injured. Ray wondered if Coffman now had similar plans for Lubbock.

  ‘Guess they felt they didn’t have much choice,’ Hayden reasoned. ‘That’s a big city, huge population. I guess the Lubbock thing spooked them.’ He looked at Ray and said, ‘I can’t imagine how bad that must’ve been.’

  Ray glanced down at his slippered feet, the memory still raw. ‘I saw a little girl, couldn’t have been more than three or four years old. She was naked, covered in blood, and quite clearly infected. One of her little legs was badly mangled, and she limped along the sidewalk, all alone, making this terrible screeching sound. It was heartbreaking.’

  ‘Goddam,’ Hayden muttered.

  ‘When you see it up close, you realise it’s got to be stopped.’

  They watched TV in silence for a few minutes, then the rancher turned to Ray. ‘Well, I’ve got business to attend to. You need anything, just ask Alice.’

  ‘That’s very kind, but I need to leave.’

  Hayden hesitated. ‘Doc says you should rest up a few more days.’

  ‘I can’t. I have to get back to DC.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ Hayden said, nodding. ‘Your clothes were pretty torn up, so we threw them out. I’ll get you some fresh ones.’

  ‘Where’s the nearest airport?’

  ‘Abilene. That’s about a hundred-and-fifty-miles to the south-east.’

  ‘In Texas?’

  Hayden frowned. ‘Sure.’

  ‘What the closest airport outside the state?’

  The rancher thought about that one and said, ‘Roswell, New Mexico. About the same distance due east. It won’t get you direct to DC but they hook up to the hubs in Phoenix and Albuquerque.’

  ‘I need to hire a car. What are my chances around here?’

  Hayden smiled. ‘Oh, I think we can do better than that.’

  It took Ray almost three hours to drive to Roswell.

  The Ford pickup was ten years old but clean and recently serviced by one of Hayden’s boys. It ran smooth, and Ray saw little traffic as he headed west on Highway 380. He found a jazz station on the radio and the music helped to clear his mind, as did the empty road, the empty plains, and the huge Texas sky that was blue and clear and stretched all the way to the distant horizon.

  He drove through small towns and past fields of nodding donkeys sucking oil from the ground. He crossed the state line a few miles west of the town of Plains and drove into the parking lot at Roswell Air Centre ninety minutes later, leaving the pickup in a long-term bay. One of Hayden’s boys would collect it in a few days, but Ray paid for a week in advance anyway. It was the least he could do.

  He waited two hours to board a feeder plane to Phoenix, and from there he connected to a United flight that got him into Dulles at just after nine p.m. Instead of going home he checked into the Intercontinental overlooking the Potomac River and charged it to the Times. He was exhausted, and although he’d slept on the plane a little, he felt bone tired. He took a shower, dressed in the complimentary robe and lay back on the bed. He scanned the room service menu, trying to decide what to eat.

  It was still lying on his chest when the sun rose the next day.

  Born in the USA

  The de Havilland turboprop came in low over the York River and touched down onto the runway at Camp Peary in Williamsburg, Virginia at a little after ten a.m. local time.

  Mike Savage was already on his feet as the twin-engined aircraft taxied into a large, empty hangar. He waited until the wheels were chocked and the turboprops shut down before he cracked the forward passenger door and dropped the stairs. Outside, Stan Lando was waiting to greet Mike and his team. Two SUVs idled close by, doors and tailgates open, ready to transport the
m to the Special Activities Division building.

  ‘Tough break,’ Lando told him as they shook hands.

  Mike began loading his gear and weapons into the back of one of the SUVs. ‘I screwed up, Stan. Big time.’

  Lando led him out of earshot. ‘The guy played you, I get it. Your ego is bruised — ’

  ‘Fuck ego,’ Mike snapped. He lowered his voice as heads turned in their direction. ‘If I did my job properly we might’ve located Marion, stopped her.’

  ‘We have no way of knowing if Philip knew her location.’

  ‘He chose death over talking, Stan. He knew. Now millions are dead.’

  ‘That was Beijing’s call. Besides, given the timescales, I doubt even the Chinese would’ve been able to stop her. These people are professionals, Mike. More than that, they’re fanatics, and you know how that goes. Folks like that can’t be reasoned with. You did your best with the time and resources you had. Let it go.’

  Mike folded his arms across his chest as he watched his team climb aboard the other SUV. Tapper lingered in the doorway and Mike waved him away. His XO nodded and climbed aboard, and the SUV drove out of the hangar.

  ‘The guys know I screwed up. They’ve been good about it, but maybe you should consider reassigning me.’

  ‘Tapper and Miller said the same.’

  ‘You spoke to them?’

  ‘That’s my job, Mike.’ Lando stepped a little closer. ‘We’ve been doing this for some time, you and I, and right now I can’t think of a single occasion when you didn’t get something useful from an interrogation. Factor in the ripple effect, and you’ve saved a lot of lives.’

  Mike didn’t answer. All he could see was Philip leaping over that rail. ‘Any luck with the prints?’

  ‘Surgically acid-scarred, and no facial recognition hits either. Philip was a ghost. Same with this Marion broad, I’m guessing.

  ‘Are we getting anything from the Chinese?’

  Lando shook his head. ‘The White House has offered assistance, but the bamboo curtains have been pulled tight. All borders closed, nothing in or out, and they’ve shut down their comms networks. China’s a black hole.’

  ‘What about Marion?’

  Lando shrugged. ’She could be anywhere.’

  ‘So where does that leave us? And more importantly, who’s getting hit next?’

  ‘Christ knows, but what I do know is this; I need all my top tier guys prepped and ready to deploy. SOCOM is running everything out of McDill now, and the DOD is mobilising every unit in the country. There’s no time for navel gazing, Mike. I need you on your game and ready to move. Understood?’

  Mike nodded. Stan was right, about everything. He knew he wouldn’t make that same mistake ever again.

  ‘Get your team turned around,’ Lando told him. ‘The call could come any time.’

  ‘Roger that.’

  The field supervisor held out his hand. ‘Welcome home, Mike.’

  Mike took it and shook it. ‘It’s good to be back.’

  Tammy Lindberg had reserved a suite at the Hay Adams on 16th Street under the name of Fairbank. Ray Wilson arrived at one thirty and made his way to the beautifully-appointed room that overlooked a snowy Lafayette Park. The newspaper boss had ordered a light yet exquisite lunch, and Ray had to admit he was glad to be back in the bosom of a big city and all of its conveniences. He’d been gone from DC for less than a week. For Ray, it felt like a month.

  He told Lindberg the whole story over scallops and steak frites, or his version of it at least. He left nothing out, not even the horror of Lubbock. The only detail he withheld was the name of the family that had taken him in.

  Across the table, Lindberg listened without interruption. She took no notes or made any recordings. She didn’t comment when Ray’s recollections forced him to stop and compose himself, nor did she offer words of comfort. She simply listened. It was only after Ray had finished his tale of death and survival that he realised his boss had been shocked into silence. That kind of thing didn’t happen often, and Ray knew why; there was simply too much blood in the water.

  They waited until the table had been cleared and fresh coffee served before Lindberg attempted a cross-examination. It was her way of testing the veracity of a story, and she didn’t any pull punches.

  ’So you think someone went to all the trouble of luring you to Lubbock — then release the virus — just to squash the Baghdad story? C’mon, Ray.’

  ‘Baghdad is the key to all this, Tammy. It put Coffman in the Whitehouse, remember?’

  ‘And you believe the White House is behind the outbreak in Lubbock?’

  ‘I have no idea, but from a terrorism perspective, wouldn’t DC have been a better target? Or New York? Chicago? Lubbock is literally in the middle of nowhere.’

  Lindberg got to her feet and began pacing the room. ‘Okay, let’s back all the way up. The Delta guy you interviewed — ’

  ‘Kenny Chase.’

  ‘Yes. You’re saying his team was in Iraq to stop the dispersal of the Angola virus?’

  ‘Correct. Angola was man-made, that’s what they were told. The global outbreaks were field trials. Angola was designed to kill half the world’s population.’

  Lindberg stopped pacing. ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘You heard me correctly, Tammy. Right after the raid there was that avalanche in Switzerland, remember? The one that buried the hotel and killed a lot of very powerful and influential people? Then the arrests began, here at home; the President, half the Executive, military leaders, industrialists, all of whom are now being held without trial — ’

  ‘Yes, the so-called financial scandal. Get to the point.’

  Ray set his coffee down. ‘What if Coffman was part of the Angola conspiracy but somehow slipped the net? What if she’s finishing what they started?’

  Lindberg bit her lower lip as she processed the theory. ‘I don’t buy it. Angola was a pretty benign disease. Flu-like symptoms, coma, then death. This H-1 thing is the exact opposite. I also have it on very good authority that Coffman was deeply troubled by the terror threats sent to the State Department.’

  ’So she’s a good actor.’

  ‘Maybe…’

  ‘Get me back in the White House, Tammy. I can ask her about Lubbock, put her under a little pressure. You saw what happened last time.’

  ‘I can’t,’ Lindberg told him. ‘Coffman has relocated her Cabinet and National Security Council to a new facility in Denver.’

  Ray sat back in his chair. ‘Jesus, Tammy, what does that tell you?’

  ‘It tells me they’re scared.’

  ‘Or they know what’s coming. Maybe they’re going to hit DC after all.’

  ‘It’s precautionary,’ Lindberg explained. ‘A prudent move, in the wake of Shanghai. And remember, the terrorists are still on the loose.’

  ‘You don’t sound convinced.’

  Lindberg toyed with her wedding ring. ‘I’m not sure what to think right now. And that’s the problem, Ray; everything you have is circumstantial. We can’t run with any of it.’

  ’We can publish my personal account. Why I was in Lubbock, what happened in that cinema, how I escaped, the deaths of those innocent men, all of it underpinned by Chase’s testimony. No pointing fingers, just a timeline. It’s explosive, Tammy, and I’ll add a disclaimer. Legal won’t have a problem with it.’

  ‘The White House will.’

  ‘So we shake a few trees, see what falls.’

  Lindberg stood motionless, her tanned face devoid of expression. She was struggling with the decision, Ray knew. His boss had supported Coffman, the first female President, only to now discover she might be as corrupt as her predecessor.

  ‘I’ll sleep on it,’ she told him.

  ‘I can live with that.’

  ‘Go home, get some rest.’

  ‘I’m staying at the Intercontinental.’

  Lindberg frowned. ‘Why?’

  ‘They tried to kill me, Tammy. Home doesn’t feel ver
y safe right now.’

  ‘Use the suite,’ she said, waving a hand around the room. ‘I need you close by.’ The newspaper boss picked up her coat and purse. ‘Type it up anyway. We’ll see how this looks tomorrow.’ She paused by the door on her way out. ‘There’s a box by the bureau. It’s your office mail, and a new Powerbook . Take care, Ray.’

  Lindberg left the room, closing the door behind her. Ray locked it and slid the chain across, then he picked up the box and began going through the mail. A lot of it was junk. The padded envelope with the UPS stickers was not. It was addressed to Ray and had been signed for at the office the day before.

  Ray set it down on the table, his heart beating fast. It was similar in size to the one the guy in Lubbock tried to pass him, the one Ray was now convinced had contained the virus. He turned it over in his hand, squeezing gently. There was something inside, something small and rigid, not angular. Is this another assassination attempt?

  Ray sat and thought about his next move. He’d travelled from New Mexico using his driving licence, the tickets paid for on a company credit card. He hadn’t been home since he’d landed, and he’d called Tammy from a coffee shop payphone. Sure, his movements could be tracked, but was anyone really looking for him? The package was sent yesterday. Why bother if they thought Ray was already dead or trapped in Lubbock. They could send it to anyone and still spread the virus.

  He got to his feet and crossed to the bureau. He wrote a note on Hay Adams stationary and left it on the carpet by the main door. Then he locked himself in the bathroom. He grabbed a towel off the rail and held it over his mouth and nose. He ripped the package open and emptied the contents into the sink. A mobile phone clattered onto the porcelain. No white powder or liquid, just a phone.

  Ray stared at it. It was a Samsung Galaxy.

  He unlocked the door and left the suite. Down the hallway he saw a maintenance cart. He gave the housekeeping maid a twenty-dollar bill in exchange for a few pairs of latex gloves. He went back to the room, pulled on the gloves and powered on the phone. The battery was fully charged and had a strong signal. There were no contacts in the address books, no text messages or call history. A virgin phone.