The Lost Journal (A Secret Apocalypse Story) (10 page)

"They’ve been testing the town’s people. And the refugees."

"Testing?"

"Yeah. For the virus. If anyone tests positive, they get taken away. No questions asked. No explanation."

"I guess people are starting to get pissed off."

"Yeah I’d say so."

Gordon pushed button on a control panel that was attached to a drip.

"What’s that?"

"PCA."

"What?"

"Pain killers. It’s morphine."

"Oh. So what the hell did they do to you? Was cutting your head open like that really necessary?"

"Yeah. Apparently my head injury was worse than I thought. They had to cut me open to relieve the pressure. If my brain continued to swell, I would’ve died. Brain basically would’ve been pushed out the base of my skull."

"Damn. I didn’t know. I would’ve been here sooner. I…"

"Don’t worry about it. I’m fine. So what else has been going on out there?"

I was going to tell him about the fire, the massacre at the unofficial immigration center. And about Franco and how he may very well be infected. And about the rabid old people who very nearly ran us down. But I held my tongue. I didn’t want to freak him out or upset him unnecessarily.

He needed to focus on getting better.

"Not much," I lied. "Since you’ve been in hospital it’s been a whole lot less interesting."

"Yeah? Why am I not buying that?"

"Look, you just concentrate on getting better. You don’t want to be in here forever. You’ll get hooked on that stuff."

Gordon closed his eyes and took a couple of deep breaths.

"Kenji, listen to me. You gotta be careful. I know it’s getting worse. I know. The guy in here yesterday, the one doped up on pain meds. He told me some stuff."

"What do you mean?"

"If they can’t keep this thing under control they’re gonna order in air strikes."

"Air strikes? What are you saying?"

"I’m saying, if the infection gets beyond their control, they’re going to level this town. They’re going to wipe it from the face of the planet. They’ll use nukes if they have to."

"You’re kidding."

"I wish I was. First
they’ll use napalm. Anything that doesn’t get blown up will burn to the ground. In World War Two the allied forces fire bombed the major German cities in their counter strikes. They created firestorms that would last for days. Burn the cities down. Buildings, houses, bomb shelters. Everything. In Vietnam, they used napalm to burn the jungle down. Now they’ll use it here. They need to make sure the infected burn. They need to make sure the virus doesn’t get out. If they can’t stop it with fire. They’ll nuke the place. Vaporize every last one of them."

I was speechless. Dumbfounded. Imagining in my mind’s eye a huge crater in place of this town.

"Nuke the town?" I asked. "They’ll never get away with it."

"The quarantine," Gordon answered.

"What?"

"The quarantine. They’re about to enforce a nationwide quarantine. No one gets in. No one gets out. They’re shutting down the phone networks, internet, everything. They’re going to stop the flow of information to the outside world. Believe me; they’ll get away with it."

I was shaking my head.

"Woomera is just the beginning," Gordon continued. "They’ve tested nukes out there before, out in testing site. The damage from fallout will be minimal. They figure this is an easier option. Sacrifice a few to save the many."

"Is it that bad?"

He nodded. "It’s a last resort but once they make the call, they won’t hesitate."

Gordon then closed his eyes again and took a few more deep breaths. "Damn, this morphine is stronger than I thought."

"Maybe you should just take it easy."

Gordon started to drift off to sleep. "You know wars, battles, fighting," he mumbled. "You used to fight the enemy face to face. But it changes. Jungle warfare. Desert warfare. Urban warfare.
It’s constantly changing. You prepare for the last war you fought and then the next battle comes along and the rules change. The enemy gets smarter. They evolve. But what if the enemy is within? What if the rules change so much, to a point… where..."

He started to slur his speech. It was taking him considerable effort to talk.

"Gordon, are you all right?"

"This virus makes an enemy out of everyone. If it gets out of control there will be no stopping it. Command knows this. The people in charge, the people responsible know this. They are going to do everything in their power to stop it."

Gordon then passed out and I left the hospital even more worried than when I arrived.

To Hell and back.

I walked out of the hospital feeling like I’d been kicked in the guts. I went to Gordon for reassurance but instead I was even
more one edge than I was before.

Would they really order in airstrikes? Would they really nuke the place?

There’s no way, right?

And what the hell did he mean by ‘people in charge’? If the military weren’t in charge then who the hell was?

I got back to the barracks, looking forward to a hot shower and some hot food. But as soon as I’d finished writing in my journal Drake and I were pulled aside. Initially I thought we were going to be reprimanded for the incidents at the outer-perimeter. For our hesitation the day before, for almost disobeying a direct order.

For Franco.

But instead we had been chosen for another operation.

A chopper had crashed in the middle of the unofficial immigration
center
. Right in the middle of the slum. The pilot and co-pilot had survived the crash. But they had suffered some serious injuries and they were possibly surrounded.

"Surrounded by who?" I asked.

"We can’t confirm but it’s possible, actually it’s more than likely there are infected people in that section," the commanding officer said. "And the refugees are now starting to riot. They are getting hostile. We fear they may attempt to take the pilots as hostage and start making demands for their lives."

I shook my head. The refugees were getting desperate. Violent. I can’t say I blame them. People will only be oppressed for so long until they fight back. No matter what the situation is.

Fortunately for us the riots had broken out on the opposite side of the slum to where the chopper had crashed.

This gave us some time.

But if the riots moved the pilots would be in big trouble.

We needed to provide protection for the pilots until the medical chopper arrived. We would act as a deterrent in case anyone got too close or got any wild ideas. I can’t say that I was thrilled about the assignment. It would’ve been nice to have had more support. But that wasn’t possible.

And we couldn’t pick them up in any land based vehicles because the area where they had crashed was inaccessible to cars. The laneways and walkways between the shanties were too narrow for a car, let alone a Humvee to pass through in that area.

"Why can’t we move them to a suitable location, get them into an ambulance and get them out?" I asked.

"No. We can’t move the co-pilot. He has a suspected spinal injury. You have to wait there for the medivac."

And that was it. We couldn’t get them out in a chopper at the moment and we couldn’t drive in there and get them out. We were it. The last hope.

The only hope.

We had to wait it out with them until the medical chopper was available.

I couldn’t believe it. I initially thought we had sent way too many soldiers down here. But now we had no one left. We were stretched to capacity.

I wondered what the hell was going on out in the 50,000 square miles of the military testing site. What the hell were they doing out there? Were there more immigration
centers
? Were there more towns under quarantine?

I suddenly wanted reinforcements.

We were driven into the slum as far as we could go, until the laneways became too narrow for the Humvee to drive through. It took us about ten minutes to reach this point. Again, the size of the shanty town took my breath away. It was an endless sprawl of shacks, and makeshift huts. In the far north-west corner of the slum we could see black smoke rising into the sky.

That was where the riots had broken out.

The Humvee pulled up in one of the wider laneways. "Last stop," the driver said. "Good luck."

We would have to walk the rest of the way.

Amazingly, there didn’t seem to be many people in this area. Maybe they were all over at the riots. Maybe they were all hiding indoors. Too scared to come out.

We were a few ‘streets’ away from where the chopper had gone down. The driver of the Humvee performed an awkward U-turn and sped away. We were on our own now until the medical chopper arrived. Hopefully that wouldn’t be too long.

We set off at a jog and made our way as quickly as possible through the slum.

Drake pointed down a small side street. "Should be down here."

We moved down the side street, carefully checking around each corner and through each flimsy doorway.

No people. No one at all.

We came out into another main street. I guess it was more of a walkway really. The chopper was a mangled wreck. It was lying on its side, the rotor blades crumpled up. It had crushed a few of the shacks in the area as well.

We found the pilots inside. The head pilot had a compound fracture in his leg. The co-pilot was lying on his back in the cabin area. He was unconscious.

There was another person as well. A refugee. He was lying across the front windshield of the cockpit. He had a giant hole in his chest. And his head.

"Thank God you guys made it," the pilot said. "He’s in bad shape," he said motioning with his head towards the co-pilot.

"What the hell happened here?" Drake asked.

"Engine failure. We came down hard. Luckily the area seems to be deserted. Otherwise this could’ve been a lot worse."

"Who the hell is that?" I asked referring to the guy sprawled across the cockpit windshield.

"Don’t know. He tried to attack us. He charged us. He was screaming. Tried to break through the windshield. I had to take him out."

The guy's face was frozen in a look of pain and anguish. His mouth was open, like he was killed mid-scream. His teeth were exposed. There was a bullet hole in his chest and another one just above his right eyebrow. It was so small you could barely see the entry point. The exit wound on the other hand was a different matter entirely. It was the size of a man’s fist. Must’ve been shot with a hollow point, I thought.

"You better check him out first," the pilot said. "He’s been out for awhile now. And I’d love some pain killers. My leg is killing me. Wait, where is your equipment? Where’s the medivac? Which one of you..."

"We’re not doctors," Drake said, cutting him off.

"What?"

"We’re not doctors."

"But they said the medivac was on its way."

"Well yeah, technically the medivac is on its way. But they’re tied up at the moment. We’re here to provide support until they show up."

"Fantastic," the pilot said through clenched teeth. He put his hands over his head and took several deep breaths, closing his eyes.

The bone sticking out of his leg was covered in blood. He must’ve been in an extreme amount of pain. I felt bad that we didn’t think to bring any morphine with us.

"Look, they’ll be here within a few minutes," Drake said. "We’ll be out in no time."

"I hope for his sake you’re right," the pilot said. "I’m not sure how badly he is busted up. He’s been out cold for awhile now. I haven’t been able to check up on him. I can’t put any pressure on my leg."

Drake moved over to the co-pilot and checked his pulse. "Strong heart beat. Nice and steady."

"So why did they send you guys anyways?" the pilot asked.

"Just as a precaution. Make sure none of the people here tried to hurt you or take you hostage or anything. We’re pretty lucky that this area seems to be empty at the moment."

"Yeah. When we did our fly over it looked like there was town meeting on the other side of the slum."

"Town meeting?"

"Yeah, that’s what it looked like from the air. Of course, that’s not what it was. It was the riots."

"The refugees are angry," I said. "They’re fed up. Everything that’s going on. The virus. The testing. It’s pushed them over the edge."

"Yeah, that’s an understatement," the pilot agreed. "Hey, can you check up there?" he said pointing to an overhead storage compartment. "There might be a first aid kit in there. Might have some pain killers."

Drake retrieved the first aid kit from the storage container. He opened it up and found some morphine.

Drake prepared a shot and injected it into the arm of the pilot. A few minutes later he was asleep.

"What now?" I asked.