Tumultus (2 page)

Mac despised hospitals.  Hated the smell.  The lighting.  The sense of impending sickness and death.

Throughout his seventy five years, he had managed to avoid them with but very few exceptions.

Unfortunately, today was one of those exceptions. 

A few months after the defense of Dominatus, he had felt the occasional shot of pain from deep in his chest when taking a breath.  Initially, these moments were far and few between, but over the last year, he noted them coming much more regularly until finally, they were waking him up at night.

These pains were now accompanied by a cough that would worsen, and then improve, but never entirely go away.  It was Dr. Lester Miller, another Dominatus survivor, who when noting Mac’s cough two weeks ago during a dinner with other former residents of Dominatus, requested the former Navy SEAL stop by the medical clinic he had recently started in Juneau. 

Mac had insisted his cough was nothing, but Dr. Miller persisted to the point of begging Mac to stop by.  Something in Mac knew the doctor was right – his dislike of hospitals be damned.

His initial visit to the clinic was three days ago.  Dr. Miller listened intently to his breathing, took all forms of fluid samples, and finally, multiple chest x-rays.  The doctor told Mac to come back at the end of the week to go over the results of the initial examination.

And so, there sat Mackenzie Walker atop an examination table inside a small room awaiting the return of his old friend and personal physician.  His cough actually seemed to have improved in recent days – only flaring up a few times a day.  The pain inside his chest was still felt from time to time, though even that seemed to have diminished somewhat.

The door to the examination room opened.

“Mac, how are you feeling today?”

Dr. Lester Miller was now in his late 60’s, a man born from poverty who had worked his way through college to eventually become one of the most prominent kidney specialists in the United States – a Nobel Prize winner in medicine.   Soon after emerging as one of the most influential opponents of the federal government’s takeover of healthcare though, he found himself stripped of his medical license, and banished from the profession.  The doctor had described it to Reese Neeson during their interview over two years ago in Dominatus by simply saying, “Everything changed in this country after Obamacare.”

Mac shrugged as Dr. Miller sat in a small chair placed in the corner of the examination room.

“Well, I guess that depends on what you have to tell me, Doc.  And don’t bullshit me, ok?  None of that soft landing crap.  Let me hear it.”

Dr. Miller folded his hand on his lap, a small smile creeping across his dark skinned face.

“I know, Mac.  I wouldn’t try that with you.”

Mac straightened up and looked the doctor in the eye, holding his gaze there for several seconds.

“Good – then get to it.  I figure I’m dying…just a matter of how soon, right?”

Dr. Miller nodded.

“Yes, Mac, it’s not good.  I ran the tests, looked over the imaging, re-ran the tests, and sent the results out to a retired oncologist in Fairbanks who confirmed what I thought.  There’s no doubt.”

Mac’s head tilted slightly to his right as his brow furrowed, deepening the lines on his forehead.

“Oncologist?  That would be…cancer?

“Yes, Mac, cancer.  It’s in your lungs. Both lungs.  Spreading up the lining of your trachea.”

“And we can’t get it out?  Inoperable?”

Again Dr. Miller nodded.

“Inoperable.  It’s spread too far.  We can possibly slow its progress some.  But even that…I don’t know.  This isn’t my particular field of specialty.”

Mac grew momentarily silent, his eyes glancing down at the floor.  Dr. Miller sat silent as well, knowing Mac was digesting the death sentence he had just been given.  Finally Mac raised his head.

“How did it…don’t see cancer much these days.  Not since the vaccine.  Was it…was it the smoke?  The bar?”

Dr. Miller rose from his seat and walked toward Mac, shaking his head.

“No, it wasn’t that.  You’re right, Mac, cancer is a rare occurrence.  Has been for some time now.  But, it does still happen.  Do you recall Reese’s story about his father, how he died from cancer?  How the specialist called it a one-in-a-million form of the disease resistant to the vaccine?”

“Yeah, Reese was suspicious of that.  Thought that his dad was basically poisoned,  injected or whatever.”

The doctor again nodded to Mac.

“That’s right. I had heard of such things, rumors of it, going back thirty years or so.  That there was a government sponsored program for that type of thing – but I had never seen it confirmed.  Never had a patient to confirm that such a program actually existed.”

Another prolonged silence placed itself in the small examination room as Mac’s eyes again locked with Dr. Miller’s.

“Until now.”

Dr. Miller’s right hand place itself on Mac’s left shoulder and squeezed it softly, a look of powerless regret showing itself for the first time.

“That’s right Mac – what is in your lungs right now.  It was put there.  That cancer is a manufactured product.  I suspected it and the oncologist confirmed it.  That’s no regular cancer.  It’s something else.   Raise your shirt up Mac and look just under your right arm pit.”

Mac followed the doctor’s directions, looking down at what appeared to be a tiny red-tinted mole at the top of his rib cage.  The same mole Dr. Miller had scraped some skin off of during the initial examination three days ago.

“Yeah – that little thing?  What about it?”

“That was the entrance point.  That was how the manufactured virus was introduced.  Two years ago.  That’s my guess – two years ago.”

Confusion spread across Mac’s face.

“Two years…what?  How?”

Dr. Miller left the question unanswered, knowing the realization would soon come to Mac, a realization that was uttered in a single word.

“Hess.”

August Hess had been the New United Nations Special Operations officer who had come to Dominatus with the intent of destroying both it and its inhabitants.  He had failed, but it now appeared he had managed to leave a deadly and quite personal reminder of that conflict inside the body of Mackenzie Walker.

The doctor folded his arms as he stood in front of Mac, his head shaking slowly from side to side.

“When you two tangled that first day Officer Hess arrived at Dominatus.  I’m certain that’s when it happened.  Just a quick jab.  You wouldn’t even have felt it during the confrontation.  In and out and left unnoticed since then.  The cancer was injected, took root in your lungs, and now…it’s killing you, Mac.  It’s killing you and there’s nothing I can do to stop it.  Nothing anyone can do.  Even if we had a full ration of the cancer vaccine, this form, this manufactured form, is resistant.  It’s meant to be resistant.  I’m so sorry, Mac.”

Mac brushed Dr. Miller’s sympathy aside with a wave of his right hand.

“Stop right there, Doc – none of that shit.  Look, I’ve been living well past my expiration date for a long time now.  A long-long time.  And Hess, son-of-a-bitch has been dead and gone for two years now and here he is ringing me up all over again.  Tenacious evil piece of shit that he was.”

Mac looked down again for a brief moment and then chuckled.

“Ok then, time is short and I’ve got things to do.  We’re meeting up tonight about the trip east.  Going to see that priest, see about the weapon they’ve been saying he’s got to bring down the New United Nations.”

Dr. Miller’s eyes widened in alarm.

“Oh, Mac – no.  I don’t believe that is possible for you now.  That kind of trip…in your condition?  I’m sorry, Mac, but that is just not practical.”

Mac hopped off the examination table and gave his friend a warm smile.

“Well, Doc, it’s not your call now is it?  Take off the doctor hat for a moment here, ok?  I’m not dead yet.  Won’t be tomorrow.  We defended Dominatus.  We took back Alaska.  There are people in the Lower 48 willing to fight back against the globalists, right?  And they’re looking for those of us who’ve done it already to help them out with that fight.  I intend to do just that.  Whatever time I got left, Doc, I’ll be doing it fighting.  It’ll be kicking down the door of the New United Nations.  That’s how I’m going out.  I won’t be sitting around here waiting to die.  You know me better than that.”

The doctor shook his head again, putting both his hands on Mac’s shoulders.

“Mac, your condition could worsen very quickly.  I truly have no idea if it’s a matter of weeks or months…or what.  I do know you won’t be getting better, and the stress of that kind of trip will likely exacerbate your condition considerably.  Even if you were healthy – you’re a seventy five year old man.  You can’t do this kind of thing anymore.”

Mac’s hand shot up in front of Dr. Miller’s face, his pointing finger extended upward.

“Watch me.  I ain’t dyin’ just yet, Doc.  And I’m taking this trip.  I’m getting them to that priest.  To that weapon.  If it’s the last thing I ever do, well then let’s get to it.  And as far as my condition, the damn cancer, you keep your mouth shut, Doc.  Ok?”

“I won’t say anything, Mac.  I wouldn’t compromise doctor-patient privilege.  But I have to say in the strongest terms, you are in no condition to make any kind of trip.”

Mac’s features softened, knowing his friend was simply trying to protect him in the only way his own experiences as a physician would have him do.

“You’ve been a good friend for a long time, Lester.  I’ve had a hell of a good run.  Better than I deserved.  If I can get just one more mission in before it’s all done…I wouldn’t ask for more than that.  And if I can do just a little more to give some hope of liberty and freedom to others, this old man will die happy.  You take care of yourself, Doc.”

Mac extended his hand toward Dr. Miller, who then received it into his own.

“You too, Mac.  You too.  Thank you for everything you did for us all those years in Dominatus.  You helped protect a lot of people for a long time.  Right to the end.  You’re an honorable man, Mac, and I’ve been blessed to know you.”

Mac snorted at the doctor’s words.

“Blessed?  Shit, Doc, blessings got nothing to do with it.  I’ve no use for God.  Don’t believe in him.”

Dr. Lester Miller lowered his head slightly as he looked at his friend, his voice whispering an affectionate response.

“That’s ok, Mac – He believes in you.”

II.

The conference room inside what used to be the Bank of Juneau building housed a long table where former residents of Dominatus and current members of the Alaskan militia now sat.  From Dominatus were Mac, Reese Neeson, Dublin Meyer, and Walter Tedlow, known more commonly as Bear. 

Across the table from them sat forty-six year old Franklin Thomas, unofficial leader of the Alaskan Militia.  He had helped organize the ten thousand who marched in defense of Dominatus two years ago. A former long haul truck driver who had in his 20’s served eight years in the United States Navy, Thomas now found himself speaking on behalf of the thousands who were now active members of the Alaskan Militia – a group whose example was now being followed by other freedom fighters across the former United States of America.

To the left of Franklin Thomas was Sally Emerich, liaison to the recently elected mayor of Juneau who many were already pushing to be the next Alaskan governor. She was a tall, dark haired woman in her mid-30’s who, despite her relatively young age, appeared quite comfortable sitting among this rag-tag group of newly emerged revolutionaries.