by Sage du Toit
Both men were in the truck and were pulling out of the parking lot. Sam sat glued to the window for the whole afternoon and into the evening watching the road for their return. Almost everyone else also watched but she couldn’t tear herself away for anything. She didn’t even leave her spot for lunch and Rebecca ended up bringing her a tray but she barely touched the food. Betty sat with her most of the time except for when she left to help make lunch. They didn’t say much but occasionally Betty would reach out and hold her hand.
Betty had just gotten up to head for the kitchen to help cook dinner when Sam saw the truck coming down the road. She yelled, “They’re here! They’re here! I see them coming back!”. She was so relieved she was afraid something bad had happened to Tom. But she froze when she realized there was only one person in the vehicle. She couldn’t tell which one it was because of the gas mask and she sat in fear waiting. The Bronco pulled around to the back of the building and parked by the loading dock.
She ran to the back of the building and waited at the freezer door. She could hear when the rolling door opened and then shut. She heard the shower come on and go off again. Then come on and go off again. Finally, the freezer door opened and there stood Tom. He looked tired and his face was troubled and sad but he brightened up a bit when he saw her and she ran and jumped into his arms hugging him tight. She whispered in his ear “Don’t do that again, I thought I had lost you when I had just found you.” He hugged her back and then went to the dining area to give everyone his debriefing.
Everyone was excited and they put off cooking the dinner meal so they could all hear what he had to say. Betty was at his elbow asking him about her daughter and everyone else was asking where Drill Sgt. Davis was. Tom sat down at the table and Sam brought him a glass of sweet tea. The thanked her and took a deep breath. He called quiet and everyone sat down and shut up. He stood back up and started pacing before he started talking. She could see the devastated expression on his face. He said it was bad out there...really really bad. They went to the PX first to see if they would be able to get some more supplies there and it is still fully stocked but the Nerve agent was inside the building and anything they took out of there would have to be decontaminated. Also, the building was full of dead bodies. There were cars clogging the road and they had to push several out of the way just to get to the PX.
He continued telling them that there were several instances where people saw them driving by and they came out of their houses but they weren’t wearing gas masks! He wasn’t certain what made them leave their homes on seeing them, couldn't they see that they were wearing their masks!? Everyone that came out died. He explained that they went to the daycare center next and shaking his head he looked at Betty and Sam could see tears in his eyes. He groaned, “I’m so sorry, so very sorry. They were all dead. The windows and doors had been open and some of the kids had been outside in the play area.” Betty screamed and collapsed to the floor and several people including Sam went to her and laid a hand on her. There was nothing else they could do but physically comfort her while she wailed and cried.
Once they had consoled Betty as much as they could and she just sat leaning against Sam in shock. Tom continued, he said their next stop was Joe’s house and Sam sat in confusion wondering who Joe was, and Tom corrected himself and said Drill Sgt. Farmer. Joe’s face was frozen waiting to hear the worst and Tom said his wife was alive but she told them by writing on a note pad that she was running out of insulin. Joe nodded and said he was afraid of that. Tom said they drove by the hospital next and it looked worse than the PX but they didn’t go inside.
He resumed talking and explained that next they stopped by Heather and Sgt. Amy Torres’ apartments because they lived in the same complex. He said that both of their apartments were empty of people. They knocked on the doors and no one answered. They looked inside the windows and in Torres’ apartment her cat came to the window. Drill Sgt. Torres looked surprised and said “Yes, she’s probably lonely by now, but luckily I feed her with a gravity flow feeder so she has food to last for a while.” She also said her roommate had probably just left when the bombs were dropped.
Heather was one of the kitchen workers and she said, “Are you sure no one was in my apartment? My mom works nights and she should have been home asleep by then.”
Tom assured her that they knocked and looked in the window and when no one came they had entered the apartment with the key she gave them and they didn’t find anyone inside. But he said there was an apartment with occupants and one of them made the mistake of coming out and died immediately. He said it was a lady in her 50’s and she came out when she saw them enter Heather’s apartment. Heather looked confused and then she asked which apartment she came from. Tom told her it was the apartment directly across from hers.
Heather said “No,no,no!! Surely she wouldn’t be that dumb as to come outside after all of this time!” She was crying and sobbed, “That apartment is where mom’s on and off again boyfriend lives and she was probably over there for a ‘special’ visit.” Tom looked at her sadly and said he was sorry. Several people around her consoled her and she quietly cried.
Tom continued talking and said they next went to Jeanie’s house and Sam knew from his look that more bad news was coming. He told them the front door was open and he looked at Jeanie, another of the kitchen workers and he shook his head and said he was sorry. Jeanie had told everyone that her parents and her husband’s mom lived with them because they were getting on in years and needed the extra help but didn’t want to go to an old folks’ home. So, her husband stayed home and took care of them and their 5 dogs while she worked. Tom said no one was alive, even the animals were dead. She wailed and grabbed a hold of Heather and they both cried together.
Tom said that last they went to John’s house and his wife and kids were inside but they were low on food. John had told him that his wife had planned to go grocery shopping on Saturday when he would be home to help her with the kids so he had worried about that being a problem. He said it took them awhile but they rigged up a sort of decontamination area in John’s garage and John went into his house with three of the gas masks. He had told Tom to come back and get them tomorrow so he would have time to get his family together and packed.
Tom took a deep breath and said he did have some good news. He went to Dozier Hall Hotel where his team had stayed the night before the attack. He said there were eight people alive inside the Hotel, mostly workers. This brought some murmurs and exclamations as possibilities occurred to people. Sam instantly saw where this was leading and she hoped she wasn’t wrong. Dozier Hall had hundreds of rooms with only a few outside doors to worry about, and they had a large dining area that probably also had a full-sized kitchen. Plus, she thought some of the rooms had kitchens as well...but she was sure they were electric. If the Hotel kitchen had gas stoves then they would be fine for cooking. If not, she was sure they would find a way.
Tom said he talked to the people inside with his note pad and he thought they could rig a decontamination area at the entrance that had two sets of double doors leading inside and a long divided covered awning. He said they could all move there where they would have actual beds and individual spaces. There was stunned silence as everyone processed this then some “hooah’s”. But out of respect for the bad news, most people were quiet. He said they had a lot of work to do to get there though. They would have to pack up all of the food here to take with them and they only had the one small vehicle right now so they would either need to go find another vehicle or they would all have to walk. And Dozier Hall was on the other side of the base. They would need to transport all the supplies and the people.
Joe cleared his throat and got Tom’s attention. He said he might have an idea. He explained that the Logistics Readiness Center was nearby and they were in charge of transportation so we might be able to find a vehicle there and they probably had tons of MRE’s and other things we could use. Plus, all the stuff should be wrapped up in pal
lets so even if the large warehouses were contaminated the pallets should still be fine under the wrapping. Tom smiled and slowly started clapping his hands. Everyone else started clapping too.
When the clapping stopped Tom said they had a lot of work cut out for them but that he was starving and when was dinner going to be ready? Then he realized that he had just told over half of the kitchen staff that their families were dead and she could see his face blanch. Maggie and Michelle, the other two kitchen staff that didn’t have any family to go check on in this area, looked around and realized they would be the cooks for tonight, but the team on KP, Team 1, got up and went with them to help.
Chapter 11
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15 July 2020 N-Day +5
Fort Jackson, SC
Last night they had worked out all the details. Tom had also canceled guard duty for the night except for one person on each team to keep track of the time and wake everyone at 6 am so they could get an early start. He also asked for volunteers to help cook breakfast so the kitchen staff could take time to mourn, there were plenty of volunteers. During the meeting Tom said that everyone needed to drop ranks and learn first names. They were no longer a military unit...they were now just people that needed to survive. They all ate an early breakfast and started getting ready for the day. The plan was six people would suit up, plus Tom and squeeze in the Bronco, they guessed four would fit in the back and two in the front with Tom. Tom had siphoned gas out of cars on the road yesterday so he said they should be good on fuel for today. He would drive them out to the Logistics Readiness Center and leave them there to see what they could get and if they got a working bus or truck then they could drive it back to the mess hall. Joe said he would lead that mission and added that he called shotgun in the Bronco which made everyone laugh.
Tom would then return to the mess hall after dropping those six off and pick up four more people suited up and supplied with items they would need to make a decontamination area going into Dozier Hall. They didn’t have enough of the higher MOPP gear for everyone, but they could make do with tape and garbage bags. Jerry volunteered to head the Dozier Hall assignment since he had done most of the work on their decontamination area. After dropping them off, Tom would go over to John’s house where he would get John and his family and take them to Dozier Hall to get settled in there. He would then return to the mess hall and see if anyone from the Logistics mission had returned and if they hadn’t he would go check on them. After that he would start transporting food and as many people as they could fit in the Bronco with the food at a time.
They were all in the dining area planning out the last-minute details of what those left here would need to be doing. During the meeting Sara, who had been 3rd squad leader screamed. She pointed out the window and everyone turned to look. Betty had walked outside and was staggering around the side of the building from the back. She fell down on the grass and started twitching. Sam turned her head away and Tom grabbed her in a hug and let her cry on his shoulder. Jerry was already running to get his suit on and Tom told Sam to say there and he went to suit up too. By the time they were suited and out the back roll-up door she had quit twitching.
It was the first time any of them, except Tom, had seen anyone with full exposure to the Nerve agent. The reality of it really hit home with all of them. When Jerry got to Betty he rolled her head to the side and checked her neck for a pulse. Sam could see bloody foam streaming out of her mouth and there was even blood leaking from her eyes. Jerry was about to start giving her injections but Tom stopped him. There was no pulse, it was hard to tell through the gloves but even if they had been able to reestablish one they didn’t have the facilities to treat and save her from this amount of Nerve agent. Sam and Rebecca were hugging and crying along with many others. Especially the kitchen staff, they were all on the verge of hysterics.
Jerry and Tom were putting her body in a body bag, Sam didn’t even know where they found such a thing. Then they hauled it off to the front and put it somewhere out of their sight. Sam had whispered to Tom last night as they were going to sleep that she was worried about Betty. She had been despondent since she heard the news about her daughter. Tom said it was terrible, he wished it had been different. She had held him as he quietly cried and told her about the daycare and all of the babies and the stupid people that just walked outside with no protection and how he had seen some bad things in his time as a Green Beret but he had never seen anything like that day. She had cried with him, cried for the babies, cried for the unknown people and cried for Betty who she could hear crying across the room. Tom had held her hand as they fell asleep next to each other. Now Betty had committed suicide by just walking outside. Their plans for the day were delayed as they coped with what Betty had just done. Sam knew Betty’s heart was broken and she didn’t want to live without her daughter but it was a terrible tragedy that one more person died when so many had died already.
After awhile they decided action would help them get through this better than anything, so Tom and the other six people going with him for the logistics mission suited up, including Sam. Sam had gotten clearance from Jerry to join the Logistics team. He checked her nose and said it looked to be healing well and had her put a gas mask on to make sure it didn’t hurt her nose. She put it on and said she actually felt like the mask was protecting her nose more. The other people on the team besides her and Joe were Rick Lee, a member of the Green Berets and he said he knew how to drive a forklift and he suspected they might still be working. Benny Townson who said he also knew how to operate a forklift, he was also one of the ones responsible for breaking her nose. Austin Jones, who was another Green Beret, said he could drive a semi if they found one. And the last person was David Sellers, she didn’t really know much about him he was a quiet hulk of a guy that played D&D with some others but she supposed his strength would come in handy. Sam had volunteered saying that she would go to make a list or find an inventory of everything so they could locate what they needed and have an available list for future reference. The guys were happy about that because none of them relished the idea of paperwork.
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20 December 2020 – Kittens 5 days old
Douglasville, GA
Sam lay in bed thinking about the people back at Fort Jackson. Maybe she should have stayed there. She didn’t even know if her parents were still alive. Maybe she should head back to Fort Jackson when the kittens were big enough. It was so dangerous traveling alone and she had a long way to go. She told herself she would think about it later. She got up and put the kettle of water on. She decided to skip coffee today, she was worried that it was getting low and she wanted to make it last as long as possible. She poured out a bowl of Honey nut Cheerios and waited for the water to heat up. She checked on the kittens and took out their Hot water bottles so she could refill them. When the water was hot she poured some in a cup and mixed several spoons of creamer in and then poured it over the cereal. She tasted it to see how it turned out and decided she liked it. The hot liquid made the cereal soggy fast but she didn’t really mind. She poured another cup of hot water and made Ovaltine with creamer since she wasn’t having coffee she still wanted a warm drink to help keep the cold at bay.
She had opened her shutters and saw that the sun was shining again today and it looked like the ice was melting fast. It must have warmed back up, and she realized she didn’t feel as cold as she did yesterday. After replacing the Hot water bottles in the kitten tub she fed Lucky and got dressed putting on layers including the pantyhose that were silky and cool to the touch but under her jeans they felt warm. Once she was bundled up she checked her holster and grabbed her backpack, gloves and gas mask and headed next door to the neighbors. As she went out the front door she checked in the tree for the squirrel, he was sitting up on a branch and when she came out he chatted at her. She hoped he would live and find a mate and make lots of babies like Lucky.
She made sure to chec
k the area before crossing this time, of course nothing was there but she kept telling herself she had to be safe. When she entered the cat lady’s house she glanced at the body on the floor and realized she was laying on an area rug. She decided to roll the body up in the rug and move it out of the doorway. If she was going to be hauling big bags of cat food out she didn’t want to take a chance of tripping over the body. Sam realized she was becoming hardened to seeing the dead and the thought of handling this dead body didn’t bother her like it would have before. She carefully flipped the rug over the body of the woman and cat and dragged it to the other end of the living room near the back sliding door. She was glad it had been many months since this woman died, it had dried out the corpse and made it easier to move. She had seen some of the corpses right after the beginning and she had almost puked in her gas mask.
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15 July 2020 (Continued)
Fort Jackson, SC
They loaded up into the Bronco with four guys squeezed on the bench seat in the back and Sam sitting on the floor between the two front seats where a console would normally go. Tom said he had cleaned some of the garbage out of the Bronco but there was still garbage under the seats and on the floor boards. She couldn’t help but think if this was clean, what did it look like before? But the Bronco was old and the seats were torn, they probably hadn’t cared what it looked like. It made a knocking noise when Tom started it and she looked at him wondering if she should be concerned. He seemed fine with it and was getting directions from Joe on where the Logistics center was located.
When they pulled up to the Logistics center she noted that several of the bay doors to the large warehouses were standing open. That was a bad sign that they wouldn’t find any survivors. Tom dropped them off at the open bay door and squeezed Sam’s hand before she got out of the Bronco, he told her to be careful, and she said you too. She watched him as he pulled off heading back to the mess hall. She knew he didn’t relish playing chauffeur today and he could have assigned it to someone else but he was the only one that knew the way to John’s house so it kind of fell on him.