by James Harden
The Humvee finally made it to us.
It was a medical Humvee. The driver and the medic confirmed they had been waiting for us. But they had no idea where we were and had no way to reach us because the massive vehicle wouldn’t fit through the narrow laneways. And all radio frequencies were jammed up.
They were just about to leave before they saw us.
It was a stroke of good luck. But there was no time to celebrate.
We lifted the co-pilot and the pilot into the back of the Humvee, making sure they were secure.
Off in the distance we could hear howling and screaming. The strange noises were getting closer.
More gunfire erupted, coming from all around us. I was the last to climb into the rear of the Humvee. I was just about to close the door when I heard fast, running footsteps, like someone was sprinting towards us. I turned around and saw a small child charging at us. I tried to shut the back door but the kid jammed his body into the doorway.
Drake reached over from behind me to help shut it.
The doctor was yelling at us. "Close it! The child is infected! Close it!"
And all of a sudden I’m reminded of that small child from that isolated village in the Hindu Kush mountain range we tried to help.
Drake kicked the boy in the chest, trying to push him back. But the kid didn’t budge. He was snapping his teeth furiously, chipping and cracking them in the process.
Outside someone started shooting as us. Bullets smashed into the armoured doors of the Humvee.
The boy had been shot. Drake managed to finally kick him back and we were able to slam the door shut.
Drake fell back into the cabin of the medivac. His leg was covered in blood. He had been shot and bitten.
He was in bad shape.
"Drake, are you all right?"
He was swearing and looking at his leg, like he was afraid of it, like he was trying to back up away from it.
He kept swearing. He kept saying no. Over and over.
No. God. No.
"Drake, snap out of it. We made it. You’re gonna be all right. We’re going to the hospital right now. You and the pilots. You’re all going to be fine."
The doctor was working frantically on the co-pilot, strapping him in, making sure he was secure so he wouldn’t fall out of his stretcher.
The doctor’s hands were shaking.
"Are you all right, man?" I asked
"We got less than five minutes," he answered. "If we’re not out of here we’re going up in flames."
I looked at my watch as I coughed uncontrollably. I couldn’t really focus my eyes. I must’ve inhaled way more smoke than I thought.
Less than five minutes.
The doctor told me to sit back and strap in. He slipped an oxygen mask over my mouth. He said that I’d inhaled a dangerous amount of smoke. And judging by the materials in this slum, it was probably toxic. So I needed as much clean oxygen in my lungs as possible.
"Just breathe," he said. "In and out."
Inhale. Exhale.
As soon as he said this I started to feel weird. The fumes had gone to my head. I was still coughing.
Outside the Humvee I could hear screaming and howling. Like a wolf.
The doctor then jabbed a needle into Drake’s leg. He inspected the bullet wound and bandaged it up. He told him to sit back as he pulled an oxygen mask over his head.
He told me to hold on. Keep an eye on the guys. It was going to be a bumpy ride.
The doctor jumped up front to the passenger seat and strapped in. He yelled at the driver to go faster. "Step on it!"
The Humvee picked up speed.
Drake was staring at his leg. "Kenji. You gotta help me."
I knew what he meant. But I couldn’t bring myself to look at him.
"I’m bitten," he said "I'm infected."
"We don't know that," I said, desperately trying to fight the obvious.
"Yeah we do. You get bitten, you get infected. Simple as that. Please, Kenji."
"Maybe not. Maybe you’re fine. We need to get you to the hospital."
"Look at me!"
Flak jackets. Armor. Gloves. This is why we were ordered to wear them.
"Please, Kenji. I don't want to turn into one of those things."
He begged me. Pleaded with me.
But I didn't answer him. I couldn’t even look at him.
I couldn't.
I unstrapped myself from my seat and fumbled around in one of the medical kits.
I gave him another shot of morphine. Drake is usually terrified of needles. Terrified to the point where he passes out whenever he’s about to get a shot or a vaccination injection. But at that point in time, he didn’t notice the needle.
He didn’t even flinch when it punctured his skin.
His breathing began to slow.
I told him it was going to be all right even though I knew that it was not. I told him I was sorry. Sorry for everything. I told him that it was an honor to have served with him.
I readjusted the oxygen mask on his face, making sure it was nice and secure.
As the morphine and the oxygen warmed and calmed him down he began to slip into what I knew would be a dreamless sleep.
I checked my watch again. We had three minutes.
We were in bad shape. Drake had lost a lot of blood. I had inhaled a lot of smoke.
The Humvee continued to pick up speed as we raced the clock. Somewhere off in the night sky were the approaching jets. F16 falcons. Or maybe A10 warthogs. They were on their way. They would not wait for us.
High Speed.
It gets a little hazy here.
But this is what I remember.
It’s starting to come back to me – little bits and pieces. I was feeling weird and dizzy. At first I thought I must’ve inhaled a large amount of smoke. And the smoke must’ve been way more toxic than I initially thought.
But the real reason I was feeling so damn weird?
The doctor had hooked me up to a bottle of nitrous oxide in his haste, instead of oxygen.
I was tripping out.
It was surreal, like I was having an out of body experience.
I wasn’t even scared of being blown up at that point. I was more concerned with Drake. He was hurt. He was in bad shape.
I remembered I’d given him some morphine. And I’m pretty sure the doctor had given him some morphine as well. So he was well and truly out of it.
Imagine my surprise when he started talking to me.
I remember the Humvee ride was a bumpy one but I didn’t seem to care. The speed we were travelling at was definitely not safe for the narrow laneways but again, I didn’t seem to care.
I focused on my breathing. Inhale. Exhale. Just like the doctor said.
I looked over at Drake and the other men. The pilots. And I wondered if they were going to die.
I wondered whether or not there should be someone in here besides me just in case these critically injured soldiers decide to flat line or something. Would I be able to resuscitate them if I needed to?
"I don’t think they’re too worried about us dying." Drake said.
"Huh? What?"
"I said, I don’t think they’re too worried about us dying. As a matter of fact, I don’t think they’re even taking us to the hospital."
I looked over at Drake again. My vision was blurry. I couldn’t see him clearly. But it looked like his leg was bleeding heavily from the bullet wound and the bite wound. "I…I thought you were asleep. We pumped you full of morphine."
"Yeah, I am asleep. You’re having a psychotic episode, genius. You’re hallucinating."
"What?"
"And I don’t think that’s oxygen you’re sucking on."
I followed the tube from my face mask to the blue bottle it was connected to. On the little pressure gauge on top of the bottle it read: NO2 - Nitrous oxide.
AKA - happy gas.
I took another deep breath. In and out. Just like the doctor said.
/> I should’ve been scared. I should’ve been terrified that we were about to be blown up and vaporized. But I wasn’t scared at all. I was as high as a kite in a hurricane.
I should’ve taken the mask off.
But then Drake spoke again. "Leave it on. You might as well enjoy these last few minutes of your life."
"What the hell is that suppose to mean?"
"You really think we’re going to get out of here alive? You think we can outrun those jets screaming their way towards us faster than the speed of sound? You do realize that it took us ten minutes to drive from the entrance of the slum to where they dropped us off. I’m no mathematical genius but even if we’re driving at sixty miles per hour right now we’re still not gonna make it."
"Shut up Drake. We’ll make it."
I felt like I was trying to convince myself more than anyone.
"And just what the hell did you mean by they’re not taking us to the hospital?"
"Open your eyes, Kenji. It’s over. We’ve lost control. The virus is spreading faster than they can contain it. Do you really think they’re going to take us all in and patch us all up? I’ve been bitten. I’m infected. Do you think the medic hasn’t radioed ahead and informed them of our situation? If we get out of here, and trust me, that’s a big ‘if’, they’re not going to risk taking us into the hospital, they’re not going to risk another outbreak over me, a lowly grunt. I’m as good as dead. You shoulda saved me the trouble when you had the chance."
"You’re wrong. They’ll take us in. They’ll get us fixed. We don’t even know that you’re infected."
"Doesn’t matter if I’m not infected. Easier to get rid of me. Safer. Sacrifice the few to save the many."
Gordon’s words coming out of Drake’s mouth. Would they really kill us?
"Yeah they would. They got bigger problems to worry about now."
"Bigger? Like what?"
"Like making sure no one finds out about this unholy mess. Like making sure this virus doesn’t spread out of the desert to any of the cities. The only way to make sure that happens is to blow this place up. And what do you think they are hiding out in the Woomera military testing site? Whatever it is, I bet they’ll do anything to stop it from getting out. This air strike is just the beginning. You think a couple of soldiers are going to change their mind? Hell, you think a few thousand refugees are going to change their minds?"
Dammit Drake. He had it all figured out. Maybe being on death’s door made it easier for him to see the grim reality of it. Maybe I knew it all along as well. Maybe I was just too scared to admit it, to say it out loud.
The other day when Franco was bitten, I looked to the east and thought of running away. Maybe I still could. Maybe. If I got out of this slum alive, if we survived the air strike I could get out of here. I could warn Rebecca before it’s too late.
"Yeah that’s a great plan. Again, not that you’re going to get out of this slum alive, but let’s just say hypothetically you do make it out of here. Where are you going to go? How are you going to survive? You’ll end up infected. Just like me. Just like these poor refugees. Oh, you think you’ll run away? Run all the way to Sydney and warn Rebecca? How are you going to do that? How are you going to make it that far? Have you thought this through at all? And what is she going say to you when you get there? You think she’s going to welcome you in with open arms and give you a big hug? You’re a goner. You should never have joined the marines. You’re not a warrior. You never will be. You’re a coward. A lying coward. Not that it matters anymore what you are. Because in a couple of minutes you’re a dead man. Just like me. Just like the rest of us."
"Shut up, Drake."
At that moment the Humvee ran over a pothole or a ditch or maybe even a crowd of people and my ass momentarily left the seat. Maybe it was the first missiles of the air strike.
I don’t know what it was.
But the ride was a bumpy one. The speed the Humvee was travelling at was not safe for the narrow laneways.
The Humvee swerved and I was thrown back in my seat. The tires screeched and the brakes locked up. The Humvee spun out of control and I lost all sense of direction. Left or right, up or down. I had no idea what was happening. I didn’t know where I was. The only thing I knew for certain was that Drake was shot, bitten, bleeding. He was dying right in front of me but he was one hundred percent right about everything.
January 27th – Escape.
I woke up in a hospital bed. I was alone. There were five other beds in the room but they were all empty. The white sheets were all covered in blood.
No sign of Drake.
No sign of the pilots.
The one and only window of the room was open slightly. It was dawn. The first rays of sunshine were just appearing over the horizon.
I wondered where they were keeping Drake.
I went to get out of my bed but then I noticed both my right leg and my right arm were bound to the rail guard with Velcro straps. My left leg and wrist were not tied down.
I untied myself quickly and jumped out of bed. My head was throbbing and I was dizzy. I slowly made my way out into the corridor, using the walls for support.
I expected the hospital to be full. I was expecting to see nurses and doctors and patients everywhere.
But there was no one.
The hospital was deserted.
I checked a few other rooms and saw the same thing each time. Empty beds. Blood stained sheets.
But the last room I checked was different. The last room still had bodies in the beds.
Civilians.
They were all dead. Bullet holes in their heads.
The room stank of death. I felt dizzy again. I doubled over and threw up. I fell to my knees and crawled out of the room.
At the far end of the corridor was a team of guys in bright yellow HAZMAT suits. They were coming this way.
They were armed.
It dawned on me then that these guys weren’t regular soldiers. They weren’t U.S. Marines or Rangers or Special Forces. And there’s no way they were part of the Australian Army.
There was something about them. Their weapons were different. Their radios were different. Even their HAZMAT suits were slightly different. They looked more advanced, less bulky, more mobile.
It was clear to me then. These guys were powerful.
And deadly.
And they were doing the dirty work of whoever was in charge of this mess.
I had no idea who that might be, still have no idea. But I sure as hell wasn’t hanging around to find out.
I stayed low and crawled around the corner of the hallway. Once I was out of sight, I bolted. I did not look back.
I made it to the main entrance of the hospital. To my surprise the news van we had seen the other day was parked directly out front. The hood of the van had been smashed in like it had been in a pretty serious accident.
The satellite dish on top of the roof had been shot to pieces.
All the tyres had been shot out. Bullets holes streaked down the side of the van.
I heard gunshots coming from back inside the hospital. The noise scared the hell out of me, sent a cold shiver down my spine, forced me to keep running.
I’ve been running for days now.
I had to get out of their while I still could. We had lost control. The immigration centers, the town. Everything. The people in the towns weren’t so much under quarantine as they were prisoners.
Prisoners on death row.
I have no doubt that Command were about to order a nuclear strike.
As Gordon said, sacrifice the few to save the many.
It doesn’t matter if those people are innocent. Doesn’t matter if they’re healthy. Command weren’t prepared to take that risk.
And it makes me sick to my stomach.
Their top priority is to contain the virus by any means necessary. Nuclear strikes included. And I wanted nothing to do with it. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself.
No way.
So I’m leaving. I’m running away.
Again.
Yeah I know.
I must be crazy. I could get court marshalled for this. They could lock me up and throw away the key.
Damn. I’ve got to stop running away. But I’ve got no other option.
This virus is out of control. And if spreads. If it gets out...
I need to warn Rebecca. I can’t stop thinking about her.
What’s that saying? ‘Fortune favors the bold’ or something? Well, I hope fortune favors the crazy. Because what I am doing right now is downright insane. There’s every chance that I’ll be caught.
There’s every chance they’ll shoot me dead and bury me out in the desert.
The virus was spreading faster than they could contain it.
How long before it reaches the next town over? Or the next city? Will the Apache gunships get all of the infected? Will the containment crews be able to chase them all down?
I don't think so. The Australian outback is huge. There's no way.
And that thought terrifies me.
So I’ve got to warn Rebecca.
She's here somewhere. My parents said she had moved to Sydney. That was over a year ago. I have no idea if she's still there. I don't even know her address.
But this is my decision. To hell with the consequences.
I’m on the run. I’m alone. I’m hungry. I’m dehydrated and scared.
But I have to try. I have to warn her.
Rebecca, I am coming for you.
OUT NOW
The Secret Apocalypse (Book 1)
Extinction Level (Book 2)
Where The Dead Men Lie (Book 3)
The Lost Journal Part 2
COMING SOON
TORN APART
BOOK 4 IN THE SECRET APOCALYPSE SERIES
Also Coming Soon
Test Subject Zero
For more info visit http://jamesharden.blogspot.com/
Copyright © 2011 by James Harden
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the