Outbreak (Book 1): Emerald City

by Jay K. Anthony

  The moon was up, full in the sky with only spots of clouds, but there was no sign of the sun on the horizon. With the moon where it is, it’s probably still the middle of the night, she thought. Not the best time for avoiding creepers but hopefully other survivors will still be asleep. She went to the edge of the roof where there was another ladder leading over the side of the building to an old fashioned steel fire escape. She tightened her backpack so she would have both hands free and climbed the ladder up and over the rooftop wall. Moving carefully, she started down. There was suddenly more crashing from inside the building and the sound of a human howl of despair. They found the body, Tasha thought. Throwing caution aside, she hurried down the steps.

  She raced along the fire escape, descending around and down each level. When she reached the bottom, she saw how the ghoul had gotten to her. He had stacked crates together to make a kind of ladder so he could reach the bottom of the fire escape. The bottom ladder normally hung out of reach from the road, but was now extended to the ground. In one way it helped her because she did not have to worry about the noise of lowering the ladder, but she worried the ghoul’s friends would come for the fire escape too. She squatted down in the shadow of the bottom tier of the fire escape and looked around to try to make sure there was no one else in the alley. Everywhere she looked there were shadows cast by moonlight that she could not see into. Damn it, she thought. They could be anywhere. Tasha listened as hard as she could. Nothing but the noise of whoever was inside the building behind her. She began to wonder if it was loud enough to attract creepers when she heard something running hard down the alley below her. She froze and held her breath, her heart slamming in her chest. It was a creeper and it slowed beneath her, as if sensing her. Tasha thought there was no way it could see her and she did not understand how it could possibly know she was above it. Then something big fell over inside the warehouse and the creeper ignored her and sprinted through the alley, turning around the corner of the building.

  She waited again and listened. She was conflicted. She did not want to wait too long because she knew the others looking for her inside the cannery would eventually start working their way back outside. I have to risk the creepers, she thought and gathered her nerve. Slowly and as quietly as she could, Tasha climbed down the last ladder and stood in the alley below. She considered just finding a spot nearby to hide for a few days, waiting for the men and any creepers to leave her building, and then going back to her locker. But will the ghoul’s friends ever stop watching for me now that I’ve killed him? She did not think they would. So, she looked down the alley, staring hard into the shadows and wished with all her heart that there was nothing waiting there as she crept by. Nothing jumped out at her as she reached the end of the alley, so with nowhere else to go, she turned left and ran for Broken Top mountain.

  CLARK

  Clark woke up in his bed and looked over at Corpsman Nagashima beside him. He had slept well and with a smile he casually put his hands behind his head and closed his eyes. He thought about going back to sleep and was enjoying the lofty feeling of that delicate moment between being awake and being asleep when suddenly there was a knock at his door. Really? he thought. “Hold on a second,” he called out as he sat up. He was dressed only in his boxers so he looked for a shirt. Nagashima stirred, grabbing the blankets before she rolled away from him and onto her side. Pulling on a shirt, Clark slipped out of the bed and went to the door. He opened it a crack and looked out to see a young sailor standing there.

  “Sir?” the sailor asked.

  “What?” Clark replied.

  The sailor swallowed nervously. “My apologies for disturbing you, sir,” he said. “Your chopper just came in.”

  Clark rubbed his face with both hands to try to wake up. “What chopper?” he asked.

  “Sir,” the sailor said. “Command sent a chopper. Apparently a Priority One has been recovered and they need you to come in.”

  What the hell is he talking about? Clark wondered. “Sailor,” he said. “Can you throw me a bone here. I’m not expecting a chopper.”

  “Sir? I don’t know. I thought they would have sent orders or something.”

  Clark looked around. He could not remember getting any orders and wished the sailor would stop calling him “Sir” when Clark had no military rank. Maybe something had come in during the night. After looking at the infected in the examination room, coming back to the room with Nagashima had been a bit of a distraction, if a pleasant one, and he had not checked his email. “One second,” he told the sailor and reached over to wake up his computer. Sure enough, he had an email from command on the mainland. Shit, he thought. When the hell did that get here? He quickly scanned the message. It had arrived just over an hour ago and was an order from Seattle Command stating he needed to board the inbound helicopter and report immediately. The email went on about a priority patient which had come in the day before with a head injury. Clark did not like the sound of that. Unless this patient’s injury can be fixed with a nose job, I’m not sure I’m the right man for this assignment, he thought.

  Clark looked at the sailor standing in his doorway. “Why can’t they just fly the patient out here?” he asked. Clark was thinking if they could bring the patient to the ship, he could pawn the job off onto one of the more experienced trauma surgeons. Plus, Clark had no interest in going to the mainland. He had heard horror stories of the conditions in the city, whereas the ship was safe and comfortable. The aircraft carrier offered the best of everything still left in the world, from the ship’s mess hall to its state of the art medical facilities. Plus, it ran on nuclear power and was fully staffed. Unlike the majority of the rest of the world, the ship had running water, working toilets, and hot food. He was more than content to stay just where he was.

  The young sailor looked stupidly at Clark. “Uh, I don’t know why, sir,” was all he could manage to say.

  Clark expected as much. It was his experience with the military, albeit short, that the lower ranks did not get much information. Maybe the less they know, the less they complain, he thought. “I’m in the middle of research here. There isn’t anyone else they can send?” Clark asked the sailor.

  “I don’t know, sir,” the sailor replied. “They just told me to come and get you.”

  Feeling frustrated, Clark ran a hand through his hair. “The chopper is here right now?” Clark asked.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Son of a bitch, Clark thought. Who the hell is this priority patient? “Fine,” he said to the sailor. “Give me five minutes.” Clark closed the door before waiting for a response. He turned back to Nagashima, who was now another reason he did not care to leave the ship. She had rolled over and was watching him.

  “Sounds like you need to go,” she said.

  Clark let out a sigh and tore his eyes away from her figure under the thin blanket. “So it seems,” he said as he started making a mental list of what he would need to take with him to the mainland.

  “Do you know what it is all about?” she asked.

  “No idea,” he said. He grabbed a large duffel bag and reluctantly began to pack. He had no idea how long he would be gone or what all he would need, so he started packing everything he could think of.

  “I need to get going,” she said and sat up. “I have a shift today down in ER.” She reached for her clothes and Clark thought about telling her he enjoyed last night and would miss her while he was gone.

  “Listen,” he said.

  “Don’t,” she interrupted. “I will make this really easy for you. We both know you have no idea how long you will be gone. We also both know that given the state of the world, you may not even come back.”

  Clark frowned at the last part. He wanted to come back. Really, really badly. What does she think is going to happen to me? he wondered. Her expression changed to one of compassion when she saw his dismayed look. She stood up, naked in front of him, and touched his cheek. “If you do make it back, I’ll be here,” she said and
kissed him. Clark returned her embrace and kissed her back.

  “I really want to stay,” he said.

  “I know,” she replied. “But we both have work to do.”

  Clark did not like it, but he knew she was right, and let her go. She got dressed as he finished packing and five minutes later, Clark opened the door to his room for Nagashima and followed her out into the hall. She gave him a wink and walked off in the direction of the emergency room. Clark missed her immediately. He closed the door behind him and looked at the sailor waiting in the hall. “Let’s go,” Clark said and the sailor turned and led Clark through a series of steel corridors and up multiple flights of stairs to the main deck.

  Out in the open, the wind was blowing with a light rain and a large helicopter waited for him on the deck. The rotors were already spinning, so Clark held his duffel bag to his chest and ran for the chopper. Another soldier greeted him and helped him aboard. In seconds they were airborne and heading for the mainland.

  Clark did not care for flying and it was his first time on a helicopter. The noise and wind were incredible. “Can’t you close the doors?” he yelled at the soldier who had helped him aboard.

  “What?” the soldier yelled back.

  “The doors!” Clark screamed. “Can’t you close the doors?”

  “No doors!” the soldier yelled. “They just get in the way!”

  Clark had no answer for that so he did his best to stare at the floor and try not to throw up. The vibration inside the helicopter was nearly unbearable. He clamped his teeth together to keep them from rattling out of his head. Clark closed his eyes, but that only made his nausea worse, so he tried looking outside. He saw they were already over the mainland and high over the city. It was the first time he had actually seen Seattle. He had come up from California on a cargo plane at night. He remembered it was dark and raining like a son-of-a-bitch. All he had wanted was a safe landing, not to take in the view.

  The helicopter suddenly dropped in altitude and Clark’s stomach flip-flopped. He looked out at the city to make sure they were not going to crash into anything and was surprised to see they were well above the buildings. Seattle was holding up better than he had expected. From the stories, he had thought maybe the city would be a bunch of ruins like the pictures he had seen of Iraq and Afghanistan. Places where entire countries had been bombed back to the Stone Age. Seattle showed none of this. Most all of the buildings were still standing and there were cars sitting empty and idle everywhere. He did notice there were no lights. Interesting, he thought.

  Just as Clark felt like his stomach begin to settle, the pilot banked the chopper hard to the left and began to bring the aircraft around in a looping circle. Clark looked down through the open door and saw Command Headquarters. The military base looked like it had been converted from a large school of some kind. There was a baseball diamond, football field, and trucks and equipment everywhere. Some junior college maybe? he wondered. A moment later, the helicopter pilot brought them in and landed hard on the baseball diamond. The soldier threw Clark’s duffel bag out of the chopper and into the mud. “Hey!” Clark yelled. “Be careful with that!”

  The soldier looked at Clark like he was crazy. “Sorry, bud,” he said. “They just called our chopper out on another mission. We need to go.”

  Clark shook his head and jumped out after his bag. He landed with both feet in a mud puddle and was not on the ground more than two seconds when the chopper took off. In a moment, it was gone from sight. Clark stood in the drizzling rain as he watched it go, then he picked up his dripping wet bag and looked around. Soldiers were running around in every direction. A truck drove by, going too fast for such a busy place, and splashed mud everywhere. Another group of soldiers were working next to an enormous tractor, digging a trench. Others were putting up fences and filling sandbags. Armed soldiers patrolled the whole area. He noticed something in the distance was burning and it stunk to high heaven. Clark suddenly realized it had to be a body dump and the military was burning corpses to help stop the virus. Clark’s stomach lurched at the thought. What is this place? he wondered. And why am I here? He looked up at the sky for his chopper, hoping maybe his being there was all a big mistake and the helicopter would come back and pick him up. To his disappointment, the sky was empty. He looked at the school and saw yet another young soldier running over to greet him.

  “Are you Dr. Clark Mason?” the soldier asked.

  “Yes,” Clark replied.

  “Come with me,” the soldier said. “General Dodge wanted to know the moment you were on the ground.” Clark followed the soldier into what looked to have once been the school’s community center and was surprised to see there were lights on.

  “You have electricity here?” Clark asked.

  “Yes sir,” the soldier said. “We got the whole base running on diesel. We’re trucking it down from Canada. Did you know the Army Corps of Engineers are working on building a pipeline? Won’t be long until things are back to normal!”

  Clark did not agree with him about the “normal” part, but kept it to himself. I’ll believe it when I see it, he thought. “Well right now, it looks like a war zone to me,” Clark said.

  The soldier held a door to the school open for Clark. “It’s been a rough couple of months for us, sir,” he said.

  They reached the school's front office and a man Clark assumed was General Dodge came out to greet him. The general looked straight from a military recruitment poster. Lean, fit, and wide in the shoulders with a chiseled jaw and a crew cut that looked straight out of the 50’s. The general dismissed the young soldier and invited Clark into another office on his left. “Dean of Academics” was on a plaque beside the door. It was a large office with windows to the outside and an enormous wooden desk with an old fashioned typewriter set to one side. Dodge had also set up a bed.

  Clark decided to cut to the chase. The sooner he took care of this patient, the sooner he could get the hell out of there. “General,” he said. “I have to admit, I don’t have a clue what I’m doing here.”

  General Dodge nodded and sat down behind his desk. “Take a seat,” he said as he leaned back in his chair. Clark did as he was told and sat down. “To be honest,” the general continued, “We keep civilian contractors in the dark. The less they know, the less they complain.”

  Clark pursed his lips, but kept his mouth shut.

  The general picked up a report from his desk. “We had a patient come in who was reported to have been bitten a week ago and was not showing signs of turning,” he said.

  “Interesting,” Clark replied. “Where is he?”

  “Well, unfortunately, the patient died from other complications just over an hour ago,” the general said. “Sorry you had to make the trip.”

  “Sucks to be me,” Clark said. On one hand he was happy. He could get the next flight back to the ship. On the other, he wanted to know more about why this one person had shown resistance to the virus. “What can you tell me about the patient?”

  “The civilian was brought in yesterday,” the general said. “He barely survived the trip. We had one of our medics take a look at him. Based on the extent of his injuries, we thought it best the patient not be moved again. So, we ran it up the flagpole and Command said they would send over a specialist. I’m going to go ahead and assume that’s you.”

  “Yeah. Sort of,” Clark said. He wasn’t sure breast augmentation translated well to trauma surgeon, but it was a crazy new world. “What kind of injuries did the patient sustain?”

  The general opened a report. “Traumatic brain injury with hemorrhagic contusions,” he read. “Patient with severe open head injury. White male of undetermined age. CT scan showed right front temporoparietal contusion. Then there is something about an emergency decompressive craniotomy. You know what all of this shit means?”

  Clark knew enough to know it meant the patient was in incredibly bad shape. Maybe back before the outbreak a real trauma surgeon could have saved him, but w
ith the limited resources they had to get by with these last couple of months, Clark was surprised the man lasted as long as he did. “Yes,” Clark replied. “Anything there on why he was resistant to the disease?"

  “This is everything we have,” the general said and handed the report to Clark. It was not much, only a couple of papers. “There is something about blood type. This patient had some rare kind or something,” the general continued.

  “Really?” Clark asked as he flipped through the report. There wasn’t much information, but enough that Clark was intrigued. Maybe coming out here will be worth it after all, he thought. Clark set the report down and looked at the general. “Where did they find the patient?” he asked.

  “A recon patrol found him,” the general said. “We have special ops teams out in the city. A couple of our guys were clearing out a hospital and ran across this survivor. They found him in some kind of research laboratory.”

  Clark looked out the window. Maybe I should talk to the guys that found him. Ask what was special enough that they worked so hard to bring him in? Plus he knew they might have detailed information on the conditions of the lab and how the patient was being treated. He turned to look at the general. “Can I talk to the soldiers who found him?” he asked.

  The general nodded. “You can talk to one of them. His name is Rocha. Corporal John Rocha.”

  “Just the one? I would think they could all give me useful information,” Clark said.

  “Well, not much can be done about that. Rocha is the only one of them who made it back.”

  Shit, Clark thought. He had forgotten for a second that he was living in the middle of an apocalypse. “I’m sorry,” he apologized. “Maybe I will save that conversation for later. Can I examine the body in the meantime?”

  “Yes,” the general said. “The body is still over in the medical facilities. Private Arnold!”