by Brian Parker
“Ah, yes, sir. Sorry. Um, so we monitor for the BFT signals of the, um, six Strykers that Colonel Albrecht took and the Stryker that Lieutenant Murphy stole. Um, we think, based on signals intelligence that one of First Brigade’s Strykers was left in a little town in New Mexico—the name escapes me right now.”
“Santa Rosa,” the intelligence officer piped up.
“Um, yeah, that’s right,” Calamante agreed. “We never spoke to them, but we know that they entered that town with six trucks and left with five.”
Bhagat rolled his wrist. “I know all this already.”
The major nodded. “Yes, sir. So they, ah, they went dark after they went by that airport in Kansas.”
The general looked to the Two. “Any satellite intel about what’s going on at that airport?”
“Yes, sir. It appears to be a refuel point for the transnational UN flights. The runway is just large enough for C-130 cargo planes and fighter jets to land and take off. In fact, there were a C-130 and two MiG-29 jets sitting near the terminal when the satellite passed overhead. We’ve observed several of these types of operations at smaller, isolated airfields across the Midwest. It makes sense that they’re avoiding larger airports in heavily populated areas in favor of these airfields to reduce the chances of being discovered and overran by the infected.”
Bhagat nodded. The signal officer may have been an idiot, but his intel officer was good at his job. “Good assessment, Major Blackledge.” He turned back to the Six. “So, they went offline in Kansas. How far is that airport from the farmhouse that Colonel Albrecht targeted?”
“It’s about thirteen miles, sir,” the intelligence officer answered.
“So it’s possible that they got rolled up by the UN troops at the airport?”
Major Blackledge shrugged. “That depends on whether we are considering the UN forces as hostile.”
The major seemed to pick his words carefully as he continued. “There have been indications that the Iranians and North Koreans that make up the bulk of the new UN force may not have the United States’ best interests at heart. Yes, they brought in stabilization teams almost immediately to work at our nuclear power plants, shutting them down or keeping them running as needed, but…those actions would be prudent for any force looking to occupy a location long-term.”
Another quick knock at the door preceded the Three. “Dave,” General Bhagat said in greeting.
“Sorry I’m late, sir. I didn’t know—”
“It’s okay. This is a last-minute meeting,” Neel said. “Did you see this morning’s update?”
Colonel Tovey sat down to the general’s right. The smell of fresh soap drifted off the operations officer, not the unpleasant, unwashed smell of one of the other two officers who’d entered. Bhagat wasn’t sure which one it was. “Not yet, sir,” Tovey said. “I approved the operational highlights, but haven’t gotten a chance to review the other staff sections’ input.”
Bhagat slid the paper over and pointed to the paragraph. After a few seconds of Tovey’s lips moving as he read silently, he looked up. “What the hell does that mean, sir?”
“That’s why I brought you three in here,” the general replied. “Why are my Strykers in New Jersey, of all places? What is that? Two thousand miles?”
“Probably, sir. If not more.”
“We’ve had one telephone call from Jim Albrecht since this whole thing started,” Bhagat said, glancing at his aide who’d sat at a chair along the wall. “He was told about the UN presence and within ten or twelve hours of that phone call, all of their BFTs went offline. Why is that?”
“I could only venture a guess, sir.”
“Then guess, Dave,” Neel directed the operations officer. “What chain of events led one of my brigade commanders to go off the rails and abandon his family here in Fort Bliss?”
“My guess,” Colonel Tovey began, “is that he’s dead and the lieutenant that they went to apprehend has taken over the group.”
“That’s a pretty far-fetched guess, Dave,” the general replied, staring at his operations officer as if he’d never seen the man before. “I didn’t mean make up a wild claim like that, but let’s go with it. Why do you think Lieutenant Murphy is in charge of them instead of dead?”
He pointed toward the daily update page. “We know that Murphy’s Stryker is with them, so they’re together somehow. He could be dead and they commandeered his vehicle once they found him, but that still doesn’t explain why they’d go to New Jersey.”
“Ah, sir? If I may?” the intelligence officer said.
“Go ahead, Todd,” Neel answered.
“We just know that they were in New Jersey when this signal began broadcasting. That’s pretty strange behavior to drive completely across the country without having them on and then flip the switch when they were near New York. I think they’re trying to signal someone in the city.”
“Go on.”
“Do you have a map, sir?”
Bhagat looked over at his aide. “Freddy, can you pull up a map of—” He looked back to Major Blackledge.
“The United States, sir. Specifically New Jersey.”
Neel nodded at the lieutenant as he moved over to the general’s computer and began manipulating the mouse. The internet had been spotty, at best, but it should be sufficient for the intelligence officer’s needs.
“Okay, so while he’s doing that, continue,” the general ordered.
“So we know that New York City is still intact. The governor dropped all the bridges and blocked the tunnels, supposedly the subway tunnels as well—anything that connected the islands to the mainland—as a way to try and stop the spread into the city.”
“Last we heard, sir,” Dave cut in, “the city was still intact with no infected.”
“The IC’s assessment is that New York City is still intact,” the intelligence officer confirmed.
“Can you imagine the hell that it must be?” Bhagat mumbled. “There are twenty million people there, we had a little under four million and were prepared with food supplies. New York City had nothing.”
“Here you go, sir,” Freddy MacArthur said from the computer as he hit the button to project the screen’s images onto the television mounted to the side of the conference table.
The map of New Jersey came up. “Can you scroll toward Staten Island?” Major Blackledge asked.
“I… Ah, I’m not sure which…”
“Here, let me,” Major Calamante said. “I’m from the Bronx.” He went to the computer and re-centered the map over Staten Island.
“Zoom out just a bit,” the intelligence officer directed. When the screen showed the bump out of New Jersey toward New York, Blackledge said, “Stop.”
Major Blackledge stood and went around the table, pointing at the screen. “See, they were right here on this highway when the signals went live, right, Juan?”
“Um, yeah. I believe so.”
“How long were they there before they went south?”
The signal officer referred to his notebook. “I don’t know, around five minutes. Then they went south into this area.” He ran his cursor in a circle over an area that had a marker centered over it indicating it was a point of interest.
“What is that?” General Bhagat asked.
“Um…” Major Calamante looked at the map. “It says ‘Harbortown Ports’, but I know for a fact that nothing’s there.” He switched to satellite imagery. “See, it’s just a massive construction project.”
“Okay, so where’d they go after that?” Todd asked.
“They went south for about mile and they’ve been there ever since.”
“About a mile?” Todd stated, looking at the map. “Like around the Perth Amboy Harborside Marina?”
Juan nodded. “Yeah, that’s about right.”
The intelligence officer looked over at the general. “I think they were trying to make it into New York City, sir. They were on the highway, came up to the destroyed bridge going over t
o Staten Island and began broadcasting their BFT for any friendlies in the city to hear. Given how quickly they left, they were probably pursued by the infected. They went south to find a boat over to the city, found the harbor and made their stand there.”
Neel scratched at his chin. “Sounds entirely plausible. Do we know if anyone replied to their BFT signals?”
“Negative, sir,” Juan replied.
“Hmm…” Bhagat thought about the implications of the platoon going to the city. “Were they seeking safe haven there, or what?”
“We don’t know, sir,” the signal officer said. “All we know is that they began broadcasting.”
“We could have offered them safety here,” Todd stated. “What if they weren’t seeking safety, but something else altogether? What if they were trying to get in contact with someone in the city, someone who might be able to help, like a scientist or something?”
“We have scientists here,” Neel said.
“Not really, sir. Most of the research personnel we had here were killed with that outbreak last March. What if they were trying to get somebody who was immune to a scientist in the city to begin working on a cure?”
“That’s not possible,” Bhagat scoffed. The statement dragged the memory of his old friend’s betrayal from the dungeon he’d locked it in. Aarav Sanjay hadn’t been working on a cure as he’d professed. “There’s no curing those things out there.” He jabbed a finger in the general direction of the walls. “But, of more pressing concern is what’s happening to our scouts that we send out.”
Colonel Tovey sighed. “I don’t know, sir. You saw on our daily update that the teams we’ve sent out to try to scout on that base have all gone offline—probably killed. We don’t know if that’s from the infected or if that’s from something else.”
Bhagat nodded. He’d thought the same thing before he called this impromptu meeting. He gestured at the intelligence officer. “Before you came in, Dave, Todd had just asked the most pertinent question of the morning. Are we going to begin considering the ‘UN troops’ enemies?” He made quotation marks with his fingers in the air as he said the words. “I know what the president has said, but the president is also in a bunker somewhere and hasn’t poked his head up out of the sand in almost a year.”
“It’s a sticky situation, sir. I don’t think the Iranians and the North Koreans are here to help keep us safe,” Colonel Tovey stated. In his periphery, he saw the signal officer slink back to the table from the desktop computer. “I think it’s the opposite. I think they caused this and they’re here to wipe out the rest of our resistance so they can take our land.”
Neel grimaced. “I’m beginning to think the same thing, Dave. I don’t like it. There’re too many problems with them being here. The first of which is that they conveniently had a security forces package ready to go in the middle of a worldwide pandemic. The next is that their population wasn’t decimated like ours was. The whole thing stinks. Now I’ve got missing troopers near a UN base that just happens to be on the edge of where we could reach it with a combat force and near the round trip flight limit of manned aircraft out of Holloman.”
“I agree, sir,” Dave said. “But what can we do about it? The Iranians and the Norks seem to be a few steps ahead of us all the time, plus they have the blessing of the POTUS. So unless we’re talking about disobeying his orders…”
Dave trailed off. Neel knew what he was doing. The operations officer had left it open for his commander to commit treason, but hadn’t actually suggested it himself. If we go down that road, how are we any different than that traitor, Murphy?
He didn’t have an answer for that yet. One thing was certain; he needed to confer about the situation with a few trusted people. “Major Calamante, I need you to figure out a way to set up a VTC with Colonel McTaggert, the base commander over at Holloman Air Force Base. I don’t want to hear about us being jammed, just make it happen.”
“Roger, sir.”
“Check that, make it a SVTC, secure point-to-point. Send along the info that it’s to be him only, nobody else.” The signal officer nodded at his request to take the unclassified VTC to the secret level.
“Timeframe, sir?”
“Any time. There are no meetings that we have around here that are more important than the conversation I’m going to have with him, so whatever fits his schedule.”
“Roger,” the man answered, scribbling notes into his book. He was already planning on the logistics of the operation. Maybe he isn’t a terrible staff officer, Bhagat thought.
“Alright. I’ve got to prepare some notes for the SVTC. In the meantime, I want everyone here to keep an ear out for Lieutenant Murphy and try to figure out what they’re actually doing up there in New Jersey.”
The three officers nodded in unison and Bhagat pushed his chair back from the table. They each sprang to their feet and rendered hand salutes. He returned them and looked out the window at the dreary gray sky.
“Might be a storm coming,” he said. “A giant, fucking mess of a storm.”
24
* * *
LOWER NEW YORK BAY, NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK
MARCH 1ST
“Well, I’ll be, L.T. You did it!” Grady chuckled, slapping Jake Murphy on the back. “You believe this shit, Taavi? Here I thought we were gonna have to walk all the way to the lab. But fuck me if we aren’t on a nice little pleasure cruise.”
The operator looked over to his companion, Major Shaikh. The man’s dark skin was pale and he appeared as if he were only a moment away from vomiting up the MRE he’d eaten earlier. “I guess you ain’t really been on a boat too often since you grew up in the desert, have you?”
The Iranian shook his head and then ran over to the side of the boat, leaning over. Grady watched his back arch as he emptied the contents of his stomach. “Damn, Taavi. We aren’t even really in open water. This is just a glorified bay.”
He laughed, relishing in the open air after over two weeks cramped inside that tin can Stryker vehicle. The salt spray off the ocean stung his eyes when he looked toward the front of the boat, but he didn’t care. They’d overcome nearly impossible odds to make it this far and now they were on to the next leg of their journey, only two soldiers fewer than what they’d left Kansas with.
That small thought sobered Grady’s mood. They’d lost two men when they abandoned the Strykers to go to the boats. He didn’t know the specifics of it, but somehow, both of them had become separated during the footrace to the water’s edge. By the time the boats shoved off, the docks and shoreline had been jam-packed with the infected. The creatures snarled their hatred of the humans that had eluded their grasp. All of the soldiers knew the two men were goners, but the lieutenant had anchored the boats twenty feet offshore for over an hour, giving the men every opportunity to appear. They never did.
Grady spat a lump of phlegm into the ocean. Off to their left, maybe four hundred feet or so, was Staten Island. It looked as if the island was packed shoreline to shoreline with homes and businesses, presumably all occupied prior to the outbreak. Now? None of them knew. He’d glimpsed occasional people along the water’s edge, but none of them paid the small three-boat flotilla any mind. Fishing boats seemed to be in abundance on the water, so they were used to them speeding by. There were hundreds of boats going back and forth across their path, obviously trying to keep the remaining population alive. The other boaters were a hard-looking bunch, bundled against the icy weather, the sea spray, and likely concealing weapons. They did not appear friendly in the least—a fact not lost on Grady.
The world he’d awoken to—or more appropriately, the world that he’d been released into—was completely different than anything he’d experienced, and he’d been in some major shitholes in his lifetime. He’d been on presidential guard duties in Africa that had almost ended in disaster, taken part in the bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade, been the point man for the US response to the whispered rumors of biological experiments on human
s, and a whole host of other missions that were an organized mess inside his skull. Nothing had prepared him for the wanton disregard for life that he’d experienced since awakening in that Oklahoma airport. He used to think that people in Sub-Saharan Africa thought life was worthless until now. Now, they slaughtered the infected by the thousands without anyone blinking an eye.
And those men and women in the fishing boats looked back at them the way the soldiers in the platoon looked at the infected. Another person’s life was truly meaningless to them.
His mood soured further and he adjusted the M-4’s two-point sling on his shoulder, loosening the nylon that wrapped around his back and connected with the rifle near his hip. Best to keep it close with a round chambered, especially once they made landfall.
As they sped past an inlet that looked to have a small harbor in it, Grady reassessed the buildings on the shoreline. They’d traveled beyond the closely packed single family homes and now several unkempt beaches were off to their left. There were still plenty of homes and businesses, but they were set farther back, away from what had once been miles of sandy beaches for native New Yorkers and tourists alike. The shores were littered with trash, beached boats, and even a large container ship had wrecked by a large hotel, its contents half on and half off of the ship as it had rolled to one side on the rocky bottom.
He felt a tap on his shoulder and turned to see Taavi with a thumb sticking up in the air. “Good to go?” he asked.
“I am feeling better. Your food is shit.”
“Thanks,” Grady chuckled. His gaze lingered on the Iranian for a moment too long. What was his end game? He’d professed to having no love for his fellow Muslims, but the operator had seen too many insider attacks in his day. Whatever they said, he could never truly trust them. When pressed, the major admitted to wanting to go back home to Iran to oversee the burial of his wife and children. Beyond that, the man wouldn’t say any more.
“This place sure went to hell, didn’t it?” Lieutenant Murphy asked, jutting his chin toward the shoreline.