Survivors

by Rich Goldhaber

  Fillmore answered, “Aye, aye Captain; I’ll bring him out here as soon as possible.” The fishing boat pulled away from the submarine and headed at its maximum speed into the dockage at Old Orchard Beach. It was almost thirty minutes later when the same boat pulled away from a quay and headed out toward the submarine. As the fishing boat slowed to a crawl, Sanchez could see five people crowded onto the aft deck.

  The men on the fishing boat were all smiles as they docked on the starboard side of the submarine. Sanchez and Gordy Phillips stood as close to the edge of the starboard deck as they dared without risking falling into the sea.

  Sanchez asked, “Mr. Knight?” A man standing in front of the others said, “Yes Captain, I’m Kevin Knight. You can’t believe how good it is to see another group of survivors. Why don’t you guys come ashore and we’ll talk?”

  “Mr. Sanchez, none of my crew has been exposed to the virus. I’m afraid we can’t risk getting exposed.”

  Kevin Knight smiled, “I don’t believe that will be a problem Captain.”

  “Why is that Mr. Knight?” “About four weeks ago, one of our fishing boats returned to Portland. They had never been exposed. They had stayed out on the ocean for almost three months. They didn’t really know if it was safe to return, but they thought they’d risk it. None of them have shown any symptoms yet, and they’ve been walking around the town. I’m sure they’d be infected already if there was any live virus around.”

  Sanchez asked his Chief Medical Officer to join him. Doctor Raymond Fleming arrived two minutes later, and Sanchez briefed him on the situation. Fleming spoke to the men on the fishing boat. “Mr. Knight, the CDC indicated the incubation period can be as long as ninety days. It’s still too early to ensure the safety of our crew.”

  Kevin Knight showed his disappointment. The two ships spent the next two hours exchanging information. Sanchez was able to explain what had happened immediately before losing communications. Kevin Knight provided some history on how the survivors in this group had come to Old Orchard Beach. It was really all about the need for fresh food, and the ability to fish on a daily basis. They had found a well just outside of town and they were operating it using an emergency generator to run a makeshift pump. The system was sufficient to provide enough water to fill a nearby water tower, and it could provide just enough fresh water for the small community. Between a diet of fresh fish, a few deer they had been able to kill, and scavenging for canned food at nearby houses, they were just able to keep themselves fed.

  Sanchez and his crew listened to the story of the small community trying to survive. “Mr. Knight, it is my intention to continue cruising down the eastern seaboard looking for groups of survivors. We will let everyone know where survivors are living. We’ll probably cruise all the way to Galveston before we return here. I’m guessing we’ll be back in a few months. If your men who were out at sea are still free of symptoms, then we’ll be coming ashore, and we’ll share with you everything we’ve found out.”

  It was difficult for the Old Orchard Beach survivors to accept the fact that this symbol of American power was unable or unwilling to provide any hope of a better life.

  The fishing boat pulled away from the USS Jimmy Carter and headed back to its port with nothing to offer its residents other than the same miserable life.

  Chapter 28

  I had never been on the tarmac of the Fort Myers International Airport. I had always been restricted to the terminal, but TSA was not there to stop me. Captain Stewart had settled on a Southwest 737-800. She said it was the newest generation of the 737 series built by Boeing.

  Dozens of people from the campus were busy helping load the plane with fresh produce and the last of our solar array kits. Stan had even brought over a couple of freezers and refrigerators to help store the food. Beth donated a few of her precious tenderloins for the MacDill survivors.

  Bill and his team were helping prep the airplane. They had found one of those portable generators on wheels to provide power to the aircraft while Ami completed her pre-flight checklist. I was sitting in the copilot’s seat. Jessie chose to accompany Sammy in a sleek black Bell 407GX helicopter that Sammy had found over on the civil aviation side of the airport.

  Blaine had driven down to the Naples airport and had flown up in a Beechcraft King Air 350i twin-engine airplane. Captain Stewart had everyone using the same radio frequency so we could all communicate.

  Finally, Bill and his crew closed the baggage compartment hatch, and his team of six boarded our aircraft. I quickly gave up my seat to Bill who I felt might be able to help out with a lot of the technical things that might come up.

  Ami ordered the start of our mission with the words, “Gentlemen, start your engines.” Ami looked like she had flown this plane for hundreds of hours. I figured it must be like when I used to get a rental car, and it only took me a few minutes to figure out all the controls.

  Captain Stewart taxied out toward the runway followed by Blaine with Manny riding shotgun. Meanwhile Sammy Lafayette was doing his own thing. After his chopper warmed up, he saluted the remaining ground crew and increased the pitch of the blades with the collective. The helicopter rose slowly from the tarmac and banked to the north.

  Ami Stewart applied the brakes at the end of the runway and completed a final check of her instruments. She spoke into the radio. “Eagles One and Two, this is Eagle Three. I am ready to roll. Blaine and Sammy acknowledged her call, and then she advanced the engine’s throttles, and the 737 started gaining speed. Halfway down the runway the plane rotated and slowly lifted into the air. Bill had been shown the control to retract the wheels and at her command he flipped the switch. When a green light came on, he indicated wheels up and locked.

  We had planned on arriving at different times, feeling this would reinforce the psychological perception of many personnel arriving at the airbase.

  Captain Stewart leveled out at 10,000 feet and set the plane on a heading that would bring us to the east of Tampa. It took us about twelve minutes to arrive at a point about ten miles east of the city. Ami banked the aircraft into a gentle turn to the left and pulled the throttle back to reduce our airspeed. About five miles from the airbase, Bill lowered the wheels and Ami extended the flaps.

  Anyone on the ground, unless they were deaf, would have heard the noise of the engines as Ami lined up with the east-west main runway at the airbase. She slowed her airspeed further and then fully deployed the flaps. As we flew over the city, I thought I could see a number of people looking up at our plane, and I hoped our arrival scared them to death.

  Captain Stewart set the plane down on the very long MacDill runway, and then taxied over to where Blaine and I had parked our plane the day before. By the time she had turned off the engines, Major Connors and a group of soldiers and civilians had gathered around our plane. Ami opened the door to the 737 and saluted Major Connors. He returned the salute. As a truck with an attached stairway moved up to the airplane, Captain Stewart said, “Major, we come bearing gifts.”

  The MacDill survivor’s eyes lit up as the campus crew began unloading the solar arrays and fresh produce. As the plane was being unloaded, I introduced Bill and his team to the major and Sergeant Gomez.

  Blaine’s aircraft was the next to arrive, and after it parked near our plane, I introduced Manny Garcia. I could hear the thumping of the chopper’s blades as it flew in from the east and set down on the tarmac near the other two planes. I introduced Jessie Bolden to the MacDill people, and then our entire team followed the major into the war planning building we had been using the day before.

  Back in the general’s conference room we were treated to coffee and some Oreo Cookies. Bill asked, “Is this the building we need to power up?”

  The major answered, “Yes, this is our Threat Assessment Center. If we can power this place up, then we can access our military spy satellites.”

  “Can we get to the roof of the building?” Bill asked. Sergeant Gomez answered, “We’ve got a cherry p
icker at the motor pool. We can use it to lift all of your supplies up onto the roof.”

  Major Connors said, “Sergeant Gomez, I want you and your men to give the Naples crew all the help they need in setting up the solar array.”

  The response was emphatic, “Yes Sir Major; will do!” The meeting ended quickly, and everyone walked outside to assist Bill and his team. On the way out, Major Connors stopped me and asked, “You said Jessie is one of your governors. Isn’t she a little young to be one of your leaders?”

  I looked at the major and smiled. “Major you will learn she has this rare skill to be able to see the future, not like a psychic, just like an excellent long-term strategic planner, and she’s a great people person. My advice is if she says something, then listen up, because it’s likely to make a lot of sense.”

  The cherry picker arrived along with a pallet truck to move the fresh produce and other equipment. It was almost noon before Bill’s crew began assembling the solar array on top of the building’s roof. I watched them work and realized how good these men and women were at their newly acquired skill.

  Jessie was leading the crew working on mounting the inverter control system and arranging two dozen batteries in a room on the top floor of the building just above the electrical utility service box located on a concrete pad at ground level. A retired electrician from Cape Coral was wiring up the system.

  We stopped for lunch, quick box lunches prepared by Beth and her staff. The major said, “My God, fresh baked bread. It seems like forever since I had fresh bread. Where does it come from?”

  I answered, “There’s a Costco near the campus. We use their ovens.” As we were finishing our lunch, a convoy of military vehicles approached the group. Major Connors said, “This will be Lieutenant Monroe and his team.”

  The electrical part of the project was completed and Jessie, the Major and I walked over to Lieutenant Monroe and his men. I introduced Jessie, and Vince Monroe made the introductions of his team. We looked in the back of the first truck, and I was shocked to see pallets of weapons, ammunition, and special equipment. Two other trucks were filled with more of the same.

  After receiving his final orders from Major Connors, the three trucks left for Naples in a convoy of three trucks and two Hummers.

  It was a little after four o’clock when Bill’s team was ready to test the solar array. He flipped a circuit breaker on the inverter control panel and the lights came on in the Threat Assessment Center. A cheer went up from everyone on the tarmac. Major Connors walked to Bill and gave him a hug; very unmilitary I thought.

  I followed the Major and some of his people into a large room located on the building’s second floor. The Major turned to a young soldier who was probably in his mid-twenties. “Private Duncan, it’s time for you to do your thing.”

  The skinny young soldier began flipping switches, and a variety of systems came to life. He sat down at a console surrounded by large computer monitors and began typing into a computer. “Sir, I have established communications with one of our military satellites in low orbit over the United States.”

  Major Connors said, “Private Duncan, you have the GPS coordinates of the Tampa area. Please task all the satellites to maintain tracking of the area.”

  “Yes Sir, Major.” The major indicated the satellite would need an hour to begin monitoring the Tampa area. “This particular satellite is in a low earth orbit and will circle the planet every ninety-three minutes. We’ll have a couple dozen birds keeping a constant watch over the Tampa area. Lieutenant Monroe is bringing telecommunications equipment with him. Other military satellites will allow him to communicate with us and also his people.”

  Jessie asked, “Does that mean we can communicate with anyone using satellite phones?” Connors said, “No, they operate differently. When you use a commercial satellite phone, you uplink your call to a commercial satellite. It, in turn, downloads your voice to one of only a few base stations in the United States and Europe, and then it goes by normal landlines to the eventual person you’re calling.

  “Military communication satellites are different. Our phone system is managed entirely by a group of global satellites. We can’t afford to be tied down to landlines. One well-placed nuclear weapon would bring the whole system down.”

  Jessie asked again, “But if we have military satellite phones, can we call anyone in the country that has a military satellite phone?”

  The Major corrected, “No, anyplace in the world works.”

  Jessie asked, “And are there a lot of these satellite phones around here?” Connors answered, “We’ve got maybe a couple thousand on the base. We pass them out to our troops that are being deployed into a combat zone.”

  Jessie asked, “Major, can you give us a couple dozen?”

  The Major smiled, “Yes mam, I can arrange to get you as many as you need.” Captain Stewart, who had been standing nearby observing the startup of the military’s hightech communication system, said, “Major, we need to head back to Naples soon. I want to land while it’s still daylight.”

  Major Connors said, “Sergeant Gomez, please gather the residents who wanted to transfer to the university. They need to be on the tarmac in half an hour.”

  The sergeant left to find the residents. Luckily, they had already packed their belongings and many were already waiting near the 737, ready to be transported to a better life. Jessie carried a couple dozen military satellite phones into the helicopter, and we took off for Naples about an hour before sundown.

  Chapter 29

  We arrived back at the Fort Myers airport a little before sunset. Stan had prepositioned several U-Haul trucks, and a yellow school bus was waiting to receive our new residents.

  It was after seven o’clock before everyone had been checked in at Margaret’s desk and had settled into their new accommodations. Beth, knowing we would be hungry, arranged for an assortment of cold leftovers and fresh fruit for the late arrivals.

  The kids from MacDill, who we had brought here yesterday, ran up to the new arrivals and greeted them all. There were plenty of smiling faces to go around, and our newest residents stared in amazement at the spread Beth’s people had prepared.

  Lieutenant Monroe and his team arrived as we were having dinner. We invited them all to join us, and they filled their plates with smiling faces. After dinner, Monroe set up a satellite phone and laptop computer just outside the dining tent. He turned on the system and positioned the transmitting and receiving dish until the signal registered maximum. He then called the Threat Assessment Center. Private Duncan received the call. “Major Connors, Lieutenant Monroe is on the phone.”

  “Lieutenant Monroe, what’s your status?” “We’ve arrived at the campus Sir; pretty impressive digs; I think I’m going to put in for a permanent transfer.”

  “Well, not for a while Lieutenant. I’m going to transmit the latest pictures of the area just east of Tampa. As our scouts have been telling us there appear to be a large group of thugs congregating just west of Route 75.”

  “Yes Sir, we’re getting the pictures right now. I’ll store them in memory so we can look for any changes in their deployment.”

  I couldn’t believe the clarity of these pictures. As the lieutenant zoomed in on the group, you could distinguish objects no more than a few inches apart. To think, the government had this capability to spy on Americans anytime they chose. I wondered whether they ever did.”

  The major asked the lieutenant to report in again after his group had arrived at the dairy farm. Lieutenant Monroe took out two military phones and showed us how they worked. He added his phone number and the major’s phone number to the directories and then did the same for our two new numbers in his phone. Now we were able to contact each other as long as we were outdoors, a minor inconvenience.

  I checked in on Jasmine and Hunter. They were both doing their homework. Each was filling out a math worksheet. Hunter had simple addition and subtraction, and Jasmine was working on some geometry problems.
They were both hard at work, and I wondered whether all of the kids were as equally motivated. I’d have to talk to Janet to see how all our young scholars were doing.

  Chapter 30

  USS Jimmy Carter Captain Sanchez was sitting in his cabin reading a book for the third time when he heard over the P.A. system, “Captain Sanchez, please come to the Sonar center.”

  Sanchez immediately walked quickly to the ship’s sonar control center. The ship’s head sonar technician was sitting at his station with his earphones on. Seaman First Class Freddie Boyle removed his headset and said, “Captain, we’re picking up a sonar signal from a submarine. I put the sonar data in our computer, and the computer thinks it’s the Akula, a Russian Typhoon Class sub.”

  “Where’s it now Freddie?” “About thirty miles off our port bow. We’re on intersecting paths. Our paths will cross in about one hour.”

  Sanchez considered the situation. Apparently they were not alone in the ocean. He assumed the captain of the Russian submarine would have lost touch with his home port just like the Jimmy Carter had. So the key questions were why was the sub here, and what were their intentions?

  Sanchez discounted any hostile action. This wasn’t about the cold war, this was about survival. Perhaps the Akula was on a reconnaissance mission just like the Jimmy Carter.

  There were three options as Sanchez analyzed the problem. They could avoid any contact and just let the Akula continue on its course. They could follow the Akula to better understand the ship’s intentions, or they could make contact with the submarine and exchange information.

  Captain Sanchez made up his mind. “Freddie, I’m going to meet with the other officers. Let me know if the Akula changes course.”

  Sanchez got on the P.A. system and asked the officers to meet in the officer’s mess. Ten minutes later they were all gathered in the officer’s galley and Sanchez explained the situation. “Inputs gentlemen?”