“The only reason this time was different is because we move around a lot more freely now, so the contagion spreads much faster, and it was a weaponized pathogen that lasted longer than most that appear in nature,” he answered. “You have to understand that jet travel and being able to mutate a virus or bacteria is a relatively new wrinkle on things, and both are total game changers.”
“Were you serious about us having used every weapon ever developed?” Erin felt herself sucked in by the subject matter despite her earlier comment.
“Absolutely. Think about it. We have seen chemical warfare used in the Middle-East and during WWI. You already know about the biological weapons. You know the atom bomb was used, and I’m sure you’ve read about the cyber wars that took place before the plague hit us.” He paused for a moment. “The bottom line is that developing new weapons systems and not using them is like giving a really cool new toy to a child and expecting them to not touch it.”
Emily’s eyes were wide. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Not at all. I just told you how they all got used. I don’t think I need to tell you that earlier weapons were also all used.”
A long pause ensued while everyone mulled it over.
“Do you know how the virus was developed?” Annie asked.
“Not for sure.”
“What do you think?” she insisted.
Erin watched as Stryker took the figurative bat off his shoulder and again prepared to hit the pitch out of the park.
“It’s kind of a long story.”
“We’ve got nothing but time.” Emily arched one eyebrow.
“Well, before 1972, almost everyone had some kind of biological program going. Then, most of the civilized world signed a treaty that banned further development.”
“So, how did the virus get developed?” Emily asked.
“Well, the problem was that you can’t put the genie back in the bottle, so many of the countries, even the ones who signed the treaty, continued their programs in secret, including us. They felt they had to because if anyone cheated, they could get wiped out by not cheating too. It was the next iteration of the mutually assured destruction doctrine of the cold war.”
“So, where did the virus get developed?” Emily asked.
Stryker thought it over for a minute before answering. “Well, I don’t know for sure.”
“What do you think?”
“One of the ISIS fighters told me they got it from an American scientist.”
“How would a scientist get access to the stuff you need to make the virus?”
“Well there really is only one place where it could be done.”
“And, where’s that?” Emily asked.
“Fort Detrick, Maryland,” he replied. “It’s an Army medical research center.”
“You’re saying everybody was killed by our own government?” Annie’s expression reflected disbelief and horror.
“It seems that way to me.”
“Oh my God,” she whispered.
Stryker paused to let that sink in and looked away toward the flood waters. He seemed to grow more thoughtful, and turned back toward the group.
“It was pretty much an open secret in the military community. It sort of had to be that way because, in the end, it isn’t a deterrent unless your enemies know it exists. So, the struggle the powers-that-be-had was to have the knowledge of its existence out there, but never allow any specific information to be released. It’s a delicate balance.”
“Lord, I am getting a headache,” Emily said.
“I know.” Stryker sighed. “I debated telling you about it, but decided to be honest in the end. Haley and Erin already know, so it’s not fair that you two don’t know what we know.”
“So, you think the scientist somehow got the virus out of the fort?” Annie asked.
“I have no way of knowing how it happened. But, I do know that the government pretty much operates with one assumption when trying to keep very important information secret.”
“And that is?” Annie asked.
“Well, it’s that three people can keep a secret…if two of them are dead. So, my guess is the security at the fort was so highly compartmentalized that nobody understood that somebody was about to release something that he or she very possibly developed without anyone else even knowing about it.”
“How could that be possible?” Annie asked
“It’s happened before.”
“When?”
“September 21th, 2001.”
“What happened?” Annie’s voice was becoming more persistent, but Stryker let it go. He was pretty sure she was shocked by what he told them.
“Several media outlets in New York, the Department of State in Washington, D.C., and two U.S. Senators all received envelopes containing anthrax.”
“What happened?” She repeated.
“It killed five people and infected seventeen others.”
“Who did it?”
“The FBI found that it was a man named Bruce Ivins.”
“And, where did he get it?”
“Fort Detrick. He was a scientist who worked in the biodefense lab. He was still under investigation when he committed suicide in 2008. He died six days before the FBI traced the anthrax DNA to a vial in his lab.”
Emily and Annie looked both shocked and horrified.
“I know,” Stryker said sadly. “It’s hard to accept that they managed to lose control of the virus after they already suffered one major security breach.”
“I think I’m going to be sick,” Annie said.
“I get sick every time I think about it.” Erin placed an arm around her.
Annie’s lip quivered. “Are you sure about this?”
“There is no way to be positive, but I’m reasonably certain about it. I get the problem you have with it too. I’ve thought about it a lot, and the question I have is how could anyone, who really understood what the virus could do, release it?”
“Exactly,” she replied.
“My theory is that, for the first time, we had a weapon that really could wipe out mankind, and that is unthinkable. If you can’t conceive of the weapon’s existence, you can’t imagine what the effect will actually be.”
“So, you think they didn’t really know what they had?”
“I think it’s possible because we had never seen anything like it. Even nuclear war isn’t an all or nothing option. You have limits to throw-weights and payloads on weapons. You don’t have to use all of them at once. Radiation only remains lethal for certain distances. Choices remain to policy makers even after they are used.”
“Not this time.”
“No, once it was released, it wasn’t going to stop and there was no way to shut it off. It was the perfect weapon, if you can even think that way.”
“Jesus,” Annie murmured.
“Yep, that does sum it up.”
“My God,” Emily said. “We went through all this because some guy developed something in a government lab and sold it to a bunch of lunatics.”
“It would appear so,” Stryker replied.
She shook her head. “God help us all.”
“God helps those who help themselves, so let’s worry more about saving our own asses than relying on anybody else.”
Stryker turned away again, examined the flood, and then turned back.
“We’re leaving tomorrow morning.”
“Will it be dry?” Erin asked.
“Doesn’t matter. It’s time to leave. I’ve spent enough time here. If we have to tow the loaded Humvees with an empty one to get out of here, we can do it. Let’s get some food and rest and leave in the morning.”
“Works for me,” Haley said. “The sooner, the better.”
“Emily, are you okay with heading back to your parents’ place tomorrow?” Erin asked.
“Well, sure. Why do you ask?”
“You could bring them along and come with us to San Diego.”
“That’s not going
to happen,” she replied. “I want to stay with my folks, and they’ll never leave the ranch.”
“That’s fine with us, but I just thought I would ask.”
Emily walked back toward the building, and Stryker’s eyes followed her for a bit. He was again taken by her diminutive stature. She looked like an emaciated dwarf to him.
“Is it normal to be that small?” he asked Erin.
“I’m not sure it’s normal, but be glad she is.”
“Why?”
“Because if she was larger, you’d probably be dead.”
CHAPTER TWELVE.
“No plan ever survives the first shot,” Stryker said, his voice filled with frustration. “I thought we would be on the road by now.”
“It’s too soon.” Erin eyed the flood water that still surrounded them.
They stood outside the building, sipping coffee and examining the terrain around them. The water level still looked to be close to four feet deep in the low areas of the landscape to the west of their location.
“And what the hell does that mean, anyway?” Erin asked as an afterthought.
“The plan thing?”
“Yes.”
“Well, it just means that you have to adapt. You don’t change the goal, but you can adapt to changes within the framework of a larger plan. The larger plan is to get the hell out of here.”
“Is there some reason that requires we leave early, even if it’s stupid?”
Stryker frowned. “No, I guess not.”
“Why be stupid?”
Stryker took another sip of coffee and considered the landscape around them. “I guess you’re right, but I’m not sure I want to sit here for another day sucking my thumb.”
“Are you just saying that to bitch about the situation? I know you well enough to know that you’ve already figured all this out.”
“You know when you have to worry about Marines?”
“No.”
“When they stop bitching.”
“You’re good at it.”
“I’ve had a lot of practice.” He grinned at her and put an arm around her shoulder.
“How about we go to one of the out buildings and have some fun?”
“You serious?”
“They’re all still asleep and nobody would care anyway.”
“The one on the left has a bed in it,” Stryker said.
“Lead on.”
A half hour later, they lay next to each other, each turned toward the other. Erin smiled a Cheshire grin at him and punched him in the shoulder. “That was pretty quick for an old man.”
“How do you think I got this old?”
They both smiled and Erin touched his face with her fingers.
“I thought I had lost you.”
“Not going to happen. As long as you’re breathing, I am going to be around.”
“So, are we going to calm down about leaving right away?”
“Whatever you want to do. I don’t feel like complaining about anything right now.”
“You are highly bribable.”
“Yes, I am.”
“I don’t mind. It’s a good excuse.”
“Any excuse works for me.”
“You want to go again?”
Stryker pretended to think about it until she again punched him in the shoulder. “You want to be on top?”
She answered by throwing a leg over his midsection.
“Okay, I am really done now,” Stryker said.
“Me too.”
“I guess we should go find something useful to do.”
“I can’t think of anything,” Erin said. “Let’s go to sleep.”
“I don’t know if I can,” Stryker answered.
“Well, give it a try.”
“Okay.” He closed his eyes and immediately was snoring. Erin stared at him as he slept.
An hour later, she rose, got dressed and tiptoed out of the building and joined the other women in the lunch room.
“Where were you?” Haley asked.
“Stryker’s sleeping in the outbuilding. He was still pretty tired so I took him out there so he could sleep as long as he wanted.”
“Ahh, yeah, okay, whatever.” Haley’s face split into a knowing grin.
Erin ignored her response and found some coffee still in the pot.
“I guess we’re not leaving yet?” Emily asked.
“No, the water is still too deep. I know you want to get back to your parents, but we just don’t think it’s worth the risk of losing more vehicles right now.”
“I understand.”
The women continued chatting and each described the events that occurred before they all met. Haley felt as though they were actually getting to know each other for the first time, and Erin felt the same. Her feeling about Annie changed quickly when she described the trials she faced in her captivity. None of it was pretty. Erin’s heart went out to her as she described what well might have been Erin’s life, if Gramps and Stryker had not shown up when they did.
“Tell me about Stryker,” Emily said. “All I know about him is that he saved me and he talks about a lot of stuff I don’t really understand.”
“What more do you need to know?” Haley replied.
“Well, he scared the crap out of me when he got out of the water. I thought he was coming to rape me or something.”
“Ahh, no, that wasn’t going to happen.” Erin looked at her with reproach. “You probably should have figured that out by now.”
“I did, but at the time, I just saw this really large man coming at me and I didn’t know what to think. He is kind of odd looking and I guess I just felt afraid.”
Erin fought back her temper. She was tired of the same reaction to her man from both of the new women. “All you need to know is that you’re alive because of him. You don’t need to understand anything else. Are we clear?”
“Yes.” Emily looked down, apparently realizing she had stepped into forbidden territory.
Haley, the eternal peacemaker, added, “She’s a little sensitive about that. Don’t take it the wrong way; she’s just standing up for the man she loves.”
“I get that, I guess,” Emily replied. “I didn’t mean to offend or anything.
The chatter of automatic gunfire split the air, and Erin looked to the west, sensing it came from there. When she looked back, she saw Stryker chugging up the hill toward them, with the same long shambling stride she had seen many times before.
“Get my vest. And my M-4.”
She ran into the building.
“Get everyone geared up,” he said to Haley. She followed Erin into the structure.
He turned toward Emily who stared, white-faced, at the sound of the gunfire. “Is that coming from your farm?”
“It sounds like it.”
“Can you shoot?”
“Sure, been doing it since I was a kid.”
“Get Emily an M-4,” Stryker bellowed as Erin and Haley disappeared into the building.
“I’m not sure they heard you,” Emily said.
“Go get one yourself, but get a vest and spare mags as well. I’m heading that way, across country and through the water, so follow me as quickly as you can and tell Erin to bring the Barrett.”
“Barrett?”
“She’ll understand. Just go and follow me as fast as you can.”
Erin came out of the building, handing him his vest and his weapon, and Stryker moved off without another word, disappearing into hip deep water, he rose over a hill and again disappeared from sight.
“He wants you to get something called a ‘Barrett!’” Emily said.
Erin ran back into the structure, grabbed the Barrett and spare mags, handed it to Emily, and then gave her an M-4 and a vest with spare mags. She turned to Annie and Haley. “You guys hold the fort. Get your rifles and make sure nobody comes up behind us.”
“We got it, Erin. Just go,” Haley replied.
Erin and Emily jogged out of the building and tracked St
ryker’s trail by following the muddiest part of the flood water.
Stryker topped the hill that lay to the west of the ranch, fell to a prone position and gazed down. He was on dry ground on the rise, but the water below was still fairly deep and surrounded the house, which was also on a small hill directly west of his position.
“What the hell?”
He was looking down on a modern day version of Indians attacking settlers’ wagon train, except they were firing from three small fishing boats as they circled the house. He stared down at the scene in disbelief. Not only was it a really bad idea to try to shoot from a moving platform, but they were entirely exposed, with no cover or concealment.
The attackers had stayed alive because they were able to maintain a high rate of fire, and Stryker guessed there were only one or two defenders in the house.
“This is absolutely the dumbest thing I have ever seen,” he muttered to himself.
He shook his head and looked for any other attackers, but none were visible. The boats were on the side of the house, and the men did mag changes as they moved through the water. Nobody fired at them from that side.
Stryker counted eleven attackers, and then heard the boom of what sounded like a .308 firing from the house as they again opened fire on the front of the house after coming up the opposite side of the structure. One man in the second boat slumped down and didn’t move.
Stryker pulled his carbine up, gazed through the scope, and acquired the first target. He fired a burst at them, knowing he was barely within effective range but needing to give them something to think about to take the pressure of the defenders. He saw one shooter go down. He adjusted the angle and aimed at his next target, and took down two more men who sat in the back of another boat.
“This is really screwed up,” he said to himself.
The men below looked confused. They didn’t know where their casualties came from and looked around as they continued to slowly circle the house. Stryker peered over his scope for a moment to see the entire battle scene, and noted a rock formation around eighty meters downhill, but still on dry ground.
He brought the M-4 back to his shoulder, switched it to full auto, and emptied the magazine in seconds into one of the vessels. He dropped the mag, replaced it, and did the same with the second boat.
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