Amanda's Story (8 page)

“They left the cabin door open.”

“They do that sometimes,” she answered, watching as the team's supplies were stacked in untidy piles. “They generally strap you in fairly well.”

“So if the pilot suddenly decided to turn right and my straps weren't quite tight enough?”

“Then something unfortunate would have happened.” Bernice smiled and winked. “Don't worry, I doubt you'll have to take another helicopter. I think we're here for the duration. Or at least until the roads open up.” Without another word she sprinted over to the soldiers as two of them awkwardly carried a large wooden crate. “Be careful,” Amanda heard her scream.

Twenty minutes later the team of fourteen and platoon of seventeen stared at a mountain of crates, boxes, and plastic as the echo of retreating helicopters faded into the living sound of the jungle. “All right, if I could get everyone's attention!” Bernice was in her take-charge mode. “We had hoped to use the airport, but Lieutenant Garcia”—she paused and pointed with an open hand at the cleanest of the seventeen soldiers— “tells me that the security situation is still uncertain. So for tonight it is probably better if we just set up here.”

“I like the sound of that,” said the muffled voice of Doctor Greenburg, who was still reclining in the grass.

“It will give us all,” she emphasized the last word, “a chance to organize our supplies.”

“I hope you are not including me. I was promised a tropical vacation in a seaside resort,” he answered.

“Well, you are in the tropics, and there's the sea,” Bernice retorted.

“I want a Margarita. Did we pack a Margarita maker?” Greenburg continued.

“Doctor!” Bernice now flipped into her disciplinarian mode. “We have less than two hours to create some semblance of order out of this mess. I appreciate the attempt to lighten the mood, but it's time to work.” Her voice reverberated through the clearing.

Greenburg sat up and whispered a chastened “sorry.”

Order restored, Bernice rapidly handed out assignments. “Finally, I am going with the lieutenant and some of his men into town to make contact with the security force, and hopefully get us some wheels. Maybe even con some of the residents to come and help set things up.” She crossed the fingers of both her hands.

“Bernice, is that wise? You just told us that the security situation was uncertain.” Doctor Jorgenson had politely worked his way to the front of the group so he could face Bernice directly.

“That's true, but we have some local help. A number of the soldiers grew up in Tela.” Several soldiers subtly responded. “I'll be fine, David. I know what I'm doing.” Bernice smiled, but by the expression on Jorgenson's face he clearly remained unconvinced.

Amanda marveled at nature's destructive power, but also at its resilience. Parts of the jungle had been completely flattened, as if a giant boot had stomped the trees and vines. She had been warned to expect this; tornadic winds—giant eddies in the usual straight line currents—were common in powerful storms. What was unexpected was their focal nature.

“This is amazing,” Bernice remarked as they approached a clearing half as large their landing site. Stumps of trees that only days earlier were over a hundred feet tall stood in mute testament to the power of Hurricane Michael. Their shallow roots, normally buried by several feet of decaying vegetation, baked in the afternoon sun. The detritus had been blasted into the trees that edged the clearing. “It's like a bomb went off,” she said, slowing her pace and falling behind the Honduran soldiers.

Amanda slowed as well, and eventually the two ladies simply stopped and stared.

“Mrs. Scott,” Lieutenant Garcia called, breaking their trance. “I must insist that you stay with us.”

Amanda was surprised to see that they had tarried long enough for the squad to disperse into defensive positions along both sides of the choked road that lead to Tela. They held their weapons waist-high and scanned the jungle nervously. “Maybe we better go.” She tugged at Bernice's blouse, suddenly aware of their situation and its potential. They hurried up to the officer, who gave a command, and the group reassembled with the women in the center. “The sound is almost deafening,” Amanda said and they continued down the narrow lane and a half road that by Central American standards was a main arterial.

“Lieutenant, how did all these bugs survive?” Bernice asked after walking through a cloud of small black midges.

“I do not know,” he answered, barely acknowledging the question as he scanned the jungle ahead.

“He's making me regret my decision to come along,” Bernice whispered to Amanda. They both hesitated when Garcia suddenly jogged to the head of the column.

“Me too,” Amanda answered just before the lieutenant halted the squad with a raised fist. A pregnant moment passed. Garcia grunted an unintelligible command and all ten men crouched and rotated towards the forest, guns raised. Amanda and Bernice found themselves inside a circle of very nervous and heavily armed men. Instinctively, they dropped to the ground.

“Stay low,” Garcia said unnecessarily to the two women after he found his way back to them, his eyes and weapon constantly moving. Amanda stared at the jet-black rifle that swung in an arc a foot above her head. She marveled at its utilitarian design but was terrified by its capability. She knew nothing about weapons, military or otherwise, and imagined that a simple errant touch would suddenly make them go off, with obligatory lethal consequences.

A full minute passed and then Amanda heard a small pop. Just a single innocent crack, but it sent ripples of apprehension through the lieutenant. “Was that what I think it was?” She whispered to Bernice, who was inches from her face.

Before she could respond, a whole series of pops like a string of firecrackers followed. “MAC 10,” Garcia whispered. “That's not us.” He squatted and retrieved a small radio from beneath his flak jacket. “Maya seis, Maya seis.” No one responded. He tried three more times without success and then changed the radio's frequency. Three more times and no answer. He let loose a short string of Spanish that both ladies knew was not suitable for mixed company. He duck-walked over to a soldier, pulled a larger radio from his field pack, and then sat back to back with the man.

“Damn it,” Bernice whispered. “Smugglers. Tela is a part of the drug corridor; boats pull up in the middle of the night, take on fuel, and then are usually gone the next morning. No harm, no foul. Except five days ago a couple of boats that should have been watching The Weather Channel a little more closely pull in and then find that they can't leave. So they stash their boats and cargo in a warehouse by the river. They must be trying to protect it.” Bernice turned to Amanda and found that her dirt-covered face had a questioning look.

“General Regara told me before we left; it's why he sent these guys with us,” Bernice clarified

“I don't understand. The general knew there were drug smugglers here and didn't do anything?” Amanda tried to keep her voice low, but the lieutenant heard enough from fifteen feet away that he glanced over while talking on the radio.

“How long do you think the general would last if he started pissing off the drug cartels? It's their way, and it's been their way ever since we started turning a blind eye to foreign governments involved with the drug trade, so long as they hated the communists as much as we did. This is hardly the place for a political debate.” Her voice was low, but it still communicated a rebuke for Amanda's naiveté. “Sorry,” she said after a moment. “I didn't mean to get so carried away. Sometimes I can be a real bitch, and right now I'm a real nervous bitch.”

Garcia crawled back to the center of the circle. “We've been ordered back to the landing field …”

“Contact, ahead,” a voice hissed.

“Contact, left,” a second one added, followed closely by a third on the opposite side of their circle.

“Down,” Garcia said, and all ten men flattened themselves. “They probably heard the helicopters,” he said to himself and the women.

Maybe they'll just pass by us
, Amanda thought, but then took stock of the situation. Tela had one road in and one road out, and they were currently on it. Even if by some miracle they missed her group of thirteen, the presumed drug gang was on its way to investigate the helicopter landings and they would surely find her Red Cross team, which only had a handful of soldiers to protect them.

Two full minutes passed with almost no one breathing, and then even Amanda could hear them. At first it was just the snapping of a tree branch, then hushed voices followed by the smell of cigarettes, and then finally six men rounded the corner. They were dressed in fatigues and carried rifles that looked decades older than Lieutenant Garcia's. They had their heads down and shuffled more like zombies than Honduran soldiers.

“¡Alto!” Garcia yelled and was suddenly on his feet, along with his ten soldiers. The six men did indeed stop; they stared at their clean and rested colleagues with looks that ranged from confusion to relief. “Who is your commanding officer?” Garcia demanded, first in Spanish and then in English. The six men looked at each other, wondering who was going to answer.

“He is dead,” a man in the back finally answered in Spanish. His uniform was ripped in several places, but Amanda still could read the name Listera over his left breast pocket. He was the least haggard of the group, but it still looked as if he were about to fall over. Three of his comrades dropped their weapons and sat in the dirt. “So are twelve more of us and just about everyone else in the city. There are bodies everywhere.” His voice trailed off and he too dropped his rifle and slipped into the dirt.

Garcia turned crimson and screamed, “On your feet soldiers!” Three of them, including the spokesman, slowly climbed to their feet. “You need to give me a better report than that!” Amanda didn't need her high school Spanish to understand. “Form up!” he yelled in English and his ten soldiers immediately formed two columns. Garcia walked down the center of his men and then over the fallen branches that separated the two groups. He slowly walked among the exhausted soldiers, inspecting them closely until he reached the spokesman. “What happened here, corporal?”

He looked confused. “There was a hurricane.”

“What happened to you, to these men, to the city?” He waved both arms, his impatience obvious.

“It started last night, a few hours after the rain began to slow.” He stood straighter but struggled for words. “Before the storm hit we had divided up the civilians into three groups, and then Colonel Mencia split our platoon into three groups to protect them. The six of us were in the storm shelters by the airport with about a hundred civilians.” He suddenly looked confused. “I think it was a hundred, maybe it was a thousand.”

“It doesn't matter, Corporal. Where are they now?”

“We let them go, and then they all died. At least most of them, I think.” He began to lean and then sway. Garcia grabbed the man just before he fell.

“Sit down, Corporal. Can anyone else tell me what's going on here?” The remaining men, following the corporal's example, sat in the dirt. They stared at Garcia, and like before, no one answered.

“I think a lot of them got shot,” the corporal finally answered.

“Who shot them?”

“Colonel Mencia. But he didn't kill them all; the Columbians killed a lot, and then we killed the Columbians.” He smiled proudly and Amanda noticed that his teeth were red.

“All right, Corporal.” Garcia softened his tone. “Listen closely; why did Colonel Mencia shoot the civilians?”

“He didn't just shoot civilians. He shot Reyes, Quinteras, Alonsa …”

“He shot the mayor and the police captain,” another soldier added.

“That's right; he started with them.” Listera nodded his head and stared back at Garcia.

“You didn't answer my question, Corporal. Why did your colonel start shooting people?”

“He got sick; everybody was getting sick. See.” Listera rolled up his sleeve to reveal a line of blood-filled blisters up his arm. Two other soldiers followed suit and pulled up their sleeves, and another opened his shirt. All of them had the same lesions.

Garcia backed out of the knot of soldiers. “Mrs. Scott,” he yelled.

“Right behind you, Lieutenant,” Bernice said. “I heard what he said. Does any of it make sense to you?”

“No,” he answered quickly. “What are those things on their skin?”

“She just walked in from the jungle and passed out,” Mary Ecklers told Dr. Greenburg as the pair hurried behind Oso, the large Honduran private. He carried a small bleeding woman, whose moaning had ominously ceased.

“Senor, take her over to the tent.” Greenburg pointed to the large pavilion that had been erected just minutes before. In time it would serve as triage and, if needed, an open air hospital ward.

“His name is Oso,” Mary teased. The large man grunted at her; she had been calling him Oso since they had landed, and his fellow soldiers were starting to pick it up.

“My name is Miguel,” he said, reaching the tent and lowering the stricken woman onto the only clear spot, which happened to be a stack of bottled water cases.

“Help me clear this, Oso.” Greenburg had started to pull boxes off of a large wooden crate.

“Miguel,” he said, brushing aside the physician and opening the side door of the crate. “I am guessing that you want the exam table.” He slid the folded table from the crate and in a single move expanded the legs.

“I never knew they opened like that. Thanks, Oso.” Greenburg stood back and examined the crate's side door.

The big man shook his head and gave Mary a long look as he lifted the unconscious woman onto the exam table.

“Sorry, but it suits you,” she said, tearing open bags of saline and IV supplies.

“She's been shot,” Greenburg said in surprise. “We're going to need more help.” He applied pressure to a small wound in her upper right chest. “Get me a set of vital signs and a couple of IVs as soon as you can.” He reached around the small woman and his hand came back bloody. “Shit, the bullet went all the way through. She's got an exit wound that's as big as my fist. We could use some help in here.” He yelled, “Hey Oso, or whatever your name is, see if you can find us a pair of gloves.”

Dr. Jorgenson and four other people rushed into the tent. “What's going on?” he asked his colleague.

“Gunshot wound to the chest; as if these people didn't have enough problems now someone is shooting them. Can you get me a blood pressure?”

“I can't get a blood pressure,” Mary said, stabbing the woman's arm with a large-bore needle.

“She's still bleeding so she must have one. Get me some instruments—maybe I can clamp this damn bleeder off.”

Twenty minutes later, and after fifteen minutes of CPR, David Jorgenson tapped his partner's back. “She's gone, Eli; you need to stop.”

Greenburg reluctantly stopped chest compressions. He was dripping in sweat and had blood up to both elbows. “Not even two hours and we're already pulling the sheet over one of them,” he said bitterly as Miguel helped him off the table. “I'll bet she's not even thirty.” He brushed the dark, bloodstained hair from her face and then paused. “Hey David, what do you make of these?” He pointed to a crop of small clear blisters that had appeared over her otherwise smooth face. “She didn't have these when we started.”

“Allergic reaction?” Jorgenson bent close.

“To what? All she got was saline and epinephrine. We didn't even have gloves for a latex allergy.” He lifted both his bloody hands as proof.

“Doctors, she's got them on her arms as well, and she definitely didn't have them when I started the IV.” Mary raised one flaccid arm, which was now covered in a cobblestone rash.

“Okay, I'm starting to get a little concerned here.” Jorgenson pointed to the skin of the young woman's neck, which moments earlier had been completely normal.

“What the hell?” Greenburg said, watching her skin blister before his eyes. Instinctively, he checked for a pulse. “This is impossible,” he said and then backed away from the table. “I need some alcohol and Betadine to scrub this crap off of me.” He held up his arms and one of the nurses led him outside. She began pouring alcohol over his bloody arms. “Can someone find me some hydrogen peroxide?”

“How do you want to handle this?” Jorgenson asked Greenburg after his arms had been scrubbed raw. The body of the small woman lay unattended in the now off-limits tent.

“No way we can get this body out of here, huh?” Greenburg was sixty-eight and the senior physician by more than three decades. A retired internist, he had volunteered only to break the monotony of retirement. Jorgenson was a general surgeon who had just finished eight years in the employ of the US Army and was donating a month of his time to the Red Cross before starting a private practice position in Boston.

“Not until the morning,” Jorgenson said as everyone looked up into the darkening sky.

“The lab is the one thing we have up and running, and I'd sure like to know what that shit is. How about I gown up and take some tissue?” Greenburg was asking for advice, but ultimately the decision was his.

“So long as we maintain isolation. I'd do skin scrapings only and reduce the risk of contamination. We might want to freeze some while we're at it, and bring it back home.”

“Good idea.”

Ten minutes later, the lights around the compound began to come on, and the drone of the jungle was partially replaced by the hum of small generators. Lieutenant Garcia led the way into the clearing and four of his ten soldiers followed, with Bernice and Amanda bringing up the rear.

“Are we just going to let those men spend the night in the jungle?” Amanda whispered to Bernice. They had had the first serious disagreement with the Hondurans over the fate of the six men, all of whom were clearly sick. Garcia had disarmed each man, then detailed six of his men to watch over them until his superiors could decide what to do with them.

“We could at least bring them to the clearing and give them food and water,” Bernice had pleaded.

“They are soldiers and have been trained to do without,” Garcia answered tersely. “My orders are clear: they are to remain where we found them.” His tone closed the door on any further discussion.

“They are sick and dying men,” Bernice said, stomping after the lieutenant. She fumed all the way back to the camp.

“I'm glad you're back,” Greenburg said, greeting Bernice outside of the large tent. The corpse and exam table had been removed. He filled her in on the last hour's activities, and when he was done she shared her adventure. “So it's not an isolated case; we've got some sort of outbreak going on.”

“Looks that way. I'll contact our people in El Progresso. Garcia has already talked to his superiors, who are busy pulling their puds trying to decide what to do with the six in the jungle. Can I see the slides so I can at least sound like I know what I'm talking about?”

“Absolutely. Any woman who talks about pulling puds can have anything she wants. Follow me; the lab is set up over here.”

The pair walked to a smaller tent that sheltered the three small generators and an even smaller medical lab. Bernice noticed an odd collection of empty crates and boxes just past the arc of lights. “The body,” he said simply, and she nodded.

“After you.” He lifted the tent flap to find David Jorgenson bent over one of their two microscopes. “Did you figure it out yet?” Greenburg said loudly, causing his younger colleague to jump and knock over a bottle of water.

“Damn it, Greenburg, you better sleep with one eye open tonight.”

“Relax, it's only water. What do you see?” He peered over the smaller man's shoulder, as if seeing the slide would answer his questions.

“Nothing; you have a look.” Jorgenson backed up and let the internist take over.

“Dermatology was never my strong suit.” Greenburg pulled up a small stool, and Jorgenson and Bernice shared a look and broke out into broad smiles wondering if the stool would bear Greenburg's weight. “I can feel you smiling,” he said as he adjusted the focus. “Hmm. Extensive dermal damage. Even the subdermal blood vessels are necrotic. That would explain the fluid.”

“How about in English, Doctor?” Bernice asked.

“Something has affected the cells of the skin, not just the epidermis, the outer layer, but the living skin beneath, and its blood vessels. When the dermis is injured it loses some of its grip on the overlying epidermis, which can peel away, allowing fluid to accumulate in the space. Voila! A blister. The problem is that, whatever the process, it should have stopped with her death, but this one didn't.” He pulled back from the scope and began to stroke his chin.

“Skin cells continue to grow and divide after death,” Bernice said.

“Only for a very short time,” Greenburg said. “So obviously whatever caused this had already been in the dermal tissue before blood flow stopped. Which means either a toxic or infectious etiology. In fact, I'll go further—it means either heavy metal intoxication or a viral infection.”

Without warning, Jorgenson suddenly scrambled backward into a generator. Bernice nearly tripped getting out of his way in the close quarters and Greenburg spun in his chair. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Bernice, back away from Eli,” Jorgenson said. She hesitated. “Bernice, now, back away.” She looked at him and then back at Greenburg, completely confused until she saw the small red and clear blisters on the backs of his hands.

“Oh shit!” he said, more angry than concerned. “Well, I guess we can cross heavy metal intoxication off our list,” he said, examining the backs of his hands. “You two need to get out of here. Go clear some space for me in the big tent, preferably by a window and the fire.”

Bernice and Dr. Jorgenson slipped out the back of the tent and literally ran into an uncharacteristically disheveled Lieutenant Garcia. Amanda was only steps behind the officer. “I am so glad I found you,” Garcia addressed the doctor. “We have a situation with some of the soldiers from town. Six of them were found wandering in various states of delirium outside of Tela. Their arms were covered in lesions. I left some of my men with them and they have radioed back that one of the six men has died, and the other five are close to death. I need you or Dr. Greenburg to go and see if it is safe to bring the men back here.” Bernice and David hesitated and then looked at each other.

“What's wrong?” Amanda asked.

“While you were gone we had a woman come into camp. She had been shot, and we couldn't save her. She had lesions—small blood-filled blisters …” Jorgenson began to answer.

“Yes, that's what these men have,” Garcia interrupted.

“Dr. Greenburg has developed the same lesions,” Jorgenson finished.

“Oh my God,” Amanda whispered, and Garcia made the sign of the cross.

“We can't let those men into this camp until we have a better idea what's going on. I'm sorry, Lieutenant.” Jorgenson tried to walk passed Garcia, but the larger man stepped in front of him.

“But they will die. Can't you just come and see them. It's not far.” Garcia was pleading.

“I don't understand this sudden change in heart,” Bernice said suspiciously. “Thirty minutes ago you were happy to leave them out there all night.”

“They are soldiers, just like me. They have families just like me.” He began to cry and then dropped to his knees.

Amanda took a step away from the sobbing officer. “He's been like this for about fifteen minutes. It happened so fast; one minute he was talking to the general on the radio, and the next minute he was crying and smashing the radio,” she said quietly to Bernice. “Ours is still okay.”

“Where's his rifle?” Bernice asked.

“I'm not sure. I think he handed it to someone when we went to radio the general.”

“Good. Everyone who came in contact with the men in the woods, or with the dead woman, needs to be disarmed and isolated,” Bernice whispered.

“I understand the isolation, but what does this have to do with weapons?” Jorgenson asked.

“The soldiers in the forest told us that after their colonel became sick he started killing people,” Amanda answered.

“Great. Apparently whatever it is that's killing these people isn't doing it fast enough.” The doctor shook his head. “We'll have to take it to secondary contacts as well, which I'm guessing pretty much includes everyone.”

“Well, at least I'll have some company.” All three turned to find Dr. Greenburg standing just outside the lab tent. “Can I come out now? I promise not to shoot anyone.”

“What are we going to do?” Amanda asked the obvious question over the lieutenant's renewed sobs.

“First thing is to segregate everyone who is clearly infected, which includes the doctor and the lieutenant. Then we need to check everyone for signs of infection, and keep checking, let's say every hour. Then we need to get on the horn and get us some help.” Bernice had once again become the grand organizer.

Greenburg still seemed unfazed. “We need to keep people away from each other. I'm afraid that our little meeting here has probably infected you two ladies. David, I'm guessing that you were infected earlier when we tried to save Patient Zero. I would spread the word that no one gets closer than ten feet to anyone else in case the agent is spread by airborne droplets.”

“That's going to make it difficult checking for signs of infection, but I see your point.” Bernice said. “I've got a bullhorn and I'll spread the news. One last thing—he has six men in the forest guarding the ones already infected from the village. Do we bring them in? They had been ordered to keep away from the sick men.”

“Yes,” three voices said at once. “I doubt that the risk here is any less or greater than out there. Do you think he's in any shape to give that order?” Jorgenson asked the other three. Garcia had rolled onto the ground and curled into a ball, but at least he had become quiet.

“No,” Greenburg said flatly. “Is this what we have to look forward to?” He faced Jorgenson.

“Why is it affecting him like this? None of the men from the village were this bad.” Amanda stared at the man who earlier in the day had been strong, articulate, and vigorous. “This is terrifying.”