Omega Pathogen: Mayhem (20 page)

They all fight the urge to rush in. They wait and observe the home and neighborhood. Most of the homes are damaged. The destruction, like what they’ve been seeing, is not uniform. Some are burned-out husks. Some are seemingly unscathed. Jim’s mother’s home is not one. The front door of the single-story home is hanging by its bottom hinge and leaning inside the home. Its white paint is smeared with brown handprints, blood that’s long dried.

The large double windows to the right of the door are shattered. Much of the glass is on the interior and is seen in brief glimpses, reflecting sunlight as the sheer curtains move slightly in the breeze. There are multiple bullet holes that seem to be both entry and exits.

No one speaks.

Gunshots, a familiar sound now, are heard and by the sound are very distant. Jim sees no vehicles at the home. The garage door is down in its closed position, and is dented and pushed inward, but remains intact.

Jim steps down from the turret. Chris and Jeremy move ahead of their father and stand near the rear doors. Jim does a final check of his gear and as he moves toward the rear doors, he nods and joins them as they open one of the doors and exit. Chelsea closes and secures the rear doors and takes up an armed position in the turret.

“Like we always do,” Jim says to Chris and Jeremy in a quiet voice. They approach the home left of the door, keeping away from the openings of the door and the windows. The only sounds are of their breathing. Their gear has long been carefully taped to prevent noise when they move.

Chris leads them as they reach the exterior wall and stack against it. Chris’s area of coverage is the door. Jim, in the middle and slightly to Chris’ right, covers the shattered windows. Jeremy faces away from them, protecting from threats from behind.

Chris clicks his comms twice, their predetermined means for asking if all are ready. If ready, he’ll receive four clicks in reply, two from their father and two from Jeremy. Jim replies with two clicks. Jeremy does the same.

Chris rises from one knee to a crouch. Seeing the cue, Jim does the same and places his right foot against Jeremy’s. After a pause of a second, Chris moves to the door. Jim follows and when his foot no longer is felt against his own, Jeremy knows it’s his turn to move. He smoothly pivots and falls in behind his father.

Chris enters the door and covers his area, which is ahead and to the left. To his front is the entrance of the dining room, and the left is where a hallway leads to bed and bathrooms. Jim enters an arm’s-length behind Chris and covers right of Chris' sector, which includes the kitchen and doorway leading to the attached garage. Jeremy enters, also an arm’s-length behind his father, and pivots again to cover their rear.

They stand in the living room. It’s in shambles. The sofa that had been in front of the front windows is pushed over. Glass is scattered around six feet into the living room from the shattered windows. An end table is tipped over and the lamp that had been on it lies broken on the floor.

There are multiple bullet holes in the walls and even the ceiling of the home. They hear nothing. The dining room and kitchen are not completely visible and therefore not yet cleared. They receive two clicks from Chris again. Like before, they reply in turn.

Jim takes over the point of their formation. He steps beside Chris and touches his shoulder to indicate his move. Chris steps to the left and aims his AR-15 to the hallway to focus on it and assist Jeremy if need to cover the flank, leaving the dining room to his father.

Jeremy moves forward in a crouched walk and now covers the kitchen and the garage door to the right and the path they took inside. Jim pies off the entrance to the dining room and the kitchen beyond that. The dining room and kitchen cleared, Jim gives a click from his comms and moves back toward Chris and Jeremy in the living room.

Stacking up behind Chris, he signals to Jeremy, pointing at his eyes and then the closed door leading to the garage. Jeremy nods, shifts near the wall near the hallway and takes a knee to watch the front and garage doors.

Jim gives Chris’ shoulder a squeeze, his signal to move forward. Jim and Chris move in a crouched position down the hallway, Chris ahead and to the left. The first room they come to is a bathroom on the right. The door is open about twelve inches. The opening gives a view of the sink and all but a small portion of the left side of the mirror.

Chris stops before reaching the bathroom doorway and continues to aim his rifle down the hallway. Jim quietly approaches the bathroom door and gently pushes on it to open it further. The door moves about eight inches inward and stops. A wet and guttural growl comes immediately after.

Jim can now see the bathtub and watches a figure rise, turn toward him and emit another growl. The door is pulled inward and an infected male, with its left ear and the left side of its scalp missing, reaches for him, its teeth bared in a snarl and lips and chin drooling thick saliva. Jim fires three rounds into the infected’s upper sternum and it falls backward into the path of the female infected exiting the bathtub.

The first causes the second to stumble on top of the other. Before the female can rise from its hands and knees, Jim puts two 5.56 mm into its forehead. “Contact. Two infected down. Maintain security,” Jim rapidly transmits into the comms.

He begins to turn from the bathroom when Chris opens fire, aiming down the hallway. Jim brings his AR-15 up and adds his rounds to the five infected tripping and fumbling over each other trying get to them.

After the muffled reports of the suppressed AR-15’s go quiet, Chris says, “Contact. Multiple infected. They’re down.” Jim and Chris continue down the hallway. Jim calls out, “All clear,” and shortly after they meet with Jeremy where the hallway joins the living room.

“The infected. . . Who?” Arzu asks over the comms from the MRAP. “Unknowns,” Jim replies and adds, “Going to check the garage, standby.” They move to the kitchen, where the door leading to the garage is located: Jim in the lead, Jeremy second, and Chris now bringing up the rear.

The garage door is flanked on the left by the refrigerator. The door opens into the garage and its hinges are on the right. Stacked against the wall to the right, their best position, Jim tries the doorknob and finds it locked.

“Shit,” Jim whispers. He turns slightly to Chris and Jeremy and says, “If anyone is here, they know we’re here already.” After a pause, he raises his voice and says, “Is anyone in the garage?”

A few seconds tick by and then Jim and Chris and Jeremy hear muffled voices from above them. “Attic,” Jim says. They wait and listen. Soon they hear the creaking of the attic ladder being lowered into the garage. “Don’t shoot,” comes from the other side of the door. They recognize the voice: Kathy, Jim’s sister.

The door clicks twice as the doorknob and deadbolt locks are unlocked. Kathy pokes her head into the kitchen, to her left, and sees her older brother and nephews. They embrace each other. “John’s hurt bad,” she says as she releases from the hugs. “We’re up in the attic,” she explains further.

Jim is told that John was shot three times while defending the family from a group that had been scavenging in the neighborhood. Like their attackers, they too had been searching for food and water in homes that were abandoned or the occupants killed or infected. The men that shot John felt they should have everything.

Chris runs out to the MRAP and retrieves the combat litter and medic bag, and gives a situation report to Arzu and Chelsea. Kayra and Berk sense the emotions of elation, apprehension and fear.

Jim climbs up after Kathy into the attic. Jeremy stands by, awaiting Chris and maintaining security. Jim’s happiness is dampened when he sees the rest of his family. Like Kathy, they’re thin and drawn. His surprise to see his ex-wife Linda, Chris and Jeremy’s mother, in the attic along with his family will have to wait to be explained.

He gives his mother, Judith, a quick hug and kiss as he’s already assessing his brother. John is much paler than the rest of the family that’s been taking refuge in the attic.

John is lying supine. He has dressed wounds to his lower left and upper right chest and shoulder. His left leg is bandaged as well. All the dressings are pieces of bed sheets. His breathing is shallow and rapid. His carotid pulse is rapid and weak. His body is cold clammy. With some weak moaning from John, they lower him into the garage and onto the litter.

Jim begins digging into the med-kit and comes out with a stethoscope. He listens to John's chest quickly, then snatches off the stethoscope and grabs a 14-gauge intravenous catheter. Tearing open John’s shirt, he locates the left mid-clavicular line and then palpates his second intercostal space. Jim swabs the area with iodine, and then inserts the needle just above the third rib. Escaping air from the hollow needle is audible. Removing the stainless steel needle and leaving the Teflon catheter, Jim then tapes it in place.

After checking breath sounds again, Jim begins looking for a vein for an IV. Although no one sees the need, he apologizes to everyone for being curt and then says, “Chris and Jeremy, hug your mom. Then cover everyone while they get only a couple changes of clothes, and then escort them outside to the MRAP.”

Jim has a 14-gauge IV catheter in John’s left upper forearm with Ringers Lactate solution running when Chris and Jeremy return and assist carrying him to the MRAP.

Chapter 34

Present

Once in the MRAP, greetings are hurriedly given to all and introductions of Chelsea made. Jim carries on with his examination and treatment of his younger brother. Carefully he cuts away some clothing in the way, exposing his injuries to better assess them. “I see he got shot, but why?” Jim asks no one in particular.

Jim’s mother Judith explains. “John went to try and find some more water after we ran out. We’d seen the people coming into the neighborhood and scavenging for supplies. We noticed they started breaking into neighboring homes that were still occupied by the owners. Those people didn’t care. They killed the ones that tried to fight them.” Judith stops and wipes away tears.

“It’s OK, Mom. We can talk about it later.” As Jim exposes the injuries, what happened becomes apparent. John has exit bullet wounds to his lower left chest and another to the upper right chest. A third exit wound to the front of his left mid-thigh. All three of his wounds were obviously inflicted from behind.

Jim checks breath sounds again and finds further improvement. He has Jeremy attach a non-rebreather mask to one of their two oxygen tanks, instructing him to set the flow at 10 liters per minute and place it on John.

Jim confirms his guess of the age of the injuries from his sister Kathy. “They shot him two days ago,” she replies to his query. After about an hour of constant monitoring of John’s vital signs, Jim cleans his brother’s blood from his hands and drinks some water.

Jim had listened while he, Chris, Jeremy, and Arzu tended to his brother. He heard his mother and sister as they recalled their ordeal since he’d last spoken to them. It registered. He could repeat it back to them. But he kept thinking of the people that shot his brother in the back.

Jim has brief thoughts of exacting revenge. He can’t without putting his family in danger. Their group has now grown to eleven. He pushes that to the back of his mind. He’s not able to push it completely out, though.

They spend some more time rearranging the rear of the MRAP. Talk then turns to where to go next. Jim wants to stay near Gainesville for now; its university has many medical facilities throughout the city. They all agree the possible need for more supplies for treating John will keep them nearby.

Arzu suggests a golf course again, since the last one they stopped at provided good visibility for considerable distance. Linda reminds them of Ironwood Golf Course nearby. The course is located on the northeast side of Gainesville off of SR 24. It should take them an hour or less to get there.

Jim can feel the eyes of the infected on them as they lurk in the shadows of the homes. They depart the neighborhood, Arzu behind the wheel and Jim in the passenger seat. Their mood is good but fragile, with the joy of being together mixed with concern for John.

The family and friends reach the golf course without issue and after the normal security check surveying the area with binoculars; they open up the MRAP and begin preparations for lunch.

Judith and Kathy explain how Thomas, Kathy’s husband, had become infected. They had been seeing the news reports on TV and knew about the spread of the infection. Thomas and John had ventured out for supplies as they’d been forced to do recently. On this occasion, Thomas was bitten severely on his left arm and shoulder.

Thomas and John returned to Judith’s home, and staying out in the front yard, Thomas said his goodbyes to the family. He then asked John for the .410 over-under shotgun, which John gave. Knowing they only had two rounds for the shotgun and it wouldn’t be greatly missed, Thomas only required one round. He left after tearfully asking for prayers to be said for him. They heard a distant report of a single shot about twenty minutes after Thomas left. They never saw him again.

Linda explains that she had come to Florida to visit her grandfather, who had lived nearby in Old Town and had been hospitalized in Gainesville. Just prior to the outbreak he’d suffered a stroke. The outbreak of the infection prevented her from getting to the hospital. The crowd was a mixture of panicked people seeking medical aid, and infected rending flesh from those in the crowd. She sped to Judith’s home and was taken in.