CHAPTER 18

Kent Island, Maryland

“Bruh.. Do you know how rich we would have been if we would have brought the good stuff from the casino bar instead of stupid canned food? Which had probably expired, might I add.” McCune whined to his team while looking around the crowded Kent Island swap meet. “So dumb!”

SSgt Becket had tuned out the coxswain’s unconstructive criticism while watching a lively crowd around a leathery tan skinned auctioneer who struggled to hold up a massive fish in both arms.

“This gigantic beauty is the largest stripper fish I have ever caught!” The fish vendor said, sitting the heavy fish down and pulling his long thin hair back under a wide brimmed hat. “Do you know what else is gigantic? The news of the former secretary of transportation has accepted the Vice President position from Mrs. DeVod! We have an official working federal government again! Isn’t that great news!” 

The swelling crowd cheered, but Beckett couldn’t tell if they cheered for an established government again or simply to hurry the fisherman on to start the bidding. Beckett wondered where this information was coming from and if it was accurate. Did the fisherman have a source, or was he just spreading juicy tabloid rumors to draw in customers?

The crowd around the fish auction continued to grow, pushing Beckett further down the vendor alley. Some of the market vendor’s pop up canopy tents had been replaced with more permanent building materials, which made Beckett wonder why or when the strip mall would be reopened for daily business. Casually window shopping he noticed a fair number of new items, then he had the previous week’s which meant the vendors had risked venturing off island to scavenge highly requested items. 

Among the vendor booths where homesteading food preparation products like mason jars and canning lids, cast iron cookware, spices, bags of salt. Also was a variety of bathroom supplies, toilet paper, toothpaste, brushes, deodorant, soaps, feminine hygiene product and disposable and cloth diapers. 

Not only were consumer goods and supplies available, but many professional services were offered as well. There was a vendor selling new shoes and boots as well as blow out repairs. One person claimed to be an optician while offering an eye test and premade corrective eyeglasses, the kind that you would find in a convenience store. A schoolteacher was offering daily reading and math classes.

Beckett’s team corpsman was chatting with a young lady sporting waist length dreadlocks. With a quick glance at her table offerings of holistic herbs, essential oils, crystals, jars of honey, bees wax and homemade candles, Beckett could not tell if the lady was Wiccan or a hipster. Although, she had some name brand pain relievers and cold medicines too.

Darkness nudged Beckett in the ribs to get his attention. “Look at this non poker playing ugly ass trying to read.” Darkness said loud enough for Raymond to hear.

Raymond looked up and shook his head. “It’s a graphic-novel Darkness, they have pictures.” He said, tossing the well-used comic book onto a stack. “There are some National Geographics if you want to reminisce about some cheetahs or some shit from your homeland.”

“Screw you mister liaison man. Hey, you still owe me five hundred pushups.” Darkness laughed.

“The hell I do! Darkness, you know I had that hand.” Raymond countered.

Raymond stepped away from the Free Lending Library towards the brothel tent next door and put a hand on the shoulder of a navel Chief Petty Officer who had been chatting up one of the young Asian working girls with excessive details about his workdays, for well over half an hour. “Chief, loose lips sink ships.” he said, politely reminding the man about operational security. 

Raymond joined the Recon team as they continued to browse the market. “Those girls probably know the entire aircraft carrier layout by now.” Raymond said to Beckett while pointing a thumb over his shoulder towards the brothel. 

“I remember getting the weekend liberty brief in Thailand. We were warned that all the good-looking street girls were either honey trapping Chinese spies or cross-dressing boys in drag.” Beckett said with a shiver. 

Raymond offered some small talk as they made their way through the crowded market. “I need to shop for a new winter coat. I was freezing on that last mission, and it’s only getting colder.”

“We can acquire you some cold weather gear from supply.” Beckett offered. 

Raymond nodded an unspoken gratitude. Not just for the gear hook up but comprehending that the team had begun to accept and trust him if they were willing to equip him for future missions. 

“Shall we go check in on your friend?” Beckett suggested, as they departed the swap meet market and walked down the neighborhood road towards Victor’s house.

----------BREAK----------

Erica opened the front door with a smile inviting Raymond and Beckett into their cozy warm living room. “Please, come in and have a seat. The gang is all here.”

Raymond walked over to Victor and handed him a pair of wide framed aviator sunglasses that he had found at the market. “Some friendly advice; the next time she tells you to make a sandwich, you better do it.” Raymond said, inspecting Victor’s purple and yellow swollen eyes.

“Agreed.” General Lyons said as he entered the room, handing Victor a glass of scotch, then sat the bottle on the coffee table while Erica offered their guests short glasses. “Have a seat gentleman. This is Chuck, he’s the one that mounted the daring ground rescue that saved Victor from the clutches of Grays.”

“I don’t know about all that, Sir.” Chuck said looking down sheepishly scratching the back of his head. “Victor here, had thinned out an entire neighborhood’s worth of infected by himself before we got there.”

“He always likes theatrical appearances.” Raymond said nodding towards Victor. 

“It’s good to see you guys. How is Rios?” Victor asked genuinely concerned.

“He’s fine. The creature’s teeth never broke through the MOPP suit. But Rios won’t stop retelling the story which becomes more dramatic each day. It’s becoming quite annoying.” Becket informed him.

“Well, that is relieving to hear that he’s ok and it’s a good thing he didn’t MedEvac on the helicopter with me.” Victor said, thinking about the crash that had killed three air crewmen. “The general was just briefing us on the status of the Island community.”

“Ah yes, more and more survivors are flocking to the island. Marine Sergeant Emond has begun to train and equip civilian volunteers for island guard duty. The farmers feel comfortable returning to the rural southern parts of this island now that its regularly patrolled. We also gave them hand radios and armed them for personal protection. Chuck has been able to fix a few of the older tractors which will be a food production multiplier come springtime.”

“What’s the situation look like for food during the winter?” Victor asked General Lyons.

“Bleak. The more refugees we take in, the faster our supplies are depleting. I know people are hungry, but if we keep issuing out MRE’s there will be a revolt. Chuck, we need your assistance again, to escort some farmers to an unattended cattle ranch to the north. If we can repopulate this island with beef and milking cows that would be a great renewable food supply.”

“Can do, if there is a cold beer and steak involved.” Chuck agreed.

“I’m glad that you are here Staff Sergeant, because I would like your team to reconnoiter a nearby warehouse.” General Lyons said.

Beckett wrinkled his nose at the unattractive mission. “Are you sure you need my team for that sir? Maybe the SEALs could handle that job.” Beckett asked, trying to pawn off the mundane mission.

General Lyons smiled, and completely understood Beckett’s attempt to redirect his request. “This is a mission critical assignment Staff Sergeant. The targeted warehouse is a FEMA distributions center which has pallets of emergency provisions; food, cots, blankets, medical supplies, children and toddler kits, and who knows what else. A lot of it sitting in semi-trailers ready to roll out. Also are thousands of temporary housing units that we don’t need yet but will soon enough.”

Becket breathed heavy. “Where abouts is this warehouse?” 

“Fredrick.” General Lyons said.

“Hey. That’s where USAMIIR laboratory is.” Chuck chimed in. “We have a clear route all the way there now.”

“Exactly.” General Lyons said. “I hope that the warehouse, or at least a majority of it, hasn’t been looted. It could be a real game changer for this community Staff Sergeant. Once we have this region stabilized, we can begin expanding west.” 

Raymond knew exactly what that meant. Expanding west meant pushing back against the Russian and Chinese invaders.

The general was trying hard to sell the importance of the glamorized scavenger mission. “Besides, I have the SEALs on refugee relocation duty. They feel like they are being heroes by saving our personnel’s family members or those few rescue calls we get on the short wave radio. And it keeps them out of the gym and out of my thinning hair. I’m sure they’ll write a book about how they singlehandedly saved humanity, as soon as a printing press is up and running.” 

“Alright, my team will draft up an operation order and brief you right away.” SSGT Beckett said. “Probably for the best anyways. I don’t want my guys sitting around getting lazy.”

“I’ll go with you.” Victor offered. 

Erica glared at him while everyone else in the room bust out laughed as he sat on the couch with a cold compact on his head and splinted arm wrapped in a sling. 

“I don’t think so Victor. You are on light duty for a while.” General Lyons commanded him, saving Erica from the argument. “I do have a job here for you and your family though. But before we get into that, I’d like to get Erica’s opinion on the status of the research facility.”

Erica took a sip of her own scotch then fidgeted with the glass not knowing where or how to begin. “Please don’t take this the wrong way, but USAMIIR is a mess. Most of the necessary lab equipment is inert or inoperable from EMP damage. In the current condition, all we can do is conduct environmental and behavior experiments on the Grays the same way we did in Lake City. I had a fantasy expectation of jumping into revolutionary science that would save the world. But that is just not the case.” 

Collectively the room silently slumped as their hopes for a groundbreaking report, had been deflated. Erica took another sip of her drink.

“Are you saying that we should focus resources elsewhere?” General Lyons asked, also disappointed.

“No, not at all General. That could all change now.” Erica said sitting upright with more energy. “Chuck, the supercomputers that you transferred from the NSA headquarters to USAMIIR, could literally modernize the entire laboratory to pre-Dark Day standards. For example, the first human genome was sequenced in 2003 which took thirteen years and cost a billion dollars. In the state of our lab currently, it would take us twice that long.” Erica paused to let the unacceptable timeframe comparison sink in. “With the NSA supercomputers, we could do the same work in just one or two days.”

Chuck let out a long whistle. “I should probably apologize to the techno nerds. I wasn’t very cordial to them out in the field, if you know what I mean.” he said, reaching for the bottle of scotch. 

“Even with the little equipment we have,” Erica continued, “We are better understanding the pathogen. We now know for sure that it is endosymbiont.”

Victor coughed to get her attention. “Can you dumb this down for us knuckle draggers?” 

“An endosymbiont organism lives within the body or cells of another organism in a mutualistic relationship. In this particular case the brain damaging FFI prion and ophiocordyceps unilateralis aka zombie spore are both encapsulated inside the Leishmania flesh eating parasite.”

“If the parasite is the delivery vehicle…” Chuck began a question. 

Erica cut him off, shaking her head, knowing what he was going to say. “Even before the Dark Day there wasn’t a common preventative for Leishmania. Typically, humans were infected by sand flea bites, but now we’re infected by the Grays themselves. This pathogen is so complex that it is extremely difficult to believe that it’s a natural phenomenon.”

“Man made?” SSgt Beckett asked.

“Only a hypothesis with nothing to back it up scientifically.” Erica said shaking her head. 

“We have sources in Moscow and Beijing that report that they are faring far better than the rest of the world. They could have vaccinated their populations, or simply better equipped to fight the plague since they are on the only continent that didn’t get EMP’d.” The general stated. “That information is classified and does not leave this room, understood?”

Having assets inside hostile countries would be highly sensitive information Victor thought. Most likely, the assets were American or ally intelligence agents who had been assigned to embassy annexes before the Dark Day. BRICS would have closed the embassies immediately and purged any westerners. That meant the General’s assets are operating very clandestinely in an extremely dangerous environment.

“Hmmmm. If we took blood samples from a Russian or Chinese subject thought to have been inoculated. In theory I could analyze the samples for irregular antibodies. But I highly doubt that there could be a vaccine for this hybrid.” Erica concluded. 

“I know where we could find a Russian or Chinese.” Victor injected, “West side of Baltimore!” 

“Are you sure it was an RPG?” General Lyons pressed, already have heard Victor’s debrief regarding the attack on his helicopter. “Not an LAW or an AT-4 rocket launcher acquired by a local gang?”

“That wasn’t my first time being the target of an RPG sir.” Victor said defensively. “Besides, I was close enough to watch the asshole load the tube.”

“Local warlords wouldn’t have access to that kind of foreign weapons. Do we have eyes on the Russian and Chinese embassies in DC? Are they still active?” Raymond asked, anxious to hunt down invaders.

“Has BRICS military forces made it to the east coast?” Victor wondered.

“Our reports indicate that Russian and Chinese forces have paused their advance near the continental divide.” General Lyons said puzzled, scratching the stubble on his chin. 

“But that doesn’t mean Russian special forces are not operating in this area. Our routine helicopter resupply from Kent Island to USAMIIR is the same every week, it would be easy route to target.” Victor added.

“Washington D.C. would be their highest priority target. It would make sense BRICS would be here already. They have probably been hiding here for months, maybe even before the July 4th attack. Whoever it is, since they have decided to announce themselves with an attack, that means their surveillance is complete.” General Lyons concluded.
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“General, your aircraft carrier and this entire community is in jeopardy.” Erica injected.