Death.
That’s what everything comes down to doesn’t it? I know I’m not the type to dwell on it. I’m always the one who focuses upon the task at hand. I’m the one who focuses on what is to come, the one who fights to make sure we’re all prepared for everything. Basically, that’s who I was. That’s who I am. The military tends to breed that sort of thinking, make it become second nature in you.
So that’s who I am.
Here’s the problem with that: Nothing prepares you for death. Nothing. I don’t care how many lives you’ve taken in the line of duty, as I have. You could be a doctor or a nurse. I don’t care if you’re a mass murderer. No matter how many times you’ve seen death staring you in the face, nothing can prepare for that in the slightest way. And I don’t mean your own death; I mean the death of others. Whether it’s family, or friends, comrades, coworkers, whatever. Nothing can prepare you for that.
So when death fell upon everyone around me like a rancid waterfall, I wasn’t prepared.
None of us were.
None of us could be.
Saturday, April 14, 2012
4:15 p.m.
There were few of them left, and only a day had gone by. Kevin sighed as he ignored the rumbling of his stomach, looking up into the clear, blue sky. Everything was so quiet amongst those who remained. It unnerved him in ways he couldn’t really explain. There was a lot he couldn’t explain, and no one asked for answers anymore. He was the highest-ranking solider left still breathing, and he had no clue how to handle that idea.
So many had died, and so few remained. It was something he kept thinking, but never spoke. Sam had died hours before, one of the latest to go. None of them dared pull off the gas masks, though the problem of eating and such had occurred.
In the end, you couldn’t put off death. It would come in some form. It was going to be to this plague or starvation. They had a drinking system attached, but even that couldn’t last forever. Neither sounded all that pleasant. His thoughts went to Sam, and for a moment, he considered his now dead friend lucky. He didn’t have to wait, to wonder; his end had already come. He didn’t have to choose between a lack of food and an airborne disease being the cause of his demise. It had been chosen for him.
Freedom was overrated at times.
Kevin wanted to call Brian, to see if he was okay. Yet he decided not to; there was too much to do, too much to deal with when it came to both himself and his cousin. Brian had his family to care for; Kevin had to somehow keep order within the dwindling ranks of his base. He just wished he actually had a stronger faith, like his cousin. He wished he wasn’t questioning God right then, wondering why He would will this upon them. Kevin wished he didn’t doubt God’s existence right then.
He’d tried his mother throughout the day when he could, and other members of the family all down in Kentucky. No answers. No one had returned the calls, and Kevin knew the worst had probably hit them, too. He wanted to be hopeful; he wanted to be a dreamer and see the best outcome he could. He couldn’t. Kevin Richardson was a realist, a planner, a man who could face challenges head-on, and he had been ever since his father had died so many years before. It was what had landed him in his current position. It was what kept the tears from falling, even then, knowing his mother was likely dead. Knowing that half the country or more had joined her, seeing how it had ravaged his base, the entire east coast.
“Sir?”
He turned to see a young private, who went by the name of Justin Flakeland; he was around twenty-two years old and fairly new to the base. He heard the fear within the younger man’s voice, saw it within the soldier’s sharp, blue eyes, almost hidden behind the gas mask. “We… we put the bodies in piles, like you… like you ordered, Colonel.”
It had been up to him to decide how to dispose of the bodies. He’d wanted to show more respect to all who had fallen to what obviously and plainly had to be bioterrorism now. There were too many coincidences: the mysterious planes, the plague’s city of origin, the rapidness with which it consumed lives. Somehow, the enemy had released a super-virus to destroy their biggest threat within the war.
For a moment, he envied those overseas and cursed the injury that had kept him there in the States. But only for a moment.
He had wanted to honor all the dead victims, so undeserving of their fate. But there were too many, and time was short. Kevin had to think of those who remained: the handful of men, who had managed to survive so far, thanks to the lockdown of the base and vigilance of the gas masks they all wore. To think of them, he knew that keeping the bodies till they could manage a proper burial was a biohazard he couldn’t risk. Aside from the corpses still holding the virus, there were bacteria, bugs, the smell, and so many other complications to kill off the remaining residents of the MacDill Air Force Base. So, as early in the morning as 7:00 am, he had sent out the order of what to do with the earthly remains left behind.
There were so many bodies, so many to clean out. They could just leave; they could just leave everything to rot behind. Yet duty held him here; loyalty and pride forced him to stay and do what he had to do. It was what made him who he was, and he knew his father would be proud of him if he knew.
“Did you follow the procedure I laid out?” was all he said, though, amidst all these wandering thoughts he had.
Justin nodded, paling a bit at the thought. “Ready to go at your orders.”
Kevin followed him over to the first pile. It was a sickening image to behold. Bodies piled high, tossed carelessly atop one another. It had variety in race, women, children, faithful soldiers who served to the end, all similar in their glazed stares and the violet lesions that marked them. Now they were like rag dolls, tossed aside as if they were nothing more than forgotten toys, pushed along for something better. The smell that hit him was intense, even through the masks, but it wasn’t of rotting bodies, not yet.
Within Kevin’s hand was a small pack of matches, and the other five men who still lived surrounded the pile on all sides. A simple movement caught the match ablaze, and it was tossed into the pile. The gasoline-drenched corpses instantly came to life with the consuming fire. The heat was intense, and there they stood, around the first of several piles, all ready with fire extinguishers of every kind they had, ready to control the flames.
It was almost beautiful, in a haunting way.
And that thought was the thought that finally broke him. That was the thought that caused a single tear, unseen by all but himself, to slowly roll its way along Kevin’s cheek, untouched and unnoticed by others, beneath his gas mask. It shouldn’t be this way. Death wasn’t supposed to be so consuming. This was an age where they prevented mass deaths from diseases like this.
The flames jumped and licked and bayed at their control so far. Part of him wanted it to get beyond them, to just take over the base. He’d have the excuse he wanted so desperately to leave. To search out Brian, the only remaining member of his family who may still be alive. Certainly, he was the last to talk to him sounding healthy. But even those chances were slim, because Brian had likely caught it from his wife and children, and died soon after.
He nodded to the others and walked away from the bonfire, unable to observe any longer. Walking away, his thoughts were scattered. His mind wanted to focus on everything, settle on nothing, and not think of the fact that death would soon be there to greet the rest of them.
“Mooooom, you’re, like, pulling my arm off!” he heard someone cry, someone young, probably a teenager, given the whine. Kevin raised a thick brow in question. What the hell? Maybe he was hearing things.
“Everyone’s probably dead here too,” he heard the same voice say, soaked with cynical sarcasm. Definitely a teenager. The entire thought forced him to stop dead in his tracks at realizing someone else was alive. Kevin gathered his thoughts and turned to follow the source.
Someone else was alive.
That meant there was hope.
At the nearest entrance to the base, he was met by an older Hispanic woman. She was proud-looking, yet also had the look of someone who had dealt with many trials in her life and expected more to come. Beside her was a young girl, he guessed to be about twelve or thirteen. The two were obviously mother and daughter, and the younger one had fear in her eyes, trying to hide behind typical teenage defiance.
“Oh… thank God; I thought…” The mother shook her head, nodding sadly at the gas mask Kevin still wore. “My name’s Jo. Everyone... everyone’s…”
“Everyone kicked the bucket, so we came here to see if you knew what was going on.”
“Gabby!”
“It’s true!” She rolled her eyes and turned her back to Jo. Still, Kevin saw her wipe away the tears quickly, in hopes of being unseen, and saw the attitude for what it was: nothing more than a mask to protect her mother and help herself deal.
“My name’s Lieutenant Colonel Kevin Richardson. The... man left in charge. If you want, we can go to one of the bunkers; we have a generator, and you can get comfortable. Our base... we...” He motioned to the bonfire of bodies, still burning strong. “It hit us, too... and so maybe, you can tell me what’s going on outside the base.”
Jo smiled with relief. “Alright.”
***
It had been a couple hours, and Gabby, the teenager he had heard, was staring out at the latest makeshift, mass cremating pile. They were in a smaller room, and before them was the set-up for radio broadcasting, used in emergencies. It was a room seldom touched, because with television and satellite technology, who really needed to make an old-fashioned emergency broadcast these days?
After talking to Gabby’s mother, Jo, and giving her some fresh clothing, Kevin had decided they couldn’t be the only ones still alive. It seemed the two had been around the victims, yet managed not to catch it themselves. Kevin was amazed that Jo, given her exposure and job, was even alive. If she was alive, that meant others could be. That sole thought was what saved his sanity that night.
So they were going to reach out to anyone alive left to hear.
That was all they could do.
Kevin prayed it would be enough to save anyone still out within the chaos.
