"Campion is in theater now and PACOM is starting to cough up some assets. Major Gant should make contact soon. What happens next will be based entirely on what he has found on that island."
9
Major Gant motioned for Dr. Stacy to follow him away from the morgue drawers and out of the back room of the clinic. The sound of activity grew louder and more distinct as the noise carried in through the open front doors, across the lobby, and down the hall.
Thom heard the rumble of idling engines, including something that sounded big — a diesel engine, perhaps. He heard shouts as well, and although he could not make out specific words, he believed he heard English, albeit a rather choppy version, stilted and coarse.
Then he made out the sound of boots entering the building.
He directed Dr. Stacy into an examination room that included a dental chair probably used less for root canals and cavity fillings and more for teeth whitening and cosmetic dentistry. Regardless, the bulky chair provided something for Stacy to hide behind while Gant left the door half open and stood behind it, his gun at the ready.
The boots approached at a fast walk. Along with the footsteps he heard a variety of other sounds, including jingles, crunches, and the scrape of wood and metal against fabric, which he identified as slung guns.
As usual, his mind painted a picture of the newcomers before his eyes actually saw anything. He guessed them to be well organized, which made him believe they were prepared for whatever had happened here on the island. Certainly the plane that had saved the day was part of their group. They were armed, they brought heavy equipment, and they did not come to the clinic as part of some random search.
They came here for the same reason we did.
All of Gant's suspicions appeared confirmed when he saw who entered the building: a line of people wearing white level-A hazmat suits topped with wide masks that seemed to have a lot in common with NASA space suits.
He watched them from his position behind the half-open examination room door but had to pull back as they came down the hall en route to the back room. He saw no insignia of rank or nationality on their suits but he did see AKM assault rifles dangling from harnesses.
They spoke in English but, as he had suspected, they did not speak it very well.
"Go. Back there. Go see."
"Nothing up front."
"Short time. Hurry."
A tactical light cut in to the examination room as one of the men in the bulky hazmat suits stuck his rifle in. Gant hovered inches away on his side of the door and watched the globe of illumination sweep the walls and then settle on the examination chair. It held for a moment and then withdrew.
Gant heard a burst of static and then a female voice spoke into a radio but unlike her comrades, did so with near-perfect English.
"No bodies in the clinic but there are signs of a struggle. This was ground zero. Possible bio contamination in the back room that is most likely from subject zero."
"Understood," came a reply over her radio that echoed out from the back room. "Search for any files or logs that might have any notes regarding subject zero. Then set accelerants to ensure total cleansing of that building. After that focus on specimen collection. We have reason to believe there is an outside variable at play here, so we will proceed with the worst-case scenario time factors."
Gant heard "outside variable" and wondered if that referred to him.
Another light shone into the room, but this time not from the door. A flashlight beam came in through a small window set in the outside wall. Whoever carried that flashlight — no doubt one of the hazmat-wearing soldiers — continued on without paying any attention to the inside of the building and what his light might have discovered if he had been more thorough.
Gant moved over to and around the dental chair. His sudden appearance caused Stacy to nearly jump out of the tight ball she had curled into.
"We have to move," he whispered. "Out that window," and he pointed.
Two men shuffled past the open door, moving from the back room to the front lobby. If not for the limited vision of their hazmat suits they might have seen Gant and Stacy. Instead, they moved on at a pace that suggested to the major that they were, indeed, on a tight time frame and working a series of carefully planned actions. This was yet another sign these people were not merely reacting to the crisis on Tioga, but had precipitated it.
"Who are they?" she asked. "Maybe they can help. We should talk to them."
"I admire your optimism, but you will have to lose the naivety if you are going to survive this job."
He unlatched the window as quietly as possible and slid it open. Thom helped her out first and then followed outside, onto a stretch of well-maintained lawn between the clinic and the forest.
A halo of light glowed from the front of the building, and the sound of the vehicles grew even louder.
Gant wanted very much to get a good look at what lurked over there, but he felt it important to extricate themselves from the area with the idea of calling for outside help, something he did not want to admit to Dr. Stacy after admonishing her for a similar suggestion not too long ago. Nonetheless, his instincts told him that he was in the middle of something big, and he felt that the best way to understand what was happening was to put distance between them and the people wearing the hazmat suits.
Of course, they are probably wearing those suits for a reason and I took mine off a while ago.
Regardless, he was functioning just fine. At least for the time being. He would worry about contamination later, or if he manifest symptoms of any kind. In the meantime, they moved through the forest in an attempt to disappear into the dark. It soon became apparent that remaining hidden would be a lot more difficult than it had been before the strangers had come.
Gant spotted patrols spreading out in a well-orchestrated search pattern, with the clinic serving as the central point. The searchers did not confine themselves to the marked paths but actually walked among the trees and brush, their flashlights crisscrossing through the dark like laser scalpels.
He worried they might have night vision or infrared gear, a fair assumption given the well-organized nature of the white-clad new arrivals. Yet as he watched a pair of them push between paths he noticed that their flashlights — their attention — seemed focused on the ground, as if searching for something discarded or dropped.
Major Gant stopped alongside a thick-trunked agathis tree and mumbled, "The bodies."
"What?" Stacy whispered in a tone that suggested she was surprised he would say anything aloud, given the four men twenty yards behind and two more thirty yards ahead.
"I think they are trying to find the, well, the islanders. The corpses. The …" he hesitated, took a deep breath that showed his reluctance to actually say the word, and finished, "the zombies."
Gant surveyed the forest and saw a gaping hole in the search line. He tapped her shoulder and led them further away from the clinic.
As they moved, he circled around to the west with the hope of catching a better glimpse of the opposition's equipment. The forest, however, remained too thick to allow a good view. Still, he did spy several big, bright lights mounted on some kind of vehicle, probably a front-end loader or a bulldozer. The squeal of treads all but confirmed his guess.
Unfortunately he dared not approach; four armed, hazmat-suited soldiers formed a skirmish line and proceeded in their direction. Although they appeared intent on sweeping the ground with their flashlights, the men would certainly discover Gant and Stacy if the pair did not retreat.
He moved them away from the approaching threat at a ninety-degree angle, helped Dr. Stacy navigate a short but steep embankment, and crossed a dirt road. Behind them two search teams converged, spun about, and backtracked toward the clinic in a wide arc.