One by one, the rest of his limbs fell to the steel frame. They felt heavy, almost useless. A CamelBak hose was pressed against his mouth, and he turned away.
“It’s just water, Mr. Fletcher.”
Mr. Fletcher? They must have checked his ID. He drank from the hose for several seconds, letting the excess water dribble down the side of his mouth onto the black-and-white checkered linoleum tile beneath the bed. The hose tasted like chewing tobacco, but he didn’t care. He let the hose drop from his mouth and closed his eyes for a few moments, letting the fluid settle.
“You need to drink more.”
“You got one that doesn’t taste like Skoal?” said Alex. “Just kidding, sergeant. Thank you.”
“This is going to hurt a little,” said the corpsman, sprinkling powder from a green packet onto Alex’s wrist.
He tried to yank his hand away from the intense stinging, but the corpsman held it in place.
“Fuck, Doc. What is that?”
“It’s a combination of Celox and disinfectant. The disinfectant part stings a little,” said the corpsman.
“No shit,” Alex groaned.
“I need to rub this in all of your cuts. I don’t have time to wrap all of them.”
“Sprinkle away, Tinkerbell,” said Alex, bracing for the burn.
“No time for that,” called a sharp voice from the doorway. “Battalion commander would like a word with you.”
“I need to wrap the wrist, sir. Zip ties cut him pretty deep,” said the corpsman, digging through his med kit.
“Tidy up the wrist, and get him down to the TOC (Tactical Operations Center), Corpsman.” He turned to Alex. “Can you walk?”
“I should be fine, Captain. They didn’t hobble me.”
“They should have dropped you dead on the pavement. That little disguise kept you alive long enough to generate some discussion with the platoon commander. You stumbled right into one of our platoon HQs,” said the captain.
“My lucky day. What about the other guy on the street with me?” said Alex.
“Mr. Walker is doing fine. Enjoying a cup of coffee with the battalion commander as we speak,” said the officer. “Get him down to the TOC, ASAP.”
“Got it, sir.”
Dressed in his original clothes, which now featured bloodstained, custom ventilation slits along his right thigh and ribcage, Alex followed Doc and Wintergreen through the cramped dormitory hallway. Deep red chemlights dangled from an overhead wire running the entire length of the floor, bathing everything in a muted, monochromatic crimson aura. They passed an information board titled “Hollis Hall.” Alex had studied enough Boston-area college maps to pinpoint their location. He reached up and plucked the wire, glancing behind him at the dancing lights.
“Having fun back there?” said Wintergreen.
“Sort of. Did the battalion take all of Harvard Yard?”
“Shit if I know. I’m not an alumni.”
“Alumnus,” said Doc. “And no, the battalion just took the buildings in the northwest corner of the Old Yard. It was mostly empty dorms when we got here. Six buildings form a perimeter around a courtyard, chapel in the middle. It’s about as good as it gets in terms of a naturally defensible position in the middle of Cambridge. We’re spread too thin for anything else.”
“Doc’s one of the smart ones,” said Wintergreen.
“Not smart enough to go here,” said Doc, opening a door. “Welcome to Harvard, America’s oldest institution of higher learning. Now home to 1st Battalion, 25th Marine Regiment.”
Alex stepped into the shadowy courtyard. A large tent was set up under the massive bare trees in the center of the courtyard. A flap opened, spilling bright light onto the grass. Two marines dashed toward the gap between Hollis Hall and a building with a small cupola protruding from its rooftop. Harvard Hall. Alex had reoriented himself quickly. Doc’s assessment made sense. The buildings formed a perfect rectangle, with minimum space between separate buildings. Half of the perimeter benefited from the formidable wrought-iron fencing along Cambridge Street. The two marines reached the opening and sprinted past sentries barely visible in the shadows.
“Sergeant, he’s all yours. I gotta get back to the triage center,” said the corpsman, splitting off.
Alex stopped him briefly. “How bad is it out there?” he asked.
“Bad. Every hospital is beyond capacity and barely functional. Anyone in the city exposed to the flash got second-degree burns. Some of the older buildings collapsed. Lots of partial collapses. Anyone who got up to check on the flash got hit by glass or branches. They’re saying it wasn’t a fucking nuke, but nobody’s buying it. This is exactly what they described in NBC training,” said the corpsman.
“Then the EMP,” Wintergreen chimed in.
“Then that. Something doesn’t add up, and nobody’s telling us shit,” said Doc. “Good luck, man.”
“You too,” said Alex.
“Battalion TOC is up here,” said Wintergreen, leading him across the grass.
“Where is everyone?”
“Half of Comms Platoon is manning the perimeter here and providing security at the vehicle gate. Medical section is out that way somewhere,” he said, pointing at Doc’s vanishing profile.
“We have a quick-reaction force made up of some Motor T guys and nonessential battalion staff. Everyone else is out on the streets. I’m headed back to my platoon once you’re delivered.”
“Which platoon are you with?” asked Alex.
“Indirect fire. 81’s.”
“No tubes?”
“Thank God, no. Only individual weapons. Pretty light.”
“Hopefully you won’t need any of it,” said Alex, amidst the brief, distant pounding of a fifty-caliber machine gun.
“I’m not hopeful.” He turned to a marine standing behind the tree near the entrance. Sergeant Evans with Mr. Fletcher,” he announced.
“Go ahead,” he heard, followed by a quick radio transmission notifying another marine inside the TOC.
Wintergreen, aka Sergeant Evans, opened the flap, releasing the sound of radio traffic and hurried voices, followed immediately by the pungent stench of stale coffee and perspiration. He could use some of that shitty coffee. Alex ducked into the tent and squinted in the bright light.
Modular folding tables—jammed with laptops, radio receivers, digital plotting gear and maps—ringed the tent. Men and women in Woodland MARPAT uniforms and full combat gear crowded the tables. Some in chairs, others standing—all of them speaking into headsets. To an outside observer it made about as much sense as the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. To the initiated, it signified the right amount of controlled chaos necessary to run a marine battalion. Nobody turned to acknowledge his entry.
A sturdier table divided the tent in half, holding up two immense, side-by-side flat-screen monitors, one displaying a map of the greater Boston area. The other focused on Cambridge and the areas north of the Charles and west of Interstate 93. Icons flashed on each monitor. A movie screen hung suspended from one of the tent’s center ceiling braces, extending down to the top of the monitors. The words “No Input” flashed in the center of the blue screen. Two marines sat at the middle table with their backs to the entrance. Ed sat hunched over the far end of the table, cradling a metal canteen cup.
“Sergeant Evans reporting,” he said.
A few heads turned, but the noise continued unabated. Ed grinned and started to get up, but stopped when one of the marines seated at the center table stood to face them.
“Thank you for not killing Mr. Fletcher, Sergeant Evans. Dismissed,” said the lieutenant colonel.
“Yes, sir,” said Evans.