“At this point the same can be said for Israel, although they are not as geographically isolated from the Iranian aggressor as we are. Distance is on our side, it is not on theirs. We will watch both areas of the world very carefully. We will continue to assess the rapidly developing situation, and fill in as much detail as we can to the public as quickly as is practical.
“This will be the start of official information flow to you, my fellow Americans. I will not release information that may compromise any upcoming military operations, but I will order the release of as much information as possible. Additionally, I must stress, we will not give you any information we cannot verify. There will be enough confusion in the coming days, and I want you to know we are the trusted source of accurate information.
“There will be many people coming forward offering up information they claim to be accurate. It may be, but then again, it may not. If it comes from me, or my Press Secretary, you can assume it to be of the best available quality.
“Finally, my personal prayers go out to all those impacted by these attacks. Given the size of the attacks I am sure we will find that everyone hearing my voice has been personally impacted in some fashion. The scale of these attacks is unprecedented in the history of man. Those responsible will be brought to justice.
“Let us be absolutely clear. This was an act of barbarism the likes of which the Earth has never seen. The American spirit will overcome, and be stronger as a result. We will not be brought down by this unprovoked attack. This act of insanity will not be the last thing that happens to our country nor will it be the incident that destroys our spirit. We shall survive, and be better tomorrow than we are today.
“God Bless the United States of America and our friends in Israel,” he turned from the camera as soon as the red light on the camera dimmed.
He asked the room, “How long before we get to Fort Worth?”
AP NEWS FLASH: President Scott Press addressed the nation for the first time since the nuclear attacks. He says there is evidence that the attacks were not as a result of terrorism. They were perpetrated instead by the Nation of Iran. The Iranian consulate was contacted for comment with no response. Israel has been struck with more nuclear devices than the United States. The destruction in both countries is still being assessed, although the video coming from the two attack sites in the U.S. indicate that all life for at least a mile was instantaneously eradicated with the dead and dying extending out much further.
AP ECONOMIC NEWS FLASH: The attacks in the United States have given a potentially lethal blow to some sectors of the economy. One of the most immediately impacted is the shipping, largely because of the enormous shipping hub in the Dallas Fort Worth Metropolitan area. The local area is responsible for moving commerce being delivered to a large portion of the country. As a result, shipping on everything from food to consumer electronics will be much slower, and far more costly. This will cause a downward trend in demand and ultimately push the already high unemployment numbers much higher, giving a very hard blow to a still weak economy. Given the current wave of problems some economists are already saying, in hastily prepared statements, that the government stimulus will be necessary to get the economy moving in the right direction.
Chapter Fifteen
Sandra Cooper had been on duty as the Charge Nurse in the Emergency Room in a Dallas area hospital nearing the end of her shift when all hell broke loose. Patients started pouring in from all points to the west when she was fifteen minutes left in her day and there was no end in sight hours later. She had finally figured out that this hospital was one of the closest to the disaster zone of whatever it was that had happened that was still fully operational. They had lost a few windows on the upper floors, but other than that they were intact, up, and running. They were running fast, they were running hard, and it showed no signs of slowing down anytime soon.
She couldn’t remember how many hours ago her shift was supposed to have ended. One thing she was sure of was that she wasn’t leaving anytime soon. She was also sure that the rest of the medical staff was here for the duration of whatever this was.
It all started shortly after they heard a rumble in the distance. There was an intense flash of light, and some kind of something that happened right afterwards. The staff had no idea what the cause could have been, and really didn’t care all that much, at first.
It was shortly after those strange incidents that she heard the dreaded code system go into effect. Code MASCAL was a given considering how many patients were still flooding. The Code Black rocked her to the core. Never, in all her years as the Charge Nurse had there been a whisper of a code black. When Code Lima Delta was called it was confirmed the hospital had put into action their disaster plans, and were also calling in all off shift personal to help with the insane patient count.
After the bizarre nature of the injuries she wanted to know what had caused the flood of injured people to start coming. She wanted to know if that cause was man-made, or some natural disaster. Knowing what caused all of these people to be hurt at the same time could help in their treatment, and the urgent request for supplies that would be in short supply soon. There were some insane rumors running around from the patients that were able to talk. They ranged from an alien invasion, to a crashed 747 jumbo jet in a neighborhood, and some wild claims of a nuclear bomb. She wasn’t sure if a nuclear bomb or an alien invasion was crazier.
At some primal level she did not care what had caused of all of this. She just wanted to help the sea of people begging for help, and knowledge was power in medical care. All of the rumors of what was going on were secondary to treating the injured people that just kept coming through the door like a human river of pain and suffering.
She had become a nurse to help people. There were more people in need of immediate medical attention, all at the same time, than she normally saw in a month. She just wished she could do more for each of them, but there just wasn’t time. There were so many injuries that they had long since ceased any kind of “first come, first served,” method of operations. There were so many critical patients that everyone else, and even some of the critical patients, either waited, or were given treatment by a nurse performing tasks normally requiring a doctor by typical medical protocol. Those normal protocols stopped mattering shortly after all of this, whatever it was, began.
In fact, they no longer even asked for IDs. They no longer cared about collecting insurance information. All they cared about was treating the injured.
The ER had grown to resemble what she had always imagined a military battlefield first aid station to look like. Only here this one had fluorescent lights, cheap plastic seats as the background for the broken and bleeding bodies laying everywhere there was free space. It was becoming so crowded and confused that in some cases patients were starting to help other patients.
Many of the patients she had seen offered her some kind of hysterical or crazy explanation of what they thought had happened. None of the patients, or the hospital staff really wanted to believe that it was a nuclear explosion, at first.
After seeing the injuries, without even looking at television news, which they couldn’t see because cable TV wasn’t working, the medical staff was slowly coming out of their state of denial, and began accepting what had happened.