AntiBio: A Post Apocalyptic Thriller (10 page)

They all look at the state the transport is in.

“Don’t see that happening,” Ton says and sighs. “With Milo’s condition we’ll have to camp it here until help arrives.”

“Not because of the doctor’s threats?” Hoagie asks.

“I’ve been a soldier for the Clean Nation cities for a long time now,” Ton says. “No bug doc is going to bully me into making a bad choice. We stay because Milo can’t move, not because some bitch told me to.”

Blaze and Hoagie nod and smile.

“What did I miss?” Paulo asks.

“I’ll fill you in as we get Milo inside,” Ton says. “Sergeants Crouch and Menendez? You will bring the cargo around so we can stow it inside
as well.” He moves in close and lowers his voice. “Make the bitch happy and act like she’s the reason we’re staying, not Milo.”

“What about the no bullying?” Hoagie asks.

“Why waste a perfectly good smoke screen?” Ton shrugs. “Let her think what she wants.”

“Yes, sir,” Blaze says.

Ton and Paulo carefully lift Milo and carry him into the transport.

“Worm?” Blaze calls. “Worm? You active?”

No response.

“How damaged do you think he is?” Hoagie asks. “He downloaded himself into the transport. If the machine is dead does that mean Worm is too?”

“No, no, he had to have time to backup into one of the satellites,” Blaze replies. “Once we can reestablish sat com we’ll hear from him.”

Hoagie looks up
into the grey sky. “What the hell went wrong? No sat com, sketchy info, view screens lying to us then dying? A fuck ton of Cooties laying wait, but not where we thought they’d be? You’d think this was planned.”

“You’d think,” Blaze nods. “Come on. Let’s move that cargo and dig in. The Clean Guard has almost two hundred clicks to travel before they get here.”

“Roger that,” Hoagie nods and lets out two sharp whistles then points.

Blaze does the same and their dogs stand watch, two furry sentries with blood matting
down their fur.

18

Dr. DeBeers pulls a small box from a pocket on her belt and begins to spray herself liberally. She closes her eyes and holds her breath as
StatMist coats her body. It seems to hover just short of clinging to her then dissipates rapidly as she releases the held breath.

She places the box back in the pocket and pulls out a different box, this one much smaller. She removes a glove and pricks her finger, watching the surface of the box carefully. After about thirty
seconds, it glows green and the doctor smiles. Her glove back on, and the small box stowed, she turns to the squad that stands just outside the transport, watching her every move.

“I don’t believe I have been infected,” Dr. DeBeers says. “I won’t know for sure until I go through a full battery of tests at Control, but my exposure to the Sicklands so far has not been lethal.”

“Good to know,” Ton says, nodding towards the inside of the transport. “May Sergeant Kim come in and continue tending to our wounded squad member?”

“Of course, Lieutenant,” Dr. DeBeers nods. “I’ll sequester myself with the cargo. As long as I refrain from any direct contact with any of you I should be in the clear.”

“Sergeant Crouch, you can stand guard while Sergeant Menendez and I scout the area,” Ton says. “Eyes sharp, operator.”

“Always, sir,” Blaze responds. Ton locks eyes with him, glances quickly towards Dr. DeBeers and then back. Blaze understands and nods.

“If we aren’t back in thirty minutes then we aren’t coming back,” Ton says. “Lock the transport down as tight as possible and wait until the Clean Guard arrives.”

“Yes, sir,” Blaze replies and watches as the two men walk off, rifles up, their dogs flanking them.

Blaze waits until they are out of sight then leans back against the transport, his body exhausted, but no chance for rest in sight any time soon.

“How’s he doing?” Blaze asks Paulo.

“Pulse is low, but steady so I think the internal bleeding is stopping,” Paulo says. “Or not as bad as I thought.”

“At least Sergeant Kailua won’t die of sepsis,” Dr. DeBeers states. “That is one plus to the bacterial load you operators carry.”

“One way to look at it,” Paulo nods. He stands and stretches then leaves the transport, nodding to a long row of boulders a few yards away. “Need to hit the latrine. You good here?”

“I’m solid,” Blaze says. “Have fun crapping in the Sicklands.”

“Always do,” Paulo says and slaps his thigh, calling Munch to him. The two walk over to the boulders and are quickly lost from sight.

“Is it safe for him to go that far?” Dr. DeBeers asks

“He has his bug hound,” Blaze replies. “He’s as fine there as he is here.”

“Will more come after us?” Dr. DeBeers asks, moving closer to the hatch, but still keeping a safe distance from Blaze. “That seemed like a lot of trouble for them to go to just
to give up.”

“They haven’t given up,” Blaze says, his eyes scanning the area. He’d use his helmet’s sensors, but he wants to conserve power. If something comes at them when the sun goes
down, he wants full vision available. “They never give up.”

“
No, they never do,” Dr. DeBeers laughs.

“Is that funny to you?” Blaze asks, failing at keeping the annoyance from his voice.

“In an ironic way,” Dr. DeBeers says. “The hostile elements in the Sicklands are like bacteria; always adapting, changing, growing to match their environment. I counted no less than fifteen different afflictions on those corpses out there, yet those people still had the strength to coordinate an attack on a GenSOF transport. If it was just them.”

Blaze eyes her, but she just smiles.

“What’s that guy have?” Blaze asks, nodding at a mangled corpse off to his left.

“I can’t see him,” Dr. DeBeers says. “And I’d rather not step outside if I do not have to. Can you describe his appearance?”

“Dead,” Blaze says. “Very dead. But before Hoagie made him that way I’d say he had some type of skin condition.”

“That could be a number of things,” Dr. DeBeers says. “Is the skin mottled?”

“You mean different colors?” Blaze asks.

“Precisely,” Dr. DeBeers responds. “Is it?”

“No,” Blaze says. “More like ulcers and lesions. There’s a lot of pus mixed in with his blood.”

“Would you say the pus and blood come from the same source? From the lesions?”

“No, the blood’s coming from the holes in his head and chest,” Blaze replies.

“Oh,” Dr. DeBeers says. “So just pus from the lesions?”

“That would be my guess.”

“Could be a number of bacteria,” Dr. DeBeers says. “More than likel
y
Staphylococcus aureu
s
. It has probably resulted in furunculosis or botryomycosis. I would lean towards the former since botryomycosis, or pyoderma vegetans, isn’t nearly as common.”

“Whatever it is
it’s nasty,” Blaze says. “Shit’s just bubbling out of him.”

“Bubbling?” Dr. DeBeers asks, her attention piqued. She starts to move closer then backs off. “That could be
Clostridium perfringens
instead. Does his skin look gangrenous?”

“His body looks gangrenous,” Blaze says. “Cooties aren’t the peak of health.”

“Cooties,” Dr. DeBeers says quietly. “I hate that colloquialism.”

“What would you rather we call them?” Blaze asks.

“The enemy,” Dr. DeBeers answers, taking Blaze off guard.

He looks over his shoulder at the woman. Her face is obscured by shadow so he can’t see if she is serious or not.

“Is that surprising?” Dr. DeBeers says. “Did you think a doctor would sound more compassionate?”

Blaze laughs. “I’ve run into my fair share of
bug doctors from Control. I have yet to meet one that I’d consider compassionate.”

“Then why the look of shock at what I said?”

“It sounds more military than medical, is all. I thought you’d go for ‘vector’ or something fancy like that.”

“The term vector is generally used for viruses and other genetic mutations, but I see what you mean,” Dr. DeBeers replies. “You have to understand, Sergeant, that GenSOF isn’t the only ones on the front lines of this war. Every doctor, researcher, tech, and assistant at Control is fully invested in fighting the good fight to take back the Sicklands.”

Blaze turns fully around and stares at the doctor’s silhouette. “Take back the Sicklands? Are you serious? It can’t be done.”

She moves forward and Blaze can see a gleam in her eyes as the light from the hatch hits her face. Glancing over at the cylinders then back at Blaze, the doctor looks like she’s about to say something, but stops when she looks past Blaze.

“All good here?” Paulo asks. “You guys look like you’re having one serious conversation.”

“Just discussing the possible afflictions of the Cooties we took down,” Blaze says. “The doctor seems to think we can eventually take back the Sicklands.”

“Why would we want to?” Paulo asks. “Have you seen the place? Not exactly prime real estate.”

“I don’t know,” Blaze grins. “I could see a nice summer home up on that ridge over there. Think of the view. Nothing but ash and crap for miles and miles.”

“The schools are probably great in his area too,” Paulo says. “Maybe we could put in a dog park close by.”

“You two laugh now,” Dr. DeBeers says. “But one day we will prevail. It is Control’s mission to end the bacterial apocalypse.”

“Can you end an apocalypse?” Blaze asks. “I always thought that once it starts then that’s it. Apocalypse forever.”

“Apocalypse now,” Paulo smiles.

‘Good one,” Blaze chuckles.

“Mind if I come back in, doctor?” Paulo asks. “I’ll stay clear of you, just need to pry open the walls and see if I can’t get us some grub.”

“By all means, Sergeant,” Dr. DeBeers replies and removes herself to the far corner.

Blaze leans down and scratches Gorge’s head between her ears. Her mouth opens and her tongue lolls out as her lips pull back in a smile. He keeps at it for a while, ignoring the banging and cursing coming from inside the transport.

“Finally!” Paulo shouts. “You’d think they’d design these things for better access when you get flipped over and stranded in the Sicklands.”

“What’s for dinner?” Blaze asks.

“Pink, green, blue, and red,” Paulo says. “I was hoping for yellow for dessert, but looks like that was damaged.”

“You will want to load up on pink then green,” Dr. DeBeers says. “It will help maintain your bacterial loads while also addressing the lactic acid build up in your muscles and the eventual adrenaline crash you will experience.”

“Never had one of those,” Paulo says, tossing a pouch of pink to Blaze. “That’s normal people stuff. We’re GenSOF operators. I don’t think our adrenaline stops flowing.”

“It does and you will eventually crash,” Dr. DeBeers says. “But your training allows you to push through it. I have studied many an operator post-mortem and their endocrine systems ar
e quite remarkable.”

Paulo and Blaze share a look.

“Post-mortem?” Blaze asks. “You’ve studied dead operators? I thought we were incinerated ASAP to avoid our bacterial load from migrating to a new host.”

“Not all corpses are disposed of i
mmediately,” Dr. DeBeers says. “There is a lot to learn from operators. Some more than others.” She looks right at Blaze.

Blaze
pulls his eyes from hers and lets them drift to the cylinders. “What’s in those, doc? They have a very specific size and shape. Wouldn’t be too hard to stash a body in there.”

“Very perceptive, Sergeant,” Dr. DeBeers says.
“They are in fact stasis cylinders.”

“Dude, you were right,” Paulo says. “You called it back in the transport bay.”

“Did you?” Dr. DeBeers asks, her voice losing its conversational tone. “How did you call it, Sergeant?”

“Just a lucky guess,” Blaze says, hearing the difference in her tone. It remind
s him of when Gorge goes from her warning growl to her attack growl. “Like I said, the shape fits.”

The doctor is silent for a good long time.

“Is there any other food in there?” she asks finally. “Beyond the shakes? I could use something to eat, but I don’t find the color shakes to be very palatable.”

“Neither do we,” Paulo says. “But nothing we can do about it. Curse of our bacterial load
s; can’t keep solids down.”

“Unfortunate,” Dr. DeBeers says. “The synthetics created these days are almost perfect analogs to the animal proteins and vegetables society used to feast on. How they grow them in those subterranean vats is beyond me. I’ll stick with culturing bacteria and leave the culturing of vat crops to someone else.”

“Sorry, doctor,” Paulo says. “We weren’t expecting an overnight. All we have are the shakes.”

“Fine,” Dr. DeBeers sighs. “I’ll have a blue.”

“Really?” Blaze says. “Blue?”

“It will cause the least distress with my digestive system,” Dr. DeBeers says. “And since the facilities are less than optimal I will have to make my choice based on that factor.”

“I hear that,” Paulo says. “Never fun to get the squirts in the Sicklands.”