Apache Dawn, - [little bear else holmelund minarik txt] 📗

at the clock mounted to a post by the pool. “It’s somebody’s nap time! Yes it is, mister cranky-pants…” She looked at her husband and the smile vanished. “I’ll go put him down. Let me know what’s up.”

“Sure, babe,” said Charlie. He put the phone to his ear. “Kevin? Hey, what’s up, man? Everything—” He stopped mid-sentence. After a moment, he looked at Cooper and Jax. “Okay. Whoa, whoa, hold up man, slow down. One at a time. What are you talking about?” He pulled the phone away from his head and hit the speaker button.

“—what I was telling you last Christmas? At the party?” The voice on the phone was scratchy due to the connection, but the stress was palpable.

Cooper glanced at Jax, who shrugged.

“About the flu bugs those guys in Europe were tinkering around with?”

“Oh…ah, yeah, yeah—you said something about they were trying to test to see how many mutations it would take for the pig flu or something to be…uh…easily spread from human to human. That was right before I spilled the eggnog on you…right?”

Cooper and Jax sipped their beers and tried not to laugh.

“Right,” the voice said, dripping with scorn. “And all that not even a decade after the Blue Flu. Crazy bastards. We knew it was a bad idea. We even got the administration to put some pressure on over there to stop them from publishing results. Again. That limp-wristed response we put out the first time seemed to do the trick, but none of us here actually thought they stopped the research. I think we were right. And now…well, I think something really bad is happening.”

“What are you talking about?” asked Charlie, his face taking on the visage of the veteran operator: a face of stone-cold determination. Charlie the husband, the playful father, was gone. Cooper put his beer down and lowered his sunglasses to look at the phone.

There was some static and a double click on the line, then some noises like Kevin was shuffling papers. “Look, I don’t think I have much time. They’re trying to round up as many H5N1 vaccines as possible. We don’t really have all that much left, so we’re going to recall our guy in Montana. He’s the Source. With what’s happening out west, I gotta believe this consolidation is connected. I’ll send you some info. You still got that Gmail address?” Two more clicks sounded over the line.

“Yeah, it’s still there. But what’s happening out west? What guy—what do you mean, the source?” asked Charlie. He raised an eyebrow to Jax who nodded and walked across the pool deck to the outdoor TV, his flip-flops slapping the wet concrete. Cooper rolled on his side and pulled a tablet out of his bag. While Jax selected one of the 24-hour news channels, Cooper did a quick internet search.

“Look, you can put it all together, just like I did, okay? You’re a smart guy and this line isn’t secure. I know we haven’t been the best of friends and all…”

“Oh, hey, Kevin, about last month, I—”

“Listen, Charlie, would you just forget about that? Jesus, this is serious! Just…just do me a favor, okay? Watch out for my sister.”

Charlie was taken aback. “Of course, man, she’s my wife!”

“I know—I didn’t mean…oh, hang on.” There was some noise in the background and a barely audible murmur, but the tone was unmistakably insistent. “Oh, my God—”

The phone shrieked, a high-pitched squeal, and the line went dead. Charlie looked at the phone in irritation. Signal lost blinked on the display.

“Okay, that was weird,” said Charlie as he shut off the pink, jewel-encrusted cell phone. He placed it on the table as if it were week-old roadkill.

“Hey, check it out, guys…I found something,” called Jax from across the pool in a shaded part of the porch that contained the outdoor entertainment center. Charlie and Cooper walked over to join him and removed their sunglasses. “Look at that!” he said, pointing the remote at the TV.

The screen showed a hospital in downtown Los Angeles and lines of people that snaked through the parking lot. Tents emblazoned with red crosses had been set up throughout the lot, but the crowd spilled across the grass to the circle driveway by the emergency room entrance. The terra-cotta colored, arrow-shaped hospital was surrounded by cars parked haphazardly on the nearby streets, like they had been abandoned. Police cars and fire trucks added flashing lights to the scene as emergency personal scurried here and there.

“…Scene at area hospitals reminds many of the early days of The Pandemic, ten years ago…” scrolled across the bottom of the screen.

“Where is this?” asked Charlie. He tapped the screen. “Are those bodies on the ground?” There were clusters of people gathering around them.

“…All Saints Memorial Hospital reports 327 cases of mystery Influenza-like illness in the last three days, 73 of those in the last 24 hours…”

Cooper frowned. “It’s not just L.A…look,” he said. He turned the tablet around for his brothers-in-arms to see. “That’s an article from the Seattle Times. Flu-like cases three-times above normal for September. I just did a search for spikes in flu cases and found this from Boston: over a hundred in the last 48 hours, seven fatalities.” He scrolled down and said, “Here’s an article that just broke last night, out of Dallas.” He whistled. “Listen to this, guys.” Cooper tapped a video embedded in the article and turned up the tablet’s speakers.

A female voice reported, “The investigation into a mysterious illness in Tarrant County is expanding, as other hospitals and doctors report similar cases. The new case files are being reviewed for similarity to eight people currently at the Baylor Medical Center in Fort Worth, which prompted a Tarrant County Health Department investigation. Four of those eight patients died, and two are still fighting for their lives. A doctor, speaking on condition of anonymity told CBS-11, ‘We don't currently have a diagnosis for what has caused those illnesses, other than influenza.’”

Cooper looked up when the clip ended. “That doesn’t sound too good.”

“Okay, so there’s a handful of people in Texas and a little group in L.A.,” started Charlie.

“Little?” asked Jax. “That didn’t look little to me, man…”

“In a city of how many millions of people? Yeah, I think less than a few thousand is ‘little,’” said Charlie, folding thick arms across his chest in skeptical defiance.

“They’re calling this thing an influenza-like illness,” said Cooper, looking down at the tablet again.

All three men looked back at the TV. Scrolling across the bottom of the screen, “…Influenza-like illness shows unusually high infection rate in areas along the coasts…”

Cooper turned back to the tablet. “Still, Charlie’s probably right, guys. It may not be anything to get all worked up over, since there’s been…looks like 197 ILI cases in Fort Worth this month. It’s just these eight that are different. Looks like they all tested negative for standard strains of seasonal flu, which is weird. I guess. Hell, I don’t know, guys.” Cooper turned the tablet off. “I’m no doctor. The Navy pays me to kill bad guys, not heal people.”

“Hooyah, Master Chief,” said Jax, a fresh beer raised in salute.

“Well, Danielle, you can see by these dramatic images that hospitals in Los Angeles are being swamped with flu or ILI cases. It appears, according to the CDC, that an unusually cool, wet summer has created ideal conditions for the flu,” said the anchorman with slicked-back hair. He looked at his papers and continued, “Los Angeles County officials assure us that the situation will be contained within a day or so, as stockpiles of antibiotics and flu medicine are being shipped in from unaffected areas of the state.”

Charlie rolled his eyes. “Pass me a cold one, Jax.”

“Jim, the question I think our viewers want to hear,” the camera pulled back to focus on an elegantly dressed Hispanic woman casually leaning over the anchor desk, “and I hate to even suggest it but…is this a repeat of The Pandemic? I mean, if you look at those pictures—Dale, can we bring back the view of L.A.? Yeah, there you go—does that ring a bell for anyone out there? I know I remember seeing views like this at the beginning of the H5N1 Pandemic.” She shook her dark tresses in sadness.

File footage of bodies lining the streets during The Pandemic appeared on the screen. TEN YEARS AGO flashed across the bottom of the image.

“The big worry about a situation like this, Danielle,” replied her smooth-voiced co-anchor, “is that according to what State Health officials told us early this morning, this particular ILI could certainly be one of a dozen different viruses, but it might not. It might very well be H5N1 and I quote, ‘That is the big concern.’”

“Well, there are at least a few things our viewers can do, no matter what strain it is, right?” asked the eye-candy. She cocked her head as a list appeared on the screen next to her air-brushed face. “The Centers for Disease Control reminds everyone to stay calm and do their part to prevent any of these mystery illnesses from spreading: wash your hands frequently; cover your cough but don't cough into your hands; stay home if you're sick; and get to the doctor within the first 24 hours of illness. Common symptoms include…”

All three turned when they heard a gasp come from behind them. Aliana stood in the doorway to the house, hands at her mouth, staring at the TV. She started to shake her head and took a step back, eyes tearing up.

“Ooops,” exhaled Cooper.

Charlie rushed to his wife’s side. “Allie, look at me, honey. It’s okay,” he said when she turned her watery eyes on him. He held her shoulders firmly, but gently. “It’s just some people in L.A. getting sick.”

“But, Coop said—” She pointed. “I heard him, he said it was in Texas, too. A-a-and Boston.”

“I know, but…” He looked over his shoulder at the TV.