Outbreak: Boston (20 page)

Eamon stood and hurried out of the auditorium, finding Rodriguez right where Amy said she would be. “Hey, Frannie.” he said as he came through the doors. “How are you?” When he saw the look in the young woman’s eyes he felt like an asshole for not following her out of the auditorium. The scars on her face and the movie… To his surprise the woman slowly got to her feet, wrapped her arms around his torso and buried her face in his chest. She was trembling like a frightened rabbit stuck in a trap.

“Just shut the fuck up you dumb mick and hold me a little while.” she said into his shirt. He put his arms around her and squeezed her tight, unable to think of something else to do. Eamon’s hand moved in small circles on her back, easing a knot he found near the base of her spine.

“Shhh... It’s alright, baby. It’s alright…just relax. It’ll be okay.” Eamon murmured in her ear as he continued rubbing her back. He carried on like that for awhile until the woman stopped trembling. “Are you alright? Ya know we don’t have to go back in to the movie if you don’t want to.”

Rodriguez smiled into his chest and gave him a peck on the cheek. “You’re a nice guy.” she whispered as she looked into his eyes. “Do you want to go back to the movie?”

“I think we might be able to come up with something fun we could do on our own.” the chubby medic whispered suggestively with a dirty little grin as he arched an eyebrow at her. Frannie giggled when he tickled her ribs. “What do ya say, huh?”

He held the door open for her and the two of them slipped off in the direction of the nurse’s office, grinning like school kids sneaking off for a little fun while the chaperones are looking elsewhere at the prom. 

Afterward Eamon lay on his cot in his office, watching Francesca as she got dressed. There were more scars on her arm and shoulder that he had not seen before as they had been covered by her uniform. “Don’t think this means anything, Eamon.” Rodriguez said quietly as she tugged a sand colored tee shirt over her head and tucked it into the waistline of her trousers. “I’m really not trying to have a relationship or anything.” She shook her head and kept her face away from the man.

Eamon rolled onto his back and looked at the ceiling. “Fine.” he muttered as he picked something out of his beard. The man looked at it a second before flicking it away then groaned and flipped onto his side. He opened his mouth to say something then closed it again.

“Don’t sound so disappointed.” Rodriguez said sharply, allowing herself to steal a quick look at the man over her shoulder. “Look, I…just got out of a bad relationship. This was fun and everything, but I’m not ready for anything like that.”

Eamon put a hand on Frannie’s shoulder and pulled her to the bed. He rested his chin on the woman’s shoulder, tickling her cheek with his beard. “No pressure, babe.” the EMT whispered in her ear. “I had fun too.”

A little later Eamon went looking for Lacey. The medic found him stretched out on a cot in one of the male dormitories. “Hey, Adam.” he said as he sat down on one of the cots next to him “We need to talk about Amy.”

“What do you mean?” the Marine grumbled as he sat up a little. He scratched behind his ear and took a drink of water from his camelbak. “What’s up with Frays?”

Eamon shifted his weight a couple of times and looked around the room for a second. “I’ve heard from like three different people that she hasn’t been sleeping. Like at all. Do you know anything about it?”

“She’s been busy.” Lacey said after thinking it over for a few minutes. “She’s the only one who really knows electrical stuff, so she had a lot of work to do. If it doesn’t get done, the food goes bad.” He rolled over onto his back and looked at the ceiling. “What do you mean ‘at all’?”

“I’ve heard Amy hasn’t slept for about a day and a half or so.” Eamon said slowly. He grumbled and scratched at something in his beard. “It’s not healthy, man. People are starting to get a little freaked.”

Adam let out a low groan. “What about me getting any sleep? Does that bug you at all?” he asked angrily. He sat up and swung his legs over the edge of the cot. “Look, let her do what she has to
do to deal, alright? She’ll be okay. Frays is a lot tougher than she looks.”

Eamon wrinkled his brow. “If she hasn’t slept in thirty six hours it’s basically the same as if she’s walking around drunk. Forty eight? She’ll start hallucinating. Do you want me to go on?” The medic shook his head. “She’s walking around with a loaded gun. Drunk. How long do you think it’s going to be before there’s an accident? Never mind that she’s rewiring the fucking building.”

“So, what are we gonna do?” Lacey asked after a few minutes. Eamon told him his plan. Adam decided he did not like it, but eventually agreed to go along with it.

Chapter Five

23 May 2011 2332 hours, Walter Raleigh Senior High School Concorde, Massachusetts

Lacey pulled the bottle of water from his cargo pocket as he bent over the cooler and looked at it like he was holding a hand grenade with the pin missing. He crossed the roof and handed it to Frays. “Thanks.” Amy said as she took the water, unscrewed the cap and took a sip. Lacey smiled weakly and moved off.

Amy waved goodbye to Alex, Adam and the rest of the people as she headed off towards the section of classrooms they had turned into the female dormitories. By her count it had been almost four days since she had slept for more than twenty or thirty minutes at a time. Amy went from room to room, peeking inside to see if she could find an empty bunk. The good thing about there being so few women at their…whatever they were going to eventually call this place…was that she did not have to elbow her way to a bunk. 

Frays set her M4 on the bunk, took off her Kevlar and dropped it on the floor, shrugged out of her LCS then kicked the entire mess under the bed. She stifled a yawn and sat down on the bed then
loosened the laces of her boots. After a quick prayer, Amy slipped her carbine’s sling over her head and lay back, shifting around to try and find a more comfortable position. It took a couple minutes, but she at last started to drop off to sleep.

Amy woke with a sharp intake of breath that might have been a suppressed scream. She looked at her watch and groaned. “Twenty three fifty five hours.” Frays grumbled
blearily as she rubbed her eyes. “Perfect. Wonderful.” She sat up and ran a hand over her hair, knowing that trying to get back to sleep again would be more or less a waste of time. She dug through her pack and brought out the bottle of Ripped Fuel she kept there. Amy frowned as she shook the last couple pills into her hand and washed them down with a sip of lukewarm water from her camelbak. Her teeth felt funny in her mouth and her back ached, probably from having to pee seemingly every five minutes due to the ‘dietary supplements’.

There was somebody asleep in the bunk across the room so Frays quietly
tied her boots up and shrugged her LCS on before picking up her carbine and going to the library. Frays decided to spread her map on an empty table and look it over by the light of her small flashlight. She saw something that made a smile start to spread across her face as she hurried out into the hall.                

Sergeant Barnes looked at the woman in front of him incredulously. “Did I hear you right?” he asked as he dropped down on the bunk and pulled off his boots. “Zoomie, I really hope you’re not just screwing with me.” He was beginning to wonder if she ever slept or if she was some kind of weirdo psycho Zoomie robot thing that escaped from a secret government lab someplace. She had pulled two six hour guard shifts today and helped in the kitchen for awhile after spending an hour riding the exercise bike to recharge the batteries on the refrigerator.

“I’m not, Sergeant.” Amy said with a small grin. She crossed the room to sit on the bunk against the opposite wall and spread her map out on the floor. Frays pointed to a small dot about three and a half inches from their current position. “Fort Devens is the next closest base and if there’s anyone left around here, that’s where they might be. If not, well, it’s got a supply depot and not exactly a tourist destination. Chances are really good that it’s more or less untouched.”

Barnes frowned at the map. “It’s pretty far. Almost twenty one miles.” he said as he traced the most direct route with his index finger. “How are we going to do it?”

“I’ll take my people out along with some volunteers from the civilians.” Amy said quietly. Her eyes flicked to the man’s face before looking back at the map. “You took the last one. I was thinking we take the two Five Tons and maybe a Humvee. It will probably take us a day and a half or so, with the roads being what they are.”

Barnes shook his head. “I don’t like it. The trucks are getting pretty low on gas.”

“We can scrounge along the way.” Amy countered. She rested her forearms on her knees, looking at the man across the room. “Most of the way has some pretty major roads so there will probably be lots of semis and such to get diesel from. Not to mention gas stations and truck stops that will have a good bit of diesel fuel in their bunkers, even if they’re out of regular gas. We might even come back with more gas than we left with.”

The big sergeant was quiet for a long minute. “Is it worth it? You’ll be way too far out for us to come back you up if you get in trouble. Not to mention trying to get across I-495 is going to be a bitch and a half.”

“Okay, forget about the gas.” Frays said, meeting the man’s gaze with an expression of utter seriousness “They’ll have cold weather gear, fresh uniforms, food…more than that there might be cases and cases of ammunition just waiting to be picked up. And winter will be here soon enough. If we get more cold weather gear than we need we can give the rest to the townies that need it.” Amy frowned at the map and added “I wish there was a way around the interstate too. I’m not looking forward to it.”

He immediately grasped the implications of her statement. A bunch of cold, desperate people would be dangerous. A danger that could wreck everything they were trying to build and possibly be prevented with a little forethought and careful planning. He nodded. “Alright. We’ll pack enough food and water for two days for your guys first thing in the morning.” Barnes said as he stretched. A small smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “You don’t miss a trick, do you?”

Amy smiled. “Can’t afford to anymore.” she said as she pulled her head to her shoulder. Frays folded up the map, put it in her cargo pocket then stood up and started to leave but paused at the door. “I’ve got another idea for a raid too.” she added, turning around and leaning on the doorframe. “Do you know Holden? It’s a little town maybe thirty miles from here.”

“You’re from there, right?” Barnes looked at the airman for what seemed like a long time. She looked at her feet and rubbed the back of her neck. “I asked a question.” he said sharply.

“Yeah, Sergeant, I am.” Amy said quietly. She looked hard at the man sitting on the bunk and shoved off the wall. “My mom, dad and little brother might still be there. Private Lacey’s wife and his little kids too.”

He removed his cover and rolled over onto his bunk. “Look, Zoomie.” Barnes said as he studied the pattern in the
fire retardant paneling in the ceiling. “Way I see it, if you want to go look while you’re out, go ahead. I’m not really your boss, you know.”

Amy stopped a couple paces outside Sergeant Barnes’ door. The man’s words rang uncomfortably in her ears for some reason she could not quite put her finger on. A strange feeling wormed around in her head as she sought out Eamon, Lacey and Jean. She had only had half a beer in her entire life so she had never been drunk, but Amy imagined this is what it must feel like: thick and
groggy and kinda dumb. Frays blinked and made a startled noise when she almost ran smack into Adam as he came around the corner of the hall.

“Um…” Adam said and cleared his throat. “Sorry. Um…for everything.”

“Me too, you dumb jarhead.” Frays said with a small grin. She gave the man’s shoulder a light punch. “Look, do you know where Jean and Eamon are? I had something we should all talk about.”

Adam was quiet a minute. “I think Eamon’s with that Rodriguez chick…er…grunt.” he said, turning a little red in the cheeks. He cleared his throat again. “I think Jean was in the nurse’s office.”

Frays snorted at the man’s unease, the corners of her mouth curling up a little. “Well, let’s go find them.”

“Um…Frays, it’s like midnight.” he said, suddenly giving the woman a strange look. “We’ve just been on guard duty for six hours. We did KP for like four before that. No offense but I’m going to bed.” He l
ooked a little harder at Frays, trying to get a better look at her face in the shadowy hallway. “How long has it been since you slept?”