Island-638
Restricted Naval Area
Navigation Hazard Area
North Atlantic
22 March, 1987

0830 Hours

"How dangerous is this disease?" one of the snake eaters asked.

"There's two of them, both of them airborne, and both of them very robust. Normally diseases only last about thirty minutes outside the human body, but according to the notes our deceased friend took, both of them last for literal days. Which means, you stay. Suited. Up," I told them, shading the sun from hitting the armored plexi of my armored J-suit. "Plus, we need to heed her warning, which means we're going to have a tougher time than I thought."

"How so?" Another asked.

"We aren't going to be able to use the positive pressure tent until I confirm or deny the presence of aggressive elements," I told them. "That tent is basically a big rubber balloon, and I don't want you outside of your suit when some aggressor rips a big hole in it, because then..."

I clicked the ignitor and let the dry hiss of the flamethrower punctuate and finish my statement.

I could see one of them plainly through his faceshield through a trick of the light, the other's faceshields were mirrored by the rising sun. He gulped and I saw perspiration bead up and run down his face.

"You all knew what this was, you could have backed out on the carrier," I told them, turning around. "Right now, I've spotted two possible buildings we can use."

"What about one of the houses?" One of them asked.

...they have names...

...so do pets...

I shook my head, waving the flamethrower back and forth too. An old signalling trick I'd picked up during Special Weapons Training at Madhouse. "No. Can't ensure there isn't a dead body in the crawlspace that's infectious."

"Then where?" He asked.

"I saw two buildings, one looks like a warehouse down by the docks, but I'm willing to bet that place is either wired up or worse. Not to mention that building is the furthest away from the 'town', and Special Weapon's doctrine states to leave a building like that wired up with explosives and worse to keep any enemy forces from establishing a beach-head," I told them.

"What about rescue? I mean, we need that building, right?" Another asked. God, they all sounded so young, even though they were probably all older than me.

"There isn't any rescue," I told him. Before he could say anything I kept speaking, clicking the igniter. Damn, that was a tough habit to keep from getting. "We aren't a rescue mission."

"But our briefing..." he tried again.

"Was not a Special Weapon's briefing," I said flatly. "Your briefing was courtesy of the US Naval Intelligence and the CDC."

"Shit," one of them muttered. "Goddamn political bullshit."

"Yeah. Don't get me wrong, they gave you the best briefing they could, but politics got in the way," I told them. "Everyone wants to have their fingerprints on solving this, which is why I wasn't included in that briefing until the Admiral gave you your final mission orders."

I chewed on my lip for a moment, staring at the 'town', which was about a half mile away. The island wasn't very big, two miles across, but if you knew your math, you knew, as well as I did, that the island had 12.57 square miles of land.

And who knew how far down.

I knew that they hadn't been briefed on that. They'd been told this was a possible rescue mission, that they were supposed to find any survivors as well as assist me in identifying the disease type.

The CDC and NavInt dwonks had made it seem like I was some kind of lab-rat.

That was the Special Weapons Warfare Specialist, same place that produced the sociopaths that populated Kill Shops in unit scattered through the US Army.

I was a Field Warfare Specialist.

There was a huge difference, and we'd be the first people to admit it. The Warfare guys were the cold blooded sociopaths who devised the war plans, we were the hot blooded psychopaths that carried those plans out and adapted them as necessary to fight on the nuclear battlefield and win.

"We can't take one of the houses, search it?" Another asked.

"No," I said flatly. "You are all experienced operatives," I said gently, "Now, how many of you have taken part in urban combat, house to house fighting?"

Half of them raised their hands.

"Then, a stab wound, one of them grabbing you, a tear in your uniform, didn't matter. Just one split seam, one puncture, and rip in your suit, and you're as a good as dead or even worse," I told them. "Urban combat sucks at the best of times, fighting against infected aggressors makes it into a nightmare."

The lizard was running all the angles again, going over everything, running probabilities based off experiences and data gathering. There were only two possible places that the entry to the underground facility would be located. The elementary school would lead to a sealed complex like the War Fighter Systems, so that one was a wash because I wouldn't unseal that place.

That left the medical clinic or the police station, both of them had suffered severe damage by what looked like heavy fighting. That would mean finding out if the entrance areas were still intact.

"We're got a lot of gear, and need to be very careful," I said, shaking my head. Already I was starting to heat up but I didn't want to kick in my fans so I could save on the battery power. "We've got a long ways to go, and I need to figure something out."

"What about using one of the vehicles?" One of them asked.

...they have names...

...I don't care...

"Well, that means sitting down in the vehicle, which means risking compromising your suit," I told them. "Otherwise, we'll have to take like two hours to move this stuff down to wherever we're going to use as a base site." I sighed, waving my hand at the town. "We'll want to use the bank for our base," I told them, "If nothing else, we'll set up the positive pressure system in the bank vault."

"So should we load up the CUC-V?" one of them asked.

I nodded, "Yeah, go ahead," I told them. I sighed and hefted my flamethrower. "Whoever is in charge of you snake eaters, tag two with urban combat experience on my flanks, will you?"

"Gadfry, Stollans, go with the Sergeant, follow his orders," One of them snapped. I guess I'd have to at least learn that guy's name, but I really really didn't want to.

"Where are we going?" One asked, jogging up next to me. I felt suddenly jealous at the fact he was only wearing about five pounds extra and I was packing over a hundred pounds of crap.

"The bank," I said. "I can't ride in the truck anyway, I'd have to waddle the whole way either way, so I figured I'd set off early."

"How much does all that weight?" The one of my right asked. He was paying attention to the shrubs on the side of the road.

"Over a hundred pounds, when you count my 02 and the flamethrower," I said, "Keep an eye on the ground, I don't want you to step of a fucking mine."

That got both of them to jerk their heads around and stare at the road.

After a few moments I held up the ejector. "Hold up," I told them, staring at the road.

"What the hell?" The one on the left asked.

Northern swallows. Dozens of them. All dead on the road. They didn't look like they'd suffered impact damage, and some of them were still tangled together, feathers pulled out of each other's bodies.

...shit, that one is cross-species too...

"Hang tight," I told them. I put pressure to ignite the pilot flame, then pulled the trigger. The bar of fire was white cored, quickly moving to orange with sooty edges at about the fifteen meter mark. I played it over the road for a long moment, then cut it off.

I'd used less than 2% of my fuel.

The one on the right started to step forward and I lifted the ejector, snapping the igniter to get his attention. "Don't."

"What?" He said, looking at the road.

"The tarmac is melted. The flame from this thing burns hot enough to melt case hardened steel," I told him, "We need to give it a few moments to cool."

I looked up at the sky. There were clouds on the horizon, and I compared the edge of the clouds to what it had been right after we had landed.

The clouds were drawing closer.

"Sergeant?" The one on my right asked.

"What's up?" I asked, looking at the shrubbery. Problem with the J-suits is you couldn't tell the wind speed. They might be able to, their suits were 1/8" mylar design, mine was 3" thick with woven Kevlar, radiation shielding, and asbestos insulation.

"Is our real objective the one we were given?" He asked.

"I don't know. What were you given?"

"We were told this was a rescue mission, to extract any survivors," He told me.

I snorted at that. "If, and that's a big if, there are any survivors, we'll extract them after putting them in isolation. But no, that's a tertiary objective."

"What's the real objective?" He asked.

Normally, these guys probably heard a terse "classified" and that's probably what he was expecting.

"Identify the biological pathogen, which I've already started, sweep the island for any active infected, and depending on the pathogen, either eliminate them or put them in isolation, and ensure the below ground facility is destroyed. If that is not possible, destroy and seal the entrances to the facility," I told him. "This is not a rescue mission. We are not here to save anyone on this island, we are here to ensure that the pathogen does not leave this island. To that end, this mission will end with a Tomahawk strike using HIT warheads."

"Jesus," One of them said. I was staring at the clouds, using a scratch on the outside of my face-shield as a measuring point.

The tarmac lost the shiny look, going pale and waxy looking and I stepped out on it. I left impressions, but no tar stuck to my boots.

"All right, let's go," I told them.

We were mostly silent as we followed the road down the small hill and past houses. I didn't have to tell them to mind their zones, which was nice. Usually they'd be too busy bullshitting, or not taking it seriously.

Maybe it was my rank? Or maybe seeing the birds, the three dead soldiers, or the fact that there was no sound except the sound of the wind in the bushes. It was eerie. We could see the town clearly, but there wasn't any of the sounds you subconsciously expect to hear. No engines. No background chatter. No anything.

There were two stoplights I could see. Both blinking yellow.