CHAPTER 3

NAVAL AIR STATION (NAS)
PENSACOLA, FLORIDA

Colonel Benjamin Platt didn’t recognize this part of the base, though he’d been here once before. Usually he was in and out of these places too quickly to become familiar with any of them.

“It’s gorgeous,” he said, looking out at Pensacola Bay.

His escort, Captain Carl Ganz, seemed caught off guard by the comment, turning around to see just what Platt was pointing out. Their driver slowed as if to assist his captain’s view.

“Oh yes, definitely. Guess we take it for granted,” Captain Ganz said. “Pensacola is one of the prettiest places I’ve been stationed. Just getting back from Kabul, I’m sure this looks especially gorgeous.”

“You’re right about that.”

“How was it?”

“The trip?”

“Afghanistan.”

“The dust never lets up. Still feel like my lungs haven’t cleared.”

“I remember. I was part of a medevac team in 2005,” Captain Ganz told Platt.

“I didn’t realize that.”

“Summer 2005. We lost one of our SEALs. A four-member reconnaissance contingent came under attack. Then a helicopter carrying sixteen soldiers flew in as a reinforcement but was shot down.” Ganz kept his eyes on the water in the bay. “All aboard died. As did the ground crew.”

Platt let out a breath and shook his head. “That’s not a good day.”

“You were there back then, too, weren’t you?”

“Earlier. Actually the first months of the war,” Platt said. “I was part of the team trying to protect our guys from biological or chemical weapons. Ended up cutting and suturing more than anything else.”

“So has it changed?”

“The war?”

“Afghanistan.”

Platt paused and studied Captain Ganz. He was a little older than Platt, maybe forty, with a boyish face, although his hair had already prematurely turned gray. This was the first time the two men had met in person. Past correspondences had been via e-mail and phone calls. Platt was a medical doctor and director of infectious diseases at Fort Detrick’s USAMRIID and charged with preventing, inoculating, and containing some of the deadliest diseases ever known. Ganz, also a physician, ran a medical program for the navy that oversaw the surgical needs of wounded soldiers.

“Sadly, no,” Platt finally answered, deciding he could be honest with Ganz. “Reminded me too much of those early days. Seems like we’re chasing our tails. Only now we’re doing it with our hands tied behind our backs.”

Platt rubbed a thumb and forefinger over his eyes, trying to wipe out the fatigue. He still felt jet-lagged from his flight. He hadn’t been back home even forty-eight hours when he got the call from Captain Ganz.

“Tell me about this mystery virus.” Platt decided he’d just as well cut to the chase.

“We’ve isolated and quarantined every soldier we think may have come in contact with the first cases, the ones that are now breaking. Until we know what it is, I figured it’s better to be safe than sorry.”

“Absolutely. What are the symptoms?”

“That’s just it. There are very few. At least, in the beginning. Initially there’s excruciating pain at the surgical site, which is not unusual with most of these surgeries. We’re talking multiple fractures, deep-tissue wounds with bone exposed.” He paused as several planes took off overhead, drowning out all sound. “We’re starting to move aircraft out of the path of this next hurricane.”

“I thought it’s predicted to hit farther west, maybe New Orleans.”

“Media is always looking at New Orleans,” Ganz shrugged. “Better story I guess. But some of the best in the weather business are telling us it’s coming here. Just hope we’re on the left side of it and not the right. That’s why the admiral’s nervous. That’s why I told him I needed to call you in. I told him, if Platt can’t figure this out, no one can.”

“Not sure I can live up to that.”

“Yes, you can. You will. You have to.”

“Pain at the site,” Platt prodded him to continue, wanting to keep focused before the fatigue derailed him. “What about the med packs left at the site?”

“That’s what we thought with the first cases. We removed the packs and that seemed to alleviate the pain, but only temporarily.”

“Infection?”

“Surgical sites show no swelling. Patients have no fever. Although they report feeling very hot and sometimes sweat profusely. They complain about upset stomachs. Some vomiting. Headaches. And yet all vital signs are good. Blood pressure, heart rate … all normal. Here we are.” Captain Ganz stopped as his driver pulled up to a side entrance of a brick two-story building.

The steel door was reinforced. A security keypad blinked red, its digital message flashed C CLASS I.

Ganz punched in a number then pressed his thumb on the screen. Locks clicked open: one, two, three of them. Inside was a small lobby, but Ganz took Platt down the first hallway to the right. The corridor was narrow and the two men walked shoulder to shoulder.

“The admiral wants me to evacuate these soldiers. Move them inland to the Naval Hospital instead of keeping them here right on the bay. But as you know, moving them presents all kinds of problems.”

Finally they arrived at another door, another security keypad. Ganz went through the same process again, but when the locks clicked this time he pulled the door open just a few inches and stopped, turning back to look Platt in the eyes.

“Within a week, four, five days, the blood pressure plunges. The heart starts racing. It’s like the body is struggling to get oxygen. They slip into a coma. Organs rapidly begin to shut down. There’s been nothing we can do. I’ve lost two so far. Just yesterday. I don’t want the rest of these soldiers to see the same end.”

“I understand. Let’s see what we can do.”

Ganz nodded, opened the door, and walked into a small glass-encased room that overlooked an area as big as a gymnasium, only it was sectioned and partitioned off, each section encased in a plastic tent with sterile walls that sprouted tubes and cords, monitors and computer screens.

Platt sucked in his breath to prevent a gasp. There had to be more than a hundred hospital beds filling the space. More than a hundred beds with more than a hundred soldiers.