"Coreman! check on the boy and lets get them back to roost!" Davis called back as Peyton moved up, the medical kid strapped firmly on his back.
"Lemme get a look at you little man." He said, but as soon as he got within an arm's length Andy took a couple steps backwards, timidly holding his shoulder. Peyton spoke in a comforting tone.
"Come on man, just lemme see it, I'm a doctor."
Andy nervously pulled his jacket back, and moved his shirt to the side, reveiling the huge mark on his shoulder.
"Whoa, what the fuck did you do to yourself kid?" Peyton asked searching through his pack for some gauze and some anti-bacterial.
"The soldiers mistook us for Infected...shot him." Tammy snapped.
"United States soldiers did this? This doesn't look like a bullet wound." Peyton said looking up at the Seargent. "Why would We shoot civilians?"
"The Command Personell had no choice, the fact remains that the virus is one of the most unpredictable virus' we've ever encountered, maybe they wanted to take no chances." Davis replied, Andy nervously nodded his head as Peyton started taping up his shoulder, looping the gauze under his arm.
"Ouch!" He said as Peyton applied some pressure to the wound.
"Haha, sorry kid, your gonna be fine though." It was at this moment that Peyton's eyes met Andy's, it was pretty obvious as the blood from the center of his eye had started to run into the white.
"Whoa, heterochromia." Peyton said, standing back up.
"What?" Price said stepping forward for a better look, but Andy turned his head, letting his hair fall in front of his eyes.
"Heterochromia, its probably a one in a million shot, my uncle had it, and my little cousin does too, it runs in the family." Peyton explained as Tammy and Andy sat down on the side of the chopper cock pit.
"Damn look at that, I've never seen Blood Vessels look like that, you been cuttin' it close kid?" Price chuckled under his beathe as the kid shook his head, sure there had been some close calls, but he wasn't going to let on that he had even been around the infected, regardless of the blood that now covered his clothes. Davis looked over the two teenagers sitting on the chopper, then turned to Flynn.
"Whats the situation with these two?" He asked as Flynn adjusted the ammunition in his gun.
"My Friend said that there was something special about them, he never got the chance to tell me what, said that I needed to bring them here, so here I am." Flynn, thinking of the last time he saw his friend Doyle, he thought that maybe if he had just picked them up when he had the chance, Doyle might still be alive. Regrets...
"Well either way, we gotta get them cleaned up, any idea how much of this blood is infected?" Davis walked towards the two, the kids looked up at him as he rubbed the blood on the sides of Andy's jacket.
"hey!" Andy said, pulling away. Then with much regret in his voice "...This blood came from one of them."
"Alright guys, lets get these three to the base and get em cleaned up, use maximum caution." Davis ordered, the guys geared up as Price waved his hand in the air for the three to follow them.
The three standing near the chopper had come a long ways, unbeknownst to the soldiers now escorting them towards the base. Flynn was walking just behind the group, looking back at the chopper, realizing that he has left his picture just above the pilots seat. A picture that has kept him a little more than sane for the last couple of months, his family back home, smiling in one of his better memories. He could really use it right now, but he knows that the soldiers probably wouldn't let him go back now. The feilds were a welcome site for the kids walking between the soldiers patrol, Tammy looked out across them, her eyes lost in a deep stare, probably picturing those times in Italy, the last trip they took with their parents before they were shipped off. For Andy there was something different though, and although his face was steady, there was a million thoughts slamming their way through his head. He looked up at his sister, holding his hand, yet seemingly a thousand miles away. The blood on his face had dried, and there was a sticky feeling in between his fingers. The throbbing in his shoulder had gone down a little since Peyton had worked on it.
"What you Thinking Man?" Price whispered to Peyton as they worked their way across the feild.
"I Don't know, that was definately not a gunshot wound though." He said shaking his head.
"Well then why dont you fucking say something?" Peyton put his finger in front of his mouth, Price didn't need to talk so loud. Ahead of them, Tammy had heard that last part of the conversation, she turned to the two, letting them know she heard them.
"Chill out Rook, we handle refugees all the time." Bronze muttered.
It was obvious to Tammy that Peyton had noticed something, the obviousness of the bite-mark on the side of Andy's shoulder was striking. Why Peyton hadn't said anything was still in question however, why hadn't he said anything? He noticed the blood in his eye, so what was stopping him from asking the obvious question? So little was known about the virus as a whole to really speculate on anything from the outside. Peyton didn't have any idea what to expect, he had never experienced the virus for himself. Tammy knew though, she knew what was wrong with her brother.
"Eagle Four Two, Roost requests a Sit-Rep Over." the voice on the radio was that of the Leutenant, they had been out for a while, and hadn't checked back with them since earlier.
"Eagle Four Two Situation Normal, we're coming back with two refugees and one of our pilots, yeah, it looks like they ran out of gas and had to ditch, we'll be back in twenty." Davis replied.
"Roger that, Roost out."
The walk back to the base was a long and awkward one, the chit-chat from earlier had mostly calmed down now, letting the overly depressing state of boredom creep on. The kids looked around in all directions, taking in the area, the town on the edge of the seemingly endless feild. The clouds had begun to move in on the horizon and had just begun to cover the sun, casting an outline of them in the sky,as well as the ground at their feet. Price shook his head as he looked at the boy, covered in blood and walking with his head facing the ground. Tammy looked at him in the corner of her vision, she felt the tension building in Price's head. She could see it in his face. But there was so much more on her mind now than Price could ever have possibly begun to understand. She had been through killing her father, watching him die in the pool of blood, the only comforting thought was that he wasn't himself, and that monster that she shot down in the train station was not her father. Don Harris had died long before that moment. A tear had begun to well up in her eye, but she had to be strong, for Andy, for herself. She looked down at her clothes, her hands covered with an off brown dust. She felt it on her face, the dry feeling. In the back of her head she knew that all of this was far from over.
Andy on the other hand was in a state of hopeless depression, he stared down at the ground as it passed just underneath his feet, and right then, he felt lower than all of it. Subconciously he knew that his sister had lied through her teeth to him back there. There was a cold feeling running through him now, like the tingle you get when you sleep on your shoulder for too long. He could feel it now, running through his entire body. He had felt it since he collapsed in the subway station. The feeling was too much for him all at once, it felt like he couldn't move, couldn't speak, couldn't even scream. All he knew was that he wasn't going to be responsible for his sisters death, and that was the last thing he remembered thinking before everything went black for those few seconds. Seeing her face, his Mother's, His Father's. He checked his pockets for the picture of his mother he had taken from his old house back in London, but was let down, it was nowhere to be found. He nodded his head, could anything go the way he wanted to?
Flynn on the other hand was lost in his thoughts of Doyle, of all of them on the ground back in Regents Park. Looking up at the chopper as their only way out, and somehow he didn't want to listen. He remembers Doyle's face, the last look that he gave him was a look of resent, that look that told Flynn that he let Doyle down. There wasn't really anything good that could get pulled out of a situation like the one they had been through. So much destruction, he thought then of the site of the firebombs over London. Remember feeling like everything was lost, watched the destruction man could reap upon himself. All because of something that was cooked up in a lab somewhere. As Flynn looked into the clouds rolling up on the horizon he knew that there was a lot more than just a storm coming, he knew that the road that lied ahead of him was probably still filled with alot of trouble. He had done the unthinkable, flown survivors out of District 1, jumped over the channel. Broken the rules, he knew that no one was supposed to have survived District 1, so what was going to happen when the soldiers now walking with them found that out? He looked around at all of them, Price looked right back at him, nodding his head forward.
"Hey Pilot." Price muttered.
"Flynn." He replied with a snap.
"Whats your stick man?"
"180th SOAR."
"So what was it like?" Price began to step closer to Flynn who only shook his head at the question.
"To tell you the truth kid, I couldn't even speculate, I wasn't on the ground, but from what I saw, it must have been hell." Flynn looks at the two kids walking just behind him. Price looks back at them as well, Tammy giving him an evil eye. He shakes it off and looks back to Flynn.
"You think anybody else made it out?" Davis cut price off.
"Private, stow it, lets just get these guys back to base."
Jason shook his head, there was alot that he wanted to know about the entire situation. And the thoughts now jumping around in his head bothered him all the while they walked. The base was on alert now, the atmosphere had completely changed since the patrol had gone out for their patrol, whether or not it had anything to do with them wasn't clear, but as the better part of the town got into view Price could see alot of movement. Men in bio-chemical suits rushing towards them, followed closely by multiple squads of soldiers at either side. It was standard procedure, they had to be sterilyzed before they could be processed. Andy grabbed his sisters hand, who also was feeling a little uneasy as the group of heavily suited men ran towards them. In his chest Andy's heart was pounding a mile a minute, and his breath had started to pick up. He gripped Tammy's hand a little tighter as the men disarmed Flynn and put his arms behind his back, escorting him towards a tent that was just getting blown up in the center of town. The Bio-chemical suits made the men inside seem more like robots to the kids as they moved them the same as Flynn. As the three were being Escorted off towards the tent Leutenant Forrest was there to meet them, He pulled Davis and his team aside.
"You found em huh?" He said over the sounds of the men now shouting in the background.
"Yeah, they came in from over the channel, dropped their chop three clicks to the north." Davis went over the situation.
"Well that chopper was reported MIA, they figured it had gone down, they said that the pilot couldn't be raised, I guess we'll find out what the problem was." Forrest said watching the three get taken into the tent.
"Sir, the kid is hurt pretty badly, and he might have some brain trauma, judging by the broken blood vessels in his eye." Peyton stepped up, having been the only one really able to assess Andy's condition at the time.
"Right we'll get medical to do a full exam, but if one of them were infected, we would know it." The luetenant was optimistic. Nodding his head as the inner part of the Tent had started to move as the shower hoses were turned on.
As Price's head hit the upside of his cot for the first time since being here he stretched his arms out to the side. Peyton's rack was just across from his, the man found himself sitting up, rubbing a towel through the little bit of hair the army had left him with, trying to go over everything that he had just seen. He didn't know for sure, but there was a creeping throught in the back of his head that was just now starting to really eat at him. He didn't know if he could be straight with it though, the thought was just too unrealistic to seem right. He thought of all the things he had ever heard about the virus, the way it mutates and the way it communicates from person to person. As Price sat up on the bed Peyton nodded his head.
"Hey man, I think that kid had a bite mark on his arm." He said, his voice giving away a subtle uncertainty. Price raised his eyebrow.
"A Bite mark? Like what somebody just took a chunk out of his shoulder?" Price said with a chuckle.
"No asshole, like one of those fucking things bit him." Peyton's tone became serious, more serious than he had been all day. Price didn't know the man that well, but it felt a little out of his charactor. Suddenly Price levelled with him.
"So what are you thinking? That he's one of them?" Price was going over it in his head, there wasn't a way that he could be sure.
"I dont know, he definately not acting the part though, its like theres just something about him. You now I looked into that kids eyes and I really saw the blood vessels in his eye changing. As if the blood was free flowing." The picture in his head was a clear one, he saw fresh blood, it shook him, like the soft rumble that plays in the back of your head.
"Well I guess we'll find out in a couple of hours, they're gonna run tests and shit aren't they?" Price wasn't too clear on what was supposed to happen when a survivor was found, especially survivors in such condition. The blood on the kids clothes was still wet, the blood from Andy's wound was still on Peyton's gloves. He could see the stain that it made on the finger tips as he took the gloves off and put them on the side of the bed. He took a drink of the water in his canteen and drew in a deep breath.
"What else do you think could have bitten him?" Price jumped right to the obvious question.
"I dont know, but I think we need to be on our toes a little bit, goddamn rook, you picked a hell of a fucking day to show up." Peyton said running his hands over his face and falling back against the rack. He looked up at the ceiling for a moment, trying to play over the next set of events in his head. He thought of all the stories he had heard from his friends who had seen what the virus had done first hand, during the first evacuation of the U.K. Peyton was in basic training, and alot of the guys he had done a tour with in Iraq had been there, he remembered the vivid descriptions of horror violence as if he had been there himself. He heard the stories so many times he might as well have been. And suddenly how much he really didn't understand came into perspective. Rubbing his eyes took the images out of his head. He came back into reality as Davis and Bronze stepped through the door.
"Hey guys, they just got done sterilyzing them, their gonna start running tests in a couple of minutes." Davis said stepping through the door with a tablet in his hand. "I've gotta go get a statement from the pilot before we get in touch with his stick."
"So he ran?" Price asked.
"I don't know, Forrest said that he was MIA, so unless the radio in that chopper is not working, he ran." Davis started heading for the door at the back of the tent. "Look, I'll be back in about twenty so why dont you guys get your weapons ready, we're going to the range."
He dissapeared behind the door, Bronze turned to the others and filled them in on what was going on. Apparently what was said was that there was an all points bulletin on the chopper they had just picked up. Something that Davis wasn't even being clear about, something that wasn't even presented to Leutenant Forrest clearly. They said that all survivors of District One were to be handled with extreme caution, but something about the way that everything was going down told Bronze that those kids and that pilot were not supposed to have gotten out of Englad. The reports were all wrong, the survival rate in London had dropped dramatically, and if there was anyone that could have gotten out of that place they were to be treated as prisoners. The way the military dealt with Prisoners was pretty rotten, Peyton and Bronze had both seen what they had done to POW's in Iraq and Afghanistan, but those were kids out there. Price stepped to the door of the tent and looked out into the town center, the kids were being led across the yard towards the medical facility, dressed in one piece gowns, wrist bands around their hands.
"What you think their gonna do to em?" Price asked, watching as Andy's eyes met his from across the yard. He turned away, back towards Bronze and Peyton.
"I dont know, but whatever happens from here those kids have hell ahead of them." Peyton said looking out the door as Tammy and Andy dissapeared into the medical center. Price shook his head, this wasn't right, something about the entire situation stank like a cover, back home Price would have been the first one to call out the government on an obvious cover up. And something about this smelled like it, like there was alot that wasn't getting told to everyone. There was alot more about the kids in their custody than just a couple more survivors. Price shooks his head, and laid back down on the rack, closing his eyes. They had some training coming, but a little nap couldn't have hurt anything.
Seargent Davis sat down at the interrogation table. Behind him a gigantic one way window was reflecting Flynn back his reflection. Flynn sat there timidly, his leg shaking as Davis flipped through the official report as written by Colonel Stone. The sweat on Flynn's brow was noticable as it ran from the top of his head down the side of his cheek. He was starting to feel the pressure, what he did was wrong, and he knew it, he had no call to take those kids out of London, but he had to honor his friends last wish. He thought that if he could at least do that, then maybe Doyle's death would be justified. Maybe it wouldn't have died for nothing, but the way it was looking, the way Davis was looking at him, this was turning out to be more trouble than he thought.
"So Flynn, this report says that you are MIA, off the grid." Davis said, tapping his fingers against the table.
"No sir, I'm transporting Survivors from England to the Mainland." He was trying to look as serious as possible, but Davis had interrogated hundreds of terrorists in his time in the military. And judging by Flynn's body language, he could tell that he was lying right to his face.
"Flynn, if you level with me this will be alot easier, your already looking at a court-marshal and your cooperation could only help your situation." Davis tried to explain to him that making this harder on him, would really only make it harder on himself. There was a long pause as the two looked at each other, as if Davis was waiting for Flynn to just drop the act and come clean, because he knew what the real deal was, it was right there in the report. And as scary as the thought was, as he read over the rest of the report the words just managed to push their way out of his mouth.
"It says here that they found someone, someone that was...immune...different...a carrier of the virus, a woman." Davis began as Flynn's breathing started to speed up. Davis could tell that what he was saying was hitting some sort of chord with Flynn.
"It said that it was reported to General Stone that the woman had two children, and now we assume that the two were killed in the fire-bombing, but look over here." Davis said pulling up the refugee reports, import/export for the six months. "It says here that only two children were ever transported back into the country after the re-building process began."
"What you think your getting at?" Flynn asked.
"Ohh man, come on, you think I'm stupid?" Davis paused for an answer, but really didnt need one. "Now those kids right there, the military thinks that they could be of some use if they have gotten through uninfected. But as it stands right now, if one of them is carrying that virus, we are ordered to eliminate the threat of infection to the mainland."
Flynn stopped for a moment, looking off to the left of the man sitting in front of him. Thinking that maybe bringing them here was a mistake, he thought of both of their faces, he had only really known them for a short time, hadn't really even had a conversation with them. But through Doyle he knew that they were connected, and thinking that everything that he and Doyle had done might be put in jeopardy because of what was in that report was stupid. He shook his head as Davis smirked and chuckled seemingly in his face.
"Look Flynn, we've got over a couple thousand men on this base, how long do you think it would take a virus like that to wipe us all out?" Davis said, pausing for Flynn to answer, but didnt let him.
"Your playing games with the wrong things, if it was up to me, I would put you away for a long time, your lucky the kids aren't infected, otherwise you would find yourself in the middle of a shitstorm." Davis said, packing up the file and standing up from the desk.
"Wait..." Flynn spoke as Davis started heading for the door, he turned back and waiting for Flynn to get done thinking over whatever he was about to say.
"My friend Died so that those kids could live, And I'm sitting here trying to think up a reason why?" Flynn looked up at Davis as if asking him the question directly. "Why would he do that, unless there was a chance that one of those kids could stop it...all of it." The thought was something that Davis could relate to, the grand scheme of the United States Military in Europe was to stop the infection, and if one of these kids was the key, then they would stop at nothing to make sure that they found a way.
"I guess we'll find out wont we Flynn?" Davis said charasmatically as he turned and headed out the door. There was a pause as the tension inside Flynn rose and rose, until finally he snapped, punching down hard on the metal table, letting the sound ring out loud inside the small room. In front of him there were no doubt at least a dozen officers taking notes of his condition, his reactions to questions and statements. They would raelly have something to write about now wouldn't they? He thought to himself as he sat back down in the chair after pacing back and forth for a moment or two. He knew what the military was prepared to do in the name of science, in the name of the good fight, he knew that they would destroy those kids, run them through so many tests and lock them away in a box for the next thirty years. As long as they could justify it with finding a cure for infection...as long as they could Justify it.
Andy stepped through the halls of the Medical Center, set up out of an old diner, most of the stuff was still in its bags, having never been used for anything other than decoration for the last Four months that the Military had been there. There was a certain sense of rush, like everything had to happen as quickly as possible, the doctors and nurses rushed the two down the halls, almost pushing them as they went along. Andy and Tammy were holding hands, much like they had been for most of the time they had been here. But as they rounded the corner a few of the nurses scooped Andy off his feet.
"Andy!" Tammy screamed as her hand slipped out of his.
"Tam!" Andy's small scream was muffled as the nurses pulled him into a room on the left and slammed the door behind them. Andy could still hear Tammy screaming on the other side of the door, but as the footsteps got sparcer, her Screaming got lower and lower in his ears, they had taken her somewhere. But where? Before he could think of anything they sat him down on a gurney, pulling his arm to an upward facing position and feeling around for the vein in his elbow. Andy was scared, his body was shaking uncontrollably, his eyes danced around the room, frantically taking in the faces of the Nurses now crowding around him, ready for him to make some sort of drastic moves. But he was too frightened, he looked around at all of them, as if begging him with his eyes. And the needle peirced his skin his eyes met those of the Red haired Nurse standing in front of him. She looked at both of his eyes, Green and Brown, a bit of blood swimming through the green one. He took a deep breath as the blood squirted from his arm into the test tube. He knew it was time to find out if he was one of them or not, in the back of his mind he really didn't want to know. Because if he was, that mean Tammy would have lied to him, he closed his eyes and thought of his mother as the Nurses pushed him back against the gurney. He saw himself standing in a feild, the sun beating down on his face, it was warm, so real it was like he was really there. His mothers arms were outstretched, as if reaching for him, her face was warm, that smile that he remembered coming home to everyday. That smile that woke him up for school in the mornings, the smile that he loved, and missed so much, slowly he began stepping towards her, but much to his dismay as he gets within arms reach, her arms retreat, folding back behind her as her head fell backwards, she let out a scream as the white in her eyes quickly filled with a violent shade of red, suddenly his eyes cock open as wide as they can, and he screams.
"Nooooooooooo!" The voice echoes throughout the room, as Andy sits up in the bed the four nurses standing around him force him back down. Everyone in the room begins yelling, Andy kicks his legs all around him, knocking over IV's and kicking over the table at the end of the gurney. As one of the nurses quickly tucks the blood sample into her pocket the others converge on Andy, grabbing his arms and throwing them down against the metal sides of the bed. The others hold his legs down as best they can. Andy fights as hard as his body will let him, but the sheer number of people holding him down at just too much, he lets out a cry.
"Tammy, Help Me!" His voice is cracking, the horror of the situation is unbelievable, and it is now that Andy truly fears for his life. He fights for a few more seconds, as hard as he can, but the nurses hands are strong. They quickly strap Andy's arms, and then before he knows it his legs, they tighten the straps so that Andy cannot move. Frantically he pulls at the straps, screaming in fear as the nurses begin to step away. He looks around at them, mixed with emotions of fear and anger. As he turns, he feels a needle being pushed into his shoulder, he turns to look, the face of the nurse wearing the mask burns its way into his head as the lights go out. And in that second, Andy grabs the nurse...
"Tell Tammy I'm sorry." He whispered as the drugs take him under. The nurse looks at the boy as his eyes roll back into his head and close. She grabs his head and rests it back against the top of the gurney. The other nurses look at each other, all out of breathe after what has just happened. Andy's body is limp, almost lifeless other than his soft breathing. As his chest rises and falls the nurses begin to disperse. And as the door shuts behind them, underneath Andy's eye lids, his eyes begin to move.