Patient Zero

Chapter Thirty-Six

Baltimore, Maryland / Tuesday, June 30; 3:25 P.M.

THE FOUR OF them stared at me. Half an hour ago we were strangers and I was beating the crap out of them; now I was supposed to lead them on an urban infiltration mission against unknown odds and, very likely, plague-carrying walking corpses. How could I open a dialogue with these men with all of that hanging in the air?

Okay, I thought, if you’re going to do this, Buddy boy, then you’d better get it right the first time.

“Attennnn-hun!”

They shot to their feet and snapped to attention with all the speed and precision of career military. I walked up to stand in front of them and gave them all a hard, steady look. “I don’t make threats and I don’t like speeches, so this one will be short. If you’re here then you know what’s going on. Maybe some of you know more about this than I do. Whatever. You four are supposed to be the best of a good lot, all active military. Until this afternoon I was a Baltimore police detective. Church says that I’m a captain, but I haven’t seen any bars on my collar or a paycheck with ‘Captain’ Ledger on it, so it might still sound hypothetical to some of you. But from this point on I’m in charge of Echo Team. Anyone who doesn’t like it, or doesn’t think they can work with me can leave right now without prejudice. Otherwise hold your line. You have one second to decide.”

Nobody moved a muscle.

“That’s settled then. Stand at ease.” I gave them a quick rundown of my military and law enforcement career, and then told them about my martial arts background. I wrapped it up by saying, “I don’t do martial arts for trophies or for fun. I’m a fighter, and I train to win any fight I’m in. I don’t believe in rules and I don’t believe in fair fights. You want a fair fight, join a boxing club. I also don’t believe in dying for my country. I have a kind of General Patton take on that: I think the other guy should die for his. Any of you have problems with that?”

“Hooah,” murmured Sergeant Rock, which was more or less Ranger slang for “fucking-A.”

“We may actually be doing a field op as early as tomorrow. We don’t have time for male bonding and long nights around a campfire telling tales and listening to a harmonica. They brought us on board to be field ops. First-liners and shooters. We’re going to try a quiet infiltration, but if we get a kill order then scared or not we’re going to put hair on the walls. When we lock and load, gentlemen, then those living dead motherfuckers had better start being scared of us because, by God, sooner or later we are going to wipe them out. Not hurt ’em, not slow ’em down we are going to kill them all. End of speech.”

I shifted to stand in front of Sergeant Rock. His dark brown skin was crisscrossed with scars, old and new. “Name and rank.”

“First Sergeant Bradley Sims, U.S. Army Rangers, sir.”

Sir. That would take some getting used to. “Okay, Top, why are you here?”

“To serve my country, sir.” He had that noncom knack of looking straight through an officer without actually making real eye contact.

“Don’t kiss my ass. Why are you here?”

Now he looked at me, right into me, and there were all kinds of fires burning in his dark brown eyes. “Few years ago I stepped back from active duty to take a training post at Camp Merrill. While I was there my son Henry was killed in Iraq on the third day of the war. Six days before his nineteenth birthday.” He paused. “My daughter Monique lost both her legs in Baghdad last Christmas when a mine blew up under her Bradley. I got no more kids to throw at this thing. I need to tear off a piece of this myself.”

“For revenge?”

“I got a nephew in junior year of high school. He wants to join the army. His choice if he enlists or not, but maybe I can do something about the number of threats he might have to face.”

I nodded and stepped to the next man. Scarface. “Name and rank.”

“Second Lieutenant Oliver Brown, Army, sir.”

“Duty?”

“Two tours in Iraq, one in Afghanistan.”

“Action?”

“I was at Debecka Pass.”

That was one of the most significant battles of the second Iraq War. I’d heard a general on CNN call it a “hero maker,” and yet the mainstream news barely mentioned it. “Special Forces?”

He nodded. He did it the right way, just an acknowledgment without puffing up with pride. I liked that. “That where you picked up the scar?”

“No, sir, my daddy gave me that when I was sixteen.” That was the only time he didn’t meet my eyes.

I moved on. Joker. “Read it out,” I said.

“CPO Samuel Tyler. U.S. Navy. Friends call me Skip, sir.”

“Why?”

He blinked. “Nickname from when I was a kid, sir.”

“Let me guess. Your dad was a captain and they called you ‘Little Skipper.’ ”

He flushed bright red. Hole in one.

“SEALS?”

“No, sir. I washed out during Hell Week.”

“Why?”

“They said I was too tall and heavy to be a SEAL.”

“You are.” Then I threw him a bone. “But I don’t think we’re going to be doing much long-distance swimming. I need sonsabitches that can hit hard, hit fast, and hit last. Can you do that?”

“You damn right,” he said, and then added, “Sir.”

I looked at the last guy. Jolly Green Giant. He towered several inches over me and had to go two-sixty, all chest and shoulders, tiny waist. Yet for all the mass he looked quick rather than bulky. Not like Apeman. One side of his face was still red and swollen from where I’d hit him.

“Give it to me.”

“Bunny Rabbit, Force Recon, sir.”

I shot him a look. “You think you’re fucking funny?”

“No, sir. My last name is Rabbit. Everyone calls me Bunny.”

He paused.

“It gets worse, sir. My first name’s Harvey.”

The other guys tried to hold it together, I have to give them that-but they all cracked up.

“Son,” said Top Sims, “did your parents hate you?”

“Yeah, Top, I think they did.”

And then I lost it, too.