Arisen : Genesis by Michael Stephen Fuchs Page A

see any action. More than a couple of times, frightened people, in ones and twos, ran out across the path of the truck. Gunfire still rang in the distance, and a single stray round even pinged off the truck body. Down cross streets they could see more fires, abandoned vehicles – and, several times, what looked like hand-to-hand fighting. Once, they made out what looked like a milling crowd of dazed people. They kept their heads down and got through the drive without incident.
    “Emergency room?” Dugan asked.
    “Negative,” Zack said from behind. "The quarantine tent is there. Take us straight up to the front door.”
    Dugan complied, rolling them down the wide dirt road that passed in front, and then through the open gate in the stone mosaic wall that surrounded it. A couple of large trees shaded the parking lot – Dugan swung wide around them, everyone in the truck eyes peeled. There were maybe a dozen other cars in the parking lot, but no people in evidence. Dugan backed it into a space near the entrance.
    “Recce first?” Dugan asked of Bob, beside him.
    “No. This man has little time. Let’s get him in there.”
    “Hang on,” Zack said. And he passed around a cardboard box of latex gloves, and another of face shields. “Everybody glove up. Hospitals around here aren’t healthy places at the best of times.”
    With prophylaxis in place, Zack and Baxter went back on security duty, keeping their guns holstered, but their hands on the guns. They held open the glass doors as the bigger, stronger SEALs carried the wounded man inside. As they did so, he woke up.
    “What?” the man rasped, his mouth and throat clearly dry as paper. “Where’s Dan?” He rocked on the stretcher, threatening to roll off it.
    “Easy, dude,” Bob said, as they quickly lowered the stretcher to the floor, just inside the front door. “Lay still. You’re being cared for.”
    The man pinned Bob with wild eyes. He was mid-thirties, with short brown side-parted hair, handsome features, and the general cut and demeanor of a military or law enforcement type. He winced and groaned, seeming suddenly aware of his wound. He reached under him for his lower back, arched and spasmed with pain – and passed out again.
    Bob checked his vitals. “Still with us. And probably better off unconscious.”
    “Uh, guys?” This was Baxter, standing inside the reception area, at a wide, high desk. The others looked at him, then looked around. He didn’t have to say anything else.
    There was absolutely no one in sight.
    * * *
    “You want me to scout ahead?” Baxter asked.
    “No,” Dugan said. “We stay together. Come on.”
    “Should be at least one doctor somewhere,” Bob said, hefting his half of the stretcher. “Even in a Somali hospital…”
    The two stretcher-bearing shooters followed the two with handguns past the desk and into the initial wide hallway that led to the interior. Zack punched a big button on the wall, but the double-wide doors ahead of them didn’t open. Instead, he and Baxter forced them.
    Inside, it was dimmer. The lobby had a lot of exterior glass, but now they realized that the power was out, and the only light was leaking in from windows in rooms off the corridor. It also suddenly struck them all that the place was nearly totally silent. This was a damned eerie state for a hospital, which was normally a bustling kind of place. There wasn’t even any background electrical hum.
    Zack looked back at the SEALs. Bob shrugged. “It’s his only chance,” he said. “It’s this or we try to casevac him to Lemonnier.”
    They pushed forward. At each room, Zack or Baxter stuck their heads in. At each cross hallway, they peered in both directions, into deeper darkness. Zack felt like somebody should be calling out for help, as they did have an urgent casualty. But their throats seemed stoppered.
    When they were about 100 meters deep in the hospital, and had still not encountered a soul, they heard something ahead, and