The Future War

Nurse 'Virago' Vetrano.

Reese turned around and saluted.

Yanik returned it and handed the lieutenant some papers.

With a glance at the CO, Reese took them and at his nod started to read.

'Oh!' he said, pleased.

The captain grinned. 'Thought that'd make your day.'

They were Reese's orders to report to the Central States Regional Command for reassignment.

'Yes, sir!'

'Keep reading,' Yanik directed.

'They want Nurse Shea, too?' Reese looked up. 'Why? They've got your report and she doesn't know any more than she told us.

And she's really needed here.'

'Well, in case you haven't noticed, the phone lines are down, and our commanding officers are a bit busy,' the captain drawled. 'And if it gets out that she heard this stuff, she might be in danger here. Besides, it'll soothe Vetrano no end to have a professional nurse with the convoy. And since it's not my idea, she can't complain to me about it.'

'Yes, sir,' Reese agreed. Nurse Vetrano in full cry was a formidable lady. And Nurse Shea might prove to be very pleasant company at Central.

'I'll leave it to you to tell her,' Yanik said.

'Yes, sir.' Reese saluted, but the captain had already turned away. Dennis was so pleased about his new orders that it took him a minute to realize that he was going to have to face the head nurse's wrath.

ON THE ROAD, MISSOURI

Reese had planned to ride in the cab of the first truck, but Vetrano's glare and Shea's pleading eyes had quickly changed his mind.

'I have no medical training at all,' he'd protested for a final time.

'It'll be all right,' Mary said, taking him by the arm. 'There's nothing complicated about this type of nursing. All you'll have to do is occasionally change an IV bag, wipe some brows, give sips of water, that sort of thing. It's tiring, but it's easy, you'll see.'

A glance at Vetrano had told him that he certainly would. He touched the orders in his breast pocket like they were a talisman against evil and allowed himself to be led off for instructions about the care and feeding of IVs.

He had been assigned the first truck, Mary the last, and the two in between were being tended by a pair of ambulatory patients. In case there was a problem, each group had been given a radio. Reese had been given a code that would stop the first truck if he had cause, and when it stopped, the others would automatically stop as well. With luck, it wouldn't be necessary to use it.

Nursing was tiring work, also disgusting and tedious and anxiety making all at once. Maybe it got better after you'd been doing it for a while. But Reese hoped he never had to do this again. The patients diapers needed constant changing; so far he hadn't had time to bathe anyone's brow, which all six of his patients needed.

He'd been at this for hours. Where the hell are we going? he wondered impatiently. He pulled a tiny section of the curtain secured across the back of the truck aside to see where they were. Woods. Nothing but woods and hills. No buildings, no people, and not a very impressive roadway. They were somewhere up in the hills, he realized, heading toward the Ozarks.

He stumbled back to the innermost bunk to check the IV and found that his patient had died. 'Mary!' he said over the radio.

'Mugamba is dead!'

'Are you sure?' she came back.

'He hasn't got a pulse and he's not breathing.'

She didn't answer for a moment and Reese imagined what she was thinking: yup, that's pretty much the definition of dead, all right.

'What should I do?' he asked.

'Just cover his face and do your best for the rest of your patients,' she answered. 'This isn't your fault, Lieutenant. He was very sick.'

'Will do,' he said, and signed off.

He wondered why he'd called her. Had he expected her to come leaping from truck to truck to hold his hand? Of course, he was an engineer. He'd never had anyone die on him before…

before this all started; since then, it was becoming an unpleasantly familiar experience.

As if some malignant fate is out to kill us all. So maybe he just wanted someone to take this burden off his hands. Make that I'd give anything for someone to come along and take this off my hands.

The truck seemed to rear up like a frightened stallion; then it jounced fiercely as it inexplicably left the road. Reese grabbed for one of the hoops that held up the tilt and braced a boot against the side slats, swaying with the lunging pull. Either they'd left the road or the road had gone out of existence. Since he was near the side of the truck anyway, he reached out and lifted its canvas tilt enough to look out.

Yep, we're off the road all right. And the patients were bouncing around like beans in a can. If the cots hadn't been secured to the truck bed and the patients secured to the cots, things would have been pretty ugly back here.

The radio at his waist squawked and Mary Shea bellowed,

'Stop the truck!'

Good idea, he thought, if easier said than done. They'd rigged up a connection to the truck's computer back here, but it was up front, beside the corpse of Mugamba. The truck seemed to be climbing and hitting every rock in the way, causing it to buck like a mad thing. By the time Reese had struggled to the front, he'd collected some serious bruises.

The bouncing made it difficult to read the computer's screen, but not nearly as hard as it was to type in the code they'd given him. He hit enter on the third try.

'Lieutenant! Are you all right?'

He unclipped the radio from his belt. 'Yeah, sorry. I just entered the code; it didn't work.' He spoke with his teeth clenched because he was afraid of biting off his tongue. 'I'm going to try again.'

He hit clear, then reentered the code, then hit enter. Nothing happened except the damn truck seemed to speed up.

'Shit,' he said under his breath. He looked at the sick sharing the truck with him. They couldn't take much more of this. Maybe there was something wrong with the connection. He looked for the cord and pulled it into sight; it came easily, as though it had long since lost contact with the truck's brain. Shit, he thought bitterly.

He reached up and pulled the curtain aside, revealing, to his immense relief, a large rear window with sliding panels. Now for some movie-style heroics, he thought. He prayed the wildly bucking truck body and window frame wouldn't emasculate him as he bridged the space between the two. Just sliding the window aside, he felt like he was being punched in the stomach by a large and very angry opponent.

Finally he had it open, and after falling back three or four times managed to push out the screen as well. Reese grasped the edges of the window and eeled himself forward feet-first, trying to hold himself up and away from the truck frame as much as possible. He had his hips just over the edge of the window when the truck suddenly stopped.

The flat of his back hit the windshield hard enough to crack it; worse, his head hit the steering wheel and he blacked out.

When Reese came to, he was crunched between the wheel and the back of the seat in a sort of midsomersault position, so dazed that for a moment all he could do was wave his arms like flippers.

Gradually he became aware of Mary screaming, 'Stop! Stop!

These people are sick! What are you doing?'

Reese managed to flop over on his side and raised his head.