Day by Day Armageddon: Shattered Hourglass Read Online Free PDF

asset in the carrier’s skill pool.
    •   •   •
    A few decks below and aft of the communications shack was the ship’s sick bay. Before the anomaly, it had resembled a general outpatient clinic, but now looked much like a war zone trauma center. Most of the doctors had been killed in the line of duty since the anomaly had been detected in the United States. This wasn’t hard to imagine, as the doctors onboard were often the first exposed to the infected. The ship had five doctors before the anomaly. Reanimated corpses quickly infected the first two—ironic how the same doctors pronouncing death were killed by the creatures that had fooled them. A third was killed after an infected sailor blew his own head off, sending splattered blood into an open shaving cut on the doctor’s face. The doctor’s own preference was also a bullet to the head, followed by burial at sea. The fourth doctor went the nonviolent route via morphine overdose. At least he had been decent enough to his corpsmen to strap his lower body to a gurney before injection. His suicide note was so disturbing that it had been confiscated and destroyed by the ship’s security officer, fearing it would prompt further suicide attempts or even mutiny.
    The last doctor standing was Dr. James Bricker—a consummate professional and a Naval Academy graduate, as well as a lieutenant commander. Anyone who has spent time in the navy will tell you that doctors are a different breed of military officer. Many high-ranking doctors don’t give a damn if you call them sir, ma’am, rank, no rank. They just care about their job—about making you better.
    Bricker had been near the point of insanity, or possibly even the old reliable morphine drip himself, when Jan arrived fresh from Hotel 23. Upon arrival and after debriefing, the new passengers were instructed to fill out a practical skills form. The screeners knew whom to look for and knew what the top priorities were at any given time. When the screening staff reviewed the forms and noticed a fourth-year med-school student, they practically ripped Jan out of her seat and away from her husband and daughter, rushing her to the sick bay.
    •   •   •
    On arrival, Jan immediately felt as if she had walked into bedlam. Infected but living patients screamed in their beds, strugglingdeliriously against their restraints. Volunteers hovered between the hospital beds like bees. A lone mad doctor with wild, unkempt hair hunched over a microscope, cursing at whatever it was he saw between the slides.
    The screener interrupted, “Dr. Bricker, I have—”
    “Not now.”
    The screener waited a few seconds, seemingly deciding whether or not to interrupt again. “Sir, I have a—”
    With eyes still in contact with the microscope eyepiece, Dr. Bricker lashed, “Let me guess, you have an Eagle Scout with a medical merit badge, perhaps a CPR class graduate, or hmmm . . . how about a mail-order medical records transcriptionist?”
    “Sir, she’s a fourth-year med student.”
    Bricker paused for a moment, still fixated on the microscope and the secrets underneath it. “Are you certain?”
    “Sir, she’s right here. Go ahead, interview her, give her a um . . . I don’t know, a doctor’s test? Whatever you want to do. I have others to screen so I should get going. She’s all yours.”
    Jan looked over at the screener, annoyed by his candor.
    “Ma’am, I’m sorry. I don’t mean to talk as if you aren’t here. It’s just been a long day.”
    Jan’s expression eased from one of annoyance to understanding. “Don’t worry about it.”
    The interview began immediately and went on for some time.
    “Where did you attend . . . What is your experience with viral . . . Do you have any theories as to the origin . . . How fast have you seen them . . . What are your personal thoughts on where they derive their . . .”
    Jan was exhausted when Will tapped her on the shoulder, interrupting Bricker’s