Humanaty's Blight

CHAPTER TWENTY

I kept an eye on Steve’s watch. It was almost twelve-thirty when the first explosion erupted on a ship. The flash of orange was blinding because we were looking almost directly at it. Then another explosion sounded. After that, it was like one of those fireworks displays that have firecrackers linked together.

There were so many almost simultaneous explosions we couldn’t count them. Far more than seventeen, enough to account for the seventeen ships. More than twice that many, maybe three times. The kayakers the SEAL must have planted fifty or more charges on the hulls, two or three on each ship. Maybe more. All set to go off at the same time.

The entire port was alight with the fires on the burning ships. In that flickering light, some were already listing to one side or rapidly sinking. Isolated cheers broke out near us. Most watched in stunned horror and wonder, a strange contrast in attitudes. Here and there were more explosions on the ships as ammunition, bombs, fuel, or whatever they stored exploded.

Ten thousand troops, plus the mechanics, cooks, navigators, officers, and crews of the ships were fighting for their lives—those still alive. I felt more like puking than cheering. How many of those deaths were directly attributable to me? There was no way to know.

What I did know, was that I wanted to crawl back into my basement and play video games, but none involving the military or fighting. Maybe cartoon creatures racing in cars with balloon tires.

Sue slipped her arm around my waist and snuggled close. She smelled of sweat, smoke, and salt. It was not over. We still had to face the dawn.

Someone brought us blankets and the three of us fell into fitful sleep beside the Ford that had four flat tires and would never move from where it squatted. At dawn, rifle fire woke us. First, a few shots, then many.

I’d been right. The gunboats had ferried hundreds of men ashore to the north and south of us. There must have been five hundred troops in each place, and more where the concrete pier met the shore.

They didn’t stand a chance. During the night, many more of our people had arrived, thousands and thousands. Our angry people. Every one of them carried a gun of some sort. They were untrained, unorganized, and their weapons were designed for shooting targets, deer, or small game. It didn’t matter.

An hour after sunrise, the shooting stopped. There were no more enemies alive. No ships in the harbor to bring more troops ashore. The wave of people arriving had overwhelmed the troops the gunboats had delivered ashore, five hundred north of us and the same south. An estimated thousand had been at the edge of the concrete pier, ready to rush us, kill us all, and stand guard for the ships to dock and unload men, machines, food, and all the equipment necessary to occupy a foreign land as they conquered the population.

Instead, a ragged group of prisoners stood to one side, surrounded by a more ragged ring of our people. There were perhaps two hundred stunned survivors, many wounded or burned from the fires on the water still sending black smoke into the air.

The bay and harbor were filled with floating things spewed from the ships that had sunk only hours ago. Insulation, wood, plastic, mattresses, and a thousand unidentified items. Men in orange life vests, alive and dead, bobbed on the surface. So much debris had washed up along the shoreline, it looked like soap scum left in a sink after washing dirty clothing.

The quantity of flotsam was unimaginable. Most were coated with black fuel oil. Each ship presumably held enough fuel to travel back to where they came from, so they could refuel and return with more troops or settlers.

I remember reading that fifty years after sinking, Pearl Harbor sunken memorial battleship, The USS Arizona still leaked oil. What would the seventeen, no make that nineteen ships that had sunk here do to our waters? Would oil still seep out and poison the water for a hundred years? Probably.

The enormity of the situation escaped me no matter how I tried to get my head around it. Ships had sunk. Thousands had died within sight of where we stood. If the SEAL and his volunteers hadn’t planted the C4 on the hulls, we would all be dead, the pier a swarm of activity by new owners.

As I looked around at the giant swarm of people, with more still pouring in, I revised my attitude slightly. The SEALS had saved a lot of our lives, but in sheer numbers, we would have put up a fight. The snippets of conversation around me revealed everyone was as upset as me—and we had nothing and nobody to take it out on.

We walked, Sue, Steve and I, moving around the area to get a sense of what was happening. People moved aside as we approached, letting us pass freely. At first, I thought it had been good manners. Then, I heard whispers.

“There he is.” Or, “Move aside, here comes Captain Bill.” There were many comments like that.

There were others, too. “He’s so young.” And “I’d follow him anywhere.”

Sue poked me with a finger and teased me with a grin. She heard them, too. Men saluted. All kept their eyes on me long after we passed and before going back to their duties.

We walked near the radio tent. Inside were the same men, now haggard from lack of sleep, but as a group, they looked at me and smiled. They wore weary smiles, but happy. I said, “How is it going?”

One stood as if addressing a superior officer. “The word is getting out. Is there anything else you’d like to say to them?”

I said, “No.”

Instead of her normal friendly jab to remind me, Sue punched my shoulder before raising her voice and calling out, “He has a lot to say. Let everyone know Captain Bill is about to speak. Just give us a moment.”

She pulled me aside, her anger clear—and all of it directed at me. Steve seemed to have the same issues with me because he followed us, his jaw tight, his brow furrowed. When we could speak in relative privacy, Sue stepped in front, forcing me to look at her from a few inches away as she shook her finger in my face.

Behind her was the hillside, and on top was the city of Everett. Not large, but two or three hundred thousand people had lived there. It seemed that many were up there again. I heard music, cheers, and even the shouts of a few children.

She leaned even closer. “Do you even see what’s happening?”

“No.” I had no idea what she was talking about.

“Yesterday, these people were killing each other. The ships with the troops… and you pulled them together. If you don’t do something, tomorrow things will be like they were yesterday.”

“She’s right,” Steve said. “They look up to you. Your name is on all their lips. Do something to help them.”

Now, there was a stalemate. How had it become my responsibility to do something to help them? Because I’d stolen a sailboat and made myself captain? A week ago, I’d been living in a cave by myself.

“Like what?” I asked.

“Compliment them. Congratulate them,” Steve said. “Tell them it’s all going to be alright.”

Sue said, “Am I going to have to be your spokesperson again?”

“I don’t know what to tell them.”

“Follow me,” she said as we walked back to the Ford. Because of the flat tires, she stepped up on the fender, the hood, and then the roof. “I need your attention!” she bellowed as loud as any longshoreman who had ever worked on the dock.

Hundreds of people stopped whatever they were doing. The pier became oddly quiet. She raised her voice and shouted, “You all saw what happened here. And you know who is responsible for leading you to this great victory. Captain Bill has sent word to the rest of the country to repel the invaders that are at our shores.”

A cheer went up.

She waved her arms and called for silence, then continued. “Those who sent the blight to kill all of us will pay. This is not over. We must find out who killed our families and friends and return the favor.”

More cheering.

She called for quiet again. “We need someone to lead us. One man has stepped up and saved us all. I nominate Captain Bill to be voted in as the next president of the United States!”

The cheering went on for what seemed like hours. The radio operators spread Sue’s words to the entire country. I couldn’t stop them or her. Steve stood to one side and grinned.

The radio operators kept us informed of the battles in other places. In Oregon, at the small town of Newport, seven ships had attempted to disgorge troops and equipment. People from all up and down the coast had arrived and by sheer force of numbers, drove three ships back out to sea. Of the other four, two sank in the harbor by unknown means, and two were overrun by citizens.

Down the coast in California, four separate fleets had appeared the same day as ours. One had been destroyed by locals who had access to an army depot with large weapons. Three more, the largest fleets, all with small warships accompanying the troopships, found themselves fighting hordes of people, so many that they were prevented from landing their troops. At San Diego, two naval destroyers crewed by ex-sailors had engaged in a furious battle at sea with the enemy before they landed.

While the news coming into the radio shack was positive, my name was thrown around in about every third sentence, from as far away as San Diego. We heard of no invasions in Texas or the east coast. However, there was a rumor of a large fleet near Greenland, waiting at sea for the right time to attack. How it had been discovered was unknown, but the word of the attempted invasion of the west coast spread and convinced those on the east coast to work together.

Also, the information that the pandemic was intentional, spread faster than good news. The simple CB radios on the pier had been replaced during the night with short-wave, and the operators were talking to people nation-wide, and around the world.

Any ship crewed by foreigners and arriving on our shores would meet with massive crowds of armed, angry citizens. Instead of fighting each other, people pulled together within a single day, and everyone had the same objective: Find and defeat the enemy that unleashed the blight on our nation.

The information from the radio operators continued to pour in. Militia from Wyoming wanted me to tell them whether to deploy to the Gulf states or the west coast. I sent them to the Gulf.

Think about that. I sent militia to the Gulf. Me. How can that have happened? While thinking about that, consider that Sue, who was still fourteen, set up relief centers in three western states, instructed survivors in the northeast to gather at West Point, where they would be housed and fed at the military academy. She had appointed a retired general to be in charge.

Steve sat with the radiomen and continually used my name to order new sanctuary cities to be formed in the middle of the country or to direct ragtag troops to where a defensive position could keep enemies from our shores. He wanted order restored, continually suggested mentioning my name as the one person with the authority to pull us all together.

I’d quit trying to stop that talk hours earlier, not because I wanted such a position, but because I couldn’t stop them. The joke had turned into a reality over which I had no control. Besides, the average person needed someone or something to look up to. It wasn’t that we had fallen so far from civilization. There simply had to be a figurehead, no matter how inept or awkward it was, even if it was me.

I strode around the navy pier watching the crowd part before me. At the edge of the pier, I looked into the bay where it was hard to see the water because of the flotsam from the ships that had sunk. Seagulls and ravens were feasting. I refused to look at what they ate.

Turning, I looked over the pier, at the thousands of people gathered there and on the hillside. Fires burned. Food cooked. People rested, talked, and made friends.

I convinced myself it was all going to be okay.