Chapter 17

The following character reappears in this chapter:

Martha Rust

Sergeant First Class, Mess Supervisor, 5’-10’’ tall, 166 lb, 36C-25-37, 39 years old, short auburn hair, gray eyes

The following new characters appear in this chapter:

Leck

Kitchen worker, Thai, 5’-0’’ tall, less than 100 pounds, a very thin woman, 20 years of age with long black hair and brown eyes.

SFC Charles Leake

Sergeant First Class, Veterinary assistant, 6’-3’’ tall, 220 pounds, 34 years old, very dark black skin. short black hair, brown eyes, fully enhanced

The return trip to our compound went very well. In fact, there were people out on the streets waving at us as we made our way out of the city. There were no efforts by the police or others to stop us or impede our progress. It would appear that what had occurred that afternoon was now general knowledge, although what had happened had been visible or at least audible to anyone in the surrounding area. It also appeared that the local news media were very active. Trish had checked the net again with her Battle Board. While we didn’t understand what was said, the pictures spoke for themselves.

Arriving back at our compound later, we were all ready to wind down, but there were still things that needed to be taken care of before Tiger Team could relax. There were Partners to be fed and checked to ensure that they were alright. There were reports to be written and videos to be reviewed. In addition, the Colonel needed to meet with Captain Chesapeake to discuss the disposition of the Marine platoons. This was very high on her list of things to do.

First though, there was taking care of our Partners. They had made major contributions to the success of our mission, and we needed to care for them ourselves and not delegate it to someone else. Unfortunately, all of these good intentions went to hell when we arrived back at our compound. Once everyone had parked, and we had exited our vehicles, we were met by Captain Chesapeake and a Navy Lieutenant Commander.

“This is Commander Bentley, the Epidemiologist. He arrived on the first shuttle with the additional assault vehicles. He is anxious to talk to you about the disease and the vaccine,” the Captain told us introducing the Doctor.

“Good afternoon, Colonel,” the Doctor said. He was a tall man of about 36 years of age with blond hair and gray eyes.

“I understand that you went into the city to obtain some of the local vaccine for the Pandemic,” he added with a smile.

“Good day, Doctor,” the Colonel answered. “Yes, after a scuffle, we secured all of the available vaccine,” she added.

“Scuffle! Was there a disturbance?” he asked somewhat disturbed.

“Only a minor one. After we called on them to surrender the vaccine, they fired two missiles at us. The assault vehicles knocked them down, and we cast an Earthquake spell and destroyed their compound. We found a survivor who led us to the bunker where the vaccine was stored,” the Colonel told the shocked Doctor.

“You are Magic users then?” he asked.

“Yes, many of us are,” answered the Colonel.

“And did you bring the vaccine with you?” he asked.

“Yes, how many bottles would you like?” asked the Colonel.

“A dozen or so to send up to our laboratory and one to administer a dose to the Monk in your sick bay. You will all need to be inoculated after that to keep you from contracting the disease,” he informed us. Trish led him over to our truck.

“This is approximately half of the vaccine that we seized. The other half is on Team A-23’s truck,” she informed him, showing him the boxes of vaccine.

“Do you know what the dosage is?” he asked as everything was written in Thai on the bottles and the boxes.

“No, we will need someone who can read the Thai instructions,” she told him.

“And do you have someone like that?” he asked. On looking around, the Colonel and I could see that the drivers were already gone for the day.

“The drivers have already left,” she told him in a disappointed voice.

“What about the kitchen helpers?” I asked.

“Do you think any of them can read?” she asked with a frown.

“There is only one way to know,” she said after a few seconds, and the four of us headed for the mess hall to check. On arriving there, the Colonel approached SFC Rust, the Mess Supervisor.

“Martha, we need to speak to the kitchen help,” she told her.

“Is there a problem?” Rust asked.

“No, we just need to ask them something,” Trish told her. Quickly, all six assistants were assembled in the dining area.

“Do any of you read Thai?” the Colonel asked them in Standard to puzzled looks from most of them.

“How many of you speak or understand Standard?” Trish asked, trying again. Most of the women still looked puzzled.

“Yes,” a short somewhat thin young woman at the end of the line answered in a very quiet voice.

“Good!” the Colonel said with a sigh, as she moved over to the young woman.

“Please tell the others to return to work, but I need to talk to you for a short time,” Trish told her.

“Is something wrong?” the young woman asked in a frightened voice.

“Oh no, nothing is wrong. All of you have been doing just fine, and the cooks are happy with your work,” Trish told her to a look of relief. She said something and the other women returned to work.

“Come sit at the table with us,” Trish told the young woman as we moved to the nearest table.

“What is your name?” she asked after we were all seated, even the Doctor.

“I am called Leck. That means Little,” she told us.

“Leck, can you read Thai?” the Colonel asked.

“Yes, I read Thai very well,” she replied.

“Can you read this?” Trish asked producing one of the vaccine bottles plus the instruction sheet from one of the boxes. Leck looked at the bottle and squinted at the lettering there.

“The writing is very small and hard to read,” she told her after a few seconds.

“How about this paper?” Trish asked handing her the instruction sheet. Meanwhile, I was on my PDU to Sergeant Platner.

“We need a magnifying glass in the mess hall,” I told him when he answered.

“Be there as soon as I find it, sir,” he replied.

“This is a paper for some medicine,” Leck was saying when I was paying attention to them again.

“Yes, it is. Does it say how much of the medicine is to be given to each patient?” Trish asked. Leck went over the instructions again.

“It says that 0.5 ml are to be used for each patient,” she told us. “What is 0.5 mls?” she asked in a puzzled voice. Dr. Bentley was smiling.

“It is a very small amount of the medicine,” Dr. Bentley told her pointing to the bottle. Platner had arrived with the magnifying glass by then, and I handed it to her, but she didn’t appear to know what to do with it.

“This magnifies things like writing,” I told her.

“Magnifies?” she said very carefully.

“It makes things larger and easier to see,” I told her before demonstrating the magnifier. She was delighted with the way it worked and soon read the writing on the bottle.

“This says the same thing,” she told the Colonel and Dr. Bentley after carefully reading the label on the small bottle.

“Thank you,” the Colonel told her before calling Sergeant Rust over to the table.

“Martha, take good care of Leck and make sure that she gets enough to eat,” the Colonel told her Mess Supervisor.

“Yes sir, she is the smart one and a good worker,” Rust assured her.

After Leck had returned to the kitchen, Dr. Bentley had some information for us.

“I’m going up and vaccinate the Monk. If he is better tomorrow, you will all need to be vaccinated, but only a small number of you at a time until we see how how this vaccine affects our people.

“I saw the work that Sergeant Atchine and her people did, and this virus is very active and spreading very quickly. You will also need to vaccinate all of those working for you and possibly their families, if we have enough of the vaccine. I’ll send the samples up on the shuttle when it returns to orbit. I’ll be remaining here for a time to observe how the vaccine works,” he informed us.

“Have you been assigned quarters, Doctor?” Trish asked.

“Yes, Captain Chesapeake found me a room in this building,” he told Trish.

“Fine, do you know where my office is, in case you need to talk to me?” the Colonel asked.

“Yes, he also showed me around and explained where things are,” the Doctor told us. I had a question for him.

“Do you think that our Partners will also need to be vaccinated?” I asked.

“I’m not sure. I’ll need to talk with Dr. Mellifont and see what she thinks. We may need to draw some blood samples from the various Partner species to see if they are being affected,” he told us to finish. WE still needed to take care of our Partners.

While Joel had taken care of Samson and Sara, we found Bob and Susie still in our truck. Susie was licking Bob’s back. Natalie was there waiting for us. She had already taken care of Clare.

“I fed both of them, but they wouldn’t leave the truck until you came to get them. Bob is hurt,” she told the Colonel and me. I hurried into the truck to check on Bob.

Susie had been licking his back for some time, and it had stopped bleeding. There was an ugly tear wound on his back.

“What happened, Bob?” I sent to him.