Playing God Read online

  Playing God

  Written by Doug Moore

  Kindle Edition, License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Playing God

  Published by Dream Weaver Publishing

  Copyright 2006 Doug Moore

  Kindle Edition

  ISBN# 9780987676900

  Playing God

  Chapter 1

  Encapsulated by fear, loose pungent earth and total darkness, Jake struggled to breathe, each breath more shallow than the one before. Snorting through his nose and afraid of suffocating, he clawed at the soil for trapped pockets of air. He grabbed hold of something solid and pulled. Disoriented, he struggled, unsure of up from down. His chest cavity swelled as he broke free and felt a pain rip at his lungs and ache his ribs. Still clinging to his lifeline, he fought to catch his breath. Focus. He brushed the soil from his eyes, wiping his face on his lifeline.

  “What the Fuuuck!”

  Jake scrambled against the dirt wall hard as if to smash open a door. He looked back at his lifeline, the leg of a young boy. Driven by empathy and a need to know, he pressed off the wall, inching ahead on unsteady trembling feet, questioning each step. Jake looked down into the boy’s blood-rimmed yellow eyes, wide and cold. The boy looks familiar. The young boy blinked sending Jake spiraling backwards, hard to the ground. He shoveled at the dirt with his hands, scrambling to his feet and up the wall of the pit, fumbling and clawing desperately until he hit flat ground, half in half out. He cranked his head looking back for the boy then forward and up into the boy’s yellow eyes. He tumbled backwards into the pit, deeper and deeper into the black abyss.

  Jake woke as he did most mornings in a sweat, curled in the fetal position and paralyzed by fear. For a moment he didn’t realize where he was, until he caught sight of the neatly stacked boxes in the corner labeled Pan-Am Lumber Inc.

  “Jesus.” He sat up in his bunk wiped his face on the back of his forearm and hand.

  Jake had not seen the boy for some time but his memory of the boy was always there. Why are you back? Jake wondered. He rubbed his brow then shut off the alarm before it could sound, as he’d been doing more and more lately.

  How long until I’m forgiven?

  “Fuckin’ dreams.” He grumbled rising to his feet.

  Jake carried the burden of war closely, never sharing his nightmares or the events that put them there. He’d seen and done horrible things in war, but many could say the same.

  By day, hair trigger flashes of troubled memories scratched at the security walls of his psyche, testing his fortitude for stress fractures. Yet outwardly, Jake was a man’s man, a genuine war hero who maintained grace under pressure.

  By nature and demeanor, Jake had always considered himself a peaceful man. He hated war yet seemed drawn to conflict like a moth to fire. He’d seen his share of war, something he rarely reflected on, although the irony had not escaped his attention. The doctors at the veteran’s hospital said he suffered from survivor’s guilt leaving him with a death wish, pushing him to take chances that others might not risk. Sometimes a hero is just a man with nothing to lose.

  After three tours in Vietnam, Jake landed in Angola, at times caught up in smaller skirmishes in Zaire but by 1976 it was starting to wear, grind him down, and he needed a change.

  Jake had come to realize that he couldn’t escape his past. Demons never sleep, yet here he was again, running to Panama.

  A friend from Vietnam had encouraged Jake to join him there. Major Robert Williams was stationed at Fort Gullick with the 7th Special Forces Group Airborne. He helped Jake lease a recently decommissioned UH1 Bell Iroquois and Robert was able to steer work Jake’s way through his contacts in the Canal Zone.

  By September of 1978 he was closing in on his second year of business when he signed on for six months with Pan-Am Lumber Incorporated, a U.S. based outfit with a lucrative contract with the Department of Renewable Natural Resources. Pan-Am was to go in and clear cut an area of jungle, approximately three thousand acres. It was mostly a slash and burn operation, designed to eradicate or at least to control a pest infestation that threatened valuable Mahogany stocks.

  Base camp was in Sambu, a remote Embera Indian village with a population of barely one thousand. Jake flew from there to Balboa, a port city set up by the Americans on the Pacific side of the Canal Zone. Balboa supplied the base camp, and every three days Jake dropped supplies into the interior site up the Sambu River. It was an easy gig for Jake and good money to boot.

  Jake walked into the office of Howard Prentice, the owner of Pan- Am Lumber. He was sitting at his desk, staring down at the radio like it was some kind of alien.

  “Fuck,” Jake muttered. It was almost a thought. “You all right, Howard?”

  He looked up at Jake as if it was the first time he’d laid eyes on him. His face was washed white, his eyes hollow and dark.

  “Something’s wrong at the camp. I can feel it.”

  “Still no contact?” Jake asked. He didn’t need to. He could see the answer on Howard’s pasty face.

  “Why can’t I reach them? It’s been three days.”

  During their last radio communication Bruce Fleming, the camp’s field doctor, had reported that a mysterious illness had hit the camp. Apparently, eight of the nineteen men were affected.

  “We’ll know today. There’s been a break in the weather.”

  “He’s an experienced medic, Jake. He served in Vietnam and seen all kinds of jungle-borne illnesses, and yet…..”

  “Everything will be all right,” Jake reassured, unconvincingly unable to hold the old guys stare as he hung on to Jake’s words.

  “His thoughts were jumbled. He lacked focus”

  “They’ll be all right,” Jake repeated. This time he forced himself to look the old man right in the eyes.

  Three days of heavy rains had prevented flying but finally the weather had cleared.

  Jake was never so glad to get in the air. They lifted off around nine in the morning and followed the winding path of the Sambu River below. The indeterminate lines of the river’s edge deviated with the ebb and flow of the rainforest’s lifeblood. For days, the relentless deluge had swept the hills and valleys, creating mudslides and flooding the low areas.

  The soupy concoction of mud and fallen trees filtered through the bloated mangroves. Knots of mangrove roots dammed the flow, causing further flooding and blurring the periphery of the meandering river.

  “Jesus, what a mess.” Jake looked over at Howard who was staring out at the horizon, his face drawn and unresponsive.

  Jake manipulated the cyclic, banking gently and following the course of the waterway. The nose of the helicopter pitched down slightly as they flew deeper into the Darien Gap. Below, the Sambu River looked like a whipped cappuccino, a raging torrent of coffee-colored water.

  Jake hadn’t seen jungle this thick since Vietnam. An endless sea of vibrant green stretched out across the horizon. Cativo trees towered like majestic giants. Immense and seemingly never-ending, the Darien Gap was an impenetrable jungle. Mystery and adventure wrapped in strangling, biting vines that swallowed trees and men whole. Large areas of the map were blank, reading only, “not enough data.” Those maps always reminded Jake of the old medieval charts with the warning “here dragons be” at the edges to denote dangerous, unexplored lands.

  He wondered what dragons he would find at the camp.

  “We’re getting close,” Jake said into the headset and pointed toward the horizon where dark smoke seemed to leech out o
f the top tiers of the canopy, in sharp contrast with the brilliant blue sky.

  “I didn’t think they’d be working,” Howard said. “They were down eight men.”

  Jake thought he heard a hopeful note in the old man’s voice. They were both soon disabused of any such positive notion.

  As Jake maneuvered the Huey toward the camp, the roar of the rotors faded to a subtle whisper. Only the surreal setting below remained. Time slowed, unraveling clip by terrifying clip, like a series of freeze-frames as they hung in the sky. Two men emerged from a lone tent that was covered in a light dusting of gray soot. They staggered through the mud like zombies. One of the men was barely able to stand.

  Jake and Howard looked at each other with the same sense of dread behind their eyes.

  An enormous fire roared, and angry flames burst in the air like solar flares.

  The doctor and another man were standing as close to the fire as the heat would allow, huddled together and holding their arms up to shield their faces from the debris kicked up by the helicopter’s powerful blades.

  It was then that all of Jake’s senses caught up to the reality of what he was watching, and he realized the horror of what was happening below.

  “Fuck. They’re burning bodies!”

  Among the burning timber, intertwined with clothes, mattresses and twisted logs, were bodies snarled in a heap. Jake and Howard could smell the burning flesh on the column of smoke that engulfed the chopper.

  “We can’t land here, Howard.” Jake had seen this once before during his time in Angola, but the awful memory was not man-made, like in Vietnam. When he’d smelled the sickly-sweet smell of burning flesh in Angola, it was direct from God or Mother Nature or whoever one believed was in charge of such inexplicable events.

  An entire village had been wiped out by an undetermined virus, and those left alive from the surrounding area had to torch everything: huts, clothes, and people. The dead were burned like trash.

  Jake remembered his dream about the boy. His chest tightened with foreboding.

  “Put it down over there!”

  Jake snapped out of his unpleasant reverie.

  “I have to get down there, “Howard pleaded.

  Howard pointed to an area a few hundred yards upwind.

  Jake looked into the old man’s eyes and saw what he knew his own eyes revealed: Fear. But there was another ingredient. Howard looked like a killer with a conscience. Jake knew this man and knew he alone owned this. This was his operation, his company. Those men roasting down there had all cashed payroll checks with his signature.

  Jake reluctantly complied and manipulated the collective lever gently, twisting the grip while maneuvering the anti-torque pedals and cyclic stick in a coordinated dance, landing smoothly with Howard’s door toward the doctor who was still standing next to the raging fire.

  Jake tossed Howard a hand radio.

  “We need to get to Fort Gullick. I got a buddy there who might be able to help.”

  Howard nodded, but didn’t speak. Jake didn’t know if he could at that point.

  “You got two minutes!”

  Howard nodded again.

  “I mean it, Howard.”

  Howard turned and jumped out of the helicopter like a man stepping off a skyscraper.

  Jake watched as his boss ran toward the field doctor like a fullback, shoulders tucked, and head down, straight into the line on third-and-goal. He was halfway there when the doctor motioned for him to stop.

  Howard stopped in his tracks like he’d hit a brick wall. Fourth down.

  The doctor tugged at his surgical mask, pulling it down below his chin. His skin was rubbery and translucent, and lesions covered his face and neck. The pustules were red and caked in dried blood. He looked like something had been at him.

  Jake could see from the chopper that the same lesions covered the doctor’s arms. The doctor looked tired and broken. He looked like a man who had stared into the depths of Hell and knew he would soon descend.

  Howard and the doctor stood thirty feet apart in the muck, flames filling the air behind the doctor, and communicated as men had done since the beginning of time: with hand gestures, like two ancient Neanderthals.

  “C’mon Howard. Get back here.”

  Jake knew it was impossible for their voices to be heard at that distance over the roar of the helicopter, and finally Howard’s shoulders slumped and he moved closer to the doctor.

  Jake hit the button and screamed into the radio.

  “Goddamnit Howard, no!”

  But Howard was now with the doctor, his ear to the diseased man’s mouth. After a moment, he nodded and turned toward Jake, but made no movement to approach the chopper. Their eyes met. They both knew what that meant. Howard raised the radio and hit the button. Jake stared at him, watching as Howard’s lips began to move just slightly ahead of his voice over the radio. He smiled apologetically. “Sorry, Jake.”

  “Howard?”

  “Drop the supplies.”

  Jake knew the meager medical supplies and water they’d brought would make little difference to anyone left in this damned place, but it was the least he could do.

  Howard’s choice compelled his own.

  Jake looked at the men from the tent, who were approaching Howard.

  Jake waited a second, then turned to the back, lifted the first heavy box, and threw it out of the chopper. He reached for the other box, but out of the corner of his eye, he saw the crazed men from the tent staggering toward the chopper. Howard tried to stop them, but they barreled over him and the doctor, knocking them to the ground. Sickness made for desperation.

  Jake lifted off, the other box on the co-pilot’s seat temporarily forgotten. He hovered over the scene as Howard helped the doctor from the ground and lifted the radio to his lips. Jake hit the button first.

  “What the hell is going on down there, Howard?”

  “Bruce thinks it’s a strain of smallpox.”

  “Jesus.”

  “But faster. Much faster. There’s eleven dead, two in the jungle, and everyone’s infected.”

  He didn’t say it, but Jake thought, and now so are you.

  “Get on the radio. Tell your friend at Fort Gullick we need the World Health Organization, the CDC, and the Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases down here. I’ll do what I can here.”

  “Goddamnit, Howard.”

  “It was my decision Jake. You have to live with your choices. I can live with this one”

  Jake nodded, saying nothing.

  “And Jake.”

  Jake banked the chopper so that he could look down at Howard. He wondered if he’d ever see him again.

  “Please hurry.”

  Jake dropped his radio and swung wide, shoving the second box out of the Huey so it landed away from Howard, but close enough so he might be able to get to it before the others. He hit the throttle and flew away from the scene, not waiting to see if he succeeded.

  Jake radioed Fort Gullick on the Atlantic side of the Canal Zone.

  The Zone was a U.S Territory, a country within a country with its own government and laws. The ten mile wide strip of land cut a swath across the isthmus. Jake enjoyed living there. The people who lived there were referred to as “Zonians” and were mostly U.S. military personnel and citizens stationed there to maintain and protect the canal from anything that might affect operations. This gave America a great deal of control over Panama’s affairs.

  Jake was patched through to Robert, his friend at the base. He wasn’t sure of protocol, but he figured he’d report what he knew to Robert and let him decide what steps to take first.

  “Jake. How you doing, buddy?”

  “We’ve got trouble.

  I’m in the Gap, at the interior site south of Sambu. We need help.”

  Jake laid out the sequence of events that had unfolded. Robert was calm as usual, but Jake knew he was analyzing the information, formulating a strategy.

  “This is what I wa
nt you to do. Find a place to land away from the interior site, but not too far, for logistics. Get me the co-ordinates and sit tight. We’re going to quarantine you there as a precaution.”

  “Roger that.”

  “You didn’t make contact with anyone at the interior site. Correct?”

  “No.”

  “Jake?” Robert repeated.

  “No,” Jake answered assertively this time sensing the concern.

  “I’ll light a fire under the CDC and anybody else I can think of, but the Panama National Guard will likely be the first responders. I’m going to request the lead on the security detail for the quarantine.”

  “Thanks, Robert.”

  Jake knew Robert would do everything in his power to get things moving quickly.

  “And Jake.”

  Jake waited.

  “Watch your back but stay put.”

  They cut communication, and Robert paused in thought. We better be able to contain this thing.

  Chapter 2

  A group of blue and yellow macaws, spooked by the approach of the helicopters, repositioned themselves at a safe distance, hiding in the layers of the jungle canopy. Jake lowered his binoculars and wished he could make a similar tactical retreat.

  The peaceful jungle was fractured as the Panama National Guard dropped in on the co-ordinates Jake had provided. He watched as they surveyed the immediate area around his helicopter which was set atop a barren knoll in the center of a small clearing.

  Fortunately, Jake was able to kill some time with more than just bird-watching. He’d been drinking some of the warm Balboa beer which was on board, part of the supplies Howard provided for the men.

  Jake sighed and choked back another pull off his third bottle. His thoughts drifted off to his boss. Howard had never served in the military because of a bum knee, but he’d often talked about how much he wished he had. He was an only child, the son of a disapproving father who had served with distinction and expected the same from his boy.

  As far as Jake was concerned, Howard’s decision to stay with his dying employees was courageous enough to impress any father. He wondered once more if he’d ever see Howard again.