The missile flew low over the waves, but fortunately not low enough to avoid being tracked. It had been detected when it was launched from a submarine, and once its trajectory had been determined to be Washington DC, an interceptor had been launched. The explosion as the two collided was not as large as it might have been, and resulted in a heavy cloud that drifted in the wind towards shore, slowly dispersing as it did. A Coast Guard response team was dispatched to recover what they could.
The cloud descended and drifted to obscure a fair-sized sailboat crewed by a family on vacation, and anchored off a sandy barrier island. As the cloud passed on, leaving the boat behind and slowly dispersing and seeming to almost sink into the ocean, it revealed the unconscious family, some scattered on the deck, some belowdeck, all unconscious wherever they were when the cloud had enveloped them.
The response team found the boat there, and observing their condition, sent a medic aboard. The medic also fell unconscious quickly while checking a man lying on the deck for life and vital signs, and a quarantine was called. A team in hazmat bio suits was sent in to move the unconscious people into shade, take blood samples for analyses, and set up IVs to keep them hydrated in the heat. To all appearances, they were all asleep but could not be roused, and all had low-grade fevers.
Twenty-four hours later, the family began to wake up, and a short time later, the medic woke also.
* * *
I opened my eyes and felt a major headache, like my brain was under pressure, and throbbing with pain. Some guy in a plastic suit out of a science fiction movie bent over me and asked "How are you feeling?"
"Ugh. Like hell," I said.
"Are you in pain?"
"Terrible headache," I said. "Thirsty. Got to piss like a racehorse!"
"Okay, we've got a urinal for you to use, do you need a hand standing up?"
I sat up, groaned, and looked around. I was on the deck in the cabin, and there were people in the bunks. My wife was in the bunk on my right and my oldest daughter on my left. My head swam with dizziness from just looking about like that. "Yeah," I said. "I may fall over otherwise."
He helped me to stand, and I unzipped my fly. Bracing myself against the upper bunk, which held my sleeping son, I took the urinal held out to me and filled it. I closed the lid and handed it to the guy in the weird suit, who took it and called to a woman clad in the same fashion. As he helped me to move forward to a chair, I thanked him and asked, "What happened?"
"First, what's your name?"
"John Davidson"
"Birthdate?"
"November 15th, 1962."
My wife began to stir, and the guy called the woman over to help her. "We're not sure. You may have been exposed to something hazardous. What do you remember?"
"An explosion on the other side of the island. Something flew overhead and BLAM! and then... mist or something, I think? It gets fuzzy..."
"Well, a Coast Guard medic was sent in to check you over and he passed out too, so the area's been quarantined. We're going to run tests to see what you were exposed to. You said you've got a headache?"
"Yeah. Feels like my skull is in a vise!" I replied.
"My name is Jim, and that's Sheila with your wife. We'll be looking after you for a while."
What do you say when something like this happens? "Who are you with? The CDC or something?" I asked.
"USAMRIID."
"Holy shit. The explosion was a biological weapon?"
"That's what we're here to find out," he said. "Your fever has dropped back to normal, and your pupils are equal and reactive. You've got a small bump on the back of your head, probably incurred when you fell down."
Where did the missile come from?" I asked.
"Unknown," he said. "I can't say anything more that that."
Ah. Whatever answers they had were classified, I guessed. Heck, *we* were probably classified at this point. Sheila brought my wife, Ann, forward to sit with me, collected the samples, and went up on deck. Ann apparently had a monster headache, too, but hadn't fallen and hit her head.
"How are you, babe?" I asked.
"What the fuck is going on?" She asked.
"We may have been exposed to something dangerous. We're under quarantine," I told her.
"Are they going to lock us up?"
Jim shook his head. "Not at the moment," he answered. "We're just being careful and running some tests."
"What was the explosion?" Ann asked, and I gave her the answers I'd gotten from Jim, who had gone back to check on the others.
"My back and boobs hurt, and they're hot," said Ann.
"They've always been hot!" I said, trying to lighten her anxiety. "Did you fall?"
"Smartass!" she snapped, but smiled as she did. "No, I never got out of my bunk. I was napping when it happened."