Grants Pass (2 page)

Plague

****

Hospital Quarantine Declared

The Sydney Morning Herald

Wednesday, June 20
^th

Authorities have imposed
quarantine in a wing of the Prince of Wales Hospital, following an outbreak of
Ebola on Monday.

The hospital’s Albion Street Centre
was closed late last night following the fifth confirmed case of the disease,
which doctors believe is the Zaïre strain of the Ebola virus.

“
At this
stage we don’t think there’s any significant risk to the general public,” said
Professor David Rawlinson of the Prince of Wales’ virology department. “The
disease requires contact for transmission, and the outbreak has been isolated,
so there’s very little chance of it spreading.”

No other cases have been confirmed
since the quarantine was declared, but hospitals throughout Sydney have been
put on alert for early symptoms of the disease, which include vomiting, joint
pain and fever.

Hospital staff members have been
unable to trace the origin of the first reported infection, but are
investigating whether the disease was carried by a passenger on a flight from
Africa.

“
Ebola has
historically originated in Africa, although it has appeared in the past in the
Philippines and the US,” said Professor Rawlinson. “We’re looking at the
possibility it crossed from one of those regions via plane.”

The Ebola virus typically has a
mortality rate of 50-90 per cent, and is transmitted via skin and mucous
membrane contact.

The Price of Wales quarantine
coincides with three other cases of rare disease outbreaks that occurred early
last week in Paris, Tokyo and Austin in the US state of Texas.

Diagnosed as bubonic plague, the
other outbreaks are also suspected to have been spread by airline passengers,
and have already led to several deaths. The US Centres for Disease Control has
declared the outbreak contained, echoing statements from authorities in France
and Japan.

****

Ogawa Calls Black Death
Emergency

The Japan Times

Friday, June 25
^th

TOKYO (Honshū) Prime
Minister Taro Ogawa has declared a state of emergency in the Adachi, Kawaguchi
and Hatogaya metropolis wards in order to contain the spread of what has become
Japan’s worst disease outbreak on record.

“
We cannot
ignore the fact that there is a humanitarian crisis underway,” Ogawa said at a
news conference on Friday in Tokyo. “We have acted to contain the spread of the
disease, and we are evacuating neighbouring wards.”

Cases of the Black Death have risen
to the hundreds since the original diagnosis of the virus almost two weeks ago,
and the body count hit 90 early this morning.

Coinciding outbreaks of bubonic
plague in the United States and France have already quarantined sections of
Austin, Texas and Paris, France and health authorities have estimated cases at
220 and 312 respectively.

Scientists are still struggling to
isolate the exact strain of the disease, which has exhibited significantly
higher fatality rates than other known forms of bubonic plague and has so far
proven resistant to antibiotics.

The carrier for the disease has also
yet to be found, with the historic transmission via flees having already been
discounted.

Meanwhile, efforts to control the
spread of the Ebola strain dubbed Severe Viral Hemorrhagic Fever (SVHF) in Sydney,
Hollywood, Cape Town and São Paulo have stalled as…

****

Peruvian Army Begins Lockdown

Agence France-Presse (AFP)

…
said
General Muñoz.

Army trucks have begun ferrying
bodies to mass graves on the outskirts of the city as improvised morgues have
become overwhelmed, according to local media reports.

The flood of refugees to
neighbouring states, many wearing the white surgical masks already proven so
ineffective, have had to contend with police roadblocks and bridges washed away
by heavy rains.

Peru’s government remained
optimistic that the international research coalition formed yesterday under the
aegis of the World Health Organisation would yield a vaccine quickly, despite
the WHO’s declaration on Tuesday that the three diseases ravaging the globe had
been deliberately engineered.

“
We have
determined that the Severe Viral Hemorrhagic Fever and the new strains of
bubonic plague and the Super Flu were intentionally created ― designed to
become more transmissible and fatal than their original forms,” WHO Director
General Dr Paula Chernoff said in a statement.

“
It seems
obvious from the breadth and speed of the outbreaks that they were also
released deliberately, although no terrorist groups have so far claimed
responsibility.”

****

Walton Makes Address on
California Earthquake

The Washington Times

President Walton made an address
to the nation early this morning, rallying the public to increase relief
efforts across the country.

In the President’s address, he said
the earthquake that hit California yesterday would serve to stiffen the spine
of all Americans in their effort to overcome the challenges placed before them.

“
While Los
Angeles may not be part of the continental United States any more, the city and
its people will live on in the hearts and minds of all Americans, for all
time,” the President said.

“
In this
darkest of hours, it is our duty to rise up against the massive difficulties
placed in our path.”

The death toll from the earthquake
may never be confirmed, but local disaster relief authorities have estimated it
in the hundreds of thousands.

“
Most of the
city has been flattened. Parts of it are just gone. Just…gone into the ocean. I
can’t even begin to describe it,” an unnamed spokesman from the Los Angeles
Fire Department said.

Thankfully, large numbers of the
city’s population had already been evacuated in the effort to contain the Super
Flu and SVHF outbreaks in the metro area…

****

La Super Influenza

La Vanguardia

El Servicio Nacional de la Salud
emitió algunas cifras hoy  confirmando la muerte del número de muertos
producidos por la Super influenza en Barcelona.
Esta cifra en Barcelona
ha llegado a 100 000.

El caso inicial  en Barcelona se reportó durante los
últimos días de la semana pasada.

La cuota de muertos en Madrid,  donde se cree que fue
el inicio donde esto comenzó, se reporta en los miles ya.

Se considera  que el virus llegó al país a través del
Aeropuerto Internacional  de Barajas de Madrid.

El Rey Felipe ha tomado control, después de que las
muertes el Vice-Presidente y del Presidente fueron publicadas.

****

Radio Announcement

This is the BBC World Service.

Fighting has broken out across
Northern Ireland following the British army’s declaration of a total quarantine
yesterday afternoon.

Elements of the New IRA along with
groups of armed civilians attempted to storm army blockades at ports and
airports in Derry and Belfast, but military sources say the attacks were turned
back.

The Prime Minister is due to enact
further emergency powers tomorrow, which will include full martial law over the
British Isles and a suspension of parliament.

In other news…

****

Invasion du Canada

Quebec Post

Tous les contacts ont été perdus
avec les stations de control de la fronti
è
re de Edmunston
ā
Cornwell. Le gouvernement a admis que un grand nombre de refuges
(lesquels sont armés) ont inondé les fronti
è
res.

La police a calculé que le nombre de
refuges ont contribué avec l’épuisement du syst
ē
me de la Santé de l’Ámérique  avec 1.2 millions.

L’armée a envoyé 3 bataillons 
ā
la fronti
è
re, mais les troupes ne vont pas arriver jusqu'à demain...

****

Radio Announcement

This is…this is the BBC World
Service.

Following the death of the Prime
Minister, Deputy Prime Minister and head of the opposition, the Queen has
announced the dissolution of parliament, and urged all healthy Britons to
co-ordin- [Sound of coughing.] To co-ordinate…

I can’t do this anymore. God,
forgive me. No James, I can’t. Just turn it off.

[Quiet, rough-voiced singing]

God save our gracious Queen,

Long live our noble Queen,

God save the Queen.

Send her victorious,

Happy and glorious,

Long to reign over us…

[Coughing.]

Oh Lucy. Oh Lucy…

[Broadcast fades out into static].

****

Ham Radio

“
And the
Lord spoke unto Moses; say unto Aaron, take thy rod, and stretch out thine hand
upon the waters of Egypt, upon their streams, upon their rivers, and upon their
ponds, and upon all their pools of water, that they may become blood; and that
there may be blood throughout all the land of Egypt.”

And Aaron did so as the Lord
commanded, and so he has done again! The judgement of the Lord has fallen upon
this world of sinners, and the unclean shall be washed away; the adulterers,
the homosexuals, the heathens, the worshipers of false idols.

All across this land, the three
plagues are performing the will of God as the sword of Azrael. Repent, sinners,
for the time of the Lord’s judgement is at hand! For too long you have mocked
the word of the Lord. Repent, sinners! The wrath of a vengeful God is upon your
backs!

Reverend Robert Whitlock

****

Radio Announcement

Todos están muertos.

Todos están muertos.

Todos …. En el río.

Todos están muertos ¿Qué puedo
hacer?  . ¿Qué puedo hacer?

Lucía dijo, vamos al norte

Antes de morir, dijo que deberían ir al norte.

Hay un pueblo, dijo en el pasado de  Grant. La gente
iba ahí.

¿Hay alguien más vivo?...Por favor…
¿Hay alguien ahí? Por favor.

The Survivors

14 months since Kayley’s post…

An Unkindness of
Ravens

Stephanie Gunn

Ravens mourn their dead. I didn’t
know that, before. I always thought that ravens were solitary animals. I don’t
know where I got that idea. Maybe in school. I’ll never get to find out now.
Now, there is no school, no New York, no world.

Now all I hear is the mourning song
of the ravens, and in my head is the line from Poe’s poem:
Quoth the raven,
nevermore.

Back in June, when it started, we
thought they were just aberrations, the effects of global warming. The
hurricanes, the droughts. The earth gone crazy. But then the plagues came, the
Black Death, the hemorrhagic fever. And then the super flu. Rob told us that it
was the end of days, thrusting a moldy New Age tome in our faces. We laughed at
him, of course.

We stopped laughing when the plagues
hit New York.

This is my city, for all that I was
born on the other side of the country. I came here ten years ago, drawn by
Broadway, the television shows and movies. I was going to be a model, an
actress, a star.

I think you can guess where I ended
up, even if you can’t see my thigh-high boots and miniskirts.

I’m not ashamed of it. I made good
money, sharing an apartment in a good building with another one of Rob’s girls,
Renee. Life was easy.

I was working the night it started
here. A Japanese businessman. He’d been a customer of Renee’s, but she had
called in sick. I’d been happy to step in for her, borrowing one of her Versace
gowns for the night.

The dress had been discarded on the
floor, the champagne popped when he started to cough. This deep, rasping cough
that went on and on until he was coughing ropey strands of mucus and blood.

It was at this point that I blanked
out. It’s something I’ve done for as long as I can remember. When I’m with a
particularly repulsive client, my brain just switches off, and I go through the
motions on autopilot.

When I came back to myself it was to
find the bed littered with the pillaged remains of the mini-bar. Even the
chocolate bars had fallen prey, and a crumpled cigarette packet was on the
nightstand, for all that I had given up years ago.

It seems so insane now that I
thought that renewed habit was the worst of my problems.

I returned home to find Renee gone,
and Rob seated in the living room. I had blanked out again on the trip, but
found myself unlocking the door with a bottle of bourbon and carton of
cigarettes under one arm.

Rob fixed me with bleary eyes as I
entered. “Renee’s dead,” he said, his voice flat.

I dropped the bottle of bourbon, the
cigarettes following to splash into the puddle. “What?”

He rubbed a hand over his eyes. “It
was the flu. Just the flu,” he said. “But, at the hospital, there were people
everywhere. With the flu.
Dying
from the flu. There were bodies in the
corridor, on the lawn out front.”

I pulled the cigarettes from the
bourbon puddle. “People don’t die from the flu.”

He strode across the room and seized
my arms. “They do from this flu,” he said, his eyes wild. “People are dying.
There are corpses out in the street. They’re dying of the flu.” His fingers
tightened on me hard enough to bruise. “The goddamn flu.”

He began to cough.

That’s when I tuned out again. I
don’t know how much time passed in that fugue state, but I know that when I
came back to myself again, Rob was dead. It must have been days. He lay on
Renee’s bed, fetid fluids staining the silk coverlet. His eyes were still open,
bloodshot and staring.

That’s when I got really scared. I
ran from the apartment to the elevators, and punched the button hard enough to
crack the plastic face. The first doors to open revealed a group of elderly
people clustered on the floor of the cab, all dead. A rat was gnawing leisurely
on the neck of the closest woman, whiskers beaded with blood.

My stomach heaved, but nothing came
up but thin, acrid bile that tasted of ash. Thankfully, the next elevator was
empty.

The electricity flickered halfway to
the street, bringing the elevator to a screeching halt. It swayed from side to
side in the shaft, metal clanging on metal like the ringing of a church bell.
After a long moment it started again, shuddering its way down.

The lobby of the building was empty,
but someone had covered the walls with hundreds of pages of paper. When I moved
closer, I saw that each page was identical. As I took one down, the electricity
flickered again, the hole I had created suddenly an abyss. I turned and fled
from the building, holding the paper like a talisman.

The area immediately outside was
empty, a small pool of captured sunlight; the warmth baking into my shoulders
bared by the thin straps of the tank top I wore. I was also wearing an ancient
pair of jeans, the fabric little more than threads at the knees. On my feet
were Renee’s black stiletto Gucci heels.

The paper I had taken from the lobby
wall was crammed with tiny print. Several pieces were on the flu, as well as
newspaper clippings on the plagues worldwide. At the bottom was a journal
article, written by a girl named Kayley the previous May. In it she outlined a
sketchy plan to meet in Grants Pass if the end of the world ever eventuated.

I folded the paper carefully and
tucked it into the pocket of my jeans. It was then that I noticed the complete
and utter silence.

For me, New York has always meant
noise. The ever-present music of traffic, yelling voices, the thump of bass
from the clubs. Today, there was none of that. Just the eerie, flat silence
that crowded at my ears, pressing against the hollow of my throat, close as a
lover.

I ran then, heedless of the stiff
leather scraping at my heels, the screaming of my calf muscles. I blanked in
and out as I ran.

Lines of cabs still neatly parked in
their lanes as though waiting for a change of lights, their drivers still
behind the wheel, faces swollen with the putrid gases of death.

Black.

A woman sprawled on the sidewalk,
her hands reaching out for a nearby newspaper stand, now empty. Her fingers
were heavy with gold rings; her lacquered nails the color of blood.

Black.

A group of children huddled around
the still form of a dog. Their limbs were locked over the matted fur, stiff and
blue. I tried not to see the ragged holes in the dog’s sides where the
children’s teeth had been.

Black. Black. Black.

I stopped at an abandoned newsstand
and helped myself to a chocolate bar, digging change out of my pocket to leave
on the counter. No newspapers were left. I walked down the street, looking
upwards at the buildings to try to orient myself. I didn’t want to look down at
the sidewalk or street anymore. When my feet nudged against something solid, I
felt my way around without looking. I focused instead on the taste of the
chocolate, the rich creamy sweetness. It was warm, half melting in the packet.

It hit me then that it was summer;
that the dead would putrefy rapidly in the heat. Suddenly the chocolate tasted
rancid, and I tossed it away half eaten in a trashcan.

My sense of direction clicked in
then. I was only a few blocks away from Central Park. I walked them quickly,
eager for the refuge of the park. I passed a hot dog vendor on the way. A hot
dog, complete with mustard and ketchup, sat on top of the stand. Next to the
food, a large black bird eyed me before dipping its beak to the sausage,
tearing away a shred of pink, gristly meat. I shooed the bird and took a bottle
of water from the cart. I didn’t leave any change this time.

Strangely, the park was almost
empty. I passed only a few corpses, splayed out as though sunbathing. Their
eyes had dried to opalescent pools in the bright sunlight, lending them the
aspect of surprise, as though death had snuck up behind them. Gotcha.

I swigged from the already warm
water as I walked, feeling a thin sweat break out on my forehead. The sky above
was completely clear, a gorgeous summer day. A month ago, there would have been
dozens of people sunbathing here.

I came across another of the black
birds after a few more minutes of walking. This one was perched on a small rise
in the lawn, gazing steadily at me as I approached. It didn’t move when I moved
close, not even when I attempted to shoo it. When I looked over the rise, I saw
why.

They were a family, united by rigor
mortis into a single unit. The baby was wearing denim overalls, unsexed. The
father was dressed in full army regalia, camouflage useless against death.
Letters embroidered on his breast spelled his name: Brown. Their eyes were all
gone, ragged crimson holes left in their place.

It hit me like a soft blow to the
midsection, standing there looking down at the Browns. This was it. The world
was at an end, and I was left, somehow immune to the plagues. And except for
the bird still staring at me, I was alone.

I lay down on the grass next to Mrs.
Brown, curled an arm around her waist. Her flesh was hard beneath my touch, feeling
more like stone than muscle and skin. I closed my eyes. Prayed the lord my soul
to take.

When I woke again, the air was
cooler, the sun a dim orange eye sinking beneath the buildings. The bird was
still there, watching. But now it had been joined by three others, all arrayed
in a neat line along the ridge, all gazing down on me. Were they ravens? Crows?
I didn’t recall ever seeing anything but the ubiquitous pigeons in the park
before. The pigeons were all gone, leaving only these black birds. The lines
from Poe’s poem rolled through my head, and I knew. They were ravens.

A series of shots echoed across the
park, unnaturally loud in the stillness. I scrambled to my feet and was running
towards the sound when another volley of shots sounded. I didn’t care if it was
a madman. It was someone alive.

I found him near the edge of the
park, blood still pumping in arcs from the hideous wound that had consumed most
of his face. Surrounding him were at least a dozen ravens, all dead. The
closest was still bleeding, its thick blood blending with that of its murderer.

As I watched, a group of ravens
spiraled down from the sky to form a circle around the fallen birds. As one,
they began to vocalize, the noises coming from their throats rising and falling
like song. Were they mourning?

“
A group of
them is called an unkindness,” a voice said from behind me.

I whirled around, blood hammering in
my ears. Sitting on a park bench was a man who appeared kin to the mourning
birds. His hair was long, as black and glossy as their feathers. He had skin
paler than anyone I had ever seen, tracings of blue veins mapping his life. His
eyes were fixed on me as intently as the raven’s had been, a deep sapphire; the
color of the sky at dusk.

He lifted himself off the bench with
a dangerous, feral grace, his steps eating up the distance between us with
disconcerting rapidity. He was wearing brand new combat boots and a pair of
black jeans slung low on his slim hips. His chest was bare but for a tattoo,
its ink faded, obscuring what it had originally been.

“
He was
going around shooting the ravens,” he said, gesturing to the corpse in the
middle of the circle of mourning birds. “He must have reached his target or
something, because he turned his gun on himself.” He slipped through the ravens,
who shifted slightly to allow him passage, though they didn’t break their song.
He knelt down and began to pry the gun from the dead man’s fingers.

“
You can’t
do that!” I protested.

He worked the gun free and wiped it
on the man’s shirt, tucking it into his waistband before pillaging the corpse’s
pockets for ammunition. “Why not? He doesn’t need it anymore.” He slipped back
through the circle of ravens again. “There’s no law that says only the good
guys survived.”

I found that I couldn’t look away
from the gun, this murder pressed against his pale flesh. “Have you seen anyone
else alive?” I asked.

He shrugged, muscles sliding
smoothly under his skin. “There was a baby in the building I was in, crying.
But the door to the apartment was locked and reinforced, and I couldn’t break
in.” He was quiet for a moment, rubbing his fingers against the stubble on his
chin. “There must be others, but I haven’t seen them.”

His accent was strange to my ears.
“Where are you from?”

His lips curved in a half-smile.
“That obvious, is it?” He laughed. It was a harsh noise when juxtaposed against
the song of the still-mourning ravens. “I’m Australian. I saved up my money for
a few years to be able to come here. I’m a songwriter, thought I could make it
here.”

“
Well,” I
said, arching one eyebrow in a practiced coy smile. “There’s a lot less
competition here now, sugar.”

He stared at me for a moment before
laughing. “That’s true, I guess. You’re from here?”

I nodded. “For the last decade,
anyway.”

“
What did
you do for a living?”