Plague: Death was only the beginning! (8 page)

“We must face the truth that our life span on Earth is limited. But, we can make it worth every second.”

-Thoughts from the Author.

Chapter 22

Worldwide Deaths: 115,125,000 est.

Hitting the release on his web belt, Tom let the heavy weight strike the concrete flooring. He had walked the fence line for the entire complex today, and it stretched over three miles in total. For flat level ground, three miles was a cakewalk, but this was Missouri, and he had to scramble like a bird over some sections that were driven deep into the rocky ground. So, it took him about three hours each month to check that a tree hadn’t fallen or rolling rocks hadn’t damaged the fence. Having done so in the past, he now confirmed, by eye, that each and every yard of fencing was secure.

Sitting at his radio room desk, he listened to the bursts of static that were coming through the speaker. The countless voices that he had heard in the past on the current channel were now almost gone. The normal 14.300 MHz USB frequency, used by the Maritime Mobile Service Net, had only a faint single cry for help that soon fell silent. No one was there as Net Control, not even a single government station that was monitoring the channel now like he was. Knowing that answering the call was worthless, considering the situation as it was, he still felt badly for the lost soul dying alone in the wilderness.

Reaching down, he grabbed his equipment belt and chucked it into his locker. He would clean and check it later. Now, he checked his system to see if anyone was having problems at their own compounds. He refused to go inside their houses, but he could repair or replace generators and solar panels, on the outside. Because they were exposed to the sun and weather, the UV rays from the sun would sterilize them. Most people didn’t know that you could sterilize water by placing it in a clear bottle and setting it in the sun for eight hours. The UV rays did the trick every time.

There was only a single note from Jim, requesting that Tom check the wiring connections on the solar panels as they were running low on power. While the panels themselves had no moving parts, they were exposed to the wind and rain, as well as temperature changes. So, from time to time, the connectors had to be checked and retightened. It was a real pain in the ass, and a waste of an afternoon job, if there ever was one. He would have to power down the system, check and test every connection, and then power it back up to see if that worked. He had to do just that two months ago on the same system, and never did find the fault. As the system worked again, he noted the problem and left it for a professional to check. Jim passed on doing so to save money since it was working again. Now, this would be a critical issue affecting the amount of power that was available into the near future. Tom typed in a note that he would be over in the morning to effect repairs. He also requested that everyone remain indoors until he was finished. They still had a few days of their quarantine left to go. And there was no way he was pushing his luck with something this deadly. Tomorrow was soon enough.

Nearby, Heather closed the ward doors by hand after the power failed for the last time. All of the respirators, monitors, and IV control units had failed at the same time. While most had battery backups, they were only good for a limited time. That period had now passed. Without staff to care for the sick, as well as to monitor the still living caregivers, she was faced with an impossible situation. As doors closed off the dead, she told the few living caregivers to depart from the darkness about them. Most were already sick and had only been going to care for the living. Soon, they too would join the dead. Only Heather was still healthy; her family had not been and had passed away in the opening days of the crisis.

Heather waved her flashlight about to ensure she had everything she needed piled on the gurney. Besides her own belongs, she had placed a Lifepak portable EKG/defibrillator, IV fluids, drugs, isolation gowns, gloves, and a number of nursing scrubs. Under this were oxygen e-tanks, batteries, and oxygen masks as backup supplies. She had quickly realized that coming back to the hospital for supplies would expose her to dangerous diseases caused by the numerous dead.

Exiting outside, she pushed the gurney to the back of a parked ambulance and began to unload it. While her own car was nearby, it was too small to carry the supplies she was taking. And the ambulance, with its heavy-duty chassis, was built for the job. It was an easy decision to gas it up and to begin loading food, water, and medical supplies inside. It even came with its own bed, of sorts.

Finished, she sat for a moment on the tailgate and wondered where she was going to go. Her friend, the author, had passed on a secret during his last moments about a place of security where others had already built a home and would welcome a trained cardiac nurse with her own supplies. After checking her map, she mounted up and pulled away from the last hospital she would ever work at. Tears filled her eyes, but she had to remain strong if she was to make her way into this changing landscape.

“The life of man is filled with sorrow and regret. Some more so than others.”

-Thoughts from the Author

Chapter 23

Worldwide Deaths: 129,000,000 est.

While the world’s population was still teeming with life, society as a whole was crippled and afraid to show its face out of doors. The major cities had quickly succumbed to the swiftly moving wave of death. Panicked crowds ran through the streets, unknowingly spreading the disease with each breath and touch. Others fell, and in their death throes flung blood and bits of bloody spray about them. Each drop was a death sentence to whoever caught it.

In Moscow, Red Square was empty of life and as cold as Lenin’s tomb. The few surviving members of the population lay covered in blankets and shawls to conserve whatever warmth was to be found, as they too had lost all power and water days before. As luck would have it, the people saw this as a normal state of affairs and went about life as normally as possible.

Berlin, Germany saw things in a different light as the bodies of the dead were placed in dump trucks and taken to a mass gravesite outside the city. They were used to burying the dead after two world wars and aided by stories from the holocaust. After burning or burying six million Jews, the cities were efficiently moving each corpse with an almost clock-like expertise of movement. But, even they were struggling to care for the living at expense of the dead. They soon saw mounds of bodies being bulldozed into empty lots or abandoned buildings and set afire, even German engineering and efficiency had its limits. Within a few weeks, even the burnings had stopped as the people died by the thousands in their rooms and apartments, until no one could count the dead.

In San Paulo, Brazil, the city quickly emptied as the people ran into the jungle to escape the plague. This worked for a while until the disease spread to the local monkey population. They quickly started to die and fell from the trees into the local camps and water systems. Even the jungle was no haven from the Black Death.

Only in the Polar Regions, were the local populations free from its spread. Here, the cold killed the fleas and airborne bacilli before they could infect others. While transport ships had brought the disease to Fairbanks and points west on the Alaskan coast, the interior was fairly isolated and sat out the end of the world in semi-comfort.

But here and there, a handful of survivors were immune to the plague, and they watched the world die about them. Like Chevy Sands and Heather, they ruled as a population of one or two out of millions prior to that point. They walked the quiet empty streets and called out to whoever might answer. Man is a social animal and does not enjoy the solitude of a lonely existence. Even the King of New York got lonely.

Simon walked the empty streets of Bangor Maine, a toy wagon pulled behind him as he cried out for help. His mother, brother, and sister lay dead behind him in the dark and brooding house down the road. There was no milk or cereal left, and even Jonesy, his dog, lay quiet and still. He put on his hat and coat, filled his backpack with his schoolbooks and Iron Man toy, and headed for Grandma’s—wherever she lived.

Simon gave a tug to free his wagon from a hole in the street and wiped his eyes of tears. Grandma’s was nearby he thought, and he should get there soon. Glancing up, he looked to the cloudy skies and prayed that his father would come home soon. He had been gone for so long, and Simon missed him terribly. Looking back down, he saw a lone figure watching him. Daddy?

He started to run but quickly stopped again. This was a woman wearing men’s clothing. She just stood there watching him as he started to back away.

Pooling on the ground at her feet, a flood of red slowly gathered, meandered and crept its way between the stones. Here was another lost soul wandering the empty streets in search of life, but she had already given up hope of even finding it. Except now, it had found her! And it was either blood loss or hope that left her in a shivering mass on the wet ground.

“Sin has left us cold and alone in the gathering darkness.”

-Thoughts from the Author

Chapter 24

Worldwide Deaths: 197,000,000 est.

It was more than a month after the fall that Raj roamed the death-filled streets of New Delhi. Days before, he had been driven to find a gas mask to help cover the smell of rotting bodies lying about the streets. He was loath to stay any longer, but he was also terrified of having no destination if he did leave. The newspapers, television, and radio programs had all stated the level of death that was creeping through the cities. And living in a country of over one billion lost souls was too horrifying to contemplate. He considered finding a boat and sailing away, but he didn’t know how to sail. Even his driving skills were pretty poor as he had never owned a car, an impossible luxury even now and still totally out of reach. He even contemplated suicide but felt too cowardly to carry it through. So he walked, bag in hand, as he walked from shop to shop searching for who knows what just to get him through the day.

Finally, he made his way to the Temple of Shiva to pray to the God of death and destruction that now ruled the land. Maybe he could make the gods smile upon him by offering sacrifice of food and grains to appease their appetite. Surely, by now, they had eaten their fill. And kneeling by the feet of the statue he bowed his head, prayed, and fell into a deep sleep.

In Perth, Australia, Jimmy Joe filled out the back of his lorry with the final load. He figured he had enough food and water to last him more than a year or two in the outback. The long years of heading up a land train in the outback had given him the skills to survive almost anywhere. And as he watched civilization crumble about him, he filled up the multiple tanks on his lorry and began loading up to make one final trip at his favorite watering hole well past Alice Springs.

He was still amazed at how quickly the world fell apart around them. Two passengers on an intercontinental flight had gotten off the plane in Melbourne, and in a matter of days, the first people started dying in the streets. No one could understand the severity and the ferociousness of this particular strain of plague. Standard dosages of ciprofloxacin as well as other powerful antibiotics were completely helpless and did not even slow down the growth of the plague bacilli. They could only watch in horror as it swept through entire towns and neighborhoods like a wildfire on a hot summer day. Within two days, the death rate had reached well over 1000 per day, and in a week, 10,000 per day. Soon after that, all civilized activity ceased and anarchy reigned. Vital power and water systems quickly collapsed never to be restored. Even at the height of the panic, the government urged calm and for people to stay within their homes, while even the most hearty and adventurous thought long and hard before trying to escape into the outback and away from civilization. The ones who did so only helped to spread the disease even further into the isolated populations as they had to stop for food, water, and petrol. Each breath a death sentence and each cough a firestorm of corruption. Almost no one was immune.

As Simon sat at the feet of the woman and held a bloody bandage to her wrist, he cried and he prayed for salvation. With a moan, the woman slowly opened her eyes and gazed up into the cloudy skies over her. Had she died? Was this heaven or hell? She could only sigh and shake her head slowly as she searched for an answer. Finally, in a moment of clarity, she raised her head and gazed at the small boy at her feet who stared back with equal concern. Eventually, her eyes moved down to the blood-soaked bandage at her wrist and she grimaced. She had almost done it that time, and she could no longer afford the self-pity. This boy had found her, in which case others could do so as well. It was a good thing she had lost her nerve after making one shallow cut on her left wrist. Using her right arm, she slowly levered herself to a sitting position and accepted the bloody bandage to help stop the bleeding. Reaching behind her with her one good arm, she found a small backpack and asked the boy to quickly open it for her. Rummaging around, she found some purple vet wrap, an elasticized rubber bandage material, which had the ability to stick to it. Initially developed for caring for animal wounds, it was later found to be ideal in sealing human injuries as well. She got the roll started with her teeth and clumsily began winding it about her injured wrist. By the time she was finished, she had used the entire roll, but the bleeding appeared to have stopped and that was the important factor. She had the whole world to roam to find new supplies.

“Hello, my name is Sharon. What’s your name?” she asked. “Are you all by yourself?”

Simon shyly looked into her face. “My name is Simon. I’m trying to get to my grandma’s; can you help me?”

“I would be happy to help you, Simon. It is the least I can do for you since you saved my life. Do you know where your grandmother lives or what her last name is?”

“Her last name is Griswold, and she lives on Summer Lane,” replied Simon. “My daddy is in the Air Force, and he always said if I needed help, I could always go to grandma’s. And that she would always take me in and give me cookies and milk. Can we go there now? I’m very hungry!”

“Sure, Simon, just give me a few minutes to catch my breath, and we will be on our way. Summer Lane? I don’t think I’ve heard of her street name as being in Bangor. Are you sure that’s what it is?” Sharon asked. “Maybe I could get a map and look it up.”

“Oh, it’s not in Bangor. It’s in Phoenix!”

“Oh, well it may take a while then to get your grandma’s. Let’s see if we can find a place around here that has cookies and milk, shall we?”

Simon could only smile and nod his head. Cookies and milk were the best thing in the whole world.