The Reanimates (Book 3): The Escape (14 page)

Plague

It wasn't long before the newlyweds announced that they were expecting a baby. Their baby would be the first one in Wilsall and the first one since JJ was born a couple of years ago. It was awesome to know that we were settled in and didn't have a huge threat from a bunch of bad guys this time. Shayla was going to be able to have her baby in a clean, stable environment. The hope that this baby was going to be born safe and into stability was all that I had hoped for with JJ, and that yearning was stronger than ever.

We established a set trade schedule with a few towns. Like with Jack's group, the thing people needed most was medical care. I was grateful for Trisha learning so much with me, because on a few trade circuits, I needed to go with the guys, and it was comforting to know that I wasn't leaving our group empty handed.

Since the beginning, I was worried that the lack of medicine would catch up with us. I worried about infections rising up and that I would be powerless to help the sick person. I was right to worry.

There had been another call from one of the towns on the radio, specifically calling about medical care and help in a diagnosis. I knew that there would be a few people that were going to be waiting for me at the next meet, they planned to bring the sick first so I could see them and they could go home. I made sure that there were several bags of IV fluids and IV start sets in the medical bag I was taking with me. I sorted through the mostly expired meds that I still had, and I hit up Kristen's house for as many herbal remedies that she could spare. I didn't know what I was getting myself in to, but the nagging thought in my head was that I was bringing a knife to a gun fight. I had no idea of how apt that feeling was, and it terrified me.

Since this was going to be mostly a medical mission, we didn't need the whole team of trade people, so only Trent and Lucas were going with me on this run. We worked well together, Lucas was kind and compassionate, and I knew that he would be a lot of help, and I was grateful to have him with Trent and me. As it turned out, compassion was going to be a key ingredient in this visit.

These people were sick. Really, really sick. I was under the impression that there were just a handful of sick. There were nearly twenty people waiting when I came to them. I thought that I was going to be able to arrive at the site, build up some sort of field hospital before the rest of the people got to the meet and get set up, but they were waiting for me in a large tent, shivering despite the bundles of sleeping bags wrapped around them.

The sick were deathly pale, the sheen of sweat on their faces gave a wax-like look to everyone. Their eyes were red rimmed and lost a lot of the life they should have had, and their faces showed signs of significant weight loss; disproportionate to what the others had experienced. Deep, rattling coughs shook through them like thunder and left them gasping. Many hands came away from their faces with splattered droplets of blood on them.

These people looked like they were infected with tuberculosis. My heart plummeted into my stomach. I was going to be worthless here. There were no meds to treat them. This infection would rip through them unchecked by any antibiotics, and for close to 70% of them, they were going to die a slow death, drowning in blood and mucus. I looked at the faces of the people who were sitting with their loved ones, holding them close, trying to keep them alive and comfortable. I stood there, taking in all the faces, and I couldn't make myself move.

Trent noticed my face, how I was reacting to the scene. "Cali, what is it?" Trent whispered in my ear discretely.
"They're sick." Tears started to spring to my eyes. "They're really sick. It looks like TB and I can't help them. I don't have the resources. And the healthy ones holding the sick? I can't help them either. They are probably already infected."

Lucas was standing behind me and gasped when he heard what I was talking about. "What would you need to be able to help them?"

"About nine months of a few different meds per sick person, same for the people that are taking care of them, and that's just for the actual bacteria. They'd also need all sorts of respiratory meds, and stuff to help the symptoms. I can't even begin to imagine where to find enough for one person, let alone enough for everyone who has symptoms and the ones who haven't started to feel sick yet, but have it. I don't know what to do." I took a few deep breaths and forced my brain to stop panicking. There is always something that can be done. I channeled my days of hospice care, where all the treatment was centered around making the person comfortable.

This was the only card left to play. It wasn't the best card, but it was better than nothing. Feeling resolved, I turned to the others and said, "What I can start doing is help make them more comfortable. It isn't a lot, but if I help get the coughing under control, there will be less droplets in the air. I can also bring the fevers down. We need to protect ourselves and that won't be easy. I don't have TB masks. If we double up on bandanas, that would be better than nothing. We need to have the people who are trying to help to wear a mask as well. I'm hoping that if they aren't sick yet they stay that way. We'll have a lot of work to do, but we have to try."

I tied a pair of bandanas over my face and shook my hands at my sides, like I was trying to make the anxiety I felt fall off of me like water. I looked at Trent and put on my most confident facial expression that I could muster. I looped the mantra of 'I could help make them more comfortable' over and over until I about convinced myself. With a determined stride, I walked to the tent.

"Hi, everybody. I'm Cali, and I hear that there are a few of you that feel like crap. I have some stuff that might make you feel better, so I'm going to borrow the people that are feeling okay to help mix up some teas and sort pills, and get the meds into you." I smiled as reassuringly as I could, and I was glad that no one would see how forced it was through my mask.

When the tea was all brewed and passed out, I made individual visits to the sick. I started an IV on the people that were showing signs of severe dehydration, but for the most part, people were doing better than I feared. A few of the healthy asked if they could do anything to help, and I had very few ideas. I asked if there were any nearby drug stores, and I sent them out for a run. I wrote out a list of helpful items like ibuprofen, chamomile tea, and anything that said cold or flu therapy, as well as any sports drinks. I added nice tissues and hand sanitizer in hopes of being able to contain everything.

I think that the idea that there was something being done was more helpful than the actual treatment. People seemed to perk up when they saw that there were people that were moving around like they knew what they were doing, and I think that seeing the people that were sicker than they were being treated by getting IV's started, helped them to know that when the disease progressed in them, there was someone there to make them comfortable.

Doing something helped me too. That freaked out person I was that didn't have a plan when I got there scared me. I didn't recognize her at all. I had to be someone doing, not sitting, or else I was prone to a freak-out episode.

The men that I had sent out were resourceful little scavengers. I had a lovely cache of tea and bottled drinks, and even a few bottles of cold medicine and ibuprofen. I thanked them profusely for all the work they did. I set up a schedule for people to take their medications and encouraged the helpers to keep everyone as hydrated as possible. I showed a few people how to change out the IV bags and how to refill the bags with a saline solution that I had them make. I cringed inwardly that I was actually recommending refilling the bags, but there was no way to keep the bags coming otherwise. I really stressed that the people that received an IV shouldn't be on them for any longer than they needed it, and to encourage them to keep drinking as much as they could.

At the end of the day, I felt like I did little more than throw a bucket of water on a forest fire. When everyone was as settled as possible and it was time to head back to Wilsall, I felt deflated and exhausted, and I just wanted to go home. The people I took care of were thanking me and all I wanted to do was scream that I did nothing. I didn't help anyone. They were all going to be dead no matter what, and I hated myself for it. I felt like I was doling out as much help as swearing to a toddler that kissing a boo-boo would make the owie feel better, all the while knowing that the kid actually had a broken bone. I didn't know what else to do though. I felt like a fraud, but I had to keep the smiley face on. I didn't want to take away the little bit of relief that they finally had.

The leader of the group walked with me over to the truck. He introduced himself as Jim. I could see why he was the one in the group that was leading them, he was straightforward and kind.

"I need to hear it from you. I saw your face when you came here, whatever is going on is serious, isn't it?"

"Yeah, Jim, it is. From what I've seen, it's serious."

"What is it? Is it contagious?"

"I'm not going to lie, I think that those people over there have TB. The fact that they are coughing up blood is a huge red flag, not to mention the fever and the obvious shortness of breath."

Jim didn't seem that surprised. His eyes told me that this wasn't totally unexpected news.

"I used the library after a few of them were sick and read a lot. I hoped that this was a passing flu bug, but what you just said is sadly not that much of a shock. I've been keeping the sick in a motel building, I told them it's so we could keep a closer eye on them, a hospital of sorts. It's not altogether untrue, but when I kept finding their symptoms in reference to TB all I could think was that I needed to keep it away from the general group." He laughed wryly, "I have a leper colony in the zombie apocalypse."

"Jim, you probably saved the lives of many by doing that." I looked him in his eyes as I said that. "And, I know that sucks. Really, really, sucks. Now, there are some good things to say. TB is carried by droplets. When someone coughs, the droplets spread, and if they are picked up by someone breathing in, they can take root. They aren't really spread by touch, and people need to keep about three feet away from the sick person. When I was a nurse in the before world, we had a patient that had TB who worked at a bank. She had a husband, a teenager, and a five year old. We thought we were in the middle of a public health crisis, and they had to investigate her coworkers and her family to see how far it spread and how fast. Her little one and her husband were the only people that caught it from her, and that was because she and her husband shared a very close space and the little one was a cuddler. Her teen didn't have it at all, and none of the bank employees or customers were infected with it. It's possible that there are less potentially sick than you think, and there is a good chance that there are several people with latent TB, which means that they could maybe become sick, and if you did a TB test they would show up as positive, but they may never actually have symptoms."

"Can the symptom free people spread this?"

"Nope. You have to have a cough to spread it."

"What do I do to help them?"

"Used to be, they'd go on a series of specific antibiotics for about nine months. Obviously that can't happen now, so all you can do is what I did today, and help them feel as comfortable as possible. Use all those old fashioned remedies as you can, chamomile, peppermint, elderberry, things with vitamin C. Help them keep as good an immune system as you can, especially in the helpers.

"Jim, I am so sorry I don't have better news for you. I wish I did."

"Heh, I wish you did too, but I thank you so much for coming out here. They look optimistic for the first time in a while, and that's worth mountains of gold. Speaking of gold, I want to send you home with something to express our gratitude for coming out. We have a couple of cows, one is a good milk cow, and the other is from a group that was intended for food. We want you to have them."

"Jim, that's too much. I didn't do anything."

"You did. You gave us all your time and energy, and you got us on track to help what can be helped. Besides, I want them to see you take them, because they are the kind of people that want to help too. We all talked about this before you showed up, that we were going to trade those two cows for this. It's not anyone's fault that the news was bad news. You are appreciated."
 

I conceded with a nod of my head, and I shook his hand. "Call out if you need me again."

"Will do." Jim motioned for Trent and told him to back the truck over to where a trailer was sitting. After everything was hooked up, Jim sent us on our way. We found the road out of there, and began the trip home.

I held on to my tears until their group was out of sight, and that was as long as I could hold it in. Trent pulled over so Lucas could take the wheel and he could sit with me. We moved to the back seat, where I leaned into his arms and cried.

Spaceman

Trent had taken to spending hours in the post office that was turned into the radio room. He had a huge map of the United States that he found in the auto shop and he hung on the wall in the room. He stuck a pin in every town that he got through on, and surprisingly, there were a lot of towns reporting in. There was a pin as far south as Arizona, a few in Canada to the north, Washington to the west and even a couple of connections in Illinois. He would sit there, suddenly run outside to mess with the antenna, bounce back in his chair, then cheer when he made a new connection. I was so glad that he had a hobby that he was enjoying, and I loved that he was being able to teach the kids about geography in the process.

There was a low and long cloud in the sky that he was trying to bounce signals off of. He told me that making far connections was a lot like a game, especially one of those games that involve a sling shot where you bounce your payload off of a cliff so it can hit all of the pins at the same time. That made as much sense as anything else so I nodded as though I understood. The ability to pin new places mattered to him, and so it mattered to me too. I was truly interested in the amount of groups that chimed in that they were there too. The human race was persevering. I loved seeing his face as he collected a new town, although I had to feel a little jealous here and there that his free time was so focused on the radio. Tanya laughed at me and said as long as his little midlife crisis was appeased by that, I should be happy. She recounted the time and energy that Tyreese had spent trying to find a nice version of his first car, but as it turned out there was no nice version of a Datsun 210, those things were flawed from day one.

Since that run, I was struggling a little bit with the full realization that people were going to be sick no matter what. I tried to find other things to do, like try to do the whole radio thing that Trent was enjoying, or helping in the garden to feel like my hands were doing something that mattered, but when things were quiet, the images of the emaciated people as they coughed blood still wormed themselves into my head. I was missing the idea of going to a hospital and having a well-stocked pharmacy at one’s disposal. I wanted to be able to help people out, not just make them comfortable as they died.

I was sitting in the radio room thumbing through a paperback when it occurred to me that if their town were to take a hit from the zombies, the sick people were going to be an easy meal to get. They were all short of breath so they weren't going to be able to run fast, and I could only imagine that the smell of blood that was being coughed up had to be something like the smell of steak cooking. There was no safe solution for them. There was one thing that my brain insisted on asking after that call; if it could happen to them, it could happen to us. That lone thought kept me up at night, tearing me from the edge of sleep.
The hiss that came from the radio changed as Trent twisted the knobs and dials, ripping me from my morbid obsession. He lifted the microphone and began to speak into it. "Wilsall Trent, This is Wilsall Trent. Do you copy?"

A garbled static broke through and the sound of a voice was mixed in the noise, totally incomprehensible. I put my book down on the floor and leaned forward, staring at the radio as if I was going to see something change like it was a television.

"Requesting repeat, message was garbled. Are you there?"
Silence fell in the room and we stared at the radio waiting for the reply.

"Wilsall Trent, we read you. This is Dr. Harold Hiller, broadcasting from the International Space Station. I must admit, it's a pleasure to hear a new voice."

My mouth fell open in awe. "Trent? Did you just Ham the space station?"

"I did," Trent whispered, his eyes wide. He leaned back in his chair and repeated, "I really did." He had a gleam of pride and joy in his eyes, his lips were turned up in a smile that he had no intention of suppressing. "Sir, it is an honor to be speaking with you right now. It may be too much to ask, I understand that you are busy, but is there any way I could talk you into giving me a second to have my group come to the radio? We have several kids in our group that would have their mind blown to know there was a person in space talking on the radio right now."

Dr. Hiller laughed a bit before responding, "Sure, that would be fine. I actually kinda miss talking to the kids. I used to do the school addressees on this here radio and had the chance to teach people about this place. It would be a privilege to be able to talk to them, if for no other reason than I want to remember what it was like. I'll hold."

"Get the kids," Trent whispered, as though he had to. "They are going to go wild."

I ran over to the school area where the kids were in one of the classrooms. As I burst through the doors, startling many, I called out "Field trip!" Every face was on me and the expressions were comical. "We have a guest speaker over the radio right now, and it's super long distance." I had a mischievous look on my face on purpose and they knew I wasn't going to be offering any spoilers. Lacey looked at me with a puzzled expression and I grinned at her. This was going to be a super cool surprise.
The kids bolted out of their chairs and put on their jackets to make the trip out to the post office. While they were getting ready I ran over to the garden and told Tanya and Kristen to grab the others. When I came back to the school the kids were filing out the door, and we took the short path to the post office.

When the last person came in the post office, and the door was closed, Trent got back on the radio.

"Dr. Hiller, this is a pleasure to meet you. An absolute honor. We are the residents of a town called Wilsall, located in Montana."

"Good morning Wilsall! It's lovely to hear from you guys. For those of you joining us, my name is Dr. Hiller, and I am a researcher on the International Space Station. We're flying over the northwest at this moment, so I think that's why we have such a nice connection right now. So tell me, how are you all doing down there?"

An appreciative whoa was heard as the kids realized what the man just said. Whispers about astronauts and outer space broke out from the kids mouths.

Trent clicked down the button and said, "We're doing alright. How are you guys doing up there? I never realized that there were enough supplies on that station to last you through so long."

"To be honest, Trent, we were more than a little scared at the start of this all. There were only about six months of supplies on board and we didn't know what we were going to do. We don't have any shuttles or anything to get us home, so we were going to have a lot of hard decisions to make. Want to know what saved our bacon? India's space program."

"India? I didn't know they were set up to send supplies to you guys." I said into the radio.

"They weren't to the best of any of our knowledge, either. That was part of how amazing this whole delivery was. No one knew that they were that much of a contender. They sent up an unmanned rocket that had nothing but supplies. We should have more than enough to last us at least five years, more if we ration well, and we're hoping something comes together to have a new plan in place by the time we are out."

"I hear that!" Trent replied. "We're hoping something gets fixed by then too." Trent chuckled. Drew whispered something in Trent's ear. When he was done, Trent clicked the microphone to talk and asked, "Sir, I have some kids that would like to ask a couple of questions. Do you have time for that?”

"I certainly do, fire away." Dr. Hiller had a warm laugh and I truly believed that he was happy to be talking to us.

Drew walked up to the radio and took the microphone. "Hi. I'm Drew. I'm 12. What's it like up there? I heard that the space station was a small place. Is it?"

"Hello Drew. Before we hooked the Mir station to us, we were pretty cramped. It used to be like a little apartment that you just couldn't leave. When we hooked up to the Mir that helped a lot, and since then we added a couple of modules. So now, it's a lot bigger and more the size of a house with special areas to work on projects: like how well things grow in a micro-gravity situation."

Liam took the microphone next. "Hi, I'm Liam. How do you guys eat and sleep up there?"

"We have sleeping bags that are hooked to the wall like a hammock. There's a ventilation system that makes sure the air keeps moving over us so we don't have a bubble of carbon dioxide over our heads. Our food right now is a bunch of tubes of stuff. No one wants to risk any crumbs getting into anything since there is no way to fix anything that may come up."

Abigail was the last one to want to ask a question, and so when it was her turn she looked like she had been thinking very hard at what to ask. When she opened her mouth, a shy little voice asked, "Can you see what is going on here? I mean can you see the zombies?"

"We have some neat cameras and telescopes, but we can't see fine detail. It's kinda like standing in an upstairs room and looking out the window to watch ants. With our good telescopes we can see the movement on the ground but that's about it."
Trent took back the microphone then asked, "How does it all look from your point of view?"

"It was amazing to watch the power go out. It started in California and New York and went chunk by chunk from there, like dominoes falling. It's interesting; we can tell where survivor groups are camping. Little dots of fire are all over the place like a string of Christmas lights. Most people in your country seemed to settle in the southern states, only a few are in your neck of the woods. Maybe they were avoiding the winters?"

"Is the rest of the world in as bad shape as we are?" Lacey asked.

"Yeah, they are. This thing went global really fast. There was one country that has been mostly unaffected by this, though. Ireland. Ireland closed down their borders very fast, and while I heard chatter that they had a couple in the very beginning, their aggressive lock down saved them from being overrun. For them, cars are still driving, the power is still on, and the factories are still producing goods. It's the only place on the planet that isn't dark, which gives an odd sense of disorientation when you're looking down at this big dark ball with only one part glowing in the night. They don't run any airplanes, I suppose jet fuel is just not worth the hassle. Ireland isn't that big, they can drive from one side to the other so they don't really need it. The U.S. government was renting computer server space from the people of Ireland, and I guess someone was paying attention to the packets that were coming in, huh?"

"They are okay? They have hospitals and medicine?" I breathed out.

"Yes ma'am."

"Too bad there is no way to get us over there." Shayla commented as she absently rubbed the baby bump that was starting to poke out a bit. "I would love to raise my baby in a place that is safe like that."

"It looks to me that they are still accepting immigrants. There are ships that take off from New York on a regular basis and steam out to Ireland, then turn around and do it again."

My mouth hung open. "They are letting people in?"

"That's what I've heard on the radio. We've talked to a few people from Ireland on the Ham. Once they understood what was going on and the transmission of the disease, they opened up a couple ports. I've talked to a guy that worked in one port. After people arrive there they have to stay in quarantine for a week, just to be overly cautious, but after that they will take you through the emergency help office so you can be screened for a job and are assigned a place to live until you get on your feet. They asked me to give this information to anyone that wants it. Hang on, lemme find what frequency they were on."

He put us on hold and we started looking at each other with the idea of making the journey brewing in our heads. I heard Dr. Hiller come back over the speakers, but I felt like I was already miles away in thought.

I was conflicted over the idea of going to a place where the power was still on. I liked life as it was, things were easier now, you grew the food, you ate the food, and you depended on the people around you. I liked being a farmer and a general health care person, although there was so much I didn't know. I felt like I was playing the role of country doctor, but I didn't have enough knowledge to be that doctor, not to mention that my entire life as a nurse was with technology, a stocked supply room, and a full pharmacy at my fingertips. I missed the ability to find answers from Google and know that there were resources all around me. I wondered if there would be a job for me in Ireland, would they accept some nurse from California? Was the return to a normal civilized life even possible after the last few years we spent living like this? We were used to being our own law, we were judge and jury, and we were the ones to deal with the consequences of our actions. We'd been living like that day might be our last, and made decisions based on the immediate consequences. Going back to normal wouldn't be easy.

I was vaguely aware of the continued conversation but as they continued to talk, radio was losing more and more connectivity, and it wasn't going to be long before we lost him completely. Trent said his goodbyes to Dr. Hiller, and we in unison said thank you to him.

It was funny how a couple minute long conversation could so totally worm its way into my head. It's safe somewhere. That little island that I always wanted to visit was safe and welcoming people. All we had to do was get over to New York. But at the same time, I didn't really want to leave. This was a serious discussion point that we knew would be the main topic at many tables that night. Trent and I decided that there was no point discussing what we were going to do on this just yet. Trent mentioned as he passed the salad that we really need to figure out how to get the signal on the radio to pick up people in New York so we can prove that there really was someone doing this and not some pipe dream that would leave us screwed if we were there and found nothing at all. I agreed that I was worried about wandering into some urban shipping yard, to find there was no ship, no transport, and nowhere to go since it was foreign territory.