Plague Book: One Final Gasp

by Druga, Jacqueline

  It wasn’t easy and it wasn’t a short route, nor did it have any less the horrors as seen on the deck, but they make it there, finally arriving at the bridge.

  It was a large room, the entire section of the top part of the ship. It was completely surrounded by a glass window. Inside Eve could see several people.

  “We aren’t the only ones,” she said with relief to Silas. “Thank God.” She didn’t see Glen in there, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t.

  She prayed he wasn’t one of those bodies, finding their final resting place decomposing on the deck of a majestic cruise ship.

  Quartermaster Lane introduced himself when he opened the door for them. He wasn’t what Eve imagined. He was young, possibly not even thirty. He wore a tee-shirt and his uniform pants. There was a strong smell on the bridge, stale air and body odor. Probably much like the suite where she and Silas buried themselves.

  “Is this it?” Silas asked, looking about the room to those inside.

  There were a dozen people, some employees, some guests, men and women. One child. All of them looked as beaten as Eve felt.

  “So far,” Lane answered. “I suspect a few more may make it up. At least I hope.”

  Eve asked, “Have you had any direct contact with any passengers or has that been ...” She immediately shut up when she heard the radio.

  “Please stand by for a message from the president of the United States.”

  She inhaled sharply and looked at Silas.

  “Don’t get too excited,” Lane said. ‘Ever since we powered up and started radioing for help, that’s come on every hour on the hour. Same message. I’m guessing it’s from a few days ago.”

  “My fellow Americans,” the president spoke. “It’s hard to believe that only a week ago the downward spiral of humanity began. Whether it was on our shore or across the ocean, its existence damaged ours. I, like many leaders have been removed and placed in a safe bunker. Like many of you, I am waiting it out. I have been in contact with a few leaders and I assure you, this is not the end. We are actively working on a plan that will heal this nation when we emerge from our safe houses. Help will be available. I ask that you wait. Be patient. Sometime in the coming weeks I will address through this station again when we formulate a strategy. Until then, keep the faith, know you are not alone. We may be beaten, but we're not broken. Gods bless you.”

  It was generic, Eve thought, kind of cheesy, and it had been longer than a week since the outbreak began.

  The quartermaster was probably correct in his assessment that the message was old.

  Lance nodded to another person who turned down the radio. “And that’s it. That is all we have. We have been trying to reach shore to let them know we will be docking, but so far it's been unsuccessful.”

  “It’s encouraging,” Eve said. “That’s encouraging. Do you think it means we just need to wait it out somewhere?”

  Silas interjected. “It doesn’t mean anything, Eve. You heard what he said. Once he formulates a plan. We shouldn’t wait for anything.”

  “I’ll leave that up to each individual,” Lane said. “Once we dock, we’ll have a better understanding of what happened on shore.”

  “Where are we going?” A woman in the room asked.

  “Boston.”

  “Isn’t that ground zero?” She asked.

  Lane nodded. “So they say. First hit so it will be ... it will be an indication, let’s just go with that.”

  Eve asked, “What do you think?”

  “I don’t know.” Lane shrugged. “I know as much as any of you. But I do know this, in about two hours ...” he said. “We’ll know for sure what happened to our world.”

  ◆◆◆

  Boston, MA

  When it first started happening, Elias was selfish, he thought only about saving his own skin, not taking the fall for the release of Virus X or Marcum Flu as people had taken to calling it.

  His arrogance and overwhelming feeling of being dealt a hand of injustice blinded him. Or maybe it was a protective front for what he knew would eventually come.

  It didn’t take long in that hotel room for him to realize it didn’t matter how it got released, it was a time bomb waiting to go off. A bomb Elias built himself.

  He watched the city afoot spiral into a fast burn. It went from loud and noisy, gunshots, sirens and chaos to ... nothing.

  Silence.

  Elias had big plans. He was going to atone for his sins. Make his way to the lab and work on a cure.

  Until it was clear there was no one to cure.

  There was no way he could create a vaccine that fast, but a treatment, a cure was possible. He’d pull a ‘Robert Neville’ from ‘Omega Man’ and use his own blood to create a serum, chalked full of antibodies that would aid anyone stricken with the virus. Possible curing them.

  Elias was immune.

  When he created the virus, he created the assurance he would never catch it.

  All of that went out the windows.

  His hopes were dashed with the pessimistic reality when no one returned to the news station. How long did he watch that television staring at the empty anchor desk?

  Until the screen turned to static and finally the power went down.

  Not long after that, midst of the August sweltering heat, the hotel room became unbearable and Elias knew he not only had to venture downstairs, but out as well.

  He made it as far as the lobby, it was tolerable, and he peered outside looking for movement, anything.

  Elias was always a loner, but the emptiness of the world outside the hotel frightened him.

  The next day he would search out a better place, one cooler, maybe even outside of the city.

  It was odd, because the electricity went out not even a week after it all started, yet it seemed like weeks to Elias, the days and hours just crawled by. Not even sleep made time pass faster.

  He looked at his phone a lot, read the text messages of friends, looked at his pictures and played that stupid game some actor was the spokesperson for. He was smart enough to grab a power bank from the gift shop, He had charged that, but the light blinked on that and it wouldn’t be long before Elias didn’t have a phone at all.

  Not that it worked, but it provided some entertainment.

  When he finally did go outside, he saw one person.

  Actually, he heard the noise first. A rattling, he looked for it and then saw a woman. She had her face covered in a mask and even in the heat wore a coat. She pushed a shopping cart full of stuff, and when she saw Elias, she took off running and she didn’t stop.

  Was she scared of him? Frightened that he’d take her stuff? Elias was certain it wasn’t because she recognized him, she started running long before she was close enough to see his face.

  Everyone was dead, wouldn’t she want to speak to someone?

  Elias was just as guilty, he didn’t bother to say anything to her or chase her.

  An empty world and still, people didn’t connect.

  Until he figured out where he would go and how he would get there, Elias settling on a deli style restaurant near the waterfront.

  At night, it was cooler there and aside from having plenty of food that wasn’t perishable, it was well stocked with booze. Elias stayed in a steady state of being buzzed. Although it seemed to take a little more each day to get him there.

  He had fleeting thoughts of taking his own life, but dismissed them. The world was his cross to bear. Conner had told him something like that. He wondered if Conner had survived, if he made it out of the city and joined up with his wife.

  Elias did a lot of thinking. He wondered how many people went into hiding, self-quarantine, only to discover that they or someone in their family was already infected.

  There were so many people on the streets afterward, it was hard to imagine the virus even remotely being contained somewhere.

  Again, Elias knew there were those who would never get it and those who could possibly beat it. More than lik
ely it would be outside of Boston in the rural areas. In Boston, it just didn’t seem like many beat it, maybe it was just him and Shopping Cart lady.

  Daily, he would walk around, take in a new area of the city, a new block.

  He was partaking in his later morning route before hitting another street, sipping on rum—his choice of drink on this day—he contemplated going back out to the area he saw Shopping Cart lady, listen for her cart. She couldn’t have gone too far and was living somewhere nearby.

  Boston was a huge city and while odds were against him ever seeing her again, it was someone else alive. It was a goal; find her or find anyone. Just as he thought when it would be that he’d never come across another human being he heard it.

  The boring foghorn.

  It blasted loud and long.

  One time.

  After a pause, three short blasts of the horn.

  He jumped up, nearly knocking over his chair.

  Did he really hear it? Was it his imagination?

  He downed his drink and bottle in hand, Elias raced outside.

  He looked left and right.

  When the foghorn rang out again, he quickly turned his head to the direction in which it came from.

  It was in the distance, but Elias didn’t need binoculars to see the huge ship making its way to the harbor.

  A big, glorious cruise ship.

  With it coming to port, that meant someone was manning the boat and that meant people.

  Excited and without putting down the bottle, Elias raced top speed to where he knew the ship would eventually dock.

  33 – DISCOVERY

  Franklin, PA

  They started with the most obvious ... the church camp. Matt had his strength enough after another day to go and get the 1-800-HOARDER truck from Sam Blaise’s property. It was cold, it felt wrong, but it was the only way to somehow pay respects to those who died. Not to leave them in the blistering heat rotting in tents.

  It was also the only thing he and Hervé could think of. Burying them was out of the question. There was no way they could do so. There probably was no way they could find all the bodies of those who died in Franklin.

  If ninety percent of the people remained and died, they were looking at thousands of people.

  The plan was to clear in sections, when they did, they’d take the bodies out near Midas Little League field and burn them.

  It didn’t go very fast nor was as easy as movies depicted.

  It wasn’t a big city.

  Those they found wrapped in blankets, laying on sleeping bags and cots, men, women and children, weren’t just numbers. They weren’t just nameless faceless people. They were neighbors, friends, people they saw on the street and in church.

  They had to stop every couple of people to take a break, to stop from crying.

  It hit hard for Matt, emotionally it was a challenge with every person he helped lift.

  Especially when Hervé made it personal.

  “He’d come in every Tuesday for egg salad,” Hervé said. “He was a nice guy. He tipped well, too.”

  Or...

  “She always smelled so nice.”

  “Odd thing to say,” Matt told him. “Especially as we’re carrying her body.”

  “Angel, her name is Angel. And I don’t think she smells as bad as the others.”

  Matt only looked at him.

  “Is it my imagination?” Hervé asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Because she always smelled so nice.”

  Matt got it. He did. It was just so damned hard.

  He finished carrying Angel to the truck and they placed her in. There were maybe a dozen or so in the back. It was the third day working on the church and it seemed they weren’t making much progress.

  “I need a break.”

  “I think we should carry one more,” Hervé replied.

  “I think we should say the hell with it, go get my daughter and find somewhere else to go.”

  “Like where?” Hervé asked. “The lake house? Dude, that won’t cut it for the long term. And do you think Franklin is the only place hit. Everywhere was hit. Everywhere is like this. Let’s clean up our home.”

  Matt nodded solemnly. “Fine. But I’m taking a break.” He wiped the sweat from his brow and headed toward the side of the church where it had been cleared and there was less of a small and some shade.

  A few steps into his walk he paused when he heard a noise in the distance. “Is that a car?”

  “It’s definitely someone driving.” Hervé moved toward the street. “It’s getting closer.”

  Matt watched Hervé step into the road. “Do you see anything? Should we go look?”

  “We don’t need to. There’s an SUV headed this way.” Hervé waved for the vehicle to stop.

  Matt moved toward Hervé.

  “Hey, Matt. You need to come here.”

  “I am.”

  The vehicle stopped and Matt could see it. He heard the door open. Another few feet and Matt saw it was Luke driving Stew’s car. Luke stepped from the vehicle.

  “You’re alive,” Luke said to Hervé.

  “Like you, I never got it,” Hervé replied. “Guess what else?”

  “What?” Then Luke shifted his eyes and saw Matt. He stumbled back some. “Oh my God.” He hurried over to Matt. “Mr. Hader. Oh my God. You beat it. You survived it.”

  “I did,” Matt replied.

  “You look …” Luke spoke almost anxious. “You look … okay.”

  Hervé coughed a laugh. “You should have seen him a couple days ago. I thought he was the walking dead. He looks better.”

  “Really. Oh … wait. Wait till Emma sees you,” Luke gushed. “She’s gonna be so happy. She misses you.”

  “You didn’t tell her I died?” Matt asked.

  Luke shook his head. “We couldn’t. We kept telling her you were sick.”

  “But she’s alright?” Matt asked. “She didn’t get sick.”

  “Not at all. I’m sorry I didn’t bring her,” Luke said. “She stayed with Stew. I came to start, you know, seeing what needed done here so we can move back and get ready for winter.”

  “That’s what we’re doing,” Hervé said. “Then we were going to go look for Stew’s lake house. Glad you’re here so we don’t have to go knocking on every lake house door.”

  “You don’t know where it is?” Luke asked Matt.

  “I didn’t bother,” Matt said. “Plus I was dying. I didn’t think I’d even need to know where it was.”

  “I can take you,” Luke said. “It’s only an hour and a half and …” He winced. “I’m sorry. I’ll write down the address. It’s not hard to find. It really isn’t.”

  Hervé looked curiously at Luke. “Why did you suddenly switch what you were saying, and why are you apologizing?”

  Matt answered. “Because he has been apologizing for months. It’s all he knows how to do with me and I never listened. I should have.” Matt stepped to him and extended his hand. “You saved my daughter’s life. You stepped to the plate and I will never forget that. Thank you.”

  Luke didn’t say anything. Maybe he didn’t know what to say or was too humbled. He nervously shook Matt’s hand.

  “Now, hating to leave Hervé,” Matt said. “I’ll take you up on that first offer of going to the lake house.”

  “Wait. What?” Hervé asked. “Leaving me? No. I’m going. All this will still be here when we get back.”

  “Good,” Matt said. “Will you take me to my daughter, Luke?”

  “Yeah. Absolutely.” Luke backed up to the truck. “Let’s go.”

  ◆◆◆

  Magnificent Jewel – Cruise Ship

  As quartermaster on the cruise line Lane had pulled into the cruise port many times at Boston Terminal. He was quite versed at how long it would take with pulling in. It was almost second nature to him, just as the ‘please stand by for an important announcement from the President of the United States,’ recording was.
/>   He had heard it so many times that morning he could have recited it word for word. He dismissed what he believed would be the final one he’d hear on the ship until it changed.

  “Good afternoon,” the president said over the radio.

  “What?” Lane spoke, shocked, looked at the radio, then raced to the door. Those watching and waiting to leave the boat were lined on at the railing. “Hey! New message from the president!” he shouted and ran back in.

  “… Accomplished in the week since the last message was sent,” the president said. “Admittedly, I wasn’t expecting the enthusiasm to rebuild what is now broken.”

  Lane focused on the radio as the others poured in.

  “What did he say?” someone asked.

  “What’s going on?” asked another.

  “Shh.” Lane held up his hand.

  “We have worked effortlessly, day and night, my team and the others that have made it into the bunker. Our scientists tell us that as long as we take precautions, we can emerge and begin. Sadly, at this point, all those who were exposed to the virus have already caught it. And had done so and passed no less than five days ago. The virus only lives on surfaces for twenty-four hours. Take precautions with the bodies, while the risk of viral contamination is slim, there are other dangers associated with removing the deceased. It will take a massive cleanup effort and there are not enough hands alive to bury all the dead. Because of this, we need to know how many survived. We will take it one city, one town at a time, in a cleanup process that will take years. In the meantime, we will begin our task to establish communities. In a few moments I will list the locations of what we are calling FEMA communities. They will serve as interim camps. On October first we will start accepting residents. There you will receive food, shelter and medical attention. These are short term. Once rural communities and towns are repaired and prepared, the residents of the camps will transition to new towns. It is imperative that we stick together as communities and towns. We have all lost and will grieve through this process. We ask that even if you do not intend to be part of the camps, you check in for the census. It is vital for our continuity. If you wish to volunteer in the rebuilding and assembling camp structures, please report on September first. We are in need of all skills. This message will continue to play until another update is recorded. Now for the locations.”