A dresser with broken drawers sat against the wall next to the door. Above it, on the wall, hung an old model viewing screen. A remote control rested in a holster of sorts on the dresser. The old technology and furnishings were cozy. More importantly, the bed was very soft, just the way I liked it.
“Yup, me too,” Shift replied.
This has been a very long day. And we’ve only traveled 100 miles or so. That was part of the plan though. We took the Fluxor, which has plenty of room for the four of us and our gear, so the ride was nice. But the constant stops were taxing.
Shift, dutifully fulfilling his assignment as travel coordinator with the bunker, kept our speed at a terribly boring pace. Not his fault I guess. At each stop, we used the binocs to scope out buildings and fields in the distance. Getting used to those took some time. Hopefully our speed will pick up as we get better at this, or we’ll never get to northern Canada.
The Fluxor can travel at speeds up to 180 miles per hour, but not safely. Most drivers are unable to maintain speeds in excess of 120 miles per hour in a craft like this. We are unlikely to ever get anywhere close to that speed. Because our goal is to find and vaccinate the living, we intend to drastically scale back our speed in all areas but the wide open roads. We need to be able to see signs of human life, even in places where Mike hasn’t seen any through the satellite feeds.
Shift will be discussing our travel plans with Mike and Dr. Shevchuk over the MEHDs, or Multi-dimensional Eyeglass Holographic Displays, numerous times throughout each day. The general idea is that we’ll travel day-to-day with updated instructions from the bunker about locations of likely human life. Our travel will be slow and methodical as we pass through town after town.
But importantly, today, we wanted to find animals. And we did. We found a huge farm not far from the bunker. Many of the animals were dead, particularly those inside barns and corrals. But some free-roaming animals were still alive—cows mainly. A few animals were sick. We vaccinated every one of them still living; many cows, several chickens, and two pigs. Hopefully some will live and we can use them to produce food in the future. We’ll continue looking for farms throughout our travels, studiously logging the locations where immunizations take place.
“So, where are we headed tomorrow Shift?” I asked. After leaving the small parking lot outside the cabin this morning, we had traveled generally northwest toward the Massachusetts-Vermont state line.
“We’ll keep traveling the same direction,” he answered. “Once we get to Interstate 91, we’ll take it north until we reach the Canadian border near Montreal. Then we’ll head west through Montreal to Ottawa.”
“Are we still going to Churchill?”
“Yeah, that’s the plan,” he replied. “The goal is to travel northwest from Ottawa.”
“Still no plans to go to Toronto?” I asked.
“Yeah. Yurgi told me a little while ago that Toronto’s bunker has finally duplicated his research and inoculated some people today. Those people will be leaving the Toronto center in a couple of days heading south and west, hopefully vaccinating along the way. So we won’t waste time going over there.”
“Makes sense,” I said. “So does Churchill still look good?”
“Yup; looks great actually,” Shift said.
Before we left the bunker, research and satellite video logs suggested that there were hundreds of people alive in Churchill. Somehow, they’d escaped Anthrax E. If that holds true for the next few days, we hope to vaccinate as many as 1,500 people there!
“Does Mike, or anybody, have any theory about why Churchill seems to have escaped Anthrax E?” I asked.
“Yes, I do,” Shift replied, as he reverted to his lecturing voice. Shift is a gifted and renowned anthropological historian, which is why he was asked to get involved in the crisis at El-Alamein in the first place. His knowledge of ancient diseases and their effects on human life proved invaluable in the bunker. Of course, his modesty won’t allow him to accept praise to his face. But, without considering it, he often becomes “the professor” when asked to explain something in his specialties. I think it’s cute, which is why I encourage him.
“It’s isolated from almost everything. There’s only one road in and out from the south and one to the west. The only paved road, coming from the south, isn’t equipped with energy modules, so travel into the area is restricted to older automobiles or hovers with energy rejuvenation cores. And, for much of the year, that lone road is covered in ice. Then, it’s impassable for most vehicles. The dirt road to the west heads off into the wilderness.”
“But isn’t it next to a huge bay or something? What about boats?” My knowledge of the geography of North AM is obviously dismal.
“Yes, it’s sitting on Hudson Bay. But boats don’t really operate much during the winter because parts of the bay freeze over. So, before the IWO issued its order shutting down travel and international commerce, very little travel was happening anyway because it was winter. Once travel was shut down, it’s likely that trains and boats stopped moving in the area altogether. So, only personal vehicles and hovers could get there; but why would anyone go so far away? Anyway, that’s my theory. Isolation and timing.”
“That’s interesting,” I said sincerely. “So, assuming we find people there, what are we going to do with them after they’re vaccinated?” We had discussed this topic before, but I hadn’t been a part of the final discussions in the bunker. I was tending to other matters.
“Well, that’s a little sketchy. Dr. Shevchuk wants to wait and see what we find. But he wants us to make that decision on the ground, so to speak.”
“There are probably tourists there, right? Not everyone there would be natives. So maybe some of them will want to go home.”
“I thought about that,” Shift said. “It seems likely. There are polar bears all around the Churchill area, or so I’m told. That would have been a major tourist draw during the winter since they’re virtually extinct everywhere else. And the tourists would have been stuck there when travel was halted, if they obeyed the rules. And that’s a possibility since no commercial craft would have taken them out of the area.”
“Yeah,” I said. “If I was stuck in some place where I was isolated, knowing that a crazy disease was destroying the human race, I’d probably want to stay where I was too. So, what do we do about them?”
After a simple discussion, which we ran by Angel and Street, we decided that we should stop in Manitoba to pick up three more large hovercraft, one to be driven by each of us, along with a huge supply of energy rejuvenation cores. Our goal now is to vaccinate and leave the additional hovercraft in Churchill so that any of the non-natives who want to return “home”, wherever that might be, can use the machines to facilitate that initial travel back to ‘civilization’.
May 22, 2093—Web post: Dr. Steven Porter
Jon, where are you? Please post.
May 24—Shift
“Shift, this is crazy,” Dr. Steven Porter said through the MEHD.
Each person from the Boston bunker was provided a MEHD. These awesome contraptions allow us to communicate with anybody we wish, provided we have their ID number. Basically, the MEHD allows us to communicate via real-time holographic display, which is the MEHD’s main purpose. So, not only do we hear each other, we can see each other, standing, sitting, eating, or whatever else the person might be doing during the com. Even more amazingly, the users of a MEHD can smell what each other smells and, if allowed by all users during a com, the participants can actually feel what the others are feeling—their emotions, fear, hunger, love. It requires a bit of discretion on the part of the participants.
“What’s crazy?” I asked. Steve’s face showed genuine concern.
“Well, I got home this morning. Actually, I don’t have a home. It’s just rubble. But I went over to the house where my son was staying. It was empty.”
“That’s not too crazy Steve,” I replied. “But where is he? Did he leave a note or something?
”
“No. That’s the crazy part. I’m sure he would have left me something to go on. He’s a smart kid.”
Steve broke down. It’s very difficult for me to watch grown men cry, but not because it makes me think any less of them. Actually the opposite. I just don’t like to cry along with them because it makes me feel weak. Sometimes, like now, the MEHD provides a little too much sensory information.
“I’m sorry Steve. I’m sure he’s around. He’s not dead, right? You would see his body if he were dead. Maybe he’s just out exploring. Maybe he went shopping or went for a round of golf.” I was trying to lighten his spirits.
“Yeah, maybe. I didn’t see a single living person on my way here though. It was a little scary to me. Jon’s only 14 years old.”
“I can imagine.”
“You probably think I’m a wimp or something. But I wasn’t scared of any danger to me. I’m sure I’m perfectly safe. The scary thing is that there isn’t any real danger to me anymore. Any person who might have taken my son or caused him harm is probably dead. It’s scary because the world as we know it is no more.”
“That is certainly something I understand Steve.”
“Anyway, it seems unlikely that Jon left against his will,” Dr. Porter said. “But then, where is he and why did he leave?”
“Have you talked to Mike?” I asked. “Maybe he can go back through satellite feeds and try to find him and follow him.”
“That’s a good idea,” Steve said. “I’ll talk to Mike; but I don’t know how many cameras our little town has. It might be tough.”
May 25—Anta
“There ain’t nobody left but us, and this guy,” Street said, pointing to the road in front of the hover. He sounded a little too much like the thug football player of days gone by. But his point was well taken. It’s remarkable what Anthrax E has accomplished in such a short time! There truly “ain’t nobody left but us”, or so it seems.
The rotting corpses in every town and village are so odiferous as to completely overwhelm our senses, even though we haven’t been up close to one yet. We haven’t seen more than a couple hundred corpses along our route. But one of them lay in front of us now, in the middle of the road.
“I have to see it!” Dr. Angel Robertson said.
“Let’s go then,” Shift said. “But it isn’t going to be pretty.”
We each exited the Fluxor from a different door and slowly walked around to the front of the hover. The sun was directly overhead, and its heat was radiating off the roadway. Hundreds, or thousands, of flies were flying and buzzing around our heads, getting thicker the closer we got to the corpse. I pulled a bandana from my pocket and tied it around the lower half of my face, mostly to keep the flies out, but also for the smell. The others noticed. I’m sure they wished they had thought ahead, as I had done.
With Shift in the lead, we crept toward the body, as if sneaking up on someone still living. Street looked the most nervous. Even though we’d been immunized, we still hadn’t had a real test like this, so we didn’t really know that it would work. This was the closest we’d come to the disease . . . and the smell . . . yuck.
As we walked toward the body, Angel pulled out her MEHD and set it to record. She began to chronicle the event visually and audibly. Her inspection got very close and personal, much closer than any of the rest of us dared approach.
“As the biologist among us,” she began, speaking into the MEHD, “it behooves me to diagram and identify the characteristic marks of the beast that is Anthrax E. The skin and bones of the subject body remain relatively intact, but with fissures ranging from mere millimeters to several inches in diameter. Two gaping holes exist along the left side of the lower torso. Their origin is unknown, but appear to have resulted from a bite, perhaps by a wolf or other large carnivore. Through these torsol fissures, we can see the subject’s main body cavity. The inner organs and other tissue appear to have dissolved, or in some cases, are presently in a state of decomposition.”
Angel kept talking while the rest of us stared at her, swatting flies, watching with fascination as she became more and more animated.
Shift whispered, “This lady is nuts, man.” I agreed silently.
“Wet blood is seeping from the decaying organs. It appears to have remained fresh as the tissue around it dissolved, leaving the blood exposed for the first time.
“While the degree of decay on this subject appears to be less pronounced than in other bodies we have seen from a distance through the binocs, the end result is certain—the entirety of the body’s organs, muscle and other internal tissues will decay and rot until there is nothing left but an epidermal shell. Then, the skin will certainly dissolve over time as well.
“Certain of the bodies we have seen from a distance have been in a state of relative wholeness, while others are left as only a shell. We have not had the opportunity to get this close to any other body, but this particular shell is not rigid apart from the bony frame which holds the skin in place. The skin is still soft,” Angel continued as she poked the body with a gloved hand, “despite the decay process, or possibly due to the decay process. Likely, the skin is softer in fresher bodies, possibly indicating that the slow trickle of blood from within is keeping the skin relatively moist until the time when the last organ has decomposed completely.”
Angel was disturbingly fascinated by the spectacle. Three days ago, when we first sat down in the Fluxor outside the cabin, Shift described to Street and Angel the first body we saw in the cave near El-Alamein. Then he showed them the photographs Riyad Shafik took of the desert men and the photos we took back on January 6—four and a half months ago. From that moment on, Angel’s appetite for knowledge and her desire to see one of the bodies up close has been growing.
Well, she’s in it up to her wrists now—literally. She just stuck her gloved hands inside the body.
May 27—Web post: Jon Porter (14-year-old son of Dr. Steven Porter)
Dad, if you’re there, I’m so sorry. I know you must be worried and scared. I just read your posts. I didn’t have access to them until now. Let me tell you what happened. But first, everything’s okay. I’m fine. I’m not sick, but now I’ve been around more people with the disease—I know it.
Just after my last post to you on May 14, I heard a sound in the house. It freaked me out. I was so scared that I almost puked. It was so different from the sounds of wind and creaking that I was used to. It sounded like breaking glass, but this house is so big that it was more like an echo of breaking glass. I was a wimp and hid in the closet. I was there for a long time without hearing any more sounds. I don’t know how long I sat in there, but I had to pee so bad that I had to get out. I shouldn’t have done that. I should have just peed myself.
The closet door squeaked when I opened it to come out. Right away I heard the sounds of footsteps running up the stairs from the basement. I ran to the front door to get away from whoever it was that was running after me, but the lights were off so I didn’t notice that the door was locked. While I tried to get the door unlocked in the dark, this dude grabbed me from behind. He was huge, but not that strong. I thought that was weird. I kicked him and he let go of me, but then there was a second guy after me. They caught me again and dragged me out of the house. I would have tried to bite them, but I thought if they were sick or something, that would have been stupid.
They didn’t talk to me or to each other, but one of them—I think it was the guy that first caught me—kept coughing. I knew he was sick and that made me scared cuz I was pretty sure I was about to be kidnapped by these guys. I didn’t know what they wanted, and they wouldn’t tell me. They put me into an old auto that looked like the “Mystery Machine” from those old Scooby-Do cartoons we used to watch. I think it’s called a mini-van or something like that. It stunk sooooo bad. They made me lay down on the floor and I think I was laying in blood or puke. It was so nasty it made me hurl. They didn’t even care.
After driving for a long time, when i
t was almost morning, they stopped the Mystery Machine and made me get out. They pushed me into a hotel, up the stairs, and into a big hotel room with couches and stuff. They made me take off all my clothes and take a shower in front of some other people who were watching me—totally grossing me out. I wouldn’t have done it dad, but they had a gun pointed at me. There was tons of food and everyone was eating. I was starving but they wouldn’t give me any. Then, the one guy who had been coughing before started coughing again. That made everyone there, like 10 people, freak out and start running away. They all took off. I didn’t know what was going on, but I think when he coughed, all the other people got afraid that they were going to get sick too.
Within a few seconds, the only people left in the hotel room were me and the dude who coughed who had originally caught me back at the Sorenson’s house. I didn’t know what to do. I just stood there watching him as he coughed more and more. Then, some blood came out of his mouth which freaked him out, so he ran away too, leaving me alone.
I took a shower to get his germs off me and washed my clothes in the same shower. Then, when my clothes had dried (I used the hair dryer on the wall in the bathroom), I got dressed, ate as much as I could, stuffed my pockets with more food and left the hotel. I wasn’t too worried about being caught again, but I was quiet and checked around corners, being sneaky, like the actors in the holofilms.
Out on the street, I couldn’t tell where I was, so I started walking. This small town, just like our neighborhood, was empty. I didn’t see or hear anybody alive, but saw lots of dead people. Most of them looked like they were Mexican or from South AM or Central AM somewhere. That made me think that we had gone south, close to Mexico, but I still couldn’t tell. I wish there were road signs like you said were around when you were a kid, ‘cuz then I’d know where I was. I don’t have any of my personal tech on me—not a phone, tablet, watch or anything else. They’re all at home—well, at the Sorenson’s home. So, I couldn’t even use GPS to tell where I was. And I sure as heck wasn’t going to go snatch one off a dead person. Too disgusting.
Tomorrow We Rise (The Killing Sands Book 2) Page 2