All over the continent, she knew people were making the same calculations. The cities were probably emptying in panic. She would not allow herself to panic. In fact, she was proud of how calm she had managed to keep herself. She had her emotions gathered and controlled, at least when anyone else was around.
Dorothy had to be the strong anchor; it would not be Thomas. Without his job, he would lose much of his identity. Could he telecommute from the farm? Would he have to quit? The thought chilled her. He would hate his life if he did, and he would probably take it out on her. He would be impossible to live with. However, he would be alive, and that mattered more than his happiness. She had to do what was right for the family, and she knew what that was...Thomas would not like it, but it was what had to happen if they were to live.
Either he came to the farm and stopped commuting into town or he stayed at home on his own. Never before in her marriage had she laid down the law about anything. The woman was not supposed to do so except in matters pertaining to the kitchen. Besides, she had never really needed to lay down the law before. Her husband was as willing to defer to her on women's matters as she was to defer to him on men's. This was a woman's matter: the safety of the children, her safety, and his safety.
For now she drove the boys home. Thomas was not yet back, and she feared for a moment. Only for a moment. The plague was not yet here. It might not even come, except that she could not believe that. Could not cling to that hope. She had to plan for the worst. To be prepared for what she feared was inevitable.
Her children caught on to her tension, and Junior was as silent as his laconic brother. Neither of them seemed to want to break the quiet that shrouded the house. Jace found a book and vanished into it, a miniature version of his father.
Junior just stared out the window. Finally he asked, "Are people going to get sick?"
"I hope not. It might not be able to spread this far." She was not going to shelter him, but nor was she showing him those pictures. She'd password locked the computer, just to be sure.
"I don't want anyone to get sick."
She wanted to hug him for that wording, so much less selfish than most boys would have used. Anyone. Not himself, not herself. "I know, Junior."
"Especially not you and dad."
And maybe a touch of childhood immortality. These things never happened to boys. Dorothy knew what was going through his head, that this would never happen to Jace. She'd seen that before. Some boys never lost that sense, stayed that way as men. Those were the ones who became soldiers and firemen.
That women became soldiers and firemen was to her a pure, historical anomaly; a break in the pattern that would resolve itself with time.
"We'll be fine," she assured him. The lie came easily, as much to herself as to them. In truth, she did not know anything. She thought she would be fine. "We might be going to Uncle Jason's."
"Why?"
She kept her explanation simple. "So we don't have to go into town to buy food."
"Because people in town will be sick."
"Maybe." Dorothy sighed a bit and looked past him out the window. "It's okay, you know. There have been worse disasters. People are resilient."
Humans survived, no matter what. She ignored the fact that civilizations had collapsed before. Or perhaps she simply did not accept the possibility of a collapse of civilization into her picture of the world. She knew about Rome, but to her it was columns and false gods, the reality that empires could fall impinging only on the very edges of her thoughts.
Chapter Four
Night was silent and sleep was not coming. Dorothy was normally one who rose from the dead each morning. Now she lay still, Thomas' even breathing next to her.
Would she give up on sleep and get up? You were supposed to get up and do something to make yourself more tired when you had insomnia. But she did not want to move, did not want to risk waking Thomas or the boys.
Somewhere in the middle distance a dog started to howl, its voice going through several modulated notes. The unmistakable sound went on and on and on. Normally, she would have slept through it. Tonight it was the last straw. She got up slowly, sighing a little as she found her house robe in the dark and pulled it on over her nightshirt.
Stepping out of the room in bare feet, she felt keenly aware of everything. She navigated her way through the house and finally stepped into the little den and booted up the computer. She knew it was a bad idea to court knowledge of the outside world. After all, that was what was keeping her awake in the first place. Her morbid curiosity drew her on.
"For the sake of sweet kittens." She was angry enough with herself to swear out loud, but the self-censorship was automatic. But something stronger was certainly warranted. The disease had started to spread into Texas, the plains, and the Midwest. It was growing exponentially and in its wake was a darkness both literal and metaphorical. No news came out of the stricken areas except those occasional, haunting images.
One scientist estimated the immunity rate at ten percent. The media now knew the progress of the disease. First confusion, then aphasia, then the victims stopped talking altogether. Finally, they became violent. It was like the zombie apocalypses that had been popular in fiction a few years ago...except the zombies didn’t die first.
There was a rumor that the disease destroyed the brain, rendered the person mindless, killed them while leaving the body alive. If that was the case, then victims were zombies in truth. She shuddered. And she prayed, something she was often bad at keeping up with.
Besides, where was God in this? Was He letting this happen? Causing it? In her mind, neither was appropriate behavior for a supreme being. A supreme being was supposed to be...well...benevolent, paternal, somebody you turned to in your hour of need.
Either God was not good or He was not omnipotent. It was something she had thought about before, but now, looking at the map somebody had posted of the disease's spread, it became confirmed in her mind.
And perhaps He could not be omnipotent, or Satan would not exist. Evil and an omnipotent God did not go together.
That left her with only one thing to trust in: her family. Family was the only thing that could support one through insanity, through darkness and death. But this darkness might tear her family apart.
Ten percent immunity, with the rest of the population becoming violent and crazy? If that was true, then it was the end of the world.
Dorothy had to survive and hope for a cure. But the mood that descended over her was enough to chase away any more thoughts of sleep...
...until she woke up stiff, having slept for several hours in the uncomfortable computer chair.
She felt more tired than when she had gone to bed.
-#-
"Thomas. I think you should telecommute from now on."
He opened his mouth to protest, words stopping halfway, then he sighed. "You're right. I can't stand it, but you're right."
"I'm not letting anyone in this family catch the bug." She refused to use the popular internet name for it. It gave the virus too much dignity and too much power over herself and others. She preferred to belittle it as a "bug."
"I'm afraid it may be airborne." He sounded resigned.
"And? There's still things we can do, precautions we can take. It's not going to just blow here all the way from, say, Raleigh without somebody carrying it." Dororthy was not going to let him get depressed by the situation, despite the fear that rippled through her. Somewhere inside, she felt a cold settle in, as if she had turned all of her emotions off so she could survive. Maybe that was how people faced catastrophes. Maybe it was how people became concentration camp guards. Perhaps she finally understood the chill ruthlessness that turned humans into one kind of animal. This disease turned people into another kind of animal.
"We can take them, but it's not a guarantee," he said quietly.
"Nothing is in life." At least the boys were wrapped up in their gaming console. However, Dorothy was not sure how large the ears
on the little pitchers were today. Knowing the boys, they were hearing all of it and coming up with the solutions of childhood. Crazy ideas that might even work. What would happen if both she and Thomas were stricken and they were immune?
They probably already thought they had a plan for that. The boys needed a real plan...but who was she to say that the plans they came up with wouldn’t work?
Alone, the boys would not make it, she realized. Or would they? "We'll find a way." She made the promise to herself more than anyone else.
Thomas glanced at the kids. "I hope so. Do we have a choice?"
"We never do. Life has to be lived."
He nodded, then with a sigh, walked upstairs into the bedroom and shut the door.
Dorothy swallowed. "Junior. Can I talk to you?"
He glanced up and then set the console aside. He looked bored.
"If both me and dad get sick, then you have to look after Jace. You know that, right?"
"And get away. We take a gun, we go."
Normally she would have shivered at the thought of an eight year old with a gun, but she nodded. Would Junior have to shoot somebody? Could he? The worst part was, she thought he could, if he had to. If they were really already dead, then there was nothing at all wrong with finishing the job.
The girl from the internet still haunted her. Would she...could she....might she have to kill... She could not shoot one of her sons. Thomas, maybe, if she had to, but the boys? What mother could? Perhaps some unnatural woman raised in a time where infanticide was normal; people had been twisted in the past and perhaps this bug would twist them again.
No, there was no perhaps about it. This bug would change humanity. Morality would take a second place to survival if they did not find a cure soon. Morality, and all things “human,” probably had already gone away completely in Seattle. Was there even still a Seattle?
She forced herself to breathe. Junior was looking at her oddly. "Mom. It will be okay." His small voice sounded more certain than she felt.
To be reassured by her own son caused a swell of pride within her. He was learning to be a man. "I'll make sure of it, Junior. I just...other people are not okay. A lot of people aren't okay."
With the childlike faith she had lost long ago, Junior said, "Let's pray for them."
She almost told him to go ahead without her, but she knew she had to support him and love him. So she bowed her head and pretended to pray. What she wanted to do was scream at God, ask him why He was letting this happen. But perhaps she already had an answer of sorts. The rumor was that this bug had been manufactured, perhaps as a weapon. The suffering she had seen in those photos caused by human free will and the human tendency to choose evil.
She imagined its creators as hard-eyed scientists in white coats who could make...unless. She frowned and shook her head.
Three days later, the full truth came out.
-#-
She watched the news. A talking head—a DC man in a grey suit—was giving the latest updates.
"The virus escaped from a biotech laboratory near Darrington, Washington. It was designed as a non-lethal measure to cause temporary aphasia in order to damage communications. It appears..." She realized the grey suit was trying to maintain a professional demeanor. His mask was cracking. "...that the virus has either mutated after its escape or hybridized with another virus to create a version with permanent effects. We have all resources mobilized to try and find a vaccine or a cure."
"Right," Thomas muttered. "Any bets that anyone who understands this bug at all was in the lab."
"We are asking that people remain calm and stay in their homes unless they need to leave to get food."
"We're going to Jason's," Dorothy said immediately.
"Dorothy..."
"He can produce enough food for us. He has the net. We won't have to leave at all."
"And what if we're already infected and take it to him?"
"They said the incubation period was only a day or two before the first symptoms. None of us have left here in two days. We're as likely to be clean as they are." At least that’s what the authorities and experts claimed. She was not sure she believed it.
He frowned. "I..."
"Thomas. It's the best way." She had never spoken to him like this before. Her voice was not angry but firm. Dorothy was in charge and laying down the law. "We have to think of the boys."
"The boys don't..." He sighed, "You're right. And besides, people are going to be hoarding now."
"I'll call him." She stood and left the room, her head beginning to throb slowly. She was mentally and physically tired. The insomnia had continued. It was just worry and stress—she knew that. Yet paranoia murmured, was it an early symptom? Was it already too late for her and her family?
She sighed and eyed the phone before picking it up. The phone rang and rang while she waited. It could sometimes take a while for Jason to pick up.
It was not Jason who answered but Janine, his non-entity of a wife. Dorothy did not much care for her; Janine was just too much of a shy little mouse to be any fun to hang out with. She did everything Jason said. "Hey. Is Jason around?"
"Out with the cows."
"Get him to call me once he's back." Asking Janine if they could come was a waste of breath. She would not say yes or no without consulting her husband. He refused to take a smartphone with him - he considered the devices an electronic plague.
That was not a good thought. Plagues were not something to joke about, not now. Maybe not ever again. This would be an event like the Great Depression. It would shape the country for generations if the country survived. If the world survived.
Janine's voice: "Okay."
She heard the click of the call ending, and her thoughts drifted right back to the virus itself. The experts claimed that ten percent would be immune, but even less would survive with the victims becoming so violent. At least, she thought wryly, they could be stopped by bullets. They weren't real zombies, that had to be shot in the head or something. The expert on the newscast had said the Silence was permanent. Dorothy felt no guilt about the idea of killing somebody whose mind was already destroyed.
Yet, she realized the violence would be the worst part. Who would let anyone close to them if there was the distinct possibility that they would turn? Could you have a society of isolated individuals and families? Not for more than a couple of years.
She saw the globe in her mind's eye and wondered if she was watching the extinction of humanity. She imagined alien archeologists puzzling out what had happened. If there really was no god, humanity was not that special and maybe some other race would take their place. That seemed more likely than aliens. Maybe the planet would be reclaimed by apes after all, like in that old movie. Nah, it would be the freaking raccoons. Those things already had hands and could, she swore, pick locks.
Maybe a race stupid enough to make designer viruses deserved to die, but she had not been so foolish and neither had her children...
She was not going to give up on humanity so quickly. It did not deserve to die, only the losers who had started this. The scientists were probably already dead, but what about the politicians who had come up with the idea? They were probably in a climate-controlled bunker somewhere with their families, waiting the bug out in safety. She hated those politicians. Hate was not an emotion she normally experienced. It was alien to her, yet she was not going to deny that she felt it. She felt she had a right to a bit of hatred.
Anyone still alive in Washington State had even more right. If Dorothy lived there - and was still alive — she wouldn’t want anything to do with the American government. They could all burn in Hell. She mentally consigned them there to spend eternity together, each unable to speak a language the other understood. Or perhaps a fitting punishment would be to feed those so-called experts to the plague victims.
She had heard rumors of cannibalism and wondered if they were true or just people with visions of zombies. Some were calling the plague victims that;
others named the victims Silents. Dorothy preferred victims. To call the victims anything else felt like blaming them and failed to acknowledge that these people had been murdered. This had been no accident.
Murder was the only word for it. Anyone involved in creating this plague should be hanged. Society didn't hang people any more, but somebody should build a gallows just for them. Nooses and white coats.
"I hate them," Dorothy said. She had never spoken those words in her life, but now they felt right and essential.
In this situation, it was perfectly fine to hate. Of course, some people would have disagreed with her. Some people thought hate was soul-poison and one must forgive others for the sake of one's own self. The problem with that was that to really forgive, you have to have — or force yourself to believe you have — some power over that other person. Forgiveness was power.
Dorothy was in too low a place to be able to claim that power right now. She could only hate.
-#-
Her family drove west towards the farm. Turning the farm into some kind of family compound seemed to be the safest way through this plague, perhaps the only way.
Yet even driving along the road scared her. Galatea had called, saying the disease was in Raleigh and she was going to the mountains. Dorothy hoped she would be alright. Then again, Galatea was pretty tough. Or was she? The woman had always seemed physically tough but emotionally fragile. Or had Galatea just been desperate for a girlfriend?
Maybe. Maybe the woman’s desire for Dorothy was even a compliment, but Dorothy had her man and no interest in anyone else. Ever.
If Thomas died and she survived... She had to consider all possibilities. She was not sure she wanted to live if the boys died, even if she could theoretically have more children. Theoretically. She was not sure she would try for another pregnancy, thinking about the risks at her age without technological support. Before, it had been another matter. At least she did not have to worry about it right now. The proof she was not pregnant had finally come, if late.
She was already starting to think as if the world had ended. At the side of the road, she saw a group of children, ten to twelve of them, none older than fifteen. They were not playing. The children had surrounded somebody, and the sight made her shiver.
The Silent Years [The Complete Collection] Page 3