The Virulent Chronicles Box Set

by Shelbi Wescott

  The incision went deeper.

  Ethan screamed, even in his fevered state, and rolled his head from side to side. Doctor Krause looked up, unperturbed, and paused until the wailing died down before moving to the red, stringy muscle.

  “Clamps,” she called and Ainsley answered by placing several within her reach. “Thread.” The doctor started to clamp Ethan’s exposed veins and sew several others shut. Still the blood seeped through the towels below his leg, turning the white into crimson.

  And still Ethan screamed, calling out gibberish, guttural exclamations of pain. Sweat pooled along his brow.

  “Darla,” the doctor said in a near-whisper. “If you could…there’s a bit more morphine we can use. This will be the last though or we risk overdose. Ainsley?” The young woman handed Darla a syringe as Doctor Krause continued running the blade into Ethan’s tissue and muscles and clamping the remaining, exposed pieces of his leg. Darla positioned her body against Ethan’s and then jabbed the analgesic into his upper leg. Ethan still whimpered and groaned, but his eyes closed, his head flopped to the side. His breathing became ragged and labored.

  “Check him,” the doctor said and her voice was tense and terse. Her daughter rushed wordlessly past Darla and listened through her mother’s stethoscope at Ethan’s heart.

  “Fine. Fast, but normal,” came the reply as Ainsley moved back into position.

  The doctor reached the bone. Ethan’s skin above the knee hung limply without anything to support it. Leathery and loose, it didn’t even look like skin anymore.

  “Saw,” Doctor Krause demanded and the saw was delivered. She flipped it on and the buzzing sound filled the room—Darla looked away as Doctor Krause instructed Ainsley to tug upward on the flesh to expose the bone. With ease and without flinching, Ainsley worked the fat and muscle around the bone, creating a clear path. Manhandled and cut to shreds, the inside of Ethan’s leg began to look like ground beef.

  It took four attempts, but then the bone broke free. Doctor Krause tossed the amputated leg to the ground and it fell with a thunk. Then she sprang into action, removing clamps, stitching veins, and positioning the remaining pieces of Ethan’s leg around the clean-end of the bone. She took the skin flaps and, like wrapping a burrito, folded them over the muscle and fat.

  She began to stitch the top and bottom skin flaps together.

  In less than thirty minutes, the entire procedure was completed. Ethan’s stump was stitched crudely and wrapped with layers of gauze.

  His lower leg lay abandoned on the floor.

  Blood splattered their clothes and the floor, and the room smelled like sweat, blood, and fresh meat. Doctor Krause removed her rubber gloves and shook her mask free and exhaled through her mouth.

  Ethan moaned and shifted, but he did not wake.

  “That’s it?” Darla asked.

  “No,” Doctor Krause replied. “He has risk of infection and shock and phantom pain. And morphine addiction, if we need to keep him sedated. Among other risks and worries. And I don’t have any knowledge of prosthetics…so, he’ll never walk again. If he lives. No. This is not over for dear Ethan.”

  Ainsley coughed into her shoulder and sniffed. She stood rooted to the floor, the stethoscope still around her neck.

  Darla kept her hand on Ethan’s arm and felt how hot his skin had turned. “What can we do? How can we help him?”

  “Nothing. We can’t do anything more,” Doctor Krause replied. She put a hand on her daughter’s back and gave her a small push back toward the garage. “Go on,” she said in a small voice to Ainsley. “Help watch the child. Go relieve Joey.” Ainsley obeyed, and she slipped out of the house with her head bent low, and her shoulders hunched. Then the doctor turned back and crossed her arms, looking around the room.

  “What can I do?” Darla called—her voice rising in fear and anger. “Is there anything I can do?”

  “We will stay with him until he wakes. Then we’ll move him back into his bedroom and care for him there.” She marched into the dining room and grabbed a chair by its back and dragged it over to their makeshift operating table. After checking Ethan’s vitals once more, she sat down and closed her eyes. Darla refused to sit and she refused to move. She stood by her friend, and looked at the horror they had created; her stomach ached.

  After five silent minutes, the women heard shuffling in the garage and steps in the hall. They lifted their heads in unison and waited with curious expectancy.

  Darla figured the news would be Teddy-related; after all, what other reason would Joey or Ainsley have for venturing back? She gave up a silent prayer that Joey had kept an eagle eye on her rambunctious child, and that the news from the house was benign.

  But it was Principal Spencer who materialized from the dark of the hall and into the light.

  The last time Darla had been anywhere near Spencer, she was shuffling away three angry and confused people from the entrance of the high school after he had told them, “Get out. You’re not my problem anymore.”

  He held a metal flask in his hand and he took a swig, bearing his top teeth as he sucked down his daily allotment of bourbon. Then he surveyed the carnage and whistled low and long.

  “Looks like I missed all the fun,” he said, his bloodshot eyes resting for a quick second on Ethan’s discarded limb. His mouth curled downward in disgust. “Jesus, this looks messy.”

  “Good afternoon,” Doctor Krause said in reply, her voice easy and calm. But she didn’t budge from her chair, nor did she leave her eyes on him for long.

  “Yeah, and a hell of an afternoon it’s been,” he said. Then he nodded to Darla, who regarded him with crossed arms and blatant disdain. “I’m here on official Whispering Waters business.”

  “It can’t wait?” Darla asked him, rolling her eyes. “If you haven’t noticed…your timing is shit.”

  “No, it can’t,” Spencer replied and he took a step closer.

  “Just stop where you are. You can speak to me from there,” Darla took her right hand off of Ethan’s arm and lifted it up to halt him in his tracks. “He’s at risk for infection. Do you mind? What right do you have to just waltz in like this?”

  “I’ve been talking with Joey—”

  “I’m sure the conversation was riveting.” Darla rolled her eyes.

  “Yeah, well. We decided it was best for me to move up here. Join you guys.”

  “Like hell you will,” Darla said and she took a step away from the table and toward the door.

  Doctor Krause turned from the debate and stood up from her chair. She busied herself with Ethan in a calculated attempt to avoid confrontation with the man who had unceremoniously whisked her away—she checked his temperature again and wrapped the blood pressure cuff around his arm, squeezing the bulb in her hand and watching the dial spin and shudder.

  “You’re not wanted. We’ve been doing great on our own,” Darla added.

  “Totally looks that way,” Spencer said with a look around the room. Darla huffed, but stayed silent. “Look, chica. It doesn’t make sense anymore to stay at Pacific Lake. If you haven’t noticed we’re the only ones left. And I’m not gonna lie…the building is really starting to reek. But you’re in luck…I’ve got no ill-will. I’ll even bring my supplies with me.”

  “Oh, how suddenly generous.”

  “This is the way it’s going to be,” Spencer said to her and he turned to leave. “I’ve been eyeing that cute little tan house on the corner. Couple houses down from yours. Decorating style matches my taste already. Owners were probably at work when the virus hit…nary a bloater in sight.”

  “You’ve been snooping around our neighborhood?”

  “Shopping. Property is dirt-cheap right now. Surely you’ve noticed.”

  “You’re disgusting,” Darla rapped her knuckles on the table and swore under her breath. She closed her eyes tight and let out a throaty growl. “There’s no room for your ego up here.”

  “It seems a bit tactless to mention that without me y
ou’d have no doctor. No Joey. Who’s been quite helpful…even you can admit that. Your problem, Darla, is you seem to think I’m the bad guy—”

  “Only a bad guy would forget that without Ethan,” she pointed to his unconscious body, “you’d be dead. And for the record, I was against bringing you along. I don’t trust you and I don’t care for you, and I don’t care if you know it. Stay at Pacific Lake.”

  Doctor Krause sighed. She opened her mouth like she had something to say, but then promptly shut it and returned to her chair.

  “What was that Doc? You want to weigh-in?” Spencer asked and he took another sip.

  Darla scoffed. “You don’t get to move into these homes and take over. Doctor Krause and Ainsley think you’ve made enough decisions for them, thank you very much. We make choices as a group here.”

  “Come on, Doc?” Spencer pushed again and Doctor Krause rolled her head back and looked the ex-principal in the eye, a strand of curly brown hair falling into her face.

  “It’s hardly the time to even start this conversation, since I’m clearly with a patient…Ethan is my entire focus. And I don’t care where anyone lives as long as we work together—”

  Frustrated, Darla shot the doctor a look and then threw her hands up in the air, agitated and defeated.

  “Then it’s settled. Say sayonara to your little self-imposed exile. It’s hard to hide when there are only a handful of us left alive,” Spencer replied swiftly and he turned to walk away. “I’m thinking of a housewarming party in a few days. Save the date,” he added with a smile, and then he walked back down the hallway and out of the house, leaving the doctor and Darla alone with Ethan’s broken, bloodied body.

  Chapter Three

  Brixton, Nebraska

  It was late afternoon when Lucy and Grant rolled into Brixton. Lucy’s heart nearly stopped when she saw the green population sign announcing their arrival: Welcome to Brixton. Population 26.

  It appeared that the population used to read twenty-seven, but someone had drawn over the seven with a sharpie—broadcasting the loss in crude, broad stroke marks. Beyond the sign was another half a mile of nothingness, flat plains, knee high grass waving, dancing, and welcoming them into the city like a parade.

  When they reached the first set of buildings, Grant rolled the car to a stop, threw open the door, and swung his foot out on to the dirt, stretching his arms up to the sky.

  Lucy followed behind him, exiting the car and looking around.

  Brixton was a ghost town.

  From their vantage spot, they could see most of the city: A church, a bar, a fire station, a schoolhouse, a general store, a post-office, and a library—beyond that a cluster of houses and a baseball field, and a red grain silo towered to the sky. The store and the bar stood side-by-side along the narrow Main Street.

  That was it; that was the entire city. All of Brixton could fit inside of one-quarter of Lucy’s local mall back home—a sprawling expanse of department stores, pretzel shops, and makeup kiosks. And the dusty town wouldn’t even take up one quadrant of the area. She’d never visited a city this small; a city practically nonexistent. A city of nothingness.

  Lucy couldn’t help but wonder about the people who chose to live their life in a place like this, so far away from civilization, removed from a decent shoe store or coffee shop. What did the people of Brixton do when they wanted to watch a new movie or go out for pizza? She started to feel sorry for the kids who lived here, but then she shook her head, frustrated with herself. It still took too long to realize that movies and shoe stores and nights eating pizza were relegated to the distant past.

  Unless Brixton had been protected from the virus that killed the world, everyone here was gone.

  “This doesn’t look promising, does it?” Lucy asked and she walked over to Grant and stood by him—they took in the flat landscape and the empty buildings. They had the appearance of a movie set facade. She wondered if they walked inside if there would be nothing there but exposed beams and open sky. “There’s no one here.”

  Only the church looked somewhat substantial with its white roof and bell tower and stained glass windows adding color to the landscape.

  “Hey now, don’t get discouraged yet. There’s only one way to find out,” Grant replied and he started to walk forward.

  Lucy remained with one hand planted on the car, her eyes searching everywhere for movement. She hadn’t expected a welcome sign or an army of people waiting for her, but she had expected something—she had hoped for people, for life.

  “You coming?” Grant called to her.

  Without answering, Lucy jogged to catch up. She kept pace with Grant, matching his steps as they meandered down Main Street, where the road fluctuated between paved and unpaved in increments.

  Their heads vacillated between the right side and the left side of the street—storefronts on one side, grass and a boarded up house, the church, and library on the other. When they reached the midway point, they both stopped.

  “Maybe we got all the clues wrong,” Lucy said and she let out a long, slow exhale. “There’s nothing here to see.”

  “Come on,” Grant waved her forward.

  The bar on the main strip sported a huge neon sign out front that read: Carson’s Place. With the power out, the sign looked depressing in the afternoon sun; the fluorescent tubing winding around itself in forced cursive. In the front window, the blinds were drawn tight, but the door was left standing wide open. Grant walked straight to the open door and nudged it open further with his toe before peering inside.

  Lucy, only steps behind him, sidled up to his elbow.

  Without a word, Grant walked into the bar and made a beeline for the blinds. He yanked them upward; the sun spilled in through the streaky window and flooded the area with light, illuminating a swirl of dust particles that floated around their vision. Lucy coughed and waved her hand—the dust danced and swam and settled on the floor.

  With the sun as their light, Grant began to inspect the bar. There were two abandoned drinks on the bar-top—a coffee cup and a brown liquor of some kind. The coffee had hardened to a block of solid sludge and the top was dotted with mold. White and green circles grew on the surface of the former liquid and crawled up the sides of the porcelain.

  The dust on the floor was undisturbed by footprints until Grant’s and Lucy’s own shoes created a pathway of tracks.

  “Totally vacant,” Grant stated the obvious. But he looked perplexed.

  “The virus?”

  “This place has been empty long before that.” He pointed to a bowl of fruit on the counter—formerly bananas, lemons, limes—they were virtually indistinguishable. Each one was merely a lump of green, dusty mold. If Lucy had touched one, it would have disappeared into the air. Cobwebs floated from the ceiling; the mirror behind the bar no longer displayed a reflection—the dirt and grime obscured every inch of its surface.

  “These drinks were left here,” Grant pointed. “And the door was unlocked. There are open bottles on the ledge. They left in a hurry?”

  Lucy felt a shiver crawl up the back of her neck and her arm hair stood on end.

  “I’m going back outside,” she whispered and shuffled back out into the sunlight.

  Without a word, Grant exited the bar behind her and stood on the street with his arms crossed. He looked up and down, his eyes scanning, searching. Then without announcement, he walked into the general store next and Lucy followed at his heels. The store was equally abandoned. Lucy ran her hand over one of the shelves in the fully stocked store. She passed by rows of canned goods, cereal boxes, and two liter bottles of soda.

  “This isn’t right.” Lucy called over the row of untouched supplies. “Unless…everyone here died before they thought about stocking up on things?”

  “Or maybe it’s such a small town that no one thought of looting?”

  “But look.” Lucy ran her hand over the top of a box of rice and held her finger up for Grant to see. It was darkened from the dust
.

  “Too much neglect. That box has been there a long time,” Grant said.

  “Right.”

  They left the store and stood once more in the center of the road.

  “I’m confused,” Lucy admitted. “Isn’t there supposed to be something here? Anything? I feel like I should be searching for the next clue maybe.”

  “Your father wouldn’t send us here for another clue,” Grant sighed and ran his hand over his hair. “That’s just mean spirited. No. What we’re looking for is either here…or it isn’t here anymore. Look, Lucy, I don’t think I’d want to stay here tonight and we’re almost out of gas—”

  “No. There has to be something here.”

  “So, Brixton. What are we missing?” Grant spoke into the road. Then he turned to Lucy, and he reached over and nudged her shoulder. “Don’t be discouraged. It’s not like we’ve seen the whole city.”

  “Yes, we have,” Lucy replied and she waved her hand in a sweeping gesture in front of her body. “This is the whole town. There’s no one in the bar or the store. There’s no one coming out to greet us. There are no dead bodies. It’s just like everyone here vanished.”

  Then Lucy raised her eyes and saw the post office. A wind-torn American flag flapped lazily next to its entrance, and a blue mail bin, covered in dust and mud, sat next to the entrance. She had an idea. “Alright, there’s one thing we can check.” She started walking swiftly toward the brick building; this time Grant followed her. When she reached the post office, she pushed open the single glass door and listened as a tinny bell announced her arrival.

  The Brixton post-office was a single room with a laminate countertop separating the front and the back. Along the far wall were PO boxes and Lucy realized that the townspeople must not have had mailboxes, but rather traveled to this building daily to collect their mail. Its cash register was ancient and the drawer was wide open; stacks of ones and fives, and a single twenty, remained.