Cough (16 page)

It was already after midnight and Nadia needed a break. She just wanted a few hours of sleep. Before stopping for the evening she called her husband and then followed up with a text message. She wasn’t told to be secretive, but she knew better. Just on the outside chance someone could read her communication, she wanted to be as evasive as possible.

She was going to rest with a little bit of weigh off her shoulders. There was little more she could do. The antidote and vaccine were slated to go into production in six hours. Plus, her oldest son, a brilliant computer programmer finished the OBAPP or Outbreak App he had designed years before. It was a basic reporting app that made it easy for health care providers to report an outbreak. The app would then track cases and map them.

Three years earlier the World Health Organizations scoffed, but as of two hours earlier they had uploaded the app to the servers and sent out notification for all healthcare providers to download it.

The app dedicated solely to Hemorrhagic Respiratory virus cases. It was easy. After logging into the WHO site, they downloaded the app. If they had a case, they launched the application. It was easy. Three fields.

Provider or Hospital Code

Number of suspected cases.

Notes.

Send.

Nadia and her son were both administrators and not only did they have access to see results, they received notifications.

“It may still have a few bugs,” her son said. “But it will at least give you an idea.”

Bugs or no bugs, Nadia thought. For her own personal peace of mind, her son would be able to see it soar out of control and he would be able to put the family contingency plan into motion.

He would be able to move the family out to an isolated area if need be.

Nadia knew she was safe, she just had to make sure her family was as well.

She was at ease and her eyes were heavy. It was time to go to sleep.

A futon was in her office and that would suffice. Just as she sat down her phone beeped. She chuckled as she read the message from the President.

‘Everything good?”

She replied. “App launched. Vaccine goes to production. All quiet. No new cases.’

As soon as she hit send, an eerie feeling of ‘she spoke too soon’ came upon her when she heard an unending series of blings and beeps coming from her tablet.

She jumped up and raced across the room to grab it.

Notifications from the OBAPP came in rapidly and nearly froze her screen.

It couldn’t be right. No way. It had to be a bug that her son mentioned. Because there was no way, no how she was receiving a thousand case notifications in less than a minute span. It was too many, too fast and if it was true … Nadia knew her staying two hundred feet under Washington DC was no longer necessary. It was beyond her control. It was indeed … over.

<><><><>

It had been a good twelve hours since they lost contact with the survivors of flight 473, but Air and Rescue was certain they had a lock on location. That information led them only to the tail end of the plane. Just when they were about to call it a night, they spotted the rest of the plane in the middle of a cornfield.

The spotlights lit the plane that rested tilted on its side.

“Command One, this is Ren92, we have an affirmative on 473. Over.”

“Ren92, do you have any visual on survivors. Over.”

The pilot, Ren92, peered down. He saw movement, cornfields waves and he did see survivors running. Perhaps their way of signaling for him.

“Command One, that’s affirmative. We have movement. Please advise. Over.”

“Ren92 do you have a position to land and extract? Over.”

“Roger that. Over.”

“This is an extraction mission only. No other survivors. You are searching for a Sharon Kelly. Fifty-three year old Caucasian female. She should be in Airnamics uniform, be advised this is a BSL 4 extraction. Over.”

“We are advised. Will communicate once extraction is made. Out.”

The pilot circled the area and found a safe landing place not far from the plane. He initiated the exterior spotlight of the chopper for the BSL4 team. While they disembarked his aircraft, he placed on his mask.

The extraction team was a two man team consisting of two soldiers heavily experienced in level four bio safety.

They knew their mission was to get in and grab Sharon Kelly. They didn’t know why or care why, that was not their job. Getting her was.

Corpsman Baker led the search. His vision was limited and blocked by the mask of the biohazard suit. He was guided by his own flashlight and spotlight beams of the helicopter,

They landed only fifty feet away and as soon as he stepped into the cornfield, airplane in his cope of vision, he heard the thunk.

Thunk.

Pause.

Thunk.

“What is that noise?” Baker asked.

“I don’t know, sir.” Replied the other soldier.

Twenty feet into the walk, eyes focused forward, Baker heard the movement of cornstalks just before he felt the bodily slam. Something or someone ran into him knocking him off his balance.

“What the hell?”

“Sir,” The other soldier reached down. “You okay?”

“Yeah.” Baker grabbed his hand. “What was that? Did you see?”

“It looked like someone running.”

“Jesus,” Baker commented. “Let’s put the exterior speakers on.”

“Roger that.”

They were closer, and not only did Baker see the plane, he could hear the coughing. “We have infection.” He spoke to the other soldier. The placed on the external communications.

Thunk. Thunk.

“We are here to help,” Bake called out. “We are looking for Sharon Kelly.”

The plane had flattened a good section of the cornfield in its landing and as soon as they emerged into that clearing, Baker nearly fell over a body. Using his flashlight he shined it on the person,

They were still alive. They coughed, jolted and their arms thrashed back and forth.

“Infected,” Baker said. “You go that way. Look for Kelly.”

“Will do.”

The other soldier veered to the right and Baker continued straight ahead.

What was causing that noise? It was steady and it continued.

With each step he took, the more the scene didn’t make sense.

There were infected, but they didn’t stay still. They ran amuck, coughing with each step. He moved his flashlight left to right.

The beam of his light caught a male. He sat on the ground, rocking back and forth. With each cough he hit himself in the head. Cough. Hit and then he’d jump and jolt in some sort of rigid short term convulsion.

“Something isn’t right …” Baker started to say but stopped when he heard a high pitched long scream. He turned his flashlight. A woman stood rigid, arms to her side, screaming out. Continuously screaming. Bloody tears rolled down her cheeks. She just screamed, like a spoiled child taking a temper tantrum...

“I found her.” the other soldier called out.

“Where?”

“Near the front end.”

Thinking ‘Thank God’, Baker raced over. He could see the soldier by the twisted yellow escape slide by the front of the plane. He just stood there, flashlight aiming down.

“Found her.”

As soon as he arrived, Baker closed his eyes.

The woman. The extraction mission was dead.

It was obvious she was trying to get in the plane. Her body was twisted, her red hair bloodied and matted. Her left eye was swollen and her face the recipient of scratches and bruise. Her twisted legs were covered with tattered pantyhose. Nylons that were clawed and ripped as if an animal got a hold of her.

The flashlight beam hit the name tag of ‘Sharon’.

“This is her,” the soldier said. “What’s that in her hand?” he moved the beam.

Baker reached down. Her grip was firm and stiff and he nearly had to break her fingers to reveal the item. “An inhaler. Christ,” Baker sighed. “What happened to her?”

“I can only guess. But I’m pretty sure.” The other soldier moved the flashlight beam.

The source of the steady ‘thunking’ was revealed as the beam of the flashlight illuminated a man in an Airnamics uniform. His face was unrecognizable with the amount of blood that covered it. He didn’t stop, nor did he bother to look at them or the flashlight. He kept on task. He was the reason for the noise. Full force he ran straight into the plane.

Thunk.

After he fell backwards, he stood up again and repeated.

Run. Slam. Fall. Cough.

Thunk.

Baker reached down and grabbed the inhaler. He didn’t know if it meant anything, but it was all they had.

“Let’s go. Head back.” Baker instructed.

“We just leave?” the soldier asked.

“We just leave.” Baker turned and led the way.

“What do we report?”

“Do you know how to describe what you just saw?”

“No, sir.”

Baker stopped and looked back at the other soldier. “Well, yeah, neither do I.”

With one thought on his mind, and that was to get away from the plane, Baker moved steadily back to the chopper. He hadn’t a clue what he just witnessed or what caused it, and he was pretty sure no else did either.

She could be anyone. Any visitor, tourist, worker, anyone that was exposed to those who fell ill twenty-eight hours earlier. Tens of thousands of people were exposed and just didn’t know it. She was one of them who knew.

Jane Doe played by the rules.

When authorities requested that everyone at the Grand Casino remain there, Jane understood. Sure, she was scared, but she saw why. She watched as hundreds of people were seized by some sort of choking fit and dropped to the floor around her. One of them, a young man she had seen several times during her trip to Vegas.

She first ran into him on the bus. He was returning from Fremont Street and raved about how awesome it was. Jane Doe told him she was going to go down there and planned on it. She saw the same young man the next morning at the hotel coffee shop, and then that fateful night at the casino. He had just hit a jackpot, was high fiving his friends. Jane smiled at him, thinking he probably didn’t remember her.

Then she watched him die.

It didn’t take long for the authorities to be honest with them. They were informed there was a suspected biological weapon released and it had a three day incubation. They weren’t sure if those exposed were contagious before they showed symptoms, but were certain they were once they coughed.

As frightful as it was, Jane Doe abided by the quarantine.

She would know in three days, or so she thought, if she was infected. A part of her felt certain she was, the young man was ten feet from her when he died. She just hoped that she didn’t suffer the same way. While quick, it was a horrible death. Jane Doe prayed that is she was infected that maybe the contact version of the illness would be different.

Her prayers were answered.

Jane knew, she felt it internally, almost as if she were in tune with the bug. It was there. There was something different about the way her chest felt. As if a big giant dry patch was somewhere just below the nape of her neck.

What she didn’t realize was that it wouldn’t be seventy-two hours since the man died in front of her it was seventy-two hours since she first was exposed. Or something near to that. The ‘in tune’ with her body symptoms were actually the virus.

She was still in quarantine when she heard the first cough. Her eyes widened, was it happening again.

One person, two, then more and suddenly, her chest tightened. It felt like she inhaled a brick. Suddenly she couldn’t breathe. The need to cough was overwhelming. The first few coughs were easy, the next few were out of control. Within seconds she felt her airways close and inhaling was a chore, she couldn’t get a breath. The more she panicked, the less she was able to breathe. Then out of the blue, the coughing stopped. Jane Doe was still unable to breathe freely. It was thick and her eyes burned as if on fire. A continuous stream of blood poured from her nose. No one was around to help her. They backed off screaming. She was a freak, a monster, a deadly being.

Her legs weakened and she found a spot to sit down. More than anything she was dizzy and lightheaded, almost as if she were drunk. She didn’t recall falling asleep, but apparently she did, because when she opened her eyes next she was no longer in the casino.

They had moved her. It was some sort of odd quarantine. No bed, no windows, just gray stone walls and floor. The doorway was an opening and she walked to it.

“Hello!” she called out. “Anyone.”

As soon as she stepped through that door, the wall shifted and closed.

She was trapped.

“Anyone! Please, I’m sick.” She pounded on the wall. Fist over fist. “Let me out.”

The wall slid.

Was she in some type of maze? Was it a joke? The opening led to another small hall and within seconds, another door blocked her in.

She cried out a bellowing scream. It caused her to cough. When she did, blood shot from her mouth and landed on that wall. She reached up, ran her fingers down it then slammer her palms against the wall.

What was going?

Why was she trapped? It was never ending. Every turn was another blockade, and despite her fighting, the walls kept coming.

<><><><>

What Nadia wanted to say was she couldn’t watch anymore. But the answers were needed and warnings needed to be issued.

The video feed from the Grand Casino played on her tablet. She watched one woman repeatedly walk into furniture, people, pound her fist against them, back up, turn and do it all over again. She’d cough, scream and call out unintelligible words.

The woman was one of many.

They had one thing in common, they all did a bizarre repetitive ritual, broke for a few minutes and continued again.

“What is this? Why are they behaving like this?” she was asked.

Nadia explained that it appeared a good portion of the contact victims were experiencing hallucinations. From what she witnessed. That perhaps the virus was causing electrons to misfire and what the camera saw was totally different than what the sick person was experiencing.

Hallucinations, like with LSD, were the only explanations Nadia could give for the outbursts. They were only violent to others if others got in the way.

The behavior varied. From walking into things, striking out, jumping on the floor, and continuously crying out.

How long it would last, she didn’t know. The only clue she had was from Kimble’s research and it said contact victims lived twenty-four hours.

One thing Nadia was certain, the behavior wasn’t random, somewhere in the depths of the victim’s minds they were elsewhere. She recalled reading an article by a behavioral researcher, whose work was noted in many psychiatric journals. The researcher Katelyn Rushe found that hallucinations were merely comprised of society’s obsessions along with fearful obsessions of the inflicted. If the LSD user played a violent game, he or she would act it out. If the drug taker was obsessed with zombie shows, they behaved as such.

The theory actually gave way to the term Rushe Syndrome.

The search and rescue team reported seeing passengers from flight 473 acting similar. Unfortunately, Sharon Kelly’s miracle treatment went down when she did.

The only thing that found was an empty inhaler in her hand.

Nadia looked at her notes on it.

Was that? Could it be the inhaler? Nadia wondered. It actually made sense. The airways restricted with the virus, inflaming to the point of bleeding.

The inhaler alone was not a long term treatment, but perhaps combined with something else, it could extend a life. Unfortunately, the virus was so deadly, she didn’t see how ‘long term’ it could be or how long it could extend a life. She supposed in some cases, long enough to say goodbye would be enough for some people, instead of watching those they love suffer, struggle and succumb quickly.

The Sharon Kelly post mortem suggestion warranted a look into.