The Country of Teeth and Bones

Prologue

The sun rises over Santa Verre, California. The 'jewel of the West Coast.' A dusty highway leads the way, past rusting cars, past vandalized buildings. A scratched sign duly reads out a message inscribed forty years ago, back in the electronics boom:

WELCOME TO SANTA VERRE, CALIFORNIA

HOME OF MCGRATH ENGINEERING

Below that reads a graph of the sign's population, as is common in most small American towns. It's covered in cardboard, scribbles and crossings out. It used to read 19,237. Now it reads 616. Get further in, and you find a collection of boarded-up apartment blocks, covered with the words CONDEMNED. DO NOT ENTER and graffitied bungalows, burgled and spray-painted by the youth of yesteryear. Near the cliffs, civilization still reigns, but not supremely. Old Mr Brunner, ninety-one, mows the lawn. He's got nothing else to do other then look at the shredded, bloodstained coat with its Victoria Cross resolutely hanging on. Nothing will ever repay him for the friend he lost. Harper Brittan, nine, loves listening to the adventure-filled stories that he tells while her father, Leonard, thirty-two, grieves over the picture of his wife, Amelia. It's been a year since her heart attack, but Leonard still hasn't forgotten what it was like. Overall, the town of Santa Verre is dead. Gone. Finished. The electronics factory that used to make TVs, video games and computers closed in 2004, leaving Harper's generation without a job. On a happier note, Ernie Parilla, also nine, rides past on his new blue bicycle, tooting the horn and smiling at Harper as he goes. Of course, this is all redundant to the old cormorant, still sitting on the telephone pylon after six years. Fed by the elderly, he's grown fat and lazy. It's a wonder the cormorant stays up. 20 meters away, in the living-room of Nora Blanchard, her husband and her five kids, the accidentally-left-on-TV blares an insignificant news story at full volume. The cormorant cocks its head, almost... listening?

An outbreak of a supposed 'new strain' of rabies has ravaged the small African town of Mokamba, Nigeria. A possible infection in the water supply is believed to have caused the infection of three villagers. Further spread in the poorly sanitised region went unchecked and it is now believed that over one hundred people been infected. Of these, 68 have been displaying symptoms. Nobody has died yet, although the strain is highly unusual. Attempts to link this with the 'Live Dead' video, recorded in what is believed to be a rural location in Northern China, have failed. The Chinese government is attempting to cover up knowledge of this video. More on this fascinating story later.

The cormorant shifts, uneasy. For the first time, it feels an emotion with which it is unfamiliar. Fear. Perhaps it is the waves breaking at the cliff's edge, or the gentle cawing of the far-off seagulls. Something is coming. Something big.

It's now September, two years on. The cormorant is dead, Nora Blanchard's eldest has moved out and Harper has celebrated her eleventh birthday. Aside from that nothing has changed. Except for tonight.

Harper Brittan awoke in a cold sweat. She burrowed under the covers, but oh no, the noises outside wouldn't let her sleep. Gunfire, tires, shouting. Giving up, she walked into the lounge and turned on the television. Another CNN report on the sicknesses, now spreading in Ohio. God, all anyone talked about was the sickness. The religious nuts at her school were all repenting, the video-game nerds chatting about zombies, the gossip girls wondering if the end of human civilization would chip their beautiful nails. Ugh. Harper wouldn't have believed it if she tried, even after the creepy video a nerdy kid had showed her. It looked so real, with the blood and the jagged footage, but the movie guys could fake anything these days, right? It was probably just another swine flu thingy. A creak in the house startled her. She was still scared; Dad had told her that the beams contracted because of temperature, but it was still creepy when the creaks echoed through the dark house. Suddenly, the sliding door smashed open and Uncle Theo came flying through the glass, breathing heavily. "Uncle Theo?" Harper whispered tentatively. Suddenly, three bullet holes appeared in his spine and he slumped to the floor. Harper turned and her father was standing in the doorway, holding an old Smith and Wesson .38 in his hands.

"Get in the car, Harper. Uncle Miles is waiting. Go on, go!' he yelled. Harper leaped into the backseat and shrunk into the leather. The normally funny Uncle Miles was frozen in his seat, not moving, not talking. Scratches lined his arms, although the skin had not been pierced. Her father cursed and floored the accelerator, shooting from the driveway and onto the main road. As they drove into town, they passed a caravan streaked with blood, two of the wheels missing. The inhabitants were on the roof, shooting down at shadowed, indistinct black figures. On Wilkerson Road, a house lay in ruins, the windows smashed in, the door snapped in half. Harper could just make out a sign. It read HELP US. A body, missing a few parts, was dangling from the ceiling. Strange things lurked in the shadows as they passed. Pulling onto the Calhoun Square Road, a burning car was smashed against an office block, but before Harper could see what was inside, Uncle Miles snapped out of his reverie and slid his hand over her eyes. Then he spoke. "What the hell is this? Is it the sickness?"

"I'd hazard a guess at yes, Miles. Very much yes. And it looks like those undead rumours coming in from Mexico were true." her dad replied. As he spoke, a woman, bleeding and pale, smacked against the window. Harper noticed purple bite marks on both her arm and her neck. "Take my baby! Take him!" she sobbed, and held up a bundle of blankets. Before either Leo or Miles could answer, a bullet hit the woman in the back of the head, smashing her skull against the window. A soldier ran on from his sniping spot in an apartment building, pursued by two screaming people. A man fired at a bunch of soldiers with a bow before being hit by an out-of-control van. A firebomb crashed into the wooden frame of the clock tower, setting it alight. Soldiers were desperately firing into the crowd. Their car skidded down a side road, and they were halfway down it before a huge horn blasted. The car abruptly slowed as the brakes squealed, but it wasn't enough. The rear end of the car was smashed by an incoming eighteen wheeler, flipping it onto its roof before it landed back onto its wheels. Leo had escaped the worst, but shattered glass cut into Harper's arm, blood spurting over the tarmac. Uncle Miles was crushed inside the car, blood running from the shredded door. Harper whimpered as her father hugged her tight. The first aid kit had been in the car, but got crushed when the glovebox crumpled. Leo swore, before turning to Harper.

"Can you run, baby?" Leo asked gently. Harper nodded, her lower lip trembling. He grabbed her hand and ran down the path.

After twenty minutes of running, Harper's lungs were burning. Her arm felt numb and her legs were cramped, but the edge of town was in sight. One problem; it was road blocked. Platoons of soldiers were training their guns on the various avenues out of town, shooting anyone with bite marks. When they got within twenty meters, however, one of the army men held out his hand.

"Stop! We've seen lots of infected persons; have any of you two got cuts, bite marks or boils on the neck?" As the soldier said this, Harper noticed that her dad stood and blocked her partly scabbed cut from view.

"No, no sir, we haven't." replied her dad timidly.

"But Dadd-" Harper begun.

"HEY! HEY YOU!" the soldier cried. Harper realised he'd seen the cut on her arm. Leo whipped around. His voice sounded weird, like he was begging.

"She's only eleven, the cut has half-scabbed over...surely...a little girl?" he whispered.

Conflicting emotions chased over the soldier's face. Regret, sadness, denial, madness... "I'm sorry sir, but my orders are final. Please step away."

"NO...no you couldn't, you wouldn't..." cried her dad.

"We can't take this risk, sir. I'm really sorry." Tears leaked from the soldier's eyes. Leo stepped away, wracked with sobs. Harper was confused. "Daddy, what are they going to do to me? Daddy? DAD-" Then a flash from the sobbing soldier's gun and her world spun. She felt like a wrestler had slugged her in the stomach. Her father stood, tears dripping down his face. "It's all right, Dad." Harper told him sleepily. "It was only a punch. Just a punch."