Infectious

Teaser

Lives have been stolen, and youths buried. Our cities and schools are losing more and more every year. With each new baby born, it mutates.

Standing in the children's ward, all I can feel is the misery and death that seeps throughout the room, threatening to steal my breath. Child after child is laying on the bed, each in varying states of pain and living. I can feel the bile racing up my throat but I have to force myself to swallow it.

I can't do that here. My thoughts are wild, racing through my head. They're already dying.

Most people live past their seventies, but here...no one makes it to their twenties; the disease already picking off the children faster the older they get. Age isn't just a number to us, it's means that we've survived. That we can try help others.

As I walk along the beds, I grab a pile of sheets. They're warm, having been freshly pressed, as well as being in mixes and shades of varying colour, possibly in the hopes of lighting up the place. Inside my head I scoff, the place is already too dark.

But colour is something that we cherish now, especially after what happened. Despite the years from when it happened to now, the event is still shaping this planet and the people. Natural disasters and nuclear weapons never did seem like a good mix, and now it's even worse. The disease brought about after the disaster was mutated beyond what our medical capabilities could cure, and even further after the bombings during WWIII.

I remember being told the story when I was smaller, except they wanted to give us hope; hope that we can survive, and flourish.

Blinking, I see my hands resting on the foot of a bed, sheets in hand and a young child staring at me, coughing slightly. Our eyes lock, and neither wants to look away; despite their cough worsening. Soon, their whole frame is shaking with the force of the cough, blood seeping through gaps in fingers, landing on the bed sheets.

My eyes wide in alarm, I press a large button on the side of the bed, out of reach from the children, and quickly follow the procedure that has been imprinted in my mind.

Cradle them, my mind whispered. As I pick them up, I can feel bones digging into me, the child almost lightweight. Their coughing worsens, and I tilt them, trying desperately to not let the drown in their own blood.

Whatever I do seems to make them worse, and I can only watch in horror, my vision slightly blurred. I don't want them to die, I don't want this to happen. I don't...I gulp. I can feel myself shaking, trembling. Its almost as if there's an earthquake but I'm the only one feeling it.

In my panic I can only slightly feel something drip down my front, but I don't look to see what it is. I'm almost scared to find out.

Footsteps sound behind me but I don't hear, all I can hear is the death in front of me, never ending and in my arms. They're eyes are wide and helpless, and I...I can't help them. I can't stop this. Gathering them up, I pull them tighter to me, and tears slide down my cheeks. I don't care.

All I want, all I need to not have these children die, but how long until we accomplish that? How long will parents and families must go through this?

Hands grab my arms pulling them apart and I scream. It's heart wrenching but I refuse to let them go; it's a mad scrabble, and at the end I'm on the ground, dazed.

Everything's a blur and voices are almost distant. My vision spinning, I gaze at my clothes, the dampness of them triggering my memory.

Blood...blood...oh gosh...there's blood on me. That child's blood is on me, the thing that helps keep them alive. As I'm occupied by my thoughts, the acidic taste of bile fills my mouth and I gag.

As my stomach contents coat the ground, I stare at my hands. They're shaking uncontrollably, coated in a mixture of blood and vomit.

I feel ill, even worse than I did before. Sores and boils form on my hands, increasing in size every second. The pain is unbearable, dull throbbing pains turning piercing.

I can't focus on anything, and my mind is grabbing onto and tossing thoughts to the side every second. Distantly, I can still feel stuff over my pain. It's focused on my arms and legs but I still can't pinpoint where.

My heart is racing and beads of sweat are trickling down my face, hitting the floor with a splash. Something brushes over my forehead and I can hear distant shouting, almost as if I'm hearing it through a body of water.

I'm scared, I don't know what's happening to me and I've never experienced anything like this. Like this pain, and absolute terror.

The terror is cold and it runs through every vein, every muscle until all you can feel is frozen by terror.

Someone please. HELP. ME. The loudest thought screams in my mind, echoing in a dark expanse, no one else being able to hear it.

All of a sudden, my mind goes blank and there is nothing. Nothing anywhere, just me. Just...me. JUST. ME.

I can't stand it. I don't want to be alone. All I feel is terror, and loneliness; both threatening to eat me alive.

I scream.

More noises fill my ears, and pressure floods parts of my arms.

"-very!" The noise is warbled, but some part of me recognises it as part of my name. I want to respond but I can't make my mouth move, aside from screams but even then, I'm not doing them; my soul is.

A tingling is passing over me, from the tips of every limb till it builds up, further and further till I can feel it nicking at my neck.

I can't move, almost as if I'm paralysed. I want to, I need to move. Just to know what's happening to me. My eyes seem to be the only thing I can move, so with no other options, I open them.

All I can see are vague forms of people around me, moving rapidly and colours blurring.

Lights shine from above, blaring into my eyes making me squint. Despite this, there is still too much light.

My heart rate starts to get slower, changing from the pace it was at before. It's no longer fast and quick paced, beating rapidly against my skin, instead beating groggily. Slower and slower it gets, until it's practically non-existent.

Even with my mind muddled, I know that's bad and I know that I've been infected. Infected with a non-curable disease and infected as an adult.

Mature genes make it develop faster, my mind tells me; a small voice that occasionally in and out. No one's has ever had the disease past twenty, what's it going to do to me?

In my mind, I'm scared. All I can think about now is my eminent death, something that can't be stopped. I can't be saved.

My eyes relax as I feel my heart stopping. My heart is stopping. All I can hear is that voice.

As breath after breath leaves me, I can feel the effects of oxygen deprivation. My vision is stained black, and my lungs are burning. Desperately, I try to regain air but to no avail.

As everything turns dark, one last thought fills my mind.

They said it was going to be light.