Author's Note:
All characters are over the age of 18. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is coincidence. Some of the locations in this story are very loosely based on real places.
Recap:
This chapter largely follows Katherine and Thorvald who are the de-facto leaders of the "outside surviors" - and who have now set up and organized the shelters. The "inside survivors" are led by Melissa, who has organized the protection of the town's children, locked into the High School to protect them from the events outside. We are also following Dr. Emily McKinnon, head of the Wildfire project, who is spearheading the scientific response to this infection, and Carl and Ruth, two survivors attempting to escape the quarantine zone.
>>> Philipsburg, PA, Pod A, 19:50
"No good deed goes unpunished." Katherine finished swabbing the last sensor on.
"At least they are wireless now. My dad..." Thorvald fell silent a moment, then continued. "My dad was in the hospital once, and he had these things all over him. Wires everywhere."
Imani stepped out of her cubby-room. "You notice the sensors are all for white skin?"
Of the "outside survivors," Imani was Katherine's favorite. It helped that, although she was about their same age, she was one person Katherine had
not
gone to high school with. Imani had moved to town the year prior and taught yoga at the Y, and upstairs at the massage place. She was a pretty, busty, black woman with a bright smile and a kind word. She had been helping with some of the more traumatized survivors, including Joey, a guy with down's syndrome who was prone to angry meltdowns. When Katherine and Thorvald had mentioned their instructions around wiring up overnight for science, Imani had volunteered to join them, and they had gotten Dr. McKinnon's approval, along with a rather thorough lecture about abstinence.
Imani looked amazing in her yoga pants and athletic top, but the sensors
were
a jarring bright beige against her rich, dark skin.
"How come they were only going to wire up you two? Why not everyone?"
Thorvald answered: "Too much data, they said. We were really just top on their list because we set up the first shelter, but there's only so much data they can process. And, Gebre said they didn't want to freak out more people."
"Well," Imani said, "I'm glad they let me in on the game! I want to contribute to the solution!"
"How do you stay so cheerful, Imani?"
"Meditation!"
"I guess I need to learn that, then."
"And," Imani added, "compartmentalization. I will probably spend the rest of my life in therapy, but I am not dealing with that right now."
"Thank God," Thorvald said. "I'm glad to know you're human after all."
Imani laughed, and Katherine saw the way she looked at Thorvald. "Oh, I'm human, don't you worry 'bout that!"
"So," Katherine said, "What now?"
"Well, with the extra shelters they brought in over the afternoon, we've got enough beds for everyone out here, and enough food, and we're all pumped to the gills with that nasty army stuff. You know I
heard
that gatorade was more sugar than anything, but I'm not so sure that's a bad thing now. This powdered stuff is
gross
. But, since the field is still soggy, I was thinking we just hole up for the night and keep each other safe."
"How do we keep each other safe?"
"Like the doc said, it's the sexy times that cause the problems, so let's just all keep an eye on each other and make sure - if anyone starts to get, you know, then the others can help distract. I was thinking, maybe play some cards."
Katherine took a lingering look at Imani's delicious curves and wondered how that was going to work out. She was thinking it might be nice to feel the shape of those breasts in her hands, in her mouth, and Katherine had never even been slightly interested in women before.
>>> State College, PA 19:59
McKinnon joined the ConCall a minute early, and found Ana Gonzales already online.
"You got my message?" the CDC director asked.
"Yeah. We put a request through the channels for all the data that hospital can get us."
"It's going to be hard to keep this quiet," Gonzales said.
"Not my department."
HomeSec came on, and a beat later, General Buckley joined as well.
"Speak of the devil," McKinnon said.
Both of them raised their eyebrows in unison.
"Ana was observing it's going to be difficult to keep the quarantine breach quiet."
Glenn from Homeland Security made an expression suggesting he agreed. "But there are a variety of ways we can control the narrative. For now, we're calling it a new covid variant. Everyone is used to that, exhausted by it. It shouldn't cause any panic."
"Well, here's the news from my team," McKinnon said. "We have ascertained that we are dealing with extremely complex metalloproteins and chromoproteins. There are no bacterial or viral structures present, no cells, and no RNA or similar. Instead, these protein complexes seem to leverage a wide range of minerals, similar to the way hemoglobin works. But we are still cataloging these proteins. There are thousands or more variants, and we are still getting a handle on the
categories
of these proteins, but the long and short of it is, there are situations in which they basically leech all the minerals out of a human being, forming the crystalline structures we have seen. Mineral salts that form and grow far faster than occurs in nature, so we assume it is a protein-assisted process. The human dies from sudden, massive hyponatremia -- salt deficiency. Heavy doses of salt -- aka electrolytes -- may contribute to survival. It's worth noting that the survivor in the hospital was on her saline drip, while the deceased was not."
"Is that a cure, Doctor? A preventative?" Glen asked.
"Far, far too early to tell. And we are hampered by the fact that we have been unable to replicate results in our labs. For reasons we do not understand, the symptoms have only been seen in humans. In rats and other test animals, these proteins appear to be relatively inert."
"You've tried monkeys?"
"We have a pair of rhesus macaques, yes. They have not, as yet, shown any susceptibility to these proteins. Nor do we understand how, in the absence of RNA, these proteins replicate, but there is ample evidence that they do, so there may be polypeptides handling encoding and replication in some way we don't understand."
"That was a mouthful. Other than the electrolyte thing, is there anything we can use here?"
"Nothing we haven't already discussed. Beyond that: the team has taken to calling this the Arcturus Syndrome, as the meteor appeared to originate from the general direction of the star Arcturus. We have no reason to believe it actually comes from there, but there is every reason to believe this is, in fact, a landfall of extra-terrestrial organic matter."
"Is it alive?"
"Not by any definition of life meaningful on earth, but we may well have to rewrite our definitions before this is over."
>>> Philipsburg, Pod A, 20:37
They had recruited Amy into the game. Amy was the oldest of the twelve in their pod. They were calling them pods now, because Military Self-Deploying Remote Shelter just didn't roll off the tongue.
Amy was twenty four, had a haunted look in her eye, long, lank hair, and wore the ugliest, baggiest clothes possible, like something she had stolen out of her obese grandmother's goodwill bag.
They sat on the floor of the pod, playing hearts.
Outside, it was just dusk. They had the pod door open, the fresh, warm summer evening humid with the afternoon's rain, fireflies starting to flash and dance. Their other pod-mates were out and about.
It was all women: Thorvald was the only male survivor, other than Joey.
People seemed to mostly want to be alone. Katherine wasn't sure what the point of the pods even was, although nearly all the houses had dead people in them, so there was that...
Amy played hearts without much spirit, mechanically tossing her cards, pulling them in when she took a round. But she had either crazy luck or mad skills, because she was clobbering everyone.
They talked about nothing. About the weather, the food, the energy drinks they were continuing to sip on.
Until, shockingly, Imani broke the ice.
"The sex was
really
good though, wasn't it?"
Amy instantly burst into tears.
Katherine winced.
Thorvald looked surprised. "I thought we hadn't...? I mean? That's why we're alive?"
Imani made an "Ohhhh" expression. "I guess maybe that's why
you
are alive."
Amy sobbed, now, rocking, and nodding. "The best," she sobbed.
Katherine cocked her head. "You want to tell us what happened, Amy?"
She shook her head, crawled a little and got reluctantly to her feet; then shut herself in her room.
"So much for hearts," Imani shrugged. "She was a downer anyway. Girl needs some meditation!"
"And compartmentalization," Katherine added.
Thorvald, meanwhile, was still catching up. "So you... survived?"
"So you thought you were going to die, early today? When it... almost happened?"
Thorvald shrugged. "I figure we're all going to die anyway. Might as well enjoy it."
Imani hadn't heard this bit. "You two?"
"They caught us," Katherine explained. "They can see everything in here. They stopped us. But, I kind of thought Thorvald was immune, because, you know. Like us."
Imani slid over next to Katherine so they could both observe Thorvald from the same spot. He was obsessively shuffling the deck.
"I wish he was," Imani said. "It would be a shame to lose that fine, handsome body to the crystal monster. We could have some fun with him, couldn't we?"
Katherine felt the heat rising through her again.
"I thought we were supposed to distract each other
from
sexy thoughts."
Imani pouted. "Darn you, now
you're
the voice of reason. Ok, ok. Maybe you and I should take a walk," Imani suggested. "Clear our heads."
>>> Phillipsburg High School, 20:48
Melissa never liked talking to Dr. McKinnon. The woman was hard, and abrupt, almost mean. Not at all the way a woman should be. A woman should be nurturing, nourishing, a force of love and beauty in the world.
At the same time, talking to Dr. McKinnon reinforced her authority, and it was very important for the school to have someone in authority.
Dr. McKinnon herself made that very clear.
"The
most important thing
, Melissa, is keeping the children safe. We have to protect the children
at all costs
. That is your... sacred... duty. We are counting on you, relying on you. We need you."
Melissa wasn't quite stupid enough to believe Dr. McKinnon. She knew the Doctor didn't like her. But she was used to that. The lord said: "You will be hated because of me, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved."
And that's what Melissa was going to do.
Stand firm until the end.
But she did appreciate the reminder. This wasn't about her. This was about
