Endless Waltz
It starts off slowly; haphazard but with a level of determination.
The infection, as it was dubbed by the press, hit south New Zealand on the 15th of January 2015. The government had issued statement after statement; all was well and the sudden medical problem that plagued the country would soon come to a standstill. The press however, spun the story; made it seem that something else was lingering in the depths of the Government's lies.
Chaos ensued as people tried to flee from their homes, tried to escape from the country where a plague had begun to ravish their lands and their people.
Sixteen days later, New Zealand went dark.
No one is quite sure which country was hit next, from members of the press, it varies from Japan to Russia to China.
The infection had somehow fanned out across Europe and the media urged that no one was safe. The Government's of said countries issued statements; urging their people that it wasn't the infection that had ravaged New Zealand only weeks before.
They did, however, urge people to stay in their homes and lock the doors.
However, in the scale of the panic that ensued, people tried once again to flee.
Both Russia and Japan went black on February the 12th.
February 14th, the United Nations released a statement to the entirety of Europe; stay in your homes, and under no condition, let anyone into your home. The United Nations continued to operate well into the middle of the year, while the countries that surrounded them begun to go dark, and the media presence in Europe slowly began to diminish.
By July 22nd, the United Nations suddenly went black.
Without the European Government in control, the infection continued to ravage the continent. They fell fast, faster than any of the others; Italy, Spain, Portugal, Germany, the Czech Republic, Ukraine, Norway, France, England, Ireland.
And then it stopped.
The American Government held on with bated breath and they waited and watched for something to happen. Europe had gone, Africa and it surrounding islands too; it was only a matter of time until it turned up on their doorstep.
The President sat in the Oval office, hand hovering by the red phone, waiting with bated breath for the call to come through. He sat, all day, waiting for it. By midnight, eyes red with exhaustion, tense muscles screaming at him to just stop, he rose from his seat.
His country was safe for one more day.
As he shut the door and walked down the hall, he missed the telltale ring of the phone from within his office.
Less than five weeks later, after being shipped from location to location, from bunker to bunker, the President of the United States was exhausted. He collapsed on his bed, hidden away in another bunker, and he waited for one of his bodyguards to come in and tell him that the location was compromised, just like it had twelve times before.
But no guards came, and he huddled against the wall, closing himself off, shutting his tired eyes. He thought of his wife and children; how they had been taken so cruelly from him.
Unlike the call he had missed that day in his office, the call that may have given him a head start on the infection, he didn't miss the telltale noise of moaning; low, monotonous, terrifying.
The door opened.
The United States of America went dark October 4th.
The world went dark on October 13th.
Quinn Fabray had been at work when she had happened to glance up at the TV that dominated the front of her office. Her work mates huddled around the TV, obviously catching up on the latest news, but what struck Quinn as odd, as she pushed away from her desk and stood, is that none of them were talking to one another.
She pushed into the small crowd, hoping to get a view of the news that had struck her friends dumb, but almost immediately, she was pushed back by her boss, who asked in his usual aggravated tone, what the fuck was going on.
None of her colleagues responded, or even looked in the man's direction, but when his head happened to turn toward the TV, he too, stopped in his tracks, mouth pursed in a hard line.
She took the initiative and shoved her way through the group, pushing herself to the front, and dead center of the TV screen.
The news repeated on a loop, the same reporter telling the same story; New Zealand's Government had shut down mysteriously after an infection ravaged the country. It had only taken sixteen days for New Zealand to eventually disappear off the map, and Quinn pushed back the fear that clogged her throat.
She too, stood still, staring at the TV, along with her friends and colleagues, until eventually she dragged herself back to her desk, along with the rest of them, and continued on with their work as before.
But the lingering truth still remained; something was wrong, and it wasn't going to stop in New Zealand.
Quinn was at home when she heard the next piece of news about the epidemic. She had been chasing up on some information needed for one of her articles when a particular article struck and stopped her heart dead in her chest.
JAPANESE AND RUSSIAN GOVERNMENTS GONE
She poured through the article meticulously, drawing in every word and remembering each and every one. Only a few weeks after New Zealand went black, Japan and Russia had been quick to join. The cause?
The infection.
Eyebrows furrowed, she pulled away from her laptop and ripped the glasses from her face. She had searched every database that she could utilize, hoping to find some information on this 'infection', but nothing had come up. She didn't even know what its proper term was, no one had really dubbed it anything other than 'infection' and 'plague'.
As a columnist for the New York Times, Quinn was stumped for what seemed to be the first time in her career. No databases, no internet searches, no other media information available; what was this infection and what was it doing to the population of the world?
She was biting her nails when the United Nations, the European body, released a statement telling people to stay in their homes and lock the doors. She had watched the endless footage online, of armies from different countries coming together, along with disease control experts, head to toe in hazmat gear, go into the 'hot zones'.
This infection had ravaged more countries than she'd like to count, yet, amongst the major media coverage, she had never seen a victim of this so called infection. Were they toxic? Were they dangerous to every human day life? Were they dead or were they just sick?
Quinn had no idea, and no amount of searching could answer her questions. Questions to her local Government official came up empty handed, as they quickly shoved her voice recorder away and steeled their response with a 'no comment'.
So she sat, alone and isolated, in her one bedroom apartment and clasped her hands together in her lap.
And for the first time in years, she prayed.
When the European Union suddenly stopped releasing statements, she knew what had happened. She picked up her phone almost immediately and dialed a familiar number.
"Quinnie?"
"Mom, have you watched the news?"
"Of course, the whole town is watching. What is going on, Quinn?"
She tried not to tremble at the terror in her mother's sweet and gentle tone.
"I have no idea, mom, but it's not good. Look, I'm trying to figure out what I can, but I need you to go get whatever you have to get, okay? Food, supplies, gas…Then lock your doors and don't leave."
"I doubt it's that bad…"
"Mom, the EU is gone. Europe is gone."
"Maybe it was just a European thing, it can't really cross the Atlantic, can it?"
"Mom…please. Do this."
"…Okay."
"I love you."
"I love you too, you'll call back soon, right?"
She swallowed the bile in her throat, "Of course, mom. I love you, bye." She hit end call before her mom could tell she was crying. She wasn't even sure how long she'd be able to use her phone, or jump on the subway, or grab a coffee from the nearest coffee place, or jump on a plane and go see her mother.
Somehow, in the pit of her stomach, she knew that it would be the last time she'd hear her mother's voice.
When the rest of Europe fell, and along with it, the African continent and surrounding areas, Quinn clung her cellphone to her chest and stared at the TV with terror in her eyes. She could tell, that although the reporter was trying to keep her cool, that she was completely terrified.
The infection had suddenly stopped after ravaging the entire European Union, and no one in America knew what to think. South America had no counts of the infection, neither did Canada; what had happened to the infection that destroyed half the world?
She held her phone out and slid her finger across the screen; who could she ring now? She had warned her family and friends, even her damn father and he barely recognized her voice through his drunken haze. She had choked out a hasty warning and hung up.
It would be his fault if he didn't take it seriously.
Quinn dragged her eyes away from the TV and rested her forehead against the cool windowpane. Looking out across the city, she had a perfect view; New York was so incredibly majestic, lit up in the night, like a thousand fireflies had taken the city within their grasps.
With a sigh, her eyes danced along the streets, watching as people went along with their business, as cab drivers yelled to one another on the busy and hectic streets, as people rushed home to be with their families; it was almost as if nothing was wrong.
But soon this would all be gone.
She dialed a number.
"Quinn…?"
"The news, you've been listening, right?"
"Of course."
"Are you scared?"
"Yes…and you?"
"Terrified."
She sees the infection.
She actually see's it.
Locked in her apartment, she stares down at the streets and watches people scream in terror, running for their lives from the predators that follow them ever so closely. One man looks over his shoulder, and in his terror, trips over his own feet and crumbles to the floor.
Quinn rests her hand on the window, and urges herself to look away, but she's never seen it before, and something inside her, tells her to watch. Her breathing shudders as the infected group get closer and fall to their own feet to attack him.
The man, covered in blood and gore, screams for his life as one of the infected sinks their teeth into his neck and pulls away a healthy chunk of skin and muscle. Quinn swallows down the bile that rises up her throat, but as the screams continue to echo throughout the streets, she runs to the bathroom and only just manages to get to the toilet before the bile rises once more.
The infected, those people, were unstoppable.
It finally hits her when she tries to make a call.
Looking down at her phone, she thumbs through her contacts and lists them all off one by one as she calls. Michelle, her colleague and friend, someone that she had roomed with at Yale, didn't answer. Dan, her boss, his arrogant tone left only behind as some distant memory on his outgoing message. Her countless business contacts whom she frequently met with at a quaint cocktail bar in downtown Manhattan; none answered.
She continues, in the vain hope, that she would reach someone, anyone.
Santana Lopez.
"I can't take your call so leave a message."
As blunt as ever.
Finn Hudson.
"I'm busy so leave a message and I'll get back to ya!"
He sounded so happy.
Mercedes Jones.
"Alllllll by myyyyyselllllf-. Only joking! Leave a message!"
She certainly feels all by herself.
Mom.
"I can't make it to the phone right now, so leave a message and I'll get back to you as soon as I can."
Her own mother…
She fights back the tears as she dials and re-dials her mother's number. The same message repeats itself in an endless loop and she feels like throwing her phone against the wall at how useless she feels. Why hadn't she gone back to Lima to be with her mother? But what could she have done, truly?
For the past nine days she's been stuck in her apartment, alternating between staring at the door and the TV that no longer turned on. The power grid had gone down days ago, and now there was nothing to ease the tense silence that reverberated around her.
She glances at the charge on her phone.
3%.
Enough for one more call.
She leans back against the wall, shutting her eyes, and dials the number. She counts each individual tone in her head; twelve.
"You've reached the number for Rachel Barbra Berry. I'm too busy right now to take your call, but I'll make it the utmost importance to return it. Thank you.
She feels a tear slide down her cheek; they're all gone.
She calls again.
Once again, twelve familiar tones.
"You've reached the number for Rachel Barbra Berry. I'm too busy right now to take your call, but I'll make it the utmost importance to return it. Thank you."
And again.
But this time, she only reaches five.
Her breath catches and her back straightens; did the call finally connect? Holding her breath, fingers tense around her last life source, she waits for a voice to tell her that she's not alone, but nothing comes.
Brows furrowed, she pulls her phone away and looks.
A black screen.
Chin trembling, she tries the power button, but all she's met with is that same black void that masks her phone.
With a scream, she throws it across the room and listens as the screen cracks and shatters against her bedroom door.
Knees pulled up to her chest, she burrows her head down, cocooning herself away from the pain that surrounds her.
With the telltale moans from the infected on the other side of her door, her neighbours, the people she had only seen and spoken to weeks before, she sobs quietly to herself.
How long will it be until she's next?
For now, she's just another number to the casualty count; a lonely victim that will die alone.