Survivors

This is how the world ends, not with a bang, but with a whimper. -- T.S. Elliot

Chapter One -- Plague--

Death slipped among us like a snake in the garden and no one could see it coming. No, I guess that's not true, we should have all seen it coming. In the aftermath there weren't enough people left to lay blame, of those that survived some said the military was to blame, some said it was a biological act of terrorism. I said who cares how it happened, just pray for survivors.

It was mid September, and a hot nasty bitch of one at that, especially in DC. I work there as a nurse. I have for several years now. I had a nice, quiet little life. So when the plague hit, it took me by surprise as much as anyone else.

It started like a flu outbreak except it spread really fast. The center point seemed to be Colorado and it spiraled out from there like a brush fire. The CDC denied there was a problem, the Army denied there was a problem, everyone denied there was a problem until this particular problem was leaving bodies to rot in the street. By then the population was down by half. Stop and think about that. Half We lost half of our population in under one month.

But like any plague, any where in history, there are always those who have an immunity. I was one. Notice I didn't refer to us as the lucky ones. No, I think the lucky ones were lying in the streets, churches, and homes of America. I decided I needed to get out of DC, but how to do it was the question. A car was out of the question, even a four wheel drive couldn't get around some of the traffic snarls that I had see just in the city. That didn't even begin to count what the inter states and highways would be like. Walking was way out of the question, it left you too vulnerable. A motorcycle would have been nice, and I did know how to ride one, but riding alone is tricky. If anything were to happen no one would be there to help. So I settled on a bicycle.

A trip down to the local bike shop and I picked one out. I also added a small tent and all the dehydrated food I could carry from an outfitting store and then I was almost ready, but I needed a gun. Like it or not, it would be stupid to go without one. The best gun I could think up for myself was a pump shotgun. Hey, I never said I was a great shot and they call them scatter guns for a reason. This was the hardest thing to find. The gun shops and pawn shops had been cleared out at that point, but I got lucky one day and found one in a police cruiser. Now I was ready to leave.

I started out heading west toward the mountains, thinking I would just find a smaller town, less bodies in the streets, less smell, somewhere that I didn't hear the sound of automatic gunfire at night. There were plenty people alive in the city, just not all of them were nice.

I made it five days before I found him.

I thought he was dead at first. He looked like it, laying there in the ditch but something, instinct I guess, told me he wasn't. As I leaned over him to get a better look and his eyes opened and I almost fell on my ass.

We both whipped our guns around "Drop it,"he said.

"You drop yours first," I countered a little shaky.

"All right, OK, lets both calm down and drop them at the same time, OK?"

I agreed and we both cautiously lowered our guns.

"So, do you sleep in ditches a lot?" I asked him.

"Took a spill off my bike," he said, pointing to motorcycle not very far away, "I've got a bad knee and it gave out on me when I tried to stand up."

I looked down to see one knee obviously more swollen than the other one.

"Probably tore a ligament," I said.

"You a doctor?"

"A nurse."

I stood up and looked at the sky, thinking. I couldn't just leave him there.

"Look, mister..."

"O'Neill, Jack O'Neill."

"I'm Jessie Allen. Jack, I can't just leave you here, I mean... Do you want to come with me? Or me to stay with you?

"Where you headed?" he asked.

"Does the phrase' anywhere but here mean anything to you'?"

"I'm a colonel in the Air Force," he said, carefully moving to sit up, wincing as he did so. "I'm headed to Colorado Springs, Colorado. The last news I got there was a group of survivors and they were working on a cure. I'm pretty sure I can get you into the complex, if you can help me get there."

"I'll do my best,"I answered. "The first problem to tackle is bracing that leg until we can get into a hospital or a medical supply store."

"I've got an idea..."

"So do I, let's hear yours."

"Sticks and my bandanna." He nodded.

"Same idea as mine. Copycat." He didn't seem to know how to react to that, and I figured he wasn't used to people teasing him, not being a high ranking officer. I was a natural born smart-ass my Mom used to say. I didn't think too much about my Mom as I got my camp hatchet and hunted around for sticks, I had buried her myself the second week of the plague. I finally found what I was looking for, two saplings, about two inches in diameter. I chopped them down quickly and stripped the leaves and branches as I went back to where Jack sat tearing the bandanna into two pieces. A couple of minutes later we had a rough but functioning brace on his leg.

"You ready for this?" I asked him, almost adding the word Sir to the end. But there was no way I as going to start calling him Sir now.

"You betcha'," He said with even less confidence than I felt.

"Gonna get a little close," I said, "Just in case you need extra support. We'll just have to see." I stepped in close to his body, fitting my shoulders under his arm. "Ready when you are."

I stood up as he rose to his feet and it worked perfectly. The two saplings on either side of his thigh supported his knee and he could walk, although not very well.

"Now we need wheels." I said, helping him carefully sit back down.

"I can't ride a bike or a motorcycle, that's for sure," Jack said.

"You could ride a trike motorcycle," I said after a minute, "or a motorcycle with a sidecar."

He nodded "That I could do. Can you drive one though?"

"I can, it's been a while but I know how to ride one. First thing tomorrow I'll bike into town and see what I can find. I think we should go ahead and camp for tonight, don't you?"

He nodded after glancing at the sky, "I think that would be a good idea. I might actually be able to pitch my tent tonight instead of sleeping under the stars."

We worked together easily and set up both tents just off the road. I did a lot of camping as a kid, and there is some work to it. Jack apparently knew this just as I did because any task that could be done seated on the ground he accomplished somehow. After I got back from gathering wood he had Sterno cans going, heating water for supper.

The last five nights had been hell. I spent most of them crying myself to sleep, feeling like the last person left on the planet, or the only sane one anyway. Tonight the world smaller, less dangerous, and as I saw Jack sitting outside his tent as I returned with more arm load of wood, maybe still being alive wasn't so bad after all.