Keeping the Dream Alive
Chapter 1
It was warm spring day in New Jersey, quiet and still. Shovel in both hands Jack filled the grave up with dirt. He was burring his father that day. As each shovel of dirt fell so did Jack's innocence. He wasn't just saying goodbye to his father but to his childhood. He was on his own now. As the grave closed in on his father's body Jack took one last look at him. He could still hear his father's stern voice…
PRE VIRUS
"Get up boy! I'm not going to have you skipping class again, you lazy shit!" His father yelled
Jack was groggy as hell and was in the mists of a horrible hangover from the night before with Sarah. He decided to ignore his father and drift back to sleep.
"Get up!"
"Fuck you" Jack murmured low to himself as he got out of bed. He went to the bathroom and turned the shower on. He looked at himself in the mirror, God I look like shit, his hair was a mess and his eyes were bloodshot. He stepped into the shower. As he was washing his hair he heard coughing, minute-by-minute it got louder.
After, he got dressed in a light blue button up-long sleeve shirt and jeans. He hated wearing light blue but it was the only thing that was clean for he hated doing laundry as well.
He walked to the kitchen, his father looked worse than Jack-before-the-shower.
"How do you expect to keep a job when you can't even wake up in the morning?" cough "I don't know how you're going to survive!" His father stated in an everyday ritual of ridiculing Jack
Jack just ignored him and stared at the ground
"Well? Aren't you going to answer me?"
"Why should I?"
"I pity your arrogant ness" cough "One of these days Jack, you'll learn" He coughs more and louder
"I better get going" Jacks starts for the door
"Wait!" Jack stops "I want to drive you there and make sure that you go" His father got the keys
All through the drive there his father kept on coughing, Jack tired to convince himself that is was probably just the flu…nothing more
His father pulled the care over in front of the school entrance If I find out that you skipped today by all means I'll kick you out, there's no way in hell I'm going to house a ---" his father cough louder and worse, Jack silently backed away not sure of what to do "You got that!" His father grabbed his wrist
"Yeah Mitch, um bye" Jack said quietly as he released his wrist. As he was walking to the front of school he noticed a bloody hand print on his wrist. He then saw that the school doors were closed,that's odd they're always open, he went to the door it wasn't locked and opened it and walked inside as he did the door slammed shut, all students were there: the jocks, the gamblers, the lan party freaks, the cheerleaders, the Goths, and Sarah
Jack tried to hide but Sarah spotted him
"Looking preppie today, Jack" She quipped
"Go to hell"
"Listen I know you're still mad about last night Jack, but I had to do it"
"Like I'm going to believe that"
"I knew you wouldn't understand"
"How am I suppose to understand when you don't tell me anything, you could at least told me Sarah, you could at least talk it over with me before you go ahead and---"
"What good would that do, huh? You would only make me live a life that I don't want to live, it was MY decision Jack, not yours"
"It was mine too Sarah" Jack said as he walked away from her, he wanted to get away from her
Jack and Sarah had been going out for six months. Jack met Sarah through the new kid, David. Jack became friends with him, and he introduced Jack to Sarah, Jack could swear it was love at first site. Whenever Jack had dinner at David house Sarah and him would play footsie under the table and exchange glances at each other. Then Jack started sleeping over at David's house, and usually in the middle of the night he would meet up with Sarah in the bathroom (because Sarah's room was next door to Mayer and Esther's room) and make out and then some, and David would wonder why Jack always wanted to sleep over. One thing led to another and Jack and Sarah became an item at school(and David then knew the real reason) Sarah then became popular(because Jack was) and became the queen bee who all the girls feared-envied-praised. Jack was in love with Sarah and Sarah needed Jack to boost up her popularity.
While Jack was walking through the hall deciding whether it was love or attraction he felt for Sarah, he saw one of his classmates Steve coughing, he paused and then went over to him
"Hey Steve, you okay?"
"Look who stepped out of Abercrombie and Fitch" He joked behind the coughs "Don't worry about me, I just got the flu, my whole family has it, well except little Daisy"
Steve was Jack's neighbor and childhood friend, he was a year older than Jack and was like a big brother to him.
"What kind of flu is it?"
"I'm not sure, but man none of us can't stop coughing"
Jack backed away as he asked "Has any of you coughed up blood"
Steve coughed some more and was about to answer then David came in front of Jack
"What's with you and my sister? What happened between you two?" David asked
"None of your business. Hey Davy, have you or your family been sick lately?"
"Yeah, my mom and dad have a cold, why?"
"Seriously?"
"Yeah, is there something going on?"
Jack suddenly saw the clock on the wall
"The bell hasn't rung, it was suppose to ring ten minutes ago. Something's wrong, the bell always rings, the door's always open…" Jack noticed something else "David…where are all the teachers?"
"You're scarring me Jack"
"Where are all the teachers?"
"I don't know in the teacher's lounge"
"Something's happening"
"The door's locked!!" a teenage girl yelled trying to open the door
It was then that the school became chaos
"I can't open it!!"
"We're trapped!!"
"Everybody stay calm!" an unfamiliar voice said from the speaker, then the back door flew open and a team of men in plastic suits and helmets stormed in
"Who unleashed ET?" Race, the head gambler joked
"You all must evacuate the building immediately in an orderly fashion, boys on right side, girls on left, you all will board a bus that will take you to safe facility that will protect you, line up now, this isn't an option, if you will not cooperate we will have to enforce strict punishment"
The chaos calmed and students lined up to board the buses
"What's going to happen?" David asked frantically
"I don't know" said Jack
"What about my mom and dad, I have to get home to them"
Jack didn't know what to say, everything was happening so fast, so sudden, yesterday was like another world
They boarded the bus, Jack looked out the window as it moved
…He couldn't believe what he saw, bon fires burning bodies, people breaking into stores, people fighting, people dropping down dead
David saw too
"This can't be happening, I have to go home! Now! I have to see if mom and dad are okay, I have to get off this bus!"
Jack grabbed David put his hand over his mouth and held him down
"Listen David, you need to get a grip of yourself, these people have guns! One more outburst and they might shoot you, there's no telling what they'll do"
Jack removed his hand off David's mouth and released him
"What will become of us Jack?"
"God knows"
"Is there even a God?"
"Only one way to find out…"
"All right, every body out, line up!" The man in the white "E.T." suit ordered
"I feel like god damn cattle" Jack complained as he and the rest stepped out of the bus
"Line up in alphabetical order by last name!"
Jack lined up besides David
"We will be coming by to all of you, once we reach you, you must state your full name and birth date while my assistant Dr. Randall will check your health, now please remove your cloths except for you under garments and remain patient"
All stripped down
"I never realized how many boys wear boxers, practically everybody does, not one person in whitie tighties" Jack tried cheering David up a little
They waited a long time when finally after an hour they reached David, Jack was next
"Name?" One of them asked
"David Jacobs"
"And"
"I'm Sixteen birthday is July 12" He said as the doctor checked his heart beat
They took notes and then moved forward to Jack
"Name"
"Jack Kelly"
The man stopped and looked at Jack, Jack recognized those stone cold eyes
"I'm 17 born October 17"
They stopped completely
"You're almost eighteen"
"Yeah so?"
One of the men called another over
"This kid is over take him away"
The man grabbed Jack
"Wait, where are you taking me?" Jack struggled to break loose
"There's nothing wrong with him" David pleaded
"Come with me, son"
"I don't have to go anywhere with you!"
The man gripped Jack's arm tighter as he moved him away out of the lobby and to the elevators, the man pushed Jack into the elevator and it took them to floor five…Jack's unlucky number. They walked down the hall and then the man stooped at a room and pushed Jack in and locked the door.
Jack knew why they took him away, there was a great chance that he could have it or be getting it for he was soon to be eighteen in a few months.
Jack stood up on the bed to reach the TV to turn it on to see what's happening, he fell back and watched the woman newscaster
"It's speculated that it came from a Russian prison, some form of tuberculosis, one that is resistant to all antibiotics. It only effects mature lungs. It goes at a rapid pace. Once the victim gets it they start to cough harder and harder until their lungs can't take it anymore and the victim falls down dead." The man besides the woman coughs, Jack and the other newscasters on TV thinks it's a sick joke but then the man coughs harder and blood appears all over his shirt
"My God…" Jack stood there in horror
PRESENT
The grave was full now and Jack stood there saying a prayer in his mind.
What will become of me? He thought to himself What's to become of all of us?
To be continued shortly
AN: Okay I sort of started early, okay so there's going to be flash backs here and there of PRE VIRUS because this is sort of a mystery in a way and so I'll be switching to PRESENT and PRE VIRUS till a point
Most on the Cast list won't show till about, I think chapter three, chapter two is another chapter explaining background