I actually wrote parts of this chapter two years ago but with the dawn of Covid, I put it to the side. I don't have this story written. I'm posting the first chapter to see if there's any interest in this storyline. If you want more, I'll keep writing and resume the story when I complete it.
The Lualaba River Valley - The Democratic Republic of Congo.
A nurse carrying a bucket of water from the Lualaba River rushes past the soldiers to the camp infirmary where she replaces the towel on the forehead of a feverish, delirious Australian with a cold new one.
"Gimme something for the bloody pain. C'mon, mate, help me." The man tries to lift himself out of his stretcher. Can't. He's too weak. His skin is yellow and covered with blisters that look like chickenpox.
A nurse checks his temperature. "Still over a hundred and four. Why can't we bring it down?"
Dr. Marcel Gerard looks on helplessly. "It's the virus," she starts to say when their patient emits a sharp cry. He begins convulsing and his eyes roll back.
Before Marcel can even reach for an anticonvulsant, the man is dead.
Both he and his nurse stare with horror.
Suddenly the drone of a helicopter grows louder as a Chinook CH-47 appears over the edge of the forest and kicks up a storm of dust as it lands. Marcel and the nurse run to meet it.
In their eyes, hope.
Finally.
Two space-suited figures emerge from the chopper, their faces hidden by thick green plexiglass shields. The U.S. flag is emblazoned on the side of their helmets.
"I'm Lieutenant Mikaelson; this is Dr. Salvatore from the CDC."
"Come this way," Dr. Gerard states and gestures with his arm.
The two space-suited figures follow the doctor past patient after soldier infected with the same disease.
"Twenty deaths yesterday, fifteen the day before, the disease is killing our men faster than any invading army ever could."
Dr. Salvatore stops at a young American's cot. He's shaking with fever. His skin is mottled and looks like the pulp of an orange.
His voice is a whisper. "Take me home... Get me out of this shithole. Please, I need to see my girl." The man reaches out with his arms to Damon, who shrinks back, not wanting to be contaminated.
"We'll get you home. First, I need a tissue sample." Damon pulls from his black bag a long metal syringe and plunges the biopsy needle deep into the man's liver. He places the needle in an aluminum test tube and seals it.
"Promise me you'll get me home. Promise me, damn it!"
After a long uneasy beat, Damon replies, "We'll get you home."
The two men start to board their chopper, Dr. Gerard is standing by.
"Not just supplies, but doctors and nurses. And suits like yours to protect us. This disease spreads too fast."
"The plane tonight will bring everything," Lieutenant Mikaelson assures him as he slides the door closed.
Brilliant streams of orange and purple, the last rays of the setting sun, dance across the sky and penetrate the vapor cloud above the rain forest as the helicopter flies away.
A week passes since his visit to a cave- Damon feels a throbbing pain behind his eyeballs and calls in sick to his job.
The headache grows worse. His eyeballs ache, and then his temples began to throb and his back starts hurting. On the third day, Damon becomes nauseous and spikes a fever. He begins to vomit which grows intense and turns into dry heaves.
At the same time, his face loses all appearance of life and sets itself into an expressionless mask. His slightly droopy eyelids give him a peculiar appearance as if his eyes are about to pop out of his head. The eyeballs themselves seem almost frozen in their sockets, and they turn bright red. The skin of his face turns yellow, with starlike red speckles.
Damon begins to look like hell. Although not delirious, he doesn't seem to know exactly where he is either.
When he fails to show up for work the following Monday, his colleagues begin to worry. One man goes to his house to check on him. One look is all it takes for him to decide that Damon needs to be seen by a doctor. Since he's very ill and unable to drive, his co-worker takes him to a hospital.
The doctor examines him and is unable to come up with an explanation for his symptoms. Thinking that he may have some kind of bacterial infection, he's given injections of antibiotics, but they have no effect on his illness. Deciding he needs a bigger hospital with more advanced care, he's loaded onto an ambulance for transport to the airport where he boards a flight.
It's a small prop plane that seats thirty people. The plane climbs over belts of forest and clusters of round huts and villages with tin roofs. The land suddenly drops away, going down in shelves and ravines, and changes in color from green to brown. The plane was crossing the Eastern rift valley. The propeller moans as it passes through puffy rift clouds, and begins to bounce and sway.
Damon becomes sick to his stomach. Hunching over in his seat, he holds an airsickness bag over his mouth. He coughs a deep and regurgitates something into the airsickness bag.
Damon glances around. The other passengers stare at him, obviously noticing that his lips are smeared with something slimy and red.
His eyes are the red of demons, and his face is an expressionless mass of bruises. The red spots, which had started out as star-like speckles, have now expanded and merged into huge, spontaneous purple shadows. His whole head is turning black-and-blue. The connective tissue in Damon's face is dissolving, and it appears to hang from the underlying bone as if the face is detaching itself from the skull.
Damon opens his mouth and gasps into the bag, and the vomiting goes on endlessly. He keeps bringing up liquid, long after his stomach should have been empty. It is hemorrhage, and it smells like a slaughterhouse.
The black vomit is loaded with virus particles. It is highly infective and lethally hot. The smell fills the passenger cabin. The airsickness bag is brimming with black vomit, so Damon closes it and rolls up the top. The bag is bulging and softening threatening to leak, and he hands it to a flight attendant.
When a hot virus multiplies in a host, it can saturate the body with virus particles, from the brain to the skin. Experts say this is known as "extreme amplification."
This is not something like the common cold. By the time extreme amplification peaks, an eyedropper of the victim's blood may contain a hundred million particles. In other words, the host is possessed by a life form that is attempting to convert the host into itself.
The transformation is not entirely successful, however, and the end result is a great deal of liquefying flesh mixed with a virus, a kind of biological accident. Extreme amplification has occurred in Damon Salvatore. He appears to be holding himself rigid as if any movement would rupture something inside him. His blood is clotting up and they're lodging everywhere; his liver, kidneys, lungs, hands, feet, and head.
Clots are accumulating in his intestinal muscles, cutting off the blood supply to his intestines. The intestinal muscles are beginning to die, and the intestines are starting to go slack. Damon doesn't seem to be fully aware of pain any longer because the blood clots lodged in his brain are cutting off blood flow. His personality is being wiped away by brain damage.
Tiny spots in his brain are liquefying. The higher functions of consciousness are blinking out first, leaving the deeper parts of the brain stem still alive and functioning. It could be said that the who of Damon Salvatore has already died.
The heart bleeds into itself; the cardiac muscle softens and has hemorrhages into its chambers, and blood squeezes out of the heart muscle as it beats; and floods the chest cavity. Blood runs from both nostrils and drips over his teeth and chin.
Damon grows dizzy and utterly weak. His spine goes limp and he loses all sense of balance. The cabin is turning around and around. He leans over, head on his knees, and brings up an incredible quantity of blood. It spills it onto the floor with a gasping groan. He tries to stand but loses consciousness and pitches forward onto the floor.
The only sound is a choking in his throat as he continues to vomit a huge amount of blood even while unconscious.
The other passengers move away from him as pools of blood spread out around him, enlarging rapidly.
Moments later a guttural sound escapes Damon's mouth. His eyes roll back, his lead lulls to the side and his breathing stops...
Having destroyed its host, the virus is now trying to find a new one.
The alarm is an ear-splitting wail. It rises to a peak then ebbs and rises to a peak again, undulating like a wave and all the while ringing his brain out like a sponge. In the grip of silent panic, Damon jerks upright in bed and slams the silence button with his palm. His eyes are wild, pupils dilated, his heart is racing and his head feels like a cluster bomb is exploding in his brain.
Dropping back onto the mattress, it takes several minutes for Damon to calm down at the realization that he's still alive.
When the alarm rings a second time, he turns it off and drags himself out of bed to get ready for work. Damon lives and works in Atlanta, Georgia, and is one of an elite group of disease detectives. He's an officer in CDC's Epidemic Intelligence Service. When disease outbreaks hit U.S. cities or towns — or spread across States and even internationally — CDC disease detectives work closely with State and local officials.
Before going upstairs to his office, Damon stops in the building cafeteria.
"Damon, over here!" Bonnie Bennett waves to get his attention.
"It's good to see you," Damon gives her a hug before taking a seat.
"You've been in Africa for the last month. I know you usually stop to pick up a coffee before going to your office," Bonnie explains and takes a bite of her omelet.
"I had a nightmare about that last night. I need to finish a few reports... then it's off to Hawaii for two glorious weeks," Damon brags and waggles his brows at her.
"Alone?" Bonnie asks, her eyes locking on his.
"Yes, alone." Damon empties his coffee cup and is about to set it down when a voice comes from behind him.
"There you are, Damon."
"Esther?" he starts and notices the file in her hand.
"I have a case for you..." Esther's words die on her lips when she notices Bonnie.
"You remember, Bonnie?" Damon starts when he notices the look on Esther's face. "She works here too as an administrative assistant for Dr. Lahari and she's Sheila Bennett's granddaughter."
"Yep, my grandmother got me the job. Nepotism at its finest," Bonnie jokes, winking at Damon.
"Oh, that's nice," Esther starts before turning to Damon. "You're not going to want to hear this, but I've gotten a request from a doctor in Gallup, New Mexico. They've had several deaths - a type of febrile illness characterized by pulmonary compromise and clinically resembling Acute Respiratory Disease Syndrome. The typical prodrome consists of flu-like symptoms. Typical laboratory findings include hemoconcentration, left shift in the white blood cell count, and thrombocytopenia among others. The doctor mentioned that the mortality rate is almost 50%."
"Interesting, they have no idea the cause?"
"No, not a clue. Listen, I know you just came back from the Ebola zone and I promised you a vacation... but I need you to take a team down there to help them find some answers."
"Esther? I wanted to be soaking up the Hawaiian sun. Can't you send Tobias?"
"No, I can't. You're the best, Damon."
"You owe me, big," Damon adds and takes the file from her.
"I want you on a plane this afternoon," Esther states firmly.
"Whatever you say!" Damon's grip on the file tightens as he forces a smile.
"Ask for a Dr. Gilbert when you get there," Esther adds as she walks away.
"What the hell was she talking about?" Bonnie asks and sets her mug down.
"A prodrome is an early symptom indicating the onset of a disease or illness. A left shift typically means there are more band cells in a complete blood count. I personally think of bands as baby white cells. If the body is producing and mobilizing a large number of new white cells, then the body is attempting to fight off a very active infection. Thrombocytopenia is abnormally low platelets."
"I'm glad I don't have your job."
"Sometimes I wish the same!" he shakes his head. "I need to run. I'll give you a call when I arrive." Damon gives her shoulder a squeeze before rushing out to pack a bag, and catch the first flight to Gallup, New Mexico.
Thank you for reading. Do you want me to continue? This is not a DE version of 'Outbreak'. It is however based on a real-life case so it won't be a long story.
Thank you, Eva and jmfangs for pre-reading.
I did get some information for Damon's dream from "The Hot Zone" by Richard Preston.
Have a wonderful day everyone.
