Turners | Book 2 | 90 Degrees

by Thomas, Ellis

  “You mean an epidemic victim?”

  Carson had a very active mind and was constantly researching crime related events. Dale was thinking he had read one too many and paranoia had taken over.

  “Yeah. I’ve been following it and reading all of the bulletins from the areas close to us. The people who contract the virus all die and then the bodies reanimate. But they’re not really alive like they can think and remember. The bodies just start moving and feeding. Anyone that is scratched by the infected, die and turn also. From the look of his wounds and the fact this guy didn’t fall from my shot, I knew he was dead already and that he had to be one of them.”

  “Is everything ok out there?” Regan called out.

  “Everything’s fine Regan,” Dale answered back. “It was just a… a… a rabid animal. We’re getting things cleaned up but there may be another about so stay inside for now.” That was the best Dale could come up with given the circumstances.

  “Carson, call the coroner for a pick up.”

  Inside the house, Regan could see it wasn’t an animal the two men were bending over. Perplexed as to why Dale would lie to her but not wanting to alarm Leandra, Regan did as she was advised. Turning to Leandra who was sitting anxiously on the couch, she smiled and said “It was just a crazy animal. Everything’s under control. Why don’t we check on those new mothers?”

  Since JoJo was no longer growling Leandra relaxed and made her way to check on the puppies’ progress.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~

  By the time dawn broke, all evidence of the struggle had been cleaned up. Leandra went home and after a careful inspection of the kennel fencing, Regan went over to the station to see Dale.

  “Hi Dale” she casually greeted him. “Thanks for coming over so quickly this morning.”

  Dale was seated at his desk and gestured for her to take a seat. He brought his stocky six foot frame partially out of his seat as a gesture of respect when Regan sat down.

  “Just doing my job.” He smiled as he said it but he couldn’t keep the concern out of his green eyes and Regan saw it. Regan looked him straight in the eyes.

  “That was no animal last night Dale,” she flatly stated. “Who was out there?”

  ‘Aghhh’, Dale thought. ‘She had to turn on those lights.’

  To Regan, he kept up his casual manner. “What do you mean? It was just a rabid animal.”

  Not to be pushed aside, Regan was even more direct. “It may have been rabid but it was no animal. I saw a man lying on the ground when I turned the lights on. Besides, coroners don’t pick up animals!”

  Dale had known Regan a long time and knew she didn’t like playing cat and mouse. She was level headed and had a serious nature. Knowing neither she nor Hank were gossips, he decided to take her into his confidence.

  “Alright, Regan. For your ears alone. I don’t want a panic in Walters. It was a man but not like you think. Have you been following the news or reading about what’s been going on with this Turner plague?”

  “Hank has been following it more closely than I but I know some pretty weird stuff is happening because of it.”

  “Well, looks like it made its first appearance here in Walters last night. Thank goodness Carson was up on it or I would have been the next victim. Carson shot it where it counted and put it down before any damage could be done. When you turned on the lights, I got a good look at it and nothing could have survived the massive wounds that it already had.

  When Howie arrived, he told me he was going to quarantine the body at the morgue so I think he knew what he was dealing with.

  Anyway, I went to the coroner’s office before coming in this morning and examined the corpse. Howie pointed out the mortal wounds that had been previously inflicted. Based on the post mortem, he said the body had been dead about two weeks!”

  Regan sat silently as Dale spoke, trying to digest the horrible news that Walters was no longer a safe haven.

  “You have to let the townspeople know” she said. “They have to know so they can protect themselves.”

  “Carson has spent the morning going through police reports to see how other precincts are handling these…these things.” Dale wasn’t sure what to call the animated dead.

  “Let me know when you’ll be doing a town meeting. I’m going home and look at my house and kennel through different eyes. I’m sure I need to beef up the security and fencing around them.” She turned to leave but looked back at Dale. “Thank you for being up front with me Dale. Let me know if there’s anything I can do” and she left.

  6 Changes

  After a thorough inspection of her property, Regan called Brent, the local handyman. He arrived at the appointed time and Regan walked him through the changes she wanted done.

  “You’d think an invasion was comin’” he said and looked at her with suspicion. “Why all the reinforcements?”

  “We had a rabid animal try to get at the dogs last night.” Since this is what Dale had said, she felt comfortable passing it on. “It started me thinking that it’s a lot smarter to be proactive than wait for a fatality to act. These animals are precious to people.” This seemed to satisfy Brent’s curiosity and he got into his truck and left to pick up the supplies that he would need.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~

  Late that afternoon Hank surprised Regan by coming home earlier than expected. Thrilled at seeing him, she threw her arms around his neck and greeted him with a warm kiss.

  “Wow, I know you love me but I didn’t think you would miss me that much!” Hank laughed.

  “I did miss you! But I’m also glad you’re home because so much has happened since you’ve been gone” Regan spilled out.

  Regan was so practical and calm about things in general that Hank knew something big had happened just by seeing her agitation.

  “Come on babe and sit down” Hank said as he led her to the kitchen table. He put on a kettle of water to make tea as he always did in the evening and brought out two of their favorite mugs and chamomile tea bags then sat down beside her.

  “Go ahead Regan” was all he said.

  Regan started at the beginning with the dogs barking, the intruder, her conversation with Dale and finished with calling Brent.

  Hank silently listened with concern etched on his face.

  “I saw on the news that a while back that Phoenix had a major outbreak but I thought it would be a lot longer for it to happen here. You were wise to get Brent working before he gets in demand. Let’s wait until Dale makes the announcement before we decide our next move.”

  Then he took Regan in his arms. “For right now, let’s pretend all is well with the world.” Smiling affectionately, he took her to their bedroom.

  7 No Refuge

  When everyone that was able had arrived for the town meeting, Dale began.

  “Most of you are aware of the epidemic that is spreading around the country, commonly referred to as Turners.

  Like most of you, I thought we were pretty safe because of our relatively isolated location. If you haven’t already heard, that changed a couple of nights ago.”

  Loud murmurs surged through the assembled group.

  When the talking settled down, Dale continued.

  “Our first encounter happened at the Larkes’ place on Tuesday night.”

  In unison, the group turned to look at Hank and Regan, some with anger on their faces that they had kept quiet and others with concern that they were alright.

  “Let me make it clear” Dale raised his voice, “they were silent at my request. We needed time to assess the situation and come up with some kind of plan to deal with these things. A panic throughout our community would not have helped anyone.

  We weren’t sure who or what we were dealing with, so we refrained from any announcements until our suspicions were confirmed. The Turner, for lack of a better word, was examined and found to be in the early stages of decomposition.”

  Dale was silent in order for the news to soak in. He needed the townspeop
le to realize that no place, however isolated, was immune to the horrific disease that had total control of the host.

  The range of expressions, disbelief, shock, and fear told Dale that most of the people were aware of what had been going on around them.

  “I contacted a pandemic specialist that had interned under Dr. Wiggins and who is now the CDC Field Officer in Maricopa County and also part of the CDC’s Boots on the Ground team. For obvious reasons, she cannot be here for this meeting.

  The CDC has been working around the clock developing vaccines to try to combat this plague. One of the vaccines they have developed is called AT48. AT48 has had the highest success rate in the lab of creating antibodies to attack the virus.

  Now the CDC needs to take it to the next step and see if it will work on humans on a mass scale. However, they need an isolated target group which makes Walters an ideal choice because of our location.

  They believe the best mass penetration method would be airborne so they plan to ‘dust’ the selected area.

  Now that we have been officially invaded by this virus, we need to think of large scale protection.

  This, obviously, is not a decision the town council can make on their own.”

  Dale held up his hands for silence as everyone started voicing their concerns at the same time.

  “Like I said, ‘You will be the ones who decide if this is a course of action you want taken’. The CDC offers no guarantees, but if Walters is willing to allow the mass vaccination with the new drug combinations, the CDC will pay all expenses involved and also pay a test subject fee to each participant.

  We will be passing out voter cards tonight along with the CDC test subject waivers. We will make sure each resident that is absent receives one. All cards with the signed waivers must be turned in to the sheriff’s office by Monday. The cards have the website listed where you can go to find answers to your questions on the proposed treatment. Please do not call Dr. Wiggins with questions. He needs to be available for those who need medical attention. The website that is listed on the cards will give you all of the information that is available to us at this time. Remember, this is new territory for all of us. Everything outside of the information the CDC releases is just conjecture and supposition.”

  With that said he turned off the mic and left the city council members to deal with all of the questions that would come regardless of what he had just said.

  8 Goodbyes

  Two weeks later the second town meeting came into session. This time it was held in the school gym because every resident in Walters was showing up to hear the vote results firsthand.

  “Thank you all for coming” Dale began. “The last two weeks have been a whirlwind of emotion and decision making. The vote was almost unanimous to try to protect this town by dusting it and us with the experimental agent, AT48.”

  Nods and verbal agreements surged through the large crowd gathered. The McCullens and the Larkes were among the few who still had doubts.

  “With a majority approval from the townspeople, the date has been set for two weeks from today. A crop duster will begin the process at 10:00am sharp on Saturday the 12th.”

  Excitement pulsated from the 600 plus people that were in attendance. By now everyone was well aware of the consequences of contracting the Turners virus.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~

  The next day Hank and Regan dropped in to see Dale and Carson.

  “Morning.” Hank and Regan took seats at Dale’s desk.

  “How are you two doing?” Dale asked, knowing they were among the residents who were not in favor of the dusting.

  “We’re actually doing fine” confessed Hank. “Regan and I just want to let you know that we have decided to leave Walters before the dusting occurs. We’ll be closing the kennel and locking up the house.”

  “We just can’t get on board with absorbing something that has so little research behind it” continued Regan. “The cure might turn out to be worse than the sickness and we just don’t want to take the chance.”

  Dale knew Regan loved Walters and this must have been a very difficult decision to make to leave home and friends.

  “I know the decision was not an easy one for most of us” Dale said. “We sure are going to miss you both around here though. Do you know where you’ll be settling down?”

  “There’s a place on the way to Southern Cal that I have stopped in for the last couple of years when I’ve had to go on business trips. It’s called Junction” Hank said.

  “I went there once and loved the small town peacefulness of it” Regan reminisced.

  “Anyway” Hank continued, “there is a really nice bed and breakfast there that we’ll stay in until we decide our next move.”

  Just then Dale’s radio went off, calling him to an accident.

  “I have to go” he said as he stood up. “You know both Shar and I wish you guys the very best wherever you end up and hopefully our paths will cross again.”

  Dale shook Hank’s hand as he walked out. Looking back over his shoulder, he said “Let’s get together for dinner before you leave” and he was gone.

  Dale’s heart was heavy as he walked to his car. He knew Hank and Regan were only the first of what would turn out to be a long list of goodbyes.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~

  “Hi Leandra” Regan greeted her with a hug. She had waited for Leandra to come over to break the news in person.

  Leandra automatically headed towards the back of the clinic with JoJo at her heels to take care of the animals.

  “Wait, Leandra, I need to talk to you about something first.”

  Leandra turned back and smiled at Regan wondering why they couldn’t just talk while they worked together. Never the less, she gave Regan her full attention.

  “What’s up?” Leandra asked.

  “Leandra let’s go into the kitchen for some cake and milk.” Leandra obediently followed Regan, puzzled at her odd behavior and deviation from their normal routine.

  After putting the refreshments on the table, Regan sat down.

  “I have some hard news to break,” Regan had rehearsed this conversation so many times in her head but it still was not coming out easily. She decided a direct approach was best.

  “Hank and I have decided to leave.” There, it was done.

  Leandra’s mouth opened in protest but nothing came out. Her large brown eyes began to water and her throat contracted. She wanted to cry at the thought of her friend leaving but at the same time, she felt she was too old to react like that.

  Knowing what was happening, Regan quickly went on.

  “Hank and I just aren’t comfortable with this whole dusting thing so we’ve decided to move permanently since we don’t know how long the residue from the dusting will remain on things.

  This was not an easy decision for either of us. I’m really going to miss you” she finished, her eyes beginning to water.

  Clearing her throat, Leandra tried to console Regan.

  “It’s ok Regan. We can still call each other. Maybe I could even come and see you once you’re settled in.” Leandra felt better just saying it and hoped it would be true. “I’m going to miss you so much though” and she could feel her throat constricting again.

  “As soon as we settle down, I’ll let you know a good time and make the arrangements with your parents” Regan said, trying to encourage them both.

  “Where are you going?”

  Regan brightened. “A place called Junction” she said and began to tell Leandra all about it.

  9 AT48

  The week before the dusting, Walters was buzzing with activity. Those who were for it, were anticipating the freedom of not having to fear the terrible contagion. They had heard that even a scratch would infect a healthy person and the incident at Regan and Hanks’s house had made the sleepy community realize that no place, however isolated, was safe.

  The coffee shops and cafés were unusually busy as people gathered to exchange news and ideas.

 
~~~~~~~~~~~~

  The morning finally arrived when Walters would rise above the other communities and become a haven for the residents. Shop owners anticipated economic growth as people found a place where they could relax in safety and the local lumber yard envisioned lines of people waiting to buy the supplies to build their retreats. Parents looked forward to the safety for their children.

  The day turned out to be beautiful, with just a slight breeze. All doors and windows were opened to let the chemical penetrate everything. The residents were encouraged to stay outside when the dusting occurred so that they could absorb as much of the airborne antidote as possible. The residue that lingered in Walters would continue to build immunity as people came in contact with it.

  Those who were not on board with the mass inoculation but who were unable to leave, stayed inside with their homes locked up as tightly as possible, avoiding all possible contact with the powder.

  The McCullen family was among them. Leandra was especially persuaded by Regan and Hank but the entire family was in agreement on the decision so they chose that week to do a camping trip in the mountains. The monsoons were just beginning and they hoped there would be a good rain to clean everything before they returned.

  The hospital was also shut up because of the concern over how patients with compromised health conditions would react. All of the hospital staff were required to stay inside the hospital for at least 48 hours to avoid contact and because they might be needed if there were negative reactions to the drug.

  Businesses closed everything up so those who chose not to be dusted would feel comfortable coming in afterwards without fear of absorbing the chemical.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~

  The residents were out in masse waiting for the miracle cure and enjoying the beautiful weather. They even had their assorted pets with them.

  At exactly 10:00am everyone looked up as they heard the crop duster approaching with the miracle cure. There was a feeling of euphoria surging through the crowd. The thought that they would all safely ride out the epidemic raised their hopes to new heights.