The Virulent Chronicles Box Set

by Shelbi Wescott

  She’s on the plane, Salem thought. But a quick scan of the sky above them revealed only empty airspace. Not a single plane traveled through the clouds. Salem did notice a few news helicopters hovering in the distance—and she hoped the pilots had the wherewithal to steer away from homes in the inevitable event that the sickness overtook them mid-flight.

  Salem jolted as a car raced by her down the residential street, swerving to the right and to the left, before losing speed and coming to rest against someone’s fence. She stood, horrified, as the car emitted a plume of white smoke and a punctured tire hissed.

  She needed to be inside, safe, and soon.

  Limping, Salem continued down the street, her head low, and wandered down side streets and through yards until she hit the edge of the school property. She didn’t know what she had hoped to see outside her school—her school—but what she saw made her heart sink. Stay inside, her father, the police, and the news had counseled, and she had refused to listen. Now, her eyes scanned the crowd outside the doors, hoping to find a happy and familiar face among the crowd. The people there were mad, crazy, and their energy poured outward. They banged upon the glass of their fortified windows and screamed to be let in; a few people took baseball bats to the cars in the lot and rummaged through discarded backpacks. Many of the people stood aimless and afraid, watching those who terrorized the inhabitants of the school with a detached affect, and yet, no matter which camp the survivors found themselves, the school was closed. Colored paper, the same paper that was used for cheerleading tryout announcements and to cover bulletin boards, obscured the view inside. People banged on the windows and they shook, but they remained a force against letting anyone gathered in the breezeway access to the school.

  Their principal, a creepy, middle-aged dude with a perpetual glower, had solicited grant money to install state-of-the-art security measures. They were a model school for all top-of-the-line mechanical enhancements against intruders, and Salem was quite sure that the whole thing was just a publicity grab. She knew several ways to sneak in and out of Pacific Lake that would go undetected by hall monitors and cameras, and she was sure that Vicki DeCosta sneaked her college-aged boyfriend into the auditorium for lunchtime make-out sessions at least twice a week. All the locks and cameras in the world couldn’t deter the creativity and utility of teenagers.

  Still, Salem moved robotically toward the crowd.

  A swell of people had congregated in the alcove between the math wing and the cafeteria. There was a line of floor-to-ceiling windows, and they too were covered in paper. People banged with balled-up fists against the class, and a few determined men rushed forward in unison, throwing their shoulders against the door and hoping for what? The glass to break? The doors to unhinge? The effort was futile. Salem found herself standing in a patch of soggy grass, unable to move even as the other survivors flowed around her. She realized she wasn’t wearing socks, and her feet felt wet against the fabric of her tennis shoes.

  When she looked up, she saw him standing ten feet away. Patrick Miller. He had been her sophomore year crush: a transplant from the south who played the piano and wore a tie to school. His brown hair looked wildly unbrushed and his winter jacket was torn along the sleeve, but there he was—a familiar face. Salem watched him for a few minutes, too tired and too relieved to shout or call his name, but happy nonetheless to know that someone she knew was here, with her.

  She wanted to cry and sob into his shoulder and ask him about his morning. She wanted to hold his hand, just to be able to touch someone’s skin and not be afraid. Salem opened her mouth to say, “Patrick!” and she took a tentative step in his direction and held her hand out, poised to wave. But just as his name slipped from her mouth, Patrick fell. She choked on the last syllable of his name and rushed forward to aid him, but it was too late. He convulsed on the ground in front of her, and she had to look away. Her legs buckled out from under her, and Salem landed on the soft earth with a thud.

  “Another one!” someone shouted behind her. “Get him out of here!” And a small crew of men wearing gloves and white masks materialized around Patrick’s shaking body. He wasn’t even dead yet; there was still life in his eyes and his chest still moved up and down as he struggled to take a breath, but the men were swift. They each grabbed a limb and moved him to the far end of the parking lot where Salem only now noticed a small mound of limbs, hair, and clothing. They left poor Patrick among the corpses to die by himself, and Salem refused to watch.

  A woman stumbled over Salem and cursed as she tripped forward, and the men with gloves were directed to another small area of sidewalk where it looked like a family had expired together. There was measured chaos—the best and worst of humanity—and Salem couldn’t move. She reminded herself to breathe. The air felt cool in her lungs, but foreign and strange.

  “Here,” someone said and handed her a granola bar. She stared at it.

  “Thank you,” she mumbled. And the anonymous stranger kept on moving forward, handing the small token of kindness to the people he passed. Salem wasn’t hungry and she wasn’t thinking about being hungry later, but she held the treat in her fist all the same.

  Patrick was dead.

  Her parents were dead.

  Everyone was dead.

  She shivered involuntarily. She didn’t know if she was angry or sad. She felt cold and hot at the same time. She felt like screaming and never speaking again. Out of habit, Salem looked at her cell phone and noticed that the service was still down, which gave her a strong pang of isolation. Maybe someone out there was wondering if she was okay, and they thought she was dead.

  Still unmoving, Salem listened as a small group of refugees congregated beside her. Either they were unaware of Salem beneath their feet or they didn’t care about her presence.

  “I tried the pool door,” one of the girls said. She might have been a Pacific Lake student, but Salem didn’t recognize her and she didn’t put any effort into turning around to study her face. It wouldn’t have mattered anyway. “Totally locked. The handle wouldn’t even budge.”

  “That’s the only way,” another voice said.

  “I’m walking back,” the first one said. “Not worth it.”

  “It’s at least two miles.”

  “Not worth it.”

  “Someone should just be able to get us in there. I don’t understand. The Red Cross is in there.”

  Salem didn’t think this was true.

  “Yeah, the news said they’d send Red Cross supplies to the shelter locations. Bastards.”

  “It’s safer at home,” a third girl said, her voice small, weak.

  “I can’t get home, Jennifer!”

  “We’d all be inside that school right now if you hadn’t wanted to get coffee this morning.”

  “This isn’t my fault,” the Jennifer girl replied. “I want in there, too. But it’s not the only way—”

  The group moved away, discussing in hushed tones the benefit of making their way back to their respective homes out in the extended suburbs of Portland. Salem felt her body drifting and for a moment, she thought maybe this was what it felt like at the end: a sudden sleepiness and fatigue, an out-of-body experience, a desire to curl up and let the ocean waves in her head carry her away.

  Instead, she heard a gunshot. It jolted her back to reality, and Salem scrambled to her feet. She turned wildly one way and then another, looking for the direction of the gun. People scattered away from the man who was now taking aim again at the glass cafeteria door. He fired another shot, and Salem covered her ears and screamed.

  “It’s bulletproof!” she called. She could feel the muscles in her neck bulging and tightening as she yelled. “Bulletproof!” Either no one could hear her above the din or no one cared.

  Salem realized she was still holding her phone in her fist. She glanced down only to see her bars line skyrocket into action and her social networking notifications pile up, each one coming in on top of another, as though a sea of people suddenly
wanted and needed her attention. But with the phones now back in use, Salem called the only person she wished she could talk to… and the only person she was sure was unreachable—Lucy.

  She hit the preprogrammed number and started to sprint away from the crowds and the guns. It rang, a sound so glorious and unexpected that Salem began to bawl and her tears wet the phone screen.

  Lucy answered. Or someone answered. The call connected.

  “Lula! Lula!” Salem screamed, using Lucy’s nickname. She halted fifty yards away from the doors and pushed the phone closer to her ear. “Are you there? Are you there?”

  “Sal?” Lucy’s voice croaked back at her while the line went fuzzy and faint and then roared back. “Sal? Where are you?”

  Relief flooded every muscle and joint in Salem’s body, and she dropped to her knees. “I’m at the school,” she cried.

  “Thank God! Sal, I’m here, too! It’s a long story… but I’m inside Pacific right now. No one can get out, Salem. They have everyone locked inside! It’s a total nightmare.”

  Salem had stopped listening to Lucy, and she tried to shout at her friend. “Lucy, listen! I’m outside. I’m right outside the cafeteria… by the doors… We can’t get in, Lucy. No one can get in!”

  “No one can get out,” Lucy said again.

  The man by the doors shot his handgun at the glass again. This time, the crowd scattered, and Salem watched as several more people succumbed to the convulsions. There was no escaping the dying, and Salem watched in horror as a man who looked like the guy who gave her the granola bar was dragged off the cement and into the grass. Her granola bar. Where had she lost that sweet treat? She patted her pockets and the lining of her shirt, realizing she must have left it in the grass. Great despair flooded over her again and she sobbed, shaking.

  “Salem, what the hell is going on?” Lucy asked her. And Salem paused. Why was Lucy at the school? Didn’t she have a plane to catch? All the questions she needed answered rattled around inside her head, but she couldn’t find the words to express her confusion. Everything went foggy. Lucy was alive. She was alive in the building right in front of her, and she was talking to her on the phone.

  “They’re trying to shoot the card lock off. They’re trying to shoot the glass?” She raised her voice up at the end like it was a question, but it wasn’t. “I tried to tell them it was bulletproof, but it’s madness here.” It wasn’t quite the truth, Salem realized, but it wasn’t quite a lie. There was no way she wanted to be anywhere near the throng of maniacs who felt like getting into the school required violence. Was this all because they thought Pacific Lake had benefitted from the Red Cross? Could the aid program have had time to mobilize?

  Rational thought was a luxury in a crisis, Salem realized. She’d been stabbed. She’d watched a police officer die. She’d seen a man try to shoot through the locks at her school. What should normal people be doing in a time like this? They wouldn’t be sitting around holding hands, waiting to die. That lost granola bar was one small act of kindness amidst a growing sea of desperation.

  “God, Lucy, help me!” Salem cried, appealing to her only hopes—her savior and her best friend. “Help me, please!”

  “I’m coming!” Lucy called, but Salem didn’t hear the rest. Coming to where? Salem realized a second too late that Lucy was running toward the cafeteria crowd, running toward the gunfire. In an instant, Salem was on her feet and rushing through the parking lot toward the crowd she’d been trying to avoid. She pushed her way through the people and jumped up and down, waiting for her friend. What was her plan? She felt like throwing up.

  “I’m almost there,” Lucy said.

  Salem took a breath. “Lucy, you have to get me inside the school. You have to get me inside the school right now.”

  But even as the request left her mouth, Salem realized the location wouldn’t matter. She wanted to be with Lucy, that was true, but a world without her parents, a world without the Patrick Millers or without the hopeful laughter of little children, and a world with fear and terror around every corner? It was not a world she cared to live in. She hated herself for feeling so dark, but the hole in her heart could not be filled by switching from outside to inside.

  Maybe Lucy would hold her and let her sob. Maybe she’d finally feel safe from guns and knives and sudden death. But it was more likely Lucy wouldn’t be able to staunch the loss or make her feel better at all.

  It all came down to this: Salem was lost, alone, afraid, and dizzy with uncertainty. Still, she stood a few feet back from the window and waited.

  Right as Salem was about to lose hope in Lucy’s efforts, the black paper over a section of the cafeteria window was torn loose and her best friend’s face peered outward, her blonde hair a tangled mess as her brown eyes scanned the crowd. Salem jumped and waved her arms, and in that one second, when Lucy’s eyes locked on hers, Salem began to cry pure tears of joy.

  It felt wonderful to be seen.

  It felt amazing to be wanted. Rescued.

  Lucy had come for her.

  Salem smiled through the tears and let the crowd propel her forward. A new excitement overtook the crowd, who had failed to locate any living proof of people inside the school until now, and it seemed like Lucy’s presence energized them. A few people begged to be let in, and the gunfire stopped in anticipation of a rescue.

  But Salem didn’t care about any of that. She kept her eyes trained on her best friend, and in that one second, she felt like everything was going to be okay.

  ANNABELLE SAUNDERS’S DAY – Action News Team, San Antonio

  “Good morning, San Antonio. We are bringing you the latest coverage of our up-to-date coverage… no, no, no.” Annabelle flipped her blonde extensions forward and twisted a curl around her manicured finger. She sniffed and leaned forward, inches away from the bathroom mirror, and inspected her pores. Then she settled back, stood tall, and tried again.

  “Good morning, San Antonio. I am Annabelle Saunders, filling in for Bob Gunderson today, who can’t be with us,” she droned in her practiced Texan drawl. “We are continuing our action news coverage of the devastating act of bio-terrorism that is sweeping the nation and the world this morning. Just a few moments ago, our president issued a plea for people to stay calm and rational. And I can’t stay calm and rational because I’m in the freaking anchor desk.”

  She’d called her parents, who had not fully shared her enthusiasm in light of the recent attacks on the country, first thing. But all great anchors were made amid tragedy, and she would be no different. When the dust settled and the terrorists brought to justice, she’d still be there—her winsome expression and comforting eyes a beacon to those who were afraid.

  “Where were you when the virus hit?” generations would ask. And someone would say, “Sitting at home, watching KP12, and that newscaster Annabelle Saunders comforted me when I didn’t know what was going to happen.”

  When people turned on their TV sets, they’d have her, and she’d walk them through the tragedy. She smiled wide, then wiped the smile away and stared at her refection. The makeup artist had bailed, too, but Annabelle didn’t care—she’d do her own makeup, do her own hair, and write her own leads. Bob Gunderson could eat her dust.

  “Stoic. Sincere. Serious,” she repeated on a loop. “Stoic.” She raised her eyebrows a touch. “Sincere.” She put her hand over her heart. “Serious.” All hints of her excitement, erased.

  “Good morning, San Antonio. Annabelle Saunders with the news… filling in for Bob Gunderson, who called in sick for work because he’s a chump who’s afraid of the big stuff—” She did a small dance and listened to the way her heels clicked on the tile. Her pencil skirt was pressed, and her tulip blouse unbuttoned just enough to show the outline of her collarbone, no cleavage.

  The bathroom door swung wide, and a production assistant with wild hair and a clipboard that Annabelle was pretty certain was just a prop motioned for her to follow.

  “On in five. The early morning t
eam will say their goodbyes.”

  “Perfect,” Annabelle cooed.

  The assistant scrunched up her nose and kept walking with focused intensity, her little arms pumping. “No teleprompter.”

  “I can wing it—”

  “Like hell you’ll wing it. We’ll wire you up… speak to you directly. Say only what the big guys tell you to say. You got it?”

  “I was born ready,” Annabelle said, and then she realized the assistant hadn’t asked her if she was ready. She cleared her throat. “I’ve got it. I got it.”

  “Jesus Christ, where’d we get you?” the girl replied, and she rolled her eyes. “You an intern or what?”

  “No!” Annabelle replied and she crossed her arms, indignant. She froze five feet away from the anchor desk she coveted. The morning team was off, stripping themselves of microphones and shedding their jackets; they rushed off without even so much as a handshake and Annabelle glared at them, annoyed. They could at least congratulate her or wish her luck, or tell her they’d be watching, or offer some advice. It was a well-known industry fact that Steve Gunner, the early morning anchor, was a real jerk, but she still expected a half-hearted hello. But nothing. Gunner was gone and Bridgett Young, his co-host, was gone, too.

  “Well? You want to do this? I wish we had other options, but you’re the only one,” the assistant said.

  “The only one willing?”

  “The only one who showed up.” The assistant rolled her eyes, and then she moved a pair of worn headphones off her ears and wrapped them around her neck. She leaned in conspiratorially. “You see… people are dying, right? Most people don’t get in their cars and rush to work.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Annabelle replied. She refused to accept that she was here by default. “It’s the news. If you’re a real journalist, you absolutely get in your car and rush to work. If people are dying, you drive faster.”