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  Diary of the Last Seed

  ( Diary of the Last Seed - 1 )

  Charles Orangetree

  Kenneth wakes up in an empty room with no memories of his past life and an uncertain future ahead of him.

  A defiant teenager finds herself home alone, or at least that’s what she thinks…

  Meanwhile, a silent and mysterious disease is spreading through the human population. A pair of scientists are trying to understand how the disease attacked, and why some humans react to it differently, but they are running out of time. The disease causes unspeakable atrocities. The scientists have patient “Zero” to prove it.

  Is there any hope for mankind? Only time will tell….

  Charles Orangetree

  DIARY OF THE LAST SEED

  Vestige 1

  This is for my Wife and my boys for all their support.

  And for all the Zombie/post-Apocalyptic fans out there. The End is Near…. be prepared!!!!

  PROLOGUE

  The raindrops felt like small pebbles as they poured down on her face, preventing her from seeing clearly. Emma did not know how much longer she could hold the rusty metal bar. Cars were still parked on both sides of the collapsed bridge, while others dangled off it across from her. Emma saw a couple of the cars impaled by the same metal bars that she was now clinging to.

  Although the rain made the bar slick, Emma knew she had to deal with it. The bar was the only thing keeping her alive. Emma knew that she needed to be strong and put all her efforts and strength into holding onto it.

  The rain prevented her from smelling the crawler’s rotten flesh, but Emma could not avoid being in the path of the decomposing fluids that dripped down from every part of their bodies. She gathered strength from deep down to keep herself from vomiting as the mix of rain, blood, and flesh from the crawler’s, dripped down on her face. Emma started to feel like gagging; the texture of the fluids on her face was the most disgusting thing she had ever felt in her life, but she knew that any sound or movement could be her last.

  The crawlers were standing right above her, inches from her head. The only reason they could not smell her was due to the rain. Emma thought about climbing up and somehow fighting her way through, but she didn’t have any strength left to fight. She barely had enough to hold onto the metal bar. It seemed like an eternity, but she had only been hanging for a few minutes. Her strength was rapidly fading away.

  Food was not easy to find, and it been almost day and half since the last time she ate. She never saw herself as a quitter, but this time was different. She was pushing herself as she had never done before. Surviving the end of civilization was exhausting, and fighting every day for food and shelter was worse. Emma knew she was lucky to be alive. She had devoted friends to be grateful for, and she was not going to let them down. She tried to gather some strength to wipe her face on her shoulder, but she was too exhausted. She looked up again and saw the reflection of a crawler on the window of a dangling car.

  The crawler seemed like it was standing still, unable to see her, but Emma could see its reflection. It was a female crawler. She was still clinging to whatever pieces of humanity she had left, smelling, scratching its nails on the pavement, and letting out an unholy scream that sent Emma’s nerves into a complete frenzy. Emma noticed her long, dark hair dangling down in ragged clumps. The crawler’s clothes were torn, exposing one of the crawler’s breasts, though now it was no more than shredded skin dangling from her chest. The crawler moved on in a slow, shoveled pace. Emma knew this because they could no longer walk like a person; they did not have the will or capacity. They had degenerated to beast’s mode, searching for prey. This was their only primal instinct. The crawlers could smell any uninfected humans, and some of them were still able to use their eyes to track them down. Emma was glad the one on the bridge did not have eyes. The rain was keeping her concealed. If it had not been for the local town mayor investing in solar powered streetlights, she would be in complete darkness. She was relieved that she had some light illuminating on her. There was one downside to this though, crawlers, just like flies, were attracted to light, or at least they always stayed closed to it. At this moment, all she could do was concentrate on not letting go of the bar.

  Unfortunately, she could not see what was below her, or how high she was from the ground. All she could see was darkness beneath her, a never-ending sea of shadows that she would soon be drowning in if she let go. Her thoughts strayed, if she had been stronger or faster she would have avoided the crawlers, maybe she could have even saved her family. But all of that was in the past now, she needed to focus on the present and focus on the task at hand…holding on for her life.

  “This is some freaking bullshit!” she yelled as tears ran down her face. “I know you are out there, stop hiding in the fucking shadows and do something. You know, you will regret this for the rest of your miserable life. I know you are scared, but I am too, and right now I need your help.” The crawlers could hear her, but couldn’t pinpoint her location. They were roaming side to side on the bridge, one of them even felt down the bridge just at the bar where she was holding on and almost grabbed her. Emma completely ignored it, and kept yelling into the night.

  “Since you are not going to do a fucking thing for me, at least answer a question. Why did you tried to kiss me and tell me you loved me? Why, now, are you acting like you don’t even know me?” she asked. Emma was tired. Tired of not getting a response back, and tired of waiting for something, or someone, to save her from her current situation. She wished she had done something different; however, it was too late for that type of thinking.

  Emma’s mind was spinning a hundred miles an hour, trying to find a solution, and without realizing it her fingers let go of the metal bar. All she could do was close her eyes and hope that this was all a terrible dream. Images from when it all started filled her head. Flashbacks from those horrible first couple of weeks when she was alone, when her whole family had died, turned into crawlers, and tried to eat her. She could still remember the overwhelming stench of rotting flesh; the air around her had tasted of half-decomposed corpses. Crews of survivors worked at a feverish pace to purge the city of the dead, piles of dead bodies on every city block waited with sightless eyes for their turn on the pyre. Crows and other carrion birds descended on the endless feast of human flesh. She stopped staring at the tangled mass of arms and legs after what seemed an eternity. She could no longer bear the sight. The vision burned behind her eyelids of the young woman, only weeks away from giving birth, who lay nearby with her hands still clutching her swollen belly.

  She opened her eyes and arms as if she were welcoming the end of her life, and her body was swallowed by the night…

  CHAPTER ONE

  Stacy Blackburn

  Stacy Blackburn found herself leaning against the window, trying to look down toward the hospital parking lot, but it was impossible for her to see outside due to the winter storm punishing the streets below. Stacy caught her reflection in the window. Noticing her own smile, she rapidly turned her attention to her son’s bed. Who could blame her? In normal circumstances every snow day would bring so much joy to her family. Especially to Stacy’s son. He enjoyed playing in the snow ever since he was a little boy. He would be so happy during the winter months playing in the snow. Stacy’s memories were filled with her son running around, making snowmen, and playing with the family dachshund. She could still remember the first white winter her son had. To her surprise, it had been back in Texas. With a good two inches of snow, it was more than enough to build a snowman between her husband and child. Her son was happy, even though it didn’t last long due to the Texas weather.

  The snowman
melted within half an hour after construction. Stacy spent a few hours hearing her son grieve over the “dead” snowman. Stacy wished she could go back in time, back to the time when her son was happy and active. She knew that was not possible. All she could do was dream about having her son back and healthy. He had been in a coma for almost two months now and the doctors had not been able to figure out what was wrong with him. Stacy could not bear the sight of the snow anymore, so she slowly walked over to her son’s bed.

  Stacy’s hands were shaking and her face was covered with tears, but she managed to set a small cupcake on the table without dropping it. It was her son’s favorite flavor, chocolate. She raised her hand to cover a portion of the cupcake, looked around making sure that no one was nearby, and pulled a lighter out of her pajamas. She slowly lit up the lighter, brought it closer to the cupcake, and lit a single candle in the middle of the cupcake. She leaned close to her son’s ear and whispered, “Happy Birthday, Son.” Stacy grabbed her son’s hand and raised it closer to her chest, finding an empty space for her to sit next to him. She held his hand and leaned forward planting a kiss on his forehead. At least her boy was still alive.

  “Mrs.Blackburn?” a man’s voice asked as he entered the room. He was a tall, white gentlemen with black and gray hair; he looked at her through a pair of thick glasses. Stacy turned her attention to the man, but before he could say a word, a nurse approached both of them.

  “Excuse me,” she said, referring to Mrs. Blackburn, and discreetly whispered some words to the doctor.

  “What is it?” Mrs. Blackburn asked. He didn’t say a word; he simply approached her and put his hand on her shoulder.

  Stacy remained seated and held her son’s hand. She knew there was no point to keep asking the same questions over and over. Her son’s condition had not improved in two months, no matter how much the doctor’s would tell her. Deep inside she knew that her son would not get better. She tried to pretend that everything would be fine, that her son would recover and wake up from his comma, but all she had was hope.

  She could not stand seeing her son buried in IV’s, monitors, and oxygen hoses. Stacy’s heart broke a little every time she visited him. She still remembered the morning when she went to wake him up so he would not be late for school, but he never woke up. The night prior, before he went to sleep, he had told her how he was not feeling good; he thought he might be getting sick. She didn’t pay too much attention since this wasn’t the first time he’d feigned an illness to get out of school. And he was due to have an exam the next morning. Everything seemed normal to her, nothing out of the ordinary, but all that changed the next day when she tried to wake him and he didn’t respond.

  She tried everything to no avail and then she called 911. The paramedics arrived at her home and reached her son’s room. They strapped him to the stretcher and put him into the ambulance. Stacy was so worried, that she forgot to leave a note for her husband. It was Friday morning and she knew her husband was in the middle of lake fishing. He had decided to take Friday off and go fishing with some friends. His cell phone normally didn’t get any signal in the middle of the lake, so he would leave the phone either in the car or at the cabin. She still called him and left a message on his voice-mail. She jumped inside the ambulance and spent all night at the hospital.

  Stacy’s husband didn’t show up to the hospital until the next day. He tried to apologized to Stacy about his delay, but there was nothing he could have done. After he finished fishing late Friday night, Stacy’s husband and his friends headed down to the cabin and spent all night drinking. He completely forgot to check his cell phone. If he would have arrived a few hours earlier, he would have had an ear full from Stacy. But she was not angry anymore. Stacy knew she needed to focus her attention on her son. All she could do was hold his hand in hopes that sooner or later he would wake up. Feeling a pressure on her right shoulder, she snapped out of her daydreaming. She looked up and saw the doctor next to her, looking over her son.

  “We will figure it out Mrs. Blackburn, he will wake up,” the doctor said.

  “I’ve been waiting for him to wake up, or for you guys to figure out what is wrong with him, for about two months now. The world is going to shit out there, and I have to deal with my sick son and a bunch of incompetent doctors and nurses that cannot diagnose him. It’s not fair for me or my family. I am tired of all the excuses you have given me. I have not seen my husband for over two weeks now, and I can’t even give him an update on our son’s condition, because there is none.” She shook her head side to side with tears running down her face. She was exhausted.

  The doctor bent down and looked into her eyes. “You need to rest, go home. Spend time with the rest of your family. If there is any change on your son’s condition, I will personally contact you. As a matter of fact, here.” He handed her a small business card with his personal information.

  “If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact me any time. I normally don’t do this for patients, but I will make an exception for you Mrs. Blackburn. You need to promise me that you are going home to your family.” He kept his hand on her shoulder for comfort.

  Stacy didn’t know what to do or say. She got up from where she was seated, nodded to the doctor, and looked at her son.

  “I will be back next week.” She lifted her son’s hand to her face, moved the IV out of the way, and kissed it.

  “I love you. I love you with all my heart and soul from the moon and back.” Stacy lowered her son’s hand back to the side of the bed. She blew him another kiss and slowly walked toward the door. “Please take good care of my son,” Stacy told the doctor. She left her son’s room in search for the exit door. Walking through the hospital, deep inside her thoughts, Stacy failed to notice all the chaos and sick people that had overpopulated the emergency room. All Stacy wanted was to get away from the hospital for a couple of days and go see the rest of the family. Stacy left the hospital, got into her car, and drove home. That was the last time she would ever see her son.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Dr. Meacham

  “So the disease is airborne?” Dr. Meacham asked. He was standing in a small observation room, looking through a glass window at who he thought was patient zero for a new type of epidemic. Dr. Meacham rested his forehead against the glass wall. He could see his reflection on the glass and noticed the guilt on his face. And who wouldn’t feel guilty when seeing one of his co-workers in that type of predicament? He raised his head and stared into the other side of the glass wall where there was an even smaller room painted all in white. A sealed bio-hazard door was on the left side of the room, and his co-worker strapped to a metal frame bed was on the right. Dr. Whitney was a brilliant, up and coming virologist, now, by a mistake or just pure lousy luck, she lay motionless. Her face was still covered with trails of dried blood running from her nose, ears, and eyes. An open gash from her forehead disappeared under her red hairline. Other wounds were slowly appearing over her entire body.

  “If I were a man of God and not a scientist, I’d swear she looks exactly like the exorcist,” Dr. Moore said. Who would debate him? After all, her wounds and behavior could be confused with a possession, or a person suffering from stigmata. The other doctors tried to treat her wounds, but they hadn’t had any luck, it seemed as if the blood was not coagulating. Dr. Meacham knew that the young doctor didn’t have too much longer before she bled to dead. It had been three hours since she started acting weird, and the other doctors had to strap her down to the metal bed.

  Dr. Meacham remembered her asking him if she could work during the weekend, since she had family coming in this week. For just a moment, he thought that whatever was happening to her was his fault. He had no idea that this was just the beginning, and that she was not the last person that he would see dying under his authority. Dr. Meacham didn’t pay any attention to Dr. Moore, who was next to him asking him a question.

  “Sorry, Dr. Moore, you said something?” “Are we infecte
d as well?” Dr. Moore asked, with disbelief written all over his face. “Maybe,” Dr. Meacham said, “Naaa, it is not possible. If the virus were airborne, that would mean everyone in the building is infected.” “If that were the case, someone else should have been showing symptoms already.” “You are right, Chris,” Dr. Meacham said. He knew that Dr. Moore preferred to be called by his first name, at least by his colleagues.

  “What if the virus has different incubation periods, depending on the person who is infected?” “Because the antibodies of each individual are different, maybe that’s why it had taken longer to show in everyone else,” Dr. Meacham said. “If you are right about these, we are in a time bomb and I don’t want to be inside this building went it goes off,” Dr. Moore said.

  “Chris, I need you to lock down the building, nobody comes in, and nobody goes out. I will also need you to gather a few more personnel and conduct blood tests on everyone in the building. I need this to happen ASAP. You got it?”

  “Yes,” Dr. Moore answered with an attitude. He knew Dr. Meacham was his supervisor, but he didn’t like to be bossed around. He knew this was bigger than him, or anybody else in this building. If, in fact, this was a new virus, and it was airborne, that meant everyone was infected, and it was going to be a terrible day for all. He hoped that Dr. Meacham was wrong and that he was just having a bad day. Dr. Moore could not imagine, or even believe, that a virus, fungus, or whatever it was, could become airborne in a day.

  The only possible way would be if the virus had mutated a long time ago and for some reason the incubation period came to a halt. But, these were all theories, speculation his mind was working on. He knew that if anyone could fix this, or find a cure, it would be Dr. Meacham. Dr. Meacham had been working there much longer than he had. Dr. Moore could still see that Dr. Meacham was worried, and that made him a little uncomfortable since he never worried during this type of situations. This time something was different. Something was not right, as if Dr. Meacham had known this would happen. But could he? Dr. Moore thought about it. Dr. Meacham was a little worried about the whole situation, but he was still acting quite calm.