Title: Dawn
World: Original - Post-Vitiglen Infection
Words: 1,702
.pROLOGUE.
In early January of 2015, the first case of Vitiglen was noted.
The patient was a 20 year old male who hailed from Nebraska. After being vaccinated for the flu virus, he started developing patches of pale, numb skin. He was admitted to Johns Hopkins Hospital after admitting that he could no longer read. Slowly, the function of the injected shoulder decreased, the patches of numb pale skin slowly flowing down to his fingers. The patient complained of sharp points of pain. His internal temperature at this time was written on his chart as 99F. Vomiting spells broke out every hour or so. Irregular heartbeats were noted, and so far no known medications were working.
A specialist took a biopsy of the skin near the injection site. The cut made for the biopsy was noted by a nurse to not bleed at all. Still, the site was cleaned and wrapped. His fervor in the next five to six hours increased to 103F, and he shows slight fits of dementia. Spots of white skin started to develop on his chest and his feet, as well as on his back. The patient complied of joint pain, and rapidly became irritated. The order to strap him down and sedate him was made 48 hours after his arrival.
The spec lists notations about the biopsied skin were very small - the only notated item on the chart was that the sample was dead.
It was noted 50 hours after the patient was admitted that his pupils no longer responded to light stimuli, nor did his infected arm and feet respond when pinched or poked. Patient's heart rate slowed, and his fever spiked to 106 F. Monitored brain activity slowly decreased for another hour before it was determined that the patient had fallen into a coma. 52 hours after being admitted, the patient went into cardiac arrest, brain activity ceased, and he was pronounced dead.
The autopsy revealed that most of the major internal organs had been decomposing inside of the patient before he was pronounced. The sight of the flu injection was examined thoroughly, and it was noted that the cells in the area had been dead for quite a long time - at least a week. The brain, the coroner noted in her report, had lacerations and pock marks everywhere, pieces of the brain - she noted - 'seemed to fall apart as I tried to remove them'.
The coroner - as it was detailed in the papers later - quit immediately after that examination. She was quoted saying 'I could swear to you that he was moving some times. That his foot twitched, his hand - his mouth. When you start seeing the people on the table move, you need a new job.'
In January of 2015, the first epidemic of Vitiglen was noted in Nebraska.
In February of 2015, after extensive study of the corpses that where noted with the first string of the Vitiglen virus - after half of the diagnostic team contracted the disease themselves and died trying to find a cure and a reason behind the infection - the first string of Vitiglen Blockers were created and distributed.
In April of 2015, the first NIP - Non-Infected Persons - Camp was opened in Nebraska - cases of Vitiglen were found spreading through the state, expanding slowly. The cause was not yet found.
In May of 2015, the first case of Walking Vitiglen was notated. The patient, who had been administered Vitiglen Blockers, resisted the early progressive stages of the disease. The patient stayed alive for a full week - patches of dead, white skin developed slowly and inability to understand the written word remained intact - before falling into a coma and passing on. An autopsy was never conducted on the corps. The media was denied by the government to release any information that came from the first WV case, and the coroner who was working early that morning - who walked in on the WV patient's body standing face first in the corner of the morgue, teetering back and forth, moaning softly - was taken into custody and disappeared altogether.
In June of 2015, Mike Walker - a reporter - contracted the disease. His last report, given to his spouse, was based on the chaos that the hospital he was in. He described the pandemonium because of the sickness, the rate at which patents were dying, and the overwhelming government presence in the hospital. Mike also reported seeing corpses - who were stored in the hallways, the morgue full, to make room for more Vitiglen patent's - were moving inside their body bags, three or four of them strapped to gurneys to keep them from moving. His wife snuck the papers out of the hospital and disrupted them to all the major news papers, TV and radio stations. Amy Walker disappeared over night from her home, leaving her two children alone, but Michel Walker's story was printed the next morning in every major paper.
In July of 2015, the United States Government announced that a Vitiglen pandemic was sweeping the nation. Two days after, England, China, Russia, Canada, and Mexico all reported that cases of Vitiglen were spreading in isolated parts of their respective countries.
In late July of 2015, an updated version of Vitiglen Blockers were distributed to hospitals and pharmacies. The pills were given out to the limited public - at a price. A very high price.
In early August of 2015, the latest version of Vitiglen Blockers was determined a failure. A majority of the patents who had acquired the new Blockers contracted the disease. The virus moved slowly, the degeneration of the skin and the mind stretched out the four weeks before most of the patients fell into their final commas. Most patents stayed living anther week after their coma, but eventually succumbed to the disease. All of the cases were deemed WV's, as all of them seemingly - thought the medical world hated this word, but it was the only way to describe it - reanimated after their deaths. Scientists remade the Blocker and tested it on another twenty patients. Ten of them died and were reanimated within the month, five died in a month and a half and were reanimated, three lasted two months and were reanimated, and one lasted three months before succumbing to the disease.
The last patient, after accepting the clinical trial (against his will) admitted to already being infected by the Vitiglen virus before joining. Scientists watched as the degeneration and spreading of the virus minimized. With daily tests, the patient continued to function like a non-infected person - maintaining his skill to read and communicate, as well as all of his motor functions. In December, the patient started complaining of headaches, fatigue in his muscles, and joint pain. Slowly the virus spread over his skin, and he - very quickly - fell into a coma. He died by the end of the year, and against expiations, reanimated. The patient split the study of the Vitiglen virus - those who were trying to prevent infection, and those who were trying to stop the infection in its tracks.
In late September of 2015, an outbreak started on the college campus of Boston University, leaving the campus empty of student, factuality, and staff within 60 hours. The city was ravaged by the virus. A corps was found in the water treatment plant, a worker who had been give the initial infected version of the virus had broken down and infected the water supply for the entire city. This specific string knocked out and infected the nervous system first, than damaged their brains before they succumbed to heart failure, reanimating an hour after their death. The Boston strain of the Vitiglen virus could kill a person in less than 48 hours from the time they were infected.
In early October of 2015, a doctor named Meric Blandman isolated the main strain of the Vitiglen viruses - in the Boston strain as well as the California strain that had the infected dead in less than 24 hours, but did not reanimate the deceased. He determined that the virus spread through muscle mass the quickest, killing the epidermis quickly by damaging and eradicating nerve endings, spreading through the nervous system. He generated a vaccine based on this, and through a test and experiments found that by enhancing the vitamin B in Vitiglen Blockers, the infected patients' exposed dead-cell area slowed dramatically. In later clinical trials, Meric Blandman created Viticeine - a synthetic mineral that literary stopped cell death in its path. Mixing Viticeine in with the Vitiglen Blockers increased the life time of an infected persons by months, though it did not cure them.
In late November of 2015, the first attack by an infected person was recorded and reported. A reanimated body attacked and bit an attending at a hospital and was quickly destroyed with a blow to the head. The body was deconstructed - and it was found that the Vitiglen strain had mutated more. It made the reanimated violent, and hungry. Blandman, the Vitiglen expert and frontrunner for the cure of the disease, determined that the reason for this was because the Vitiglen-infected body required red blood cells to improve its existence. Thought not necessary for 'life', as it were, accumulating red blood cells that the host no longer created rejuvenated the body of an infected victim. Reanimated Vitiglen-infected bodies were now considered predators.
In late December of 2015, the Carie Goorn finally called the infected what they were in her article.
Zombies.
In early January of 2016, it was estimated that a total of 3 billion people had died, worldwide, strictly from the Vitiglen virus alone.
In late January of 2016, The First Act went into effect, and life as we - the human race - knew it finally died.
In early January of 2020, Meric Blandman died of a Vitiglen infection after living on his own antidote for four years, The Browning NIP Camp in Northern New York was demolished when a Troop - the term used for a group reanimated Vitiglen-Infecteds - attacked one night, and I turned 21.