Pandora (Book 5): Behold A Pale Horse

  BEHOLD A

  PALE HORSE

  BY

  RICHARD MCCROHAN

  A PANDORA NOVEL

  Copyright 2019 by Richard McCrohan

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written permission from the author, except for brief quotations in articles or reviews.

  This is a work of fiction and all characters resembling any people living or dead is purely a coincidence.

  Also by Richard McCrohan

  The Pandora Series of Novels: Pandora

  Pandora 2

  Dead to the World

  Quarantine

  Behold a Pale Horse

  Novellas: Family Ties: The Novella

  Short Stories: Family Ties

  Old Haunts

  Win Yourself a Kewpie Doll

  The School Bus

  Save the Last Dance for Me

  Monster Hunter

  Shawtuck Asylum

  Welcome to Paradise

  Why can’t we summon the ingenuity and courage of the generations that came before us? The dinosaurs never saw that asteroid coming. What’s our excuse? –

  Neil deGrasse Tyson

  In the short term, some deadly virus might be more important, but in the long run there is hardly anything more important than astroids. –

  Rusty Schweickart

  This is the way the world ends; not with a bang or a whimper, but with zombies breaking down the door. –

  Amanda Hocking “Hollow”

  There are parasites out there that get close to making actual walking around zombies –

  Dr. Ben Neuman, Univ. of Reading

  Behold a pale horse and he who sat upon it had the name Death; and Hell followed with him. –

  Revelation 6:7-8

  BEHOLD A PALE HORSE

  Wednesday…

  Dwayne Shannon sat at his desk in his last period class at Oakwood High School. It was American History. A slight smile creased his face as he surreptitiously glanced around the room at his fellow classmates. Most of them had that alternately bored, yet anxious expression the majority of students get during the final class of the day. Mr. Nelson, his history teacher, didn’t seem to notice as he continued this semester’s coverage of the American Civil War. Dwayne loved history and, in fact, basically liked school. As an A student, he had an easy time with his subjects. Gazing about, he was amused on how fast everyone returned to their doldrum existence. Oakwood High School and, in fact, all of the Oakwood schools had been closed for two weeks due to the Pandora virus that had spread like wildfire throughout the world. This was only the second week that classes had resumed.

  When the rogue comet hurled into our solar system, Dwayne paid little heed to the event. Like most teenagers he had more important things to worry about then some comet flying through space. He gave it his usual ten seconds of interest and then completely forgot about it. Homework, school, playing ball with his friends and above all, that cute blonde girl sitting two seats ahead in English class were more than enough to consume Dwayne’s full and undivided attention. But many scientists, astronomers, and space aficionados had been following the comet’s path. Their initial theory of a collision with Earth was reevaluated as the asteroid’s trajectory was analyzed and charted. They did predict a collision with Mars, albeit a glancing blow and not a direct hit, which was indeed what had happened. Pandora exploded on impact and issued a vast dust and debris cloud that continued in a slightly altered trajectory path. What they didn’t predict and really couldn’t know was that the comet was host to a heretofore unknown alien virus. Viruses are not uncommon in meteorites and have long been found containing remnants of them from time to time. As the earth passed through this vast debris cloud on its orbit around the sun, the inhabitants of the world were exposed to the alien virus ensconced throughout the dust particles.

  When the comet hit the planet Mars, Dwayne, like everyone else in the world, was glued to the television screen. Pandora, as the comet was now universally christened, became the number one topic in the entire world. Other than brilliantly colored sunrises and sunsets as the sun’s light rays passed through the minute dust particles, nothing much seemed to happen. At first. The world breathed a vast sigh of relief that we dodged another bullet and again went about its normal routine. Then, about two weeks later, more than one third of the entire world population developed flulike symptoms. This ranged from moderate to severe and ran its course over a two-week period. Although it put a massive strain on the medical community, it only resulted in a very minor death toll (involving the old, very young and the immunity challenged). A lot of that was usually from ensuing complications – especially in Third World countries.

  As the viral illness ran its course people began to once again assume the various activities of normal life. Scientists realized that the origin was from an alien virus present in the dust cloud of Pandora, but assumed that the worst was over. They couldn’t have been more wrong. The virus had just gone dormant and was now mixing with human DNA and combining with various other more earthly viruses and bacteria. Soon it began a rapid mutation and lodged itself in the human brainstem. And the Pandora virus, as it was now named, was doing this in every one of the previous victims of the original virus. By the time a few more weeks passed, it was a completely new type of virus; a hybrid of alien and human DNA and ready to re-infect that one third of the population it was present in.

  § § §

  The final bell sounded and Dwayne joined the other students rushing to file out of the classroom.

  “Jeez, I thought that would never be over,” Dwayne’s friend Billy Dwyer said as he passed him. “I’m past ready to leave.”

  “Aw, it’s not so bad,” Dwayne remarked, “I like studying about the Civil War. All of the battles and stuff. It’s interesting.”

  “Maybe for you, D,” Billy said using Dwayne’s school nickname, “not me.”

  Dwayne smiled at that. He knew that most kids thought history was just a boring collection of names and dates. But he always wanted to find out the whys and the reasons for things happening. Making their way down the crowded hallway to their lockers, they talked about what they would do today.

  “My dad wants to take us to see my grandma this weekend,” said Dwayne as he stuffed his books into the locker.

  “Sounds like loads of fun,” mumbled Billy as he grabbed his jacket from the hook.

  “She’s only been out of the hospital for two weeks and dad’s a little worried about her,” Dwayne explained.

  “Pandora, right?” Billy said turning to his friend while putting his arms in the sleeves of his denim jacket.

  Dwayne took out the books he needed for his homework assignments. “No,” he answered, “it was gallstones, and got her real sick. Much worse than my mom was when she came down with Pandora.”

  “I can’t believe how many people got sick with this Pandora virus,” Billy said. “It laid up both of my parents. My father thought he would need to be hospitalized, too. He didn’t, but boy was he sick.”

  They closed the locker doors and turned to head out for the buses parked in front. Dwayne spoke as they walked. “It sucked. The only thing good about it was we got two weeks off school because of it. With so many kids and teachers out sick didn’t make sense to open. People were afraid of catching it. Why even some businesses closed.”

  Chuckling, Billy said, “Turns out wasn’t contagious anyway. My parents were sneezing and hacking all over the house and I never caught a thing.”

  “Same here,” replied Dwayne, “my mother was the only one sick.”

  As they approached the doors, a group of students were cluster
ed together looking intently at their cell phones. Dwayne recognized a few of them as fellow classmates.

  “Hey, Kevin,” he said to a boy staring at his screen, “what’s up?”

  Kevin glanced up at Dwayne, momentarily distracted. He immediately focused back at his phone screen. “Hey, D,” he said. “Some cool videos are coming on the Internet from Asia. They’re really sick. Looks like some zombie kind of shit. Freaking awesome.”

  Dwayne and Billy crowded around him and peered over Kevin’s shoulder. The screen showed a scene from some hospital. Dwayne could see the name Manila in the lower corner. The footage was kind of dark, but they could make out rows of hospital beds and cots. All of the beds were occupied and most of the patients seem to be tied down. Leaning in closer he saw people fighting in the background. A few of the bound patients were frantic and as they struggled violently against their bonds, they appeared furious. The boys watched for a few minutes until the screen went dark. Kevin shook the phone and swore.

  “Shit! My battery just died.”

  Two girls looked over and then took out their own phones. There must have been a dozen students crowding together all chattering at once. A teacher even came over and joined them. Afraid that he’d missed his bus, Dwayne pulled Billy’s sleeve and motioned for him to follow. They both rode the same bus to and from school. They both exited the front doors of the school and descended the stairs.

  Billy said as they walked, “Jeez, D, what the hell was going on there?”

  “I don’t know,” said Dwayne, “but it was happening in the Philippines. It looked like some sort of a riot or something.”

  “No shit,” snorted Billy, “they were beating people with clubs in the background. Really whacking them in the head…hard.”

  “Mary Terhune was standing next to me,” said Dwayne, “and I could hear her saying something about China and Australia. I think I heard her say a lot of people were dying there.”

  “Yeah,” Billy agreed. “I heard some guys saying the same thing about Japan.”

  They reached their bus and entered. Inside everyone was glued to their cell phone screens. A few kids were talking and making awed comments; but some just sat there in stunned silence. One girl up front was silently crying. Sitting separately, as the bus was already almost full, they both pulled out their own phones and quickly thumbed through the Internet combing different websites.

  The rapidly multiplying video clips and comments were mind boggling. There were dozens of camera phone videos of rioting crowds, people being attacked and police and soldiers firing on surging crowds of crazed looking people. Worst were the comments and replies to the clips. The narration consisted of stories of stories of stories of people becoming sick and then flooding the hospitals where they would go crazy and attack those around them. Even to the point of biting their victims. Asia seemed to be in complete chaos. Apparently the death toll was starting to increase dramatically. Whether that was because of the new sickness or from the violence now spreading was not indicated.

  The students riding the bus home started to become more vocal. They were calling back and forth to each other and exchanging information in a cacophony of competing voices. The Japanese Prime Minister collapsed in his office. The Philippines declared martial law, as did China. A famous Australian actress had been rushed to the hospital. Several high government officials in various Asian and East Asian countries had become sick; some of them had even died. All of this madness was parlayed back and forth between the various students. Even the driver had a small radio on. Finally, as the noise level grew, one student stood up gasping and yelled out loudly.

  “Hey, there’s some guy on the radio in Australia saying that there are zombies attacking people.”

  For a brief moment the entire bus went completely silent. Everyone just stared at him. Then as if a switch was pulled they all started talking at once. This new information put a completely different spin on the tone of conversation. Everyone, the boys especially, seemed to suddenly view the ongoing advances if they were videogame. Now, between vocal exclamations of “Cool” and “Sick”, they all started to envision their own take on a zombie apocalypse. The majority of students suddenly viewed the events as unreal and probably “fake news.” But a few, including Dwayne, had a very uncomfortable sense that there was more here than met the eye.

  Finally arriving at their stop, Dwayne, Billy and six other students exited the bus which had just three more stops before being depleted of passengers. Waving goodbye to their friends, the two boys turned down their street. Both boys were still looking at their phones as they walked.

  “Man, this is awesome,” Billy mumbled aloud as they continued down the street together. “Those people are crazy in Asia. What’s with them?”

  “It’s some kind of pandemic,” Dwayne said sagely.

  “What,” said Billy looking up, “like some sort of flu, you mean?”

  Dwayne nodded. “Yeah,” he said, “flu or virus or something. Has to be.”

  Chewing over that piece of information, Billy said, “Do you really think that there are zombies running around there?”

  Dwayne chuckled as he answered, “That would be cool, huh? But no, it’s just not possible. No zombies. Though, it would be sick. Huh? Big time.”

  “Hey, speaking of zombies,” Billy said, I just got a new Xbox game. You get to kill zombies in it. It looks good. What if I came over and we play before we eat dinner?”

  “Sure,” said Dwayne, “sounds like fun.”

  Reaching their houses which were located across the street from each other, they both high-fived one another and went inside their homes.

  Dwayne opened the door and put his books on the hall table. “Hi, Mom,” he called out.

  “That you, Dwayne?” a voice called from the kitchen.

  “Yeah, Mom,” Dwayne answered. Walking into the kitchen at the rear of the house, he gave his mother a kiss and said, “Billy’s coming over. We’re going to play Xbox before dinner.”

  “Don’t forget your homework,” his mother noted.

  Taking a glass of lemonade from the refrigerator, Dwayne turned and said as he left the kitchen, “I won’t. I’m doing it right after dinner. I don’t have much.” Ten minutes later the doorbell rang and Billy entered with his new videogame. The two friends ran upstairs to Dwayne’s bedroom and began playing.

  For the next two hours the Shannon household settled into a familiar formula of domesticity. The kitchen turned fragrant as Anne Shannon, Dwayne’s mother completed fixing dinner for her family. A half hour ago his dad, Patrick, had walked through the side door from their attached garage, kissed his wife, loosened his tie and made himself a drink. Remembering the watercooler gossip at the office, Patrick reached for the remote after making himself comfortable on the easy chair in their living room. Switching to the news, Mr. Shannon settled in to her very unsettling array of grim reports from overseas.

  Upstairs, the two boys were hard at work trying to beat the new game that Billy had brought over. They had been told to keep the volume down once already. The clatter of gunfire and groans of zombies burst from the television screen.

  “Oh man, this is hard,” Billy complained.

  “No kidding,” groaned Dwayne. “Oh, crap, I just got killed.”

  “Again?” smirked his friend.

  “There’s so many of them,” Dwayne said. “And you have difficulty set on high, so one bite gets you infected. That sucks. It’s not fair.”

  “Dammit,” cried Billy, “I just died, too. You’re right; we have to set the game on easy mode. Otherwise we’ll be dying all the time. We need like machine guns or something. I just had this stupid shotgun. It’s always running out of ammo. They should leave more lying around. That would be better.” Just then his phone chirped. Looking down, he saw message from his mother to come home for dinner.” Gotta go, D,” Billy groaned. “My mom says dinner’s ready.” He reluctantly stood up and retrieved his game Dwayne’s Xbox. “We’ll try again t
omorrow.”

  Both boys walked downstairs and as Dwayne said goodbye to his friend, he heard the muffled sound of gunfire coming from the living room. Curious, he wandered over next to his dad and looked at the TV screen. He could see military trucks and soldiers rushing to and fro. The sound of shooting came from the building in front of them.

  “Hi, Dad,” Dwayne said in greeting. “What are you watching?”

  “Hey, son,” said his father looking over and smiling. “It’s the 6 o’clock news. I see it appears that what has been happening in Asia, now is starting in Russia also. This footage is from the Ukraine, I think. There are some kinds of attacks going on in a hospital over there; patients attacking the staff or something. The locals there are blaming it on terrorism.”

  Seating himself on the living room sofa, Dwayne watched the news unfold. Not being able to get any closer or even get any more information, the on-screen reporter signed off. A brief, not-too-informative commentary by the anchor person led to another story, this time in India. It again showed rioting and violence. People were seen attacking one another and, if Dwayne had seen right, actually biting. Just then his mother called from the kitchen that dinner was now being served. Dwayne’s father slowly turned off the picture and, with a barely concealed worried look, glanced at his son.