You and Me against the World: The Creepers Saga Book 1 Read Online Free PDF

incineration of Punta Sol’s seven hundred residents required little explanation. The DEA reported that in the struggling economy, the residents had turned to meth production and that an unfortunate explosion had dominoed through the home labs. They further stated that the explosions had filled the air with a dangerous combination of poisonous gases and that for reasons of public health and safety, the area would remain quarantined until further notice. The media, busy with politics and celebrity news, covered the story for just five minutes before they moved on to more scandalous and better-selling stories. Relatives who challenged the meth production story found agents on their doorsteps. The agents’ inquiries made it clear that they intended to investigate the complaining relative’s possible involvement in narcotics trafficking. People stopped asking questions.
    None of the flu-surge models could have predicted the spread of such an infectious strain. None of their research would have revealed patient zero. The carrier never displayed a single symptom. He was only six months old. The Mimi virus he carried had been a genetic gift passed from father to son for longer than time could record. In most generations, the virus slept; but in some, it encountered another virus strain that allowed it to create something new.
    Researchers would have been astonished at patient zero’s lineage. They would have discovered that the child’s great-grandfather had traveled to Africa during World War II. And that while there, his own Mimi virus combined with another. Forty years later, they would call this new virus HIV. They might have found that an even earlier relative had, in 1918, brought the family’s genetic passenger to a Kansas army base and launched the famous Spanish flu. And that yet another had visited the Orient in the late 1300s, where his Mimi virus became history’s most infamous plague. Of course, none of this would have made a difference. The Mimi virus had waited thousands of years and countless evolutions to find its perfect mate and reach its full potential. On that beautiful sunny Memorial Day weekend, proud parents brought their new baby to visit relatives in Punta Sol. The baby’s aunt had been feeling fatigued all week. She assumed she was just tired from her travels. She was unaware that she had picked up the flu on her business trip. She kissed the baby and the Mimi virus found its destiny.
     
    Can’t see the forest from the trees
     
    Five of Punta Sol’s infected were transported to a research facility on a small island near Sanibel Island, Florida. The researchers observed the infected’s behaviors, ran a full complement of tests, and worked furiously to find a cure. When a cure proved impossible, they incinerated the infected specimens. The team strictly followed all decontamination protocols; no one stole samples for black market sales, no one accidentally left the facility with trace amounts of bile on their shoes, and no subversive group enacted a conspiracy to infect the populace.
    In the end, it was a matter of right church, wrong pew. The researchers focused exclusively on transmission post-transformation because at that stage, it was both quick and deadly. In their horror over the infected’s murderous behavior and their frustration with their inability to isolate a cure, they forget a key attribute of the virus. It was, after all, a form of influenza, and it still possessed the ability to use the slower but just as assured flu transmission process: aerosol contamination. The researchers ignored their own coldlike symptoms.
    Sixteen of the twenty researchers and half the military personnel left the facility with the sniffles. Some took time to enjoy the Florida coast, some went to Disney World, and others returned directly home to California, Georgia, South Carolina, Washington DC, Chicago, and New England. All told, thirty-two people carried the early-stage virus to the public. After