The World's Next Plague (2 page)

“Look closely at the arm,” Rock said to the
camera as he placed a short stick in the grasping hand and lifted
the attached arm into the air. Manon zoomed in.

“There is no muscular definition under the
skin. You can clearly see the radius and ulna bones in the forearm,
yet… there must be some small remnants of muscle still remaining to
grip the stick. The skin looks as thin as parchment.”

“Up here near the shoulder and on the upper
arm you can see down to the bone where a large section of flesh was
cut or torn out, but nowhere else on the body are there signs of
any physical wounds.”

Rock let the arm back down and pulled the
stick from the creature’s grip. He pointed at the body with it.

“Look at the chest. This appears to have been
a male, though I only assume that because there are no remnants of
breast tissue or extra skin in the chest area. The skin has been
pulled tight over the ribcage. Below the ribcage the abdomen falls
as if off a cliff face. If I was brave enough, I could probably
encircle the waist with both hands.”

“I just had a thought. Isn’t it also odd…”
Though the camera was rolling, he was just speaking to Manon, not
performing. “The jungle has a complete ecosystem dedicated to
cleaning up dead and dying things. Hundreds of species of beetles,
ants, worms, rodents and fungus feed on anything too weak to fight
back… yet it appears not even the fungus wants anything to do with
these defenseless beings. The only other life in the area seems to
be a large species of common spiders. They are everywhere… under
every crevice… roaming openly across the clearing.”

Rock gave the cut sign and asked, “Have you
ever seen anything like it?”

Manon had no words.

The regular crew also consisted of three
muscular men who carried large backpacks full of basic supplies and
weapons to provide security for the team. In addition, two English
speaking native tribesmen had been employed as guides for the
excursion, and to translate if necessary. These two had refused to
enter the village and were nowhere to be seen.

One of regular crew, a large black man Rock
had recruited from the Special Forces named Armando, was waving
them over with highly exaggerated movements.

Rock and Manon walked over to see what he had
found.

“It… I think it melted,” Armando whispered in
reverent awe.

The remnants of the body at their feet looked
to have been carved from white vegetable shortening in a warm room.
The skin no longer existed. The bone structure, though it was
possible to still see the framework, had collapsed. The ribcage
sagged until it had rested on the spine. The pelvic bone folded
outwards like an open book. The skull resembled a rotted
jack-o-lantern fallen in on itself.

“This is far beyond a television show… this
is Pulitzer material. Get your camera ready Manon, I am going to be
famous.”

The two roamed the clearing, documenting the
remnants of both the living and dead beings scattered randomly. In
some cases the bodies were literally stacked on top of each other.
In other places, the bodies lay isolated. All lay immobile on the
ground in varying states of decay.

~ Chapter II
~

“Did you notice the huts?” Manon asked
distractedly. He was sitting on a fallen branch absently picking at
his untouched lunch with a foldable metal camp fork. Out of habit,
the others sat around him perched on various rocks and branches to
avoid the many ant species in the rainforest, though there were no
ants in the clearing to avoid. The two native guides were still
nowhere to be seen.

Rock looked around. “Yeah… so?”

“They are heavily decayed,” Manon pointed
out. “You have been roaming jungles for a long time. How long does
it take for a native hut to crumble like that? The grass making up
the once thatched roof is nonexistent. The bamboo poles have
rotted, cracked and broken. A few of the huts have fallen over
completely.”

After a few seconds of silence he continued,
“If these people lived in these huts before… this… happened, and
they stopped maintaining them at the same time, that means these
bodies have been disintegrating for…”

Rock continued for him. “years… wow.”

Rock got up. Nobody else seemed inclined.
“Grab the camera Manon. Let’s go have a look.” They walked over to
the nearest hut.

“The most likely place for the poles to fail
is where they touch the ground, but look,” he gestured towards one
of the thick supports. “They did not bury the poles in the ground.
Instead they placed them on thick rocks with pockets for the poles.
That makes a lot of sense in the wet jungle where insects will bore
into the wood and contact with soil will lead to rot. They probably
also smoked the poles before using them, which can help to keep the
insects away.”

“I would just be guessing, but if the huts
were well maintained beforehand, maybe four years… give or take a
year or two.”

There was a minute of silence while they
circled the hut.

When they reached the stairs leading to the
hut’s elevated entrance Manon asked, “What do you make of this
one?”

The figure at their feet had fallen in on
itself like many of the others. It seemed to be one of the most
ruined. It had been a tall individual for a native tribesman,
probably making it a male, and had fallen to the ground face first.
There was no skin left. Only the leftover bones were still visible
and they had all sunk flat to the ground. When Rock poked a rib
with his walking stick, it slid in like a knife into warm
butter.

Still looped loosely where the neck had been
was a rope connected to a long decaying bamboo pole. The pole was
lying on its side, weathered and covered with small holes. It had
been there so long the far end was half buried in the dirt. A spear
with a stone tip lay half underneath the body and appeared to have
been thrust completely through the chest. The back of the ribcage
had now melted around the spear’s handle.

“It looks like it was restrained,” Rock
commented. “Maybe a prisoner?”

Manon contemplated a moment before speaking.
“What if this one had caught some kind of disease, or went crazy,
and they tried to capture him? Remember the long poles we used to
capture the crocs last year in Africa?”

They had done a show the previous season
about crocodiles encroaching on people’s homes in Egypt. A long
sturdy metal pole with a coiled steel cable on the end was used.
The cable had been slipped over the reptile’s heads in the process
of capturing them for relocation.

“It does not appear they were successful,”
Rock said, and smiled at his sarcasm. “That gives me an idea. Do
you think we could take one of these back with us? The only thing
better than the footage we have is an actual subject.”

“I believe that is the worst idea I have ever
heard,” Manon replied. “Obviously, whatever is wrong with these
people spread to all of them. Now that I think about it, what in
the world are we doing this close without suits, or at least masks,
on? We could be infected with some deadly disease already.”

Rock quickly replied. “I thought about that.
I don’t think that is how this works. I think you are right about
it being some kind of disease, but I don’t think it spreads through
the air.”

“Answer this for me,” Rock continued. “If you
saw others around you getting sick, would you not get as far away
as possible to escape it? Yet here, about thirty people caught
something so quickly they did not have time to leave. Even after
they caught it, they stayed right here in the open. They did not go
lay comfortably in their huts to get relief from the sickness or
protection from the persistent rains.”

Manon continued the thought, “so if it was
airborne and is as quick to infect as you are thinking, you and I
would already be… what? Changed? Sick?”

“I don’t know. Infected. Maybe unable to
move. Let’s take another look at the bodies after lunch. I think we
will find they all have wounds on them consistent with bites. That
might explain the reason all of the ones still moving continuously
are snapping their jaws at us. It might be something similar to
rabies.”

“I am still putting on a mask,” Manon said as
they walked back over to the rest of the crew. “I still think
taking one back with us is a bad idea.”

Armando spoke up when they arrived back in
the midst of the other men. “The natives won’t come into the camp.
They are afraid there is a curse.”

“For the first time in my life I might
agree,” Manon replied. “This place is not right.”

Rock looked disapprovingly at him. “Look
guys, we have been in dozens of situations more dangerous than
this. I don’t see anything here that is going to jump up and attack
us. There is nothing to be worried about.”

~ Chapter
III ~

Just outside the camp the two native guides
were also discussing what they had seen. The two men were brothers
from a tribe hundreds of miles away. Many of the native languages
were derived from the same basic dialect and they were often able
to converse with other primitive tribes, although sometimes with
difficulty.

Both men were significantly shorter than the
other men in the film crew. Their age was impossible to determine
with a look, and neither could answer with any certainty if asked.
They each were wearing khaki shorts and button up shirts which
badly needed a wash. A souvenir from the native heritage, any
visible skin from the neck down was liberally covered with dark
black tattoos running in perpendicular lines with various sized
circles filling in the space between.

The men now lived comfortably in two worlds.
They grew up in the rainforest, but early on decided to look for
more than their isolated world had to offer. Together they migrated
to the large village of Porto Velho as young adults. Moving to ever
larger towns, they discovered everything they had been looking for.
All of the elder’s warnings given to them in their youth had been
accurate, and they rejoiced in the forbidden comforts of modern
life. Their unique background allowed them to escort rich men from
around the world into the forest and live in luxury compared to
their native brethren.

Though never at a loss for words in each
other’s company, neither was willing to discuss the things they had
seen in the small village. In their native culture, speaking of
evil was the one sure way to bring it into your own life.

The two sat silently in front of a small fire
eating their dinners. Each carried canned meals in their packs, but
preferred to eat the many fruits and roots they had gathered on the
day’s journey. A small aluminum pot sat precariously on the fire
heating water spiced with wild herbs and leaves.

Surrounding the pot in the fire were six
large spiders with legs drawn in tightly to their abdomen.
Periodically the men reached in to swiftly flip them over by hand.
It was important to assure the long hairs, which could irritate the
throat, were singed away and the spider was cooked all the way
through.

“I think I miss the spiders most of all,” the
older brother said. “Can’t find them anywhere in town. Maybe we
should open up a stall in the market at home when we get back. They
are everywhere here. I have never seen so many spiders in one
place. We could come back here to gather them. They don’t even run
away when we get near them.”

“Nobody besides us is stupid enough to eat
these spiders,” the younger brother said.

“True… plus, I’d eat all the profits,” the
other replied.

They pulled their meals out of the hot fire
and set them down on small aluminum plates to cool. Each then
reached into their packs for their pocket knives, which they would
use to remove the head of the spider.

“You better put that one back in, it’s
looking a little frisky.”

The younger brother looked down and one of
the spiders was spasmodically twitching its legs on one side. He
grabbed the charred spider, which was still too hot to hold onto,
and promptly tossed it back into the fire, where the legs
immediately curled back up next to the abdomen. “You’d think you
would know how to build a hotter fire,” he said sarcastically.

After flipping open his knife with his
fingers still stinging from touching the roasted spider, the
younger brother started trying to stab at the heads of the spiders
on his plate without touching their steaming bodies. Each time he
came close, but the spider glanced off the blade and would spin out
of the way.

“Stop being a child and grab it,” the older
brother said as he reached down to grasp one of the spiders in
front of him. “Our sister is more of a man than you are.”

As he placed his hand around the large
roasted spider in front of him it suddenly struck at the exposed
skin between his thumb and first finger. The fangs went in deeply
before the astonished man shook his hand viciously. The spider was
thrown brutally into the trunk of a nearby tree, where its hairless
brittle charred abdomen cracked open like the shell of a nut.

The pain quickly spread to the fingers before
he put the bleeding pinpricks into his mouth and started in a
forsaken attempt to draw out the poison. It was already too late.
The venom spread like wildfire up his arm. The agony was so intense
when it reached his shoulder seconds later he started
screaming.

The fire intensified even more as it flowed
into his chest and neck. An uncontrollable seizure threw his body
savagely backwards and his head cracked brutally against the hard
ground.

The younger brother stared transfixed a few
feet away, hands frozen, still reaching towards the spiders in
front of him… his dazed expression clearly mirroring the horror he
felt. Fifteen seconds later, before he was even able to consider
how to react, with the echoes of screams still echoing in the
forest, the tortured figure of his brother lay nearly motionless
except for small tremors running through his prone body.