Hospital Car Park

[Laraqua]

Outside accident and emergency, where the ambulances came to park and where stretchers bearing the injured or the seriously ill were moved quickly and cautiously into the rooms beyond. The sky was a bright blue, unmarred by clouds, but for a line of thick black cloud that Nurse Sarah Carpenter can glimpse at the outermost edge of the sky.

This is her break. Two other nurses, Julian Rogers and Maria Jane, had dragged her outside so they could have a cigarette. Most staff pretty much agreed that these two were the most sociable and outspoken nurses in the entire hospital and it was common knowledge that simply going along with them was often the easier option.

Maria Jane was far more popular of the two of them with men, though, her dark brown curls tied into a thick bun, her full lips and wide eyes seeming to perpetually flirt. As a pair of paramedics dragged a stretcher bearing a man with vomit on his shirt part the trio, Maria raised her hand a little and smiled at one of the more handsome of the duo. A couple other staff members took hold of the stretcher and the paramedics got back onto their ambulance and headed off to take another call.

Today seemed to be busier then usual even by the past week's unusual standards.

"We have got to get more staff," Julian Rogers complained as she crushed her cigarette butt underfoot and headed indoors.

Maria Jane sucked on her cigarette, attempting to finish it quickly.

[Mr. Handy]

Strange, thought Sarah Carpenter when she saw the black cloud in the distance. I don't think I've ever seen anything like that before. She wrinkled her nose at the cigarette smoke. You'd think they'd know better than to smoke, especially since they're health care professionals.

When the paramedics brought the patient into the hospital, Sarah cut her break short and followed Julian inside to see what she could do to help. Making other people feel better made her feel better too. Besides, keeping busy with work helped keep her mind off of...other things. Sarah shook her head, pushing away the memory that had returned unbidden.

[Laraqua]

As Sarah Carpenter starts heading inside she notices a sudden swell in traffic behind her. Almost as one, a variety of camper vans, minivans, station wagons, sedans and 4WDs move in alongside a pair of ambulances, clogging the section of road the ambulances normally take. Several staff push past her and rush into the general chaos. A distinct smell of soot and blood, overlaid with something that stung her nostrils, seemed to come with them.

"Attention emergency personnel," says an unfamiliar voice over the intercom. "An emergency situation has developed. Will everyone who is not otherwise occupied, please go down to Accident and Emergency. I repeat, an emergency situation has developed. Will everyone who is not otherwise occupied, please go down to Accident and Emergency."

This in itself was odd. The phrasing was all wrong and the warning should have come a lot sooner. Why would they wait until all these people had arrived before informing them?

Everything seemed wrong.

[Mr. Handy]

Maybe I'm just being jumpy, thinks Sarah Carpenter. She had been so accustomed to imagining danger around every corner and was just starting to get used to the idea that her nightmare was over at last. Still, this is most unusual. I was heading to Accident and Emergency anyway, and I can't not go...but that doesn't mean I can't be careful. Sarah proceeds towards her destination, keeping her eyes and ears open for anything else out of the ordinary.

[Laraqua]

Sarah Carpenter heads directly to the triage area to examine patients who have come in order to sort out the basic complaints and to work out which patients had greater priority. There's already three children in there being seen by a different triage nurse who is busily asking them questions as a woman she presumes is the mother is floating around in the background, answering for them sometimes.

The children's eyes are glazed, blood trickling from their left nostril and the left corner of their mouth. Nurse Lisa Thompson checks one of the children's chests with a stethoscope and becomes increasingly agitated as she moves it around. Finally, she tosses it at Sarah Carpenter. "Get me another one!" It's not like her to be so agitated. Triage nurses were trained to remain calm.

Just as Sarah Carpenter instinctively catches the stethoscope, the doors are opened and a doctor peers in. "What are you playing at? We've got a full parking lot out there."

[Mr. Handy]

"Sorry, Doctor!" says Sarah Carpenter, hurrying over. Though the children look awful, there are doubtless people who need her more. What in the world is going on here? she wonders. "A nurse just told me to get a replacement stethoscope." She deliberately leaves out her name to keep Lisa Thompson from getting in trouble. "What can I do to help?"

[Laraqua]

"We need someone to go out into the parking lot and sort the priority for treatment," says the doctor, scratching at his moustache. "The smart tagsare in that top drawer." He gestures to a drawer in a nearby cupboard, spins around and walks out.

"...overwhelmed the back of the car almost," says the assumed mother of the three children.

[Mr. Handy]

"I'm on it," says Sarah, slipping the stethoscope around her neck as she hurries to the drawer. She opens it and collects the smart tags, trying to follow the conversation at the same time. It seems like Lisa thinks this stethoscope isn't working right, she thinks. Easy enough to check by seeing if I can hear my own heart once I get a spare moment - but that could be quite a while. Sarah takes the tags and runs towards the parking lot, thankful that she's a very fast runner. None of the others would be able to get out there as quickly.

[Laraqua]

It was chaos out there. So many different types of cars filled with so many different types of people. Strangely, most of the cars seemed to be poorly looked after, marred with dirt and rust, the paint flaking in places. The nurse was distracted by the dozen or so potential patients starting to form a loose group, held back by one staff member who told them to wait for the triage nurse to sort through them.

A blonde woman with a gucci bag: "My husband ... he's gurgling, there's blood everywhere, he's spitting it up."

"What the hell is back there, anyway? Are we contaminated or somethin' All the cars behind us started going everywhere! I can't focus my eyes right. What's goin' on?" demanded a man with long blonde hair that fell to his shoulders, looking back at his two friends for support. "Radio kept sayin' somethin' 'bout that and all."

"My eyes!" screeched an elderly woman, clutching at her face as blood stains her fingers. "I can't see my eyes."

"You have to help me, my son's back there," says a gaunt woman whose five-year-old daughter clutches her legs. "I called him and he sounded hurt. He needs an ambulance. I-I-I can't do anything. I-I can't go back there. My tyres have popped and there's nothing I can do. Is there something you can do?"

A queasy-looking man suddenly breaks from the group and falls to his knees, a stream of yellow vomit and bile laced with blood.

Another woman stands there, her face immaculate beauty, her dress embedded in her charred flesh as she stares beautifically at the staff member. She is cradling a baby to her chest. It takes Sarah a moment to realise that the baby, charred and blackened, seems to have partially melted into her arms, its lips, burnt solid, tear a line, pus seeping out, as it struggles to utter a pained cry.

"What's going on? The radio's just nothing now," says another.

"Can I help? I know first aid."

"Do we need to keep going? Where should we go?"

"Terrorists! It's all the terrorists I tell you."

"Help me..."

"I can't stand it. I can't stand it. It flayed the walls clean. It turned the others to ash."

"It's in the sky. Didn't you see it? It's in the sky."

"I think my husband had a heart attack..."

"My son fell and broke his arm but ... what's going on with all these people? Maybe we should just leave."

"It hurts. It hurts so much."

"I'm scared. Where's my mummy? She was in the car and then she wasn't in the car. I had to make it run and I scared."

"Please! Come with me. I had to leave her there. I didn't mean to."

"Won't you help me?"

[Mr. Handy]

Sarah springs into action, moving among the casualties in the parking lot and assessing their need for treatment, starting with the ones that look like they're in the worst shape. "We're going to help you," she says to reassure the people, "starting with those who need help the most. The rest of you will be taken in turn." She tags each patient, keeping an eye out for anyone whose life seems in imminent danger. The scene is horrifying, but she tries not to let it get to her and does her job automatically as her mind is bombarded with sensory input.

Her first instinct when she had seen these people was that it must have been a terrorist attack, like one of them said. The memory of the July 7 Tube attacks a few years back is still fresh in her mind, but this seems far worse. Could it be some kind of biological weapon? she wonders, though the symptoms don't look anything like any bioweapon she had ever heard of, nor do they look chemically induced. She remembers the black cloud she had seen earlier and glances up to see if it's getting any closer, thinking it may be connected. We're short on staff as it is, she thinks. How are we going to handle all these people? This is going to be a long day.

[Laraqua]

The black cloud appears to have come ominously closer, moving at the speed of normal clouds on a moderately windy day, though she feels no wind. A few cars have none but the dead in it, some charred, some seemingly untouched. In one, a foreign blue car, the driver's hands still clutch the steering wheel, his flesh seemed untouched by damage and yet he has no pulse. As she goes to turn away, she sees his eyes move out of the corner of her eye, turning towards her with a clarity in his eyes that belie his corpse-like condition. His lips tremble, as though to speak, or perhaps because of a few random nerve firings.

[Mr. Handy]

Sarah immediately begins to apply CPR. "This man needs help now!" she shouts. "He's got no pulse, but I just saw his lips move!"

[Laraqua]

Roger Woodward is barely conscious when the paramedics storm into his home and drag him away. He is barely able to comprehend the words they say to him as they put him in the ambulance. He is not even aware of whether they put him on a stretcher before or after he was in the ambulance.

He does hear the sirens and see them move about. He does notice a bump and thinks it is the ambulance mounting the pavement. He does catch glimpses through the windows of storm clouds.

The ambulance stops with a sudden jerk and the sounds of hands slapping on metal. Then the doors are opened and another fellow is brought in. They start working on him as well. Through the open door he can see the storm clouds are like a dense, dark fog that flows across the street, transforming all that it touches.

One of the paramedics notices and says something in a high voice before slamming the doors shut. The ambulance lurches forward. This time there is no rhyme nor reason to their movements. He is tossed against the wall, paramedic holding him down, as the ambulance rounds a corner. There are several thuds as the ambulance gets briefly higher and lower. The scrape of what sounds like branches can be heard against the walls.

Tape is brandished and used to line the doors and windows. There is a screech, no, not a screech, a dull thudding sound, no, more than that... It becomes very dark inside the ambulance, a darkness that seems to recede and grow, as though the clouds had passed over the sun, but there was electric lighting here? The darkness never seems to cover it wholly, but attacks part of it.

The paramedics continue their job.

[Laraqua]

It takes a tremendous effort to open the rusted door, sending flakes of oxidised metal in a shower to the ground. Tears roll down the driver's face as Sarah Carpenter works to get his heart going again. Unfortunately, it seems to have been too late.

None of the doctors at the scene, already busy dealing with tagged individuals, come to aid her. She takes a look inside the car for a moment and notices that the seats are worn nearly beyond repair, stuffing bursting through torn stitches. The woman in the passenger side, younger than the driver, possibly a daughter, is slouched over in her frayed seat belt. In the back are two children and a baby in a specialised seat on the far right behind the driver's chair.

The little boy on the far left seems to be trembling, his eyes focused on the floor of the car, his body held rigid, where all others seem slack. Oddly, the seat beneath him does not appear to be so old and his seatbelt isn't frayed.

[Mr. Handy]

Sarah tries to hold back her own tears, but without success. This happened to her every time she lost a patient. She recalls her father's words of comfort to her when he hugged her after the first time, when a patient had died on the operating table when she had been assisting in emergency surgery: You can't save everyone, Sarah. She and the doctors had done everything right, but it still hadn't been enough.

Well, I can bloody well try! she thinks. While it's too late for this man, it's not too late for others. "There's a live one in this car!" she calls as she examines the boy to see how badly he needs treatment and if there's anything she needs to do for him. "Hang in there, son. Can you talk?"

[Laraqua]

The side of the car that the boy was on was less rusted. The blue paint is clearer and polished over his door and part of the passenger's door. The boy merely trembles in response to her words but as soon as she opens the door, he utters a high-pitched squeal and scrambles free of his seat belt. He starts climbing into the front seat. "Daddy!"

[Zombiedla]

Roger Woodward tries to stay conscious but his body, and mind, is so numb he can barely move or think. He feels like he's sleeping - dreaming. Nothing feels real.

The darkness is overwhelming at times, yet sometimes faintly evident.

[Mr. Handy]

Sarah's heart breaks all over again when she sees the boy's reaction. She had been around the same age when her mother had died. She had done everything she could at the time, but it hadn't been enough. Mummy, wake up! she had said. Please, wake up...

"I'm so sorry," says Sarah. "The doctors are going to come, but until then I need you to be a big boy and wait for them." He doesn't look to be injured, so she assigns him a smart tag. She checks the rest of the family out to see if any of the others are still alive and in need of medical attention. If only I had moved faster, she thinks, though she knows that few people are faster than she is.

[Laraqua]

The fractured wail of an ambulance can be heard above the commotion. The sound sputters and crackles as it comes closer, as though the speakers themselves have suffered some damage. It is out of view, so far, but the sound of it is commanding.

Sarah finds no other living person in the car and is forced to turn aside as a dozen waiting faces demand attention, SMART tags, priority, demanding she attend other cars where more still corpses rest, burnt or not. As she passes one vehicle, the tyre shatters as though the rubber were as brittle as glass, the pieces of rubber slashing across her legs as they pass.

Roger Woodward feels himself pass in and out of consciousness as the ambulance bumps around. At least the shadows were no longer passing over him. Everything felt brighter. A particularly violent lurch makes his stomach contents shift and he vomits over himself and the gurney.

[Mr. Handy]

Sarah cries out in pain. Quickly, she rolls up her scrubs and inspects her legs to see if they're bleeding so she can bandage them before resuming her rounds.