* * *
During the next few days, the situation went from bad to worse as panic spread around the globe. The town council appointed Michael acting mayor. The approximately 3000 residents of NEMI pulled together to patrol the nearly 500 square kilometers of the municipality, offering information and assistance as needed. Local police, volunteer fire departments, sea cadets who’d been training on Georgian Bay, and regular citizens were organized into teams and assigned to specific areas. People were free to come and go, and many residents brought in family members to ride out the pandemic on the island, but all new arrivals were to be given a basic medical screening to make certain that they had no potentially infected wounds. Anyone with evidence of any wounds whatsoever was to be quarantined until released by a medical professional. Of course, at first not everyone observed the check points for arriving friends and family, but once the community lost a young mother and her children to the infection compliance was no longer an issue. The woman ate her infant entirely, but the twin six-year-olds lasted long enough to become child zombies and attack their grandparents. The children, their mother, and the grandparents were all put down with shots to the head by a relative who then committed suicide. After that tragedy, no one argued with the established protocol.
Within ten days national television had stopped broadcasting, the internet had somehow been shut down; some types of cell phones worked intermittently, but power grids all over North America were collapsing. Travel to and from Little Current was restricted after a straw poll of residents overwhelmingly demonstrated support for tighter controls. Less popular measures, such as rationing of gas and other supplies, led to some conflicts, and residents of the island were beginning to divide themselves into factions. Still, Michael knew he was luckier than most people on the planet. Before phone service was lost, he’d spoken to his Uncle Jim in Ohio. Cleveland was in chaos, and it seemed safe to assume that the rest of the United States was descending into the same situation. Jim was a suburban “prepper,” and he had some pretty well thought-out plans to survive for the next few months. His only child, Christy, had just arrived with her boyfriend, and evidently someone they knew had come up with a manual of sorts about dealing with the infected. It boiled down to wearing protective gear and destroying their brains. Michael had intended to keep in touch with his uncle, but he couldn’t reach him again after their initial conversation. Nevertheless, Michael did take to wearing a leather coat and gloves, briar-resistant hunting pants stuffed into thick leather boots, and carrying a new-style goalie’s mask in a small backpack. He also attached a huge Bowie knife and a long-handled construction hammer to his belt. Unsurprisingly, many people in town, including his own family, began to outfit themselves in a similar manner once they realized the potential value of Michael’s “uniform.”
Robbie Peterson had proven to be a godsend. He stayed at the Carboni’s bed and breakfast for three reasons: to be close to Carolyn Easterday, as a parental stand-in for Connor Schrock, and to help Michael navigate his new position as mayor-in-crisis. While Michael was excellent at maintaining his cool and fleshing out every pertinent detail in a comprehensive containment plan, he was not equipped to deal with the concrete problem of what to do with the quarantined people who succumbed to the virus. There were only a handful of them, but their very presence posed a danger to the island. Some doctors proposed trying to get blood samples or otherwise study the creatures, but Michael was more concerned about short-term safety than the obscure potential benefits of a risky research project. Family members of the victims were divided about what they thought should be done, instigating further tension. Robbie listened to Michael explain the dilemma, then began gearing up for a visit to the hospital’s isolation unit. The families had only been allowed to see their relatives once after the victims had transformed into black-eyed flesh eaters, so Robbie calmly explained how Michael would inform the families that their diseased relatives would not eat any of the food supplied to them and had starved to death. He said that the medical staff shouldn’t need too much convincing to go along with the story, but anyone not on board with the plan could report to Inspector Tessier for further briefing. Michael didn’t ask how Robbie planned to exterminate the infected, and after it was done they never spoke of it.
Two weeks following the incident at the community center in Espanola, Robbie, Michael, Carolyn, and Katie were sharing a pot of coffee before the kids awoke for the day. Electricity was being rationed, but like most families in the area, the Carboni’s had a back-up generator. A few minutes after the adults all sat down with their steaming mugs, the general silence of the early morning was suddenly broken by the roar of an approaching motorcycle which abruptly shut off after it was obviously parked in the driveway. Katie had the door open before Eli was able to knock.
“We’ve got trouble,” the officer reported after removing his helmet. “Somebody’s reconnected the bridge, and a couple dozen cars are backed up at the checkpoint. I can’t say how many got through before we realized what happened and put the roadblock back in place.”
“The controls for the bridge . . . is anybody in the control room now?” Carolyn wondered.
“We have our guys in there. No trace of anyone when we got to it.” Inspector Tessier looked like he hadn’t slept in days. “We’re trying to get the people processed car by car, but some of our local folks want to just send ‘em back where they came from. I’m not happy they’re here, but I’m not about to send a bunch of families back to hell for no good reason.”
Robbie nodded. “Why didn’t you just radio for us? We could have been there by now.”
“It’s like I said, some people don’t want to let them through. No reason to advertise they’re here. I decided to tell you in person to slow down the news—everybody listens to scanners nowadays. My guys have things under control for now. Vehicles are being checked in and parked, and the people are being escorted to the hospital for physicals.”
“I’ll help you at the check-point,” Carolyn offered. “I have a way of making people feel comfortable.”
Robbie grinned. “You underestimate your talents. You ready, Michael?”
Michael turned to his wife, “Will you be OK alone here with the kids?”
Katie practically pushed him out the door. “Half of those kids are bigger than me, and we’re far from alone. We’ll go help Mrs. Jorgenson with breakfast and entertain the guests. I think it’s time for another Scrabble tournament to boost the Americans’ morale. Those senior citizens take their word games very seriously.”
Eli led the way to the bridge, with Michael and the others following in Katie’s SUV. They were waved through two roadblocks before approaching the line of newcomers backed up to the middle of the bridge. Carolyn was given a nametag and a notebook and began cheerfully working her way back through the long line of vehicles.
“How many have come through?” Robbie asked the officers who’d been manning the main post.
A young constable replied, “Forty-seven so far, and it looks like we’re almost half way through the line.”
“We need to get those cars off the bridge and swing it open again. Let’s move everyone back and line the cars up on either side here,” Michael pointed to the shoulders on both sides of the road. Robbie and a few others immediately set off to make the necessary adjustments and get the word out to the security forces and the drivers waiting on the bridge. Michael turned to Eli, “So where are these people from, and how did the bridge get closed?”
The inspector scanned a pile of papers on a clip board. “Most of them are from Sudbury, but a few say they’re from Toronto.” He studied one of the sheets carefully for a minute, then groaned. “The bridge controls were apparently sabotaged—we haven’t been able to get anything to work.”
“Let me have a look at them. It’s just electric motors to operate the machinery and hydraulics to actually swing the bridge. I was an electrical engineer for years,” Michael explained, “and the with the back-
up diesel generator in the control room, I don’t see how we can’t get it up and running quickly unless they’ve cut the cables.”
“Go for it, Mr. Mayor. We’ve got a couple mechanics up there already, I’ll radio ‘em and let ‘em know to expect you. It’ll be a tight squeeze.” Eli shook his head. “I’m no engineer, but it always seemed weird that the control room is on the bridge itself—I always thought a little remote control button from either side would be handier. You know, kinda like a garage door opener.”
Michael laughed. “You’re right. You’re no engineer. Tell Robbie where I’m at in case he needs me for anything.”