Can you feel the horror? This is the first of the Writer’s Island posts that I have been promising for a while. It’s a potential start to something. Tell me if you think it’s worth pursuing.
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Good morning. Can you hear me at the back? Excellent.
There were many hateful acts perpetrated at the beginning of the 21st Century, but it wasn’t until the Opening Night of the 2012 Olympic Games in London that the world understood the true horror that the Age of Terror could bring.
The weapon used was like nothing that had been seen before. It appeared above Tower Bridge and floated in the air for a moment getting brighter and brighter. Colours flashed out in every direction and crowds gathered assuming it was part of the celebrations, which had been going on all day. It wasn’t until it crashed through the centre of the bridge that people started to panic and back away. As the mighty towers crumbled, the ball of light shot into the water and turned the normally muddy waters of the Thames into the purest mountain spring. The water leapt into the air and rained down on everyone. The crowds tried to escape the water but it touched everyone and then dissipated on the air. There was a brief moment of complete silence as everyone tried to figure out what had just happened. Tower Bridge lay demolished in the water, the dust settling, as the water of the river settled on the millions.
Just an hour later the body count started. It was indiscriminate. Some blamed the motorway system because that was where everyone was dying; on the way out of London… Then some who had not been in London that first night and left got through unscathed. The disease was apparently diminishing the body’s ability to process air. The Prime Minister left the city to go to a ‘more secure location’ and died when his helicopter plummeted to the ground. The Queen and most of the royal family had also been in the capital for the Olympic Games celebrations and again, as soon as they hit the edge of, what was later referred, to as the bubble.
So, doctors and other support workers flooded to London to try and help but as they reached the capital they felt the effects of asphyxiation and drowned where they stood. There was the traditional level of national panic and all travel in and out of the capital halted. The dying stopped.
The death toll of the first week was a massive 2.6 million.
Panic gripped the entire world as everything stopped to watch the terrifying images of destruction in London. Riots and looting, suicide and murderous rampages. The very worst of society laid out for all to see. The piles of bodies that no one had the time to deal with. Volunteers recreating scenes from horror movies and black and white film as they pile them in lime lined pits. Names going onto a database as the bodies were searched for identification. Reporters inside London reporting from secret locations hiding from the mayhem; reporters outside in tears as they recognise a neighbour, a celebrity, someone they saw on the underground.
Hospitals were overcrowded with the injuries of panic but no one appeared to be suffering from the strange asphyxiation disease. Scientists began to theorise that whatever it was had burnt itself out and recommended that the exclusion zone around London be lifted.
People in London started to go about their daily business, trying to keep the stiff upper lip, ‘we will never be defeated’ attitude, but as soon as they tried to leave, they suffocated and died.
There was no escaping whatever it was that had decided to keep them in
The scientists did test after test but could find no chemical or biological agents in the air. There was nothing to say that anything had changed except for the ring of death that seemed to encircle London.
Slowly as it seeped into the public consciousness, that London was now truly only safe for the people who were there now some decisions were made. No barriers were put up, as no one had gotten sick from coming into contact with the bodies of those who had tried to leave. It wasn’t a contagion in the people; it was just the area. No one was outlawed from leaving or entering London (although it was seen as the quickest way to commit suicide, so the area around London became a place of death). Spiritualists said that the air was thick with negative energy, and their counterparts inside the city were reporting the opposite – that now the initial fear had died down the energy inside was very positive.
The centre of power moved to Manchester and they communicated with the MPs still left in the capital. The rest of the population turned their backs on what had happened to the Londoners, and all the known lines of communication dried up. Lights were still seen glowing from the centre of the city and the bells of the churches could be heard ringing clear across the otherwise silent cityscape.
We built this centre of learning on the bubble’s edge to help people understand what happened and how we can move forward in our understanding. If you follow me onto the balcony I will take you to the edge. You will see it clearly marked. We are in time to see the daily test of the air. You will see a box being placed at the edge, inside is a young rabbit which will be let out to immediately cross the edge. Yes, it is a little cruel but there are no other ways of seeing if the bubble is still toxic.
As you know this was the last time this particular test was seen at the centre. The rabbit, codenamed FreedomBunny, was the first living creature to survive crossing the edge. All witnesses to the event were found at the site, seemingly killed with the effects of the bubble. The same day, the Trusmann Organisation bought the apparently useless land rights with the intention of returning the city to it’s former glory.
He did not realise it at the time, but he had some sit in tenants…
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