The Human Disease

Esmerelda Sanchez. Everybody across the globe knew the girl's name. She was a legend in Africa, a hero in America, a tragedy in England, a fascination in Japan, and an angel of death in Mexico. Shunned by half of the nation, and loved by the other half. Esmerelda's picture was plastered onto billions of peoples' chest, on t-shirts, sold all over the world for twenty dollars, American currency. Esmerelda had caused a riot in Brazil where thousands killed each other, many of them women and children. Esmerelda had cleared out the entire city of Manhattan. New York City's streets were completely bare. Time sqaure's vast displays were shutdown, perhaps for good. Two, perhaps three people lay dead on the sidewalk. Trampled and crushed by others sprinting out of the city, only to be shot and shunned by relatives in other states. All because of Esmerelda. All because of that dried goo on the sidewalk.1

The sidewalk near the theater playing the reprise of the ancient "The Sound of Music" on Broadway had been bare the longest. The roads were closed. All of it for one smudge on the sidewalk. One tiny seemingly insignificant smudge on the sidewalk. Most of it was gone by now. It had drifted away in the wind, possibly causing more chaos and terror. 2

The green dried scales rubbed on the sidewalk were the cause for these riots, cheesy benefit t-shirts, and this deserted Manhattan. 3

Only a week ago, Esmerelda walked down this very street. Her slender legs were jittery as she walked. She walked around, staring up at the skymobiles, the broadway shows playing, and the sky. Taking it all in through her deep brown eyes. She took pictures of every last bit of it, grinning as any child would for the first time in New York. Her black hair swung as she stared around. 4

Her tiny fingeres clicked away. Taking pictures of every last person walking by, every last building, and every last street sign. She sat on a bench next to her mother. Her mother looked almost exactly like Esmerelda, tall and slender, black haired, and brown eyed. They both took little sips out of their cool water bottles. 5

Esmerelda asked her mother, "Could we go and see one of these shows, Mom?" 6

"Well, which do you want to see? There’s a reprise of Rent and Wicked that are ending soon, so, maybe we should go see them," her mother said. 7

"No, not Rent. I want to see an ancient show. Oh! Can we go and see how much tickets are to The Sound of Music?" asked Esmerelda.8

Her mother agreed, and they walked over to the ticket booth for The Sound of Music. Esmerelda stared up at the buildings around her as she waited for her mother to purchase tickets. Esmerelda bumped into a short, tubby man, and said, "Excuse me." 9

When she turned around to walk back over to her mother. She scratched her itchy nose as a peculiar sensation overcame her. She let out a loud noise, and shot a green gooey substance out of her nose. Her eyes filled with tears as she put her hand out to see what was on her fingers.10

It was all over her fingers. It was green, sticky, and wet. She felt her face with her clean hand, and realized it was all over her face. She screamed and fell to her knees. She rubbed the substance onto the sidewalk as hard as she could. 11

The substance wouldn't rub off right away, so, she rubbed harder. She pressed her hand onto the sidewalk so hard that her skin was beginning to tear off. Blood drenched the sidewalk. Esmerelda's mother rushed to her side, and saw the green ooze. She screamed just as Esmerelda had, and jumped back. She quickly dialed 9-1-1, and stepped farther back. Esmerelda stood up, and cried hysterically. She felt around for her mother to afraid to open her eyes. 12

Her mother stared at her for another moment, thinking that maybe, the blood on the sidewalk had something to do with the green substance covering her daughter’s fingers and face. She began running as fast as she could in the other direction. People stopped and stared at Esmerelda, wondering what was going on.13

Esmerelda was offered help by five more people before the police came, but was deserted by all of the helpers who claimed something was eating her skin. 14

"It's a disease! A disease! Run! Hide! Get away from her! She'll kill you!" yelled a man sprinting away from Esmerelda.15

Even before Esmerelda was rescued her story was beginning to be heard in California.16

"What?! We haven't had any disease in years! What do you think it is?!" asked a Los Angelos friend of an Ohioan.17

"I have no idea. They say it eats your skin. Who knows what it is? We better stay away from the northeast," decided the Ohioan.18

In New York, Esmerelda's pleas were finally answered when policemen arrived. They began by knocking her out with a shiny mallot as she ran for them to help. 19

After shutting down the street, the policemen, carefully dressed in airtight suits, picked her body up. They put her in a airtight plastic bed which was loaded onto a airtight plane which was sent to an airtight facility in northern New York.20

When Esmerelda awoke New York was already half empty, the world was already in chaos, and a million people had her (and themselves) in their prayers. Esmerelda, however, was physically in a blank metal room. 21

She looked around the room for some escape. She stood up shakily. Her face was covered with the familiar ooze from Broadway. She wiped it off with her hand which she immediatley wiped on the wall.22

Esmerelda turned around and walked to the other side of the room. She beat against the metal. "Mom? Where are you? Where am I?!" she yelled to no one.23

Well, not to no one exactly. A high definition monitor sat in a control room two floors up. Dr. Westing, a young doctor, watched Esmerelda's pleas and frowned. He sat down and sighed. 24

He stretched, and reached for another cup of coffee. He studied her carefully via the monitor sitting on his desk. The control room he sat in was covered in televisions - half showing Esmerelda screaming hysterically. Westing reached over and turned on one of the blank monitors. 25

A newscaster's face came on the screen in mid sentence, "-relda Sanchez is in critical condition, and not expected to live. Her state of being has caused an uproar in the medicine society, who is having their first meeting in twenty seven years today. They plan to research ancient cases, and figure out how to cure the "Green Death" as it has been so crudely named. In related news, riots raged on this morning in Moscow-"26

Dr. Westing knew he was risking his life as he sat in that lab, two stories above the sick girl. He had agreed to it, hoping curing it would make him infamous around the world. He knew there had to be a cure. He had to save her before she died. It was crucial for society and for him. Life as a doctor had declined in the last two centuries as all diseases had been isolated or annihilated by the doctors of the past. He was one of the few doctors who roamed the earth today. The profession had gone from being attractive and glamorous to poverty ridden and poor. Westing was paid little, but if he could cure the disease he'd been promised 8 billion dollars. It wouldn't be as much as an actor or a pro footballer was given a year, but enough to last him for the rest of his life.27

The Medicine Society would have to go on without him. He had decided hours ago he wasn't going to leave the girl. He knew if he left he'd miss something. He knew he'd miss the answer.28

He typed into a monitor to the right of the television, "Victim of 'green death' has awoken. She awoke with the green ooze on her face. I have not obtained contact with her mother as of yet."29

Esmerelda whispered, "Please. I just want to talk to my Mom. Once. Please." The high definition microphone picked it up perfectly.30

It may have been the lack of sleep, food, or human contact, but Westing began to cry. He sighed piteously, and stood up. His side hit the left control board on his way up, and he clicked a button. A button that said "speaker". A loud beep sounded through the control room.31

He said, "What the fuck?" He said it loud enough to sweep over the room two floors below. The microphone buzzed loudly. Esmerelda looked around in wonder.32

"Hey! Who's there?! Mom?!"33

Westing said, "Shit. I-I'm Dr. Westing. I'm uh monitoring you. You are, well, you-you know, right?"34

"I'm dying, aren't I?"35

"You're more of an old term. It's rather archaic, but it's called 'sick'. You aren't exactly dying as far as we know, but everyone of these 'sicknesses' we have on record from the ancient times uh, well, they uh we don't know yet," explained Westing.36

He knew that all of the sicknesses on record from the ancient times contracted were deadly. He justd didn’t have the heart to tell a little girl, her number was up. He watched Esmerelda closely. His young blue eyes, and unshaven face which would have looked playful a week ago looked downright depressed in that dark room talking to the angel of death. 37

"Oh," said she, "well, Dr. Westing, is there anyway I could talk to my Mother? Please?"38

Westing's eyes filled with tears. "Let me try and uh reach her again," said Westing.39

He dialed Esmerelda's mother's number for the eighth time.40

"Please, leave me alone. I am having this number cancelled, so don’t contact me anymore. Esmerelda was not my fault!" said the mother.41

"Hello, wait?! No, miss, please I-I mean your daughter wants to speak with you," said Westing. He almost asked her for Esmerelda's health history, but thought that that might frighten Esmerelda.42

"No! I will not talk to her! That girl was a curse! She probably gave me the sickness, just kill her already!" said Esmerelda's crying mother. Westing fumbled for the off switch to the speaker as she talked. A click was heard, and the line was cut. Westing stared at the monitor.43

Esmerelda stared forward with a blank expression for a moment, her eyes silently dripping tears. 44

Westing turned off the microphone switch, and then used a nearby binder to hack the switch off for good. He didn't want to get too attached to the girl.45

Days passed, and Westing never slept. He had become obsessed with finding a cure. Every day, he made sure she was given food and water.46

The first few days Esmerelda would cry out for him to return, but she soon forgot a Dr. Westing even existed.47

Westing watched and watched. He dreamt of the fame that he would recieve from finding a cure. He nodded off and on after the first five days, and woke up once to hear Esmerelda's voice. It was like a dying person's.48

It was raspy and clogged, and it plead for help. It was yelling about monsters attacking it. Esmerelda was hallucinating. He knew this was something. He reached for his medical dictionary sitting to the right of him, and flipped through the pages for the index. It was hallucinations! Hallucinating was a myth widely told by modern residents who believed it to be fake. Dr. Westing trembled. This was from an entirely different disease. What was happening?49

The girl lay in a ball in the corner, holding her knees. 50

While Westing recorded this, he stopped. He stared ahead, and blew the green substance out of his nose. All over the monitors. He screamed, and jumped three feet backward. He panicked.51

He knew that if they found out he had it, he would be quarantined. He wouldn't be studied, he would be killed. They would find out that it made the girl hallucinate and they would kill him. 52

He wiped the ooze off of the monitors, and collapsed on the cold tiled floor. He snorted pulling the ooze up his nose. He prayed that the ooze wasn’t burning his insides. He did this for hours, before he realized he was controlling it. 53

He could face the world. He could take the prize. He could be world renowned until he died. He could spend his last weeks in euphoria. 54

The girl. What if she got him even more 'sick'? The Medicine Society had found that most of the files from the ancients were either lost due to neglection, or long ago burnt due to loss of fear of disease. He had no idea what these sicknesses would do to him. Westing stood up, and pushed a button on the control board. He watched as a green noxious gas entered the metal room. Esmerelda screamed bloody murder as the gas suffocated her forever.55

He almost suddenly forgot about her, picked himself up, and left the room. He snorted the ooze up his nose every second, wondering if the disease would eventually have killed the girl. Wondering if the disease would eventually kill him.56

Daniel Westing. A new cause for destruction. Now, people could not trust other people - could not trust their own blood. Other people were the cause of this sickness as far as the world knew. Other people spread it. Other people could ruin them.57

As soon as he forgot that girl, and just as soon as the world had forgotten the microscopic predators so many years ago, Westing smiled, and wondered what he'd tell the world.
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