Caswell

Caswell
By: Keyghan Reed and Tacinda Logsdon


It’s a dark, gloomy fall evening in upstate New York,1958. A woman is pacing back and forth in Dr. X’s office. The doctor has not yet appeared and she is getting worried. Thirty-four year old Piper Caswell’s baby, Alex, has been sick all weekend. He has been getting worse each day and recently lost consciousness. When Dr. X walks in he immediately gets to work. He checks Alex’s vital signs and says that he is still breathing, but he isn’t looking good. He then draws some of Alex’s blood and leaves the room. He comes back after a few minutes and says that the blood needs to be analyzed before he can give a diagnosis. He injects a clear liquid into Alex, then leaves the room again. While waiting for Dr. X to come back, Piper sits and watches her baby thinking about how much she loves him and hopes he pulls through this. Piper has felt very alone since Alex was born, he was a surprise to the father,who left as soon as Alex was born. Now she fears that she will be alone again, but she can’t think about herself right now. Alex is in trouble and needs her support.

When Dr. X entered the room he looked very overwrought, he just sat there and looked at Alex. When Piper finally found the courage to ask Dr. X what was wrong with Alex, he just sat there looking blankly into space. He then stood up and regained his composure. He explained that something very strange was going on with Alex. He hasn’t ever seen a disease like this and he was hoping it was just something that would blow over. Even if it was something the body could get rid of on it’s own, he still was going to work on an antidote. Suddenly, Alex started to roll around and cough. The two jumped up and quickly moved over to the baby as it regains consciousness. They were both overjoyed, Dr. X immediately checked his vitals and noticed that Alex seemed to be just fine. He then said that Alex would be okay and that he must have made a mistake when he was analyzing his blood. He then explains that the child could have just had a fever that died down. Piper then leaves with her healthy looking baby.

The next morning, Piper was on her way to work at the bank while Alex is staying home with the babysitter, Mary. Mary has a day planned out that involves a lot of fun learning for baby, Alex. She has a lot of time on her hands considering her current age and she isn’t going to waste it by herself. She is at the age of eighty-seven and just loves Alex. She hadn’t seen him for a few days and was extremely happy to spend time with him. Today, after spending a few hours with Alex, Mary was starting to feel faint. She sat down and drank a glass of water, thinking she might be dehydrated. When she started to feel worse, she decided to take Alex and go to the hospital. She was putting on her coat, about to grab Alex and leave. She started to feel a throbbing sensation in her neck, then she could feel herself falling. It felt as if she were falling for hours, she could barely tell what was going on. Then she finally,hit the floor... dead.

When the police got to the location of the death of one Mary White, they weren’t that surprised to see that an old woman randomly died. They get these calls all the time and they didn’t even think about questioning it. These policemen both went home to their families that night, unaware of the fact that they were infected with a virus that will destroy anyone it comes in contact with. Dr. X is still thinking about what he saw in the microscope the night before. The blood of the child looked so different from anything he’d ever seen. He had been looking at it all day long, trying to figure out what the problem was with the blood. The baby is fine now, but it was weird the way that he appeared to be in so much pain and then he looked fine. Dr. X was afraid that something bad may be happening, he didn’t know what it was... but it wasn’t good.

The next day the local paper informed everyone that two families were all found dead that morning. The cause is currently unknown, but they are having a coroner look at them and see what it was that made them all die in unison. When the bodies were delivered to Dr. X’s office, he immediately saw what the problem was. He looked at the blood of the two families and noticed a similarity to something he had seen before, then it hit him. It looked just like the blood he drew from Alex! He then remembered reading about an elderly woman that had died that was looking after a baby. He was starting to put it all together now. Alex is a carrier of a disease that will kill all that come into contact with it. He then thought about the fact that he was around Alex, but he was still alive. He must have , which kept him from getting infected. What about Piper, is she okay? He had to go see and tell her what was going on before it was to late.

Piper had to stay home from work today, after the incident with Mary, she didn’t have a substitute sitter. She was feeling very bad about the loss of her friend and she felt as if everyone in her life that she loves is leaving her. She has to think about the task at hand though, she needs to think about Alex. When Dr. X came over to deliver his news, Piper was in shock. To think that her baby boy could have killed two families, and anyone that the members of those families have come into contact with is ridiculous. She couldn’t believe what type of accusations Dr. X was making. Though after the facts were shown to her, she began to see the truth. She then saw the dangers of her son, even if he were quarantined, there are probably so many people already infected that it wouldn’t matter. Piper now knows that her baby might be the thing that kills of all life on earth.

It’s been three year after the Caswell virus had been discovered. It has taken out over three fourths of the worlds population. There is a small safe zone in Ontario where the largest group of survivors live. They keep themselves safe by never leaving the designated area, and never letting anyone else in. One day on a perimeter check, a man named Charles was looking around on the other side of the North wall, he had heard a faint noise that was coming from a large bush. When he went over he saw a small child, about four or five years old sitting there crying. He wasn’t supposed to do anything, but he couldn't leave the kid there. So he took the child back to the interior of the safe zone. After he as cleaned up and dressed, Charles took the child to the leader of the safe zone. The leader was outraged and ordered the child to be killed. The boy was brought to the doctor to be euthanized. When they got there the older, but still living Dr. X, was amazed to see a young child that was living out there on his own. When Dr. X asked the child where his mother is, he just sat there. After a few moments he replied... dead. Dr. X asked then the child his name, and was then paralyzed with fear... the child was four year old Alex Caswell. In all life there is death and in all death there is life, without one, the other cannot survive. When one is lost, all is lost.