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unlucky enough that the first sign had been on a limb. Unlucky because if it was your nose or ear you suffered for perhaps just two hours before death released.

Her father had manifested the spot on both his feet, one on his middle toe, one under his foot. By nightfall of that day both of his legs were rotting horrors. By midday of the second day her father was dead and as an unknowing parting gift provided her with the source of a lifetimes nightmares when as in her sorrow she had hugged his still form and his corpse had burst. Soaking her in the putrid mess that had just hours before been her wonderful fathers internal organs.

Shortly the plague just burnt itself out. Every member of the human race who was susceptible to it had died. She and her mother had been amongst the lucky ones. The dead had been buried and the world changed.

The man who she had been listening to as he whimpered suddenly stopped. She thought she heard him speak to someone, they replied and then the sound of a butcher plying his trade. Then that buzzing noise louder now. Coleen screwed up her courage and moved to the door to try and see a little more. She thought she could see the shadows of people in another cell fluttering on the floor outside it. Nothing more.

She moved away from the door once more and curled up against a wall. The mans cell was next to hers, either she or the woman who was still unconscious would be next to shriek. Coleen was shocked to find she couldn't cry, couldn't feel. She sat in emotional stasis her mind ranged once more to the much more recent past.

She had been job hunting, since the plague and the social collapse that had accompanied it the haves had everything and the have nots had even less than ever before. Manufacturing and farming both had been nearly totally automated and the survivors either owned shares in those or lived on hand outs. Her mother and her were in the later category. But a flurry of lesser plagues had recently struck leaving her mother and herself once more miraculously untouched and many positions empty that had to be filled when the luckier new victims found themselves limbless and unable to perform their duties. She had hoped to help by filling one of those slots.

She had sat for an interview and done well she thought, then had the necessary medical examinations and blood tests done to confirm she was healthy. They'd told her she would hear from them very soon.

She heard from them now.

The door swung open with an ear shattering crash and

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