Here's a novella written around BushcraftUK and inspired by a thread here:
http://www.bushcraftuk.com/community/showthread.php?p=119399#post119399
OUR GOOSE IS COOKED!
By Eric Methven
A Speculative Post Apocolyptic Novella dedicated to, and written exclusively for members of BushcraftUK.
Introduction
This novella was inspired by a thread on the BushcraftUK discussion forum. It deals with a scenario where the only people left alive on the planet are people from BushcraftUK and their families.
The year is 2006 and some forum members have recently attended a bushcraft get together at Loch Achray in Scotland. Some of the same members also attended a formal BushcraftUK Moot the following weekend in southern England.
While in Scotland, one of the members brought along some wild geese he'd shot flying over his property. Everyone had a go at dressing the birds out and plucking the feathers. What nobody knew was that the geese had a serious form of avian flu and this was transmitted to everyone at the Scottish meet.
Within a week everyone had a heavy dose of flu like symptoms. Those that went to the other moot passed on the infection to all there. The flu was particularly virulent and everyone got quite ill for a few days.
Nothing more was thought about it until six weeks later when ordinary people started dropping like flies all over the country. A pandemic had started and it spread like wildfire. Many panicked and tried to get away by flying out of the country before the authorities closed all the airports. Those who got away just spread the virus throughout the rest of the world.
There was no recovery from this flu. If you got it, you died. It was a strain of avian flu that had mutated so it killed people. People had no immunity to the virus.
As more and more people died, and there was less and less people left to look after the sick and dying, systems started to close down. Power stations stopped working because there was nobody left to operate them. Banks didn't open and there was nobody there to fill the cash machines. Sewage works stopped pumping for a lack of fit staff and raw sewage backed up. Water stopped running from the taps and most people's homes became inhabitable. Those that had quarantined themselves at home were forced through hunger and lack of water to leave their homes and try and find help elsewhere.
The people who were left were terrified. They fought, they panicked, they died at the hands of someone bigger than themselves or with a bigger pointy stick. There were no more police, they had all succumbed to the virus. There was nobody to drive ambulances, and even if there had been there was nobody left in the hospitals to render aid.
Within six weeks of the virus striking, society had disappeared and the towns and cities of this and most other countries had become ghost towns with rotting corpses everywhere.
There were survivors. The people who had attended the bushcraft meets had unknowingly developed sufficient antibodies from the infected geese to give them immunity from the virus. The infected ones had infected their families, friends and work colleagues in some cases. All who had become ill six weeks previously didn't become ill when everyone around them succumbed and died. Within a short time, the population of the United Kingdom had reduced to little over one thousand people and they were all spread throughout the country.
They were alive in a living nightmare with no way of contacting each other since the internet was now only a thing of the past. Most families didn't even realise that the others from the meets were alive. They just thought they'd been luck, or been spared for some reason. Medik knew why they had been spared. He'd realised early on that his exposure to the first flu had immunised him from the mutated deadly version. This dawned on him when he was treating his sick patients and everyone else got sick until he was left on his own. Medik was exhausted though and it took him weeks to recover enough to start looking for others from the group.
Chapter 1
Dragging himself out of his camp bed on the fourth week after seeing his last patient die before his eyes, Medik stumbled out of the tent he and his family had been living in.
"Ah! You're awake at last" his wife said. She had the camp fire going and a large pot was suspended above it steaming gently. "Fancy a brew?"
"Hmmm" Medik grunted. "Sounds good. I've got a throat like a badger's bum".
"Well, you've been asleep for days. I'm not in the least surprised you're throat is dry. Are you going to try the amateur bands again today?"
"Yes" he said, " There's a few of us are radio hams so maybe someone will have his rig switched on."
"What are we going to do if we don't hear from anyone else?"
"Well", Medik said, "I'll have to make contact with them somehow. I know all, or nearly all of us will have survived the bird flu. I just hope the ones in the towns are safe."
Medik drank his coffee and looked around him. They were on the shores of Loch Achray in the Trossachs. They had moved out to the campsite when their home became uninhabitable and there were still sufficient numbers left in Perth to riot and cause security problems for him and his family. The boys were at the Loch side fishing and had landed a couple of good size trout. His wife was rubbing some clothes through and was hanging them out on a line to dry in the warm summer air. His bow and arrows were under a tarp he's erected to keep the majority of their gear dry and would be put to use later in the day if a deer presented itself.
Wildlife was abundant. Deer roamed freely now that there wasn't human scent around. Rabbits soon re-colonised areas denied to them by man and his machines. Medik drank his coffee and thought. He thought a lot these days. He thought about friends and colleagues who were no longer there. He thought about the vaccine that didn't work. He thought about all of the bushcraft people who were probably still alive and he wondered how he was going to make contact with them.......
That's it for now. Feedback so far please?
Eric
http://www.bushcraftuk.com/community/showthread.php?p=119399#post119399
OUR GOOSE IS COOKED!
By Eric Methven
A Speculative Post Apocolyptic Novella dedicated to, and written exclusively for members of BushcraftUK.
Introduction
This novella was inspired by a thread on the BushcraftUK discussion forum. It deals with a scenario where the only people left alive on the planet are people from BushcraftUK and their families.
The year is 2006 and some forum members have recently attended a bushcraft get together at Loch Achray in Scotland. Some of the same members also attended a formal BushcraftUK Moot the following weekend in southern England.
While in Scotland, one of the members brought along some wild geese he'd shot flying over his property. Everyone had a go at dressing the birds out and plucking the feathers. What nobody knew was that the geese had a serious form of avian flu and this was transmitted to everyone at the Scottish meet.
Within a week everyone had a heavy dose of flu like symptoms. Those that went to the other moot passed on the infection to all there. The flu was particularly virulent and everyone got quite ill for a few days.
Nothing more was thought about it until six weeks later when ordinary people started dropping like flies all over the country. A pandemic had started and it spread like wildfire. Many panicked and tried to get away by flying out of the country before the authorities closed all the airports. Those who got away just spread the virus throughout the rest of the world.
There was no recovery from this flu. If you got it, you died. It was a strain of avian flu that had mutated so it killed people. People had no immunity to the virus.
As more and more people died, and there was less and less people left to look after the sick and dying, systems started to close down. Power stations stopped working because there was nobody left to operate them. Banks didn't open and there was nobody there to fill the cash machines. Sewage works stopped pumping for a lack of fit staff and raw sewage backed up. Water stopped running from the taps and most people's homes became inhabitable. Those that had quarantined themselves at home were forced through hunger and lack of water to leave their homes and try and find help elsewhere.
The people who were left were terrified. They fought, they panicked, they died at the hands of someone bigger than themselves or with a bigger pointy stick. There were no more police, they had all succumbed to the virus. There was nobody to drive ambulances, and even if there had been there was nobody left in the hospitals to render aid.
Within six weeks of the virus striking, society had disappeared and the towns and cities of this and most other countries had become ghost towns with rotting corpses everywhere.
There were survivors. The people who had attended the bushcraft meets had unknowingly developed sufficient antibodies from the infected geese to give them immunity from the virus. The infected ones had infected their families, friends and work colleagues in some cases. All who had become ill six weeks previously didn't become ill when everyone around them succumbed and died. Within a short time, the population of the United Kingdom had reduced to little over one thousand people and they were all spread throughout the country.
They were alive in a living nightmare with no way of contacting each other since the internet was now only a thing of the past. Most families didn't even realise that the others from the meets were alive. They just thought they'd been luck, or been spared for some reason. Medik knew why they had been spared. He'd realised early on that his exposure to the first flu had immunised him from the mutated deadly version. This dawned on him when he was treating his sick patients and everyone else got sick until he was left on his own. Medik was exhausted though and it took him weeks to recover enough to start looking for others from the group.
Chapter 1
Dragging himself out of his camp bed on the fourth week after seeing his last patient die before his eyes, Medik stumbled out of the tent he and his family had been living in.
"Ah! You're awake at last" his wife said. She had the camp fire going and a large pot was suspended above it steaming gently. "Fancy a brew?"
"Hmmm" Medik grunted. "Sounds good. I've got a throat like a badger's bum".
"Well, you've been asleep for days. I'm not in the least surprised you're throat is dry. Are you going to try the amateur bands again today?"
"Yes" he said, " There's a few of us are radio hams so maybe someone will have his rig switched on."
"What are we going to do if we don't hear from anyone else?"
"Well", Medik said, "I'll have to make contact with them somehow. I know all, or nearly all of us will have survived the bird flu. I just hope the ones in the towns are safe."
Medik drank his coffee and looked around him. They were on the shores of Loch Achray in the Trossachs. They had moved out to the campsite when their home became uninhabitable and there were still sufficient numbers left in Perth to riot and cause security problems for him and his family. The boys were at the Loch side fishing and had landed a couple of good size trout. His wife was rubbing some clothes through and was hanging them out on a line to dry in the warm summer air. His bow and arrows were under a tarp he's erected to keep the majority of their gear dry and would be put to use later in the day if a deer presented itself.
Wildlife was abundant. Deer roamed freely now that there wasn't human scent around. Rabbits soon re-colonised areas denied to them by man and his machines. Medik drank his coffee and thought. He thought a lot these days. He thought about friends and colleagues who were no longer there. He thought about the vaccine that didn't work. He thought about all of the bushcraft people who were probably still alive and he wondered how he was going to make contact with them.......
That's it for now. Feedback so far please?
Eric
It sounds very similar to 28days later, except more possible. 
