Rain would fall for hours and hours. It
seemed it would never end. The storm had been lashing out against the land for
many days now and only from time to time it would feel like it stopped being so
harsh. But then it seemed to restart again, twice as strong, relentless against
anything living in the land. Even the oceans and lakes were in turmoil.
Everything was upside down and people had begun to suffer serious shortages and
problems, mostly related to food and general supplies.
What families did was to ration food and try
to consume as little as they could. They hardest hit groups were the ones where
grandparents and small children shared a household. No one had the capacity to
feed such a large amount of people and it wasn’t unheard of that so many people
lived under one roof in that region. After all, it was very far away any big
cities and that was the way people had lived for generations. Rain had never
changed that before and this storm was no exception.
So they had to make what they could with what
they had, which wasn’t a lot but they made it last as long as they could. Fish,
chicken and beef were kept like treasures and mostly vegetables were eaten
because people could still try to recover some of those from beneath the mud.
Some were pretty resistant like celery or carrots. So they consumed that first
with maybe a little piece of actual animal fat every day. Pieces were slightly
larger for children but that was not enough.
Many children lived in those mountains and
they were seriously affected by the rain. The poor quality of water to make
their food and the amount of nutrients from what their parents could give them
was simply not enough for them to be correctly nourished. After the first week,
many children started feeling bad and many parents did the trip beneath the
rain towards the small town nearby, where the only doctor in the region lived.
He always had bad news for the concerned parents.
They had malnourishing problems, very serious
cases of infections and lack of proper hygiene because of the water being
contaminated by damages to water pipes and so on. Many children died instantly,
the others filled the few rooms the doctor had available on his small practice.
He asked for help from other parts of the country but the roads were under
water or severely damaged and no trains or planes could reach the remote
location. They had been driven out of the world by the storm and had been let
to die or starve for who know how long.
When the elders started feeling as bad or
worse than the young, people were in a general state of panic. It didn’t felt
real that it was happening all at once. Some thought of the storm as a
punishment from the Gods but others thought it was simply the chaotic weather
changes happening all over the world. They might have not been the most well
connected people in the world but many had television sets and they knew very
well about climate change and what it had done in other parts of the world.
After three weeks, an emergency team was able
to reach them through the forest and then taking a very long path that made
them penetrate a nature preserve. It was the only way to reach the small town
and that was only because they studied several maps of the region in order to
find that hidden way in. When they reached the only settlement in the
mountains, they were able to tell people that a couple of helicopters had been
sent before they left for their mission, but they had never called back.
People were only shocked to hear this but only
for a few minutes, because their families were suffering and it was too much to
start caring for others at the moment. They needed the help the group brought
them and that was the only way they could think of to change the state of
things. So the volunteers, a group of fifteen men and women, got installed at
the doctor’s house and started helping with vaccines and other treatments they
had brought on big crates that had been carried by mules and themselves.
Sadly, all they did was not enough to really
ensure that everything was going to be fine. The rain wouldn’t stop and sick
people from the most remote areas of the mountain range would come in at all
time, very wet and sicker than they had left. It was a really sad thing to see
for the volunteers and it was difficult for them not to be sick as well just by
looking at all the despair and the human condition that was in display on that
small community. It was hard and a test to their abilities.
After a couple of days, it was decided that
most of the group would go back to civilization. Only five people would remain
with the doctor, in order to help with all the patients arriving and leaving
every day. Besides, the townspeople needed hands to bury the people that had
died and they also needed appropriate bags to do that because contamination of
the water had to be avoided at all costs. The group also had to bring more
people and medicines, a whole lot more than before. They left early one morning
and expect to reach their destination in two days.
And they did. However, they also encountered
the crash site of one of the helicopters. The scene was gruesome and some of
the helpers had to vomit right besides the wreckage because of the stench and
the sight of things. They had to mark the place on a map, on their electronic
devices, in order to go back there in future in order to collect the corpses
and any valuables that could shed a light on the cause of the accident. But
thunders above them reminded the group that the storm was the culprit, no
matter the details.
Meanwhile, in town, another tragedy happened
at night and there had been no way to escape it: the mountain itself collapsed
and carried several homes from almost the summit to the foot of the hill were
the most densely populated part of the region was located. So bad it was, that the
patients at the doctor’s house felt the rumble in the middle of the night and
they alerted others in order to evacuate. But that didn’t happen because there
was no other place to go besides there.
The volunteers that had been left there had
the very difficult task to find survivors. However, they soon realized that was
not going to happen. They started finding bodies, after some of the mud and
dirt had been washed away by the rain. It was gruesome to see their faces
covered in brown or grey and their expressions of fear forever imprinted on
their faces. That had been their last thing to do and it looked horrible. The
volunteers, however, did what they had to do.
People from town helped with blankets and also
tablecloths and the dead were covered with those and then lined up in front of
the doctor’s office. Then, one body at a time, they were carried to a clearing
in the woods where the ground was firm. They had to spend several hours digging
for a hole, but they did so anyways, in order to provide a dignified place to
rest for the many people that had died at night, never expect nature would turn
against them after so many years living there.
It took one more week for more help to arrive.
The condition of the trail they had used had decreased and the amount of things
they brought was not easy to transport. Besides, many people on the outside
world wanted to help, to do something for those poor souls.
The storm ended two weeks after than, suddenly
one afternoon. Clouds slowly floated away and the sun came back. But the lives
of that community had changed forever. Death had covered them with its veil and
now they couldn’t see a proper future in what had been their home for such a
long time.
