Chapter 11

Charles watched Connie leave, staring after her as she hurried away. She was still wearing his 'hoodie'. He had asked her if she wanted to borrow some of his sister's clothing; at least some panties and maybe a pair of sandals for her feet. Connie had said no. There wasn't much to say after that. As he watched her leave, Charles thought about Connie and what she had said to him. When she was no longer in sight, Charles went and sat down on the couch. Silently he turned on the television, ensuring that it was muted. All the channels were still black. Biting his lower lip once more, he put down the remote and started to think.

Charles felt sorry for Connie. True the world had turned upside down for him as well, but he had survived essentially unscathed. Connie on the other hand had suffered greatly. First she had been raped and sodomized, and then she had killed the guy who had done it. She had sought help from her mother and was almost raped a second time. Then there was Clyde. True she hadn't killed him, but she had wanted to badly. Seeing him after the cops had emptied eight cartridges into him had taken a lot out of her. Now she was on her way home to deal with her mother's boyfriend's body. Life sucked the big one. Thankfully, he had been smart enough to keep his mouth shut. Charles wasn't sure how sympathetic Connie would have been if he had mentioned his father's attempt to have sex with him. Maybe she'd listen politely one day, but not today. Charles really should have gone with her, but Connie had insisted that she had to do this alone. Hopefully, everything would turn out okay.

About then the television channel started flickering. A minute later the news came on.

Charles turned up the sound and sat back to listen.

The news wasn't good. There had been massive deaths that morning, not only locally but from around the world. Government officials in every country were reporting that their countries had suffered enormous losses. No country could give a firm number at the moment, because emergency services were still searching for victims, but the reports placed a conservative estimate at over three million dead.

That caused Charles to sigh heavily and shake his head. He thought of Clyde and cursed him under his breath.

The reports stated that for a period of almost six hours, the world had suffered a massive trauma. Something had happened, that had sent the population of the Earth into what some psychiatrists were calling a 'psychotic crisis'. People had engaged in unrestrained sexual depravity, regardless of where they were or what they were doing when the urge hit. People driving cars, crashed their vehicles when the urge hit them. This occurred to people operating all kinds of vehicles, including pilots who crashed their planes as they joined with their passengers, coupling madly as their planes plummeted to the ground. It happened everywhere and people paid for this 'crisis' with their lives. Then just as it had inexplicitly started the crisis ended. People woke from the crisis naked, either at work or at home or in their schools. So far, no one knew whether the crisis had been caused by terrorists or by solar flares or even by aliens.

Charles watched with interest. When he became bored with one commentator, he changed the channel and tried another. Every channel was covering the event. There was nothing else on but the news.

What interested Charles the most about these news reports was the manner that they were being reported in. The reporters, both famous and local, did their jobs professionally. They all stood by and watched as bodies were pulled from the wreckage of burnt out vehicles and they droned on about the event. They interviewed people about what had happened and the people droned on about what had happened. They interviewed the police and the government and these people droned on about what had happened. None cried over the dead. Not one person, victim or witness showed any emotions. No one mentioned a state of emergency nor were there indignant calls for an investigation. The crisis had happened. People had sex. People had been raped. People had died because of people having sex, but no one showed any emotion as they reported it.

That worried Charles. It worried him a lot.

The good news was that people were up and functioning. Charles watched the television and noted that the people who should be responding, the police and emergency services, were responding to the situation. True there was no emotion or sense of urgency in their actions, but they were responding. People were being rescued, the dead were being cleaned up, and the gears of the world were turning. There wasn't any sparkle but things were happening. Charles could even hear the sirens of rescue vehicles moving throughout his neighbourhood responding to calls for help. One of those calls was probably from Connie. That thought saddened him the most.