We live in a small suburb on the outskirts of town. It's usually pretty quite, but tonight it was unnaturally so. I could see lights on in some of the houses, but all the street lights were out. As I pulled onto our street I was shocked to see a burning car further down the street. I reached for my cell phone to call 911 before remembering the battery had gone dead.

I pulled into the drive way and noticed that Jen's car was gone. I figured that she probably was working a late shift at the hospital and that she had taken Kaitlynn to the babysitter. That's when I saw that our front door was sitting wide open. I keep a gun in a small safe in case someone ever breaks into our house, and I bought one for Jen too, but that wouldn't do me much good if someone was in the house and I was outside.

I sat in the car weighing my options for a good minute or two before making up my mind. I hadn't seen any signs of movement in the house, and with a dead phone I couldn't call for help. I decided to go inside and see what was going on.

As I went through the open front door I saw that a light was on in the kitchen. I worked my way around the corner and was shocked to see a red smear on the floor, and two of the kitchen chairs knocked over. I raced upstairs to our bedroom and dialed the combination into the gun safe. I grabbed my Glock and made sure it was still loaded, noting that Jen's gun was gone, before checking the other rooms upstairs. Kaitlynn's room was it's usual mess, and nothing else seemed to be out of place.

I went back downstairs and stared at the red puddle on the kitchen floor. Jen is the medical professional, and would know for sure, but it sure looked like blood to me. It seemed like some of the food in the kitchen was missing, but nothing else was out of place. I couldn't find a note, so I went to call the police from the house phone.

I tried the emergency 911 line, and got a recording that said "I'm sorry, but all circuits are busy. Please try your call again later.". I then tried the non-emergency number for both the police and fire departments, and got the same thing. Calls to Jen's work, her cell phone, and to a number of local friends all gave the same results. I grabbed the spare battery for my phone, but didn't know what to do.

That's when I noticed the "Saved Message" light was blinking on our answering machine. I hit the playback button, and Jen's voice came through the small speaker:

"Jackson, honey, I hope you get this in time. I don't really know what is going on, but it's bad. I got a call from the hospital telling me not to come in. There has been some sort of outbreak and they were quarantining the hospital, and they didn't want to spread the inspection. Weird things have been going on all over town. I haven't been able to reach anyone on the phone, either. Dad showed up to check on us and make sure we were ok. We decided to go over to his place since it's a bit isolated and should be safer. Kaitlynn and I will wait for you there. We grabbed some food and I took the gun you got me, and even though the phone isn't work I took it too. With everything that is happening I'm sorry I fought you at first about getting a gun. I love you and I hope we see you soon."

There was no mention of why the front door was open, or why there was blood on the kitchen floor. I'm not sure what surprised me more about the message: the fear in Jen's voice, or the fact that she said she loved me. I hadn't heard either from her in a long time.

A Beginning, or an ending

I didn't want to go to the corporate retreat, but it was part of my job. Being stuck in the wilderness at some new age lodge learning 'trust exercises' with the stuffed shirts I work with is not my idea of fun. I work in television, as a writer on a number of shows. I've done cops shows, worked on a highly popular "tween" show for a major studio, and even worked on lines for a "reality" show.

Every couple of months on of the bigwigs comes up with these team builders every couple of months. We've done paintball, bungee jumping, and all other 'extreme sports' that are suppose to bring a bunch of competitive people work together in a competitive business together as a team.

Normally I would have hated being away from my family for a week like this, but things at home had been a bit tense. My wife, Jennifer and I had been drifting apart for a while. We both have intense jobs, just in different ways. My job is very competitive, and her job as a nurse has a lot of stress, which has affect our marriage and our nine year old daughter Kaitlynn. We both love here, and try to keep her out of things, but when Mom and Dad are fighting the girl is bound to hear. It sounds stupid, but we were staying together for Kaitlynn. We hoped it would be enough.

The lodge had it's own runway, do the boss had us picked up and dropped off at our closest local airport. After a week of no contact, noteven television, I was ready to get back to civilization. I got into my car, popped in a CD, and prepared for the 45 minute drive home. I would have called ahead to let Jen know I was on the way home, but I had left my charger at home, and it was late, so I just took the back roads home. It was very quiet, and I honestly don't think I saw another car on the road. That should have told me something...