How to Raise a Baby in an Apocalypse - Chapter 6 - As If She Had Entered A Mortuary
An Ran managed to wash off the yellow phlegm with some difficulty while tolerating the blackness of the water. When she was done, she gritted her teeth in anger and strode out of her room, heading to the doctor’s office to apply for her transfer.
On the way to her next destination, An Ran made an observation on the demeanors of the nurses walking around and about — they walked in a weird way, as if they were somehow floating. What was more alarming was that the nurses had a temperament similar to that of a walking corpse. The pink uniforms seemed as if they were donning on the body of rotting flesh. The exposed foreheads of these masked nurses were throbbing with prominent veins as well. Furthermore, their eyes seemed disoriented, which added more fear to An Ran’s heart.
An Ran held her stomach as she moved slowly along the walls while clenching on the handrails. The doctor’s office gradually came to her view as she inched closer. It was night time at the moment, so there were only a few doctors scheduled on duty. Despite the distinct number of doctors on duty, all of them were just sitting at their desks absentmindedly and not doing any work, like checking on medical records of their patients. They just sat there like logs, as if not knowing what they should be doing next.
Why did the entire maternity ward feel as if she had entered the mortuary all of the sudden? The atmosphere felt immensely weird for no apparent reason.
An Ran’s heart instantaneously beat wildly. She pressed her face on the cold surface of the wall and continued making her way to the entrance of the doctor’s office. With her feet costumed in confinement shoes, she walked softly and hushed, nearing complete silence.
And then it was all clear to An Ran. Shocking as it was to her discovery, the foreheads of the doctors were similar to that of the nurses’, where the veins were prominent. These doctors were not required to wear a mask while inside the office, which was why An Ran was able to notice the saliva dripping from the corners of their mouth, as if they were infected with some kind of uncontrollable illness.
Although she perceived it as saliva, it was not actually saliva. Saliva was commonly known to be clear, yet what trickled from the doctors’ mouths was some sort of yellow viscous fluid, like the yellow phlegm that caught onto An Ran’s hand when she touched the drip bag.
The instinct of a higher intelligent being to seek safety and avoid danger prompted An Ran to quickly turn back. Disregarding the incision on her side and the discomfort of her inner organs being suspended, she supported herself with one hand on the wall while holding her discharge-filled stomach with her other hand. She moved as fast as she possibly could without affecting her incision wound towards the elevator with the intention to head up to the neonatal unit on the fifth floor.
She wanted to let the medical personnel in the neonatal unit know that the maternity ward needed help, and after that she would try to figure out how she could sneak her daughter out of the neonatal unit. There was no way she would stay in this hospital, not even for a moment.
With the sudden clap of thunder through the night sky, heavy rain was abruptly poured down. The elevator was taking too long, and An Ran could not wait any second longer. With all her strength in her body, she entered the emergency staircase and began to climb up. It took her at least 20 minutes to climb up just one floor, completely drenched in sweat as if she had been soaked in the rain, looking as miserable as she could.
In the end, she managed to reach the entrance to the fifth floor. As she looked through the transparent glass on the door, she could see a crowd of people moving within the neonatal unit. Besides that, everyone had blue veins pulsing on their foreheads, and yellow phlegm flowing uncontrollably from their mouths.
These people without exception, including the doctors and nurses, as well as the family members waiting in the fluorescent room outside of the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit and the normal neonatal unit, were all either being blighted or had contracted some sort of infectious disease.
What was happening?