The year is 2012. Nearly seven years after the outbreak.The following is a news story, broadcast on CNN...

"...Which is currently seeing hotter weather than usual for midland USA at this time of year. David Richardson, reporting for CNN.

Thank you David, that is the news of current high temperature still afflicting the mid-west. In other news, seven years on; we'll be having a look into 'The Black Year'.

Uh, we have Professor Bennet, from the Institute of Biology, Toronto, Mr Bennet, thank you for speaking with us."

A few seconds of shared silence pass, and a small section of the screen reveals a middle aged man, giving a smile to the camera, as the few seconds of lag begin to set in.

"You're very welcome--"

"Uh, Professor" The news anchor went on, "Sevens years after the viral outbreak in 2005, are we making any progress?"

"If by progress you mean cleaning up, then yes. An immense amount of resources has been pushed into -- uh every country in the world to keep the clean up operation going, and from all sources, the population of the refugee camps is beginning to fall back into society, and into the bigger cities. Infact--"

"So are you saying that we, as a species, are finally getting back to normality?"

"Uh, yes. In that we are slowly regrowing in strength and population once more, as a species, but I'm sure that most families and comunities will never be 'normal' again, even after all this time."

"Professor, can you tell us any more about the Virus, was it man made?"

"...Well, currently, the cure works, and we're using different strains of the virus to create all possible cures should this happen again - however, we can safely say that --"

"Is it true that some...organizations are testing the virus for biological warfare?"

"--I--I should hope not!" Came the audibly angered reply, "That would be complete insanity. Even though there are cures, the horror of this virus are out of our control! We have all seen what happens when this bacteria gets into mainstream society."

"Professor, thank you for joining us, unfortunately we're out of time..." The camera slowly pans so that the anchor is center screen. "Now over to Andrew Marr with the sport..."


The virus took out nearly 70% of the Earth's population of humans, but somehow, humanity pulls through, and continues just as it did before the outbreak. Now, society seems to be getting back to normal, communities are still cleaning up, but the remaining humans begin to repopulate...

This RPG has been going for some years until it lost activity for a while. Now, on re-opening the story has changed. For those coming onto the site for the first time, here is a quick summary of the old RPG.

Back in 2005, Helmont Boarding School, and it's pupils were locked in quarantine, for a long time. They were treated like prisoners, and one was even shot as he tried to escape by the quarantine guards. This was no ordinary quarantine, however, as the pupils soon found out. It wasn't as they first thought, and infact the pupils were perfectly healthy, and the outside world was what was being quarantined...

As the world began to clean up, the town of Helmont was cleared of the virus, and it's hosts, and soon the school was lowered of it's quarantine.

We intend to release the virus again, obviously. It will not be released all in one, and for a month (at least) this RPG will be in a free-form 'life' sort of story. Every few weeks, we will release a new 'chapter' with subtle plot points, sightings, reports etc. Eventually, the story will open into an apocalyptic one.

The virus is a strain of Helios-12 bacteria, which was originally formed by the Americans to use as a 'detox' agent, designed to clean the blood of many things, such as toxicity, poisons and some illnesses. It was mainly a supplement that intended to add to first aid packs.

The testing of H12 included injecting it into animals, and during one test phase, it was added to the blood of a cockroach. It mutated and the cockroaches were showing extreme aggression, unusual eating habits (such as starvation for no reason, and self-canibalism). The cockroaches were all killed and burned, however the virus was resilient, and survived the furnace. From there, the ash from many incinerations was casually thrown away.

The H12 began to spread through animals within the test area as well as animals outside of the area. It is believed that vermin found the ash. Mearly swallowing a few specs of the ash infected a few hundred animals (and reported to have infected the first humans). Needless to say, that the US government claimed it as 'animal flu', completely dismissing any acusations that the bacteria was to do with them.

Soon it spread into the population.

Stage One; Symptoms of infection appear quickly: within one or two hours, the victim will develop a headache, fever, chills and other flu-like symptoms.

Stage Two; The victim are struck with a coma. With a slow pulse, and shallow breathing, the coma lasts only between four and six hours. Only the very young and very old do not survive these comas. Zombies have been found as young as five years old and as old as 90. The vaccine is 50 percent effective when administered during Stage Two of the infection: the longer the victim has been in the coma, the less effective the vaccine.

Stage Three; The victim has lost all sense of feeling, and emotions. Scientists believe this is because the virus may have destroyed parts of the synapses of the brain in order to breed more freely.

Stage Four; Contrary to belief, the infected are not 'walking dead', but are painless predators. They can resemble 'zombies' on times, this is because the lack of feeling means that they can keep pushing towards fresh blood without worrying about loosing an arm or two. Infact, most 'rotting' infected are mearly injured, and lack the ability to heal.

Stage Five; Necrosis begins to set in, and any open cuts or wound fail to heal and begin to kill off limbs. For example, an Infected with a finger missing will soon have it's arm rendered useless within a month, and probably lose the limb in two.


There is a cure, and a vacination to stop transmission, though many people have been killed by the still roaming Infected, though sustaining wounds from bites or being beaten to death.