> The next morning Danny woke up to find himself in an empty house and a pounding headache. Had it all been a dream? Obviously this was impossible or he would have woken up in his own crappy twin bed, not the King size bed with satin sheets and some fresh stains he found himself in.
>
> He had put on last night's clothes and stumbled into the kitchen to find a note next to a bottle of water and a couple of Excedrin laying on a napkin. He took them immediately, desperate for relief from the pounding in his head. He hadn't felt this way after drinking in a long time, but then again, maybe his tolerance had went down.
>
> The bottle of water was still cold so he assumed they hadn't been gone long. There were also two notes.
>
> The first was from Tyrone and was written in surprisingly good penmanship for a dude:
>
> Hey man, had fun last night. I hope you did too. ScarLo tells me you did at least ;-) Hahaha. We left you some water and Exedrin. If you feel like I feel this morning you'll need it. I'll call you in a couple days so we can continue our conversation about you know what - Tyrone
>
> The next note was in even better penmanship in purple ink and read simply:
>
> Hey babe, had fun last night! You were great! We'll have to do it again sometime... XOXOXOXO
>
> Love, ScarLo
>
> P.S. Check the microwave :) [https://rpgcodex.net/forums/smiles/icon_smile.gif]
>
> At the bottom was a lip shaped splatter of lipstick where she'd kissed the paper. It smelled wonderful and Danny felt a stir in his jeans. He put the note in his pocket and left the one from Tyrone on the table. He checked the microwave. There was a plate of bacon and toast. He brewed himself some coffee using the Keurig and quickly ate the food and drank the coffee.
>
> Then he headed out the door.
>
> The food had helped a lot as had the coffee and it seemed the Excedrin might be kicking in as well. He made his way back home cautiously, but feeling more confident than when he came. What happened last night had begun to sink in and he liked it. It had put a swing in his step.
>
> When he walked back into his apartment he was surprised to find the TV off and Luis to be nowhere in sight. But his keys were sitting on the coffee table where he kept them so he had to have been home and his car had been out front.
>
> "Luis? Dude?" he called.
>
> "In here man..." Luis said, his voice coming from his bedroom. The only time Luis was in his bedroom was when he managed to get to bed before passing out from smoking too much weed.
>
> Danny went to the door and begin to open it but Luis shouted "don't come in, man."
>
> "Why? What's wrong?" Danny said, taking a cautionary step back.
>
> "I mean, it's probably nothing, but I'm self-quarantining..."
>
> Danny's eyes got wide.
>
> "Why? You got a fever or something?"
>
> "Nah, I feel fine, but you won't believe what this bitch did to me yesterday. So I'm out doing deliveries and I get a call to deliver some Panda Express to this address and you know it's all no contact now. They just tell us where to drop it off and we leave. So I get there and it's just an regular house and all but I go to leave it on the back porch like the instructions said and this woman just comes out walking right towards me. I'm all like "whoa, whoa, ma'am!' but she's within six feet quick and she gets right up in my face and she starts coughing all over me. Then I noticed she looked like a zombie dude... just sunken in eyes and pale. I just dropped the food and ran and got into my car and left. But since that diseased looking crack ho coughed on me I decided to keep my ass in here. Don't worry: I didn't touch nothing. I used a napkin to open the front door. I'm sure it's nothing, but I just want to be safe, you know? Fuckin' bitch..."
>
> Danny took in all in and then finally spoke.
>
> "Well, you're doing the right thing. Did you report her?"
>
> "Bro, you know I ain't no narc. Karma will catch her ass. I know it."
>
> Danny sighed.
>
> "Well, if you need anything, let me know and I'll leave it at the door"
>
> Luis immediately requested a can of Mountain Dew and, of course, his beloved Cheetos so Danny fetched them from the kitchen and sat them by the door. A hand reached out and, like some sort of monster, snatched both and was gone.
>
> "Thanks bro"
>
> Danny took a shower and changed into some clean clothes. He was feeling better now. He realized this was the longest he'd went within checking the latest from Dante so he immediately opened TOR.
>
> Sure enough, there were new posts from Dante. Sure enough, one detailed what Tyrone was talking about: Maine was going to announce they were an independent and free territory.
>
> The other piece of news concerned more attacks on those with immunity and a disturbing new trend. According to Dante, an increasing number of people with immunity were being targeted. There was also a growth in a movement that believed the only way out of the virus was that everyone needed to get it in order to achieve herd immunity. What was disturbing was their method of achieving this goal: people sick with the virus were trying to intentionally give it to those who were not infected by doing things like coughing on people.
>
> Danny felt a shiver go up his spine. He thought about Luis.
>
> Should I tell him?
>
> He decided not to. What good what it do but make him worry more?
>
> Dante had shared a rant by some lady in a blue dress in her kitchen. She was heavy set and spoke with a slight Southern drawl.
>
> In the video, which had went viral on social media, she was advocating this practice, but there was more.
>
> "The only way we ensure we don't become a divided nation of two different classes is by making sure everyone gets immunity" she said, intensely looking at he camera. "I am infected and I will help as many people with that as I can. We can't have just a bunch of Immunity Nazis who are a privileged class! That's not what America is about! That's the only way to stop the Illuminati's evil plan to divide us and introduce big brother tracking into our lives! They think they can use this lab engineered virus to get one world government but we will stop them by bathing in their creation!"
>
> Stolen story; please report.
>
>
> She continued on from there. Danny shook his head.
>
> Dante explained this was even part of some new Internet "challenge" called the "Immunity Challenge". People were literally posting videos of themselves claiming they had the virus and spitting on food at the grocery store or running up to people coughing. More than a few videos showed them getting their asses beat.
>
> These sorts of Challenge videos had been a thing since the virus started. One was about licking toilet seats for fuck sake. But they had slowed when the government had banned Tik Tok, a Chinese based app, because they said it was a surveillance tool of the Chinese government. Danny felt this was probably true, but noted the timing: it was just one part of the diplomatic fall out from the virus, which many people, including the government, blamed China for allowing to consume the world.
>
> Danny was about to log off when he noticed two new posts from Dante since he had started reading. The first could have been a travel brochure for Maine.
>
> The post title was "People living it up in the soon to be Free Republic of Maine" and it showed smiling happy people in bars, restaurants, going out to the movies... just living without a care in the world.
>
> In the post Dante claimed it had been three weeks since any new cases of the virus were reported. Danny didn't know how this was possible, but the mainstream media had been reporting just how well Maine had done keeping the virus out.
>
> Suddenly he felt his eyes burn and blink and as he did he swore for a split second the word "MAINE" had flashed on his screen.
>
> What the hell? Danny thought. It was like that day with the billboards and TV's in Wal-Mart when he had met Tyrone and ScarLo the first time.
>
> He closed his eyes and reopened them and convinced himself he was seeing things.
>
> Still hungover he told himself.
>
> The next post from Dante was far more disturbing. It was an update about the viral mutations. An unnamed Chinese scientist had posted a now deleted post on Facebook claimed that in new cases of the virus strange things happened around the infected. The post was written in Mandarin but Dante had provided a translation. It talked about how, in the early stages of infection, things like cabinets would open, lights would flicker or medical equipment would malfunction, but then as the patient inevitably became worse and nearer death more extreme things happened such as objects are even people being violently thrown across the room.
>
> "The virus is less like a virus and more like a demonic force" the scientist had said.
>
> This sounded like pure BS to Danny, but then he remembered the strange video from China of the patient running out of the room and being seemingly flung back inside.
>
> "The larger the amount of infected in an area, the more powerful these occurrences become" the scientist concluded.
>
> Dante concluded the post by saying the family of the scientist had reported him missing two days prior and one day after making the post.
>
> BLING
>
> The sound startled Danny. He had a new private message. He opened it and was excited to see it was from Dante.
>
> Hey man, just checking in on you. How goes it?
>
> Danny had so much to tell him so he did. He'd become like an open book with Dante. It was weird, but it felt good to have someone to be that honest with. He told him what happened with Tyrone and ScarLo and also that Tyrone kept pushing him to go with them to Maine.
>
> Once again, Dante encouraged it.
>
> "I'll be going there soon myself" he said, surprising Danny. "The feds are trying to find me. They don't like what I'm doing. But don't worry, they won't catch me anytime soon..."
>
> Danny suddenly felt nervous for even talking to Dante. Maybe this was a mistake...
>
> But he kept talking to him and soon they were just shooting the shit as they often did.
>
> "What's the one thing you wish you could do that you can't anymore?" Dante asked him near the end of their conversation.
>
> "Go the the movies" Danny answered quickly. "I really loved that. I went to the Alamo Drafthouse three or four times a week. Not kidding. I was a season pass holder."
>
> "Well, they got one in Portland" Dante responded. "It's a new location actually and it's now the only one open in the country"
>
> Danny liked the sound of that.
>
> Soon their conversation was over and Danny just took it easy for the rest of the day. He actually found himself missing Luis, now couped up in his bedroom. He occasionally sat food and drinks outside his door for him and knocked. The hand came out and grabbed them.
>
> "Thanks bro".
>
> Two days passed. Then three. Danny's shopping day came up and he braved the grocery store to get supplies. Luis seemed fine, but insisted on cautious. Danny was beginning to worry how they'd keep paying the bills though if Luis wasn't doing deliveries. Truth be told, there was no money coming in right now and he was racking up credit card debt just to buy food.
>
> Danny was feeling stir crazy and thought he might snap when his phone rang.
>
> RESTRICTED
>
> Excited, Danny immediately answered.
>
> "Yo Danny, you want to get together with me and you know who?"
>