The Daily Chronicle
April 12th 2063
Judith Kemp
ITCHY SKIN IS IN
Fungal infections are on the rise across the north of England as alarming reports from local health services are scaring schools, parents and now the public. Over 43% of educational facilities from primary to university level have now gone into lockdown in Yorkshire alone, as authorities investigate the source of infections. The symptoms are developing in children at a rapid rate, some resulting in hospitalisation due to the infections spreading viciously. Adults are also being infected, however, with less severity. Those who are infected are urged to remain at home while treatment is being established.
ABC News
May 23rd 2063
Sivichi Munrosh
UK LOCKDOWNS IN EFFECT
Emergency broadcasts, news reports, and local councils sending letters to constituents detailing the exact lockdown conditions that will continue over the next few days. I will also provide a reminder within this article alongside comments from the minister of health…
Note from archivist
Overwhelming quantity of resources – Global broadcasts, publications and outreach programs from the UN and worldwide health associations flooded every outlet possible as summer bloomed into view.
On top of the constant spew from local channels – Clippings from major newspapers in the UK, USA and Europe archived in files A63-J63, along with summaries of medical reports from every continent submitted to UN assessment in file M63.
Archives managed independently from June 2063 as the government has shut down funding for all non-essential services.
FILE J63
Photos of patients with fungal infections, rashes, and scratch marks across the arms and stomachs.
- Children with verrucous lesions rippled from the reddened, swollen skin, moles extending halfway down an infant’s spine from their neck.
- A wrinkled man with jaundiced skin, turning an eye green at the edges where the eyelid has peeled away with dark brown scabbing. Carved knots of infected flesh, causing tumorous lumps to burrow out of the skin.
- A young girl with red and purple spots along her tailbone, as if she’d been branded or burned like cattle.
Newcastle News
June 2nd 2063
Alexander Reedfields
Growths: what are they?
After the King’s speech yesterday, and the medical reports from the UN,
The world is now calling it:
GROWTHS
A mutation of human skin cells, which started as simple fungal infections, have become the newest phenomenon in human genome studies, vaccination production and human history.
While we all navigate the countries’ shutdown of non-essential services,
we have had the pleasure of speaking with Dr K. Amenti, spearheading the medical research project here in Newcastle, at the medical university.
Our comprehensive guide to Growths…
FILE JY63
Photos of protesters in the streets with signs, police with riot shields, and broken shop windows.
Criminal statistics of major English cities for summer 2063.
Photos of the four lions in Trafalgar Square were vandalised with red paint across the necks of each,
one with its head sawn off. Police tape is in place around the square.
THE MAIL
August 17th 2063
Rosanlina Sans
Global response to Growths
USA and UK governments have introduced new bills into law protecting those with growths, as we are all now being told to call them. Lockdowns have slowly been lifted, and many schools have reopened. Global education into growth acceptance and acceptable language is being adopted and promoted to provide an inclusive environment for all. Many medical establishments remain on restricted schedules, while they continue to research vaccinations and now long-term treatment for managing symptoms in patients already affected.
CARDIFF TELEGRAPH
September 1st 2063
Tyler Rodhein
Welsh borders remain shut
Wales keeps borders closed, against the UK parliament’s decision to weaken restrictions.
The Welsh national health service are developing vaccines and quarantining those with growths.
“We are already conducting human trials, however, we fear it may be too late,
as infection rates continue to rise. We are hoping to have the vaccine approved within weeks, if people are willing to take it.“
says spokesperson Eva Vanders from Cardiff Medical Society.
THE WASHINGTON REVIEW
October 31st 2063
Richard Polanski
Trick or Treat?
Monsters really do walk the streets this Halloween.
Creatures rule over us all, as the US president has revealed…he is one of those with growths. This morning on live television, he stood in front of the White House and addressed each of us in our own homes. Horns and all.
File O63
Several News articles detailing the London zoo animal escape/release, and the carnage that followed
photos of the front gates with graffiti writing “free us all” across the walls.
Photo of victims
bodies torn limb from limb, intestines, blood spilt out onto the street.
Note from archivist
I can still hear howls, screeches, and screams from the attic archives. No one else has been here for weeks, the hippos were shot down, confirmed by the ABC report on the radio – uploaded to USB – and gunshots that echoed. I’ve kept the doors and windows locked, but moss and thick bramble are creeping in, there are roots tangling up the bookshelves, and it looks like leaves grow from my skin.
USB stick labeled
Nov 2063 ABC Radio News reports
Audio file transcription
“ABC News at six”
MUTILATIONS ACROSS LONDON
A man with antlers protruding from his skull has been gutted and strung by the neck from the archway of the natural history museum, despite the establishment having been shut for months now.
The entire area is shut down with police barricades on every street. The metropolitan police have refused to comment on this incident or similar crimes rumoured in the city, and continue to blindside the public on updates surrounding the London zoo animal release. As more victims of brutal animal attacks are being found as I speak.”
FILE DEC63
Document tag:
A4 poster collected from Hampstead Heath
Poster description, white paper with black text reading-
“THOSE THAT GROW,
THOSE THAT DON’T,
THE END IS NEAR,
NOW WE WAIT”
Photo underneath the text-
A crowd of people under a single oak tree,
One person at the edge has elongated, feathered wings.
Note from the archivist
I took a walk back to Hampstead heath after collecting this poster. It is Christmas Day and I haven’t left the library since the animals were shot down in the streets, and I don’t think I will again. I felt compelled to see if I could find the tree; I actually haven’t stopped thinking about it for days. Despite my better judgement, I wondered if maybe these people knew something that I didn’t. About all of this, naive hope I suppose, to think there’d be some sense of belonging in biological chaos.
Behind the bike path I found a solitary oak, I’d walked past it before and recalled its mighty presence across the field. The hope I had moments prior, was corrupted by mutated limbs. Branches now arms, grabbed at each other, mangled fingers making wrists bleed.
A writhing mess of wrestling had replaced foliage.
The oak’s trunk was still crusted bark, with a deep hollow within. Which as it grew towards the sky, turned fleshy and pink. Some arms were more melanated, beige and browns with bulging veins instead of twigs. As I watched from the edge of the footworn dirt track that led me here, the arms still crazed.
I swear I saw eyes blink from the shadowy hole in that tree.
FILE JAN64
Note from the archivist
1st January 2064
Things fell pretty fast after mothers grew roots into the ground – planting toddlers beneath concrete. The radio is static, not silent. I sometimes think I can hear someone speak. The archive will be left as is to be reclaimed, like we are being. Maybe it’s what she wanted, maybe she’s the one whispering. As birds land on the rooftops, they make prehistoric sounds. The claw clattered tiles crumble, like hailstones. Smashing down on cars abandoned in roads, engulfed by alien flora sprouting from rusted paint. When you hear hoofsbeats, think zebras, horses, buffalo and zebu cows. I’ve spotted them all, while sap seeps from my ears.
I never thought I’d hear footsteps and feel relieved. I peered through the cracks in boarded-up glass. Where sunlight split the seams.
I saw a man walking towards the bridge that the library is near. My fingers are tearing cardboard down, knuckles creaking in the wind as I cry out to him.
He stopped still, turned around, and his eyes were sunken in. Petals emerged from the caverns in his skull, blooming on a winter’s day. His jaw clenched shut, opened now, another flower from within.
Then he continued to walk away.
I watched the horizon swallow him, the last person I’d ever see.
Turkey tails, honey fungus, royal flowering ferns. I wondered how I knew their names, capturing my eyes, as dust particles sparkled in the sun rays. I had an intimate understanding of everything that had gradually consumed the reading rooms. And it felt like they knew me.
A mutual knowing.
A new beginning, the growing.
– S. J.
Shannon hails from stormy seas of the North East, and has since retreated to gentle fields here in Yorkshire. She is the local folklore of her village, with a garden attached to the graveyard, she buries dead animals found on the country roads. Her neighbors live in very polite fear of the goblin-like creature living on their street…writing her little stories about horrific things.
“The Growing” was shortlisted for the debut competition from the Where Ideas Grow Blog. The competition theme was ‘Growth.’