The symptoms showed first in the young, then quickly spread to upper age groups. We have been as yet unable to fully question any victims, but there appears from hospital and doctor records of the past few weeks to have been no forewarning of any sort, although the malady struck every victim within a period of under three hours.” She paused to let the print journalists catch up and check their little shoulder recorders, then continued.

“So far there are fourteen confirmed fatalities—seven infants, two persons in vehicles which crashed, and the others elderly. Another forty-six are considered in critical condition. Federal, state, and local authorities are currently on the scene, and NDCC is at this moment running tests on samples from several victims, as well as two bodies of the dead. At the moment this is all we know. I’ll take questions.”

There was a sudden tumult, and she waited patiently for the mob scene to calm down.

“Please raise your hands,” she said professionally when she thought she could be heard over the din. “I’ll call on you.” That settled them, and she pointed to a well-known network science editor.

“Have there been any signs of this affliction spreading to other localities?” he asked in his famous cool manner. “We have some reports of it hitting in other areas.”

“So far we have had a number of cases outside the area,” she said. “Twenty-six, to be exact. All but three are known to have been in Cornwall within the last few days. Except for four people in a truck stop on I-80 and two truckers in West Virginia who passed through there three days ago, no other victims. And, no, we can find no sign of any spreading of the affliction by these people to others with whom they’ve come in contact, except perhaps at the truck stop.”