Them any more.
Hospitals began to empty. The terminally ill were sent home to die among their loved ones. Relatives of patients on life support went into the wards to say their tearful farewells and wonder when it best to turn off the machines. A lot of medical staff went home to their own families.
In church, a preacher told her congregation that god would produce a miracle or that He would allow the faithful few to take to an ark just before the seas rose up and engulfed the land.
Round the back of the church, between the ancient gravestones, a boy and a girl who had just met were touching each other eagerly but clumsily. Afraid that they might be disturbed or caught, they hesitated every time they heard a noise. Sound of gunshots, the pounding of footsteps, someone screaming and swearing, a siren blaring. In the run-up to XF17,this was what life had become.