the masque of the neurotic flu

 On a misty night in the heartland of a principality known as Kildare, a peasant who thought he had seen it all, sitting desolate on a log in a forest glade, was suddenly surprised to see the figure of the Red Death approching him dressed only in the habilements of the grave.

The red death was humming to himself absently: "Beat boy, beat boy, get that perfect beat boy, beat, beat, beat, boy. I got that feeling, that beat boy feeling, that beat boy feeling comes over me."

As he drew nearer, the peasant, a world weary post modern type, beckoned him to sit down.

"What's a skeleton like you doing in a place like this?" the peasant enquired post modernishly.

"I'm stuck here," said the red death. "Your planes aren't flying. Your coppers are stopping people from going from one town to another. The cafes are closed. It's really frustrating. What on earth is going on?"

"You must be the only supernatural embodiment of death who doesn't know," said the peasant. "We live here under the tyranny of a cruel regent called Prince Prospero Chief Medical Officer Tony Holohan. He's used the deadly Covid 19 epidemic as an excuse to forbid us to do anything."

"Bloody hell," said the red death.

"It's the Corona Virus," said the peasant. "We're in lockdown until it passes."

"What's a Lockdown?" said the red death.

"He promises it will only be until the Covid 19 epidemic comes to an end," said the peasant.

"You mean the flu?" said the red death.

"Shush," said the peasant aghast.

"Why shush?" wondered the red death.

"Because you'll get cancelled if you call it that," explained the peasant. "You won't be able to go on  important internet sites like Tritter or Facebook or Youtube."

Suddenly the red death sneezed.

The peasant's eyes widened in terror.

"You're not wearing a surgical mask," he gasped, falling off the log.

"Calm down," said the red death.

"But  you could have the virus," shrieked the peasant.

"I can't really," said the red death. "I'm the supernatural embodiment of bubonic plague. Sometimes I do relief work for rabies when he's on holiday. I can't catch other dieseases."

"But you might be a carrier," screamed the peasant.

"Really, take it easy, that sort of panic can't be good for you," said the red death with concern.

"But we sat closer to each other than two metres," hysteered the peasant histrionically.

"Oh come on," said the red death.

"Look you got some stuff on my sleeve," screeched the peasant.

"It's only a bit of snot," said the red death mollifyingly.

This remark did not have the calming effect one might have expected.

"Get away from me," babbled the peasant, having run out of scream words, and scrambling to his feet.

He began to faff about in a frantic manner, backward and forward, waving his arms, but never leaving the precincts of the glade or the log or the red death.

"Please stop," pleaded the red death now genuinely worried. "That's really irritating. It's as irritating as a lockdown actually. And you'll do yourself an injury in a minute."

But the peasant kept whimpering and gasping and panting and occasionally managing a shriek and running up and down until finally his heart gave out and he slumped to the ground in a dead heap.

"Have it your own way," sighed the red death. "Now I won't get to deliver my classic line to wit: Go to the people and tell them that the hour of their deliverance is at hand."

Meanwhile as the sniffles ravaged the world,  Prince Prospero Chief Medical Officer Tony Holohan, a regent unsurpassed in evil, cruelty and depravity etc etc, decreed that the entire populace should be imprisoned in his castle (by castle he meant the whole territory of the Republic of Ireland) for the duration of an imaginary plague which he insisted was ravaging the land more than he was, and forced to attend a riotous debauch involving every known perversion and a few new ones besides, more precisely every person at the party being compelled to stand two metres from every other person at all times for an indefinite period of months, possibly years, and their every gross sexual excess to be performed while wearing surgical masks, and not touching each other.

It was unholy in its conception, mailicious in its design, and depraved in its execution.

Seeing the distress of his prisoners Prince Prospero Tony Holohan rejoiced with ever more twisted glee in their discomfiture.

"Who can harm me?" he crowed. "While the sniffles and Trump and democracy ravage the world, I am safe here in my castle. Ha, ha, ha."

And he laughed and laughed, a Vincent Price sort of laugh.

When the revel was its height he noticed a strange figure beyond the social distancing dancers who were miming an orgy to no music in his ballroom.

The figure was dressed in the habilements of the grave.

Prince Prospero Tony Holohan ran around the perimetre of the dance floor being careful to keep a full two metres betweeen himself and each of his woefully tortured guests.

At the far side of the ballroom he whirled.

The strange figure was now on the opposite side of the room to him.

There followed some more scuttling around the dance floor, whirling, and acting surprised every time the figure turned out to be on the opposite side again.

For some time Prince Prospero Tony Holohan continued to chase the cowled figure.

For some time it eluded him.

Presently Prince Prospero Tony Holohan fled to his bed chamber.

There the red death was waiting for him.

"The ****ing red death," exclaimed Prince Prospero Tony Holohan. "Who wudda thunk it!"

The words froze on his dead lips.

And outside his castle, nay across the whole world, the sniffles, the common cold, the flu, and advanced clinical neurosis, held illimitable dominion over all.

****

(With apologies to Edgar Allen Poe. No really, I'm sorry.)