by catt dahman
Whatever tried to land in Tungusta, Russia in 1908 blew up, so Earth wasn’t infected with the strange substance, but one tiny sample was discovered in the late 1940s and taken away by American and German scientists. The substance was a mixture of prions that ate holes in the brain, bacteria that spread the infection, and magnetite crystals. The fourth part of that substance was unidentified and that was what caused the control of dead people, rage, and cannibalism.
Dr. Parce’s theory was that some intelligent life was very close to Earth in proximity, but the beings aboard (he never said if they were alien or human), infected and desperate to be sure it didn’t spread, blew themselves apart. That one sample, which survived the blast and just happened to be found, was beyond remarkable.
Most thought he was a little odd for believing in little green men, not that he thought they were small or green, but it was plausible as zombies. Call them any nickname, but they were zombies, and no one laughed about that.
Michael Parce paused to stare again at the Professor sitting in the corner. Had the man and his town members been wise and self-sacrificing, they would have died in the town rather than allowing the infection to get out. He turned back to the screens.
Ken’s arm was eaten all the way to the bone, and his face was peeled to the skull. His stomach was only partly opened, but a little slip of intestines leaked out onto the floor tripping him. He was not inoculated, but he was infected, and they didn’t bite him anymore because he was one of them.
Subjects One and Five had tried kicking at the door, then fighting back, and finally hiding in the shadows under a table. They were out of options.
“Both are younger than the others. Consider that a possible variable.”
Ericka looked at Dr. Parce, “Youth has better impulse control? I doubt it. Maybe it’s fear of authority. They were given orders not to act on the violence they felt. Five is three-years military and trained. One is unexplainable right now. I will look back at the charts.”
“Look, people are just giant hormones and emotions, and they act stupidly,” Parce shrugged.
Ericka stared at him and shook her head.
The violence continued for another few minutes, but the ones who were inoculated and in a blood lust, attacked, bit, clawed, and ate until everyone else was infected. The twenty who were now infected brought the original ten down, and because they were unable to be infected, they ate them to the bone, stuffing themselves.
Parce pointed to the screen, clicking a pen against it excitedly, “The inoculated people bit and ate, but they were humans in a violent mode. The ones who were infected at second stage and who turned….”
“Died,” Ines muttered.
“Okay, died if you will, they didn’t just want the meat and to lose control. They became fully automated to bite, spread the infection, and consume flesh until the victim was also turned…ummm...er…dead,” the doctor said.
“Those of them who are inoculated are just humans, and while we do crave raw meat and have a higher pain tolerance, we are human and nothing more. They alone are the monsters,” said Ines’ as her pretty face lit up. Her natural paleness took on a little blush, and for once, she was smiling.
Dr. Michael Parce took a second to put his hands along her cheeks and smile into her face, watching her eyes, “I told you, my lovely assistant. Humans are food. We are Survivors. They are monsters. And those who were like us and ate meat? Monsters. We do not eat the meat of man.”
Ines bit her lip, “No meat of man. Never.”
One of the members of the science lab who was not involved in this mission directly, nevertheless, did his important duty. He knocked and when admitted, brought in a heavy tray with strips of red, raw meat on plates and small demitasse glasses of thick blood. At first this was embarrassing, as if they were kids, trying to play vampire games, but Dr. Parce explained that while the inoculation would save their lives, it also created a specific bodily condition.
They would have to eat the raw meat or spinach, liver, and anything to boost the iron intake. Ines ate iron tablets like candy. Dr. Parce said it was like a diabetic taking insulin or someone with high blood pressure taking meds.
Iron is the only naturally occurring magnetic element on earth. The inoculation that protected them (and caused them to become infectious) caused them to need huge amounts of iron. The magnetite crystals didn’t form in their brains as it did in the non-inoculated, dead people who returned as puppets and heads full of the magnetic crystals.
Dutifully, they ate.
“Even in a closed room, they make that noise. Why?” Reid asked. He had a raw, salted, and peppered strip of meat that he was dipping into a steak sauce.
Parce shrugged, “The moaning. I think it calls the rest to warm, live food, but it’s far more than that….”
Ericka jumped in, “It’s their socialization, isn’t it? They’re running on the basics need to eat and have thrown off everything else: maternal instincts, love, fear, hygiene, social needs, but with the sounds, they are social.”
Reid shook his head, “Why would they do that? Be social, I mean? They don’t require it.”
“Deep level? Did humans develop it over evolution and keep it and it’s part of us?” Parce asked. His mind was whirling, trying to figure it out, “I think it’s because of the magnetism and that it causes the flocking behavior. They are attracted,” he said as he chuckled at his own joke.
“They didn’t go for the inoculated people until the last. So that means something as well. And the time was Zero plus fifteen minutes and twelve seconds until full infection was achieved,” one scientist called.
“We know the whole human side is gone. Therefore, accepting that as truth can’t be so simple. Or maybe it isn’t so complicated. They make the noise as a social hive but,” Ericka sighed, “this is weird, but what is the sound of one-hand clapping?”
“Huh?”
She smiled at Reid, “Sorry. Thinking out aloud. What if the moaning is not just a call for dinner but also a numbering system? If there are hundreds, we get a loud noise. If there are a few of them, the noise is a little. We know they use sound, so if they hear a lot of noise, maybe they know that is a place where they are numerous, and if they don’t hear themselves, maybe that is a new hunting area.”
“That’s possible. Good work, Ericka.” Parce nodded. He made more notes. “Okay. Major, let the boys know it’s time to burn the room. We’re done here.” He stopped beside the tray and ate a portion of the meat. “Catsup man, myself,” he said as he laughed.
He left the room with Ines close behind him, asking him a question.
“Christmas.”
“Huh? You thinking out loud again?” Nic asked.
Ericka nodded her head, “I guess. For Christmas, you buy gifts and wrap them and wait, and then everything is ripped open, the paper is tossed, and it’s over in minutes, but you’ve prepared for months. That’s how this was.”
“You’re deep. Me, I was thinking this way: about how we had the shots, right? And so did they. Different strengths, but I get it even if I’m just a soldier. But in the end, that inoculation didn’t help worth a shit did it?” Reid asked.
“They didn’t catch the infection, Major.”
He chuckled without humor, “Nope. They got eaten. Alive.”
Nick watched idly as the screens lit up in orange and white light; the bunker was burning. “Why do you think they did this? Why did they bring a sample onto that plane? Why did they keep playing with it? Why would a person want this?”
“Power,” Ericka said, “because they had the ultimate power to destroy the world. It would buy them whatever they wanted.”
“It bought them being kept in that cave seventy years,” Dr. Rick Parker said from his shadows, “They tried to destroy it. The brave ones did. Then they were left there, so they did what scientists do. This is on you and your people. Military. Why didn’t you burn everything? Why didn’t you finish the job?”
Ericka sighed, �
�Dr. Parker, that wasn’t my choice, and the reasons for not burning it up have not been shared with me. But they could have blown themselves up and burned the sample. You could have done the same. But here we are; none of us did the right thing, did we?” She knew she made her point as Rick Parker’s face fell and a frown lowered his brows.
“Too bad we’re going to die because we sure have plenty of blame to share. We killed the world. Wow.”
Ericka snorted unladylike and narrowed her eyes, “You idiot. Have you missed the fact that we are sacrificing everything to find a way to save the world? It’s not over yet.”
Parker stared at the screen that showed the burning room where fabric, liquids, and flesh burned away to leave toasted bones behind. He grimaced, “Great. Tell them that. They’ll be glad. Especially the guy who was military, one of yours, that you tossed in to be eaten alive.”
“It’s burning,” Nick said for no reason at all.
Ericka sighed, “I know. It’s burning away.”
Chapter 2
Test Two…Welcome To A Slice of Paradise…All The Girls…
Rudy Is Rude…All Dressed Up And Everywhere To Go…
“I’m sorry we’ll have to burn the place afterward. I would love to live somewhere like this or at least spend vacations here,” said Dr. Inez Lindsay as she ran her fingertips along the gleaming wood of the banister and looked down at the others from the third step of the staircase. Her dreams of retirement and private medical practice were fading away as dreams do, leaving only snippets of memories and ghostly images.
She could see outside through the windows to the round, bricked drive in the front. Soldiers opened the doors and brought in more supplies, going towards the kitchen or to the upstairs hotel rooms with stacks of linens. Everywhere, people were busy, and the lodge (gigantic hotel, they called the rough wooden building a lodge because it had log siding and was shaped like an enormous log cabin) shined with new furniture, clean glass, and richly oiled walls and floors.
What a waste to burn it. She tried to imagine how the owners felt, excited about the opening of their dream resort, knowing that this would be not only the first week of operations, but the last. The owners spared no expense building their dream, but like Inez’s dream, it would be gone in wisps of fog, leaving reality, loss, and emptiness.
“No choice but to burn it, you now that, Inez. We can’t leave something this dangerous standing afterward,” Major Max Reid said as he lit a cigar. He felt a little strange calling the beautiful lodge dangerous when it looked only luxurious and welcoming.
Ines waved away the foul smoke, “You’re assuming something in here will be dangerous. Now remember the rules, Max, no interference. Even if we have a break in protocol and the infection goes hot, we may be able to contain it. Have some faith that we are useful.”
“Did I say I would interfere? Hell, girl, why would I? Check the bet sheet again. I am on there with ‘twenty-four hours’ and again at ‘a hundred percent’ at ‘end call in seventy-two hours’.”
Ericka Dickson snorted and grumbled as she carried neat bourbon; she walked over from the check-in desk, “You have three bets that pessimistic? You’ll feel funny when all the subjects walk away, none the wiser and there is nothing here to clean up. Doctor P did lower the concentration, way low, like ours. Maybe they’ll behave.”
Max Reid shook his head, “You may be the head doctor, but I know people. It only takes one, and we’ll have my prediction.”
“One? What the hell? That’s ridiculous. We can have half misbehave and not have failure. This is about the fight, not the bad behavior. Humans are more survivalistic than that. With children involved, you can assume that the need to survive will be huge. No one is going down without a fight.”
“I didn’t say they won’t fight, Ericka. I am saying they won’t make it.” Reid said. “You think untrained civvies can fight that well?”
“Yes, I am.”
“I’m a little offended you are making bets on this,” Nic Hoyt spoke up. He came in from outside where he had been checking last minute details. “I realize this is critical, and two hundred fifty lives are nothing when it is about the world’s survival, but have some respect. We’re talking about everyone dying.”
“Maybe,” Ines reminded him, “I hope everyone makes it. I really do. I don’t want it to be real. If you are right, Major, then these lives won’t matter because we’re going to be in the same spot.”
Major Reid nodded. His bravado and making light of everything was a cover-up for his worries, “If I win the bet, I can say, ‘hey, I won’ right before I kiss my ass goodbye, you know? Don’t think I don’t know what all this means.” He spun in place and walked to the doors, “That’s it. Let’s go. I want everyone ready to be counted and at the cars in five.”
Outside, he flipped his phone out and made his call, “Doctor, we are down below and ready to get into place. Bridge reports they are ready to go. Everyone here is in place, and we are about to send the ancillary people out. Yes, sir.” He listened and said, “Agreed, Sir. On your word. Yes, Sir. Copy, Sir. Repeating copy: Project Zed is now online. Affirmative. We are hot.”
“Ready?” Ericka asked. She hated the name of the operation.
“We are hot,” Major Reid said, “I wish all of you good luck, and let’s go. Operation Zed is hot.”
Men who had carried boxes into the lodge climbed into the trucks that had brought the supplies. Others, who had been working on the lodge and grounds so that it was as perfectly set-up as any movie set, got into other trucks. Experts, who installed cameras everywhere, made final adjustments and got into the vehicles to leave. Scores of military dressed in hotel uniforms, joined the rest of the staff to get a quick briefing of their duties.
The origin staff was told that they would have new managers for a week and new co-workers; they didn’t care since they expected to be paid very well. Major Reid didn’t care because he figured none of them would be alive in a week.
Major Reid was left in the driveway with five others of his team, three researchers and two security members. He dimly wondered if they would survive the next seven days; if they didn’t, well, at least he wouldn’t see the entire world end with a (no, not a bang or a whimper) moan. If this experiment failed, as he had bet it would, quickly and brutally, then everything was over anyway.
He motioned them back inside, “We should be getting guests within thirty minutes. Be ready to rock and roll, people.”
Nic Hoyt adjusted his suit and went to stand behind the front desk; he was going to be the check-in manager in the experiment.
Dr. Ines Lindsay fluffed her hair and smoothed her silk dress. She was going to be the doctor but not full-time since she wanted time to observe as well. Dr. Ericka Dickson played a rich guest, and she wanted to thoroughly enjoy her role as she watched the other guests.
Dave Dallas sat in a chair before the fireplace in the lobby with an opened newspaper before him. He insisted upon playing manager as well.
In less than a half hour, the guests began arriving aboard the buses that brought them up and over the single bridge onto the mountain. Each guest, of course, got out of the bus, commented about the magnificent view, and appraised the gorgeous, enormous lodge, four stories high, and built with pine. They breathed in the fresh, clean air. Columns of entire pine trees towered above. Windows, with their shutters open, looked out everywhere.
It was the most luxurious, beautiful resort in Arkansas, and word was that a former president meant to come stay a week later in the year; it was almost a sure bet that he would never get to enjoy the view here since the world was about to go to hell, and he didn’t qualify for a bunker anymore.
On the wide porch, comfortable rocking chairs and little tables lined up to be used by the guests. An attendant stood at the doorway with trays of cold, tart lemonade in tall glasses with ice and thin slices of limes and lemons; also, cups of coffee were on an antique server. Against the wall sat two big silver washtubs filled with i
ce, bottles of soda and mineral water.
The lodge was a countrified castle full of fun possibilities.
As porters gathered bags and luggage, guest drew away from the view; some accepted drinks while others went inside to the desk. Nic Hoyt had everything organized, and with a little help from his assistant, he handed out room keys and a map of the lodge and grounds to each person.
It was opening weekend, and the hotel was booked to the rafters.
Cameras recorded how everyone looked right then: faces happy and unbloodied, without stress or fear. It was important to have the picture of how it was before. Dr. Parce recorded the pictures of all of the faces.
People checked into the lodge. The guests were civilians: families, groups, singles, wealthy, poor, all religions, and many different skin colors. With two hundred and fifty in place, there was a diversified, slice of humanity. Getting this slice of random people had been a major issue but one all had worked hard to make happen.
Setting: A beautiful, huge lodge with comfortable and upper-class amenities set atop a flat are on a mountain with a small lake for fishing, swimming, and canoeing. A small river cutting across the edge of the landscape fed the lake. Plenty of water was in the outdoor-and in-door swimming pools, and the small, rock-lined pools were heated by a hot, natural spring.
More mountains and forest surrounded the property, but there was no way up or down except by a small bridge spanning a deep gully. Guests parked in a lot way down below and were shuttled to the lodge.
The main building was huge, laid out in a square. The bottom of the building was gray stone, common to that area and beautiful, and the roof was green slate that blended into the scenery. It was designed so that it seemed to spring up as part of the landscape, despite the many windows.
In back were tennis courts, a fire pit, and benches for late-night ghost stories, sitting areas, and a playground. The area was designed for wealthy couples or singles or families to escape to for a week at a time.
