“No,” she replied curtly. It was a lie, she had read all that information in the files the night before, but she knew her boss was going to give her his explanation whether she liked it or not.
“Excellent,” he rattled on. “Well then I will tell you about it. When an individual suffers some sort of major trauma, like damage to the brain or death, we have found that controlling the brain at a low temperature can improve the return to normal brain function. Viratech has been working with the government to try to develop a way to harness these hypothermic events. The goal is to protect the soldier in the field, salvage their brain from most injuries, and better still to return them to active duty in a more expedient manor. Sadly, we had very poor success initially. Most of our lab animals died from hypothermia associated complications right away.”
While his mantra did make sense to Judy, this was research in the medical field, not research done by microbiologists and virologists. Most of the doctors at Viratech were of the PhD variety, with a couple veterinarians, but no medical doctors that she knew of. That was what really confused her, since this area of research was out of her company’s normal comfort zone.
“Then we figured out that getting the protozoa Toxoplasma gondii in to the body led to an increased ability of tolerating these procedures. It also seemed to have additional effects, like decreased pain sensation. And other sensations were simply magnified. The problem is that most healthy immune systems would identify the Toxoplasma eventually and clear it from the body, and if the immune system did not identify the invader there was the risk of actual damage to the body, especially in women that might be carrying a fetus.”
They had arrived at a new corridor, this one visibly more medically organized. There were metal trays, surgery instruments, and cases of medical vials with syringes on the counters to her left. To her right were more cages, these filled with a handful of patients hooked up to IV lines, monitoring equipment, and restraints. Unlike the cages in the previous corridor, these had floor to ceiling glass doors, with ventilation holes less than two centimeters each speckled throughout their surface.
Mr. Dickinson turned back to Judy to continue. “So how do we evade the immune system? We had a couple ideas, but the best one came with combining Toxoplasmosis with Herpes simplex 1, enabling it to hide in the central nervous system for long periods of time without triggering an immune response.”
During Mr. Dickinson’s soliloquy, Judy subtly continued trying to take in her surroundings. She noticed a large control panel with several red buttons, each labeled with numbers that appeared to correlate with the numbers painted on top of the individual cages.
“Unfortunately thus far we have had quite some trouble with waking these patients up. Some of them never recover and die despite our best efforts. Others awaken exhibiting some sort of meningitis like signs. We’ve had a couple successes that turned out to be the super soldiers we’re trying for, though those abilities quickly reversed within a couple days. But in order to bring this product to market for the US military, we have been given quite an incentive to move on to more human trials. Our location also brought an appeal, since the Philippines hosts one of the largest markets in trafficking humans. It makes obtaining our test subjects easy to achieve and even easier to cover up.”
One of the last cells she walked by contained an awake patient. She looked like a local Filipino, based on her tattered clothing, facial structure, and physical build. But she was covered in scratches and wounds. The woman’s clothes were all nearly ripped off. Her hair was greasy and dried blood covered most of her neck. An old wound on the side of her scalp showed a large indentation in the natural curve of her head. Judy was sure if she got a good look at the wound it would contain a skull fracture. She closed her eyes, remembering how in the past agencies like the NFL would fund studies that threw variously sized objects in to the heads of unsuspecting animal test subjects in order to learn about those effects on the brain. Even though Judy used animals in her research studies she never felt good about it, and she had always found those studies she read about in college barbaric. She had a strong suspicion that something similar had been done to this poor woman in front of her.
Opening her eyes again, Judy continued to survey the woman. Judy felt a brief moment of shame as she saw that the woman’s left breast was exposed. The wound caused her breast tissue to be hanging off her torso, attached by the skin along the base. The fatty tissue from the torn breast had left the woman’s chest and abdomen glistening from the oil. It was repulsive, not only seeing someone’s private parts exposed but literally seeing their insides. Judy was overwhelmed with equal levels of disgust and embarrassment.
The woman was slowly gnawing, pulling, and scratching at the glass wall in front of her. Several of her fingers had nails that had been ripped off, while those still attacked all had blood under them. Their group arrived in front of the cell, and for a fleeting moment the woman stopped her chewing. Her cold, hazy, lifeless eyes looked up at Judy. Her lips were cracked and bloodied. The woman let out a measured, horrifying moan as blood and saliva dripped from her mouth.
Judy was startled to hear similar sounds echoing behind her and jumped around. In response to her moan, several more bellowed out from another corridor behind her that was out of sight until now. From the slight variations in tone she figured there must have been half dozen or so similar patients in the holding cells of an adjacent hallway. The inpatients were joining the chorus of moans started by the inmate behind her, who was now snapping her jaw towards the group. Judy was utterly speechless and immobile, filled with a mixture of fear and disgust at these semi-human creatures. How could anyone do this?
“Where’s Mark?” It came out more as a statement than a question.
“Excuse me?” Mr. Dickinson asked back.
“Where’s Mark?” Her abrupt question startled Mr. Dickinson more than it had caught her off guard, but she refused to let him see that. Her eyes narrowed further as she mustered all the hatred and anger she could in to her stare. Doing so, Judy felt more resilient than she could ever remember feeling, and started to realize that fear was not going to save her. While she awaited her boss’ answer she started reciting the mantra to herself: fear won’t save me, only I will…
Sadly Mr. Dickinson regained his composure too quickly to be human. His calm and calculating eyes lacked any trace of compassion or humanness.
“Oh, he will be along, in one way or another. I dare say he might be brought in just in time to watch you undergo the treatments.” A devilish smile had crossed his face.
“But as I was just saying, yes, it is most unfortunate, your fates.” Judy felt a twinge of despair having her fears confirmed, that Mark would endure a similar outcome to Chen, or the one that she might face…
Mr. Dickinson turned back ahead of them and continued down the hallway. “But don’t worry, Dr. Twaung has made significant improvements since his first experiments, and we are hopeful that within the next couple rounds we will have a viable hybrid. Even here in the Philippines our test subjects can be hard to come by. Since we’ve been going through subjects quicker than anticipated, we can’t turn up a free sample when one falls in our laps,” the man again turned and smiled at Judy viscously.
Judy was barely listening however. She was picturing Mark, tied up and knocked out like she had been, getting dragged in to a cell and having to watch her become one of these monsters. She was also thinking of her brother, who would be landing on the island soon. She hoped that when she failed to meet him he wouldn’t go looking for her, but she knew he would. She just hoped he’d stop before Viratech thought of him as a threat. The worst of all this as the nagging thought that it was her fault. If she hadn’t gone snooping around where she shouldn’t of, or gotten her brother involved in trying to save her, others might not have been injured, killed, or worse. For what was happening to these poor individuals down here seemed worse than death to her.
Mr. Dickinson continued droning on, unaware
of Judy’s inner turmoil. “I think the local warehouses are catching on to our scheme. They’ve raised the price of all individuals outside of the usual age range fifty percent once they saw we weren’t only picking the children and young women like their previous buyers.” He turned around and placed a hand on Judy’s shoulder, forcing her out of her thoughts. “Not that you would have cost us much from a warehouse dear, but it’s nice to get some freebies here and there.”
With that he pushed her forward through a door that his cronies had opened before them.
“And this is where it all takes place!” exclaimed Mr. Dickinson as they walked into another laboratory. This one contained numerous refrigerators lined along the back wall. There were cells for animals and human test subjects along the right hand side, and computers and monitors adorning the left. In the center were several cold steel exam tables, each exhibiting restraints.
One of the guards took Judy’s arm forcibly and started towards the center of the room with the tables.
“Dr. Twaung? Come out here Lin. We’ve got Judy as promised. I’m hoping losing a friend will teach you to be more cautious with security in the future,” Mr. Dickinson seemed a little taken aback that Lin had not been waiting for them in the center of the lab, and glanced at his watch.
A spark of hope flashed through Judy’s brain after her boss made the statement about being friends. Maybe I could reason with Lin. Maybe he would convince Mr. Dickinson to let me go. Or maybe I can pretend to go along with some made up plan of his. He’s my co-worker, he’s my FRIEND, and I’ve helped him so much. He owes me!
At the thought she briefly flirted with the idea that her research was somehow connected to this abominable study Lin and Viratech had performed, but aside from manipulating viral connection points she could not be blamed for this.
Pushing the thought aside, Judy started frantically looking around the room for Lin. Mr. Dickinson was doing the same.
Her eyes were drawn to the back right corner of the room as she noticed a slight movement of a curtain there. It was the standard type of curtain you would see surrounding a hospital bed.
Mr. Dickinson seemed to have noticed the movement there as well.
“Lin, is that you? I would have thought you would have wanted to be ready for all the fanfare as we showed Ms. Gau here your research and got her implemented in to the program.” Dickinson was walking quickly towards the drawn curtain. Judy suddenly had a horrific lurch in her stomach, sensing something was about to go terribly wrong.
Mr. Dickinson let out one last exasperated sigh as he arrived at the curtain and pulled it aside.
Judy recognized the back of Lin’s lab coat and head as he was just standing there next to a hospital bed. His hand appeared to be clutching the bed’s sheets, and Judy could see the smallest spot of red on the sheets under his hand.
“Lin, what has gotten in to you? I know you had the stomach flu but…” and his words tapered off as he grabbed Lin by the left shoulder and spun him around to face him. An ashen face, cracked lips, and cold dead eyes were visible to all, but the monster in front of them only had eyes for one person.
Chapter 6
Everything after that one moment happened so fast. Lin’s cadaverous face became intensely animated as he lunged for Mr. Dickinson, and all the man could get out was a screamed “Dear God!” before Lin clamped on to his neck, tearing chunks of flesh from him blindly.
The guards jumped forward, leaving Judy alone towards the back of the room.
Judy couldn’t make out what they were shouting as they raised their weapons and advanced on the now entwined Lin and Mr. Dickinson. Behind her the other prisoners joined in the cacophony, bellowing moan after moan.
That noise actually gave Judy hope, and she confirmed this as she turned and saw that the door out of the lab was still open. Following her instinct, Judy took off down the hallway she had come. She had barely made it three steps when a bullet ricocheted near her left foot. Without hesitation or fear, she slammed her hands on the control board switches in the center of the hall. It was a bold move, one that could have just as many consequences for her as the others.
Glancing behind her, Judy saw that one of the guards had his gun raised and aimed at her. The face went horror-struck as the naked woman with the half-attached breast clambered in front of his line of sight, blocking Judy and quickly advancing towards him.
More shots rang out behind Judy as she continued racing away, but none threatened her this time. In addition to the gunshots, Judy heard an increasing discord of guttural groans, reminding her of a pack of hyenas vocalizing as they shared in a meal.
As Judy reached the end of the hall she realized she had no way out of the last locked door, glancing at the keypad next to the handle.
A brief feeling of failure and terror waved through her, but she forced herself to calm down as she turned and glanced behind her. Judy saw one of the male victims from the adjacent hallway on the left turn the corner and start stumbling towards her. Fear won’t save me, only I will…
Judy turned back to the door and tried her own passcode on the keypad. She knew it was a pathetic attempt and was not surprised when the light flashed red.
Judy turned back again and saw that the test subject had made it about halfway down the corridor. She began looking around her for anything she might use as a weapon, realizing that if she couldn’t get out she might as well fight.
There was nothing. And then a lonesome great idea flashed before her eyes: Lin had given her the passcode to his computer with her perpetual habit of being in the lab late at night and needing access to it. What if he used the same number for his door coding? What if the same thing that got her in to this mess could get her out?
In desperation she turned back to the door and plugged in the numbers. Her fingers slipped as she tried to calm her terror and she keyed in the wrong numbers.
She heard a moan that sounded like it was directly behind her as she took a deep breath and slowed her fingers, deliberately typing in his passcode.
Green flashed on the handle and Judy rushed through, the semi-human beast right behind her. She slammed the door back behind her and caught the man’s whole forearm in the door. The sound of tearing flesh resounded in Judy’s ears as she pushed harder and the door bit right through the skin and in to the layer of muscle on the arm sticking though the small space. Still, the man showed no signs of pain or hesitation. Using all her strength, Judy slammed the door against the arm again, and felt it crunch this time. Her victim didn’t as much pull back the arm as it fell at an angle to his side, no longer supported by the bone beneath his muscles.
Judy briefly let up on the pressure and the arm fell back through so that Judy was able to slam the door shut behind her. Felling the lock engage through her palms gave her such a sense of relief.
She backed away and could hear the continued failed thuds and cries from her attacker as he kept trying to get through the metal door.
Turning around she realized she was in a stainless steel hallway, and that another locked door was at the end of it. She punched in the same passcode and was relieved as the door slid open. An elevator stood in front of her.
It only took her a couple seconds to get in to the elevator and realize it only had two buttons: “B” which was highlighted, and “O”. Assuming “B” stood for basement she slammed on the “O” button and the elevator doors shut in front of her. She wanted to look away from the sight in the window that she was leaving behind, but was too scared that taking her eyes off it would allow something to sneak up on her.
The elevator doors finished closing and she felt the machine move upwards. Even if the elevator had been a slower, less modern one, which it likely wasn’t, Judy could tell there were a lot of floors between “B” and “O”. The light finally changed to “O” and the doors slid open. Judy made sure there was no imminent danger in front of her before tearing down another short hallway.
Judy took a quick peek around the corne
r of the door as she reached the end of the hallway and realized she was back in the office where she had first faced Mr. Dickinson. The door was actually a secret passage hidden behind one of the bookshelves to the right of Dickinson’s desk. She was shocked to see her backpack still on top of his desk, and her computer in the corner, still accompanied by the technician.
He looked up as she rushed in to the room and grabbed her backpack.
“What the….hey, what are you doing? How did you get out here?!” exclaimed the technician, starting to rise from his chair.
Judy glimpsed the back of the desk and saw that a gun was resting on the same built in shelf holding the whiskey under Mr. Dickinson’s desk. Smiling to herself she was suddenly glad that this deranged boss of hers really did act like some crazy, power-hungry henchmen from a movie.
She grabbed for the gun and lifted it, pointing at to the technician, who had already made it halfway across the room.
“STOP!” she shouted.
“Unhook my computer and put it back in the bag,” she said coldly, tossing the tech her backpack.
“Are you kidding me? No way in hell. I bet you don’t even know how to use that thing,” he retorted with a look of pure disdain.
Luckily for Judy, her brother had taken her to the shooting range quite a few times when he had first joined the Navy. Judy clicked off the safety and cocked the gun, trying to intimidate the technician. Meanwhile, her mantra continued over and over in her head, becoming lyrical at times. Fear won’t save me, only I will…
“Do it or I shoot you.”
“Yeah right”, he replied, tossing the bag behind him and heading towards her, though hesitantly.
A warning bullet ricocheted off the floor by his feet, and only then did he realize how serious she was.
“I’ve had a bad day. I’d love to blow some steam off,” she said.
Eves of the Outbreak Page 4
