Trauma (Wildfire Chronicles Vol. 5)
Page 22
The first experiment had been a disaster. Of course, to Fred, the fact they were once more using words like experiment was a disaster in and of itself. The time for experimenting was meant to have been over. Decades had been spent on tests and trial runs. Fred had spent countless hours staring at flipboards, his eyes gradually glazing over, as he listened to scientists and researchers prattling on about this breakthrough or that advance.
He hadn't cared about any of it. The minutiae were for the people he paid to work out; the very reason he had sunk billions into Project Wildfire was so he wouldn't have to worry about how it would work, just that it did.
In many ways, that was all money wasted. Project Wildfire had collapsed. One tiny alteration by one insignificant programmer had corrupted the entire process. What was left was not the sort of precision strike that Fred had wanted. It was more like a cluster bomb dropped blindly.
The damage was enormous, but it was also uncontrolled; messy. It threw all their plans for clearing up the aftermath into chaos. Hell, more than chaos: increasingly it appeared that the straightforward cleanup Fred had anticipated was going to look more like a war. Money wasted.
Fred hated wasting money, but wasting time was an unforgivable crime. He had plenty of money; as he approached his mid-seventies, it was time that was valuable.
They had conducted the first experiment at the underground base in Northumberland, at Sanderson's request.
Sanderson had argued that they would need to establish a baseline for their results. He waffled about control groups and comparison studies until Fred's vision blurred with the tedium of it and his mind ran to blowing the man's head off with a large-calibre weapon.
When he finally reached the point, that they needed to test McIntosh's blood on the various blood types to determine the effects, Fred acquiesced without a blink, and was irritated that the head of research had even brought the matter to him. Sanderson, it appeared, still had some sort of conscience when faced with the prospect of killing a human being in the name of science. Clearly, Fred had thought, the man hadn't been paying attention.
The first round of tests made the group of subjects' blood boil in their bodies, slowly cooking their organs. It was, Fred supposed, an excruciating way to die. More importantly it was a colossal waste of time. Only those with AB Negative - the rarest of the blood types - were important.
Sanderson had wasted time on rediscovering what they already knew, but he also wasted the blood. They had started with around 100ml of McIntosh's blood which was, Fred reckoned, by a distance the most valuable substance on earth. Already half of it had been wasted on the first experiments.
When Sanderson had finally tested one of the small number of volunteers that had the correct blood type, the outcome had been different but the ultimate result the same.
The unfortunate recipient of the blood had changed alright, but the change had been nothing like the incredible transformation Jake McIntosh himself had undergone. No, this time the blood turned the subject into a vast boil, swelling remorselessly until his body burst and left a mess that would take days to clear.
There had been no superhuman strength or speed. Even worse, the subject's mind had been the first thing to go: as his body had inflated, skin stretching and tearing, the man had been reduced to unintelligible screams and grunts. If they couldn't keep the mind intact, as McIntosh had, there was no point at all. Fred had tried creating brainless monsters once, and that had turned out pretty badly.
When Sanderson had come to the panic room that Fred had made his office to report that he needed more of McIntosh's blood, Fred had come perilously close to killing the trembling man on the spot.
McIntosh had already decimated the Northumberland base, and left it vulnerable and exposed, carving open a path from the subterranean guts up into the open air that left a trail of destruction and bodies. Ordinarily, Fred wouldn't have cared about the bodies, but the troubling fact was that he didn't have that many to spare. Most of the people that had bought their way into the base were worse than useless, and many of the soldiers that would have been of use had been ripped to pieces during McIntosh's escape.
The ultimate goal of Wildfire: the cleansing of the planet; the population reduction that would allow the select few involved to take unassailable control, was further away than ever. Fred had known when he found his head of security's body - the parts of his body - that the utopia he had striven for was not going to transpire. So the people at the base, the ones with lots of money and no real use, were just dead weight.
Fred forcibly took the ones that were AB Negative, and executed the rest.
Half a century in the cutthroat world of business had taught him to move swiftly with the markets. Goals and strategies needed to be fluid and adaptable.
Cutting the base loose just made good sense. Besides, there were other bases. And what McIntosh's miraculous transformation offered was not just a seat at the table when the other leaders around the world emerged from their cocoons to take control once more, but a throne to rule them all. There would be other mutations out there, other variations on the Jake McIntosh theme, but Fred thought that for the most part, the other bases might not even know what was happening. Fred had the competitive edge, as long as he had the blood and the scientists to tame it into a form that could be controlled and exploited.
Tracking McIntosh down after his escape from Northumberland had been easy, even without the help of satellites. Just a matter of following the absurd trail of death. Given godlike power, McIntosh had simply sought to carry on the life he had lived before: mindless killing and slavering insanity.
The man - hyperevolved or not - was doomed to think small.
Capturing the abomination had been a thing of beauty; a rare instance of a plan carried out to perfection, like a musician delivering a perfect rendition of a complicated overture. Fred had even had the chance to talk to McIntosh before they took him, and to see the pain and the outrage at the humbling defeat contort the monster's misshapen face. Delicious.
It was as the helicopters had flown to intercept McIntosh that Fred got to actually see what Project Wildfire had done to the country. They flew over ruined towns and burning cities, over great herds of the Infected that were supposed to have died as per their programming, but which instead roamed the lands like flocking birds, hunting down the surviving members of the human race and converting them. There would be other mutations down there too, Sanderson had promised Fred, though he hypothesised that each could be unique. The virus, he said, would react differently depending on the host. Wildfire had taken human evolution and poured rocketfuel into its engine. The results were likely to be...unpredictable.
What was certain was that the UK was lost. It would be just a matter of time before one of the herds found their way to the installation in Northumberland, and the people within would not be able to hide. McIntosh had left the front door wide open.
So Fred was forced to cede the country for the time being, retreating to the fleet of ships that sat off the coast of Scotland. Again he was to be surrounded by the wealthy, by the paying tourists, but they no longer mattered in the slightest. There was a greater military presence within the fleet, and far greater weaponry. If the mystery of McIntosh's blood couldn't be unravelled, Fred would be forced to the last resort.
The idea of nuking his own country didn't appal Fred; he couldn't have cared less. But the notion that after all he had gone through, across decades and billions, he would wind up having accomplished nothing, well, that bothered him greatly.
It was time to conduct a second experiment. And this time, they could use as much blood as they needed. McIntosh was secure. Wildfire was far from done.
Yet now, after all that Fred had gone through, when the ongoing clusterfuck appeared to have finally been brought under control, Sanderson was standing in front of Fred and telling him that they needed Jake McIntosh awake.
Fred punched the man squarely in the nose, almost sighing with satisfacti
on as his bony knuckles impacted on the man's sweaty flesh. Fred had been a boxer in his youth. As his years advanced he fought against aging with the same energetic vigour he had utilised in the ring, battling it with a strict exercise regime. It was a punch from a pensioner in name only.
Sanderson crumpled to the floor with a whimper, and Fred drew himself up to his full height and drew in a deep breath, closing his eyes and searching for calm. Only when he was certain he wasn't going to beat Sanderson to death did he reopen them.
"Why?" Fred asked in a low voice that oozed menace.
Sanderson wiped blood away from his broken nose and blinked rapidly to clear the tears from his eyes.
"When we keep him comatose," Sanderson replied with a sniff, "only a certain part of his brain is active. It's not the same pattern we see in humans. The pattern is steady, and in his current state his blood has different properties. You see," Sanderson said, climbing upright with a wary look on his face, like he expected to be knocked straight back down, "on the screen, the dark areas?"
He pointed.
"In a normal human brain, we would see activity here, but in McIntosh there is none. It would take years of tests to understand that activity."
He held his hands up protectively as Fred glowered.
"B-but I think if he is awake, we'll see activity in this part of the brain, the dormant part, and there will be an effect on his blood. If we're trying to recreate Jake's condition, we need something to recreate."
"When did you start calling him Jake?"
The question seemed to throw Phil Sanderson, and he stammered and mumbled while Fred's mind raced. He had already seen what McIntosh could do, but they were prepared for it now. McIntosh could be restrained. Immobilised. But getting blood from his body while he was awake wasn't a job Fred imagined anybody would be volunteering for.
"Fine," Fred said, cleaving the legs from Sanderson's mumbling response. "Security will be provided. Once everything is in order you can wake him, Sanderson."
Fred turned to leave as Sanderson nodded profuse, sweaty thanks. As he slipped through the narrow doorway he spoke again without looking back.
"Get ready to leave," Fred said. "You'll be extracting the blood yourself."
Fred strode away without waiting to hear Phil's protest, and chuckled when he thought he could almost hear the colour draining from Sanderson's face.
*
When Fred departed, and the shadow he had cast over Phil Sanderson finally began to clear, Phil walked from the lab on weak, trembling legs. The decision had been made to keep McIntosh isolated on one of the smaller ships in the fleet. No one who had been present in Northumberland disagreed. The notion of McIntosh somehow breaking free and being trapped on a fucking boat with the monster was too terrible for anyone to contemplate.
Phil headed for the helipad, and the chopper which would take him on the short journey to the ship that terrified him, but he would be damned if he would go alone. As he moved through the narrow steel arteries of the ship, he searched for anyone that would provide him with some sort of personal security.
Or someone you can blame when this goes wrong.
Phil blinked the thought away and wiped his sweaty brow.
The ship seemed suddenly deserted, as though all the crew had realised that Phil was a marked man; a plague-carrier that they should avoid at all costs. He was nearly at the helipad when he heard voices talking in a hushed whisper nearby.
He took a detour and headed toward the noise, stumbling upon two men sitting in a cabin. Phil didn’t know the men, nor did he feel much reassurance when he looked at them. Both wore loose-fitting security uniforms, and neither boasted the sort of blank, psychotic stares that most of the security detail did. They didn't give the impression they were experienced enough to keep Phil safe, but there were no alternatives.
Phil clenched his teeth. They would have to do.
“Sullivan’s orders,” Phil said in as forceful a tone as he could muster. “You two are to escort me to the McIntosh ship."
The two young men stared at him for a moment, confused. Their facial features were similar enough that he thought that had to be related. Brothers, maybe.
“Quickly, now,” Phil barked, and the two men stood and fell into line behind him.
“You two are to stay alert at all times, okay? This should be routine, but…er…just stay frosty, right?”
Stay frosty. The words sounded ridiculous as they spilled from Phil’s lips. The kind of nonsense overly-muscled stars spouted in cheesy action films. He had no idea why he’d said it. Phil kept his eyes pointed forward so the two men wouldn't see the embarrassment squirming across his face.
“Uh…yes, Sir,” one of the men replied.
“Good, good. What are your names?”
“I’m Kyle, Sir, and this is Tom.”
“Good. Kyle, Tom, this is extremely important, you understand? Everything we’ve worked for depends on us getting this right, so no fuckups, okay?”
“Absolutely, Sir,” the one called Tom replied, and Phil could have sworn from the man’s tone that he was smirking.
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Wildfire Chronicles
Complete series now available!
Panic
Shock
Psychosis
Mutation
Trauma
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Contents
TRAUMA
Also by K.R. Griffiths:
Prologue
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
Epilogue
Survivor: A horror thriller