by Steven Booth
Miller let the silence build. Scratch followed her lead. She studied the four guards behind Rubenstein. They were GIs, not mercenaries like Rat and Lovell. A nearby clock ticked. Rubenstein was overdoing this a bit, but then that was his way, and just another sign of his overblown ego.
Miller got bored with the game. “We’re all here, Artie. Color us suitably intimidated. Tell me, why the armed escort?”
Apparently her voice was the signal that Rubenstein had been waiting for. He turned in the chair and faced them with a singularly unfriendly smile. “Ah, Sheriff, if there’s one thing I can always count on, it’s your consistent impulse to take command of a given situation. It reads like a desperate grandiosity related to OCD. When I analyzed you months ago, I determined this was a buried impulse from childhood when you likely felt responsible for your parents. You thereby developed the need to constantly be in charge of others to avoid feeling frightened and out of control. It’s probably something of a ‘doing’ defense against abandonment anxiety.”
Miller shook her head. “You’ve had months to work on this. Was that really the best you could come up with?”
Rubenstein’s smile slipped to one side. “However, I digress. Since the meeting has now officially started due to your immature outburst, what was your question again?”
“You know what? It doesn’t matter.”
“Tell me, were you an antisocial teen, Penny?”
“Come on,” Miller said, addressing Scratch and Alex. “Ignore him. He’s a fraud and Sheppard’s the man in charge. Let’s blow this popsicle stand.”
She turned to go. The soldiers tensed up, and Miller chuckled. She made a face at them. She shrugged in a way that made it clear that she’d tolerate that their presence was still required. It crossed her mind that she’d probably done pretty much what Rubenstein had accused her of—found a way to be in charge even under these extreme circumstances. Even a stopped clock is right twice a day. Fucking shrinks…
Miller turned back to Rubenstein. “Okay, why don’t you cut to the chase, Artie?”
“Let’s do exactly that,” Rubenstein said. “I have good news for you, Penny. In part thanks to fine work by Captain Sheppard, who unfortunately could not be with us today, we finally have the missing piece of the puzzle. Eureka.”
Scratch said, “Jesus, that was cutting to the chase?”
Miller smiled. Even Alex, catching on at last, managed a dry chuckle.
Rubenstein reddened. “Thanks to you, Penny, we now know exactly what we’ve been doing wrong all this time. As you know, you have been the main test subject since Malibu, and our progress has been stunning. The last obstacle has been removed. Our Enhanced Bioweapons Program can now continue.”
Scratch stuck a finger in his ear as if to clear it. “Sorry, got some bullshit in there. Say again, enhanced what?”
“He meant the damn super soldier program, Scratch.” Miller turned to Rubenstein. “Didn’t you, pencil dick?”
Rubenstein ignored them. He opened a drawer, removed a small metal file and cleaned under his nails. “I did indeed. We were so pleased to find that the solution was so simple.” Rubenstein held forth like a Professor. “Let me summarize. The mechanism for enhancing our soldiers was always binary—a virus to insert new genes into the subject’s genome, and an accelerant to cause those new genes to express. But the accelerant had a severely toxic side effect. Yes, the genes were presently expressed, and the anaerobic energy production worked exactly as planned, but the toxin killed the subject, creating those rather unfortunate creatures, the zombies.”
Scratch said, “That was simple?”
Rubenstein continued. “Penny, you were different. Your system can rapidly metabolize the toxin, sidestepping the transformation to a zombie state, thus creating the first perfect enhanced bioweapon that has ever existed. You are a living miracle. And now we finally know through what mechanism you were able to survive the full accelerant.”
Penny snorted. “If I hear that I’m a miracle one more time, I’m going to puke on your loafers, Artie.”
Scratch visibly prepared another smart-ass response. Surprisingly, Rubenstein stood up, almost as if to head him off. “I want to be the first to thank you, Penny.” He held out his hand.
Miller looked at it with the disdain of a zombie eyeing a veggie patty. “You know, I thought Sanchez had already figured all that out, Artie. If my memory is still working properly, Sanchez flipped his own switch months ago. He turned himself into one of your ‘enhanced bioweapons’ by using something made from my blood. And that’s why I had to take him out.”
“And your point is?”
“Aren’t you coming to this party a little late?”
Rubenstein pulled his hand back. “Colonel Sanchez’s breakthrough was impressive, but it had few practical applications. I think you’ll understand when I tell you that you yourself are a very limited resource. You could die like anyone else. You only have so much blood to contribute, thus reducing the potential number of functioning units we could produce from you. But now that we understand how you are able to survive the accelerant, we can pre-metabolize the toxin ourselves, and thus the entire program may continue.”
Scratch grunted. “Hold on, you lost me, Doc. We’re back to a weapon? I thought this whole operation was about finding a cure for the zombies, coming up with a vaccine. What the hell happened to that idea?”
“That was just your dear friend Captain Sheppard’s dream. As far as those in power were concerned, the search for a vaccine was never more than a side project. It was mostly a distraction to us, though useful as a way of covering our tracks for the purposes of the historical record.”
“Say that again,” Miller said, buying time. She felt queasy.
Rubenstein leaned against the wall. “We couldn’t risk being seen as not even having tried to find a cure, but rest assured we all tend to doubt that one will be discovered anytime soon. In short, we didn’t take the idea all that seriously. This was always about resuming the original program. Sheppard was duped by his own guilt into believing otherwise.”
Miller felt her blood pressure drop. She had once again been played for a fool. “So this was all a ruse? You hatched up an elaborate plan to keep us distracted while you used me to work out your little technical glitch?”
“Not precisely,” Rubenstein said without emotion. “It was more of an ‘elaborate ruse’ to keep Captain Sheppard busy and out of the way, yet still be certain the project was moving forward. As far back as the Serenity Center, we hoped to bring you back on board as a volunteer, not a prisoner, although personally I would have been just as happy either way. I’d say things worked rather well, wouldn’t you, Major?” Rubenstein turned to Rat, who was imposing even in her civvies. Rubenstein wanted Rat to support him. He waited.
Rat shook her head. “Don’t drag me into this little mad scientist nightmare, Doc. I’m a professional. I work for you because you’re the one signing the checks. It’s not from love or loyalty. Make no mistake. I’m a mercenary, not a damned fool. Let’s stop wasting time. Are we going to plug this lady into the Matrix or what?”
Miller turned to look at Rat. The Matrix? Was that some kind of code?
Rubenstein fumed. Curiously, Rat’s disrespect had stung him. He glared back with every shred of his bruised ego writhing, but then turned the charm back on. “Actually, you are quite right, Major. It’s definitely time for the next phase of the program to begin.”
He waved his arm. The four soldiers shifted their weapons and took a step forward, though they didn’t seem clear about what came after that.
Scratch puffed out his chest. “Don’t piss me off, boys.”
“Hold on, there.” Miller walked closer to the men. Her assertion was meant to shock Rubenstein’s ego back into subservience. Despite her own growing sense of anxiety, Miller knew him to be weak, indecisive and pretentious underneath. It was worth a try. “You’re not plugging me into anything, Artie. I don’t care what checks you’re
signing for Rat, I don’t work for you. And I want to speak to Karl Sheppard.”
“Do you?” Rubenstein shook his head. “I don’t think so, Penny. As I said, he won’t be joining us again anytime soon.”
“You’ve killed him?” Miller felt sick.
Rubenstein gestured noncommittally. “He’s been permanently relieved of duty.”
Scratch growled like a pit bull. “Well, what about the base commander? There’s got to be someone actually running the day to day of this bat shit operation. It can’t be a limp dick circus clown like you.”
Rubenstein rubbed his hands together. “I am now officially in command of the Enhanced Bioweapons project. Forget Karl Sheppard. Now that I am in charge, we can stop wasting time and begin to make real progress. And you, Penny, have been legally conscripted to our task. Would you rather be our colleague in research or stand for a summary court-martial and help us from inside a jail cell? It’s all the same to me.”
“I refuse,” Miller said. She moved closer to Scratch they held hands. “Kiss my country ass. You can’t make me be a part of your Frankenstein experiments without my consent.” Miller figured that statement was utter bullshit, but that bluff was her last logical line of defense.
Rubenstein just turned to Rat. “Major, will you please take the Sheriff to her new quarters?”
“About fucking time,” Rat said, and moved forward. The soldiers spread out to bracket Miller and Scratch.
“Rat,” said Miller, raising her fists, “I don’t want to hurt you. Just stay out of this.”
Rat shook her head. “Penny, I’m telling you as a friend. You’re done. You’re toast. Just play along with this, and at least that way both you and Scratch will live to see the outside of this base again.”
“I told you one day we would dance,” Miller said, grimly. “If it’s got to be today, that’s just fine with me.”
Rat ignored the threat. She turned to the soldiers, who had taken their positions but were still awaiting orders. “Restrain them.”
“Rat, I’m warning you…” Scratch stepped away, getting Miller’s back. She turned and took a step closer, readying herself to beat Rat down. The duo stood prepared to duke this out.
Rubenstein said, “Major, if you please?”
Rat moved so fast, Miller couldn’t make it out. She had no time to react. Scratch never even blinked. One split second later, Miller was flattened against the far wall and then spun around to face it. Before she could react beyond a startled gasp, Rat was handcuffing her. Miller struggled, but Rat handled her easily.
Too easily.
Miller heard Scratch call out as the four soldiers surrounded him. “Penny!”
Rat already had Miller in the doorway by then. She was too strong, too quick to be a normal human being. She’d been accelerated.
“I told you, Sheriff,” Rat said, grimly, “you’re done.” And then she effortlessly dragged Miller out of the room.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
ISOLATION WARD, LEVEL 6
The isolation room was cold. The walls were colored an eerie bluish white. Miller smelled antiseptic and the sweet-sour stench of rotting flesh. This place had housed the undead. It felt more like an aquarium from the interior than it had seemed when looking in through the thick mirrored glass. The door closed silently behind her. When Miller turned to look for it, the seam was almost unnoticeable, and the high tech hinges were well hidden. Naturally there was no knob or handle on the prisoner’s side. Miller looked around, a hollow feeling growing in the pit of her stomach. This room was a death chamber and the vibe was eerie. It presented a silent, sterile and heartless beauty not unlike that of a frozen artic wasteland.
The only feature was that immense mirrored window. It was about eight feet long and five feet high, with the bottom of the glass standing a few feet off the ground. All of the edges were rounded, and again there was no seam visible. Miller saw nothing to so much as dig a fingernail into, and there certainly weren’t any prying tools lying about. Hell, she didn’t even have a belt buckle. This time they had her ass in a sling.
Miller felt sore. Her wrists still chafed from the handcuffs, and her arm ached from where the surprise, virus-charged version of Rat had gripped her bicep. Rat had been shot up for sure, and was now a super soldier in her own right. Miller grimaced. She should have known they would pull a stunt like that, especially since Rubenstein really believed they had finally found a safe way to use the virus as a weapon. It was only a tad surprising that someone smart and sane as Rat had gone for it. They must have offered her an outright fortune.
Miller leaned against the wall. The temperature was chilly. She pulled her hands back and shivered. These people were desperate to succeed at any cost. They’d bought into their own bullshit. Now that they thought they had the problem solved, it was inevitable that they would try to throttle up one of their own. They’d probably already thought about accelerating the entire base. That would be the logical, if completely insane, thing to do. The megalomaniacal Rubenstein would go that route once he believed it to be safe.
Miller paced, circling the room. Why were still screwing around with her if she was no longer needed? Did they plan to dissect or torture her? To try to convert her to their cause? Study her for the hell of it, until her heart gave out, just because they could? There didn’t seem to be anything very valuable that she could still contribute at this point, not now that they had the formula for their secret sauce. She should be have been executed or in a jail cell, not in an observation chamber being studied. There had to be something else going on, something she’d missed.
Miller peered into the mirrored window but of course saw nothing but her own reflection. It figured somebody was watching but she was too frustrated to care. She reflected on the events of the last few months and wondered where it had all slipped away from her and turned to shit. But then things had gone south that first night, when the zombies came to attack the jail back in Flat Rock. Every moment since then had been leading up to this sad ending. How many thousands had died—no, hundreds of thousands, if you include Nevada, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, California, and wherever the hell else the zombies had spread? All so that some arrogant bastard could get a ten-foot chubby at the thought of controlling his own Dirty Dozen, a team of accelerated soldiers more badass than the world could ever imagine.
Miller looked around her quarters. Not even a bunk or a piss-bucket. Of course not, it was just a holding cell for the undead. The cold blue lighting was coming through the ceiling, but she couldn’t see how. If she stood on her toes, her fingers could just reach the surface of the ceiling. She didn’t feel anything that would allow light through. Miller pressed upward, looking for how the light was coming in, but the panel was made of the same aquarium acrylic as the big window to the side. So it was probably bulletproof too. Whoever had designed these rooms was scared shitless of something. She wondered if that was just the traditional zombies or something far more dangerous; maybe even someone like her.
This was for me.
Inside the wobbly security of her own head, Miller thought: No, that bastard Rubenstein is not going to get me freaked out. I’ll be chasing my own tail by dinnertime if I lose my cool.
She glared at the mirrored window. They were watching her, she was sure of it. She was now a study project. Why else would they have put her in a glorified fishbowl? She wondered what they were all doing in there. Taking videos, scanning her with a new age MRI, reading her tea leaves? After everything she’d learned from Sheppard and Rubenstein about the goals of this misbegotten venture, very little would have surprised her.
She could feel a pressure start to build, and it wasn’t just the claustrophobia.
“So, do I just piss on the floor, or what?”
Miller heard a popping sound, and a faint hiss came from hidden speakers. “Please be patient, Penny.” The baritone voice had a flat delivery as unctuous as that of some bad talk show host. It was Rubenstein, of course. “We are getti
ng things set up for you. In the meantime, look to your right.”
The wall changed. A panel slid silently to one side. Miller discovered an austere, stainless steel prison commode, complete with a roll of toilet paper.
“Make yourself at home.”
“Clever.” Miller wasn’t going to let him get her riled. Not when he was this happy. Arrogant men made mistakes when they were happy.
Her kidneys complained again. Miller kept her feelings hidden. She had been around jails and prisoners for a good part of her adult life, and there was no sense in standing on ceremony. She dropped her pants and sat down delicately on the cold steel seat. She refused to let herself get embarrassed or surrender emotional control. Whatever they were planning for her, this wasn’t even the opening pitch. She wouldn’t give Rubenstein the pleasure of shaking her up.
When she was finished with the toilet and had pulled up her pants, the toilet flushed and slid quietly back into the wall. Miller examined the space where it had been. She kept her back to the mirror and ran her hand over the wall. She could feel the gap in the wall with her finger, but she wouldn’t have been able to see it or make it out any other way. Clever.
“Are you refreshed, Penny?”
Miller turned to face the window. She cocked her head to one side, allowing contempt to ooze from her face. She wasn’t going to give Rubenstein an inch. She just waited. The cold air flowed over her arms and neck, causing the short hairs to flutter. Miller rubbed her palms together then resumed pacing. Finally, Rubenstein’s voice returned. “Thank you for your patience, Penny. We are now ready to begin.”
Begin what? Miller thought, but she did not say that out loud. Her stomach did a high dive with a back flip. What are you going to do to me?
