Infected: Lesser Evils

by Andrea Speed

  “I’ll buy you a box set,” he told her, his mind racing in a dozen different directions at once.

  How did an infected but otherwise healthy young woman enter a club as a Human, and end the night as an infection-ravaged cat corpse?

  Not that it would be much comfort, but Rosenberg wouldn’t be the only one getting no sleep tonight.

  6

  Transitions from Persona to Object

  BY THE time Roan wandered home, Dylan was asleep upstairs, and Roan watched him for a while, wondering if he should just sleep downstairs on the couch. It was almost morning, and exhaustion had finally gotten the best of him, along with the pills. The upside of the fact that he was on the verge of near collapse, the lion was too. Even the beast needed to sleep from time to time.

  Figuring he was being stupid, Roan crawled into bed beside Dylan and braced himself for bad dreams, but of course, since he was ready for them, none came. But he did have a really bizarre one, full of the smells of color and the roar of blood, and it made him wake up, a sense of doom pressing down on him and smothering him. It was just the blanket, which he had pulled over his face.

  Dylan was up, which surprised him, but in a way he was relieved. How awful—he was such a coward. Bad show for a lion.

  He was in the shower, shampooing his hair (Had it grown overnight? It felt like it), when Dylan came in. “You’re up early,” Roan said over the sound of running water.

  “It’s noon,” he replied.

  “It is?” He hadn’t looked at the clock. Perhaps he should have.

  “What time did you get in last night?”

  “Umm… it was dark. I stopped at the store, picked you up some more silken tofu.”

  “I saw, thanks.” He put the toilet seat down and sat on the closed lid, so Roan could see him through the open slice of shower curtain. He was dressed in a green tank top and loose black yoga pants, and as he crossed his arms over his chest, he had that stubborn look on his face. Oh good, were they going to fight?

  “So, I’m a little of tired of pretending something isn’t wrong. Are you ever going to tell me?”

  “What do you mean?” Dylan shot him an evil look. “Look, it isn’t you—”

  “I know it isn’t me,” he snapped. “I’ve analyzed my own behavior a thousand times, to make sure I hadn’t pushed you away in some fashion. I haven’t, so it must be you. Why haven’t you touched me in two damn weeks? What happened at Willow Creek? I’d love to accuse you of having an affair, but I know you’re not. Why couldn’t you be having an affair like a normal guy? At least then I wouldn’t have to worry about you stepping out in front of a bus.”

  Roan was rinsing the suds out of his hair, and he was glad, as Dylan couldn’t see his face with his wet hair hanging down in front of it. Yes, it was definitely longer.

  “What?”

  “I know you’re depressed. I also think you’re suicidal. Tell me I’m wrong.”

  “You’re wrong.”

  “Mean it.”

  He swept back his damp hair and glared at him through a scrim of water and steam. “I wouldn’t, okay? Now will you hand me a towel?”

  “No, not until you tell me what’s going on with you.”

  “You’re really going to keep me trapped in a shower?” He sighed irritably, then figured what the hell, and told him about the progression of the virus. If he didn’t tell him, it was likely Dee would anyways.

  Dylan seemed to listen impassively, not moving, not reacting until he was done. “Well, you’re just feeling self-pitying to believe that,” he claimed, getting up and grabbing a towel off the bar. “You’ll never be a full-time lion.”

  He seemed really certain of that. “How do you know?”

  “Because you couldn’t be a smartass as a lion. You live to annoy the shit out of people, Ro. You can’t do that as well as a cat.”

  He had a point there, he could hardly deny it. It probably didn’t work like that, but he could hardly argue with him. He turned off the shower and got out, and Dylan gave him the towel. As he dried his hair, Dylan asked, “So that’s why you won’t touch me? You’re afraid of lioning out?”

  “I’m afraid it wants you dead.”

  “What if it does? Are you going to stand for that? Does it think nothing’s going to happen to it if something happens to me?”

  That was a good point, but it only distracted him for a moment. “That’s logic. I don’t think that applies to a cat.”

  “But it must understand self-preservation. You’re still sharing a body, and if it does something to me, are you going to let it pass?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Okay then, we should be okay.”

  Roan scrubbed the towel over his head before looking at him curiously. “Why are you not worried about this?”

  “It’s you. You’re not going to hurt me.”

  He sighed, shaking his head. “It’s not me we’re talking about—”

  Dylan grabbed his face in his hands and kissed him, a full-on, passionate kiss. It was a little too nice for his not-quite-numb libido, so he reluctantly pushed him away. “No, okay, no. I’m not risking your life gambling on a lion being sensible.”

  “It’s because you bit me too hard that one time, right?”

  “Yes! You can’t tell me you’d like me ripping out your throat.”

  He considered that a moment. “It wants blood?”

  “I told you what it wants.”

  “But blood makes it happy?”

  “I—I don’t know what makes it happy. I need a cat whisperer or a virus whisperer or something.”

  Dylan did the strangest thing. He bit his bottom lip. That wasn’t strange in itself, as he often bit his lip while thinking, but this time he bit it until he broke the skin, until it started to bleed, a teardrop of blood welling on his lower lip. “Let’s give it a little something to shut it up, shall we?” He grabbed Roan again, and this time when he kissed him his lips were slick with blood. On one level, it was incredibly creepy and gross.

  Of course, the lion loved it. It responded eagerly to the taste of Dylan’s blood, and while Roan was fighting the impulse to tear into him, increase the flow of blood, he also found himself responding to him like a regular Human. It didn’t help that he was cold and Dylan was oh so warm. There was a growl/purr in the base of his throat as he pushed him back into the bedroom, sucking at his lower lip. Roan hated the taste of blood—his own more than anyone else’s—and yet it tasted so good; maybe it was just Dylan’s blood that tasted so good. All that vegetarianism and healthy living may have made his blood cleaner than most, or at least that’s what Roan told himself. The blood made him feel intoxicated, hot under the skin.

  They ended up having the most intense and somewhat violent sex Roan had ever had, and afterward he was filled with mixed feelings about it. Of course it felt good (god, had he missed sex), but the taste of blood was tacky in his mouth (both nauseating and enticing), and any sex involving blood play was kinky beyond belief.

  He knew he’d bit Dylan’s lip as well, but he had to double-check it to make sure he hadn’t bit a chunk of it off. As he cleared away some blood on Dylan’s lip with his thumb, he noticed it was starting to swell, like he’d been punched in the face. “Shit. Did I hurt you?”

  “Too many endorphins. I’m not feeling any pain right now,” Dylan replied. Then, after a moment, “It is throbbing a bit.”

  “Shit, what about work?”

  “What about it? If anyone asks, I’ll say I took a hit while sparring, just to see the look on Trevor’s face.”

  “Trevor the maître’d?”

  “That’s him.”

  “Figured. He looks like a Trevor.”

  Dylan gave him a lopsided grin, and wiped some of the blood off Roan’s chin. “I missed you, you know.”

  “How? I haven’t gone anywhere.”

  “Yes you have. Stop keeping me at arm’s length, Ro. I signed up for this crazy ride, you can’t scare me away.”

&
nbsp; “You should be scared. This was fucking freaky.”

  “And yet, pretty amazing.”

  “Yeah, well….” He was saved from further response by the ringing of the phone. It had actually rung before, while they were having sex, but they’d both ignored it. He didn’t have that excuse now.

  Dylan got up, stepped into his yoga pants, and said, “I’m gonna go get some ice for the lip. Maybe you should answer that. Although I won’t accept any excuse that keeps you away tonight.”

  “Why, what’s tonight?”

  “Gallery showing, remember?”

  “Oh shit.” One of Dylan’s art school friends, a guy named Dominik Loncar, was in town tonight for a showing of his art photos. Dylan said they had to go, because he’d promised he would, but he also warned him that Dominik had been pretentious as hell back in school, and that condition had worsened since graduation. Since he had guessed Roan wouldn’t be able to be on his best behavior for more than thirty minutes, he had also agreed they’d make an appearance, look at Dominik’s photos, and leave reasonably quickly. At least now Dylan had the excuse of work. Also, Roan was convinced most of Dyl’s arty friends hated his guts, which Dylan always denied, but he knew that, since he was an ex-cop, most of Dylan’s arty friends thought he was a fascist. Hanging around with a hockey team hadn’t helped.

  Roan sat on the edge of the bed for a moment, feeling truly crazy. His boyfriend now had to cut himself so they could have sex without the lion trying to turn it into a slaughter. This was fucking bizarre and it couldn’t continue, and as good as it had felt, he thought he should really pull his SIG Sauer out from his dresser and blow his brains out. But first, he answered the phone.

  “Yeah?”

  “Hello Captain Sunshine,” Seb replied sarcastically. “Do I take it this means you heard the news?”

  “What news?”

  “The thing down in Tacoma.”

  “What thing down in Tacoma?”

  He sighed heavily. “Shit. The cat freak-out is no longer an isolated incident.”

  Wonderful. The universe just kept churning out these reasons to live. “What now?”

  “A lion went on a rampage near Commencement Bay. The cops down there are still trying to piece together the whole story, but he caused a shitload of damage. Charged a wedding party in a church, killed three, mauled six, ate someone’s yappy little purse dog—the only good thing that happened—and three tranquilizer darts couldn’t put him down, so the rapid response team just blasted his ass back to the stone age. Took twelve shots to drop him, and by that time he was a red smear in the vestibule. We have a tentative ID as Philip Roland, best man’s brother.”

  “Fuck. Did he have that chemical in his system?”

  “That’s the working theory, although there may not be enough of him left to test. I’ve been going through some of the old reports on weird cat behaviors and other oddities, and I’ve found a couple that might be of interest. There was a domestic incident last week, where a woman shot her transformed husband with a shotgun, she said he broke down the basement door and started attacking furniture before going after her, and she was shocked because his transformation cycle had ended three days before. The evidence seems to back up her story, but now I’m wondering if I should have his tox screen fast tracked.”

  “Where was this?”

  “Bremerton.”

  “Huh. No wonder I hadn’t heard about it.”

  “Hey, neither did I ’til I started going through files. ’Cause you know how we cops love our paperwork.”

  “It’s the funnest thing in the world.” Roan wedged the receiver between his shoulder and ear, so he could free his hands to open his top dresser drawer and pull out a pair of boxers, mainly because he was cold. “So you think this is a thing.”

  “Both you and your crazy old doctor lady have convinced me this is a thing. I don’t think Ava was the first, just the first one we noticed because her behavior was so atypical.”

  “Has Rosenberg found anything?”

  “So far? Well, she found a near chemical match last I heard. The weird stuff in Ava’s bloodstream seems pretty close to burn.”

  Had he heard that right, or was the combined and dichotomous feeling of postcoital afterglow and self-loathing making him slightly aphasic? “Burn?”

  “You know, M80, glowstick, gleam—it’s a new club drug. From what I understand, a new, “cleaner” form of Ecstasy with a cokelike kick.”

  “Wow, how out of the loop am I? I’ve never heard of this.”

  “And you call yourself a gay guy? I always knew you were really straight.”

  “Yeah, I’m just into buttfucking for the affirmative action benefit.” That got a chuckle out of Seb, which was nice because it was so rare. Seb was often loath to show any kind of emotion at all on the job, but Roan had come to understand it was a protective measure on his part. He didn’t want to get too hurt, to be disappointed by the people he couldn’t help, so he kept himself numb. “Is acting like Cujo a side effect?”

  “See, now that’s the real weird thing. The known side effects of the stuff seem to be dehydration, nosebleeds, heart palpitations, respiratory distress, a lot of Ecstasy-style stuff. To my knowledge, this hasn’t caused a psychotic break in anyone, although it’s a new drug and seems to be Northwest in origin. Maybe it hasn’t been around long enough for the psychotic breaks to be noticed.”

  “Or maybe it’s only in infecteds.” There was no way that made any kind of sense, but as soon as Roan said it, it felt true. Was that it? Had it not been noted because normal people taking it didn’t have that kind of reaction?

  He heard the squeak of Seb’s chair as he sat forward. Somewhere behind him in the station, an audibly drunk guy was repeatedly yelling, “What about my rights?” “How would that work, Roan?” He wasn’t dismissing it; he sounded intrigued.

  “I don’t know. I suppose that’s something I’ll have to ask Rosenberg.”

  “Could a drug do that?” Roan almost answered, but realized it was rhetorical; Seb was just musing out loud, weighing the possibilities. “We just don’t know enough about the virus, do we? We still don’t know where this fucker came from.”

  “My personal favorite is alien PETA members.”

  “It would explain a lot.”

  “Tons.”

  “Ah shit, gotta go, Dixon’s headed this way.”

  “Duck under the desk.” Dixon was one of those cops who was a terminal fuck-up. No one ever knew how they kept their jobs, or why they persisted at it when they were so bad at it. It was one of those mysteries with no answer.

  “Too late. Let me know if there’re any developments.”

  “You too.” He hung up wondering if a drug could possibly be responsible for all the cat freak-outs. It wasn’t out of the realm of possibility, but why infecteds only? That part didn’t make sense.

  Once he was sure he wasn’t going to put a gun barrel against his temple, he went downstairs and told Dylan that was too dangerous to ever attempt again, mainly because he was an infected and Dylan wasn’t, and having an open wound around an infected was a bad idea. Dylan, holding an ice cube wrapped in cheesecloth against his lip, said it wasn’t, because the only body fluid he was exposed to was saliva, and the virus had never been passed by saliva. Somehow it figured that Dylan would know that, because, being the guy he was, he had probably gone to infectedfacts.org when they started dating and read all about it. He told him he didn’t want him to be the first known case, so that was that. But Roan had a sneaking suspicion they would argue about this in the future.

  Roan called Doctor Rosenberg, but had to leave a message because she didn’t pick up her phone. She was probably getting some sleep. So Roan did some searching on his computer.

  The first result on “burn” as a drug turned up three months ago in someone’s Facebook post, and then it increased exponentially, although it still wasn’t widespread. If LexisNexis could be trusted, it had gone as far north as Vancouver and as far
south as Eugene, but so far it had been limited to the West Coast… for now. These things never stayed regional.

  He then did a search of odd cat incidents in Washington, Oregon, and British Columbia, and it took hours to sort them out, but he flagged five. One was an article about the case in Bremerton that Seb had mentioned, but the others were new to him. At the last minute, he decided to add an article about a panther that had killed a horse in Cle Elum and mauled another (and got shot and killed for the trouble).

  The gallery opening to the public was at eight, but there was a “private” opening starting at six thirty, which was the one they were heading to, and while Dylan’s bottom lip was no longer swollen, it did have a bit of a scab on it. It looked like he’d been punched, and Roan was certain that Dylan’s friends, who already thought he was a fascist, would think he’d hit him. Considering he basically drank his blood during sex, hitting Dylan was actually the better option than the truth.

  They were supposed to dress up a bit but not get too fancy, so in honor of Dylan’s pretentious friend, Roan wore paint-splattered black jeans and a T-shirt that said in bold, fancy, framed letters, “I Hate Attention Seekers.” Dylan, for his part, wore saggy jeans and a T-shirt proclaiming “Where The White Women At?” (Dominik was a friend in a technical sense, but Dylan didn’t care for him much, and the more pretentious he became, the more Dylan agreed that pissing him off was the only way forward).

  They were the most dressed-down people to show up at a gallery so small Roan actually drove past it without seeing it the first time. They got a couple of evil looks from women so thin Roan felt like he should give them twenty bucks to go get a sandwich, and men so camp they couldn’t have been gayer if they were wearing outfits made of dildos. Still, Dylan knew a lot of people there and was greeted warmly by many. When Dylan turned to introduce him to people, Roan always held out his hand and smiled warmly while saying, “Hi, I’m his asshole husband, Roan. You may have seen me in Truncheon Beating Weekly.”

  Although there were a couple of awkward handshakes and uncertain looks, a small Asian woman named Clea burst out laughing, and a relatively good-looking emo guy named Keenan snickered and said he was more of a dickhead, but he was aspiring to be an asshole someday. Roan told Dylan he could invite Clea and Keenan over anytime.