Shit, she thought, resisting the urge to turn on her heel and sprint away.
“Dr. Lal, how you doing, buddy? Haven’t seen you up here in a few days,” the new officer remarked with a friendly, toothy grin.
The doctor’s countenance changed completely. The corners of his eyes wrinkled as he matched the officer’s smile. The posh English accent morphed into something more casual. “Heya mate, yeah. You know how it is.”
He flashed his badge without breaking stride, obviously thinking he was going to walk straight in. Kristine moved to hold out her own and skidded to a stop when the second officer, the shorter mean one she’d met the first night, held out his arm in front of the doctor.
“Hold up there, mate,” he said sarcastically. “We gotta scan you in.”
Kristine looked to Dr. Lal for guidance, making sure to keep her profile to the officer.
“Sorry? I didn’t realize things had changed,” the doctor replied, happily handing his badge over. The credentials were quickly approved.
Kristine handed her badge to the cop without meeting his eye. She could feel him watching her, studying her for any sign of deception. The doctor and the friendly cop were caught up in conversation.
“You know I’d never hold it against you, but when the Sox come out, we should go to a game.” Dr. Lal laughed and gave him a pat on the arm.
“I’ve seen you around here before,” the shorter cop said, moving his head to catch Kristine’s attention.
“Oh, probably,” she squeaked.
“Yeah, you look familiar. I’m real good with faces, you know.”
Kristine couldn’t push the limits of her mock social anxiety any further without arousing suspicion. She met his gaze. “I have one of those faces.”
The moment was balanced on the razor thin edge of this man’s memory. Tip one way, and she’d be caught. Tip the other, and they’d…
“Well, thanks for the update lads, but we better keep moving,” Dr. Lal declared. He pressed the flat of his hand on Kristine’s shoulder blade and practically shoved her through the door.
With every step, she expected the policeman to burst from the doors and expose her. Matching the doctor’s long strides, they were half way down the corridor before she felt safe. She finally felt like she could breathe and refocus on the task at hand. He’d made it abundantly clear that no photography or recordings could be used in her story. Even the smallest detail could give away the identity of the hospital, from the color of a gown to a logo in the background. But she could take as many notes as she liked.
Posted at every door was a bored, armed officer. They gave the doctor polite nods but otherwise ignored the pair as they walked by. Kristine was desperate to look in each windowed door, but couldn’t be obvious about it.
Dr. Lal entered the second to last room on the right, strolling in without a glance back. Kristine scuttled inside and froze the moment the door clicked shut.
She’d been so busy planning how she was going to get in to see the patients, she hadn’t considered what it was going to be like to actually see them. One would’ve been terrifying enough, but eight all sitting upright in the room, motionless. The fear came from a place deep inside, an innate knowledge that there was something very not right about them.
“If you’re going to gawk, at least get away from the door,” the doctor whispered as he pulled her to the left.
Kristine made a little noise in the back of her throat. She tried to move, tried to collect herself, but it was too much. The doctor sympathized.
“We ignore it, but humans have a powerful protective instinct. We find rotten food repellent, detect dangerous vibrations from bee hives. Have you ever met someone that immediately made you feel uneasy but you couldn’t put your finger on why?”
Kristine nodded. “Countless times.”
“It’s like that, isn’t it?” he asked, his voice full of wonder.
She couldn’t stop staring at them all. Their stillness was uncanny, like at any moment they would be able to swing their legs of the side of the bed and walk right on out. At the same time, the expressions they all shared were that of an emotionless doll.
“We don’t have a lot of time,” he prodded.
Kristine forced herself to type as she spoke, taking notes while gathering more information. “Four adult women, two adult men, and two children,” she said to herself. “How old is the… the youngest?” she asked, glancing at the little girl in the bed closest.
“She turns seven in three weeks.”
She’d seen some horrible stuff in her life, but the idea of a young child like getting her hands on a drug that could do this. “That’s horrible. What else do you know about them?”
The doctor paced up the center of the room as he spoke, maybe for appearances in case the officer peered inside. “Other than their catatonic state, they are all healthy. No serious pre-existing diseases or disorders. There’s nothing environmental, as far as we can tell. They come from different parts of the city, different socio-economic classes, religions, races.”
Kristine’s fingers flew across the screen, typing in as much as she could. For the first time, she loathed agreeing to the blanket ban on recordings. A five-second video of this room would get the message across far more effectively than any story or report.
“You mentioned they come in waves?” she led.
“That was actually discovered by a colleague out in San Francisco.” Dr. Lal hesitated as if reconsidering how much he wanted to tell her.
Her journalistic instincts kicked in. “You’re under complete confidentiality, don’t worry. No one will know that…”
“That’s not what I’m worried about,” he spat. “I… fuck it. In for a penny, in for a bloody pound,” he said to himself. It was the first Kristine had seen him flustered. “The waves are doubling each time. First few came in undetected because we’re a busy hospital. One here, two there, they blend in. But when it got to be four, then eight, it became a pattern we couldn’t ignore.”
Dr. Lal noticed Kristine struggling with the mental math. “We have over a hundred patients.”
“Where else is it happening?”
“San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Miami, Kansas City, that we know of so far.”
She was so blindsided by it all, she forgot the most obvious fact. Pressing herself harder against the wall, she asked, “And all these people, they killed someone before they…”
Dr. Lal nodded, his lips forming a thin line. “Every one of them.”
She was stunned into silence at the sheer number of death. Over the course of a month, hundreds of people had been killed, hundreds committed, trapped in motionless bodies. No one was talking about it. No one was addressing it.
Kristine watched the doctor as he greeted one of the patients. He spoke in a soft voice as he examined her, resting his hand gently on her back as he listened to her heart, then her breathing. Other than blinking, the woman showed no signs she even knew he was there.
“We can put the patients in any position,” he said as he softly pressed her shoulder to the bed. Kristine held a hand over her mouth as she watched the woman float back, her face emotionless. “But within a few moments, they all return to this seated state.” He stepped back, almost like he had performed an illusion.
“They don’t react to anything?”
He stared at the woman as she slowly began to rise. “No. Nothing we’ve found.”
“This is… I can’t believe…” she stammered. “What drug does this?”
“Drug?” he frowned. “This isn’t…”
Kristine’s last grasp on remaining calm was slipping. “Why haven’t we been warned?”
Dr. Lal’s jaw tightened, the thin cords of muscle standing out under the shadow of a beard. “All I can say is the medical professionals dealing with this on a daily basis are not the ones making those kinds of decisions.”
“Which is why you’re willing to talk to me.”
A heavy silence grew in the room. Kristine
was desperately aware she didn’t even know enough to ask the right questions. She felt wholly unprepared for all this.
“What can I, I mean… what can we, the public, do to stop this?”
The doctor held her with a long, hard look. “Nothing.”
An echo of voices traveled down the hallway outside. The doctor frowned at the raised tones, striding toward the door like he was about to tear someone apart.
Kristine hesitated, believing the commotion was about her. That cop finally remembered me. At the same time, she was willing to face whatever consequences if it meant getting out of this room. She peered around the corner of the open door and shrank back inside.
At least thirty people swarmed down the hallway. A handful dressed in all black directed their own medical personnel into each room. The first rooms were already being emptied, the stationary patients swaying gently as their beds were wheeled out of sight.
“What is this? What’s going on here?” the doctor demanded, his friendly demeanor gone.
The friendly officer shoved his way past. “They have the paperwork.”
One of the men in charge stepped forward. “We’re moving these patients to a secured facility,” he told the doctor with a shark’s smile.
“Why wasn’t I told? Who authorized this?” Lal demanded with quiet, professional rage.
The man in black handed him a tablet that apparently had all the information he needed. He tossed it back into the man’s hands and stalked back to the room. He didn’t see the smug smile Kristine spotted once his back was turned.
Without a word, Dr. Lal jerked his chin to the back of the ward as he whisked past. She scuttled behind as best she could, glancing over her shoulder at the chaos behind.
They approached an emergency exit guarded by a single officer. She took a step to the left, hesitating but ultimately blocking their exit.
“Move,” Dr. Lal growled.
The woman glanced down the hall and decided it wasn’t worth the hassle. They pushed past the second she got out of the way.
Once in the stairwell, the doctor rounded on Kristine. “You need to get out of here. File your report, send it to as many people as you can before you do. Hopefully they won’t be able to take it down before it spreads.” He took two steps up to the next level when she grabbed his sleeve.
“What’s going on? Who were those guys?” she asked, pulling him back.
He glanced at the shut door as if waiting for them to burst through. “I wasn’t going to tell you this today, but circumstances have… forced my hand,” he replied, gaze dropping to the floor. “This isn’t substantiated with proof, you must know that.”
“Okay,” she nodded.
“I have a colleague, a friend, Dr. Richards in San Francisco. He believes these attacks have something to do with the seed implants.”
Kristine’s hand rose to the back of her neck, a gesture the doctor didn’t miss. “But that’s… there’s never been a problem with them before…”
“No. You understand why I didn’t want to…” The voices outside the door were growing closer by the second. He gritted his teeth and gave her wrist a squeeze. “If you decide not to release this, I won’t blame you. But I’d hope you at least get the information out anonymously.”
Kristine didn’t know how to answer him, but she felt like he was looking for some kind of reassurance. “I’ll do the right thing,” she promised, without knowing what that could be.
“Follow the stairs down to the lowest level and you’ll see a fire exit. I’ll call you when I can.” The doctor leapt up the steps taking two at a time. Kristine waited long enough to hear a door open and shut a few floors above. The officer spoke on the other side of the door and Kristine made her decision.
Rochester, New York
June 5th
The fifth time Neil watched the counter tick down, he was alone again. Maggie was probably with Ian, Wills had given up, and Rachel hadn’t been around much since the last countdown. Sitting in a dark room, Neil cradled his cheek and watched the numbers tick down. He felt like the loneliest man in the world, counting down the New Year by himself.
The red numbers zeroed. Paused. Reset.
The secret code offered another sequence of letters and numbers. Neil didn’t bother writing them down, having read the entire passage in the Bible a half dozen times. The other change was significant and subtle, almost so much Neil nearly missed it.
As he was about to swipe away and stare at his homework, he noticed the caption beneath STASIS had changed.
Beta.
His fingers moved swiftly, half finishing a message to Wills before he stopped himself.
It’s just another clue in a series of clues that all point to more clues. This is so stupid! he raged at himself. With a deliberate motion, he swiped away the freshly ticking counter. I need to forget all about this.
Not at all in the mood to study, he thought about going to sleep and starting a new dreamscape, maybe one where he could crack codes. It was too early to go to sleep and with his exams only a few weeks away, he should really be spending his dreamscape time studying. Instead, he decided to browse a few websites, see what was happening in the world.
Boring politics, news about some skirmish in a place he couldn’t place on a map, human interest stories. He tapped and swiped and barely consumed any of the content he was reading.
A message popped up from Maggie. “It’s happening again! In New York!”
Even without the details, Neil could tell from her excitement she’d sent another snuff video. He swiped away, ignoring her.
A few seconds later, she sent another message. “Open it, you pussy.”
He ignored that one, too. Twenty minutes later, a fist pounded on his door. Neil rolled his head and glared at the door, imagining the gleeful look on Maggie’s face. “Go away! I don’t want to watch your shitty…”
“Let me in.”
As Neil padded to the door in his socked feet, he couldn’t remember a time he’d ever heard Wills sound so serious. He rushed in the second the door unlatched, sweaty and out of breath.
“Have you seen this?” he panted, swiping a video onto the smart wall.
The second Neil caught a glimpse of the shaky recording, he turned away. “Why are people so into watching people die?”
“This is it.”
With a bitter taste in his mouth, he forced himself to watch obliquely, ready to turn away.
Like the first one, the video was quite benign in the beginning. A group of guys were take turns hitting golf balls. Neil realized they were in one of those multistory golf complexes surrounded by a net hundreds of feet high. They seemed a little drunk but happy, enjoying the start of their weekend. Everything looked normal until someone shouted off screen.
The image whipped around to the bay beside them. The cameraman jostled through the men at the front just as an arc of red flew through the air. The image finally centered on an Asian man in his early 20’s brutally beating someone with a bent pitching wedge.
Neil gagged, holding the back of his hand to his mouth. He had to look away, but Wills picked up the narration.
“No one stops him. They yell, sure, but no one steps in the way. And then… yeah, right here. He puts the club down like it’s made of porcelain, picks up whatever is left of this person, and throws them over the side like… like…”
“I get it,” Neil mumbled. He stared at the ceiling, sucking air in through his nose at a steady count.
“But then, here, look. The worst part is over,” Wills said as he spun Neil around.
The attacker, now covered in splashes of crimson and hair, calmly sits down in the puddle of what remained of his golfing partner. With his legs straight out, eyes devoid of thought, it was like he physically shut down. Even when the first tentative people stepped close to subdue him, there was no resistance or even reaction.
The wall went dark and Wills rounded on him. “This just happened.”
“Okay… so?”
“What also just happened?”
Neil ripped his arm away, embarrassed he might actually throw up. “I don’t fucking know.”
“The countdown.”
Despite the initial surge of excitement he had knowing Wills hadn’t given up, his knee-jerk reaction was denial. “Come on,” he scoffed.
Wills wiped sweat from his forehead with the heel of his hand. “There’s only one way to find out.” Leaving the frozen video on the smart wall, Wills tapped silently on his tablet. His concentration and assurance made Neil a little uncomfortable, like they were digging somewhere they probably should’ve left alone.
“You know as well as I do, the counter probably means nothing,” Neil said conversationally.
Wills looked at him through his bushy eyebrows. “It’s in beta now.”
“But that could mean he’s adding fireworks at the end! We don’t know,” he gestured wildly.
Wills ignored him as he tapped through. When his fingers stopped moving, Neil waited with held breath to hear his verdict.
“Well?”
“That one in the mall happened on the same day, but not at the same time.”
Neil relaxed and settled into his computer chair, but his relief was short-lived. A gnawing thought wouldn’t let go. “What time did it happen?”
“Uh, give me a second,” Wills mumbled as he distractedly searched. “Around six, PST.”
The coincidence was getting too freaky. He felt his insides quiver in trepidation at his next statement. “That’s the same time it clicked over for us, remember? You can make websites…”
“Adjust by time zone. Jesus Christ, what is this?” Wills cursed, dropping his tablet like it was poisonous.
They stared at each other for a long moment before talking at the same time.
“We have to go to the…”
“No one can know about…” Wills shook his head. He balked when Neil’s comment registered. “Are you kidding me? No. No way in sweet and sour hell am I going to the authorities about this.”
“People are dying! If we can prevent that in some way, don’t we have an obligation to?”
Neil wondered where this newfound sense of heroism was coming from. Judging from Wills expression, he was thinking the same thing.
Stasis (Book 1.2): Beta Page 8
