“After that, a team from the CDC was called in. Unique mineral deposits were found lining the caves, in large quantities. In small doses, they were virtually harmless, causing only a small headache or minor dizziness. In protracted exposure, cases were much more severe. As you know, we were able to secure almost 2 metric tons of the deposits, which were subversively extracted from the area under cover of darkness, and exported via military channels back to the U.S.”
He smiled, and the blue screen lit up behind him, transforming from a blank screen to a video of several scientists bent over small Petri dishes, hypodermic needles in hand, wearing full HAZMAT regalia.
“Since then, for almost fifteen years, Starling Mountain Research Facility has been the home of the Lazarus Project. At first, we didn’t appreciate the unique qualities of the compound. While we realized that it caused various physical ailments, we were intrigued by writings found on the walls of the tomb indicating that in other iterations, the compound might actually possess restorative properties. Of course, we had no idea what that implied. We assumed initially we were talking about a primitive Ibuprofen or similar painkiller. Maybe even an amphetamine.”
He smiled again and shook his head, stepping aside as the picture behind him changed. The footage was grainier, the camera shaking.
“It wasn’t until about ten years ago that the full import of the substance was realized.” The camera was clearly being held by an amateur, and it followed the path of a stretcher as it wound its way down halls very similar to those through which we had come today. Exactly like, really.
“What you’re seeing is footage of the medical evacuation of a scientist who suffered a massive cardiac event while working with the substance in lab 4 a decade ago. In his discomfort and pain, he removed his protective garb in direct exposure to very concentrated amounts of the compound. Since he was in obvious distress unrelated to the effects of the compound, no one thought much of it when he was removed from the room.”
The camera had stopped and the image of a body on a wheeled stretcher was visible in a stark, dismal hallway. The paramedics had moved back from the gurney, and were looking at one another uncertainly.
“Quite by accident, we had been filming the degeneration of certain primate functions in laboratory animals when he became ill, and were able to catch the subsequent events on camera.” His tone was thinly veiled excitement, a tone of wonder and marvel infused with anxiety.
On the screen, a white sheet stretched over the form of a body moved, as if the body below was no longer inert.
“What we discovered by pure accident,” he continued, “was quite phenomenal.”
The sheet rose up as if levitated, falling down again to reveal the now-familiar gaping maw and gray-hued skin on the face of an older man in a disheveled white coat. His teeth were bared and his hands were suddenly active, searching for the cameraman. The camera dropped to the floor; feet moved in front of the now cracked lense, and blood splattered on to the floor. The video feed terminated in a flash of motion. The screen froze on the last image: blood covering the dull linoleum, mere centimeters from the camera lens.
The video feed shifted back to Kopland, whose grinning face was morbidly out of place considering the scene that had unfolded on the blue screen mere seconds ago.
“We found that, for lack of a better description, we could now reanimate the dead.”
Chapter 27
The screen behind Kopland now transitioned to a laboratory with bustling scientists clustered around a table. The object on the table was obscured by the bodies in white lab coats, but he continued to speak as the camera neared the table, slowly making its way forward.
“After the incident with Dr. Matthews, research progressed on the mineral, which we found had, to say the least, unique restorative capabilities. However, we also found that it was inherently unstable. Tests on subjects in the lab indicated that reanimation was possible, but only on a certain level. In other words, we weren’t raising the dead per se; we were simply reanimating the corpse and reenergizing certain bodily functions and impulses. As we saw with Dr. Matthews, brain function past certain primal stages was impossible to restore due to the instability of the element. And as we saw with the cameraman that Dr. Matthews attacked, innate impulses to feed were inexplicably drawn to human subjects, possibly due to the high iron content of the blood or some sort of genetic response to other human pheromones; potentially even a primitive draw to the scent of human hormones or other bodily odors.”
The crowd had been parted, and the camera was focused on a young, middle eastern-looking man strapped to a long, steel table. His face registered fear and pure anxiety; he quivered against the metal table and his hands and feet moved slowly against their restraints. Eyes like agates shifted constantly around the room; his voice was shrill and pleading. He was naked but for a pair of under shorts and the straps adorning his extremities. From the side of the table, a nurse approached him and coldly injected his arm with a milky red substance. As the chemical disappeared into his arm, the scientists around the table backed off. His face grew slack and his arms dropped limply to the table.
“The restorative properties of the chemical lead naturally to a drive to determine whether it could be utilized not only to safely reanimate dead tissue, as it had shown it was capable of doing, but also to make existing, living tissue regenerative or even impervious to flesh wounds or bodily injury.”
“As you know, we were provided ample test subjects from our various Defense Department sources. All of them provided vital information for the project. The young man you see behind me was our first direct injection specimen.”
The body hadn’t moved.
“In it’s solid state, the element’s restorative properties seem only to be applicable if death occurs in direct proximity. However, in the weaponized version, LZR-1143, the chemical was and remains highly transmittable through liquid contact. Fluid transfer and bites tend to be the most dangerous methods of contagion. Interestingly enough, there seem to be no similar effects from direct exposure to the chemical in its mineral form. Of course, other adverse reactions manifest, such as the nausea and headaches. But the chemical in its natural state has no transformative capacities unless the body in proximity is deceased.”
The fingers in the right hand were now twitching slowly, as if the man on the table was having the human equivalent of a doggy-dream.
“We found, of course, that direct injection of the chemical into the blood stream causes death. But it also caused near instant reanimation. ETI-I’m sorry, Exposure to Infection-times varied depending on the location of the bite, but typically had run their course within forty-five minutes. Overall, an extraordinarily tenacious and aggressive infection.”
Our assessment of the infection had been correct: infection timing depends on location of the bite. That must have been why it took Sam so long to succumb.
The man’s eyes had opened, staring unblinkingly at those clustered around him. His mouth opened soundlessly in what we knew to be a soulless moan. Limbs jerked awkwardly against the leather restraints. The man we had seen before was no more. This was now, forever, his unformed substitute.
Kopland’s voice droned on, untouched in affect by the reality of the horror unfolding behind him. “As of the date of this film, we have be unsuccessful in weaponizing this mineral in the manner mandated by our grant, or creating any version thereof that could allow for the creation of the desired “super-soldier.” While we have determined both an aerosolized and liquid delivery system for 1143, we have not been able to determine how to counteract it’s less… desirable… effects in the event that the thirteenth apostle is located. However, advances are being made every day, and we feel that we are very close to achieving that goal.”
Thirteenth apostle? What the fuck did that mean? And weaponizing? So this is how the human race was to destroy the world. I always thought it would be a nuclear war. But that was before the government really put their minds to it. This was much more interesting.
But it wasn’t the world we were ending, was it? It was just us.
As I thought about it, I realized we were really doing the earth a favor. Eliminating the virile pestilence that had plagued the planet since we rose up off four feet and started playing with fire. We were doing in one fell swoop the work that the universe usually dawdled on about for millions of years: the mass extinction of an entire race of being.
And the thing is, we couldn’t blame anyone but ourselves. It was appropriate to go down this way. As I watched this man speak so dispassionately and detachedly about a sickness so abominable that it lacked any appropriate descriptor, I knew we had created our own destruction. The bible came back to me in a fleeting moment of irrational whimsy.
And he saw all that he had made. And on the seventh day, he rested.
I guess it was time for us to take a rest.
The video had cut to one of the cages we had seen in the other monitors. A rifle had been laid to rest on the floor of the cage, and a female scientist with her back to the camera was miming the physical gesture of picking up the gun. The creature, knowing only hunger, simply clambered against the fencing, eyes on the human. She turned to the camera with a grin on her face, sighing in mock desperation: the picture of a naive scientist, ignorant of the macro-chasmal implications of their work, focused only on the end for the sake of the end; means be damned. I could have shrugged off the personal affront that this sort of arrogance entailed if I hadn’t known the woman in the picture.
It was Maria.
Kopland continued on. “Continued funding is vital for our success. We urge you to continue to support this program. It is only through the Defense Department’s continued commitment to this program that we can hope to ever perfect this process, create the weaponized agent sought by DOD, and provide a counteracting agent in the event the thirteenth apostle is located.”
The video faded out, and Dr. Kopland’s face dissolved into black. We sat there, stunned.
“I can’t believe that something like that got out,” Kate replied, still staring at the screen.
“Jesus, Maria.” I said softly, still in shock at seeing her picture. I remembered her face, but seeing it so alive and vibrant in that video-even though she was involved in what might be the Armageddon of our millennium-brought back a rush of emotion.
“Yeah, well as personally devastating as that must be, we need to figure out where this guy could have kept any research on an antidote or a cure.” It wasn’t exactly heartless, but there wasn’t a lot of compassion in her voice. And there was certainly judgment.
The wheels were turning slowly in my head, rust falling off slowly.
“In a minute. I’m still at the ‘it getting out’ part. You’re absolutely right. How did something like this make it out of here? Despite our easy entrance today, this place was pretty locked down on a daily basis. Two separate guard booths, secluded location, barbed wire electrified fencing, the works. So are we supposed to believe someone stole this thing from the outside?”
I shook my head. Not likely at all.
“This had to be an inside job: someone from the inside knew how to get it out, how to spread it, and had the means to deliver it.”
She looked incredulous, replying in an exhausted voice, “That’s absurd! Why would anyone so arbitrarily sentence humanity to something like this? What is there to gain?” She flopped down tiredly on the chair facing me, eyes doubtfully cast.
Slowly they turned, step by step…I could hear the creaking of the giant wheels as they strained against the inertia of mental fog.
“This was no accident! Think about it! How could they accidentally release something from this location that spawned initial outbreaks in Philadelphia, New York, Boston and DC all at the same time! If it was an accident, the townsfolk down the street that tried to eat us a few hours ago would have been the first ones down, and the military, the police, the fucking boy scouts - someone would have eradicated the infection before it got too far.”
As I spoke, it all made sense in the most perverse of fashions… the facts were dropping into place.
“No, no, no. This was intentional. Someone meant to do this and meant to let this thing out. There’s no other explanation. I’m not saying it was the government or the military; I wouldn’t believe that if you told me. There’s no possible scenario under which those guys win. If it was a coup, or an attack or something… people take over governments to control people, not to kill them.”
“Why does it matter?” she asked, interested but understandably circumspect. “Isn’t the whole point that it’s out? And that we need to try to stop it? What the fuck does it matter how or when or where or who let it out. It could’ve been Elton John and a troupe of trained circus squirrels for all it fucking matters. We just need to figure out how to put it back in.”
She still wasn’t following, and I had to make her understand. “That’s just it! If we knew who let it out, we might have a better idea of how to stop it! There have to be logs, or journals or… fuck! I don’t know! Something! This is a god damned government lab! Shouldn’t they have anal-retentive records or big brother spy cameras that can catch someone planning something like this - ”
She interrupted me, still not a convert. “But who would do something like that? Why? Like you said, what is there to gain? Someone with a hard-on for survivalism? Some nerd that never got laid in high school looking for a reason to repopulate the earth? Who would do it?”
The lights flickered briefly, and the monitors reset. All now showed black screens. The computer I had been trying to access flickered off once more. From the end of the hall, toward the elevator, I heard a metallic thud and then the sliding of the elevator doors. We raced to the hallway to see them slide shut, the trashcan inexplicably lying across the room, far from where we had left it.