Ellie shook her head. "I don't want to leave. She wouldn't leave me."
Shaun nodded, understanding completely. "I just thought we could go get cleaned up and you could get an overnight bag for the two of you for when she comes around. She'll want some things from home, right?" Shaun had heard what the doctors had said, but knew Ellie wasn't taking the news well. She hadn't had six months to deal with the idea that her mother was going to die. She had gone through five months thinking that her mother's drugs weren't working and was still waiting for the results to take effect. He knew what she was going through.
Frank looked at both of them. "Don't bother calling Greg. Getting an overnight bag together isn't a bad idea at all. I need to grab something from my office. I can drop you two off and then swing back by after an hour to get you."
Ellie looked at Shaun and then back at Frank. "What if mom wakes up while we are gone?"
"Then we'll have a pleasant surprise when we get back, won't we? Grab your stuff and let's head out."
Ellie shrugged and grabbed Shaun's varsity jacket, sliding it on. She walked by him, bumping him with her shoulder. "You might not get this jacket back, you know that, right?"
"Oh, really?"
The three of them were quiet on the way back to town. Frank dropped Ellie off first and told her he would call her after he got back to his place and had showered.
She squeezed Shaun's arm and slid out of the back of the truck where the two of them had been sitting, leaving Frank to his own thoughts in the front. Frank put the truck in gear and headed home. He looked in the back seat at Shaun and saw he was staring directly back at him. "Something on your mind, Shaun?"
Shaun stared a moment longer and looked out the truck window. "Is that a serious question? Yeah, something's on my mind. Lots of things are running through it, all fighting for attention."
"Which one's winning?
Shaun waited a long time then finally asked, "Well, did you come up with anything?"
"Did I come up with anything...?"
Shaun threw his hands up. "God, you can be dense! Did you come up with something for Karen!? Did you figure anything out during this time!? Do you have anything at all you can give her that might work!? At this point, what does she have to lose!?"
Frank lied, not sure if and how much he should tell his son. "I think I'm close. That's why I wanted to run back to the lab. If the results look good, maybe in a few days we might be able to give her a sample and see how it reacts with her body."
Shaun waited and finally commented, "So, as of now, you don't have it. Let's hope she has a few more days. Those doctors didn't sound like they had a lot of hope."
Frank smiled and looked in the mirror. "Doctors don't know a thing. She could last a day or she could last a month--they can't tell us when she will pass, or if she will at all."
They pulled up to the house and Shaun hopped out of the truck. Frank rolled down the window to say goodbye as Shaun turned around and called, "Don't forget to come back for us!"
****
Frank backed out of the driveway shaking his head, never thinking his own flesh and blood would have such contempt and anger for him in the ways Shaun showed on a regular basis. He put the truck in gear and drove straight to E&T, entering and doing his normal security pass check.
He nodded to the daytime security guard, Pat, who was a full-time, silver-haired retiree in charge of watching the place. Frank had a good idea from Karen what kind of profits the company earned annually, and it amazed him they chose to skimp on company security.
When Frank went to enter his lab he was surprised to see Rogers there. "Hey, Rogers! I thought I told you to take the rest of the weekend off. What are you doing in here today? It's time you got to relax a little."
Rogers didn't respond. He went into the rat facility for a minute and then came back out. Frank didn't like being ignored. "Rogers, what are you doing here? Why aren't you catching up on sleep?"
Frank was watching him. When Rogers finally looked over at him, he noticed immediately that he was tens sheets of pale, and his facial expression was one of numbness. Frank walked to him slowly. Rogers seemed completely unresponsive. Frank gave him the space he thought he needed and picked up the desk phone and called security. Frank waited and on the second ring he was greeted with an answer from Pat. "Security office, sir. How may I help you?"
Frank spoke quietly, "Hey, Pat. It's Frank up in the research and development lab. I wanted to check--do we happen to have anyone in the emergency health service today? I know its Sunday, but I was hoping that maybe someone was in."
"Are you okay? Is there an emergency, Dr. Fox?"
Frank shrugged his shoulders, unsure really at this point what was wrong with Rogers. "Yeah, I'm fine. I wanted to talk to emergency services. My assistant was here when I came in and he doesn't look all that great. I figured someone could take a quick peak at him...? I think he's just exhausted."
"Give me just a minute, Dr. Fox. I'll call up to Health." He hit the hold on Frank's line and hit a second transfer line that rang directly up to the company's health department.
The phone was answered on the second ring. "Health. This is Kiley. Can I help you?"
"Hey, Kiley. It's Pat down in security. You bored? Can I transfer someone over to you please?"
"It depends.... Is he going to be trouble?"
Pat laughed. "Yeah, he sounds like he's going to probably be a real killer."
"Well, if he's any trouble, I'm going to hold you personally responsible, Pat."
Pat hit the transfer button and sent Frank to the onsite nurse. Kiley announced herself again and where she worked for the second time in three minutes. "How is it that I can help you, Dr. Fox?"
Frank had gotten Rogers sat down, and was doing an initial assessment of him. "Oh, good! I'm glad you're here. I'm up in my research lab. I just showed up and saw that my assistant was here. He is walking around and is completely unresponsive. To tell you the truth, from a medical stand point, I'm even a bit surprised that he's up and walking still. His heartbeat is irregular and a bit fast at the same time. He won't answer me when I ask him questions. He seems to have a light bleeding coming from his eyes, but I don't see any injury to them or any broken blood vessels. I know he's been sleep deprived for quite a while--both of us have--but I didn't think he'd gotten this bad already...."
Kiley was tapping away on the keyboard. "Do you have some medical background, sir? You seem to know what you're talking about--you took care of all my initial assessment questions for me."
"I've been around the medical field for most of my adult life. I did time in the Army where I cut my teeth. Do you think you'd be able to bring a wheelchair and a medical kit if he needs anything? I think some rest and if he doesn't look better in a few hours, I'd call a doctor."
"I can bring my gear. Can you help me get him situated in his chair? I don't want to worry about hurting him if he won't allow me to assist him walking."
Frank hung up and observed Rogers. Some drool was coming out of the side of his mouth. Frank looked at the bandage on his hand and slowly unwrapped it. He examined a dark bruise but could barely find the cuts on his hand. He remembered Rogers saying something about the rats doing it the other night. Frank was thinking how he was fine just twelve hours ago and he re-bandaged the hand.
Ten minutes later, there was a polite knock on the door as Kiley entered the lab. She called out to anyone listening. "Good morning? Hello, Dr. Fox ... are you in here, sir? I brought the wheelchair, sir. Can you help me get him loaded up? Will you be escorting us to the resting room facility?"
Frank shook his head. "I'm actually in a hurry but will be more than happy to help get him in the chair. I have my own family emergency to tend to, but I wanted to make sure that he didn't stay in the lab like this all day long. This can't be good for him."
"I understand. Thank you for your help and worrying about your friend. It's always some of the worst accidents when you're tired--they say it's more dangerous to operate a vehicle when you're tired than when your intoxicated...."
Frank watched as they started to head down the hallway, thought it over, and jogged up to the young nurse. "Nurse, I'm so sorry, but can I leave this with you please? I won't feel right if I don't know that he's doing better. He's really been burning the candle from both ends for me for the last few months and I have to say that I feel a bit responsible for it. If he isn't doing better can you ring my personal cell phone, please?"
"Well, not many doctors are so worried about their assistants. It's nice to see a boss actually care about his employees! We've been seeing a flu bug that's been just horrible. From what you say he's been working here a lot, and it might sum up his list of symptoms if he caught that. I'm not worried at all. You shouldn't need to be, either."
Frank nodded. "Isn't
that
the truth!"
She walked out of the room, and Frank went to shut the place down and lock it up. He was trying to hurry--he originally planned on being here for two minutes to simply pick up the second and third doses for Karen. He really wanted to make sure that he didn't have any other reasons to leave her today.
He went to the fridge where they kept the extra eight vials of medicine. He grabbed what he wanted, but noticed a giant yellow hard-shell case. It was from the sister branch where they made small quantities of the serum. It had an order number, shipping date, and the chemicals included in the batch as well as the amounts which were used. He noticed it had the same name as the chemical he was giving Karen, but when he looked at the ingredients list, he was bewildered.
"What the hell did that little bastard do!? I swear if he did what I think he did...!" He was looking and re-looking it over. He had given no directions to make this much of the drug. He looked at a second piece of paper on the case which stated this was scheduled to begin manufacturing depending on results next week. Frank could only shake his head in disbelief. He had every intention for this to all be destroyed if it wasn't the right batch. If Rogers had done anything to endanger Karen, he could consider himself a dead man.
Frank felt betrayed by Rogers--he couldn't believe this after all these months. It looked like he took the original X-74, put in some extra vitamins and something to help with the cancer agent. He laid his head down on the box, thinking for a second, and heard one of the worse squealing noises he'd ever heard in his life. He went to the rat cage room, noticing most of the cages were fine, but there were fifteen which looked like someone had used a spray gun to paint the rats red. He flicked on the light to get a better view.
He saw a rat gnawing away at another rat's carcass. The rat appeared to be bleeding lightly from the eyes. He noticed it had eaten through the other rat's stomach lining and was working on interior parts. Frank walked up close to the cage and got queasy for a moment noticing the rat had pieces of the other one hanging from its mouth as well as stuck in his nails.
Frank backed into another set of cages making him jump. He turned to run for the exit knowing he needed to get back to the hospital. "Oh, dear God! God, no! What have I done!? I should have never asked for help!"
His phone rang bringing him back to the reality of what he was looking at. Pieces were starting to fall in order for him. He looked down at his cell phone and sighed. He didn't want to answer it because he knew he should with Karen in the hospital.
He answered it. "Yes, hello? This is Dr. Fox. Can I help you?" ###
A man's voice with a thick Indian accent caught him off guard. "
Hello, this is Dr. Sanji. Did you say that this was Dr. Fox?
"
"Yeah. Is this in regards to Karen Randall?"
"
Yes. I'm calling today from Mercy Medical Cancer Clinic, Dr. Fox. Karen Randall had you listed as an emergency contact. There's been a situation at the hospital, sir. I can honestly say in twenty-five years I've never seen anything like this.
"
Chapter 13
Day -3156: October 8th, 2008. World Population 6,698,341,485
It had been ten minutes since Major Stevenson had ordered a lockdown on Echo building and the entire base--lock, stock, and barrel. He did it without the offer of an explanation. He had any and all available soldiers guarding the perimeter with assault rifles--none were sure of the threat to come, or why they'd been put on post.
The men guarding the building were walking on eggshells and wound tight. They didn't know what the hell was going on or what was trying to get out of the medical facility. They had been instructed to shoot anything that came out. Major Stevenson knew long before Christophers and Michaels had called him to alert everyone. He had the men's quarters closely monitored where the patients had been given the second round of the vaccine.
He had been in his office of the building where the drugs had been administered on the lower level near the exit. He was busy writing reports. He was cooped up getting work out of the way for his superiors when motion on the monitors to his right caught his attention, and the shock to come was immeasurable. He saw out of the corner of his eye soldiers who had been written off for dead who were fully awake again.
His optimism for the drug quickly grew by leaps and bounds. There had been botched initial trials for drugs before but now wasn't the time to tiptoe. He didn't have time to waste when there was a need for this drug now. He stared at the young battered men on the screen--men
who had been robbed of their privilege to grow old. The very idea that what he was looking at now could be the start of a new lease on life for these soldiers. He had already began writing a report on the effects of the drug and how quickly it was working--not even a day ago these men were in a deep coma state. He monitored the once hopeless soldiers who had begun to stir in their sleep. It seemed like every few hours he could see the improvements. He had been watching them since the vapor spray had taken place. Even seeing them stir in their sleep was worth making notes about
What he saw happening next was something that in his medical career was not typical of men. Looking deep at the monitor in awe, he gripped the sides of the wood desk. He zoomed in on one of the soldiers and noticed his eyes were dripping blood. He watched as the man sat in bed, sniffing, lifting his arm up to his mouth and putting his lips around it. Stevenson couldn't tell what he was looking at for sure, but realized at once when the patient lifted his head off of his arm. The soldier had been tearing a piece of flesh and appeared to be eating it. He saw the dark blood make its way down his chin coming to rest on a small pool on his white medical gown. His arm poured fresh blood in his lap.
The Major was trying to jot as many notes as he could. His hand was jittery with nerves and shaking like he couldn't believe. The man didn't seem to enjoy what he was eating as he had only taken a few pieces from each arm. He was about to call the nurses' station to get someone in there and help the poor man who was obviously having a horrid reaction to the drugs. He stopped dialing.
With his mouth wide open, he watched the screen in horror. He saw the man had somehow skipped every bed of a patient who had been administered the drug. The deranged thing stood swaying side to side in front of a bed. As he swayed slower, drool began to form and fell from his mouth dripping from his chin on to the floor. Major Stevenson gasped, "Oh, my God! No! No! What in God's name did we create!?"
The soldier, who only moments ago could barely stand and keep his own balance, leapt into the air onto the unconscious soldier's bed. He immediately lunged for him and tore insatiably through the man's hospital gown. Stevenson zoomed in the camera and hit the volume button on his keyboard to hear what was going on as well as see it. What he heard made him make the most important and stressful decision of his military medical career. One that he prayed was going to be the right one in the end. He listened closely to the noise coming from the man.
He hung up the phone to the nurses' station knowing he'd more than likely be signing her death warrant.
He was speechless. He heard a growling sound like a dog or wolf fighting for food. The creature was crouching on its toes and hands--its entire head buried in the man's entrails. Major Stevenson bent over his garbage can and filled the lower part of it up with his previous meal.
He sat up, wiping his face with his handkerchief, staring at the screen and ready to lose whatever was still left of his lunch in the can. He had a truck full of reality hit him in his face when ten other soldiers stood--all who had been given the same drug. The men swayed slowly in place, just like their predecessor had, sniffing and lifting their arms to get a taste for the flesh.
Stevenson immediately picked up his phone to call his superior.
He punched in the number. He had never before called the private number which was for emergencies only and connected to a phone in Washington, DC. His main director, Colonel Webber, answered on the fourth ring. "This is Dr. Webber. This had
better
be an emergency, son!"
Stevenson nodded to himself knowing he was justified in calling, but, in the long term aspect of things, felt better off to lie. "Colonel Webber, I can't help but place this call. God knows that if I had the choice, I would take back the actions of others from today, helping them to make better choices, but unfortunately, it's too late."
The Colonel was not one for dramatics. "Spit it out doctor! I don't have all day! What did you do?"
"No, sir! It wasn't me. It was two of my doctors. They ran a clinical trial on a group of men. We were trying to cure the regeneration issue with men who'd suffered from biochemical warfare."
Webber sat up a bit, excited. "Did you do it? Do you have a working cure?"
"Sorry to report, sir, but these men have had some sort of horrible reaction. They are ... er ... they're eating each other ... and themselves ... sir."
Webber was silent for a moment trying to wrap his brain around what he just heard. "What do you mean eating each other? Are we talking biting, nibbling--?"
"It's an all-you-can-eat chow fest, sir! And human is the special!"
"How do we, and by
we
I really mean
you
because I'm thousands of miles from there, plan to take care of this? Do you have any protocol for this?"
Stevenson got down on his knees to open his office safe. He pulled out protocol tabs which were to be broken open in an emergency. He looked through the list and returned to the phone. "Colonel, can you please tell me what I'm to do? Because there isn't a card for what's going on here tonight. I'm worried if we wait too long, we're not going to be able to contain this!"
"If this isn't containable and they've already made their way through the facility then I suggest you lock it down. And then burn it to the ground. And Major, you make God damn sure that nothing--and I mean
nothing
--gets out of there. I don't want bodies, papers, files, or anything that could possibly bite you or myself in the ass later to make it out of there. Do I make myself clear, son?"
"Crystal, sir. I'll get everyone on base to help with this, and give no instructions other than to shoot to kill."
The Colonel looked around his office trying to calculate the dissection of Congressional hearings he would have to deal with if this wasn't contained. "Don't screw this up! Do you understand!?" He hit the end button on his phone leaving the Major to do the dirty work.
Stevenson hit the speed-dial for the security office. Reaching the Sergeant's secretary, he spoke in a harsh, hurried tone. "Put on Sergeant Smith!" he demanded.
The secretary typed away, not missing a beat in her work. "Sir, is this an emergency? Because I'm only allowed to interrupt him if it is."
Stevenson snapped, "Look, ma'am! This is a Major you're speaking to, and you had better damn well know I don't need your permission, of all things, to speak to a damn sergeant!" He sat there for a second, breathing heavily, watching the monitor, seeing the creatures there making the row of beds filled with dying men a soldier smorgasbord.
He bit on his knuckle, trying to keep it together while on the phone, but unable to stop looking at the spectacle in front of him. They all had blood coming from their eyes and began to walk past the other test subjects just like the first solider had done. The blood from the bodies which had already been feasted on started to turn the white tile floor a dark red, blood and guts dripping from their bellies. He opened his desk drawer, pulled out his .45 caliber pistol, and clipped his holster to his side. He watched as the men with guts falling out were the now beginning to stand. It hadn't been ten minutes and these men were suffering the same traits and hunger of the original selected soldiers. He saw that some were starting to stray for the doors when they'd run out of fresh, living food.