by Shanon Hunt
“So this was our deal, huh?” Layla’s voice boomed in the hushed arena.
Stewart seized her waist to throw her off, but she scooched up his chest, pinning his upper arms to the ground. She grabbed his hair to lift his head, wrapped her leg around his neck and clasped her ankle in an impressive headlock.
He bucked his hips and beat his hands against the pavement.
“That’s why you wanted me in this demonstration,” she growled, “to set me up to kill James. What better an ambassador than the furo who killed the man she loved? How much would your precious government saps enjoy that?”
Despite Layla’s much smaller frame, Stewart was trapped. His arms were useless, and he stopped thrashing around. His face was nearly purple.
“But I have a better message to send.” She pulled the hold even tighter. “You cursed us forever with a rage syndrome, a locked-and-loaded weapon against the diseased.”
She released the hold and pushed up to her knees.
Stewart sucked in a raspy breath and coughed several times.
Sweat-soaked hair draped over her face. “But here’s where you fucked up, asshole. Once the rage is triggered, we don’t care who’s at the sharp end of the knife.”
She brought the knife down with such force that blood sprayed to either side. Stewart’s hands flew up into the air and then smacked the pavement palms down on either side, spread-eagled.
“This is what … salvation … looks like, Stewart.” Her labored breathing made the words ragged. “I am your … ambassador … the face of the furos.”
The knife rose and came down a second time. And then a third. And a fourth, until James had to close his eyes.
Layla was gasping for air. “This is your vision. Welcome to the rage colony.”
70
March 2024, Mexico
This was it. This was the place. Nick had studied the photo of the Chinese restaurant where the virus had been released for weeks. Every centimeter of it was burned into his brain.
He pushed himself to a standing position, wavering slightly from light-headedness, to stare at the almost imperceptible crooked canopy, presumably the result of whatever had cracked that pillar.
He dropped his eyes to the pavement. Patient zero, as she’d been described, had lain right here, a woman whose face was concealed by her long dark blond, blood-caked hair. She’d straddled her victim, hunched and wet with sweat, both hands wrapped around a knife buried to the hilt in his chest.
Neither the woman nor her victim had ever been identified.
He studied the clean, smooth cement to his left and right. In his mind, he saw the splatter pattern as clear as if it were there now.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Eddie had stepped in front of him and was scrutinizing his face. “Are you like having a panic attack or something? You’re pale as fuck.”
“Jesus, this is where it started. They created it here.”
Nick’s head was swimming with possible headlines, floating in and out of his mind before he could grab onto them, before he could connect the pieces. “Governments Lied About the Origin of the Virus.” “Billion-Dollar Vegas Experience Re-Created in Secret Area 51 Location.” “Genetic Experimentation Targets Brain Cells.” “Desert Cult Recruits Young People From Cities to Cure Them of Drugs and Diseases.”
Somehow, he didn’t believe Eddie would get any HIV treatment as part of his five-year Eugenesis contract. He didn’t believe a cure was the logical chaser to this big night on the town.
And he didn’t believe this was any night on the town.
His eyes darted left and right, up and down, as he tried to wrap his brain around something concrete.
Security cameras were positioned in every possible niche, not an inch of this surreal playground wasn’t monitored from at least three angles.
Undercover security guards strategically placed, at nearly a one-to-five ratio.
Area 51. Government.
Virus.
An ample population of white-clad cultists, here to do … something.
Young, sick recruits.
Brainwashed blank slates wandering all over the campus.
“It’s a training facility,” he breathed.
“What happened?” Eddie frowned.
“Reality-based training. Immersion training. This place is a government facility, like … like combat field training.”
It made perfect sense. They had cultivated a herd of sheep, with carefully planted cases of illness. This was a simulator. They were watching the whole sequence, studying it. The lure, the setup.
The kill.
He spun around toward the pedestrian mall, and his eyes landed on Bald Xena, who watched them from barely ten feet away. Her lips were still moving, her eyes were involuntarily bouncing side to side. The eye spasms.
Eddie scoffed. “Training for what? Partying on leave?”
“Oh, Jesus. God.” He leaned closer to Eddie, eyes locked on the woman, and whispered, “This is where the virus was created.”
“What?” The color drained from Eddie’s face, and his eyes followed Nick’s stare.
“Eddie. She is the virus.”
71
October 2022, Mexico
The world around James had gone silent. All he could feel was the air moving in and out of his lungs.
He couldn’t look away from the scene in front of him, even though it was covered in blood, even though he just witnessed a brutal murder by a human weapon he’d helped design, and even though his longtime business partner lay dead.
The greatest and worst moment of his life was slipping through his grasp, and he was afraid that if he turned away, it would slip away entirely: the moment he’d first seen her, Allison Stevens, ten years ago—the same moment he’d lost her.
Austin insisted on dragging him along to the thesis presentation, some nonsense from a college girl.
“Just look into her research,” Austin said. “It’s an interesting concept. You might be able to use it as a recruitment tool.”
Pain as a positive concept? A reward? No. It was a dumb idea.
But the moment she stepped up to the podium, he felt a connection so powerful he was practically paralyzed. It was as if she’d reached into his soul and squeezed. He knew, even then, he’d never be the same.
His fate was sealed that night at the cocktail reception following her presentation.
“Are you going to talk to her or not?” Austin handed James a glass of champagne as they stood against the back wall of the reception room.
He hadn’t taken his eyes off her all evening. Her radiant smile, the way she held her Diet Coke with extra lemon, the way she tossed her head and looked away to say thank you, too modest to take a compliment. She was truly enchanting.
He wanted more time, he told Austin. He wanted to read her publications first, check her research. In reality, he just couldn’t seem to make his stubborn legs move toward her.
“For God’s sake,” Austin said. “I’ll do it.”
Austin swept across the room like a professional dancer with the confidence of—well, the confidence of Austin. Before even uttering a word, he plucked her Diet Coke from her hand and replaced it with fresh champagne. Then he leaned in with a devilishly charming smile and spoke into her ear.
James would never know what Austin said, but she looked so deeply into Austin’s eyes that James could almost feel her falling in love with him right then and there.
His own heart cracked.
That reception had changed everything. James had suffered in silence every moment from that night forward, as Austin used Allison, lied to her, framed her, and almost killed her.
But that was nothing compared to what he himself had done to her. James was the one who had stolen her past from her, who’d implanted a monster inside her and turned her into the predator he saw before him now. Not a shred remained of Allison Stevens, that sweet, shy, brilliant girl who sipped Diet Coke at a cocktail party, and he was to blame. One hun
dred fucking percent.
The flash of a camera jolted him from his reverie.
Colonel Shaffer was regarding the scene with the same hardened expression he’d worn all night. The youngest DOD staffer held up an iPhone and snapped several more pictures of Layla straddling Stewart in a pool of blood just beneath the now-crooked canopy.
The colonel nodded at James. “I believe we have what we came for.” He turned on his heels and started back to the main entrance, his men in tow.
James had to jog after them to hear what the colonel said next in a low voice to his lieutenant.
“Call it in. I want this facility terminated immediately. A full annihilation.”
The lieutenant startled. “Sir?”
The colonel lengthened his stride. “That is not a weapon. That’s a nuclear time bomb. I want this facility to be a meteor crater on satellite images. Is that clear enough for you?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Sir, if I may be honest with you,” James called.
The colonel kept walking.
“I’ve known the risks with this model for a very long time now. I know General Harding had his doubts, and I’m pretty certain that’s why he sent you. I agree with him completely. It’s not ready for release. My research team here has been working on a reversion—a cure, should we find we’re unable to control the evolution of the praefuro. We’re close. We’ve been testing the lower doses, and we’re seeing a modest but distinct repression of the prey and kill instinct.”
He fell back a few steps as the DOD team squeezed in front of him at the main entrance. Security held open the double doors and saluted as the colonel strode through.
James shuffled to catch up again. “Please reconsider your order. I only need a little more time. And once we—”
The colonel stopped and faced him. “Dr. Elliott, I suggest you get yourself onto an airplane and get out of Mexico immediately, or you too will be reduced to dust.”
James watched them slide into their black vehicles, which would take them to their private jet and back to Washington DC.
Get yourself onto an airplane.
His eyes lifted to the sky, a dark and starless void beneath the high desert clouds. Here and there he saw airplanes overhead, their red beacons flashing. How many flights took off every day? How many from places with other colonies, places like—
Beijing.
Fucking Beijing.
He sprinted to the black SUV, idling just outside the back gate as it rumbled open. He banged on the back passenger window. “Sir, it’s too late! It’s too late!”
The front window cracked, and the driver leaned over. “Back away from the vehicle. Now.”
James leaned in so his voice would echo inside the cab. “They’ve been released. The praefuro! Stewart told me a little while ago. They’ve been released from China. They won’t stay together. They’ll spread out. They’ll travel.”
He expected the window to close, but it didn’t.
He raised his voice. “Sir, with all due respect, you’ve seen what they’re capable of. You know what will happen—”
The SUV peeled out onto the dirt road, shooting gravel and dirt at James’s face like pellets from a BB gun.
“Ahh.” He fell to his knees and rubbed his burning eyes with his fists.
The vehicle screeched to a halt, and James heard a door open and slam. He rolled up to his feet.
Colonel Shaffer stopped ten feet away. “China is outside my jurisdiction.”
It was too dark to read the man’s expression, but James could tell he understood the problem. He straightened, but his voice was pleading. “We have to warn them. We have to warn the whole world.” James’s voice hitched. “And then, for the love of god and humanity, you have let me save them.”
72
March 2024, Mexico
Eddie’s hand, wrapped around Nick’s arm, began trembling. “Oh, no. Oh fuck. She’ll come for me first—they always kill the sick ones first. Oh god.”
Nick surveyed the area around him, searching for a way out. Behind them, three security guards huddled against the steel walls that enclosed the far end of the Gallery. Two were chatting and one seemed to be daydreaming; none of them were paying Nick and Eddie any attention. The place was as big as six airplane hangars, but he couldn’t see an exit point. It had to have multiple emergency exits, probably along the long sides and certainly at the corners, through the Asian restaurant or the art museum.
“Eddie, we have to run through the restaurant,” he whispered. “Head for the back door. Find the kitchen. It’ll have a back exit for trash.”
Eddie mewled as the woman took two steps closer.
“Stay right behind me. Count of three. One, two, three!” He yanked his arm from Eddie’s death grip and barreled into the restaurant.
He dodged a man carrying a water pitcher, barely avoiding a dousing. “Hey, what’s going on?”
Virus rule number one: If you suspect you’re in proximity of the virus, don’t run. Remain calm. Stay in a large crowd, and avoid physical contact with it. Every little kid today learned that rule.
His legs pounded ahead.
“This way!” He yelled over his shoulder as he slammed his palms into the double swinging doors—the kitchen, just as he’d expected.
He stopped dead. In front of him was a prep table buried in freshly chopped vegetables. Along the wall hung twenty or so knives of various sizes and blades.
Virus rule number two: Never lure the virus into an area heavy with weapons.
Just beyond the prep table was a door. The sign above it read Emergency exit only. Alarm will sound.
“We can make it,” he panted. “I know how to get off the compound.” Never mind that they’d have to crawl through cactus and squeeze through a fox hole.
He bolted across the kitchen, slammed the bar, and flung the door open. Despite the wailing siren, which would certainly bring security running, the cool night air was an invitation to freedom.
“Ready? We need to stay along the fence.”
Eddie didn’t answer.
He did a one-eighty and leaned back inside to scan the kitchen. No sign of Eddie. Just three fearful chefs standing in a cluster, waiting for Nick’s next move.
Virus rule number three: Protect the sick; they are the most vulnerable.
He closed his eyes and let his breath stream out slowly through his nostrils. Eddie would certainly be dead already. There was no point in risking his own life by going back.
And now he had the story. The whole story. The world would soon know where the virus came from, how this heinous desert compound collected people from the streets to … to what, feed the virus? Create more of it?
He shivered. The story had to get out there. He could save thousands of lives, but he had to escape to write the story. Eddie was just a casualty. Collateral damage. A sacrifice for the greater good.
His legs didn’t move.
“Leave him.” He spoke the words aloud, hoping that his muscles would listen. “Just go.”
I don’t care how long it takes to get a cure for my HIV, ’cause at least the virus won’t get me.
Nick shook his head. “Fuck it.”
He grabbed the biggest knife he saw from the rack and ran back into the dining room.
Virus rule number four: Don’t try to kill it. You’ll lose.
“Eddie! I’m coming!”
73
October 2022, Mexico
James crouched in the back seat of the colonel’s Cadillac Escalade, his thumbs tapping madly on his phone’s notepad. This message to the world, coming from the president of the United States of America, would save not only countless American lives but lives in every country.
The message would have to be brief. Straight to the point. Under thirty seconds. Every major network would run it, and it would hit social media like a storm.
The door swung open and Colonel Shaffer took a seat stiffly, facing forward instead of looking James in the eye. “T
he Central Intelligence Agency has received confirmation that a group of more than ten thousand mentally ill patients has escaped from a hospital in the Gansu province of China. According to the CIA, the clinic was illegal, and the Chinese, US, and western European governments have gone on record stating they had no knowledge of its presence or practice.”
James gawked at the colonel, whose gaze remained on the headrest of the seat in front of him. It was a lie. Eugenesis’ success was overwhelmingly based on the support and protection of the national governments. Stewart had reported to the highest ranks of leadership on a monthly basis. They knew. They all knew what was happening in the colonies.
“The US government denies any knowledge of or participation in human genetic research beyond carefully scrutinized genetic therapies for the treatment of life-threatening diseases, such as cancer or AIDS.” The colonel pressed his lips together in a tight line and continued. “The US government will not endorse nor deliver a statement that suggests the US was in any way involved with such an atrocity.”
James sat back, the phone dangling from his fingertips. If the national militaries refused to acknowledge the situation, they wouldn’t be prepared the take down the ragers. It would be like—Christ, he couldn’t believe he was thinking this—it would be like the zombie apocalypse. The ragers would kill thousands before they could be eliminated, but that wasn’t the end of it. The world would let down its guard, people would reenter society, and that’s when wave two would begin. By then, the praefuro predators would be embedded throughout the world, nearly impossible to identify. And—oh god, just like his very own Layla, who had killed a man, a security guard with no known proliferative diseases—the praefuro would deviate from their mission. Their minds would evolve. They’d establish their own definition of impure.
There had to be something he could do.
When he raised his eyes, the colonel was finally looking at him, straight at him, with a stony, inscrutable expression that made James’s neck prickle. “Dr. Elliott, my driver and I are going to step away from the vehicle for the next five minutes. I have some unrelated business to attend to.”