“Debrief the Captain. Split the team. I have the lab on lockdown. The rest circle back to relieve the Captain. Civilians are the top priority.”
“Roger that.”
Stern looked intensely at Joseph for a silent moment. “Alright, debrief me, Doc. What are we dealing with?”
“I’m sure you’re familiar with Leona Kelley’s area of expertise?” Joseph was hopeful that this wouldn’t require lengthy explanation. He was convinced that Jane’s brain stimulus was burning her alive. The clock was ticking. There was no time left to stack the deck.
“Believe me, sir. The CIA has been trying to rat that crazy bitch out of Louisiana for decades. Even before she merged her rotten carcass with Kelley Enterprises. The Shreveport Armory now serves a dual purpose. We function as a micro-intelligence agency of our own.” She nodded, feeling this was all the explanation he’d need concerning the dark history that surrounded Leona Kelley.
“Then I don’t think I have to clue you into the nature of her chemical exploits. With my son’s assistance, she allegedly administered a substance purposing to euthanize Harrison Kelley first. Informed of this situation by my son, I brought Harrison here to reverse his resulting bizarre medical condition of what can only be described as, well, zombification. When we arrived to utilize the facility’s chemicals that I myself am authorized to experiment with, as I am a consulting member of the research team, we were met by Kelley herself. She had a needle forced into this young lady’s heart which injected her with a chemical solution originally intended to be a neuro-stimulant. As her condition is momentarily more dangerous than Mr. Kelley’s, I was in the process of stabilizing a counter-active substance initially created to balance the effects of rapid neuro-stimulus for the purpose of organ function.” Joseph was out of breath.
Stern nodded. “You only haven’t started shooting her up with other stuff because you don’t want to add more sauce to the marinara she’s already basting in?”
“Exactly. We have to be sure before we take measures.”
All eyes in the room trained to Jane Lewis. She was rocking back and forth on her knuckles, screaming in pain. She was sweating intensively.
“Talk to us, Doc. What’s happening to her?” The Corporal was appalled.
“My best guess? The stimulant coursing through her is causing the natural electronic functions of her brain and other organs to function at an increasingly rapid rate. The electronic frequency is becoming too hot for her cellular walls. The natural fluid of her cell-tissue is evaporating at an alarming speed. The sudden collapse in cell walls is causing her veins and arteries to implode and break in places. Which is the reason why I haven’t used a low-presser on her. The vessels aren’t breaking because of high-blood pressure, but rather because of liquid’s aversion to compression.”
The soldiers moved about the room like ghosts, bringing Joseph whatever chemical he requested in an attempt to test and then perfect the counter-drug to slow down her stimuli acceleration.
They swam against proverbial rapids to perfect the serum and save her. Yet all their efforts were still not fast enough.
Jane swept her hand through the open air as her eyes began to foam like a rabid dog’s lips.
She grappled Kingsley’s arms as he tried to fit her with makeshift cold compresses.
“She’s lost a lot of blood.” Kingsley felt himself getting sick. At this point, she should probably be going into cardiac arrest from the loss of so much blood. Only she wasn’t.
Kingsley watched slack-jawed as Jane’s chest and arms began to smoke a white, strangely sweet smelling smoke.
Live flames began to lick up, lighting in her dermis and cancerously eating away at her epidermis until it broke out of her flesh and onto her clothes.
The young woman began weeping from swiftly-drying out eyes. In that instance, Spontaneous Human Combustion went from myth to fact.
*****
Chapter 22
“Ready, set… Go go go!”
Lindsey yanked the door open. Sergeant Manson leaped up, swiveling the MG3 on the tripod. He peppered the street with an entire clip’s worth of rounds, trying to stop the carousel of hot rods from escaping.
Captain Matheson gripped his walkie tight. The White team had just debriefed him on Leona’s escape.
“Roger that. Red team, close in on the Shelby 427 Cobra. Repeat, close in on the Shelby 427 Cobra. Fire at will.”
“Sir?” Cary lowered her pistol, face twisting in obvious disturbance.
“Kelley’s escaping. She’s been in the lab, which means she’s had contact with the contraband merchandise. If the Andromeda1 serum reaches the black market then Shreveport, the rest of Louisiana, and pretty much the Planet goes up in smoke!” The Captain gritted his teeth eyes flashing with urgency.
Dexter held his breath. He knew that he’d gotten caught up in the midst of something bigger than he could have ever even imagined. The world was a darker, weirder place than he’d ever given it credit for. Jane’s haunting accounts of her father’s career and childhood training came floating back to him now.
“You’re doing great, buddy. Step on it.” Captain Matheson’s voice was like a drug calming his nerves. Still, Dexter’s innocence had shattered with the same gut-sick sinking of a thin-iced pond all around him. He could smell the lingering reeking blaze coming from two of Shreveport’s many police stations. That system he had trusted his safety almost wholly to had failed. They hadn’t counted the bodies yet. The widows didn’t yet know to weep.
The world would never be the same after tonight. That one nightmare doctor that had riddled Dexter’s life with so much stress and pain had now, like Pandora’s rakish brother, unleashed a new order of demons and burned down the world.
This fight was passing over his head.
“We’re going to have to call in reinforcements. She’s getting away and this City is being completely overrun by Modern street-hopping pirates.” Sergeant Manson instantly regretted his words.
“Pirates? Wait a minute! That’s Hollywood bed-time story stuff!” Lindsey shook her head, laughing in his face. What he’d said was ridiculous, right? Pirates and demons belonged to the kid’s books of bygone decades.
Sergeant Manson looked apologetically at the Captain. He’d obviously let something classified out of the bag by uttering those words.
“Easy, Sarge. With all that these kids have witnessed tonight, they’ll definitely end up in protective custody and later witness protection anyway.” Captain Matheson’s eyes reflected exhaustion.
Sergeant Manson took a deep breath as if he had to brace himself for the explanation.
“Wish that were true miss. But I’m not talking about swashbucklers like Captain Kidd or guys with eye patches and Jolly Rodger flags. Modern piracy is just high-sea gangsters pushing contraband over the water. It’s the mob, it’s the cartels, and it’s people like Leona Kelley. New Orleans being seated right at the mouth of the Caribbean makes it the perfect poker table for these assholes. Shreveport is the catch-all of trash that floats upstream from there. Leona Kelley has been the crime-lord of a global crime syndicate for around 15 years. She makes Whitey Bulger look like little more than an especially pugnacious Red Sox fan. Has her hand stuck so far down the cookie jar, she even has NATO on edge…” The Sarge tightened his hands around the machine gun.
“Yeah. Which is why Shreveport’s local militia has taken on a whole new function. We act sort of like a miniature, anti-piracy combination of the Secret Service and the NSA for Shreveport and New Orleans. We double as a clandestine police force. Citizen-soldiers spying on the daily lives of innocent and guilty citizens alike, trying to root Kelley’s out of Louisiana before her cancer spreads throughout the whole country. We’re backed by NATO and the CIA, of course. I mean, we are just Guardsmen. Black Ops isn’t really our thing.” The Captain grinned sheepishly. He was uncomfortable with the cat being out of the bag.
“Shreveport was becoming a peaceful place until tonight. Now she�
�s pulling her big guns— like the infamous Andromeda1 serum, which we’d always meant to get our hands on before she did. Too late now, though. She’s always been after something bigger than anybody wants to actually consider. I guess the market’s lucrative enough to suit her at last, and there’s more in store than money can buy her. We’re witnessing the shaky take-off of a Lady Hitler, my friends.” Mickey’s voice was strained. She craned her neck anxiously, trying to see what became of the Cobra.
“Matheson? Do you copy, sir?” It was L.Cpl. Stern’s voice on the line.
“Roger, Corporal!”
“I’ve received intel from the scouts we sent to check the fire department out. Compromised fire department and dead firefighter staffing are affirmative.” Stern had to stifle a sob, having had many friends on the firefighting force.
“Dear God! This woman sure knows to tie her ends off! Get me sights on that Cobra! Blow that thing back to Hell and send her down to Satan’s kitchen if she wants to cook Zombie crystal!” The Captain was spastic now.
“Sir, I have confirmed. The Cobra is down. Repeat, Cobra is down.” A random soldier’s voice responded to the command.
“Search the wreck.”
“Sir?”
“Repeat, search the wreck! We have to be sure!”
The radio silence lasted too long for comfort.
“Do you copy? Someone pick up the line!” The Captain was shouting into the walkie.
“Sir. We have confirmed that the wreck claimed the life of a female driver aged approximately 26 years. There’s no sign of Kelley in the wreckage.”
The Captain cursed and beat his hand on the dash.
“Right. I need Red team to sweep the parameters. Branch out for the next 10 blocks. This City does not sleep until Kelley is in militia custody!”
“We have a bigger concern in the Lab, sir.” Stern’s voice quivered over the airways.
“Why can’t you tell me some good news, Erica?!” The Captain was trying to laugh despite the absolute catastrophe he was shouldered with.
“We have a female patient that is experiencing what can only be described as, um… well, spontaneous combustion. In a highly flammable lab that is located in a city that’s cut its fire department budget by 5 percent annually for the last 10 years.”
“Jane!” Dexter, Ivy, and Lindsey screamed her name in unison. Without thinking, Dexter swerved the van back towards the Lab’s doors and smashed straight through them.
*****
Chapter 23
“There’s one way to make an entrance, kiddo.” The Captain had rolled across the floorboards colliding firmly with Sergeant Manson’s shoulders.
Dexter climbed through the shattered windshield and ran into the scene. He came to a stumbling stop when he saw her.
Jane had been moved to the center of the room. The soldiers had made her sit on her knees in the midst of a tarp and started pouring baking soda in rings around her. It was technically an electrical fire coming out of her, so it could, in theory, stop the spread.
She was thrashing, blood coming out of her eyes and sweat pores. They’d had to secure her jaw with someone’s belt to keep her from biting off her tongue. Her condition made Reagan thrashing around in The Exorcist look like a mildly strenuous yoga routine.
“Jane!” Lindsey fell to her knees beside Dexter.
“Oh God!” Ivy hid her face in Captain Matheson’s shoulder blades. The soldiers just stared in horror at the girl’s agony.
“Liars! Sold out! You sold them out! Thousands of people, women, children, invalids! Slaves to the Bosses!” Jane was shrieking words that didn’t make sense. There was nothing natural or sensible about her situation, though. Collective consciousness? Spontaneous Human Combustion? These were medical phenomena that belonged to the future or to heavy debate. Now it was happening before their eyes.
“Eureka! I’ve got it!” Joseph Kingsley held a syringe of clear liquid high above his head with an elated shout.
“Lu, hold her still!” Kingsley moved to obey his father’s command. He grappled Jane under her arms as she thrashed and tossed her head to either side.
To the last person, they stood breathless witnesses as Joseph Kingsley injected Jane in the spinal column with the unique substance. They watched as she gradually began to calm down. With the decreasing speed of her stimulus reaction, Jane’s cells began to cool off. They watched as the cold compresses and the fanning efforts of several of the stand-in medics gradually reduced the flames. The white smoke began to die down.
Jane groaned and slid forward.
“She’s going to need emergency cardio-vascular reconstruction!” Kingsley took Jane’s pulse, eyes the size of harvest moons.
“Let us help! We have to!” Lindsey dove forward, whipping her nurse’s license out of her coin purse and flashing it at the soldiers. Dexter pressed close, fumbling for his own.
“Yeah, they’re with me!” Mickey crowded close, Ivy at her heels.
Jane was loaded carefully up into a bundle of tarps and soldier’s jackets. They carried her carefully to a stretcher and lifted her up into the back of a Humvee. Kingsley began to step forward when a rifle’s barrel slammed into his chest.
“Nu-uh, Romeo. You’re coming with me!” Stern goaded Kingsley toward an armored truck. The soldiers didn’t bother to cuff him. They wrapped him in barbwire instead.
“Okay, let’s get one thing clear before we set sail, Doctor Psych-Show. You move I shoot you right between the legs. Yeah, you heard right.” Stern slammed the swinging doors on Kingsley. Kingsley kicked at them with anxious screams. He knew in that minute that he was done for.
The action in the lab had died down for just a moment.
“This should work to reverse frozen stimulus too, my friend. It’s formulated not necessarily as a depressant but more as a stimuli regulator. With you, it should act as a jumpstart to wind your up and unstick you from your stupor.” Joseph talked in a quiet voice as he pressed close to Harrison. He’d made enough of the serum for two syringes. Cautiously, he lifted the syringe to Harrison’s spine, injecting him in the lateral segments.
Harrison dropped to the floor and began to vibrate in freak epileptic seizures. Shouting wild apologies and cursing, Joseph dropped to try and control his younger friend’s thrashing.
“No… It’s okay. It’s okay, Joe… You’ve saved me again.” Harrison’s hands reached out and grabbed Joe’s flailing arms. The soldiers gathered awestruck to see that the vicious seizures had ended almost as quickly as they began. For the first time in over 48 hours, Harrison Kelley was capable of speech.
To be certain, Joseph reached down and took his pulse. He checked his respiration. He double, even triple checked. He was about to check for the fourth time when Harrison caught his hands with a nervous laugh.
“Normal vitals! Back from the living dead, Harrison Kelley! You, my friend, are a regular modern-age Lazarus!” Joseph laughed hysterically and clapped Harrison on the back.
“Which if you’re alive, means that you’ve once again been sucked onto her ruthless chess board.” Sergeant Manson towered over the rejoicing pair, brows twisted in painful chagrin.
Harrison swallowed.
“I suppose you’ll want to interrogate me. I’ll stand trial. Be under suspicion as her accomplice.”
“Well, you’ve clearly been rolled through this thing like a set of deuce. No, I think we want to interrogate you to get to the bottom of what that She-Devil wanted you dead for. Already have some pretty good ideas that have to do with press manipulation, player elimination, situation conditioning, and other criminal mastermind field play that would move her into the place she could begin her bio-chemical apartheid of the human race.” The Captain stooped and lifted Harrison to his feet.
“For a man who had AIDS, Lou Gehrig’s, died yesterday, suffered from an old fashioned case of Zombie Sleep-Walk and just had a massive series of psycho epileptic fits, you’re looking good, Mr. Kelley!” He clapped Harrison on the back with
a smug smile.
“Health is great, but it puts you in a vulnerable position. She’s escaped. We’re combing the parameters as we speak, but with someone like Leona, there’s no guarantee we’re going to catch her now that she’s given us the slip. We have to take you both into military protective custody until further notice.” Sergeant Manson indicated with his gun that Harrison and Joseph should proceed to one of the Humvees.
*****
Chapter 24
Leona Kelley’s criminal syndicate had stretched its fingers to every sanction of civilized society. With sinking spirits, the Guardsmen realized that even Shreveport’s medical services had been corrupted.
Jane Lewis hovered in between life and death in the Humvee’s seat. She was in dire need of care that the Guardsmen medics couldn’t give her. By rights, she should have died hours ago. Now she was hanging on by the power of will alone.
Dexter, Lindsey, and Ivy had been allowed close to Jane for a while and had administered basic first aid and comfort best as they could. In the midst of the transportation chaos, a few of Leona’s rogue gun-ladies starting firing at anyone within three yards of Jane.
“Okay, you’ve got to get to a safe zone. Get them to safety!” Mickey pushed Ivy and Lindsey into Cary’s protective arms.
“Come on!” Cary tried to grab at Dexter but he couldn’t be contained. He elbowed his way through the throngs of other medics and rolled himself through the back window until he was by Jane’s side.
“Jane…”
The city’s blazing buildings cast light over her death-pallor. The Humvee’s driver was shouting to one of the following truck’s drivers. Dazed by the impossibility of their situation, Dexter couldn’t understand their conversation. It had something to do with how Leona’s girls had infiltrated Caddo Vitality’s staff. They couldn’t take her there. There were many more hospitals in Shreveport, but they’d all come under the influence of her poison.
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