Z-Minus Box Set 2

by Perrin Briar

  One of these days he was going to stop asking Susan out. She’d regret it then. But he knew she wouldn’t. She would probably prefer it if he did stop asking her on a date. But he never would. He was one of those people who always carried hope in their heart, even if there was none to be had. Things would work out, somehow. They always did in the end.

  Phil put the robotic limbs back in their holsters and ticked a box on his clipboard to show he’d done it. He checked each of the offices were empty and locked the doors. Then he went into the main room.

  Archie sat, still and unmoving. He was going to change the world one day. There would be an Archie in every home. It pleased Phil that he would be a part of it, even if his name would long be forgotten. After a while the machines grew on you and developed a kind of personality. Archie was temperamental and threw hissy fits when you didn’t tell him exactly what he wanted. But he always got the job done. Eventually.

  Phil flicked the lights off and tossed the clipboard on his desk. Home time. After the successful fundraiser, Richard had given everyone the rest of the day off. Now it was just Phil at the research center. He didn’t mind. He felt comfortable there.

  Setbacks. Always setbacks.

  If he really wanted to win Susan, maybe he should stop jerking around and actually do something with his life, something of value. Women always found successful men attractive, and it didn’t just have to be money.

  It was one of those rare moments in life when he experienced a clear clarity of vision, like poor eyesight suddenly snapping into focus. If he could grow, develop himself into something Susan would find attractive, then perhaps he might have a chance with her…

  He shook his head. That sounded like an awful lot of hard work, no matter how true it might be. Phil was not a hard worker.

  Phil pressed the button for the elevator. It was on the first floor and making its way up to him. He looked out over the foyer, the curved roof and the garden in the center below, the fountains’ washing spray was strangely hypnotic.

  Research and development was a job for life. It would never be complete because the human race would never stop developing. It was a strange industry for Phil to be working in. He hadn’t changed in a decade. Without a goal, you were floating, without purpose or direction.

  The elevator pinged and the doors slid open. He stepped in and pressed the button for the first floor.

  “Going down,” the female voice said.

  End goal. Why did that ring a bell?

  Phil’s eyes went wide. Of course!

  He mashed his palm against the terminal, fingers pressing every button but the one he wanted: to open the doors. Finally he found it.

  Phil exited the elevator and ran down the corridor, back into the main research room. He palmed the lights on with a meaty slap.

  Archie’s robotic arms were nestled in their holsters. Archie had completed whatever exercise he was doing earlier. Phil had forgotten to check once Archie had finished.

  Phil moved to the terminal and accessed the completed projects folder. He selected the unnamed project Archie had been working on and sent it to a tablet. He scanned through the details, his brow creasing with lines.

  “A virus?” Phil said.

  He looked up from the screen. Why would they send a virus?

  He checked the schedule but found no indication of a virus they should be working on.

  Phil moved to Archie’s front Perspex panel and peered through it. There was a single petri dish with what looked like a bloody spider web inside it. The virus. It’d been colored red so it was visible to the human eye.

  Phil ran his eye down the list of properties the virus had.

  Highly infectious.

  Spread by body fluids.

  Not airborne.

  Extremely dangerous.

  “Oh my God,” Phil said.

  The tablet clattered to the floor. Unless Phil had missed his guess, this was going to be a setback. A huge one.

  2:52 pm

  Susan started awake, shrieking a scream, arms and legs flying up. In her dream she’d been falling, and as she rolled off the sofa and hit the floor, it felt like an extension of the dream.

  She was on her hands and knees, panting like she’d run a marathon, wisps of her blonde hair clinging to her sweaty face. The TV blared, something about people running around, water cannons knocking them back. Probably a movie. She must have fallen asleep in front of it. What had woken her up?

  Her phone buzzed on the sofa’s armrest. Mystery solved.

  Susan groaned, her back sore from having been sleeping in the fetal position. She hit the mute button on the TV and looked at the caller ID. It was the office.

  She turned to look at the cat clock with the wagging tail on the wall. 3pm. And fast asleep already? What a loser.

  She answered the phone.

  “Hello?” she said.

  “Susan?” Phil said. “Oh, thank God.”

  Susan snapped awake.

  “Phil?” she said. “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah, I’m fine.” Phil said. “Do you remember Archie was working on something this morning?”

  “Yes,” Susan said.

  “Well, he finished making the thing he was making and, well, it’s not good news,” Phil said.

  “What is it?” Susan said.

  “Have you seen the news?” Phil said.

  “What news?” Susan said.

  She was still groggy and half asleep, otherwise she would have shouted at Phil to tell her what the hell was going on. Movement out the corner of her eye caught her attention. It was the TV.

  People ran all over the place, down narrow alleys, and over concrete bollards. Others attacked, leaping on top of them, biting and savage. The camera was shaky, handheld, from a high angle, like from a helicopter. It kept trying to focus on what was happening in the streets, but the image turned blurry, the action lost behind a building.

  “Hold on a sec,” Susan said.

  She hit the mute button, and the reporter’s gibbering filled the room.

  “That’s affirmative,” the reporter said. “The people here in New York are attacking each other. At this moment, we don’t know why. The water hoses aren’t doing anything, but I think… I think some of the people are hurt. They got knocked down and aren’t moving… There are reports of this happening all over the city. It’s mayhem down here. I’ve never seen anything like this. If anyone is watching at home and living in New York City, you should stay inside, away from the windows. And lock your doors.”

  The remote fell between Susan’s fingers and clattered to the floor. Her worst nightmares were taking place right before her. The people were wild, mad, and though she couldn’t make out their features from this angle and distance, she could tell they were moving in an unnatural gait, limbs stiff.

  “Susan?” Phil said. “Are you there?”

  Susan worked her mouth.

  “We’re too late,” she said.

  All those years of intense research to prevent events such as the one she was seeing, and a virus was already gripping humanity’s throat. They just needed another year or two and they would have been safe.

  Phil sighed into the phone.

  “Maybe,” he said. “But there’s still a chance. Can you come in?”

  “I don’t know,” Susan said, still distracted. “I’ll have to see if I can get a sitter.”

  “Okay,” Phil said.

  Susan couldn’t drag her eyes away from the TV.

  “It’s unreal, isn’t it?” Phil said.

  “Yeah,” Susan said. “I’m going to call Rosario.”

  “Okay,” Phil said. “Hurry.”

  Susan hung up and dialed Rosario’s number. The phone rang ten times before someone answered. It was a deep, gruff voice. A man’s voice.

  “Uh, sorry,” Susan said. “I’m looking for Rosario.”

  The man grunted. There were some ruffling sounds, what might have been blankets, before Rosario answered.
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  “Rosario,” Susan said. “I’m really sorry to call you so late. It’s an emergency.”

  “What is it?” Rosario said. “Is it Amy? Is she all right?”

  “She’s fine,” Susan said. “Something is happening in New York. I need to get to the office and I was wondering… Forget it. I shouldn’t have called you.”

  “No, it’s fine,” Rosario said. “I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”

  “Thanks Rosario,” Susan said. “I appreciate it.”

  Susan hung up and turned to look at the TV again. The news anchor was speaking.

  “…but some viewers may find the images disturbing,” he said.

  The image returned, of people bashing others’ heads against the tarmac and walls, and then reaching down to scoop up the spilled brains and putting it into their mouths.

  Susan shook her head. The world had gone mad.

  3:40 pm

  The petri dish was small and unassuming. Hard to believe it contained the potential to reduce civilized people to angry beasts much less lay waste to the human race the way it had on the news. But that was what Phil was telling them, what the information on the readout was saying.

  It was all their nightmares coming true, and at precisely the wrong time.

  Susan, Richard and Phil were alone on the fifth floor of the research facility. Still, they lowered their voices for fear someone might overhear them.

  “Still no word from New York?” Richard said.

  Phil shook his head. A dark cloud settled over them. The riots had taken place just down the road from the New York research facility. It was too much to be coincidence.

  “Where did it come from?” Richard said.

  “We can’t know that,” Susan said. “We might never know.”

  “It could be a rare strain of Ebola,” Phil said.

  Susan shook her head.

  “No,” she said. “I checked out its sequence. I’ve never seen anything like it before. It could be a thousand years old, ten thousand, and hasn’t changed in all that time.”

  “Viruses have been known to lay dormant for thousands of years,” Phil said with a shrug. “And then once an organism comes across it…”

  He clicked his fingers.

  “It doesn’t matter how it got started,” Richard said, pulling on his inhaler. “It’s here now. We have to do something about it.”

  “What about the other research centers?” Susan said. “Do they know anything about this?”

  “I spoke with them,” Phil said.

  “And?” Susan said.

  “They said they hadn’t received any communication with the New York office,” Phil said. “They don’t seem to know about the virus yet.”

  “Call them back,” Susan said. “Tell them everything we know. We’ll upload everything into the cloud so they can access it.”

  “There’s nothing much we can upload yet,” Richard said. “We don’t really know anything about it ourselves.”

  “No,” Susan said. “But we could.”

  Richard turned to look at her, and then at Archie.

  “He’s only a prototype,” he said. “He might not work.”

  “Better than not trying,” Susan said. “There’s nothing to lose.”

  “And everything to gain,” Phil said, nodding in agreement.

  Richard considered the alternative, cupping his chin with his hand. He was one of the smartest, most logical people Susan had ever met. He would see they were right. He finally nodded.

  “Okay,” he said. “You’re right. We’ll use him to create a cure. We should use both arms?”

  “Yes,” Susan said. “Never hurts to have a backup.”

  “Turn Archie on,” Richard said.

  Phil jogged to the terminal and began inputting instructions. The computer bleeped, spelling nonsense, a code only programmers understood.

  Archie’s arms turned in their sockets, warming up and stretching, exercising their manmade muscles. The fingers extended and stretched, spinning around in their sockets. Then they turned and performed an intricate inverted dance, each arm performing the exact same action. The arms rose, picked up vials, and began removing chemicals from the vast multicolored bank behind them with the calm, precise movements of a dancer.

  “How long will it take?” Richard said.

  He already knew the answer, but sometimes it was good to hear it anyway.

  “Eight hours,” Susan said. “Give or take.”

  “I sincerely hope it gives,” Richard said. “We need this cure made and distributed to the world as soon as possible.”

  “We just have to hope the virus doesn’t spread too fast,” Susan said.

  “And hope Archie can actually formulate a cure,” Phil said.

  It was an awful lot of blind hope. But what other choice did they have?

  They stood back and watched Archie, his arms moving in perfect synchronicity. They were potentially looking at the world’s only hope for a cure.

  “The situation we were planning for…” Richard said. “It’s already happening.”

  “We should inform somebody,” Susan said.

  “Who?” Richard said.

  “Everyone,” Susan said.

  “I don’t think you need to worry,” Phil said. “They already know.”

  He was staring at a TV monitor. Somewhere in the land of the free a fire had been ignited, birthing a dirty gray-black column that rose like a portal to hell. From its gaping jaws, the lumbering lurching creatures emerged.

  Behind them, Archie’s arms spun and revolved, attempting to create a brew that could save them, if only the research center could last long enough.

  Unfortunately for them, more bad news was already heading their way.

  Z-MINUS: 7 hours 53 minutes

  The US army set blockades around New York, choking the lifeblood traffic to a dribble. Helicopters hovered overhead and scanned the city streets. Long queues were evacuating the city, out of every exit, purging like blood from an open wound. Vehicles were packed with possessions from their old lives. The army checked them with handheld thermometers as they passed, but there were so many evacuees it was difficult to do a thorough job.

  Richard changed the channel. More images of the stricken city. No one was entirely sure what was happening, but since the army had taken action there seemed to be less violence on the streets. Another channel. A behavioral expert sat on the panel speaking to the anchor.

  “What do you think has suddenly caused all these people to begin acting this way?” the anchor said.

  “Repression,” the expert said. “Years of repressing anger and fear from a government that has been taking opportunities away from them. You’ll notice the majority of the attackers are young men and women.”

  “What about the eating of flesh and blood of others?” the anchor said. “What accounts for that?”

  “By consuming others the attackers believe they are removing their competition and consuming the skills of others,” the expert said. “These are not normal functioning human beings.”

  “I’m certainly glad we have you here to tell us that,” the anchor said, straight-faced.

  The expert only nodded, serious expression in place.

  Richard changed the channel again.

  “It’s on every channel,” he said.

  Except one. Reporters stood waiting on an airport runway. It was still business as usual in some parts of the world.

  “After the hostilities between the US and Cuba thawed in recent years,” a reporter said, “rock and roll icons the Rolling Stones were excited to host a free concert after their sold-out show in New York. Rock and roll was banned in Cuba for many years. This marks a historic day in relations between the two countries.”

  The airplane door opened and the Rolling Stones disembarked. They looked rough, blinking against the bright sunlight. Perhaps they’d been partying hard on the plane.

  They descended the steps to the runway, barely managing to catch the
mselves with each step. The photographers’ cameras flashed. The reporters leaned in close.

  “Mick, how does it feel to be in Cuba?” the reporter said.

  Mick turned to him, cocked his head to one side, opened his famous mouth wide and bit a chunk out of the reporter’s neck. Blood squirted over the assembled, who screamed as the rest of the band fell upon them. The camera jerked side to side as the cameraman ran.

  “It’s out of New York,” Richard said. “Outside the U.S.”

  Their problems had just gotten a whole lot worse. A virus was easier to control when it was contained within a single area. If it had gone international…

  “It’s going to get here,” Phil said. “Isn’t it? It’s going to get to us.”

  “It’s a real-life test,” Richard said.

  “Except we haven’t got all the other facilities built or online yet,” Susan said. “Otherwise we would have a lot more information than we currently do. We’re in the dark.”

  “We have some time,” Richard said.

  “The plane the Rolling Stones came on was from New York,” Susan said. “Who knows how they caught the virus. Maybe they already had it. Maybe everyone at the concert was infected… And now they’re going to take it back home to their friends and family. Before long the cordons the army set up will act more like cages.”

  “Then why hasn’t the virus already started spreading?” Richard said. “We should be seeing the virus all over the country by now.”

  “Maybe it has an incubation period,” Susan said. “Maybe it takes time for the virus to spread and infect someone.”

  “I hope so,” Richard said. “I hope it’s several years.”

  Unlikely, Susan thought, but she didn’t want to cast an even darker spell on their mood.

  “We need to make preparations,” Susan said.

  “What preparations?” Richard said. “We’ll have the cure by the time the virus gets to us.”