by Joseph Souza
Love,
M.
I barely had time to mourn when I heard a loud knocking at the front door. I scooped the rifle off the table and gazed through the peephole. There’d been much knocking and banging on the door in the last few days. Most of them were beggars moving from door to door in hopes of scrounging food or seeking out shelter. Devin ran into the bedroom and retrieved his rifle and then backed me up. Usually we waited until the person went away, but this time the loud knocking continued on for another few minutes.
“What do you want?” I finally asked. “I’m armed and willing to use it.”
“I know who you are and have some important information to pass on to you,” an older man’s voice said.
“What kind of information?”
“About your brother. He was once a colleague of mine.”
I suddenly remembered that I had stored Thom’s severed head inside my backpack. But I hadn’t the stomach to take it out nor the guts to put him out of his misery. The lingering guilt of having killed my brother weighed heavily on me. Hunger, paranoia, and temporary insanity had caused me to lose my bearings.
“Do you know where I can find your brother?”
“What do you want with him?”
“Let me inside, and I’ll tell you everything.”
I could hear the murmur of the restless crowd passing on the street outside. Their collective mood seemed to be changing with each passing day, and I wondered how long it would be before they turned into those flesh-eating monsters. One moment the crowd on the street was agitated and the next anguished. Widespread misery had taken hold now that food, water and fuel were scarce.
The man at the door shouted my name, which confused me. I had no idea who this person was or why he was here. How did he even know where I lived? How did he know my name?
“Why do you need to speak with my brother?”
“Please, let me in, and I’ll explain everything to you. It’s getting dangerous out here on the street, and I’m afraid I’ll not last much longer the way things are going.”
“Go around to the back alley,” I instructed him. I turned to Devin. “This guy tries anything, we’re going to blast him back to Maine.”
“Gotcha, Thom.”
Devin ran to the rear of the condo, where I met him at the back door. Using the crowbar, we removed all the boards secured to the studs. We opened the door and peered into the fetid alley. Bodies lay sprawled along the walls, many of them dead or dying. Rats scurried freely, gnawing away on their rancid flesh. Most of the wandering homeless appeared to be covered in festering lesions and wounds, and they shuffled past like they were already dead. The smell made me nauseous, so I covered my face with a towel and waited for the man to turn the corner. Devin crouched down once inside the alley and aimed the rifle at the opening. Finally, the man appeared, limping towards us. He was tall and thin, and pockmarks lined his face beneath expensive horn-rimmed glasses. Devin shouted at him to stop, pointing the rifle at his head. Undeterred, the man continued to approach us, not in the least bit afraid. Devin waited for my cue to shoot, but I told him to wait.
“Stop right there, or we’ll shoot.”
“Go ahead. I’d rather die than live like this. I only ask that you hear me out before you kill me.”
“Who are you?”
“I was once a colleague of your brother at the university we both taught at. We were professors and research scientists at the same institution.” He looked at me, eyes large and melancholic inside that gaunt, pockmarked face.
“So what do you want with him?”
“Your brother holds the key.”
I laughed. “The key to what?”
“Let me inside, and I will tell you the whole sordid story,” he said. “Don’t worry, I’m frail and sick, and couldn’t physically harm you even if I wanted to.”
Looking him up and down, I realized that he hadn’t come here to do us harm. He was old and sickly, and dry-hacked every few seconds. I waved him inside, suddenly fearing that he had tuberculosis or some worse disease. I guided him to the now-tattered leather couch near the fireplace, making sure to keep a safe distance away. He sat down on the far end and stared down at the floor as if he’d given up all hope.
“So you worked with my brother?”
“We both taught at the university. In addition to our academic positions, we conducted genetic research for a biotech company called Vector Labs.”
“How did you find me?”
“He always talked about you, his famous younger brother, the novelist. Rick was very proud of your accomplishments.” The man smiled. “Rick once told me where your home was located. I’ve spent the last two months wandering around here and staking this place out in case you ever decided to show up. I cashed in everything I had and booked The Four Seasons Hotel for the next few months in hopes of tracking your brother down. Long odds, but it paid off. I decided to wait a few days before I approached your door, as it was too dangerous with the mobs hanging around outside. Here are the keys to my room at The Four Seasons. Cost me an arm and a leg, but it’s all yours if you decide to take it. There’s been no security or staff for many months, so you’ll be pretty much on your own.”
“Think I’ll pass. So what do you want?”
“I’ll be blunt. I’m dying. It’s a very aggressive form of lung cancer and not contagious, so no worries. I’d hoped to find your brother before it was too late.”
“He’s dead, Mr…?”
“Douglass Trowbridge. I used to be called Dr. Trowbridge by my students, but that’s ancient history now.”
“I wish I could help you, Doc, but as I told you, he’s gone.”
He looked stunned, defeated. He stood to leave. “Then I’m afraid this visit is all for naught. I doubt now that there’s any hope for us reversing the course of events.”
“Reversing the course of what?” I said. “You need to tell me what the hell you’re talking about.”
He turned and stared into my eyes. “Do you really want to know?”
“You came all this way, so you might as well tell me.”
“All this chaos that is happening. The end of the world.” He sighed and stared at me with his sad eyes. “Your brother and I were working on an important project for Vector Labs a few years back while employed at the university. We were listed as consultants, and in return, the company donated a good sum of money to the university’s Center of Genetic Research. Are you familiar with genetic engineering?”
“Vaguely familiar with it.”
“Your brother was a brilliant scientist, Thomas, though you’d never know it by talking to him. He was incredibly humble about his accomplishments, which included over thirty patents. One of the newly hired professors in the department once mistook him for the janitor. Rick laughed and played along with the young man for a few minutes, picking up a broom and sweeping out the guy’s lab. When the man finally realized who he’d been talking to, he was mortified, apologizing profusely for his mistake. But all Rick cared about was results, not fancy titles or awards.”
“Yes, that was my brother. There were no pretenses with him.”
“After years of intensive research, we isolated three strands in the DNA sequence of the crops we’d been experimenting on: corn, wheat, and soybeans, the world’s most important food staples. We had the potential to end world hunger with this new engineering technique. We even patented the technology, and at one point, I harbored dreams of winning the Nobel Prize.”
“But…?”
“But your brother wanted to go much further with this research. Much further than I felt comfortable going. The executives at Vector wanted us to do more rigorous testing of the technology we developed before we went public with it. So we did. We tested the hell out of these genetically engineered crops for any potential problems.”
“And?”
“The initial results were promising. We took a sabbatical from the university and spent a year out on one of the small islands
in the South Pacific. Beautiful place. Maybe three hundred indigenous natives lived on that tropical island. Rick and I spent a year helping the locals plant these new, genetically engineered seedlings.”
“Yes, I remember when he went out there. We had a going-away party for him the week before he left.”
“I was at that party. You and I met briefly, though I doubt you remember me, as you have many ardent fans.”
“I’m sorry, Doc, but I don’t remember you.”
“No worries. Our goal was enhanced production, stability, durability, adaption to local climate. The initial results were amazing. Huge husks of corn, tall, thick stalks of wheat, oversized vegetables, all of which proved resistant to pests and the excessive heat of that tropical climate. These crops were not indigenous to the South Pacific, but we did the impossible and made them thrive with little water.”
“So what was the problem?”
“Something went terribly wrong, and all of the natives fell ill about a year later with some kind of flu virus. It was something none of us could figure out. Vector sent corporate physicians out to examine them and to try to identify the culprit. While out there, they began to notice that the indigenous wildlife were acting strangely. They became extremely aggressive, and some of the animals even had to be shot.”
My ears pricked up.
“Vector realized that something had gone terribly wrong on the island, and they concluded that it was a result of the genetic engineering we’d conducted. Rick and I examined every tissue sample we could get our hands on to try to identify the problem. What we found was disturbing. It was then that Rick admitted to me that he’d allocated a small area of the island as his private testing ground. He’d attempted a far more aggressive engineering technique that, if successful, would have ended world hunger overnight. It was only when we analyzed the natives’ genetic code that we realized that his experiment had altered their own makeup. Their DNA had now adopted the very same strand that Rick had covertly introduced into the experimental crops.”
“And this DNA did what? Caused cancer? Gave them the flu?”
“I believe it’s the cause of my own cancer, but I don’t think that was the most dangerous aspect of it. It carried with it a virus. This virus weakened the natives’ immune systems significantly, but otherwise it was no worse than the common flu. But as I said, their genetic makeup had adopted the new strain, though it appeared to do them no real physical harm, other than making the natives more easily agitated and aggressive than before the adoption of this new strain.”
“Then what was the problem?”
“The virus, a direct result of the new strand, proved to be extremely lethal to all the local wildlife. It caused them severe agitation and a prolonged, painful death. Made them super aggressive before they died. The reason for this was that the virus was a unique strain of bovine spongiform encephalopathy.”
“Mad cow disease?” I couldn’t believe my ears. The news was catastrophic.
“Precisely. Its incubation period inside the infected animal transformed the genetic material just enough to make it lethal to the local natives when passed along. It ended up transferring a protein called prion, which resulted in a ninety-eight percent casualty rate for those who came down with it.”
“Go on.”
“Oh, but it gets worse. The company’s doctors discovered that those who died underwent a transformation. I know it sounds like some cheesy horror movie, but the brains of the deceased natives appeared to regenerate and come back to life. I witnessed one of these transformations with my own eyes. The dead came back to life, Thomas.”
He began to sob uncontrollably, and I let him get it out of his system. After he composed himself, he raised his head and looked at me as if asking for forgiveness.
“It was all hush-hush. The only reason I found out about it was because they sat me down and read me the riot act. Honestly, I was afraid for my own life. Rick had already been fired from both the university and Vector Labs for matters unrelated to this terrible experiment. All the charges against him had been falsified so that they could make him disappear. Vector paid me a handsome sum to walk away and keep everything quiet. Had I not accepted their offer, I’m sure I would have been killed. I was under a strict confidentiality clause, which meant that Rick never knew about what happened out there on the island or what caused it. His firing had been predetermined, meaning that they made up some bullshit story about sexual harassment.”
“So that’s why my brother escaped to that farmhouse in Maine. It wasn’t to live off the land and be self-sufficient,” I said. “So what did Vector Labs do about the island?”
“God have mercy on my soul,” he said, wiping his eyes. “They sent in private security forces and napalmed everything, every living thing. Burned the dead bodies and every plant, animal and living thing on that island. Scorched earth policy.”
“Holy shit!”
“Not only had the natives been witnesses to Vector’s crime against humanity, but they’d seen the dead come back to life and attempt to consume human flesh. For that reason alone, they had to kill them. Vector feared the truth and the virus might spread, and I think they were in cahoots with high-level government officials.” He paused to consider his words. “Your brother left no trace behind after he upped and left the city. He vanished completely, and I had no way of finding him. I assumed he’d been placed in a witness protection program. Then everything started to fall apart in the world, and I had a feeling that our work on that island bore some responsibility for this global catastrophe.”
“You think it spread?”
“I do. Either that or else your brother had resumed his research elsewhere. I believe that all the disparate strains of pollen from that island nation spread and mutated simultaneously, causing the governments of the world to become more hostile and belligerent to each other. That’s why the world began to go haywire; the pollen caused the people of the world to become highly aggressive. I’ve been analyzing these strands of DNA for the last year now and have come to the certain conclusion that this dissemination is directly linked to these Pacific island pollen spores, either carried across the ocean on atmospheric currents, or from wherever your brother had settled and restarted his genetic experiments. Each species of pollen has a uniquely different effect on human behavior, from severe agitation to flu-like symptoms.”
“I have something sordid to tell you as well,” I said. “Brace yourself, Doc.”
I told him about what happened in Maine. He admitted that he’d heard vague rumors of something going terribly wrong up north, but had no way of verifying it. I explained how we’d witnessed the agitated animals and the dead returning to life, and how the dead tried to consume the flesh of the living. I told him about Rick’s genetic experiments with his crops and how he’d isolated the same strand in both plant matter and the cell tissue of the deceased. I relayed his theories about brain transmission and the laws of physics. He listened intently, showing no signs of emotion. When I finished, without giving full disclosure, he sat staring at the fireplace in a daze. Finally, he stood to leave.
“I have his journal with all his research. Would you care to look it over?”
“No, thank you. I’m not long for this world,” he said. “You need to take it somewhere where they can analyze it fully. Rumor’s going around that a safe haven has sprung up on the west coast. Many people have taken the trek out there, but no one knows if this utopia even exists. Me, I’m too tired and weak to travel. But if you take it out there, maybe you can put the information into the right hands and prevent this situation from worsening.”
“Yes, I need to at least try.”
“If you don’t, all hope is lost.”
“There’s one more significant detail I need to mention,” I said. “The reawakened exhibited a strange behavior upon returning to life.”
“A strange behavior? What do you mean?”
“After their brains reawakened, they exhibited a behavior I can
only describe as enlightened, or Zen-like.”
“Yes!”
“It only lasts for a few moments, but the dead invariably spoke of their love for family and friends, and expressed profound regret about past behaviors. Then they all say something curious, although each in their own way.”
“What did they say?”
“I’ll paraphrase, but something to the effect that they were searching for the chosen ones.”
“The chosen ones?” He walked over and grabbed me by the arm. “This is crazy, but the native islanders exhibited a similar behavior. We had no idea what they were trying to tell us. I chalked it up to some indigenous form of polytheism that had habituated in their changing brain cells.”
“The dead hinted at an afterlife and talked about finding certain chosen ones, whoever they are. One even talked about a new world order. They seemed almost enlightened before the final transformation took place, just before they evolved into their final, primitive form. These creatures didn’t want to just wander the earth, but they sought out human flesh, and in particular, the flesh of the brain. Rick had some bizarre theory that combined string theory and something about particles in a weak field.”
“The Higgs boson particle, with Higgs’ weak field giving particles their mass. They refer to it as the God Particle.”
“Yeah, something like that. Too complex for my primitive brain,” I said, laughing sadly.
“God have mercy on us. Vector Labs never let it get to the point where the subjects actually consumed human flesh, although the dead tried. The diseased natives were put down almost immediately for fear of contagion.” He stared at me. “Do you know what this means?”
I shook my head. I was confused and worn out by everything he had just told me about my brother’s nefarious experiments. I’d no idea what anything meant anymore, other than I wanted to leave right away and seek out my family.
“The dead, like the meek, shall inherit the earth. It’s not only biblical, Thomas, but it’s a common theme that runs through every religious tenet. I’ve done quite a bit of theological research in conjunction with my genetic engineering studies. The two topics, believe it or not, go hand in hand.”