by Platt, Sean
The dog’s heavy snarl rumbled through the backyard, and nobody dared move for fear of alarming the beast.
Boricio stepped to the front of the group as Luca stared, slowly stepping back toward Paola.
Mary looked over at Boricio. “What are you thinking?” she whispered, looking Boricio up and down as if she were trying to figure him out.
Boricio said, “I’m thinking that I’ve not seen more than a half dozen dogs that I can think of in one half of a beer-battered bullshit of a year, and that right now I’m staring at one that’s bigger than three of King Kong’s big swinging cock sacks put together.” Still speaking softly, Boricio added, “And my agreement to keep shit PG is null and fucking void when Paul Bunyan’s Cujo is in our yard.”
The dog remained still, but its growl grew louder.
“You’re gonna have to shoot the dog, okay honey?” Boricio said, cocking his head slightly toward Paola, who was maybe 15 feet away from Boricio, and therefore unable to simply hand him the gun.
Luca could only stare at the back of Paola’s lightly swaying head as she whimpered three feet in front of him. “I can’t,” she squeaked.
“You can,” Boricio said calmly, “because you have to, okay?”
Luca couldn’t believe it, but Boricio’s voice was almost soothing. Adding to the disbelief, he said, “You can do it, Sweetheart,” then kept speaking in that same soothing voice, his eyes on the unmoving dog while he made all his words for Paola.
“Look at how he’s standing, agitated, high on all fours, head straight like he was pledging allegiance to Lassie, back raised like it’s a second from launch.” Boricio’s head barely twitched, like he wanted to gesture more but knew he couldn’t. “And see how his tail’s sticking straight out? If dogs are as scared of us as we are of them — like stupid people say — then their tails are tucked between their legs. But that tail right there is about as straight as a pecker on prom night.”
Paola whimpered again. “I can’t . . .” she shook her head. “I just can’t do it.”
Boricio drew a deep breath, kept his eye on the beast, then said. “Look at his eyes, Paola. See how they’re centered on us, especially me? I break contact and that great big bear of a dog is gonna be on me like flies on a morning pile. So I need you to pull the trigger, Sweetie, and I need you to do it right fucking now.
“I can’t.”
Boricio snarled, and for a second Luca was sure he was gonna turn around and yank the gun from Paola. But then the dog snarled back and Boricio must’ve figured she was standing too far away to get the gun before the dog was on top of him.
Mary said, “Paola honey, it’s okay. Just pull the trigger.”
The gun still at her side, Paola said, “What if I miss? He’ll kill us all.”
Boricio said, “Then just don’t miss.”
Mary said, “We’re dead for sure if you don’t try.”
The gun shook at her side. She tried to raise it but whimpered instead.
The giant dog snarled, then roared. Boricio held his gaze but the dog leapt at him anyway. Paola’s fingers stayed as frozen as her eyes were wide.
With no clue what he was doing, Luca suddenly found himself inside Paola’s head, then deeper into her mind’s twisting tunnels, and finally centered inside the specific memory that allowed him to raise her hand, and the pistol with it, then fire while thinking in less than a blink, landing the first bullet from the freshly loaded gun into the creature’s head.
The beast may have been a dog when the first bullet tore through its skull, but that first bullet gave birth to the unholy monstrosity that had been inside the dog all along. It came snarling from the dog’s falling skin, stretching its face like putty.
Paola was still aiming without using the trigger, so Luca kept firing from inside her mind, again and again. Each shot seemed to anger the rabid dog further, but was doing nothing to slow it down. But at least it was off of Boricio, rearing back on it’s hind legs and thrashing wildly through the air, like it was at war with itself, shrieking something that sounded like a dog’s bark and a human’s scream bleeding together.
The dogs fur came off in chunks revealing dark black skin beneath it that reminded Luca of the monsters. It looked soaking wet, and was getting wetter as it the massive dog’s bones seemed to shove themselves against its skin, pushing against it until it started to tear. The dog lifted his nose to the sun and roared, its mouth twisting, knocking teeth from its maw to the ground to make room for more giant teeth which erupted from its jaws like jagged swords.
Luca continued to empty Paola’s gun, until something inside her shattered and sobbed. Mary and Boricio ran to grab guns of their own from the a bench 50 feet away, where Boricio had been spending each morning showing them how to clean and care for their weapons.
Mary picked up a pistol, Boricio grabbed two, then they emptied all three of them into the creature until it finally stopped twitching.
Like the half demon, half dog that it was, the creature bled in a medley of color, though mostly black and green and red, pouring from multiple holes and pooling into a single brew of dark and shiny purple mess.
Boricio, Mary, and Paola stood around the beast in stunned silence, before they caught one another’s expression and started to cheer.
“Fuck yeah! That’s what I’m talkin’ about!” Boricio said high-fiving Paola.
Luca had returned to his own head, and felt significantly weaker, but he hid the weakness behind a smile. He didn’t want Mary, Paola, and Boricio to worry about him.
Luca began to wonder just how much longer he’d be with them.
* * * *
CHAPTER 4 — Other Ed Keenan
Black Island, New York
April 2012
SIX MONTHS AFTER THE EVENT…
Ed and Will were perched on the monastery’s roof, staring down into the darkness. The infected Guardsmen stood in a line in front of the building, but made no attempt to storm inside.
Holding the line, keeping us here.
Ed called Sullivan on the radio, updating him on the situation — the infection may have been incubating in people, and could have infiltrated the Facility.
“Test everyone,” Ed instructed. “Test them and quarantine the uninfected on Level Eight. If we can’t get the situation under control we’ll need to activate a Hard Reset Protocol. Get someone out to the ferry and prepare for an evacuation of everyone up top. No one gets on without being tested. Any infected are to be shot on sight and their bodies burned. Understand?”
“Yes. On sight?”
“Yes,” Ed said. “We can’t take any chances.”
Ed brought him current on everything that had happened, as well as with his theory, that Dr. Williams was somehow communicating with the infected and that the infected were acting on his behalf. Ed ended the call on his radio and turned to Will Bishop, who was still looking down at the Guardsmen on the ground.
“They’re trying to keep us here,” Ed said.
“Yes, they appear to be working in concert with Williams,” Bishop said, echoing what Will had just told Sullivan.
“How long do you think Williams has been infected?” Ed asked.
“I dunno. You all should’ve fired him the second you knew he helped Boricio. But screw consequences, right? Anything for the sake of science!”
“It wasn’t my call; you know that,” Ed said, annoyed.
He was just as pissed as Will that Overseer Washington hadn’t thrown shutters on the project sooner. But arguing about it now, particularly when the Overseer was dead, was pointless. There was a heap of shit they should’ve done differently. But they didn’t pay Ed for his opinions. He was paid to manage scientists and make sure they didn’t blow up the world or worse. Yet, when they actually tinkered with something as dangerous as the vials, Ed was told to sit down and shut up while the real scientists did their thing.
And we all know how that went.
“Let’s just stick to what we’re gonna do next
,” he said to Will, who seemed at least a little more present than in recent memory, maybe awakened by the danger. “By the way, what did Williams mean when he said he’d known what you did?”
Will looked confused. “I believe he thinks I have the vials.”
“Are there any left?” Ed asked.
“No, you know that. All we have left is what was in the serum that our guys are trying to use to find a cure.”
“I had to ask,” Ed said. “He seemed so certain.”
“The crazy ones usually are.”
“How do you think he was infected?” Ed asked. “It had to have happened recently, right? We’ve never seen it lay dormant for longer than 48 hours.”
“It had to be recent, yes” Will agreed. “Was he working with the infected patients that he helped escape?”
“Yes,” Ed said. “Almost daily.”
“Perhaps they played his sympathies, and he left himself open to their influence. They must’ve done it telepathically. We all know that I was changed by mere proximity. Luca more so having been injected with the serum.”
“We’ve never seen them do anything like that,” Ed said. “We’ve never seen an infected with that kind of cognitive function, have we?”
“Once,” Bishop said, but then trailed off when Ed’s radio rang again.
It was Sullivan saying that Teagan wanted to talk to him.
“Ed, I’m scared. What’s happening?”
“Everything will be okay,” he said. “Sullivan is going to move you to Level Eight. Go with him; do whatever he says. OK? Is Jade with you?”
“Yes,” she said, weeping.
Ed couldn’t afford the distraction, or the tears that came with it. “I don’t have time to talk now, Baby. Sullivan will take care of you. OK? I have to go. Now.”
A pause, then Teagan said, “Bye.”
Ed hung up without saying another word. The tune of her fear had already compromised his ability to think clearly. He had to figure out a way to get from the monastery to the Facility without running into any of the infected.
Ed looked down at the Guardsman who were no longer Guardsman, six total. He couldn’t make out any of their identities, since their mutation was nearly complete and their faces had shifted to monstrosities.
Ed turned to Will with a sudden idea. “If Williams is infected, why hasn’t he mutated like these things? His temporal lobe is functioning just fine, unlike the other infected. Could the species be finding a new way to integrate with us? More of an invisible parasite, controlling functions without showing symptoms elsewhere or going full blown mutation?”
“I wouldn’t rule it out at the moment, and that does make the most sense. But we’d need to get a look inside his brain to know for certain.”
“Well, first we need to take care of these down here and then get back to the Facility.”
“Okay,” Bishop said.
Ed loaded a fresh clip into his Glock, then aimed at the mutant in the center of the line of them and fired, hitting it square in the forehead. It dropped to the ground, screeching as it fell. Ed was’t sure if the screech was pain or a warning because the moment it started, the others followed, all opening their mouths and releasing unholy wails, piercing to his ears even from 30 yards away.
Ed fired down into the group and hit another, drowning its fallen comrade’s cry with a wail of its own. The other four scattered into the shadows as the first one finished dying from Ed’s near perfect headshot.
“Come on,” Ed ordered. “Follow me.”
They made their way down to the monastery entrance, then across the courtyard and into the woods.
“The truck is just this way,” Ed said, surprised that Will was keeping decent pace.
They made it halfway to the truck when suddenly, movement erupted around them, dark on dark moving fast.
And then they were surrounded by the four infected Guardsman.
Ed stepped in front of Will, shielding him from the closest of the infected. For some reason, however, the infected weren’t moving any closer — as if they were frozen in place awaiting instructions.
“They won’t fight back,” Will suddenly said, sounding far more certain than Ed's hunch.
“I was thinking the same thing.”
Ed raised his gun and shot each of the four infected in the head, taking them down by order of proximity. Once on the ground and writhing, Ed emptied his gun, finishing them off in the same order he shot them before.
“Let’s go.” Ed opened the driver’s side and climbed inside, though he didn’t have to say anything to Will, who was already sitting in the passenger seat, waiting.
Ed gunned the engine, floored the pedal, and said, “It’s almost worse that they didn’t put up a fight.”
Will said, “That’s because it’s easier to see the people inside them.”
* * * *
CHAPTER 5 — Boricio Bishop
Black Island Research Facility
September 2011
ONE MONTH BEFORE THE EVENT…
Boricio sat cross-legged on a mattress, alone in the glass quarantine cell, one of 12 cells in the room where he had seen Will oversee so many tests before. However, it was usually animals in the cells. Now, there was he and three doctors, awaiting tests, and a large old ape named Brian. And then, of course, there was Rose.
The Guardsman threw Boricio inside the cell, leaving him alone and afraid, sitting on the floor with a front row center view of Rose — the fresh monstrosity in the cell across from him — mutated, grotesque, and mercifully asleep, lying momentarily still as death on a mattress.
Will’s question, as he’d yanked Boricio from Rose’s room, played on repeat over and over in Boricio’s head, the sole lyrics of a guilty song:
What have you done?
The longer he waited, the longer he had to stew in the pain of that question.
What have I done?
Why?
She said she remembered me. Maybe her memory would’ve come back.
The pain would’ve gone away. I could’ve waited.
I should have stopped it.
Boricio had no idea how long it was from when the Guardsman had first thrown him into the cell to when he finally heard the pressured release of the door lock and his adopted father stepped inside his cell.
“Hey Boricio,” Will said. He was missing the Hazmat suit worn by every other Guardsman. “So?” he stood over Boricio’s mattress, arms in an X across his chest.
Boricio said nothing.
Will finally said, “Seriously Son, what were you thinking?” It sounded like he was using everything inside him to keep his voice low and emotions steady.
“You know exactly what I was thinking,” Boricio said, “So don’t show up to the barbecue and act surprised to see meat on the grill.”
Will didn’t respond so Boricio added, “What happened to Rose?”
Will shook his head and said, “Sorry, Boricio,” but followed his apology with silence.
Boricio said, “What does sorry mean?”
Will drew a breath, then said, “Rose has mutated. We’ve never seen anything like this. We’ve got our best people analyzing the serum that Dr. Williams concocted along with her blood and tissue samples. Dr. Williams will be facing punishment for his actions. And I’m sorry to say, you will too.”
“Fine,” Boricio said, “I look great in orange.”
“I need you to take this seriously,” Will said. “You could be court-martialed . . . or worse.”
Boricio felt a flutter of fear, and he must’ve showed it on his face because Will stepped into his confidence. “It’s possible I could prevent it,” he said. “I don’t know for certain. But even if you’re not court-martialed, they’ll want to excommunicate you from the island. Probably forever.”
They sat in silence for several minutes, probably since Boricio had warned Will not to ask him the same question he already knew the answer to. Finally, likely because he couldn’t help it, Will asked, “Why d
id you do it, Boricio?”
Boricio didn’t answer, just stayed quiet until Will finally lost his temper. “I’ve never been angrier with you in my entire life!” he screamed. “I don’t know what in the hell is the matter with you, Son, that you would ever think it would be okay to jeopardize our jobs, futures, and friendships, not to mention the very fabric of our family, just so you could sneak in here and play scientist. Your behavior was selfish, Boricio. Sure, you can claim it was all for love, or that it was you and Rose against the world. But that’s bullshit, Boricio. You put your needs above everyone else, including Rose’s, and you’ve done it for the last time.”
Will kept on going, throwing words at Boricio like they were kicks to a beaten dog’s belly. Boricio took every syllable, mostly because he knew he deserved them, but finally a month’s worth of torment cracked through his facade. His shoulders started shaking, then sagged.
His entire body shuddered and Boricio finally broke down.
Once his tears started to fall, Will lowered himself to the mattress beside him, wrapping his arms around Boricio’s shoulders and softly whispered his apologies.
Boricio gathered his composure and nudged his breathing into the same steady rhythm he’d been practicing for weeks. Finally, once he felt like he could finish a full sentence without his voice cracking in half, he said, “I don’t get it. You all have used the serum on animals and nothing like this has ever happened, right?”
Will nodded.
“And with the first human subject, Luca, it cured him. No bad side effects. Dr. Williams said he’d used the same formulation. There is nothing different about the serum. Nothing! Why did it do . . . that, to her?”
“Well, first of all, Luca has been having side effects. I tried to warn you that we didn’t know what we’re dealing with, but—”