by Lybeck, Kyle
PLENTIFUL POISON
Copyright 2019 by Kyle Lybeck. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written consent except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, ad-dress grandmalpress.com
Published by:
Grand Mal Press
Forestdale, MA
www.grandmalpress.com
ISBN: 978-1-79-528602-2
copyright 2019, Kyle Lybeck
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Grand Mal Press/Lybeck, Kyle
p. cm
Cover art by Lynne Hansen
www.grandmalpress.com
FIRST EDITION
Praise for The Silence of Death
“The characters are well drawn and the brutality is just that. The story moves at a good pace and delivers us to an ending that is a fist to the jaw. The Silence of Deathis an edgy revenge thriller with a lot of heart and even more blood.”
— John Boden, via the Splatterpunk Zine
“When I got to the end of the tale, I sat there and just reflected upon what I had read. Then, I went back and re-read several passages. The magic was still there.”
— Horror After dark
Praise for Nightmare Reality
On the story Lasting Impression
“Kyle Lybeck takes the reader on a disturbing journey into bleak territory that won’t be forgotten. A true storytelling master!”
Kristopher Rufty, the author of Desolation and The Vampire of Plainfield
On the story Emily’s First Flight
“In the tradition of Rod Serling’s Twilight Zone the interest builds, slowly at first, and then as the story nears its climax it takes the unexpected 180 degree turn.”
—Jim Morey, pre-reader and horror lover
Praise for Perverse Humanity
“A solid, promising debut.Lybeck is a young author to watch.” — Brian Keene, author of The Rising and Pressure
“Lybeck sits comfortably inside the minds of the twisted and shows us where pure evil comes from. Perverse Humanity is a dark, macabre look at the human soul that will leave you shaken and transformed. I can’t recommend it enough.”
— Ryan C. Thomas, author of the Roger Huntington Saga and Bugboy
“If you like your horror in small, delicious bites, Perverse Humanityis for you. It’s like a box of bloody cupcakes.” — Jason Cavallaro, metal drummer
Abby held the rusty pipe against the rager’s neck as its teeth continued to chomp towards her sweaty face. All the strength was leaving her body from holding off the former man’s bloodlust. She couldn’t get a hand loose to close the visor on her motorcycle helmet, the only thing that had kept her alive this long. The phlegm and blood mixture continuing to creep its way towards her eye. She knew if it made it, it would be the end. The end of her, the end of Caroline. She tried pushing harder against the thing's neck, to no avail. Abby screamed in frustration, her cries echoing off the metal walls of the walk-in freezer. That’s when the lights went out.
Thank you to George A. Romero and Brian Keene
for my love of zombies and the undead.
Also to my friends and family for the support
and help in making this first novel a reality.
It’s only the end of the world if you fully give up.
Part 1
The Nightmare Cometh
Chapter 1
Five Weeks Earlier
Denver, Colorado
“We had another truck hit just last night.”
“Well, what the fuck do you expect me to do about it?” James spewed in frustration.
“I want you to get that special project finished up. You said it would be ready weeks ago.”
“You know what? It takes time to perfect something like this. You don’t want to just release it out into humanity without being able to fully understand it first.”
“Perfection or not, we need it. We need a better security force, one that will stop the rival dealers,” Sean said, rubbing his temples with dry, cracked fingers.
“Trust me, I’m working as fast as I can. You want an ultimate soldier, and that’s what I’m trying to get for you.” James walked back towards his lab bench, pointing at the laptop screen. “You can see from Tuesday’s results, we’re getting close. We’ve certainly been able to keep the rats alive through torture, beatings, and bullet wounds. Their rage is immense, they don’t stop. The problem is they still die off too quickly, which means so would the soldiers.”
“That is something we just can’t afford. Once we have these mutated soldiers, they need to stay alive to defend the drugs and weapons throughout an entire convoy run, at the very least.”
“Yes Sean, I understand fully. If we went with what we have now, it would be pointless. Right now, they’d only last a few days. When a run can last two weeks it would be inadvisable at this point to move forward.”
Sean sighed in frustration. They had lost twenty thousand in cash and two hundred AR-15s in the truck hold-up the previous evening. It was the third such hit in the last two months. Their organization was bleeding money and their contacts were starting to drop like flies to the competition.
“Viruses are tricky work, Sean, but that’s why you guys hired me on. You know my background, you know I can make this happen. I just need a little more time.”
“How much is ‘a little more time’ in your world?” Sean asked.
“I’d say at least another week and we should have a viable product to put into humans.”
“You’d better be right, because in two weeks we have our next shipment going out. We can’t have any mishaps or we’ll be through.”
Sean stepped out of the lab and let the door seal closed behind him.
“Impatient prick,” James muttered, turning back to the laptop.
---
“Okay little guy, come on over and let me give you the new dose,” James said to the pure white rat in the metal cage. The rat gave a mild squeak as he administered the injection into its right hip. “There, now let’s see how you do.”
Less than a minute and the rat was tearing around the cage, jumping off the toys and snapping its teeth against the metal bars. Its previously red eyes had turned jet black. Muscles along the rats’ backside bulged out in grotesque fashion.
“Just like the others. Now let’s see how long you last,” James told the rat as he sat back in his chair, laptop on his thighs typing away the current results for virus RA-G3.
The newly isolated gene within RA-G3 was one among four different candidates that James had initially thought could work for this project. Each one, from his own personal research, led to increases in adrenaline.
A half-hour passed and James was amazed that the newest tested gene was off the charts for what he wanted. It overstimulated the amygdala to extraordinary proportions, overloading the frontal lobe of the rat’s brain. It was showing no signs of abating, yet was keeping the animals heart at a steady pace. Previous attempts had radically caused the heart to overwork and essentially explode in the test subjects’ chests. For all other intents and purposes though, the rat’s brain was shut off, essentially dead. No cognitive function could be found.
“That’s new,” James said, as he watched the brain waves end on the computer screen, yet watched the rat furiously run around the cage. He continued typing notes on all the stages the rat was going through. To his amazement and wonder, the rat maintained pace with a beating heart and no brain waves.
In the end, James still couldn’t believe it. He had finally solved the problem, albeit with a few anomalies. The fervor in which he was typing the notes was beginning to cramp both hands, while at
the same time the rat had finally become lethargic in the cage.
“Shit, you’re burning through all of your calories aren’t you,” James said to the rat, as he reached into the refrigerator under the lab bench, pulling out small balls of raw ground beef. Each was covered in coagulated blood, shining under the bench light. Using a pair of tongs, his intention was to place a ball near the rat’s manus. The animal’s chest was heaving as it was staring at the meat coming closer.
Just as the tongs crossed through the cage bars, the rat lunged at the meat and ate with lightning quickness. As it finished, the newly revived creature once again was racing around the cage, biting at the bars and clawing at its toys.
Reaching for his cell phone, James smiled.
---
“Now that’s one feisty little sonuvabitch,” Sean said, watching the rat frantically race around the cage.
“Four hours now and no signs of stopping. He just needs a little raw meat every once in a while to reenergize and then he’s set.”
“And you think this is ready for humans?”
“I don’t see why not, it sure seems to remain stable in the rat. It was the last gene of the virus I have been working with too, the RA-G3. I’ve nicknamed it the ‘rage’ gene, for what it is obviously doing to the rat.”
“Well isn’t that just cute,” Sean chuckled. “You’re just a little rager ain’tcha.” He reached out and rattled the cage, causing the rat to go on a screeching bender, clawing outwards trying to reach Sean’s hand.
“Dammit, stop aggravating the rat. I need him to calm down a little so I can take a blood sample,” James said, jotting down more notes into his laptop. Fifteen minutes later the rat had started to calm down and sit still.
James reached through the top of the cage with a metal claw, grabbing hold of the rat’s neck and pinning him to the bottom of the cage. He had Sean unlock the door so he could carefully reach inside with a 21-gauge needle and extract the sample. The rat stayed still beneath the claw as the sample was taken and the cage closed. James tossed in another ball of raw ground beef, much to the rat’s enjoyment.
“Okay, give me another day, and I’ll have an injectable sample ready for us to place in our test subject. Does that work for you?”
“That more than works for me,” Sean smiled, eyes gleaming at the prospect of his unstoppable soldiers as he watched the rat eat its meal.
---
“Sean, Phil, can you please hold this fucker down in the chair!”
“I swear I gave him enough of the sedative,” Phil said as he struggled to hold the man down.
“Well obviously you didn’t you dumb bastard,” James said as he prepared a syringe of fentanyl. Finally, they managed to strap the man into the chair, and James was able to administer the injection.
“Okay, give him a few minutes to settle down, then we’ll try out the RA-G3 injection and see how he copes.” James walked back and typed more notes into his laptop, then carefully prepared the other syringe for the first human test.
Turning back towards the man in the chair, James turned on a video camera to catch every bit of the action as he proceeded. This way he wouldn’t miss any reactions the man had, or that he spoke of out loud.
“Men, are we ready to see our ultimate fighting machine come to life?”
“Just fucking do it already,” Sean hissed.
“Way to spoil the mood,” James sneered, as he walked towards the man.
“Subject number one. The injection point is the external carotid, which lies just below the ear on the right side. Placing the needle tip into the artery. I am pressing the plunger and injecting the sample now, slowly into the subject. Injection is now complete and the subject is stable.”
Pulling away from the man, James stood watching, in quiet anticipation with the other men. Not even twenty seconds had passed and the man’s eyes shot open. The once blue irises were jet black. The man began struggling against the restraints, seething with rage. He bit down so hard in his grimace to free himself that four teeth audibly cracked. A violent scream rocked the room.
“Oh shit…” James took a few steps back.
The man stayed strapped in the chair, as the brilliant red blood began to pour from his mouth. Without provocation he flung his head back and forth, spraying Sean’s face, giving him a mask of blood.
Sean stumbled backwards, wiping his face. Before James could get over to him, Sean began to convulse.
“Fuck!” James screamed as he ran to the door. He reached the handle and pulled, just as Sean tackled him through the doorway and out into the dimly lit hall. Within ten seconds, James had had his Adam’s apple ripped free. By the time Sean had taken his first crunchy bite, James began to stir.
Chapter 2
One Day since viral injection
Longmont, Colorado
“So what you’re telling me, is that in less than twenty-four hours this “thing” has spread out to nearly forty miles from ground zero?”
“That’s what I’m being told, Major General. One of the teams reported sightings near us here in Longmont, just before they were turned into those…things. The unit behind them witnessed the bloodbath.”
“Do we have an official cause for this disaster yet?”
“From what we’ve been able to gather, it was a gang of drug smugglers and gun runners. We’ve traced it back to their hideout, where we found a laboratory setup which included lab notebooks and someone’s laptop. From what Doctor Jensen has been able to deduce, they were trying to create their own unstoppable weapon. A “super-soldier” if you will. What for, we still aren’t certain. That wasn’t anywhere in the notes, only the research and lab results,” Private Becker explained.
“Then we have the worst of it. I’m hearing a one-hundred-percent infection rate, is that correct?” Major General Cardiff asked, loudly sipping on a cup of chamomile tea despite the early June heat.
“That is currently what it looks like, sir. They can either become infected from bodily fluids or from being attacked by what the lab notebooks referred to as ‘ragers’. The turn rate is quick, from what I heard on the video camera I found on the floor of their lab.”
“Why the hell did they call them that?”
“Ragers?”
Major General Cardiff nodded, taking another sip of his now lukewarm tea.
“In reading the notes, they had a virus they were working with called the RA-G3 virus, in which they isolated a specific gene that induced unstoppable rage in the specimen. On top of that, the rat appeared to have been brain-dead once injected, yet kept a steady heart rate.”
“Wait, so what you’re telling me is that the rat was somehow both alive and dead? How the fuck does that even happen?”
“Apparently the gene was able to stop the general functions of the brain, but isolate the heart in such a way as to continue pumping blood through the rat. It probably was the main reason it kept its quickness. The brain though was completely shut off, that way the rat wouldn’t stop and couldn’t feel pain. So long as it was intermittently fed, it kept going.” Private Becker said, a strong note of concern in his voice.
“Sweet mother…”
“They were feeding the rat raw meat covered in blood. We found balls of it in their lab refrigerator. That would also explain why the team that made it out from the attack saw the soldiers being ripped into pieces and parts being eaten, before they themselves turned into these creatures.”
“I’m almost at a loss here, Private. How the hell are we going to stop these things? Especially with infection via bodily fluids in this way.”
“I’m not sure, sir. One report came back saying they stopped a few of them with direct gunshots to the head, which would lead to full shutdown of the brain. They were having trouble doing it through, because these bastards are so fast.”
“A fast, lethal weapon that can’t feel pain and feeds on the meat of its victims, all the while turning them into these… ragers. They sure don’t train us for this sort of s
ituation.” Major General Cardiff breathed a heavy sigh.
“No sir, they do not. This is a whole new ball game. All the rules are out the window at this point, and we have no clear way of stopping this as it spreads like a wildfire stoked by barrels of gasoline.”
“I hate to even suggest this, but what about missiles. Nukes, even.”
“Sir, this is still a heavily populated metropolitan area. They are just now starting evacuation procedures in Denver, but even then so many people are being attacked I don’t see how anyone would survive. Could you imagine if we nuked the nineteenth largest metropolitan city in the United States?”
“We may not have a choice, Private.”
“God help us all if it comes to that.”
Chapter 3
Two days since viral injection
Longmont, Colorado
“Now as you can see behind me, Ted and Maggie, there is a large military presence here on the edge of Longmont. They are being very secretive about this large outbreak we keep hearing rumors of. Since I have been here, there has not been much activity to speak of. I continue to hear rumblings though about an infection and civilian casualties, but no numbers to report at this time.”
“Alex, are you able to get us any sort of interview with anyone there?” Ted asked.
“Hold on a second Ted, let me see. So far nobody has been willing to take the time to speak with me.”
Alex turned away from the camera and tried to get the attention of a few soldiers, each standing with M4 carbine’s in their arms. Before he could bring the microphone to his mouth, they were already pushing him away and pointing back to where he had come from.