The Cannibal Virus

by Anthony DeCosmo

  So many questions, and each of those questions added another chill to her spine. There was something out there … something bigger and even more dangerous than Waters, Monroe, and their batch of parasitic fungi. What she had thought was a case of biological terror might be something more, with roots stretching back to the ancient world.

  That scared the crap out of her.

  "It's you who are over your head," she told him. "This thing you're playing around with is the perfect smart-weapon for killing people." She thought about what had happened after her test, although she felt it important not to provide him with any details. Her survival might depend on it. Nonetheless, Stacy told him, "You've unleashed a monster, and you are fooling yourself if you think you're in control. This thing … it does not act in any predictable way. It is evolving, Doctor, without your help. It's on the verge of wiping all of you out, but you just don't see it."

  "I have more important things to do than to debate you," Waters said, then turned to the nearest soldier and ordered, "Shoot her."

  What happened next happened fast, but somehow, some way, her eye saw everything, despite the eruption of chaos.

  The Asian soldier standing next to Dr. Waters brought the iron sights of his AKM assault rifle to his eye and pointed it in her direction. While the rounded control console provided some cover, she presented a relatively easy target. She instinctively moved to duck behind the controls.

  At the back of the room, Major Gant reacted to Waters's order. He shouted something that might have been "stop" or "no," popped up from behind the divider wall, and fired a pistol. The soldiers back there immediately shot at him; bursts of automatic gunfire filled the room with an explosion of noise.

  The man shooting at Stacy got off one round a split second before Gant's bullet hit him high in the shoulder. At that same moment, Annabelle's reflexes caused her to bend behind the console. She felt the bullet fly over her head by a measure of centimeters.

  Her hands never left the console, however, and she did as promised: her fingers flipped switches and the thirty cell doors running along the two walls of the rectangular chamber slid up.

  Waters had warned that they were prepared for such a catastrophic release, and he proved to be right. The nozzles situated above each door automatically activated, releasing a fine spray of foggy white gas like a halon system but one not designed to fight fires. It seemed their frontline security system remained the so-called PX aerosol agent.

  "You see," Waters boasted while ignoring the soldier writhing on the ground at his feet from a bullet wound, "you never had any leverage, my dear. The first step in creating a weapon such as this is to also create appropriate countermeasures. I thought I taught you that lesson back on Tioga."

  The white smoke pooled along the side walls and then started to drift toward the center. On the other side of the chamber, the guards continued their assault on Gant, pinning him behind the wall and closing for the kill, although the quickly spreading fog inhibited visibility.

  "You," Waters tapped another man on the shoulder. "I'm hoping you're more competent than your friend here."

  The second soldier raised his gun, but unlike the first, he never had a chance to fire. Two rotting arms came surging out of the cloud of ineffective gas and grabbed his arm. Teeth followed, biting into his bicep and tearing out a chunk of gore.

  He screamed. But he was not the only one screaming. The fog of the PX spray had served only to conceal its lack of effect. The zombies of the containment cells came at Waters and his security detail like the walls of a closing trash compactor. Guns initially aimed at Major Gant now aimed at the decaying, warped victims of Dr. Waters's experiments. Pasty white eyes … jagged fingernails … lunging jaws.

  Stacy nearly vomited in a combination of disgust and excitement. She had literally dodged a bullet, and her plan to use the zombies as her weapon had come to fruition. The guards were outnumbered nearly ten to one and attacked on both flanks at close quarters. Most were wrestled to the ground before they knew what was happening. A few used their rifles as clubs to beat back their attackers, but they only managed to delay the inevitable.

  "They're adapting, Waters!" She yelled at the stunned doctor, whose watery eyes had grown very large. "Your gas worked on these same creatures hours ago, but not now! Acclimatization. They developed their immunity to your gas without the benefit of generational evolution. That's not natural, Waters. Whatever this thing is, it was never going to let you control it!"

  He swung his cane and smashed a big white bulb growing out of the side of the head of a fat woman. The orb popped and the zombie dropped. Before he could regroup, however, a walking corpse grabbed Dr. Waters from behind, pulling at his shoulders while teeth dove into his neck. Two more of the mad scientist's units converged, ripping at his arms and into his stomach.

  Dr. Waters's expression changed from shock into a grimace of pain that resembled a grin. It sounded as if he might have laughed, even.

  Annabelle remembered Major Gant at the back of the room. She pushed several buttons until she saw — through the fog — the rear bulkhead slide up. At that point she abandoned the control console and walked off between the ravenous ghouls that, thanks to the blocking agent, did not attack.

  On her way to the rear of the chamber Annabelle grabbed a discarded assault rifle. She then found Gant near the now-open rear door. The walking dead were too busy taking the low-hanging fruit of the security detail to have moved beyond the divider wall, but that would change soon.

  She emerged from the fog with the rifle in hand. Gant regarded her with a look of outright shock.

  "Doctor … what the hell?"

  "Here, you'll need this. You're in danger here."

  "I … I am in danger? What about you?"

  The public address system clicked on and announced in an automated voice, "SPECIMEN CONTAINMENT LOCKDOWN IN THIRTY SECONDS. ALL PERSONNEL EVACUATE SECTOR A AND SECTOR B. SECURITY ALERT LEVEL ONE. CONTAINMENT TEAMS TO SECTORS A AND B."

  She could guess what that meant and apparently so did the major. He grabbed her shoulder and led them out the rear door into a wide hall. Instead of running off he stopped, handed the rifle back to her, and said, "Wait a second."

  To her surprise he returned inside the cloud-filled room, sized up a big metal cabinet, then put his shoulder into it and pushed, inching it slowly out of the room and toward the hall … but then stopping right in the doorway.

  "There, that might do the trick."

  "Do what?" she asked.

  "Come on, we still have a lot of work to do."

  Five seconds later the bulkhead descended so as to contain the emergency inside the specimen room. That bulkhead smashed into the metal cabinet, nearly crushing it. But not completely. The bulkhead jammed, leaving four feet of open space between the floor and containment.

  * * *

  The maintenance room door opened and the Englishwoman known on base as Pearl stepped out, adjusting the top buttons on her blouse as she exited. Behind her came a man of Indian descent who hopped on one foot as he struggled to put on his second shoe.

  "That's the main alarm," Pearl said. "Christ that had better not be that stupid girl. Come with me. Let's make sure those idiots took her over to S.C. like I told them."

  Her lover followed a pace behind as Pearl emerged from the side hall and returned to the chamber where she had successfully tested the blocking agent on that stupid little American girl. Of course she should have stayed with her lab rat but it had been two days since her last rendezvous in the maintenance room. Besides, the thrill of such a monumental success was rather exciting and she did not get excited all that often.

  She sensed commotion up ahead, which only gave her more incentive to make sure those bozos were not fucking up her work.

  I swear, if I catch them in there still running a train on this chick like they did that Japanese girl a few weeks ago, I'll feed them to the specimens.

  Two soldiers struggling to don hazmat gear jogged b
y, heading in the opposite direction. The announcement system had broadcast a message of some kind, but she had been in the closet with her mind — and mouth — occupied, so she had not clearly heard. Pearl began to fear that something might be seriously wrong.

  Nonetheless, she concerned herself first with her area of responsibility. She had built in a half hour between the end of the test and the transfer to Specimen Containment, just enough time for a quickie in the closet. Monroe was off-site and Waters was busy with his own tests. If that bozo assistant had listened carefully, everyone would have been happy: she would have enjoyed her rendezvous, the three men could have played around with the girl, and they would all have gotten credit for a successful test.

  Now, if Waters had come looking for the lab rat early or if the men had taken far too much time, then things could have gone south. Still, the successful results would probably be enough to placate the doctor.

  As she entered the outer room of the test chamber she became more convinced that her assistant and the soldiers were enjoying their captive a little too much. It would not be the first time for such a thing.

  Pearl walked directly to the isolation chamber door in a fit of growing anger and swung it open, ready to surprise and scare the hell out of the perverts. Instead she was the one surprised and scared.

  The thee three men were in the chamber, along with the units that should have been subdued by the PX canisters. Instead, it had been the guards and the technician who had been subdued. They now saw the world through pasty white eyes.

  A mob of arms reached out. She screamed and ran. The mass of undead followed at a brisk pace.

  24

  Video feeds coming from Specimen Containment showed a thick fog obscuring the entire area. The two guards in the security control booth tried to understand what was going on.

  They had witnessed the female intruder open the cell doors, resulting in the automatic flood of PX, certainly stopping any mass breakout of infected units. Nonetheless, protocol had required an immediate isolation of the room. The guards had pulled two big levers, one for each of the specimen room's access points, sealing the place tight.

  Unfortunately, the heavy concentration of PX gas had created a thick smoke, filling the room to the point of smothering the cameras. That meant there was no way to confirm the situation was under control, although both men found it a little unnerving that there had been no communication from the security detail or Dr. Waters.

  The Asian guard spoke to the European in choppy English: "I think we should activate full containment protocols, at least until we hear from Waters."

  The European security officer nibbled on the tip of his thumb. His eyes were glued so tight to the foggy Specimen Containment video feed that he did not bother with the other monitors. If he squinted he thought he could catch a hint of movement underneath that white veil, but perhaps it was only his imagination.

  "No … not yet. Monroe is due back soon and Waters will have our asses if we overreact and make it look like the place has gone to shit. The neutralizing agent deployed and the containment doors are down. We're good."

  He then squinted a little more. He thought for sure he had seen a shadow stumbling around inside the white cloud, but perhaps it was just his imagination.

  * * *

  Major Gant led Dr. Stacy along one of the main hallways. He again noted that the place was divided into sections with big bulkheads waiting to drop. Their function was something akin to the compartment doors on a submarine designed to contain flooding. In this case, flooding meant a tide of walking corpses infected with a parasitic fungus.

  The corridor curved to the right. As they followed that curve they came upon a technician wheeling a cart of computer and medical equipment. The middle-aged man threw his arms into the air and shouted, "Don't shoot me!" at the sight of the armed intruders.

  Gant raised his weapon and took aim but Stacy put her hand his arm and asked, "Where is the exit?"

  Before he could answer Gant said, "I don't give a damn about the exit."

  Several sharp reports marked the start of a firefight. A soldier wearing a black military tunic appeared thirty feet ahead, firing around the startled technician in an effort to kill the intruders.

  Major Gant held the AKM with one hand and shot wildly while using his other hand to shove Annabelle toward the outer wall, where the worker had abandoned his cart of equipment. It provided the only cover in the wide hall.

  She slid to the ground with her back against the wall. Gant dropped to a knee beside her and took better aim, forcing the soldier to retreat a step around the curve of the corridor.

  Meanwhile the technician ran in a serpentine fashion past Gant, back the way he and Stacy had just come.

  "What do you mean you don't care about the exit?" She asked during a two-second lull in the gunfire. "I want to get the hell out of here."

  "Getting out of here won't make a difference," he snarled as he raised the rifle and fired again. "Where are we? Can you fly a plane? There is no way for us to escape. But even if I could—" an enemy bullet hit the cart just above his head, shattering a computer of some kind. "But even if I could, I am not walking away from here. I intend to burn this place down."

  His bravado sounded convincing, until two more guards arrived behind their position, putting them in an untenable crossfire.

  The newcomers wore level-A hazmat suits, just as they had on Tioga Island. That suggested the base had initiated some sort of containment protocols.

  Regardless of garb, the two newcomers had open shots at the escapees from a distance of twenty feet.

  They did not offer to accept any surrender. Gant knew not to bother raising his hands. They were far beyond that point. So he turned about, intending to go down with his gun blazing. But before the events of his life had time to flash through his mind, the two soldiers who had caught Gant and Stacy in a crossfire were instead caught in a crossfire — of sorts — themselves.

  A wall of walking dead came around the corridor from behind the men, dragging whiffs of smoky PX gas around their feet and shoulders as the ineffective agent clung to its intended victims.

  Their guards never fired their weapons. First came an impact of weight from the mob, then claws and teeth. Both fell under the rolling tide, their screams turning from shock into horror almost instantaneously.

  Gant turned to face forward once again, where the first soldier watched the goring of his comrades, his eyes open and his jaw unhinged in an expression of utter disbelief. The major put two bullets squarely in his chest, but the third shot from his gun ended in an empty click.

  "Damn, I'm out of ammunition."

  His words broke Annabelle from the hypnotic sight of the two hazmat suits being ripped open like tightly wrapped Christmas presents in the clutches of a child. Stacy glanced at him, then back at the creatures enveloping the dying guards, and said, "Hold on a second."

  She ran toward the mob of zombies, some of whom were already leaving behind those victims to find new ones.

  "What are you doing? Get back here!" Gant shouted.

  Stacy ignored his command, walked between two of the animated cadavers, who paid no attention to her, and grabbed a discarded AKM. She then returned to Gant, sprinting between and past several of the creatures, who, again, did not even notice she was there.

  "Here you go," she said and handed him the rifle.

  "What the hell?"

  "I'm sort of immune right now, but I don't know how long that will last."

  His eyes narrowed.

  "It's a long story."

  "Okay … I think. Damn it. Let's go. We do not have much time," he said. He led her along the passage with his new rifle, scanning the space ahead for targets, yet he remained aware that most of the mob that had come to their rescue was following them — or at least him — in the hope of claiming more victims.

  As if to accentuate that thought, a Klaxon blared through the hall, red spinning lights coated the corridor in a crimson gl
ow, and the automated announcement system blared, "Level One Containment Initiated."

  * * *

  The images on the security cameras caused both of the security guards in the control booth to raise up off their seats like sports fans in an arena watching an intense play. In this case the “play” was not a touchdown, a goal, or a home run but rather hordes of ghouls.

  Despite a glowing red light claiming Specimen Containment had been sealed off, it seemed that the creatures had frustrated both the PX gas and the bulkheads and now had filed out into the complex at large. Worse, the monitors showed a smaller group of infected corpses approaching along the western corridors.

  Members of the internal security team hurried to the barracks room, donned biohazard gear, and moved to intercept the growing mobs while technicians and researchers ran away from said mobs, barely outracing the arms of the shambling zombies.

  "Lower the containment doors," the Asian guard told his European counterpart.

  "Hang on, hang on."

  "There's no time! Do it!"

  The European obliged, knowing full well that lowering the heavy bulkheads would stop the spread of the creatures but it would also isolate the security units. Based on what he was witnessing on the monitors, the PX did not appear to be working, and the number of zombies was increasing in direct proportion to the dwindling number of guards.

  He moved his hands over to a bank of ten black levers and turned them, one after another, lowering the containment doors. He watched on one monitor as a mob of infected units chased Pearl and another technician. Containment doors came to their rescue, lowering from in front and behind, trapping them in a stretch of hall but locking out their pursuers. Pearl took a knee and appeared to be either laughing or crying in great relief.