“Elaina…please. Let us explain.” He swallowed. “Then if you want to shoot me, so be it. I will accept my fate. Whatever you want to do, love.” I looked at Claire and grabbed her, pulling her close to me. I lowered my Sig down at my side, but I was on guard, watching Nick in my peripheral.
“Wha…what do you think we should do?”
“I think we should listen to them, at least for some sort of explanation.” Her voice was so quiet and meek. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to hear their explanation, either.
“I, for one, want to know what the hell is going on.” I turned, and Nick was resting his elbows on the counter with the heels of his palms pressed into his eyes. His voice was clearer, but he still looked like death warmed over.
“We need to get him some blood soon, or we will be in trouble,” Sophie said to Henry.
“We will. Just give me a second. Tie up his wound for now.” Henry pulled off his bloodied shirt and tore a section off of it. He handed it to Sophie, and she went to attend to Nick’s arm.
Henry looked back at me and stepped closer. I stepped back. We repeated the movements a couple of times. It was like we were dancing. For each move he made, I made the opposite.
“Elaina…please. I won’t hurt you. I love you. I’m the same person I was a week ago. The same person I was two years ago. I’ve been like this for years. Sophie, as well.”
“Okay, then. Explain. But I expect the whole truth this time. No more bullshit!” My last nerve was tweaking.
“You have my word, my love. I will give you the whole truth. This is what I’ve been struggling to talk to you about. I’m just going to start from the beginning so bear with me. It will be easier this way.” I nodded. He inhaled and exhaled a long, loud sigh, all while pacing in front of me.
It felt like an eternity before Nick growled, “Out with it!”
“Yeah, sorry. My mother was murdered when I was five. On my fifth birthday, actually.” That would explain why he didn’t want to celebrate his birthday. He looked down and bit into his blood-stained lips. He looked up at Nick apologetically. I could see him fighting his emotions already, and we hadn’t even gotten to the meat of the conversation yet. Losing his mother before his eyes affected him at a tremendous level. He took another deep breath.
“I can still hear her calling me by my given name. Luke. My father was absent from my life so I was shipped off to an orphanage. I spent my days and nights angry with the world. I rebelled at everything…school, life. By the time I turned fourteen, I had already been in ridiculous amounts of trouble with the law, and in and out of school.
“I was approached by Roger, the head of this whole fucked-up program. He told me he ran a military-style university, and promised to turn me into the man that I wanted to be. So I agreed to go. There were several new recruits when I came in. We,” he pointed between him and Sophie, and then shoved his hands in his pants pockets, “arrived at the training complex at the same time. He told us we were throwaways, and society would not want us anymore. He said that when we finished the training portion of the program, we would be accepted by society. Little did we know that once you were in, you were in for life.
“Roger was our general, and we were the recruits. There were areas in the complex for training in different skills. We trained for combat day and night. Learning different techniques: hand-to-hand, weaponry, explosives. It was relentless. It would go on for hours upon hours, with hardly any breaks for rest, or meals, or even sleep sometimes. The trainers were trying to break us and build us back up to their ridiculously high standards.
“I, being who I was, would question everything. They got sick of me so I would get tased, beaten, bloodied, and was near death on several occasions. I had countless injuries, concussions, and was hospitalized three times within those two years.”
Claire looked like a deer caught in the headlights. Nick had a similar look, but with more intensity. He had the “Angry Henry” look.
Henry had told me much of this before, but he needed to start at the beginning for everyone else. He kept shifting his weight during the uncomfortable silence. He looked over at Sophie, who looked devastated. He licked his dry lips, and continued, “Once Roger was confident that we would fit into the program, the shit became real.” I stood in silence, working on processing what would be coming up next.
Then Claire interrupted, “Wait. What happened to the ones who didn’t fit within the program? Did he just send them back to the orphanage or wherever he picked them up?”
Henry grimly shook his head. “Permanent elimination,” he whispered. We both put our hands over our mouths and gasped. Sophie tried to stifle her sobs. Claire and I suspected they saw many lose their lives to the program…or they were the ones forced to do the eliminating. Maybe they even had to eliminate their friends. Henry continued working hard not to be too emotional.
“The complex was an abandoned warehouse, which they remodeled to look like an office building. It had labs, weapons, guards, scientists, and a huge room full of caged animals. They changed our identities. Luke Richards,” Henry pointed at himself, “is dead on paper. They changed my name to Liam Henry Daniels. Then I shortened it to Henry when I came to the States because I couldn’t be Liam anymore. I just couldn’t be him.” Henry paused, and purposely didn’t give Sophie’s given name. He wanted her to decide if she wanted to share that information.
“Anyway, we spent hours upon hours rehearsing our new identities. If we so much as spoke the wrong syllable, we were beaten. Plus given extra training. This went on for few years.”
Claire interrupted again, “So where does this whole undead/true dead thing come into play? Because I really would like to know what the hell you are.” Thank you, Claire, for asking because there was no way that I could formulate a sentence right then if my life depended on it.
Then the punk ass kid bravely interrupted, “True dead? Ain’t tha’ a show or somethin’?”
“Vampires are not real!” Everyone shouted at once, and the kid stood there like a moron.
“Well, if zombies are, why not?” Claire nearly crossed the line by saying that, and Henry worked hard to control his anger.
Nick chuckled. “Good one,” he mumbled. Nick sounded angry and annoyed, but I was happy to hear his personality coming out.
Henry shook his head. “You two are so much alike.” He looked at Claire, then at me. He pointed at me. “You are just a bit more vocal.” He pointed at Claire. “And you have a filter. Usually.”
“This is one fucked-up story,” the kid mumbled to himself.
Henry snapped and grabbed the scrawny kid by his throat and pulled him close, spitting in his face as he screamed. “This is not a fucking story! This is our lives! This is what we live with day in, day out!” He was furious.
Sophie walked up to him and touched his shoulder. “Hey, put him down. He doesn’t understand. Believe me, I want to beat the shit out of him, as well.” Henry let go of the kid, and ran his hands through his hair. He continued to eye Nick, watching his every move.
He cleared his throat. “So, like I said, in the very beginning, back at my flat when all this bullshit started, I was an agent. I’m now an agent that has gone rogue. My government and your government worked together to create this super virus. Your government didn’t know that ours would be placing agents all over their country to spy on them. It was a ‘cover your ass’ deal. Our government didn’t want yours to release the virus and turn them back into the superpower they once were.” Claire was looking impatient. As for me, I still looked like I was in shock.
“Okay…to the part about why we are the way we are. During our training, they injected us with a small amount of the virus. They wanted to make us immune to it. But, after an incident, they discovered we are not immune. We can still turn into an undead. There were some side effects, obviously, and it backfired when they realized what was happening to us. They discovered that if we drank clean blood, it would bring us back.
“With
the virus in our system, it changed us a lot. Our eyes, our body temperature, our entire physical and mental state was affected. If we go too long without clean blood for the virus to feed on, we start deteriorating, much like a true dead person does. Our joints stiffen, we get these horrible headaches, and we start to downward spiral. It’s not pretty when one of us does not get the blood that we need. We, essentially, rot from the inside out.” Again, Sophie tried to stifle her cries.
Henry whispered, “I’ve seen it happen more times than I want to even talk about.” Then I realized that this must be what happened to those who didn’t meet the standards for the program. I imagined it was the recruits that were continuing on that handed out a true death. It sounded like pure torture. My body shuddered.
I was finding it difficult to look at Sophie and Henry. My anger with them was subsiding, and was being replaced with empathy.
“So the virus starts wreaking havoc in our body and brain, looking for that clean source of food. If we do not get clean blood into our systems, we will become completely undead.”
“So the cure for someone who has been bit is clean blood?” Claire said.
“No. There’s no magic pill that I’m aware of. It’s immune to everything. As far I understand, once the virus is in your system, there’s no getting rid of it.” Claire seemed intrigued, but skeptical.
“Well, isn’t this just fucking perfect?!” Nick snapped.
“Then why aren’t you like the others?”
“They injected us with a very small amount.”
Claire glanced over at Nick. “Oh. Then why is Nick like you now, and not like one of the other freaks out there?”
Henry glossed over her freak comment after he gave her a healthy glare. “Because the amount of virus that’s in us is much smaller than what is out there. Low amounts leave you in a constant state of reanimation, unless you don’t feed the virus. Then you will turn. It’s a much longer, drawn out process, unlike those who have been exposed to a full dose. Minutes for them; a week or so for us.”
“So what you’re saying is that, essentially, I’m dead?” Nick chuckled again. “This is fucking epic.” Nobody was seeing the humor in the situation.
“Essentially. I guess you can look at it that way.” Claire backed up from everyone a bit. The punk ass kid still stood in shock, with his jaw hanging open.
The only thing I could think of was that I had been fucking a dead person. Does that make me a necrophiliac? I shuddered. Henry looked at me with concern. His eyes were full of sorrow.
“So…I’m talking to a dead person?” I whispered.
“Sort of, I guess,” Henry replied. Claire seemed oddly calm with all the information that was pouring in, but not me. I had been fucking a dead guy!
But then she narrowed her eyes at Henry and Sophie. “How did it get out there? Did you bite a lot of people?”
“I have my suspicions, and no. Who would admit to it? I suspect a full amount of the virus was injected into someone. It had to be. It’s the only way the full-fledged virus would be out there. This virus can annihilate us as a population. It already has.”
“So…Nick is in a state of reanimation, like you?” Claire asked. Nick grumbled something, but I was too focused on my necrophilia.
“Correct.”
“How were you getting clean blood from people before?”
“I ran the blood bank. I stole bags and vials all the time. It was a steady supply of clean blood so I never had to worry.”
“Hence all the shortages you hear about in the media?” Claire’s words were sharp.
“Yeah, I suppose.” I could see he felt ashamed for taking advantage of a system for people in need. Claire’s anger had returned. It was the epitome of an emotional roller coaster. I couldn’t decide what emotion I was. I was still trying to process that I had been fucking a dead guy.
“Oh, my god. You were taking blood from dying people? Sick,” Claire growled.
“I can understand why you feel that way. I would collect extra vials and say I was taking a sampling of blood for research purposes before a donation. I told them it was a new process. Since I ran the bank, no one questioned it. I had official-looking documentation ready if I was questioned. I have also done some things that I’m not proud of. Some really bad shit,” he muttered, and scrubbed his face with his hand. I wondered what he meant by that, but at that point, it didn’t fucking matter.
“This is so sick and twisted!” Claire raged.
“We are sick, too, damn it!” Henry’s fists clenched.
Claire backed off some. “But now you condemned Nick to live this life, as well!”
“For real!” Nick barked and grabbed his head. “Christ…”
“Do you not think I know this? It was a natural reaction and I couldn’t help myself. I was deteriorating. The virus was taking over my brain and body!”
“That’s no excuse!” she snarled.
“You don’t understand! Do you honestly think I want to live this way? I couldn’t stop myself, Claire! I had no idea that I did it until the fresh intake kicked in! It’s like sharks when there’s chum in the water! The virus was taking over my mind and directing me. The longer I go without a fix, the more the virus takes over my body. That’s why those people, those undeads, are doing what they are doing! It’s the virus that has taken over their brains. They know nothing except they need to get their fix! We are like heroin addicts. It’s no longer a want; it’s a need.” Henry was choking back tears. “It pains me to know what I did to you, Nick, and to know I could have done it to any one of you. What if I did it to you, my love?” He was having a hard time getting his words out. He could only think of what could have happened.
“So to keep the three of you from becoming truly undead, you need a fix like a heroin addict?” Claire was trying to process all the information without pissing off Henry too much. She seemed to be a little frightened that they would turn on her. I had a feeling they wouldn’t. I figured if they were going to turn on us, they would have already.
“In a way, but not as frequent. If we can get a large vial about once a day or every other day, and a large quantity once in a while, we would be in as normal a state as we can be in. But that’s not always feasible.” Claire tried to process what she had just heard. The punk ass kid had retreated to the corner and sat on the floor to watch the surroundings, and I still stood there like a moron, staring at Henry. Everyone was silent for a few moments.
“I cannot fucking believe I have to drink blood now.” Nick was in an entirely unpleasant mood. I can’t say as I blamed him.
I could see Claire was rolling everything through her mind. His truth was difficult to process. She looked at me and pulled me in close. The thought of human beings doing this to other human beings changed my perspective of how dysfunctional the world truly was. I didn’t want to hear any more. Then Claire, ever the inquisitive one, decided there were a couple more questions that she wanted answered.
“How did he get you tied up?” Claire pointed at the kid.
“I was weak, and he grabbed me from behind and hit me over the head with that bloody gun of his. Which is empty, by the way. I was trying to tell you that. By the time he got me tied up, I had started returning back to my normal state. But I was stuck and bound.”
“I’m still lost about your eye-coloring. Why did his change to the same as yours?” she asked.
“It is like a chemical reaction of some sort. Since it is a man-made virus, a lot of chemical components are involved. I don’t have all the answers, but if we change all the way, we would have the gray glazed eyes like the undeads.” I shuddered. The little boy’s eyes came back into my mind. Then I flashed to my dream about Henry.
“That’s why yours look gray sometimes? If we see more eyes like yours, then they are like you?”
“Yes.”
Claire shook her head at the thought of more people being like them. She was fearful of Henry and Sophie, but it was obvious that she felt sorry for
them, too. They couldn’t help who they were.
“How many?” Claire shut her eyes, waiting for his answer. I was afraid of the answer myself.
“Before the virus was let out, there were ten of us living permanently here in the States. There are another ten waiting on standby for assistance, if necessary.” He gestured toward Sophie. “There are an additional twenty recruits currently working through the program.”
“And this Gunther can help?” Claire asked.
“Maybe.” Henry looked at me and stepped forward. The want was in his body language. His eyes spoke volumes. They were so full of love. I didn’t move away from him that time. “Please say something, love.” He reached for my face, and cupped it in his cold, almost dead hands.
“I…I…”
“It’s alright, love. Take your time.” His voice was soft and tender.
“I’ve been fucking a dead person,” I whispered. It was all that I had.
He raised an eyebrow. “I guess you could look at it like that.” He paused. “Elaina, I am just like you, but I’m sick.”
“Sick…dead…sick…,” I mumbled.
I felt myself going down, and the lights went out.
***
“Whoa!” Henry yelled. He tried to grab her, but she hit the counter and then fell to the floor. “Shit! Elaina!” He dropped down to her side. “Love! Wake up!” His hands trembled as he tried to wake her. Then he saw blood coming out of the back of her head. “Shit!”
Nick looked down and saw the thick red liquid dripping on the floor. He groaned. Henry looked at him. Nick’s eyes were graying already. “Back off! You’re too fresh. Sophie, grab one of those small coffee cups.” Nick took a couple steps backward, licking his lips.
“What? What the hell do you need a cup for?” Claire knelt down next to Elaina.
Broken Dreams Page 34