by Sara Brooke
Thanks goodness for April, he thought.
A sound further down the hallway caught his attention. Remembering that the cleaning crew was still cowering in one of the bedrooms, he made his way to their location and knocked on the door.
“Hello? It’s Dr. Johns. Please let me in.”
He heard a click as the lock turned and the door opened, revealing four very frightened people inside. The men and women were pale and silent, waiting for him to give them some good news.
After he shared with them what was happening, the group decided to stay put. They had water, snacks from the minibar that had been stocked for the study, and a bathroom. Clearly enough to sustain them until the entire ordeal was over. When asked about the yellow material that now covered the windows, Dan lied and said it was all protocol and that they would be allowed to exit the building shortly.
No sense in getting these poor people all freaked out, he thought.
While the majority of them appeared to believe him, one man in particular appeared to question what was being shared. He seemed to Dan like a shy, quiet sort of person who kept to himself, but was wiser than he let on. Dan asked him his name.
“Greg,” the man answered simply and looked away.
Dan didn’t have time to try to convince Greg that everything was ok. He needed to search the remainder of the hallway and the storage areas at the far end. Rick was still missing and needed to be restrained…or killed. So, it was necessary to get moving and continue his search.
Standing up to go, he looked back at the small group and apologized to them, “I’m so sorry that you’re caught in the middle of this. We’ll get it under control and then I’ll come back for you.” He turned towards the door, when a hand caught his arm. It was Greg.
“Doctor…can I come with you? I’d sure like to help. It’s better than sitting here.”
Dan hesitated for a moment and then decided to take Greg up on his offer. He did need the help and given Rick’s possible strength, it would be good to have back-up.
“Ok, but follow me closely.”
As soon as the men left the room and shut the door behind them, Dan pulled Greg aside and whispered, “I don’t know if you quite understand what we’re dealing with. The man who’s missing, Rick, isn’t well. In fact, he’s lost his mind and could be very dangerous. Are you going to be ok?”
Greg looked at him and nodded. “Yes, we heard. He completely tore up that poor woman while we listened in the other room. I can’t just sit and not try to help. And, I don’t think you were telling us the truth. We’re not getting out of here unless we catch him. Am I right?”
Dan hesitated for a moment and decided that the young man, who appeared to be in his early 20’s could be trusted to not panic the group. “Yes, you’re right. We’re quarantined here until we can treat all of the trial subjects.” He looked down the hall. “Luckily, I think I’ll be able to treat them, but it’s going to be impossible if we can’t contain all the subjects who are still alive. We could get ambushed and that would be…”
Suddenly, they heard a roar coming from a storage room that was located at the end of the hallway. Both men could tell that the room had been breached as the door was slightly ajar.
The sounds of boxes being tossed around and metal clanking erupted and sifted towards them. They could also hear someone growling in a deep, inhuman voice. Dan pulled out his gun and grabbed the knife from his belt, handing it to Greg who looked a little uneasy.
“I know it’s not much, but you need to be armed.”
Greg nodded his head and the two men began creeping towards the storage area. Suddenly, Dan realized that they only had weapons and no way to restrain Rick if they were able to catch him. They would either kill him or he would kill them.
A guaranteed mission failure…
He turned to Greg and motioned towards the elevator. “We’re making a mistake going down there like this. First, we need to go downstairs and get a sedative. I need to examine Rick to see if I can help him.”
The men turned around and quickly made their way to the elevator. After pressing the call button, the doors slid open and they got inside, but just as the doors were closing they saw Rick stumble outside.
Then, the doors shut and they began to descend to the first floor.
“Shit,” said Dan, “I hope he doesn’t hurt any of the other people up there.”
Greg just stared at him frightened and concerned. As the elevator landed on the first floor and the doors once again slid open, Dan thought he heard sounds coming from the common area, but quickly moved in the other direction towards the medical clinic.
Need to get the strong sedatives loaded, he thought.
Motioning for Greg to be quiet, the two men crept towards the clinic. The metal doors were shut and it was quiet inside. Carefully, Dan pushed the doors open and they slowly entered.
Greg’s eyes widened and his lips pursed as they passed the dead nurses and the unconscious technician. As they got closer to the last laboratory marked Laboratory A, Dan took a deep breath and said a little prayer to himself. If Rick had destroyed this room, they would be completely out of luck.
As he peeked around the corner, gun pointed straight ahead, he was surprised and relieved to see that the laboratory hadn’t been completed disrupted. A chair was lying on the floor, but the vials lining the walls were unbroken. And most importantly, the glass casing that he assumed held some of the anti-therapy virus/gene concoctions was unharmed.
Ok, before I do anything, I’ve got to find the sedatives and load them into a few syringes so that we’ve at least got a chance, he thought.
A built-in sink contained several drawers. He tugged on the first few and pulled out three sterile syringes. Dan then walked over to the glass enclosure and pulled out a mixture that was simply marked “zzz”. In preparation for the trial, the technicians had jokingly marked the sedatives with the letters “zzz” to emulate the “zzz’s” their patients would experience in the event of an injection.
Dan quickly and expertly filled the syringes with the sedative, careful to not spill any and ensuring the right amount was extracted. He purposefully filled the syringes with enough liquid to cause a severe blackout in just about any sized person, but not enough to stop the heart or other organs.
Once he was done, he packed the syringes away in a small black case. Looking quickly around the room, he spotted a number of lab coats hanging on the back of the door. He pulled one off and put it on, slipping the casing into a front pocket.
Dan then searched for the vials of the anti-therapy or what the technicians called “buffers”. After rifling through the glass enclosure, he finally found what he was looking for.
A row of vials marked “Z-“ was neatly hidden behind a row of other vials marked “Z”. Dan knew this had been done on purpose. The study had been carefully orchestrated and in order to keep the optimism alive and the technicians on track, the anti-therapy infusions had been hidden.
Yep, we were arrogant and dumb, Dan thought bitterly.
He carefully moved the vials filled with the gene therapy buffer into one of the sturdier wooden cabinets and locked them in with a key he had pulled out of his pocket. It was a skeleton key that was able to unlock every door and cabinet in the Illusions building. After securing the vials, he looked over at Greg and nodded grimly.
“Ok, I think we’re ready. Let’s go back upstairs.”
The emptiness and silence downstairs were disconcerting, but there was no time to worry or do a quick perimeter search. Both men thought about Rick upstairs, potentially doing severe damage and felt anxiety creeping into their minds. They got back into the elevator and pressed ‘2’.
***
The altercation with Jennifer and interactions with the people keeping them hostage exhausted Rosa and she knew that if she didn’t rest for a moment, she wouldn’t make it any further. She barely had any energy left to spare, so she decided to lay down on a couch located by the front door a
nd take a short nap. Sleep was a sweet escape, but a short time later, different sounds woke her up.
And waking up was not a pleasant experience.
Her head felt like it was on fire. Every few minutes, strong pain would shoot through her sinuses and erupt in the center of her skull. It felt as if someone was setting off fireworks in her brain.
This must be what death feels like, she thought.
Suddenly, she felt something dripping down her neck. Reaching up, she touched the liquid and saw that it was crimson. Blood had begun leaking out of her ears. Shaking now, she reached for a nearby box of tissues and quickly dabbed her ears.
She was falling apart.
Don’t give up, her inner voice commanded.
Find the doctor…he can help you…
Standing up, Rosa threw the tissues on the table and walked over to the elevator. Each step was painful, but she didn’t care. If she stopped now, she had a feeling that she would end up like Jennifer.
Pushing the elevator button, she waited for it to arrive. Once inside and on her way to the second floor, she leaned up against the wall and looked at her reflection in the mirrored walls. Gasping, she could see that her face was changing.
Her skin was gray and appeared to be stretched. Like Rick, she could actually see her skull separating in half. The stubble on her head stood straight up and reflected the white fluorescent light from overhead. Sometime within the past hour, her nose had started bleeding and there were dried crimson flakes rounding out each nostril. Her eyes were now red-rimmed and she could see little sores dotting her neck.
She was changing.
The elevator doors opened and Rosa stepped out. The hallway was empty, but she could hear male voices in the distance and saw that a door was open at the far end. She could vaguely hear someone speaking. Pulling out the knife that she had lodged against her waistband, she held it out in front of her and walked slowly towards the door.
As she got closer, she could hear the commotion.
Dan was shouting in the distance. “Stay right there. Don’t move towards him…it’s going to make things worse.”
Then, she heard a sound unlike anything she’d ever come in contact with before. It was like a wolf baying at the moon, but sounded human and filled with pain.
Whooo….Whooo…
Rosa’s heart skipped a beat. What the hell was that? she wondered.
Stepping closer to the door, she could now see that a lit bulb hung from the ceiling, casting a dim, yellow glow into the inky darkness. She moved to the doorway, and recognized the space as a large storage room with large shelving lining the walls, housing numerous unmarked boxes. But all of that was inconsequential, because it was the center of the large gloomy space that caught and held her attention.
Dan was standing off to the side wearing a white lab coat while another man stood close behind him. Rosa didn’t recognize the other man but figured he was with the Illusions staff. Dan had a small syringe pointed at their aggressor who stood only a few yards away.
It was Rick…and he looked like nothing she could have ever imagined. He no longer resembled a human.
His head had changed shape and was now oblong. It had split open at the top and a large wet gap traveled from the top of his head to his chin. It was oozing blood that dripped everywhere, creating a large pool on the ground. One of Rick’s eyes had popped out due to the pressure on his skull and was hanging out of the socket. The other eye had burst in the socket and was now a red and white sightless mass. Blood poured out of his nose and his mouth was a grotesque quad-shaped mess of lips, blood, and crimson-stained teeth.
Large sores dotted Rick’s skin and oozed grayish matter, giving his exposed arms a wet appearance. He stood in the center of the room, swaying from left to right, as if unsure where to go. He let out another loud moan and Rosa gasped, the sound catching Dan’s attention.
He looked over at her and said calmly, “Rosa, don’t come any closer. We’re going to try to sedate him.” And as he said the words, he moved slightly closer. Rick still hadn’t moved, but was now swaying more dramatically as if about to break into a strange dance.
Suddenly, the Rick-creature leapt forward, screeching. Dan tried to get out of the way but was pushed to the side and flew into the wall, hitting it…hard.
Rosa backed up. The oozing mess that had once been Rick slowed and was a handful of steps in front of her. Standing this close to him, she could see just how torn his skin appeared. It was stretching apart and had taken on a grayish hue similar to her own. Sloshing sounds emerged from his torn clothing as liquid seeped out of unseen parts of his body, darkening a dirtied collared shirt and dripping in many different directions.
Disgusted and trying not to vomit, Rosa took another step back. She was terrified and unsure where to go. There was nowhere to run…and within seconds she would be torn to pieces. Closing her eyes, she said a small prayer and succumbed to what lie ahead.
As if sensing her defeat, the Rick-creature dove forward, emitting a large moan. Rosa flinched and prepared herself for a mauling. But it never came.
Slowly opening her eyes, she saw the creature on the ground. Three syringes stuck out of his back. Dan was on the ground, breathing heavily and sitting on top of Rick, continuing to hold him down as the sick man twitched violently. Then, finally…the twitching stopped and an impossible snore came out of torn nostrils, spewing little droplets of blood during each exhale.
Shaking, Rosa whispered, “Thank you...” and fell to the ground in exhausted tears. Greg came over and knelt down, gently holding her as she cried.
***
Getting Rick out of the storage room and into the elevator was not easy. After discussing different scenarios, the three agreed that the best way to get him out was to drag him by his feet. So, Dan, assisted by Greg, dragged Rick down the hallway. Rosa couldn’t bear to touch him and watched as the creature’s head vibrated and shifted from side-to-side, leaving a moist path along the carpeted flooring.
Rick was unconscious but still able to moan in pain as if even the darkness of sleep couldn’t provide relief from the deadly transformation destroying his body.
Rosa watched and felt anxiety increase her heart rate. She wasn’t interested in turning into a maniacal, sick creature and was relieved that at least the doctor was safe and they were heading back down to the laboratory where hopefully she could be cured.
Once the elevator doors opened, they pulled the body inside. Dan sighed with relief as they began to descend once more.
“Ok, we’re going to get him into the lab, and see if the anti-therapy works. I really wish our friends in the cleaning crew could help out…”
Despite pleading with them, the remaining members of the Illusions facilities team refused to budge. They were all scared, some of them trying to get drunk off the small liquor bottles stocked in the mini-bar. With the exception of Greg, they were content to sit and wait for help to arrive.
If it arrived at all…
***
As they continued to drag Rick’s body to the medical center, Rosa shared that Bryan had died and described her altercation with Jennifer. She talked about her ability to breach the yellow tarp-like material that was now covering the building and then recounted her exchange with the people keeping them hostage.
Staring directly at Dan, she shot out, “So, you must know how we can get out of here. Don’t even try to deny it. There’s gotta be a way.”
Dan looked away. “The exits are pretty obvious, Rosa. The problem is they’ve got us wrapped up in here like sticks of bubblegum. We’re not able to get out and we’ve got to hurry up and get things under control, because I’m sure that our available oxygen is starting to run out.”
The group was silent for a moment. Rosa hadn’t thought about that. She’d been so concerned about her own metamorphosis that the fact that the building was encased in yellow material finally reached her senses, making her dizzy. The air was getting warm, she noticed. Feeling about to
pass out, she stopped moving and reached out for the closest wall. Finding one to her right, she put both hands flat against the surface and rested her aching head against it.
The men stopped moving Rick, and both turned back to look at her.
“Rosa, are you ok?” Dan called out. “We can stop and rest for a bit if it would help.”
“No,” she muttered quietly, “I’m ok. Let’s just get moving.”
The group moved through the downstairs area as quickly as they could. Again, Dan could not believe how quiet it was. All of the staff was dead…a result of Rick’s handiwork. And the only other people alive were upstairs, cowering in a small room.
Sighing, he kept moving despite the muscles in his arms screaming with tension. Greg didn’t complain, but did grunt once or twice when having to turn a corner or reposition the man’s greasy leg under his arm.
Finally, the group made it to the medical clinic. They managed to throw the doors open and carry Rick inside, moving down the hallway. The flickering lights and disarray made their progress seem surreal. At one point, Dan looked back to see Rosa staggering down the hallway, gray and sick. He worried that she would completely transform before they were able to restrain her, but for now, she was manageable.
He was still having trouble accepting that the infusion was a disaster. Try as he might, he couldn’t figure out where they had gone so terribly wrong. Had they rushed the trial? Was there something he had overlooked in the research? Many questions tumbled through his mind as the doctor tried to rationally understand how he could have made such a mess of things.
Would they be allowed to leave? And what would face him on the “outside”? Would he be arrested for manslaughter and negligence? Would Zyne Corporation go out of business?
The questions went on and on, but Dan couldn’t stop to worry or analyze the potential ruin of his future. Right now, he had to try to cure the two remaining subjects or they would all die.
It was that simple.