What this meant Jessica could only dread, and when the man standing next to her leaned in and started to hug her, she screamed out with pain and rage. Her left hand somehow became free of her bonds and dropped to the man’s hunting blade, and at the same time Jessica moved her head and bit down hard on the man’s throat, tearing away a chunk of flesh. His life blood gushed from the open wound as he staggered backward in shock, his hands moving to the wound, trying in vain to stanch the flow of blood.
Using the hunting blade, Jessica cut her other hand free as the others looked upon the scene, horrified. Only the pastor stepped forward to challenge her as the other two fled in fear. Jumping off of the platform, Jessica leapt at the pastor as he called out for retribution for the evil deeds this demon girl had inflicted upon his follower. Jessica landed upon the man, driving him to the ground as she plunged her knife into his chest with newfound strength.
The pain from her wounds was now a distant memory as she withdrew the blade from the dead man, his eyes fixed upon unseen horrors. Getting up, Jessica headed in the direction the other two men had fled. Seeing a car that the two men were attempting to start but with no success, Jessica approached, stooping down to pick up a rock as she arrived at the side of the vehicle. She smashed the window, and the driver cowered in fear as he was showered with broken glass. The passenger got out and fled into the woods. Then she calmly reached in with her knife and slashed the man’s throat.
There was a cry of pain from the fourth man as he crashed down after tripping on a tree root. His own pleas of mercy were ignored as Jessica walked slowly up to the man who was desperately trying to crawl away from her. With blood still dripping from her, she leaned down and slowly slid the knife into the man’s spine. His legs twitched once as he cried out in pain, and then they ceased to move. Only his arms were now frantically trying to crawl away from her. Knowing that she would never have been shown mercy, Jessica leaned down, showing the man the hunting knife, and buried it to the hilt in the soil in front of his face. “If I ever see you again, you know where I’ll stick a blade the next time.”
The voice within Jessica’s mind seemed to smile with pride at her decision for a single display of leniency. She knew that what she had been through would change her forever. Several hours of walking later would bring her to town, and she would be found by medical staff as a bewildered and confused young girl who somehow managed to endure a horrific ordeal. The authorities later found the site of this brutal attack and said it was a miracle she managed to fight back and live. The single surviving member of the cult admitted to what they had done in every detail and also admitted to killing her mother eleven years previously.
But the girl’s memories of that day faded over time and were then suppressed, but she retained her fighting spirit. Joining the recruitment academy at seventeen, she quickly rose in the ranks and moved into more complex fields of warfare.
Overwhelmed by the flood of memories from that day, Jessica just stares blankly as a single tear runs down her face, not from the attack or the death of her mother but from a police report detailing what they had found. Listed near the bottom of the report was a large slice of cake that had been trodden on; it was only listed because it was an odd item to be found at such a brutal scene.
Jessica, suddenly aware of another presence in the room, tenses and looks around to see that Neil has walked in looking rough and unshaven. “Where have you been? We have been worried about you.”
Neil looks between Sam and Abs and shrugs his shoulders. “I had things to sort out. What’s up with Sam?”
Abs, realizing the best thing now is to get moving, looks at Sam and replies, “It’s complicated, but Sam will be okay; he just needs time. But I need a little help moving him.”
Neil walks over to stand by her right side. “What would you like me to do?”
Abs leans down and reaches for Sam. “I just need you to help lift him onto my shoulder.”
Taking a step to his left, Neil produces his special blade that he’s been carefully working on, and then with all his strength, he rotates his body and thrusts the blade into Abs’s side at the same location she had been struck by the spear. Her dermal chain had been pieced there over a month previously. Abs, stunned by the sudden attack, stumbles away as the blade plunges deep into her side.
Following her, Neil leans in closer, his mouth to Abs’s ear. “A gift from Samael and a message. All traitors will burn, but you will be the first to die.”
Then with grim determination, Neil, still gripping the blade, snaps it backward, breaking off the handle and leaving the blade inside her. He then produces another blade in his left hand and draws it across her throat. Abs, hearing his words and recovering from the initial attack, slams the side of her head into Neil’s face, doing no real harm but shocking him enough to release her.
This sudden move forces Neil to step away. With her throat cut but the dermal protection not allowing the wound to be too deep—though it’s enough for her life blood to flow—Abs uses her remaining strength to twist her body toward him and brings her right arm up around the back of his neck. Then pulling him in front and stepping behind him, she drives his head down as she crouches and breaks his nose upon her knee, stunning Neil. Bringing her knee back under her, she proceeds to slam Neil’s head into the hard floor repeatedly. After the third impact, there is a cracking and grinding of bone and Neil goes limp as Abs’s vision blurs and she passes out.
Frank exits the elevator, the corridor opening up and leading to the left and then straight a short way to another room. The steam coming out shows that a cleaning cycle is currently underway. Getting closer, Frank hears shouts and some kind of disturbance. Fearing he’s too late, Frank takes off in a charge down the corridor and bursts into the laundry with violence on his mind.
However, the scene inside the laundry is somewhat different than what Frank expected. Just inside the room, he finds two guys he’s worked with for years coughing and unable to stand, choking on something as some kind of yellowish mold begins to grow out of their mouths. Farther into the room, two other guys Frank has seen around are fending off a third, but as Frank moves in closer, he realizes the third man is Jake. The whole of his face down the right-hand side is covered in some kind of yellow, paste-like mold, with veins of green streaking out down his cheek away from his eye.
Just as Frank is about to call out, Jake opens his mouth wide and exhales a large cloud of spores at the two men. One of them ducks, but the second man is not as lucky, and he goes down choking and spluttering.
“Oh, Jake, mate, what’s happened to you?” Frank says, putting is left hand over his mouth and nose and taking a step back.
Jake now turns his attention to Frank and smiles, this simple act only making his peculiarity look even more sinister as the green veins begin to pulsate and his throat seems to undulate.
The other man who was previously fending Jake off shouts out a warning and makes a dash for the door. Jake glances at the man but decides Frank is a better prize. “Don’t worry, Frank. This won’t hurt, and you will be free of your pain and guilt at last. You won’t need to blame yourself or anyone ever again.”
Frank looks frantically around for some kind of weapon as he takes another step backward, and Jake follows him. Spotting a laundry bin, he grabs it with his left hand, picking it up with ease and dumping the contents and the bin on Jake’s head. Frank roars out as he rushes at Jake, using his right stump as a battering ram as he succeeds in pushing Jake to the ground. Knowing this is only a temporary reprieve, Frank runs from the room, calling for a route back to the maintenance bay. The other man has already fled.
Jimmy the Fist is enthralled by his new life. He knows he died. Although he remembers none of his time as a corpse, he had been gutted and gutted well—that he remembered. It wasn’t a painful death, though, more of a shocking death, one he certainly did not expect. But now with this second chance, he knows for certain that he will hand out death, and although he cannot e
nsure it will be shocking, he can certainly make it a painful one.
Walking into the main dining hall, he spies who he’s after, a man using weapons and dressed in black fancy armor, not a security guard—not seen many of those in months. However, he does not charge toward his victim; rather, he will allow the freakers who are following from behind to do that first. Let them get shot rather than Jimmy the Fist, and this is what they do.
At least forty freakers run past Jimmy, and the expressions on the faces within the room turn from expectation of murder to absolute fear. Those who’d taken the guns that were handed out previously are mostly out trying to hunt down Sam and the others, so this fight will be mainly using fists and teeth—just what Jimmy enjoys using the most.
A few of the infected prisoners exhale spores at the freakers. The ones that are hit go down choking, but most are not hit, and once the fight has properly started in full-frenzied lust for blood, Jimmy makes his move. With a burst of controlled weapons fire, the soldier slowly backs toward one of the exits while five freakers break away from the rest of the pack and charge toward him but are cut down. All the while Jimmy has been slowly walking along the wall toward the same exit, the soldier’s observation distracted by so many others until it is too late. Realizing someone else is closing in, the man turns, but Jimmy places his left hand on the barrel of the gun and forces it down and away, even while the panicked soldier holds down the trigger and the barrel heats up.
With his right fist, Jimmy closes in and swings with a perfect punch, connecting with the man’s chin. He is rewarded by a grinding sound of bone on bone. Then with the desired effect of such a blow, Jimmy pulls the weapon from the grasp of his target of hate and tosses it away. The soldier draws his combat knife, showing skill, and then slashes back at Jimmy’s throat. Jimmy just blocks the attack and grabs his wrist with his right hand, and with his left, he drives his open hand into the man’s elbow joint, cracking it backward. The resulting scream of pain makes even some of the freakers turn their heads and cackle out with laughter.
Jimmy releases the man’s wrist and pulls the soldier’s respirator away to reveal another mold-covered face. The soldier takes in a deep breath, ready to exhale a cloud of death, but this too Jimmy is ready for, and he presses his open palm over the man’s mouth and pushes him all the way back to the wall and slams his head against it. “You might think I’m after information.” Then he thrusts his left thumb into the soldier’s left eye socket, resulting in another outburst of pain. “But you guessed wrong. I just like hurting people smaller than I am; it’s one of the reasons I was sent here.”
Withdrawing his thumb, he wipes it on the man’s face before thrusting it into the man’s right eye socket. All the while, the man struggles with all his strength, but to no use. His strength fails him as he loses his right eye.
“Anyway, time to move on. There’s a girl I need to go and hurt next, so no hard feelings.”
Letting go of the soldier and watching him slowly slide down the wall, Jimmy the Fist draws back for one last punch, and this one crushes the man’s nasal and eye sockets.
Still trying to comprehend the horror that his eyes are showing him, Sam crawls over to Abs and rolls her to the side, checking her pulse. It’s weak, but she’s still alive. He examines her throat wound and notes that it has already healed with a vile-looking scar; at least that will prevent further blood loss. Then he realizes that most of the blood she’s lost has pooled around her side, so he searches and finds a fresh entry wound and a similar scar there. Sam assumes that she had a fresh stab wound from this recent attack, and her body’s nanites had looked after her, but worryingly, instead of steadily getting stronger, she seems to be deteriorating.
Checking the other body and finding no pulse, Sam gives it a quick search and finds a single blade and multiple self-inflicted wounds on the wrists and stomach. The face is a mess, so identity at this point is impossible, but whoever it was, Abs must have known him for him to be this successful.
He calls for a route to medical, and a corridor opens up, leading a short way to the elevator. Sam almost has a heart attack as Frank comes crashing out of it with a look of equal surprise. “The bastards got Ja—what the heck has happened here?”
Sam, thankful for seeing a friendly face, shouts up at Frank, “I have no idea. I just woke up and found her like this. She has a weak pulse. Help me get her to medical.”
Frank, looking shocked, comes over half running after seeing the mess. “No problem, Sam. She’s in good hands, but we should be careful. The place is falling apart. As I was arriving here, I could hear gunfire, and that can only mean that the system must be down in places.”
Dr. Moore is happy, the happiest he’s been in a long time. He’s enjoying his work, and that’s a great change. Since being sent here for malpractice, he’s hated himself for what he had carried out in the name of financial security and the odd identification change, plus his family disowned him along with his wife and kids.
But now his old personality is dead, quite literally, and that old persona would have been glad of it, but they always struggle up until the very end. It’s the fear of the unknown, but it’s better when they fight back, as it helps the process: the body produces adrenaline, and the bioinfection loves that stuff and grows at a much faster rate. It’s always a joy when a new mind joins the rest. Humans have a fascinating society with many roles to explore. This profession is especially important, as the many patients under the doctor’s care are all unconscious, and so the fear is not as high as we would like, but due to their various ailments, there really isn’t much they can do to prevent their fate.
Dr. Moore leans over his tenth victim so far and breathes spores into the helpless patient’s mouth. Then he smiles and goes to the next patient in line and repeats the process. Such a wonderful day.
He has no idea that the day could improve, but he is pleasantly surprised when Sam enters with Frank carrying Jessica. It is rather embarrassing to be caught midway into converting another patient, but freezing in midpuff, the doctor waves them over to an examination bed, sounding a bit wheezy. “I’ll be with you in a moment.” Hastily putting on a surgical mask while keeping his face away from Sam and Frank, he walks over after the second urgent call from Sam. “I never thought I would see you guys again, and now you come back needing a patch up. I guess not surprisingly, as someone managed the impossible and got one up on Jessica?”
“I’m not sure who it was, Doc. Abs managed to pulverize his face before she lost consciousness.” Sam looks on with worry as Frank looks toward the sound of someone coughing. Frank’s been on edge since he saw what Jake had done.
The doctor runs a scanner over Abs, stopping where Neil stabbed her. “Looks like she’s been stabbed and the blade is still inside. Plus her nanites are fighting off an infection the blade is causing. She will need an immediate operation, so, guys, out of my sight and let me work.”
Reluctantly Sam is slowly pulled away by Frank. “Hey, come on, mate. Like the doc said, best let him work.”
Sam relents and leaves the room, but Frank slows at the last moment as another cough comes from the ward adjacent to the main examination room. Dr. Moore calls out, “Don’t disturb my other patients. I think we are about to get an outbreak of the flu, and I would rather not have to treat you lot as well.”
Frank stops at the doorway. “Oh, by the way, Doc, what happened with the inner-world security goons earlier?”
Perturbed, Dr. Moore replies, “Nothing. I just told them you guys had left, and then they asked if I knew where you all went. I said no, and they left.”
Sam returns, putting his hand on Frank’s shoulder. “Frank, let the doc work. We can ask him all about them later.”
Frank walks back into the room, shrugging Sam’s hand off and taking a few more steps toward Dr. Moore. “Good to hear, Doc. I’m sorry to ask, but do you mind if I see your face under your mask?”
Dr. Moore tries to remain calm, his hand moving toward a
surgical scalpel as Frank continues to take another careful step. “Now, Frank, you’re always welcome to visit, but Jessica needs my attention, and I haven’t got time to play these games. Freakers are not waiting for you when you go to sleep, and I’m not some monster hiding behind a mask.”
Frank picks up something without looking first and takes another step closer. He’s now only a few feet from Abs and the doctor. Sam, now taking this more seriously, is only a step behind but remains quiet. “Good to hear, Doc. Now if you don’t mind, remove your goddamn mask before I end you now.”
Dr. Moore reluctantly removes his mask, revealing speckled yellow and green mold upon his cheeks, around his lips, and encrusted over his nostrils. Sam is stunned at the sight, and Frank just mumbles, “I knew it,” as Dr. Moore takes a deep breath, causing his throat to undulate.
Knowing what is about to happen, Frank lobs the object he had picked up; it’s some kind of handheld medical scanner. Dr. Moore ducks as Sam dives to the table, grabbing Abs’s arm and dragging her away from the doctor. Dr. Moore recovers and exhales a cloud of spores that covers Sam’s head, sending him into an immediate mix of coughing and spluttering as the spores are drawn into his body.
Cussing, Frank covers his mouth with his stump and stoops for Abs, who has now fallen to the floor. Grabbing Abs by her harness, Frank runs out of the examination room as he starts to berate himself for being so stupid. He drags Abs along with him, hearing the distant sounds of Sam coughing and the doctor laughing.
14
Samuel’s Story
Prototype: The Lost and Forgotten Series Page 23