«Its cells, in their natural look, have a star shape, which could be defined as a trademark of its creators. They use powerful enzymes to dissolve the organic structures and get to the DNA in the victim's cell. They eat their prey this way. Then, the creature needs a more or less long period of time before being able to assimilate another organism. The step of assimilation is particularly critical. If the enzymes and digestive juices are insufficient, or if they become scarce before the process is complete, or if the creature is disturbed during the transformation, it loses control over the cloning process. The result is something that we sincerely hope to never see. It's often an abomination, a twisted and disharmonious body, where different life forms seem to blend in a chaotic and absurd way.»
«Dr. Ivanov, one last question for now: is there a cure, a kind of vaccine or a way to eradicate this threat?», intervenes Ironside.
Ivanov shakes his head. «Unfortunately not, I'm sorry, there is not a cure nor a vaccine. The only thing to do to prevent further infections is to completely incinerate the infected bodies.»
«If it's so perfect, how can we distinguish a person from a copy? Moreover, you mentioned the word creators before...», says Moore.
Ivanov looks at her, almost smugly. «The paleontologist, in her legacy, described how the creature wasn't able to clone parts foreign to the body. It regenerates it following the rules of its DNA. Our research has confirmed this. The clones have no fillings in the teeth, earrings, bone prostheses, and the regenerated bodies also have parts that were missing in the victims, possibly because of accidents, such as a severed finger. We initially noticed the possibility of a blood serum analysis, by placing it on a heating plate. Every cell in the body is an entity in itself and it always tries to survive. When the blood was approached to the fire it tended to form tiny creatures that tried to move away from the heat. Over the years, however, the organism seems to have evolved. It learns at an incredibly rapid pace, and we are sure that there is some form of telepathic communication between creatures. Currently the best test is through a strong electrical discharge. I would recommend to equip your men with shockers, and to check the blood of all those who have been on the crash site, and of any survivors as well. If any.»
«All right Ivanov, that's enough for now», Ironside's voice. «For the moment you will stay in the room that was assigned to you. We'll call you in case we still need your advice.»
«Just a minute», says Moore. «What about the creators?»
Ironside doesn't let Ivanov reply. «Dr. Moore, I am sure that we will have other opportunities to discuss this. We have a real emergency to deal with, right now.»
At a gesture from Ironside, Macready calls the two guards who waited next the door. The two soldiers escort Ivanov out.
Left alone, the three exchange questioning looks.
Macready breaks the silence, turning to Ironside. «With all due respect, are we really going to buy all the crap that that man told us? Did you see the light of madness in his eyes? I think that he is completely insane and, in my humble opinion, we wouldn't fail if we sent him back to the Kremlin with a stars and stripes footprint tattooed on his ass.»
The other man seems to evaluate what to say. «I don't know what to think, Major. I appreciate your candor, and I must say that this story is too implausible for me too. I'm afraid that there was more to hear. But... basically he has no alternative but to cooperate. His immunity is only temporary. If he proves successful, Uncle Sam might find his expertise undoubtedly useful in the field of biological warfare. In addition, if there wasn't at least some truth in all his story, why would the Russians haste to warn us and send him here?»
«And what if it's just a sham? He may be a double crosser, sent here just to spy on us or distract us. After all we still don't know for sure why that plane has crashed.»
«If we assume for a moment that the history of an organism able to clone a human being is true, we should take into account the fact that he himself may not be who he claims to be», says the scientist. «Not at all...»
For a few silent moments the two men watch her with skeptical expressions.
«We can't rule out any hypothesis, until proven otherwise. Personally, I don't think the stuff he told us, but until we know more, we'd better keep our guest under close surveillance», says Ironside, then he turns to Macready. «Major, I have a question. I think I noticed a certain... interest on your part, when Ivanov spoke of the two destroyed outposts...»
The soldier is a stone mask, and he stares firmly at John Ironside. Suddenly his expression changes, the features of his face relax. «I was just curious. I knew someone who served in the American outpost that the Russian brainiac was talking about.»
Ironside nods, although he doesn't seem entirely convinced by that explanation.
Right at that moment a young soldier enters the room, snapping to attention. «Sir, one of the helicopters has just came back, they caught a guy who was wandering around the containment perimeter.»
«A survivor?», asks Ironside.
«Negative, sir, he's a native of the place, he belongs to one of the tribes living in the rocky hills around the southwestern area from the base.»
Ironside and Macready exchange a worried look.
«Just what we need», whispers Macready. «I don't want troubles with the local tribes. Blindfold him and escort him into one of the rooms in the first basement floor. I want two men watching the door. Call Delgado, she knows the dialects of this region, she will be our interpreter.»
The soldier hastens to follow the orders.
Ironside takes a deep breath before hinting a tired smile. «Well, Dr. Moore, you have carte blanche to better manage the medical and scientific aspect. The Major Macready will provide all the help you'll need. Set up an analysis laboratory and, if necessary, some containment chambers. We don't know what we're dealing with, but it's better to get ready for any eventuality.»
Macready knocks three times on the table, and a new soldier faces in the doorway waiting for orders.
«Vasquez, take Dr. Moore to the laboratory, and follow her instructions as if they came from me.»
The soldier looks for a moment at the small figure of the woman, as if uncertain that he understood, but Macready quickly dismisses him. «It's all, Vasquez.»
Boeing crash site
«Dr. Waters, the uh... the object has been loaded onto the helicopter, along with most of the bags with the remains of the people from the Boeing. We are ready to take off.»
The man nods, his face concealed by a dark Plexiglas bio hazard suit. «Excellent, Matt, I'm going back to the base to run some test. You stay here and make sure that the job is done properly.»
That said, the medical officer, Nick Waters, walks towards the helicopter, instinctively lowering his head when the wind generated by the rotating blades begins to lash his suit.
Once aboard he heads to the passenger compartment, taking quick glances to the soldiers lined up on the side benches. The horrible trunk taken from the disaster scene occupies three adjacent stretchers. The soldiers covered it coarsely with a semi-transparent plastic sheet, securing it with elastic straps, similar to those used to hold the truck roof sheeting. Beyond it, there are several bags of yellow plastic fabric, piled and marked with the symbol of biological contamination hazard. They contain part of the remains of the unfortunate passengers of the Boeing.
The man puts his gloved hand on the plastic that covers the deformed mass, and further ties one of the strings. For a moment he feels like something moving, under the sheet, so he stops suddenly, waiting frozen with alert senses.
It must have been an impression...
Making sure that everything is okay, he turns and heads to the cockpit, sitting next to the pilot. «Let's go, Jay, get us out of here.»
The pilot nods, maneuvering with extreme skill the controls of the aircraft. The blade rotation speed increases more and more, forming tiny sand tornadoes all around the helicopter, which takes off slowly fr
om the ground raising into the black sky. The horizon is barely illuminated by the imminent dawn.
Waters and the pilot look at the scene of the disaster. The fires have been extinguished, but there are still faint pillars of gray smoke popping out from some scrap. No one talks, the two men sitting in the cockpit wear headphones that muffle the roar of the rotor, and they turn their back to the passenger compartment and the thing wrapped up a few meters behind them.
It's impossible to hear the low moan coming from the mass of deformed flesh, and none of the military notices the plastic sheet movement, shifting down almost imperceptibly. While something inside seems to writhe, a reddish stain slowly spreads on the floor, forming a rivulet that meanders slowly and undisturbed among the military boots, heading for the cockpit.
USA base CNT222
Ironside, Macready and Moore look at the scene behind a thick glass window. Two armed guards watch the only entrance of the tiny room. A small figure sits motionless inside, his hands locked behind his back with zip cuffs. His head, hooded by a black canvas, stoops forward.
A soldier updates them about the circumstances of his capture: «He was hiding behind a small dune, outside the perimeter. We don't know why he was there, neither for how long. The pilot of the helicopter patrolling the area noticed him, and some of our boys surrounded him quickly.»
«Any resistance?», Macready.
«Affirmative, sir. Although he seemed weak, tired and visibly under-shock, he did not hesitate to fight the first men who approached him. The boys immobilized him, but he managed to bite one of the men of the support team during the scuffle, wounding him in the hand. The name of the soldier is Foster, sir.»
«Wasn't he wearing protective gloves?»
«Yes, he was, sir, but despite this that guy has almost severed two fingers. He's just a boy but better not to underestimate him.»
«Where is now the bitten soldier?», asks Moore.
Ironside gives her a quick look of understanding, hearing her question.
«He's in the infirmary. Waters and Serum are busy at the crash site but there's another doctor in the support team.»
«We should take a sample of his blood and put the man under lock down until we can analyze it», Moore suggests, earning an uncertain look by Macready.
«That's right, follow Dr. Moore's directives», the Major agrees, before turning to a woman which has joined the group in the meantime. «We just needed this meddlesome... Constantine, you can speak the language of these people. Ask him his name, where he comes from, whether he was alone and what was he doing around the crash site.»
The soldier who just joined is tall, with dark honey-colored skin, an exotic and harmonious beauty. Her deep black eyes, almost almond-shaped, give her an oriental tinge. She speaks with the boy by intercom, translating Macready's requests in a strange language, full of aspirations.
The boy raises his head to those words, turning around to find the source of the voice, though unable to see.
The translator repeats the same words again, to entice him to answer.
After a moment, muted phrases emerge from the intercom. The boy's tone is clearly nervous, and his voice takes on shrill peaks sometimes, betraying his youth.
«What did he say?», asks Ironside.
«He says his name is Ahmed. Our suppositions were right, he belongs to one of the tribes living in small valleys between the rocky hills, southwest from here.»
The boy's voice comes back to bite. His tone is scared, he raises his voice as if to speak with someone far away.
The translator face shows an uncertain expression, as if something is missing. They keep speaking for a few minutes, before Constantine translate to the others. «He was in his village when they saw the plane falling. He, along with his brother and two other members of the tribe, went to the crash site to rescue any survivors. He says they found only one man alive, an old man with a broken leg. He was unconscious. They loaded him on the back of one of the dromedaries. Their plan was to take it to their village and care for him, but they were attacked by... he calls them mavericks with weapons , on their way back. I think he means a gang of armed robbers.»
«Damn!», erupts Macready, aware of the implications in the boy's words.
«Constantine, go on, ask him what happened next.»
The woman continues to exchange a few sentences with the hooded boy, his voice broken with sobs.
«He says that he stayed behind, for he was on foot and his dog was very nervous and barked both to men and dromedaries. He was fast to hide behind a low dune when they were suddenly attacked by the robbers. He heard the gunshots of the attackers. He could approach only after they left, but he found just the bodies of his brother and two companions who were with him. The robbers killed also the dromedaries. There was no further sign of the survivor and the dog. According to him, the robbers headed for the desert, where there is nothing. He was afraid to venture out on their trail, and he could not walk back to his village. So he walked back to the crash site, following the footprints left by his group. He was looking for water and a shelter when our boys captured him.»
After some moments of tense silence Moore starts talking. «We must take a sample of his blood, so we can analyze it. He was among the first to set foot on the crash site, they found someone who miraculously survived. This guy may have been exposed to any infection.»
«Good idea. Well, he's all yours, Doctor», replies Ironside. Then he turns to Macready. «Major, we should send some men to the place where these events took place, if we're lucky we'll find some traces confirming what he told us.»
* * *
The hermetic door slides sideways with a hiss. Moore and Constantine, dressed in bio hazard protective suits, enter the room, approaching the hooded guy.
Moore speaks first, hoping the tone of her words is going to calm him down. Constantine translates for her in a low voice. «I'm sorry about your brother and your friends. Don't worry, you're safe now, we don't want to hurt you. We just want to check you to make sure you're okay.»
The boy is nervous, icy sweat drops slide down his back. He winces when the gloved hands of Dr. Moore touch his skin.
She pulls up the sleeve of his left arm, an awkward task due to the thick gloves of the suit and because Ahmed is still tied with his hands behind his back. At the sight of the dagger tied to the limb of the boy, the scientist stops uncertain, turning a questioning glance at the other woman, who is watching from behind the cover of her mask.
He's barely older than a boy...
Constantine quickly untie the knots that secure the knife to his arm, muttering something about the idiots who have not inspected him properly.
Ahmed's body tenses when the needle of the syringe pricks his skin, but he stays motionless, holding his breath until the operation is finished.
Moore is upset by the sight of a barely fifteen years old boy tied up and hooded like a criminal, but the words of Ivanov come to her mind for a moment, and her hands leave instinctively the boy's skin at that thought. «That's right», Moore tells Constantine. «Please, reassure him. Tell him that he will return to his village soon, and he will be given back his weapon. Be sure that he doesn't leave this room and stays under constant surveillance.»
Boeing crash site
The soldiers left on the site, bundled up in their suits, are working hard completing the sad task of collecting what is left of the unfortunate passengers. They fill a number of yellow plastic containers, oblong shaped.
«Holy Jesus, Brimley, I can't wait to go back to the base and have a shower. I think that I'll keep seeing this shit every time I go to bed, from now on.»
«Oh, come on... I don't think there are many more left now. Keep that bag wide open», replies his colleague, while he uses a large forceps to raise a big piece of blackened meat, stuck to the remains of a shirt and a jacket.
The piece of corpse makes a muffled noise falling into the yellow plastic bag.
«Ugh... I feel really sorry for
all these poor people, but it's a real crap...», murmurs one of them.
The two move down to a piece of metal sheet that protrudes inclined from a low pile of sand, in a peripheral area of the crash site.
«Did you see that thing that looked like a burnt tree trunk? Holy God, what a shit! And Waters, what an idiot... He should have set it on fire and buried it under a mountain of sand... All but loading it onto the chopper...»
«Don't remind me that, Hawk... If I close my eyes I can still see those faces. When Bishop will see it, he'll make him turn back and bring it back here on foot.»
The soldiers reach the piece of metal sheet and walk by.
«There's nothing here, just as well. Let's move to the vehicles and see what the others are doing», says Keith Brimley.
The other marine doesn't seem to have heard him, and slowly crouches on the ground, as if to examine something.
«What's up, Hawk, did you find anything?»
Brimley approaches moving sideways to look at the sandy ground in front of his colleague who has suddenly become silent. The sand is slightly loose, but no matter his efforts, he can't see anything.
But one particular has not escaped Thomas Hawk who, proud to have true Native Americans among his ancestors, has spent much of his childhood hunting and learning how to recognize the tracks of his preys.
«There is a footprint here», he exclaims softly.
Brimley stoops to look better, but he can still see nothing but sand.
«I can't see anything Hawk, are you sure?»
The other gets up slowly, walking a few steps toward the desert beyond the perimeter of the area, then he squats again.
Brimley joins him puffing.
«Someone was here», murmurs Hawk in an almost inaudible whisper. «It's not a footprint of ours, it's a small shoe, with smooth soles. Someone came out from the crash, and headed toward the desert.»
Cellular Activity- The Djinn Page 11