“What do you mean they have changed?” Jamie asked. His small voice chirped. The sound was out of place as their minds were focused on the blast. He didn’t seem to be fazed by it at all. This was normal behavior for him though. He could be socially awkward at times.
Charlotte walked over to him and knelt down next to his chair. She brushed his shaggy brown hair out of his fragile face. He was still wet from the sprinklers, but he was beginning to gain some of the color back in his cheeks.
“Don’t you worry about that now, okay?” She asked, assuring him as she tugged on his dimpled chin and flashed him a brilliant smile.
Charlotte knew that he no longer had a mother. Her heart went out to him.
“If the boy and his group hadn’t been here they might still be alive.” She thought, feeling guilty.
For that, she felt she owed Jamie dearly. She was responsible for him now and no matter what happened she would keep him safe.
They watched as Jeremy stumbled out of the building. His body cast a long, dark shadow through the disheveled lobby onto the blasted debris. The scene erringly painted a picture of defeat for the group. There was nothing they could do now.
Charlotte searched the outside cameras, trying to keep track of the direction Jeremy went. She searched them all one by one, but he had already escaped. She shook her head out of frustration.
“I feel this isn’t the last we’ll see of him.” Charlotte spoke with anger.
Seconds later, they could see the first wave of undead climbing through the hole in the doors. The first time that Ian and his group had seen the monsters since they had been imprisoned. Their appearance brought back many memories of the school and the dead that resided there; many of them their fallen friends.
“They look so…. rotten.” Jamie exclaimed as he pointed to the skin of an undead on the screen. He had left Charlotte’s side and was leaning in close to the monitors, soaking in the aftermath.
“Well, they are much older than they were a year ago when you first encountered them.” Charlotte pointed out to Jamie. She motioned for the others to huddle up so that she could talk without Jamie hearing.
“We need to leave this room. There’s no way we are going up with the undead coming in through the front door. I know of a place we can go to think things through. I just don’t want to scare Jamie with his condition.” The good thing about having Charlotte around was that she understood everyone’s personality.
“And,” she paused, leaning in a bit tighter to Ian and Sam.
“We need to talk about them.” She uttered softly. She pointed at the monitors to the undead shuffling about on the first floor.
The group left the Security room and headed back for the elevators. They were going to what Charlotte called,’ the vault.’ Once there, they would be safe until they could think of a plan to get themselves out. It was a nightmare any day of the week. Not only did they have to worry about the undead inching their way closer to them level by level, they also had to worry about going into certain rooms without protective gear. She told them about the CDC and how dangerous it truly was. The world’s most atrocious viruses and diseases were kept at this location for research. And it turned out that Charlotte was a scientist herself. She had been studying for a few years before the group came and all of this mess blew up.
The elevator chimed as the last level in the building was reached. This was the basement of the CDC. The group hopped out and followed Charlotte once again, down the hall. This level was different than the rest. It looked more like an underground bunker. The walls were made of metal and the doors were steel. The whole place screamed safety.
The group rounded a corner and Charlotte walked up to a giant metal door. It had a key card reader just like the viewing room. Charlotte pulled her card out once again and scanned it. The door swung open and Charlotte beckoned them inside.
The room was very bright inside and had a sterile smell of bleach and other cleaning products. There wasn’t much color variation at all. Everything seemed pristine and white.
“This is where we destroy many of the viruses and diseases. Don’t worry; we have suits to protect us. We will be going in that room.” Charlotte pointed to another vaulted door. It had to be turned in order to get inside. Anytime you see one of those, it’s housing something important. In this case, it housed something extremely dangerous. Ian almost felt overwhelmed by it all. He was still recovering. He’d been gone for several days at the lab. There was no question about it; he needed someplace to rest.
“So, I need to rest. I haven’t gotten much since I’ve been back.” He said leaning against the metal wall closest to him.
“I know. I’ll explain once we get inside. Everyone put on one of these.” Charlotte said as she pointed to the orange biohazard suites hanging on the wall next to the vault door.
“They’ve been cleaned and are ready for entry.” Charlotte said as she took one down and began stepping inside of it. She could feel the cool lining of the suit touch her skin.
“The Cold Ones can’t get to us in there.” Charlotte said
“It’s reinforced steel one-foot-thick in diameter and it’s made just like a bank vault door. So, we are safe until we can think of something to do next.” Charlotte graciously divulged.
Ian opened his mouth to speak. “What do you mean the ‘Cold Ones’?” He questioned her.
“That’s what we call them. They are basically dead, empty of life. So, we call them the Cold Ones. The name just stuck with everyone here at the CDC.” She sat back making sure that everyone was properly wearing their suits.
Charlotte waited for Jamie to get his suite on. It was much baggier on him and more of a caution to wear. So, she had to tape some of the slack up so that he wouldn’t trip over it. The helmet was almost too heavy for him to handle. Luckily, they would be safe and didn’t have to go very far in them.
Charlotte turned the giant wheel of the vault door. As she did, it sounded as though an anchor was being pulled up from a massive boat. After a few moments of turning it made a loud, ‘clinking’ noise and Charlotte pulled the door open. A rush of air hit the group’s helmets sending them back a couple of inches. The room was air sealed to keep it safe for the workers destroying the viruses and diseases.
Everyone slowly walked inside. There wasn’t much in the room itself. Just a large pillar cut in half about the height of an average sized person’s hip area. It had a security mechanism on it so that a password had to be put in before opening.
“Okay, why don’t you go over there and read the rules for us?” Charlotte wanted to distract the boy. The group watched as he walked over to the board on the wall that read, ‘RULES.’ He immediately began reading the words written upon it out loud.
“That should buy us a few minutes. We aren’t going to be able to keep this from him for long. I just don’t want the poor boy too upset when he finds out we have to leave his mother here. He’s going to freak. I don’t want to add on any more stress as it is. He could go into a state of shock so deep he might not return from it.” Charlotte murmured lightly. Her thoughts moved away from Ian and Sam. She seemed distant for a moment. Her eyes wandered downward as a small tear left the corner of her eye. Quickly, she raised a hand to her face and wiped the tear away. She had snapped back.
“Since you have been here, there’ve been some changes to the Cold Ones.” Charlotte informed them as she cleared her throat and pressed on.
“They have acquired a few new abilities that we didn’t know of before. For all that we know they may not have developed until recently.” She paused, pulling up to the one computer in the room. Charlotte adjusted the gloves on her hand and began typing away. Eventually, a file opened up revealing what looked like a horrible monster from a child’s nightmare.
“These, are what we call, ‘Wastelings'.” She scrolled down to a picture that showed the same picture but much closer up.
“The virus has mutated inside some of the Cold Ones. These guys,” She
paused, bringing her finger up to the screen to point at the Wasteling.
“They are much stronger than the others. They can lift an entire car by themselves. And that’s only the half of it. They also spit acid, and in their own way, regenerate body parts.”
Ian interrupted, “What do you mean REGENERATE?” He questioned. He looked around over at Sam. Both of their eyes had opened wide exposing them more than normal.
“Yes, that’s what I’m getting at. They now have the ability to take from their fallen comrades what they need to ‘live’ on.”
The room fell silent. No one wanted to believe what Charlotte was saying.
“There are reports of the larger mutants salvaging parts from the Cold Ones. They simply rip off what they need and place it on their bodies. Within minutes the severed limb will latch on and grow until it becomes one with the new hosts’ body; essentially, regeneration. That particular strain we avoid like the plague. We don’t know too much about them. In the beginning, when this first went down, we turned the cities camera on. They were placed in various locations around the city. Of course, in the old world, regular everyday citizens didn’t know about this. It would have violated many laws, but we didn’t activate them until the event. After that, no one could care less.” Charlotte paused and checked on Jamie. He was still reciting the Rules and could not hear what they were discussing, so she decided to continue.
“What we discovered was that Wastelings don’t really migrate with the Cold Ones. When we speak of them together, we call the Cold Ones, ’Lessers.’ They are much smaller in comparison to the Wastelings. If threatened by the Cold Ones, the Wastelings will retaliate against them, taking body parts they deem necessary for their individual evolution. To this affect, no two Wastelings look alike. Let’s just say that they basically bully the Lessers. We know for sure that the Cold Ones can be killed by severing the spinal cord from the brain stem. Fire can even kill them if it is hot enough. But, the Wastelings take much more than this. As I have mentioned, they don’t go down too easily, since spare parts are readily available. There are more of the Lessers than there are living people in the world now.” She stopped talking and typed onto the keyboard of the computer once again.
“There are very few people alive in the world that we know of. The entire population has been affected by this virus. We call it VEX-13. There are reports of many areas without any living at all. This is coming from other CDC units around the world. If we didn’t have these reinforced walls to hide behind, we’d be bait just like the rest of them. There are only a few groups of people in this state that have made it without our help. And even then that number is going down.”
Ian watched as Charlotte pulled something up on her screen.
“This is the original video that aired when the virus made its way into the world.” Charlotte pointed to the screen just as the familiar Russian voice of the cameraman speaking about the undead started. Ian shuddered tremendously as small goosebumps appeared along his arms and neck. He remembered his disbelief that stemmed from the video, so long ago. They watched as the dead awoke, maliciously murdering the scientist and his bodyguard soldiers. Blood filled the camera lens and Charlotte suddenly paused the video.
“What we know is that this event led to the first spread of the infection and that it took place mere months before last year’s incident.” She played the rest of the video back for the group, turning the volume down rather low so that Jamie couldn't hear.
“You’re pretty much up to speed on all that I know. Do you have any questions?” She asked them. She knew that they had to be burning with a few, Or, at the very least make a comment.
“Why has the virus mutated so rapidly?” Ian asked Charlotte. He leaned in a little closer to the screen and studied the creatures. They were far from human now.
Charlotte took a deep breath and proceeded to answer his question.
“The CDC has been working on possible cures and treatments for the virus. We have gotten close many times in the past, but something always came up. Something always went wrong with the patient. We even brought in the ones that had made progress and got solid results, but nothing ever stuck. It’s like we were missing the most important piece of the puzzle, but then we made a discovery…” She pulled up a new page on the desktop.
“We call it TRIS73. It’s our way to fight the Cold Ones and the like, or so we thought.” She scrolled down a little further on the page. A picture came into view of a particularly nasty undead. To Ian it looked like one of the ones that Charlotte had called a Wasteling.
“This is our first test subject. He has had the longest time to mutate. His cells have been warped so much that he inherited the Regeneration trait. He is the first Wasteling. As you know, he has the ability to take the parts that he needs and fuse them to his body, but there is another skill that you do not know about. He has some level of consciousness underlying the creature possessing him. We still don’t understand what the virus can fully do. That is the hard part about viruses. They are constantly mutating.”
Sam interrupted her, “So, you’re saying that there are people still trapped inside their own bodies? That these creatures are taking over the bodies, but leaving the minds intact?”
“Not all of the Cold Ones have the ability to turn into a Wasteling, but a few select has the strength. We had our suspicions that it had to do with certain DNA algorithms. Kind of like natural selection but we had not had enough research under our belts with the project to determine a definitive answer on the reason.”
Charlotte paused another moment as she pulled up information on TRIS73.
“The compound that we created was supposed to attack the virus dead and eliminate the need for a host. However, in reality, we did the furthest thing from that which we intended. The genes that our serum attacked reacted in a totally unexpected way. The serum mutated the genes into having the regeneration traits, as well as the ability to spit acid from its mutated stomach bile. That was the only thing we had time to study. We were unable to contain the creature as his sheer size grew daily. Instead of destroying the atrocity, they had it released into the city. This way it could still be studied. I didn’t particularly agree with that, but I didn’t have enough pull at the time to make a difference.”
Sam and Ian took a seat and tried to ponder over everything that they just learned. It was a large amount of information to take in so suddenly. But, they would rather be in the know than be in the dark.
“So, going through the city to get out of here is out of the question. I won’t put them in danger.” Ian disclosed to Charlotte.
“I agree. I’ve been thinking of an alternative to our situation. But, I needed to check something first.” Ian and Sam watched as Charlotte mashed away on the keypad of the computer. The screen flashed a few times with different tabs and finally, Charlotte stopped.
“I was looking for security footage of the tunnels set underneath the building. They are escape routes intended just for the important employees stationed at this location. Not everyone knew about them. It’s actually situated underneath this vault.’ She described while leaning in and pressing the small button in the lower left- hand corner of the screen. The footage began with the tunnels. There wasn’t very much light that could tell you what you were looking at. There were a few lights lining the lower sides of the floor. Each camera showed a different angle and section of the tunnels. So far the crew didn’t see anyone or anything down there.
“We should monitor this footage for as long as we can. Remember when I told you that our patient was somewhat conscious? Well we have been having a problem with him making reoccurring trips to the front of the building. Like he remembers…” She paused. Ian and Sam’s skin had begun to crawl.
“He came back? You mean he remembered being experimented on here?” Ian asked. He watched as Charlotte brought up a different file. It was from a few months back. The camera zoomed in on a large shadowing figure situated at the front doors of the CDC. Once the c
amera was close enough, you could see that it was the Wasteling. He wasn’t pounding on the doors or spitting acid at them. He was just standing completely still and staring at nothing but a two-way glass door. You couldn’t see inside of the building. No matter what super power you may have.
“He comes back every few weeks. Always has several different limbs attached to his body. A few weeks ago, we noticed that he had taken almost an entire body and fused it with himself. His size had grown to almost the size of three people combined. It has been a few weeks since the last sighting. I bet you more than anything that he is in the area. If he is, he heard that blast. He will be coming. And he has a rage deeper than any Cold One or Wasteling. His beloved partner was killed here. She died from the testing a comrade of mine had conducted on her. He was a fellow scientist and employee of the CDC.”
Charlotte’s head lowered to the ground. She did not look too happy with herself at the moment. Or, the fact that she was re-living the past. She pressed her finger to her temple and continued on.
“Needless to say, he remembers her being here. At least, that is my theory. If something like that happened to me, I’d remember who did it and the person I loved the most. Those are two things that you could never forget in a tragedy like this.”
Ian had begun to wonder if Charlotte was the best person to have around Jamie. She didn’t seem dangerous but she had been here conducting experiments just as the others had.
“Why us?” Ian added into the conversation. The questioned had been killing him and everyone else in the group.
“We caught wind that there were survivors in the school where you and your group had settled. We wanted to know what made you special from the rest of the population. You had made it to safety and we wanted to find out what genes you possessed. It’s not only about the virus. We noticed a pattern of which the Cold Ones especially seem to stick too. We were able to get a few samples from Cold Ones that the military captured on one of their many ventures outside the CDC. Most of the turned victims had similar DNA. A lot of the researched that we were basing our experiments on were behavioral. We were trying to link facts about personality traits the Cold Ones chose over with their victims. You may think that they just attack anyone but, we argue they have a method.’
Scarlet Memories (Book 2): Metamorphosis Page 6