The Variant Effect

by G. Wells Taylor

  If it's skin you want...

  The small skin eaters moved close to his knees as the larger Biters either investigated their new Alpha, cautiously stroking his strange leg-braces or scouting through the shadows in the lead.

  They soon exited the tunnel and clambered around its opening. The water had overflowed the cistern pool and flooded the cement walkway that ran around its perimeter. It was four feet wide and offered the Biters perilous footing as the most anxious misread its margin and had to cling to their brethren to avoid falling into the bubbling pool of frigid water. Hyde looked up at the chamber's rounded ceiling. It was punctured at intervals by evenly spaced drains that belched rainwater into the central pond. Hyde saw the rusted iron ladder bolted to the wall and leading upward to a portal undoubtedly locked.

  "SSSKIN!" one of the males bellowed, and crouched on the flooded walkway. But there was no need to explain to Hyde. He had seen the movement in the adjoining tunnel that opened across from them.

  The squad was huddled inside the door with their hood-lamps off. A reconnoiter that had turned into an opportunity.

  If he were leading the squad, he'd let the Biters assemble then he'd hit the hood-lamps and come out firing when the last was clear of the tunnel.

  "Skin!" barked a sleek female.

  She was answered by a chorus of the same, as the Biters instinctively broke into two roughly equal-sized groups. One started north around the pool's edge, the other followed the circular walkway to the south.

  "Now!" Aggie shouted.

  The hood-lamps sparked to life.

  Hyde and the Biters cowered away from the blinding flare.

  And the gunfire started.

  Flashing. Blazing muzzles.

  "Skin! Ssskin! SSSKIN!" the Biters shrieked, leaping and running toward the squad. Blinded, reckless with need.

  Hyde took two staggering steps and felt a sudden jarring blow to the chest.

  He looked down, and an inch below his skinned sternum, a bullet hole had appeared. Blood poured out.

  It doesn't even hurt. Well that's...

  Hyde took another step and toppled through the gunfire into the cistern pool. He sank but rebounded from the bottom, lifted by the current that exploded from grated drains that opened on each point of the compass.

  The cistern was four feet deep. Hyde coughed, clamped a numb hand on the cold concrete lip long enough to hook his naked chin over it.

  And he watched.

  The southern group was cut to pieces when the baggies followed Aggie's orders and concentrated their fire on the frontal assault. The action destroyed almost half the hunting pack, though it did leave the squad open for what came next.

  Faster and stronger Biters hurtled around the cistern's northern rim and got in close with the loss of only two of their number. Those absorbed further shotgun blasts as the Biters behind pushed into the squad like battering rams. The close confines knocked two baggies into the water where they foundered in their suits, their struggles sending waves over Hyde.

  The Biters pressed the attack, fouling the squad's shotguns by charging close and forcing the violence to brutal proximity. Big or small they were fast, impossible to hit.

  Aggie recognized the danger, understood the need to clear some space around the squad. She stepped forward and broke the knee of the closest Biter. She snapped its neck as it fell.

  With a whirling kick to the ankles she knocked two of the closest Biters onto their backs where one was shot by the baggie, Dancer. Aggie smashed the other's skull with her gun butt.

  She followed through with a flying kick in the face of a big male. His naked finger bones snatched at Aggie, but a single motion of her hands folded his forearm midway.

  Other Biters, male and female, caught at Aggie. One in a ragged dress and nylons set its teeth in her shoulder. She drew her pistol and shot it in the forehead as the others used brute strength to grip her suit, pull her limbs aside and push her down.

  The squad clambered to help as a male leapt on Aggie's chest. His claw-like hands gripped her face-shield and battered her as the others pulled.

  The squad hesitated, unwilling to fire so close to her.

  Then they screamed her name, reversed their shotguns and charged the pack with the weapons raised like clubs.

  They don't know.

  Hyde watched from the water-the cold complete.

  Only Aggie.

  The Biters charged and started ripping.

  Only Lovelock would dare fight them hand to hand.

  "SKIN!" the Biters howled, focusing their intent. "Ssskin!"

  They brought the battle to the squad.

  Some guns flashed. Bones broke. Skin ripped.

  It's over.

  Hyde took a final breath. Shivering uncontrollably he lost his grip, sank beneath the surface.

  CHAPTER 70

  "It was just something I did to calm down. You know people who love to eat turkey skin on the holidays? That's how I thought about it. Christmas and Thanksgiving were my favorite: I just didn't know why. Mom used to complain that I had to eat some meat too." Jill Hyde's eyes darkened. "I started hiding the skin in napkins and sneaking it up to my room to eat when everyone else was in bed." She shrugged. "Later I got inventive and started peeling hotdogs, even pickles. I'd strip the outer covering off to eat. It felt good."

  "Your parents didn't notice?" Borland's temples throbbed as his anxiety and adrenaline built toward a stroke.

  "They were too busy fighting." Jill paced across the tunnel. The young Biter moved by her knees in a crouch. "And when they shouted, I did it more. They'd yell, and I'd skin something." She laughed at Borland's expression. "Nothing living, Uncle Joe-things like thin-sliced meat and candies: Fruit Roll-Ups, or taffy. Sometimes I'd go for anything I could flatten out and pick into mouth-sized bits." She went quiet and then smiled. "Just rolling it between my fingers was sometimes enough. Mom and dad would be fighting, but that rolling would calm me down. Eating it made everything right in the world."

  BANG! BOOM! BANG!

  Gunshots erupted in the air, rattling down from the north. Borland dropped to a knee and waved his weapons defensively.

  The young Biter cringed, wrapped its arms around Jill's right thigh. She stiffened, looked down at the Biter then pinched a loose piece of skin off the back of its neck. She considered Borland a second before anxiously popping the morsel into her mouth. Jill's stance softened as she chewed.

  BANG! BOOM!

  Still the gunfire deafened them. Crouching, Borland felt water pouring in the left side of his suit, but he kept his eyes on Jill and the little Biter.

  The gunshots continued a minute more, and then slowed. There was other noise now, quieter but distinctive. Violent blows were being struck.

  More shots.

  "Do you think daddy's okay?" Jill asked, taking a step toward Borland.

  "Stay there," he ordered, holding his shotgun by the barrel and pointing his pistol at her. "I know what you are."

  She smiled and started talking. The singsong quality of her voice was unnerving.

  "Remember when mom would bring me down to Stationhouse Nine to see dad, I was just little, and you always put me up on your shoulders and ran around the transports?" Jill's voice softened. "And we both knew daddy didn't like it, but we did it anyway. Every time-we teased him."

  Borland nodded, remembering the bright-eyed girl running to him-open and innocent, unable to judge him, no matter how badly he was cranked. Hyde always scowled.

  "When daddy got hurt, and he went away, I was just a kid. But later I learned what happened, and I kind of understood why he stayed away and why he wouldn't return mom's calls or mine. I always thought I'd grow up to be a doctor and help him one day." She smiled. "So we could be a family." Jill looked downcast. "But I was too nervous for university. I couldn't take the pressure, you know, I spent a lot of time in closets eating chicken skin. I flunked out after a couple years and got a job at a lab. "

  "Medcor," Borland s
aid, as he struggled to his feet.

  Jill smiled brightly and nodded. "We tested tissue samples from everywhere, research facilities and special clinics." She looked down, almost embarrassed. "I really tried to control it, but sometimes dermatologists sent things in for classification and disposal. Skin. When there was enough of it, well, I couldn't resist taking some home-just to touch when I got nervous." She put her hand over her mouth to cover her smile. "One time when I was really nervous I ate a little bit." A smile spread over her face. "It just happened, but...boy, it was like the feeling before but multiplied a million times." She shook her head. "It was dreamy. But after that, I took specimens whenever I was going through a rough time. It's a craving I can't explain."

  "Yeah," Borland growled, and gestured with his gun. "No closer." He'd noticed that Jill was slowly moving toward him.

  She smiled and then froze, shoulders locked, as another riot of shotgun fire echoed down the tunnel. It tapered quickly to silence.

  "I felt ashamed about eating it, Uncle Joe. I knew it was wrong, but I couldn't stop so I built a special room in the basement where I could do whatever I wanted with the skin without feeling guilty. I wasn't hurting anyone."

  "I saw the room," Borland said, realizing his shotgun was empty. The .38 will be messy. One bullet? No chance of reloading.

  "Just me and Lilly would go down there." She smiled and hefted her dead dog as a flush came into her cheeks. "About a month ago we got some frozen brain, glands and skin samples from a company that was only numbers on the return address. The samples weren't in solution like the other specimens. I couldn't resist the idea of real skin without that ethanol taste so I took some and thawed it. I was-over the moon."

  "Stop moving, Jill." He held up his guns. The shotgun had extra shells stored in the stock but he'd never load them fast enough. "I'm trying to think of a way out of this."

  "After that, the cravings got worse. I started dreaming about it and when I looked at people I only saw their skins. I never considered the pain it would cause. I just imagined their skin in my mouth, warm and soft. The idea felt sexual, and the more I looked at people, the more I wanted their skin. I would get so nervous worrying about calming down. And it made me so excited.

  "Then one morning, I woke up feeling like I was outside myself, watching me. A voice whispered about the skin, and it told me how to get some. It told me to get the Taser I carried for muggers and go to a convenience store that night. When a man came out of the store the voice told me to talk to him.

  "I told the man my car wouldn't start, so he came over and got in, and the voice Tasered him, and pushed him over into the passenger seat. Then I drove him home and tied him up in my secret room. You see, I used rope then, and I should have used chains." She smiled looking inward. "I took a cab back to the store and got his car and hid it in my garage."

  Her face twisted with emotion.

  "The voice just took a little skin at a time, in places that his clothes would cover. I don't know how long he stayed but before he got away we got excited and instead of using a knife and fork and plate, the voice licked at the skin and pulled it off with my teeth." She shook her head. "It all felt so good, but the voice had to do it...or I'd know," she gasped, eyes growing wide with terror. "Otherwise, Uncle Joe, I was hurting that man."

  "Does your father know?" Borland asked, aware that Jill had moved another step closer. He could have reached out and touched her with the butt of the shotgun. There were still sounds echoing up the tunnel: the clatter of gunfire, and then splashing violent action.

  She shook her head and looked down at the Biter. "What's happening to us?"

  "All I can figure is you got the new Variant from the samples at the lab. It beefed up your own kinderkid presentation and passed to your captive from your saliva. He took his car when he escaped and presented as a Biter when he got to Metro. He must have gone there for help," Borland sighed. "Before he left town he touched something or someone-left blood or body fluid somewhere public. Someone in Parkerville got it from there. If you haven't passed it directly, Jill."

  She dropped the dead dog, put her hands up to her face and moaned.

  "Ssskin?" asked the Biter poking the dog's body.

  "There's nothing I can do," Borland said, gasping raggedly.

  "Don't let daddy know," Jill pleaded, and then her eyes centered on him. The pupils dilated out, black absorbed her irises. "Get ready Joe, the voice is coming."

  The young Biter hissed up at Borland.

  When he looked back at Jill-at the stalker-her-its face was hard and white. Her lips were pulled away from her teeth and her body shook in muscular spasms as the stalker bellowed: "SSSKIN!"

  Borland shot the young Biter with his .38 as it leapt across the distance. Its brain blew out in a scarlet fan. And the stalker was on him, its hands around his wrist pushing it back until something snapped. The .38 disappeared with a plunk!

  Borland grimaced, smashed the shotgun barrel into the stalker's face. There was a hard clink and gasp as teeth flew.

  Scowling the stalker swung him by his broken wrist, bones grating, and he tumbled along the tunnel. His head struck the concrete. His vision flickered as he fell face-first into the water.

  He struggled, got a knee under him and turned...

  The stalker was squatting in the water, an intent look on its face as its hands trolled the liquid by its knees. It clicked its tongue and lifted a small white object: a tooth.

  Snarling at the pain, Borland clenched the shotgun under his right arm and pried a shell out of the stock. He jammed it into the breach and cocked the weapon.

  The stalker turned to him, blood dribbling over its chin, and smiled.

  Borland aimed the gun as it charged.

  The shotgun roared, and half of the stalker's torso exploded in a haze of torn meat and blood. It staggered back snarling, slumping to the left. Its fingers still ripping at the air like claws.

  That's enough! It's got to end.

  Borland growled beast-like, dragged himself to his feet and lurched toward the stalker. Blood flowed from its torn body, flooded down its legs.

  He bit back tears raising the shotgun, fingers wrapped around the barrel.

  The first blow cracked her skull with a sickening crunch. Blood sprayed.

  Borland wept as he pushed Jill down and beat her brains out.

  CHAPTER 71

  He threw the shotgun away; its stock shattered, then he dredged around in the knee-deep mix of water and blood until he found his .38. He stuffed it into his holster and staggered deeper into the tunnel, slowing as it narrowed to open his flask and drain it in three hard pulls.

  He slapped at his hood-lamps to turn them off. Darkness closed in. He knew it could be full of teeth and death, but he didn't care.

  Hyde was right.

  He was worse than the Variant Effect. Borland's toxic spirit poisoned everything it touched-warped it and pulled it down into the gutter. People died whenever his dark soul presented.

  Flushing with shame and whiskey, Borland moved slowly forward in a half-crouch. His face and back aching, his abdomen a throbbing mass of wrenched muscle. He paused at the concrete crossing, a culvert where the tunnel forked. He bent forward to investigate a submerged light.

  Hood-lamps hanging from a skinned corpse. The face behind the shield was stripped of expression. It didn't seem to mind that someone had opened its skull and taken the brain out. The meat in the water sure didn't look like the shield-name: Lazlo.

  "Jesus, Jenkins..." Borland said, and then chuckled maniacally at the way that sounded. "Jesus Jenkins!" He laughed again. "Poor bastard."

  Then, he heard noises where the tunnel branched to the left. Voices shouting: frightened, anxious, some commanding. The last was Aggie's barking orders. Did she just say Hyde? A Biter now, was that for the best?

  His gaze drifted down to the corpse floating at his feet.

  "Jesus Jenkins..." he muttered and then giggling turned to the right, away from the sou
nds of life, walking into the darkness unable to imagine forgiveness or death. "I should call you Bob."

  The water rushed noisily around his knees. Deep gurgling sounds came as he trudged against the current.

  He caught something else, too. His hood was ripped from the fight, so he could smell the damp and the echo of rot, but there was something more, a breeze coming in from the open air. He kept going through the dark, unaware of time and then...

  There was light up ahead.

  The second cistern...

  He stopped. A circle of orange hung in the black; spangled reflections flickered atop the floodwater. Someone was talking. The voices were echoes of nothing at first before he heard....

  "That should be enough." It was Brass. His normally unshakeable tone had a noticeable quaver. He was panting too.

  "You know it is," Spiko said, his voice louder as Borland crept close.

  There was splashing as they moved around, grunts and groans of exertion.

  Borland pulled his .38, opened it to clear the cartridges and slipped fresh bullets in place with the speed-loader from a pouch in his belt. His broken wrist throbbed, made him fumble, almost drop the gun. He cursed, realizing he'd have to shoot left-handed.

  The constant dripping splash covered his movements as he waded forward. Ahead, he caught shadows moving along the circular wall that enclosed the cistern pond. He froze when Spiko's stocky form backed into view dragging a heavy drum marked: BZ-2. Then Brass heaved a second drum into place beside it. The big man was wrapped in vinyl, but wore none of the insignia that went with rank. It was a simple bag-suit that any baggie would wear. Brass might wear it for...

  Anonymity. Black Ops. Murder.

  "What do I set the timers for?" Spiko asked, as he knelt and worked the controls on top of the fogger. That was a funnel-shaped unit bolted to the BZ-2 drums designed to deliver a killing fog for set periods of time. "The gunfire stopped. Somebody won and somebody lost."

  "Set them to fog in 10 minutes. Don't worry about shut-off times," Brass said matter-of-factly.

  "You sure about this? We got what you want." Spiko looked up, one hand brushing the canisters slung over his shoulder, the other poised by the controls. "The squad hasn't ziplocked yet. Without a shut-off time you'll fog the whole town."