Zelda kept looking at Aaron. “Vampires, thropes, mer, the Olympians and the gorgon, all of it is in these pages. Each species has a few things in common. For one... Only their Alpha’s and Beta’s can infect other humans. Apparently, it's some gland that develops in the roof of the mouth or horns in some cases. Sara explains it to be akin to a snake’s venom gland that can selectively release, not a venom, but some sort of specialized cells akin to what's transpiring now. They can choose when to turn someone. They call it assimilation. They have a hierarchy in each species. Omega, being those newly assimilated or born. A Delta, then Beta, and Alpha. Onward there is a Grand Alpha rank that occurs in each species. Apparently, these Grand Alpha’s are the hardest to dispatch. According to her intel, Alphas can telepathically control any subordinate spawned from their bite or pedigree. After reviewing her notes, I enlisted one of my droids to create a full report in English of course for this little gathering. I’m downloading it to your archives now.” Each member in the room, quickly began to access the data on their tablets. One woman, a few seats down, with pitch black hair, and wearing a similar robe scoffed. “They can turn invisible?” While Aaron coughed up the words, “Telepathic, telekinetic and various other levels of psychic capacity.”
Rhymes was less than thrilled. “Great, new species of sensitives to deal with.”
Sophie had hoped to gain most of her knowledge from Aaron but was pleasantly surprised all the same. “Zelda, I’m not seeing anything on these animals, only humanized versions in this report.”
Zelda shook her head. “All Sara wrote about were the specific species she knew of. She indicated that those that claimed to be gods, those that were directly exposed to the origin of all of the immortals, called themselves Aeonians, while the immortal creatures such as vampires and thropes belonged to a class calling themselves Immortium. Clearly, she had no earthly knowledge of what the comet actually did, other than she speculated the comet had shed debris in the past that carried something to earth that gave rise to the Aeonian and Immortium races. She speculated that animals were involved given most monsters in many fables appeared to have some animal trait or quality. She had analyzed her own blood according to page seven, and found traces of chiropteran DNA, apparently an unknown species that likely went extinct sometime after the comet first arrived. Meaning, that our newly emerging vampires, are in essence a new vampiric species all together. Each species of vampire bat, potentially making a different vampiric variety. This would also hold true to wolves, cats, and everything else we’re seeing.”
One man sarcastically jests with a latent French accent, “We’ve already encountered a werepoodle in Paris.”
Zelda took point again. “The good news is, that according to her research, each person who assiliamtes still has their own free will, unless an Alpha is controlling them that is. And, my personal speculation is that since these people are all newly infected, they’re each their own patient zero. However, Sara’s notes indicate that when some Alpha dies, any Beta, Delta, and Omega linked to that specific Alpha by either birth, or bitten, enter a coma like state until the Beta’s awaken as new Alphas and assume control over those receiving heritage from them. Which she points out it's one of many things that’s different from her books. In her books, they died when the master perished. She changed facts in her publications to hopefully avoid breaking their rules of alerting the world to their presence. Apparently not enough.”
Zelda concluded that line of thinking. “If a reigning Alpha’s expiration results a new Alpha emerging from the Betas. I assume that when the animal responsible for the initial infection is terminated, it's possible that any human bitten would undergo Alpha morphology.” She looked at Aaron. “I saw that in you report, about the glands. It's likely why some have them, and some don’t, the animal hasn’t died yet.”
Zelda looked at Rhymes. “Now this is where you come in dear. Her journal goes into a full two-page rant about being kidnapped as an infant and raised by a human she thought was her uncle, but in reality, he was simply a pawn himself, a thrall using her for her gifts. She was telepathically manipulated by some being that thought himself to be an angel of death named Jaxalon, they even convinced Sara that he was her father. Turns out, he wasn't. Essentially, they tricked Sara into killing this being’s rivals. When Sara learned the truth, it was apparently too late, but she did say that some of her fictitious works had truth in them. The death of a few leaders of the immortal conclave, and Jaxalon by Sara’s own hand. The point I am getting at is, she mentions both Immortium and Aeonian groups that value human life, others do not. So not all of these people will be your enemy Reese!”
“What about her daughter? Have you contacted her? This half breed...” A paled woman sitting across from Zelda inquired.
Zelda lowered her head. “Back to my conspiracy theory I suppose. I did look into Cecilia's whereabouts this morning. She died in a dronemobile accident. Poor thing was decapitated in the incident. She died exactly four days after she brought me this journal. Poor dear expired, alongside her husband, children and an in law. Her husband was a registered sensitive, a human. According to the journal the children they had were referred to as dhamplings.”
Trevor scoffed. “What does that have to do with anything?”
Zelda growled. “The poor woman was probably killed for possessing this journal. I myself am probably alive simply because it couldn’t be deciphered.”
The Madam Supreme looked at Aaron. “We have Zelda’s notes. We need to understand the full grasp of what we are dealing with. Test Zelda’s silver theory and see if there is a possible cure, or at least a way to prevent or slow down this, assimilation process.”
Zelda spoke up. “Sara clearly states in her journal that Silver will kill an immortal. She also theorized that colloidal silver could slow down infection.”
Rhymes went for this usual approach. “I took colloidal silver as a kid, why not pump the world’s water supply with it, and kill them all at once.”
Most members in the room, tossed scornful glances, including Zelda and Aaron.
Aaron was quick to refute that idea. “Most of my patients are not hostile Grand General. The only hostiles we have seen so far have been the sex offenders that were sanctioned into human testing as punishment for their crimes, and these infected animals running about spreading the contagion of course are the most dangerous.”
A tall bald man sitting next to Rhymes, wearing a grey kevlar uniform with his own stars down his shoulders asked the next question. “Have you seen anything like what Miss Eastwick has proposed to us? This Alpha morphology?”
Aaron raised his eyebrows and took a deep slow breath before divulging. “We have seen these glands she spoke about in some members of the infected populace, not all, but some. And... If she’s correct about the animal’s termination, it’s possible. I’d need more time to test this theory out on some of our inmates.”
Zelda looked around the room once more. “Look at page 33. An Omega has the strength of ten men, maybe more. A Delta is twice that, Betas follow suite, and Alpha’s are far beyond that.” She sneered at Rhymes. “Making alliances with these people is in everyone’s best interests.” She then looked at Sophie. “Sara mentioned on page 78, that there are numerous factions of vampires, living in secret, along with werewolves and many other creatures. Most of them are peaceful within retrospect. Otherwise they would have overthrown mankind centuries ago. I think, given that the lid has been blown off the tea kettle on this one, they’re exposure is at hand and they know it so … Coming out of the caves so to speak, their laws regarding mortals knowing about them is likely null and void. Their dogmatic views have been ripped from them, and infighting will naturally occur among the opposing factions. They will need allies if any of us are to find peace. It is my suggestion, that we reach out to the groups that have respect for humanity and offer an olive leaf for their aid in developing a mutual relationship beneficial to both mankind and Aeonian.”
Aaron n
odded. “I’ve seen it firsthand. One of my patients from Isla Verde, she freaked when she woke up. She picked up a four-hundred-pound table like it was a cardboard box and threw it. These people might be the best option at helping contain rogue elements in their populace, and not to mention, assist in stopping the spread of the contagion.”
General Aswick, a balding midget sitting two seats down from Sophie agreed. The man twitched his brown mustache as he cleared his throat. “The Global Alliance has restored world peace for decades now, but it's not been without conflict to preserve our society. There are seven known terrorist regimes that each member of parliament and our division heads have had to deal with to maintain our Government. If one of these terrorist groups were to acquire an Alpha, it would make perfect sense to me, to use Aeonian or Immortium aid…”
Jori Manning agreed. “Given this event, we’re looking at an entirely new civil rights movement in the works ladies and gents. We need to prepare.”
Rhymes became belligerent. “Are you people fucking serious? They’re not even human any goddamn more! We are talking about every monster from every fairy fucking tale that’s ever growled in the closet and hid under the goddamn bed. Not to goddamn mention, we are going to have to resort back to primitive fucking projectiles for blasted ammunition. Do you all have any goddamn clue how long it's going to take to manufacture handguns, and rifles again, and heaven forbid silver fucking goddamn bullets!”
Zelda snapped at him. “Your vernacular certainly hasn’t changed. Really Reese, most men evolve, you on the other hand keep digressing. Stop acting like a bucket full of PTSD and get your head on straight! Your shoot first and ask questions later routine is what got us into this mess in the first place.”
Rhimes’s eyes bulged as he bit his tongue. Meanwhile Trevor took the perfect moment to climb onto her latest words. “We could have avoided this entire situation had we attempted to redirect the comet.” Trevor looked at his tablet. “As of one hour ago, 1,387, 996 people are in quarantine, for strain 2 alone, your human variation. Strain 3, people attacked by something aquatic just reached 108,170 infected. Four, your dog people or werewolves, or what have you just hit 162,805 attacks resulting in infection. Strain five, from various vampire bite attacks have produced 87,355 infected, and this feline strain, is now at 30,902 afflicted. This doesn’t count these other off the wall strains in Battle’s report. These are people right now that have been confined to one of 302 underground facilities that are housing thousands of already infected survivors of the mellitus-32 outbreak.” Trevor looked at Rhymes, we don't have the resources to keep up with the amounts pouring in, and these are the ones that have turned themselves in. This doesn't even account for those that haven’t complied with W.H.O.’s mandate.”
Aaron got quiet for a moment before interrupting. “That number is rising more than we previously thought.”
Lyssa Monroe looked at Aaron. “What do you mean? What are you talking about?”
Aaron looked at her. “The organism seems to be capable of regenerating dead tissue if the heart survived the animal attack. The organism specifically attaches itself to cardiac tissue when it begins the conversion process. If the victim’s heart was intact, we have seen about 1,000 cases of reanimation occur. And over 10,000 in cryogenic containment awaiting the go ahead for reanimation. Before I arrived, i was observing a security guard attacked by bats at New Beginnings Zoo. If you’ll turn to my report, Hank Jenkins was nearly devoured with the exception of his upper torso. The man was 72 years old. If you look at page 88, you can see Hank has regrown his extremities, and appears to be regressing in age. He reanimated six hours ago.”
Rhimes’s eyes widened, as did every other General in the room.
“It's why I put in the request to stop burning the bodies of the dead. There is a good chance that some of them may be able to regenerate.” Aaron said hesitantly.
“OH MY GOD.” Sophie sputtered.
“ARE YOU SAYING WE HAVE GODDAMN ZOMBIES NOW?” Rhymes continued his rhetoric.
Aaron shook his head while everyone in the room reviewed page 88 with the exception of Zelda. She had already committed every piece to memory.
“No, they’re becoming what bit them essentially. There is some memory dissonance, but they’re very much alive General.”
Zelda smirked. “Zombies, or… If you read Sara’s journal, they call them ghouls. According to her research they only occur when someone that is already dead, is assimilated. Now that part, according to Sara’s research confirms when the one responsible for their creation dies, so do the ghouls.”
Sophie posed a question that no one had addressed yet. A question that was bugging her. “Ok, so we know strain one, came from the debris from the R-9 fallout. How the hell did something like this evolve in a comet?”
Every head in the room looked at Aaron first, then the next logical person to inquire information from, Galactic-Corp’s Division leader, Trevor Graves.
Trevor sighed. He tilted his head from side to side, it was as if he didn’t even wish to answer. Not because his division hadn’t found something specific for the meeting, but the simple fact of what it would raise next. More questions he couldn’t answer yet. “We have two crystals that didn’t release that landed here on the lunar surface. Based on the shape, and a sample we managed to procure from the outer hull of the crystals, it appears to be synthetic in origin, Comet’s after all, are made of ice and rock, the comet could have been serving as some sort of refrigerant.”
General Aswick leaned forward as best as his chair allowed. “Are you saying Mr. Graves that some extraterritorial society, may have engineered this organism? A bioweapon?”
Graves looked at Aaron. Aaron spoke up. “My geneticists had a similar theory. If it was engineered, A bioweapon wouldn’t turn a population into for all tense and purposes, superhumans. IT would kill. I think it's more to convert a population.”
Jori Manning nodded slowly while flicking his hands while speaking. “Race, religion, political strife, those three ingredients have always divided and conquered until a world order united the planet. You take out the race factor… You only have to worry about religion and politics.” He looked at Sara’s notes Zelda had translated. “Given the Alpha’s ability to supposedly control their underlings, you eliminate political division. Eliminate division, you create unity.”
“Or create tyranny,” A redheaded woman sitting down at the far end, wearing a white robe spoke out in a Scottish accent. The Prime Minister of Scotland, Nela O’Neal was military once, you could tell that by her form and composure. “Each of these races arising, would ultimately war upon one another until one emerged victorious, still, Mr. Manning is correct, eliminate partitioning elements and you have a more unified front.”
Australia's Prime Minister Hamel Oshbak nodded. Oshbak was an older man. White, 69 years old, and had parted salt and pepper hair. He sat there pulling at his goatee while thinking allowed. “We need to consider our options mates. Taking into consideration, Zelda Eastwick has a point. We should avoid forcing a civil war with these people. I myself will be reaching out and going public to what remains of my country. It would be far better to avoid needless conflict and attempt to integrate our society. After all mates, that was why this body was erected in the first place. Peace, stability.”
Peru’s Prime Minister Obret Meho agreed. The young man bowed his head in agreement. “World War Four, and the biohazards that were unleashed reduced our global population to the brink of human endangerment. We’ve just now reached two billion worldwide. War is not in anyone’s best interests Grand General.”
Aaron nodded. “Look, I’m not a prime minister, I’m only a division leader for W.H.O.’s epidemiology department. But given what I’ve seen, war benefits no one… Mellitus-32, it destroyed what nuclear weapons didn't. Also, we need to take into account terrorist opportunists. I think General Aswick is right, if a rogue regime managed to gain an Alpha, and Zelda’s report is correct, we will need allies. Not to
mention it would help us understand their biology and help those infected. So far, nutritional therapy seems to help those in quarantine. Their newly asserting physiology rejects most foods we’ve offered. Basically, these individuals require raw meat or in a vampire’s cases, they can’t digest solid food, they require liquid sustenance. We already clone all of our meat products. We already clone all blood products, and replacement organs, and limbs for that matter. There is no reason, we can’t already supply nutrition-based therapy to help control the infected.”
Zelda chimed in. “Can we please agree to refer to the infected as Aeonian for those that were originally human, and Immortium for those with animal infusion? And consider honoring the woman whose very journal warned us about the comet by calling it the Aeon Strain since it gives rise to immortal beings as a whole? After all, the word Aeon means, eternity or eternal ones...”
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