Feral

by Vesper Brooks

  “David, didn’t you say you were down here with survivors?”

  “Not in that room. We holed up in the middle one,” he responded as he came to stand next to me. “Let’s check it out.”

  He started forward, gun aimed as I used my flashlight to give us more light. Movement met our approach and distinct cries reached my ears. I sucked in a breath as sudden apprehension slammed into me.

  “David, stop. Now!”

  “What you thinking, Doc?” he asked, turning his head slightly to talk at me while he steadied his aim.

  “No, no, no. Put the gun down. Put it down right this second. We have to go.” I began backing up, hoping he’d take my lead.

  “Doc?”

  By now, the others joined us, clustering closer and shining their lights into the corner. A tiny cry pierced the air, as our presence agitated the residents. The force of so many flashlights ran across the mottled black and red flesh of the pups, revealing them from the shadows they’d carefully been stashed in. Their features made my stomach turn. They carried the same mottled skin as their parents, with Radia’s snout and build and quills down their back akin to Daxel’s. They reminded me of burnt piglets coated in spines.

  “What’s wrong with them?” David asked as he lifted his gun once more, obviously perturbed by the creatures before us.

  I swallowed a few times, forcing back bile before I could answer. “There were no scientists to play God and force a shape on them. This is what nature dictated from the bastardized genes of their parents. Now, let’s get the fuck out before—”

  The low moan silenced me as we all jerked our gazes to the wall. As one, the flashlight beams curved and illuminated the wall as well as the massive form that stood on it as if gravity didn’t apply to her. Radia bared her teeth at us and saliva dribbled down her chin to drip next to David’s boot.

  Immediately, the security operative swung his gun and aimed directly at her. My brain registered a single gunshot before she pounced on him, all teeth and terrible claws. His scream, raw and brutal, mixed with her snarls and the sounds of more gunfire as Jaxx and Kat opened fire. On instinct, I backed away, grabbing Destry to pull him toward the door. If shit went any further sideways, we needed to be clear and ready to run up the stairs.

  Destry’s hand, warm and solid in mine, jerked as he let out a soft grunt. I turned, expecting he’d backed into a wall or something. Instead, a headless body stood next to me, teetering a few moments before the weight of him bore down and I released his hand with a gasp.

  “Jaxx!”

  She turned and I saw the moment her eyes found Destry. The blood flowing from his neck began to pool around his torso, and I took a few steps away. I searched the shadows, trying to pick Daxel out. No doubt he crouched nearby, readying to spring on another one of us. We’d found his pups and attacked his mate. No way he’d sit this one out.

  David stilled under Radia’s heavy form, and she lifted her head to regard the woman shooting her with an all-too-human contempt in her eyes. Kat took a step back as their guns clicked, signaling they’d run out of ammo.

  “Fuck,” she muttered in the silence. “Jaxx, get Poole the fuck out and save as many as you can. You’ve been the best big sister I could ever ask for.”

  “No,” I protested at the same time Jaxx reached for her in an attempt to throw her backward and away from her foolhardy plan.

  As if predicting the action, Kat twisted while unsheathing a knife from her thigh strap. “Come on, you ugly bitch,” she snarled at Radia, turning a circle so she drew closer to the pups and pulled the ged’s attention from us.

  The attack came from behind when Daxel materialized from the shadows in the corner and leapt onto her back. Radia swung about to settle her gaze on us instead of the easy prey before her, and I knew exactly who she planned to go for. The very woman she blamed for the death of her packmate.

  Jaxx seemed to sense it too, and we acted as one, bolting out the door and slamming it closed just as the heavy body thudded against it. The automatic lock engaged, trapping them in there as a cry of despair left me and I punched the door.

  Inside, Kat stabbed at Daxel repeatedly even as he tore her throat out. Outside, Jasmyne and I wept, and a wave of defeat encompassed me as we gave our friend her last request and fled.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The hallways of the labs felt so ghostly without the scientists scurrying about. I followed Jasmyne, eyes on the floor as I tried to process everything that happened. The geds going on a murder spree. The birth of the pups. The deaths of people I’d learned to know and like. Hell, the death of a woman I’d known casually for years.

  We entered the main office where Lily stood, phone to her ear. The lights cast a pale pallor on her skin, and I blinked back the visions of death that tried to haunt me. So much death. As soon as I landed safely back in the States, I planned to demand Carborton pay for the best therapist in the universe. Not just for me, but everyone here.

  “I understand. Yes. Thank you, Captain. I can’t express my gratitude enough. Goodbye.” Lily hung up before she placed her palms on the desk and let out a shaky sigh. “Six hours. That’s the soonest anyone can come, but they are coming.”

  “I don’t even know what time it is anymore,” I admitted as I scratched at my arm. The itchiness burned with an insistence that reminded me of a severe case of poison ivy I suffered in my beginning years in the field.

  “Are you hurt?” Jasmyne asked before pointing at my arm.

  I shook my head. “No, just healing.”

  Her lips compressed in a thin line as she grabbed my arm and jimmied up the sleeve of my jacket. My stomach dropped like I’d flown down a rollercoaster as my forearm came into view.

  “What the hell is wrong with your arm?” Lily asked, crowding in close to peer at it.

  Black patches, broken up by red streaks, traversed across my skin. I touched it, praying it smudged away and pale, normal skin lay underneath. Instead, heat met my fingertips. Burning, feverish heat and skin the texture of leather.

  “Oh my God, what the fuck? Where’s Mal? I need Mal.”

  Jasmyne shook my shoulder until I stopped babbling and met her gaze. When she felt sure she had my attention, she signed, “How long will the geds stay in that pen?”

  “I don’t know. It doesn’t have a keypad so Daxel can’t let them out. It’s an ID slider. It will depend on if Radia can break through the door easily.”

  Lily tapped her lip. “I can bring a video feed up. That way, we can monitor them and assess risk accordingly.”

  At her words, I watched the color drain from Jaxx’s face. In all the years I’d known her, I never saw her look daunted before. But the idea of seeing her teammates—her friends—on the screen obviously hurt her.

  “Lily, the geds killed everyone except us,” I said. “Our friends…they’re in there. I… Could we get someone else to look? I don’t think we can handle it.”

  “No,” Jaxx signed. “I owe them my vigilance. You go to the doctor. I will watch.”

  “Jasmyne, you don’t have to do this. Let someone else. Your oath to serve and protect said nothing about submitting yourself to psychological trauma,” I objected.

  “I am all that is left. I will watch.” She jutted her chin out at me, and I knew I’d lost the argument.

  “Fine. But if they get out, you come straight to the bunker. Don’t you dare cook up any vengeance schemes.”

  She didn’t respond, and I didn’t press it. A spat like this seemed trivial compared to the reality of our situation. Once Lily pulled up the feed, and we reassured ourselves both geds prowled within the confines, she pointed at the phone.

  “I imagine we’re going to end up in the medical bay. It’s in this building. If you press this button, it activates the intercom. Just press a single tone and we’ll know to get our asses back to the bunker, pronto,” Lily said.

  Jaxx nodded before placing a hand on Lily’s shoulder. She gave the lawyer a long, sad smile that
summed up everything. Thank you. Stay safe. Take care of my friend.

  Lily patted her hand, and I knew that even without words or sign language, they understood each other perfectly. It would have been heartwarming to see two people so completely on the same page were it not for the loss of so many good people. I knew the geds had killed far more than we currently had tally of, but until this was over and rosters checked along with the bodies, we couldn’t calculate the damage—if you could even calculate a human life to begin with.

  As we walked, I talked to Lily, filling her in. I told her about the pups, about Radia and Daxel attacking. About the fact bullets did little to no long-term damage or deter the geds. When I finished, we stood in front of the bunker and she let out a sigh.

  “How did everything go so wrong? This was supposed to be a revolutionary achievement, like our seeds. A way to help those most in need. The idea looked so great on the board. But then those…those things came out of the genetics labs and they grew and grew. I told Roger to terminate them and start over. Learn from our mistakes. But all the board saw was millions of dollars thrown in the incinerator and they just couldn’t have that. So we ran unethical experiments on the grounds they didn’t qualify under any protection laws. And now we’re here, with a pack of killer dogs whose purpose seems to be, ‘Sit, stay, kill.’”

  I placed a hand on her shoulder. “Know what makes this the saddest?”

  She raised an eyebrow at me. “It gets worse?”

  I nodded. “Yeah. The saddest part is there’s a strong possibility those creatures could have been the most helpful, lovable things you ever met. They’re acting this way because of the things humans chose to do to them in the name of experimentation and militarization.”

  Her smile turned sad as she shook her head. “Even now, you’re the epitome of a zoologist. Do you think there’s still hope we can lock them back up and pepper them with love in hopes they’ll turn into goofy people-pleasers?”

  “Hell no.” I let my arm drop from her as I spoke. “At this point, there’s no salvaging anything. They are killers, just like your boss wanted. And when I get off this island, I’m going to bust my ass to shut CGC down.”

  “I have a few good lawyers I can recommend,” Lily said, leaving me stunned as she opened the door.

  I’d expected her to tell me how she was obligated to take me on and eat me for breakfast in court. Or to remind me of the non-disclosure agreement I signed. Instead, she backed me, and that left me all the more determined we needed to stop this awful corporation.

  Mal stood as we entered the bunker, and when his gaze bounced back and forth between the two of us, I knew his unspoken question. “Jaxx is still alive,” I told him. “Everyone else is dead.”

  “They’re growing more violent.”

  “They have pups to defend now, if you can call the creatures I saw that,” I explained.

  His face paled at my words. “See, this is exactly why I fought against the ban on studying their bloodwork and running simple tests. I couldn’t even check if they metabolized their antibiotics correctly, much less monitor anything else.”

  I held out my arm and rolled up my sleeve to show him the blackened skin. “Well, I submit to a blood test. What the fuck is going on with me, Mal?”

  He raced over to examine my arm. His fingers felt like soothing ice against the hot, itchy skin as he prodded my flesh. “I need to get you to a lab so I can do a draw. Come on.”

  As we took a step toward the door, someone beat on the outside. We froze, before the rhythmic sound filled the room again. Lily’s wide eyes met mine as she waited for a directive.

  “I don’t think geds tend to knock,” I said. “Pretty sure that’s a human.”

  She nodded, walked over, and opened the door. A man stood on the other side with someone else propped against him. Their sharp inhales belied either pain or panic—possibly both.

  “Please, something’s wrong with her,” he said. “One of the geds bit her on the leg and now she’s going into shock or something.”

  Mal motioned them in and once they had her on the bunk, he pulled up her pant leg. Her chest rose and fell in quick pants and when I touched her skin, her body burned with fever.

  “Oh, fuck,” Mal said.

  When I looked down, the woman’s leg from thigh to ankle displayed flesh mottled black and red, just like my arm. Just like the geds’ hides.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  The unknown woman writhed on the table, moaning as a fever raged through her system, leaving her skin glossy from sweat. I watched her as I perched on the next table over, trying to understand why I didn’t exist in a similar state. About a half hour ago, Mal and I had made our way over to the building next door that housed the human medical bay, along with several more people who now sat on the floor, rocking or staring ahead with shocked expressions. Those who were able helped carry those who couldn’t function enough to walk on their own. Each of the affected sported the mottled skin that I did, but all of them battled fevers and nausea.

  Mal and a couple of people wearing lab coats rotated frantically through the dozen or so victims, taking blood samples, tending wounds, or attempting to get them to take fever reducers. When Mal finally came up to me, he appeared exhausted and harried instead of the jovial, mellow man I met.

  “Any results yet?” I asked, keeping my voice at a low murmur.

  He shook his head. “No. This isn’t a sci-fi movie. You don’t get miraculous results that tell you everything in fifteen minutes. What I can offer is a theory.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “I was able to access my analysis of your blood sample from a couple of days ago.” He scrunched up his face. “Has it been a couple of days? I don’t know anymore. Anyway. You had trace amounts of Daxel’s saliva and a decent amount of the antibiotic that was in his system. The handlers who died before you arrived had his saliva and large doses of anesthesia that ended up euthanizing them.”

  He trailed off, brow wrinkled as he seemed lost in thought. His gaze lingered on the woman first brought to us as she curled up in a miserable ball and whimpered.

  “Mal?” I prompted. “What’s your theory?”

  “Everyone here was bitten specifically by Daxel once he…shed his Evans masquerade.”

  “Is that a theory or a statement?” I asked.

  Mal finally made eye contact with me again, as if shaking off a daydream. “Statement. The theory is that the antibiotics in your system staved off the side effects the other people here are suffering. I haven’t managed to check yet, but if I wagered a guess, I’d say Daxel’s cells are spreading. Think of it like cancer. I just don’t know what the end result will be.” He glanced at the people around us. “Death or wishing you’d died while still human.”

  “What are you saying?” I wrapped my hand around the damning spot on my affected arm as I stared at him.

  “We all saw Daxel walking around in a human form. Hell, except for the skin, he looked identical to Evans. We can’t deny there’s more going on than any of us have been informed about. If Daxel can do that, who’s to say those bitten won’t turn into monsters like him? Not human, not dog, but some kind of engineered abomination that walks the line.”

  I shook my head. “I’m not a geneticist, but what you’re implying seems impossible.”

  “Until today, I would have told you a ged changing forms was impossible. A year ago, I would have told you geds were impossible. I’m thinking, if we want to survive, we start looking at the physical facts before us and quit hiding behind what our brains insist is logical.” He grimaced as the woman on the table let out a mangled cry.

  Before I could respond, she rolled off the examination bed and hit the floor with a thud. Her body flopped and foam bubbled from her mouth as choking gasps escaped her. Within moments, Mal and the others that I assumed were doctors surrounded her in a flurry of activity.

  A keen need to leave enveloped me and I found myself heading for the door. I couldn�
��t help her or the others that suffered around me. I held no medical experience other than basic first aid. As I exited the building, the cooler night air caressed my face, and I leaned against the building to take a deep breath.

  I wanted comfort. To be hugged and told everything would be okay, that shortly, this nightmare would end, and we’d all safely board a ship while Radia and Daxel remained trapped in the concrete room with their hellish brood. I wanted to escape to Tanzania, where the cycle of nature made sense and the canines couldn’t speak human words.

  As if of their own accord, my feet set me on a path, and I found myself walking into the main building where Jaxx remained holed up, vigilantly watching the monitors to keep tabs on the geds. Every second, I felt ready to jump out of my skin as I expected the single sharp tone we’d agreed upon to echo through the speakers. When I reached the office, Jasmyne stood exactly where I left her, expression grim as she gazed at the screen.

  “Are you okay?” I asked her as I closed the distance between us to lay a hand on her shoulder.

  A sharp shake of her head caused me to hesitate. When I peered at her face, her drawn, tight features sent a shiver of ill ease down my spine.

  “What? What is it?” I whispered while my mind wailed and begged for no more. I didn’t want to know. Not really. Deep down, I wanted the constant waves of terrible things happening to stop. Hell, not even deep down. I could admit that without missing a beat. No one in their right mind would ever delight in this horrific situation.

  She pointed at the monitor and I followed her finger as she tapped on the screen. A shape moved around, pacing back and forth before the door. It took a moment to register why the height and width seemed too small. Too slender.

  “Kat’s alive? We have to figure out how to get her out of there. Come on, Jasmyne!” I tugged at her, pulling her toward the door as elation filled me that our friend survived despite our expectations.

  Her lack of willingness to follow drew me up short, however, and I stopped to study her face once more. “Jasmyne?”