Megan exhaled, bit her lip, then started pressing buttons.
I heard a number of faint clicks. Thank God. Then I realized it wasn’t the door unlocking. Someone was loading a gun.
A deep voice rang out, “Freeze or I’ll shoot.”
Crap. I spun around. Soldiers, wearing uniforms like us, fanned out from all sides and pinned us to the door.
“Put your hands in the air.”
“We’re just kids. You can’t keep us like this.” Megan’s voice rose.
“Put your hands up or die. Those are your only options. You have five seconds before the choice will no longer be yours.” A brief pause. “Five.”
Damn it, I wasn’t going back.
“Four.”
With Adam’s and my speed, we might be able to take them.
“Three.”
But there was no place to take cover.
“Two.”
And Megan has normal speed and would be slaughtered.
“One.”
“Okay.” I held up both my hands. Adam and Megan followed my lead.
“Rollins, cuff ’em.” The guy—who acted as if he was in charge—spoke to the bald and muscular man to his right; the same one who had used the wand when we’d first arrived. He shackled us in the plastic cuffs.
My hope for escape disappeared as the plastic bit into my skin.
“Got them secured, sir.” The leader spoke into a radio, then pressed his gloved hand to his ear. “Roger, that. We’ll get them to Sector Five.”
Rollins shoved us into golf carts and we sped back into the mountain.
Sector Five was deeper in the bunker than we had been before. At the entrance to what looked like another communication center, we got out of the golf carts. The soldiers opened a rounded door at least three feet thick. Not a good sign.
The massive door closed behind us with a resounding thud. The locks clinked into place. We weren’t getting out that way any time soon. The soldiers pushed us forward, then took up positions along the rock-walled circular space.
I focused on the room. It was about twice the size of my parents’ garage. A raised platform held a glass chamber about the same dimension of the average bathroom, minus the fixtures. A lone plastic chair sat in the enclosure. Cameras pointed at the empty box and my mind scrambled to figure out what its purpose might be. A row of monitors and keyboards stood next to the chamber. Dr. Morgenstern sat on a stool at the largest monitor. Her eyes met mine and gave me a sad, odd look I couldn’t decipher. I glanced away and focused on another monitor showing a map of North America covered in red.
“Well, well, well.” General DeCarlo strutted through another door.
I kept my head high and tried to stare him down while my insides twisted in knots.
“I suppose I have you to blame for their botched escape attempt.” He towered over Megan, but she refused to back down. “What’s your name?”
“Megan.”
“Ah, yes, the Megan they begged me for information about.” He smiled an out of place, tooth-filled grin. “I thought you were a smart girl. Not a criminal aiding the enemy.”
“They aren’t the enemy. They’re my friends.” Megan raised her eyes to meet the general’s gaze. “My family.”
General DeCarlo tapped his chest. “That’s touching. But they’re mutants. Look at this screen.” He pointed at the monitor with the map of North America. “Red means the creatures have taken over there. These two have the aliens inside their heads. Do you know that the only reason they’re not breathing funny is a fluke?” He stared down at Megan.
Her nose wrinkled and she snapped back, “At least their breath doesn’t reek like yours.”
Oh, no.
He grabbed Megan by the arm.
“Let her go,” Adam yelled.
General DeCarlo pushed Megan aside. She stumbled, but stayed on her feet. The general closed the distance between him and Adam. “Do not tell me what to do, punk.”
“Screw you.”
The general snapped his fingers. A soldier stepped forward and swung his gun. The smack of the gun’s butt on Adam’s flesh reverberated through the small room. Adam dropped to the ground, blood dripping from his nose, and his cheek flared an angry crimson.
My insides burned and anger built to a boiling point. I dashed to Adam. He sat up and tipped his head back, pinching his nose to stop the bleeding.
“Anderson, we need to teach this kid who’s in charge.” General DeCarlo told the soldier who hit Adam.
“Help him.” I directed my words to Anderson. He backed into his spot against the wall.
“Put him in the chamber.” The general pointed to Adam.
“Sir?”
“Do it, Anderson, or you’ll take his place.”
“He’s just a kid.”
“Oh, for God’s sake, he’s not just a kid. He’s one of them. Now step aside, you pansy ass. Jones, Rollins, do it.”
“Yes, sir.”
What? No way in hell. I looked around for a way out. The two ape-like guards clamped down on Adam’s arms.
Thwack.
General DeCarlo smacked his palm against his thigh. “This is what you kids need to understand. I am in charge here. The government you knew has ceased to exist. The President is alive, but in hiding. No one cares what I do here as long as I figure out how to kill the aliens. And you’re going to help me. Right here. Right now.”
The anvil weight crushed down on my chest. Again.
“I need to test Dr. Morgenstern’s theory. Since Adam volunteered when he mouthed off, I wouldn’t want to deprive him of the opportunity to help his country.”
The soldiers pushed Adam forward. Blood drops fell to the floor in a polka dotted line. “Go into the chamber.”
“No.” I couldn’t let Adam do this. I had a suspicion of what the general had in mind.
“You can’t do this.” Adam slumped between the guards.
General DeCarlo snapped his fingers and the wrestler soldier pointed a gun at my head.
This man was a psycho. My fingers itched for my Glock.
“Or he can blow her brains out and we can all see the alien in her head.” The soldier stepped next to me and pushed the muzzle into my hair. I sank to my knees. He pulled the gun back, but kept it pointed in my direction.
I had to be the one who went into the chamber. It had to be me. The aliens weren’t calling for Adam. They wanted me. Me, not him. Not Megan. And Megan wouldn’t be here if the Raspers hadn’t tracked us to her family’s hideout. They’d still be alive. Bethany would still be alive. I had to be the one to pay the price.
“Let me go.” Adam twisted to shrug off the soldiers’ grips. Blood flew from his face and hit the glass wall of the chamber.
“Adam, don’t. I’ll do it. I…”
He faced me. I stood and walked closer.
The soldiers restraining Adam loosened their hold just a tad. “Val, no.”
Megan sobbed.
“Ah, young love. How sweet.” General DeCarlo sneered.
When I hesitated, Adam took another step toward the glass case. That propelled me forward. I reached out to touch him, but the soldiers yanked him back.
“You have until the count of three for one of you, I don’t care which, to get in there or Nelson shoots your pretty little friend.” The general held up his index finger. “One.”
Not another countdown. I turned and locked my gaze on Megan. The soldier, Nelson, pointed his gun at her chest. Tears streamed down her face.
I licked my lips. I couldn’t let her die. I had to do this.
I spun and marched to the chamber. The closest soldier gave me a slight shove. I stumbled and fell, banging my knees on the cement floor. He hoisted me up by my bound wrists, pushed me in the chair, and secured my ankles to the chairs legs with more zip ties.
“Doctor, the specimen.” The general slipped his hands into fireproof-looking black rubber gloves.
I hoped he would get stung.
Dr. Morgens
tern gave me a look filled with guilt, unlocked a cabinet, pulled the jar out from under a cloth, and handed the Bug to the general. He twisted the lid open and tossed the Bug into the chamber with me, then locked the door.
“No!” I tried to get loose. Tears blurred my vision.
The Bug scuttled and righted itself.
I had to get free. Get out. The ceiling, the walls, the floor were all thick glass. I struggled to break the restraints, but they bit deeper into my flesh, slicing it open. If I had more time, I might be able to free myself, but time was running out.
The Bug twitched its legs and inched closer.
I choked on the stale air. My head felt heavy and I was sure I was about to pass out. I tore my gaze from the Bug and locked it on Megan and Adam. Megan’s face was red and swollen from crying. Adam was on his knees and the wrestler soldier had a gun aimed at his head.
Fear clawed at my insides.
The Bug scuttled closer to me and stopped inches from my boot. If I could get my legs free, I could stomp on it. I yanked with all my strength. The plastic loosened a bit. Blood seeped from the wounds and a droplet landed on the floor inches from the Bug.
It brought its front legs together and sawed. The screech filleted my eardrums. Pain twirled through my brain and exploded behind my eyes in bursts of colored shapes.
I was done. I was going to die.
I tried to think of something happy. My parents…my dog…Adam.
This slow agonizing torture shredded what was left of my willpower. Tears rolled down my face. I didn’t want to die. I wanted the pain to stop. Fogginess crushed down on my brain. I was on the edge of unconsciousness.
It was time. Time to finally surrender. Time to accept my fate.
The Bug’s song ceased. The pain ebbed and I snapped back to reality. I sniffed back the remaining tears and stared at the damn creature.
It stepped forward and onto my boot.
Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God.
With precise movements, the Bug crawled up my leg. My stomach soured. Six steel legs ticked up over my knee and onto my thigh. My skin felt like it would slip from my bones. Chills slithered through my system, but sweat dripped from my temples.
Logic screamed for me to react, but I was paralyzed. Trapped. I couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t lift my hands to flick the Bug away. All my muscles had turned to stone.
The Bug inched up my leg toward my hands. It tapped my left fingers with its spindly legs. Shivers rippled through my nerves. When I didn’t move, the Bug tapped again. What the hell?
The Bug gave my fingers three short taps then it inched into the back of my hand.
My chest heaved. I braced for the sting. I couldn’t watch. I shut my eyes.
Waited.
26
Time stood still. Why didn’t the Bug sting me and get it over with? The air in the glass chamber pushed down on my lungs, forcing me to take deep breaths. A burning sensation spread across my chest. Don’t panic. Don’t think. Just do.
The Bug clicked forward. I couldn’t take it anymore. I wanted to scream. Wanted to run. Wanted to cry.
I stared at the alien.
“Come on already.” I gritted my teeth and balled my right hand into a fist.
The Bug shifted its legs. More tingles zipped through my nerve endings. Where was its stinger? One of its legs?
Anxiety slid through every one of my cells. Hopefully, my death would be painless. If I didn’t die, the alternative meant becoming a Rasper. I couldn’t do that. Wouldn’t do that. Maybe…if I ended it myself, it would all be over. But I couldn’t leave Adam and Megan. If I became a Rasper, I would kill General DeCarlo.
I liked that idea. A lot. But I didn’t want to be a Rasper. The Bug inched closer.
“No. Please don’t.”
The Bug stopped. Raised its front legs and brought them to my bound wrists. I closed my eyes so tight my cheeks ached.
The cool metal legs brushed against my skin. All the hairs on my arm stood at attention. My lungs refused to work. The Bug slipped its leg under the plastic tie and sliced upward. What the hell? I opened my eyes. The binding fell from my wrists. The Bug turned so it was facing the general.
My ears buzzed. A thought formed in the back of my mind, but it was too fuzzy, too disjointed for me to see clearly.
The Bug sat on my leg. It didn’t move. I stared at it. “Please don’t move.” I whispered the words to myself.
The Bug remained still and silent. I spun my wrists and wiggled my fingers to get the feeling back.
Dr. Morgenstern, wearing a hard plastic, biocontainment-type suit and thick black gloves, walked toward the chamber. She unlatched the door, scooped the Bug into a container, and backed out of the cell, leaving the door ajar. She locked the jar back in the cabinet.
The general leaned forward, his mouth hanging open like a dog begging for scraps. Megan continued to cry and her face was a puffy red mess. The soldier still had a gun trained on Adam. He looked up, met my gaze, and smiled.
General DeCarlo balled his hands into tight fists. “Doctor, explain what the hell just happened.”
Dr. Morgenstern took her hood and suit off, then looked from Adam’s smiling face to the general. “Sir, I—”
“I can explain it.” Dr. Collins walked into the room, accompanied by a soldier.
“Then you better get to it, Dr. Collins.” I expected General DeCarlo to froth at the mouth.
“She’s immune to the sting.”
“What?”
“It appears the toxin had no effect when she was stung. The alien race failed to grow inside her system. She carries the serum, but her body will not allow the creature to grow. The Bug thinks the girl, and the boy, are already one of them. It has no desire to sting them.”
Shock and disbelief made it seem as if my body defied gravity. I was immune?
“How is that possible?” General DeCarlo’ eyes widened and he ran a hand across his face. “Can an antidote be created from their blood or DNA or something?”
“This is where it gets interesting. The answer to your question is no. They are only immune because they already carried the antibodies of the alien toxin. I just got the test results.” The doctor flapped a few sheets of paper.
What?
A soldier cut the remaining straps and dragged me from the chamber. I fell to my knees. The room refused to stay still. Megan raced to my side and bear-hugged me. Hard.
“How did they get the antibodies? Can we get more?” The general’s tone came across angry and impatient.
Dr. Collins shook his head. “This goes back twelve years or so, when Sheri, um Dr. Morgenstern, and I worked on the team at Zigotgen. The team’s goal was to find a cure for the common cold.”
Dr. Collins glanced at Dr. Morgenstern. She gave him a slight nod.
“Back when these two were kids, they received vaccinations against all the basic diseases kids need to go to school. Our project had three hundred randomized subjects who received our test vaccine for the common cold hidden inside the chicken pox vaccine. The vaccine testing was halted after a number of kids became violently ill and one died, but a lot of children received the vaccine with no effects. And most of them rarely, if ever, got sick.”
Test vaccines? My parents couldn’t have agreed to let me be a research subject. Maybe they didn’t know. It wasn’t possible. But…but I tried to remember the last time I had a cold. And couldn’t.
Dr. Collins helped Megan and me to our feet. “After checking their backgrounds, I determined they were part of the vaccine trial. The team, we…” He waved his hand at Dr. Morgenstern. “I was only an assistant. But we only ever knew the subjects by number. After finding out their names and some background information, I was able to determine Val’s subject number’s XA115 and Adam’s XH254.”
The general’s face got redder and redder. “What was in the vaccine? Can we reproduce the antibody and vaccinate everyone else?”
“The vaccine was uh…experimental
.”
“Damn it, you’re the doctor. Whip up another batch.” General DeCarlo’s voice went deeper, lower, scarier.
The doctor shook his head. “It’s not that simple. We need the correct serum. It took years to create it.”
I swallowed. “Why was it experimental?”
Dr. Collins couldn’t meet my gaze. “Uh…we created the vaccine by using the alien toxin. This isn’t the first time these creatures have surfaced.”
Alien toxin? Not the first time? Nerve-rattling disbelief blossomed at my temples. Shoots of white and gray colored my vision. I blinked hard and tightened my grip on Megan.
“How did you vaccinate them? And did they know?”
Dr. Collins turned to Dr. Morgenstern. “This is more Sheri’s area than mine. As I said, I was only an assistant.”
She pursed her lips. “The biotech industry is highly competitive, with payouts in the billions. We focused on the common cold. Can you imagine a vaccine that keeps you from ever catching a cold? Can you imagine the profits?” Her face took on a dreamlike look, then she focused on the soldier aiming his gun at Adam.
“The serum was discovered after Zigotgen acquired the remains from an archeological find in Tikal, the ancient Mayan city. How the serum was found, I don’t know. We were the researchers. We studied the composition of the fluids given to us. The fluids carried antibodies for many diseases. We were able to recreate the serum in the lab. But we need to work from the original source. Sort of like stem cells.”
She cleared her throat and took on a teacher-like tone. “The fluid held promise for curing other diseases as well. If we succeeded with curing the common cold, we were prepared to move to trials with our cancer vaccine. And we tracked the vaccines, but the subjects didn’t know they were testing them.”
Illegal vaccines? The Mayans? Cancer vaccine? My stomach clenched. There was no way all this was real. I had to be trapped in a nightmare. The problem was, I didn’t know when the nightmare started. When I was a kid? Four months ago? A few days ago? Today?
“I was able to pierce the metallic shell of this bug creature, and its fluids hold the same signature. Same antibodies as the original sample. But much weaker. The original sample was so much stronger. Like it came from a considerably stronger creature. At this lower strength, the sample would not be able to survive the processing required to create a new line.”
The Colony Page 26