Lockdown Nation

by Lim, Candice

  I slammed the button by the lab door, and it slid open. The chilled gust of toxic air wafted out of the spartan corridor. Diverse equipment decked on the benches and sat along the walls.

  My eyes scanned the empty lab―the exhaustive nights at Connor University flounced in my head. I expunged my thoughts and focused on the task at hand. Dropping into a crouch, I checked under the benches. “Botty?”

  I clicked my tongue, though I didn’t think it’d work and would probably offend Botty instead. After all, he wasn’t your ordinary BotDog. Nothing less than an artificial intelligence-powered BotDog.

  After searching high and low to no avail, I plopped onto a stool and sighed. Maybe Hershey had got rid of it. My brain racked for ideas when someone tossed a lab coat on my lab. My first thought had been Vaxine but when I spun around, the emptiness greeted me.

  “Put on a lab coat when you’re in the lab, punk.” A mechanical voice rang in the lab. Botty waggled its chrome tail near my feet.

  “Botty!” I dropped to sit on the ground and grabbed onto the cold metallic body.

  “I didn’t think you were coming back. Heard Dr. Hershey exiled you from her lab because you were useless,” remarked Botty.

  I shrugged. Had normal Hershey or Infected Hershey come up with that?

  “By the way, what’s up with Dr. Hershey? Have you seen her around? She’ll usually come back to the lab at night.”

  My lips fell apart, but no words came out. My moral compass spun in all directions. I’d never dreamed I’d be in this place, debating to tell a droid about its master passing.

  “Why you have your mouth open like that? Did you need a recharge?” said Botty.

  I closed my mouth and shook my head. “Hershey’s dead.”

  Botty looked at me, frozen. Could BotDogs freeze? “What are you on?”

  “A car wreck claimed her life.” I pulled out my phone and showed him the photos I took from the accident site, surrounded by police tape and reporters. The mental images of the crash danced in my head like I’d been transported back to the scene.

  The shrill silence stretched in the lab save for the soft hum of the freezer and machines.

  “No, that’s not true.” A certain sadness emanated from Botty’s voice. Its tail sagged. Botty hung and shook its head in disbelief. “No, she can’t be gone.”

  “I’m sorry,” I muttered, not sure I did the right thing. “We’ve long lost her already. We didn’t even know when she’d turned.”

  Botty glanced up with an inquisitive look.

  “She caught the Cranax virus. We had no idea how long it had been. She was in Project Hive Mind…” My voice trailed off. “Prof. Ronin thought Quillon Riley orchestrated this. I don’t―”

  “That can’t happen! My maker isn’t behind this.”

  My head shook so quickly I jerked back and held onto the edge of the bench for support. “Your maker? My grandpa was y―your maker?”

  “I don’t know your grandpa but Quillon Riley would never do this.”

  My thoughts spiraled so quickly in my brain my scalp overheated. I grabbed onto Botty. “Tell me about him. Is―is he still alive?”

  Botty shrugged. “We don’t talk since he’d gifted me to Dr. Hershey. It would be kinda shady, wouldn’t you think?”

  “Fair point. What do you know about Project Hive Mind?”

  Botty glanced at me up and down. “How did you know about Project Hive Mind?”

  “Well, Axon snooped around Hershey’s stuff and found out about it. That’s when we found out your master had been infected with her own virus. Now that she’s gone, and we’re left in the dark. You were the closest to Hershey so can you shed some light?”

  Botty sighed. “I knew it wasn’t gonna end up well.”

  I arched my brow.

  “Well, my maker had always been an ambitious inventor, sometimes too ambitious for his own good. Being a control freak, he always wanted to be in charge. Anyway, he started building robotic pets since a child but soon, his pet projects no longer satisfy his growing appetite and wonder. He wanted to try something novel, something…riskier.”

  I gulped and tried to remember how my grandpa used to be. But he’d always been a loving man. To be fair, I never got to see the science side of him.

  “When machines no longer pique his interests, he turned to biologicals.”

  “But that’s not his forte.”

  “He knew. That’s why he’d turned to Ronin Yamashita for help.”

  Ronin wasn't lying they were friends.

  “Their collaboration turned out to be fairly successful. With Ronin’s biotechnology skills, Quillon’s programming, and interns’ free labor, they’ve made some awesome discoveries in applied microbiology. But most of the experiments were in-vitro, which means―”

  I raised my hands. “Yeah, I know what that means. They take place outside the host.”

  “They exploited the microbes to produce certain drugs, vaccines, and even make them eat plastic.”

  “I thought people have been doing them for decades?”

  “Sure they have but Ronin and Quillon had changed the game forever. In the past, researchers would mutate or transfect the host bacterial cells with specific genes and hope it’d work. With Ronin and Quillon’s optimized method, they can now monitor and specify the site of mutation down to controlling the rate of production, turning the microbes into tiny organic factories they will have full command of.”

  “Cool, so how did he end up with Hive Mind?”

  Botty sat and scratched the back of its ear. “Well, about time the projects became too mundane for Quillon’s thirst for the next new shiny thing. Quillon wanted something more challenging, more scandalous. That’s when their friendship soured. Ronin being more cautious preferred to play it by the Ethics while Quillon liked to see how far he could push before getting into trouble.”

  While part of me admired the life of adventures my grandpa used to have, the tiny hairs on my arms stood up at the realization of how much I didn’t know about him.

  “And that’s when he found out about the Cranax virus.”

  “So all the while, he’s a mastermind behind Project Cranax as well?”

  “Not really. Stop throwing baseless assumptions around!”

  “Then how did he get involved?”

  “Let me finish. Project Cranax has always been the brainchild of your ex-mentor Hershey. When she first learned about Cranax, she saw its potential to become a silver bullet in gene therapy. That’s when she brought together her colleagues, Edmund Ong and George Tucker, and pharmaceutical expert, Adenine Cash to pursue this project.”

  “Cranax turned out to be more stubborn than they thought, and the investors lost their confidence in the project. So Cash came up with a brilliant plan to unleash a pandemic.” Had Hershey turned at this stage? “But Hershey disagreed, and the rest was history.”

  “You missed out on one important event, Roxy. During this time, Quillon Riley had come to offer her a deal she couldn’t refuse.”

  “Project Hive Mind?”

  “Close but not quite. Project Cranax fitted right up Quillon’s alley and his offer came like a warm blanket on a cold night. Quillon brought his nanotech game to the next level and using the same technology he’d worked with Ronin turned Cranax into programmable nanomachines that would work under their command. That aligned with the goal of Project Cranax. So they carried on with their first clinical trial.”

  The chill picked up in the lab. The hairs on my nape bristled. So I put on the lab coat and hugged myself.

  “Not only it has cured the disease as anticipated, but they’d also discovered another unique property of the virus―mind control. The patient did everything Quillon and Hershey asked them to do. Quillon had not only controlled the virus but a human. Fascinated, they did a few more trials to prove their hypothesis. Much to their disappointment, the replication rate barely reached 15%.”

  �
��And Vaxine was one of them?”

  Botty gasped with wide eyes and lowered its voice. It spun around in the lab. “Is she here?”

  “She already knew it.”

  Botty dropped back to sit on the floor. “Yeah, so they later realize some strains of the viruses were more resilient than others. Until they came across this pair of twins with a rare hereditary neurological disorder making them the perfect candidates for the trial. They thought maybe that would give them some insights into genetic influence in this treatment. A huge mistake that cost them their project.”

  “The gene therapy caused some terrible side effects?”

  Botty shook its head. “Their treatment became a huge success. But they didn’t realize one of the twins had received a stronger strain of the virus.”

  “Uh, did it matter when it still did the job?”

  “Probably if it didn’t possess a mind control ability.”

  The dots slowly connected in my brain, freezing the blood in my veins. “You’re saying the twin could control the other?”

  “Basically, yeah. Turned out, the twins disliked each other and only agreed to go on this trial together to make some dough. When the one in control discovered his newfound ability, he willed his twin to kill himself.”

  A gasp escaped my throat. My hand flew to cover my gawked mouth. “They knew all along?”

  “They shut down the project real quick. Hershey even tried to convince the original Cranax team to abandon the project, but they wouldn’t after pouring their soul into it. Not especially Cash. She wanted to at least scrape some profit off the drug she’d created to stop the virus in case of a pandemic.”

  “You still haven’t told me anything about Project Hive Mind. What happened then? Did my grandpa decided to pursue it as a covert project after that?”

  “I…I actually don’t know anything about the project. Yeah, Hershey mentioned it a few times. Sounds like she found a new buyer for the virus.”

  My shoulders slumped in disappointment and fatigue. Still no input about Project Hive Mind. My eyes were getting dry and heavy from the air-cond. I got up and stretched my arms. “You need to come with me.”

  “Why? Because Hershey is dead now and I suddenly earned myself a new master?”

  I rolled my eyes and picked Botty up. “I’m a millennial. I can’t afford pets.”

  When Botty and I turned up in the common area, the whole group had gathered around the pantry where they listened to the news on the radio.

  “All the interstate borders and social restrictions in Asia Nova have been removed. All business resume as usual.”

  We traded looks, reassuring one another our ears weren’t playing tricks.

  “Father of Science, it sounds like your species is trying to self-destruct. Opening borders and going back to business in the middle of a pandemic? It’s suicidal.”

  Mandy frowned between me and Botty. “Why did that robotic dog talk and why did it sound like it has more sense than the news?”

  “This is not right.” The urgency crept into Vaxine’s voice. Her eyes swirled between our faces. “This is not making any sense at all. No way they put in so much effort and resources into fixing the situation and now let it all go.”

  “It sounds very much like the virus has taken over the Council,” added Axon. “But what do they gain from infecting everybody?”

  “Don’t know,” said Sam. “But from what I can see, it’s gonna end up pretty awry.”

  I sucked in my stomach. The fear swelled in my chest. The reality of the situation sank in me. What Botty told me in the lab whirled in my head like a broken record. “Guys, you have to listen to this. Botty has something important to share.”

  All heads turned in my direction.

  4

  RONIN

  “Just a little bit more,” Ronin Yamashita muttered between his breathe. He stretched his arm further and groped the sticky metal door for the handle. His face was soaked in sweat that scorched his eye. The last thing that crossed his mind.

  With the remainder of his strength, he gripped onto the handle and tugged it hard. It gave in with a click and the door popped open. He tore away and gave it a push. The metal door creaked and swung open. The column of light coming from the small window in the cell stabbed into the pitch-black corridor.

  Ronin gazed into the abyss, unknown of what awaited him in the shadow of the night. He fought to gather his courage but the ugly mental images of the Infected were dancing in his head. He clenched his fist and braved out of the cell, guiding his way with the faint light of the tablet.

  The battery waned away, reflecting the state of his health. Ronin inched down the corridor. His hollow footsteps punctuating the drumming of his heart. He heard breathing, but not only his own. The mental images of the Infected suddenly appearing in the dark and jumping at him flounced in his head.

  “Please…anyone here…” A soft murmur floated in the dark, humming around him like a ghost. As a man of science, he didn’t believe in the supernatural but even his faith quivered.

  But the fear for his own life overcame his common sense. Hydration and fatigue were messing with his head. His lips were parched and cracking. He could taste blood. He had no idea the last time his tongue had tasted a drop of water. Not after Peyton abducted and left him in the cell to rot. He couldn’t believe Quillon would kill him.

  His eyes frantically searched in the dark, wrestling to differentiate the shades of black and gray until he worked out a panel of switches on the wall. He flicked all, but none worked. With a grunt, Ronin muttered a cuss and punched the wall.

  “Is there anyone here?” The same voice he heard became louder and clearer, fear shooting pains to his chest.

  Ronin sucked in a stale breath and glared through the window in the metal door into another cell. When he neared the door and saw the figure inside, his eyes widened. “Dr. Assunta?”

  The figure looked up. Her tired face lit up with a smile. She crawled to her feet and dragged herself to the door. Ronin stepped back, scared she might be an Infected. But when he looked into her eyes, he relaxed. “Prof. Ronin…blot my gel. I thought they killed you.”

  “I thought they killed everybody too.” Ronin unlatched the door and helped Assunta out of the cell. She sobbed between her ragged breathing while Ronin sat her against the wall.

  “I can’t believe this is happening, Prof. Ronin. I can’t believe I would live to witness this day.”

  “Me too, Assunta. But all we can do now is to fix what’s wrong…as long as we have time. Now, I want you to tell me what happened. What did they do?” Ronin put his hand on Assunta’s shoulder until she composed herself.

  She wiped her face with the frayed sleeve of her shirt and shook her head. “I don’t recall all of them. I feared for my life. I thought the ATP killed you in ANNUS. After you were knocked out cold, they put a bag over our heads and marched us into a vehicle. The next thing I knew, we were in the cell. We don’t even know why they’re doing this to us.”

  Nothing seemed to make any sense. Why didn’t Quillon infect them when he had got them in the palm of his hand? Why did he leave them there? “We have to find the others. They’re the only ones left of us.”

  Assunta’s eyes widened at Ronin, expecting elaboration. Ronin showed her the tablet. When what she saw registered in her mind, she gasped. “Father of Science, what on earth is going on here?”

  “I wish I had the answer myself now,” sighed Ronin. “Rest assured, we’ll find out soon.”

  5

  ROXY

  “Good news and bad news. We found the blueprint of the island. But it’s not looking very positive for us.” Axon Zack pushed a button and the panoramic window turned into a solid wall, sealing away the sight of golden rays glittering on the ocean waves.

  Once the ocean went out of sight, all the thoughts of Ronin and the rehab island poured into my head. We managed only four hours of sleep in the lab. None of u
s could sleep longer than that.

  The blueprint of the island appeared on the hologram. Axon waved his hand in the air to move and zoom into parts of the island. “The island served to contain and conduct experiments on the Infected. Naturally, the whole island is highly secure, and the perimeter is covered with sentry guns. I hate to say but it’s a suicide mission.”

  Vaxine perched on the edge of the coffee table next to Mandy, rubbed her chin, and turned to Sam next to me on the sofa. “Sam, you think we can hack into the surveillance system and disarm the security? You did that with ANNUS.”