by A L Carter
The next morning the news was not good however, it appeared that the swine flu had returned vigorously. He had known that it had been too good to be true and had tried to prepare himself, but it still felt like a mighty blow. Trying to remain professional, he ordered blood samples to be taken from each of the subjects and be sent to his lab. He prepared a slide with a few drops of blood from subject six and placed it under the electron microscope and a highly magnified image appeared on his monitor. The subject was clearly infected, but not with the swine flu. No this was something entirely new, something never seen before. The virus must have mutated again within the subject and it was killing every cell it touched with shocking efficiency. There was no trace of the swine flu it had completely been eradicated. As cells died new and alien ones replaced them. Even though the test had been a failure he couldn't help but be fascinated. Samples were given to his team who were equally shocked and fascinated at the same time and coming up with differing theories. Jacob had already accepted that the subjects would all die. Then as predicted symptoms intensified until the subjects went into complete heart failure. All ten subjects flat lined one after another like a poorly synchronized orchestra. That was it then back to the drawing board. Jacob requested that number six be brought to his office for him to do an autopsy, and then he would prepare his report of the failure of batch 6 to his superior's. Then a clean-up operation would commence. He watched on-screen two orderlies entered the cell with a trolley to transfer the corpse. But suddenly that corpses eyes sprung open revealing grey misted eyes. Jacob checked the life signs again but there was none. Then noticing the brain activity, somehow the brain was functioning at a lower level? Lab technicians started to chatter excitedly causing him to ask them for quite. The orderlies had not appeared to notice so he reached for the intercom, his instincts signalling imminent danger. However, he was too late, as the first orderly was pulled on top of the prone figure. The corpse proceeded to tear out the man's throat and resulting in a geyser of blood that turned everything red. Then other orderly screamed, as did the other technicians in the lab. However, Jacob had no time for panic, as the risk of contamination was too great so he hit the automatic lock-down button causing the cell to slide shut and lock in place. The half-dead thing was already up and drawn towards the other orderly. Who turned to the camera and pleaded to be let out. Which of course was ignored as security was paramount. Very regrettable of course but it was out of his hands. As the thing approached the orderly he seemed to be looking around desperately, maybe for something to use as a weapon, but there was nothing in the room the subject could have used to harm himself or others. Time was running out, but then he pulled the side rail from the trolley, now he was armed with a crude weapon. This was swung in desperation towards the thing, hitting it hard in the shoulder. The thing was staggered slightly but apparently unhurt and almost upon the orderly, who now thrust out with the rail. Even though the rail had a curve at the end, it managed to pierce into its stomach going in several inches. Still unfazed with blood gushing from the wound and forcing itself onto the makeshift weapon it managed to impale itself further in an attempt to get to the orderly. This resulted in the bar completely passing through its torso and drawing it closer to its victim. It bit into his face resulting in an agonizing squeal and the thing then began to eat the orderly.
With a morbid fascination, he had observed the thing eat until gorged filling the digestive system far beyond its limits until it completely lost all bowel control and vomited everywhere. Then it continued to eat, the whole time the rail sticking out like an obscene phallus. Intestines now spilling out and around the bar as the wound opened up even further. Then as if coming back to reality Jacob turned away and vomited and for the first time, he noticed the impact it was having on his staff. Who would probably be under the care of a psychiatrist for years to come?
He prepared his report then phoned his superiors, informing them of the projects catastrophic failure and the resulting collateral damage. He then sat back in his chair considering his life and career which could very likely be over. How could he get it this wrong? He sat back in his chair and awaited his coming fate.
He did not have to wait long before those men in black suits turned up. His team was taken away first and he was unaware of their destination and fate. This left him alone in the room with two of these operatives. They pulled up chairs in front of him, while he remained silent and sombre.
"Congratulations Mr Oswald on the success of your project, it's time now to proceed to the next level," one of the operatives informed him.
Chapter 3
Break time
Luckily, for him, power was still on, so he filled the kettle from the cold tap and turned it on. He found tea bags and milk in the fridge, which was still fresh. Not knowing whether he took sugar but choosing to avoid it anyway. It struck him that he didn't feel hungry; it had probably been days since he had eaten. When he had been sick it was mostly fluid. He supposed that seeing a girl being eaten and bashing another man's brains out had something to do with this. They seemed to be the only ones in the building, as he had found no other rooms, which was probably for the best. Was there more of them outside? Zombies he thought, crazy. Maybe not as he was sure he had read something saying scientists believed that this was one of the most likely threats to our future existence, through chemical, biological, or bacterial means. Was it some form of attack on us, warfare? He needed more information so he finished making his tea and crashed down on the sofa and deep in thought. It occurred to him that he could be dreaming or worse still laying in a hospital bed with brain damage. Like that TV show life on mars and he had to work things out in this reality in order to recover. Therefore, he had no recollection of who he was, whom he knew or even what he did in life. Nevertheless, obviously, he knew things.
He had spent about an hour there just getting up to make more tea. After using the toilet, he decided to get more information. Back to the office and carefully stepping over the bloodbath and bodies, he looked around the office. On the wall was what he assumed was the company name and logo it read; Gymtec quality fitness and sports. Looking down at the bodies, maybe they were the manager and secretary and probably staying late for some "overtime!" Well, it did not go as planned. Scanning the room again, he found a key board. There were several keys on there, car keys and some door keys. He took the door keys and returned to the front entrance door trying each key until it fit. He looked down at his hand with some trepidation; there could be more of them out there? He removed the key again and peered through, but his field of view was poor and couldn't see much. Some parked cars, a narrow section of road and another building opposite to this. Putting the key back he retreated to find a weapon of some sort. The storeroom may prove fruitful. Finding the key, he soon gained access. The room was of small size and had mainly cleaning materials, but there on the floor was what he wanted as he was presented with a large tool kit. He grabbed a heavy claw hammer that looked handy so he took that then eyed the large size crowbar. Thinking that he could use this for stabbing as well as swinging and it gave more range. So he left the hammer in the kitchen as a backup and returned to the entrance, unlocking the door again he forced himself to turn the handle.
With door only open a few inches he was only able to see one side and with no apparent threat in sight, just a nice clear day. There was nothing else for it so crowbar at the ready he opened the door wide. The other side offered more information as dread and nausea built up. Ten feet away lay another body, a woman flat on her back with half her skull missing. Brain matter and blood pooled around the head, looking up with vacant glassy eyes, snarl fixed to her blood stained mouth. Looking further away in the distance, maybe a hundred feet away lay another body and from a distance looked like it had received a similar fate. Further, in the distance, three people walked aimlessly around. He doubted that they were “people” any more just zombies. Seemingly frozen in place for several minutes he snapped out of it. They did not seem to
notice him. Maybe their vision was not that good or they could not discern him as human from that far away. Well, he would rather they kept their distance. Going to walk back in he changed his mind and started to walk the perimeter, wanting to have a full assessment of the near area. At the back of the building there was a six-foot high wire fence with fields beyond that, and way beyond that maybe half a mile was a housing estate. Therefore, the rear was not an immediate threat. Then he saw the bloody tyre iron on the tarmac at the bottom of a sectional ladder, which led up to the roof. This is how he got in then. Pausing to think, that ladder could prove useful and he did not want anybody else using it. After collapsing it he carried it on his left shoulder, crowbar ready in his right. Continuing around the other side and finding nothing of interest eventually returning to the open door. The realization hit him. It was a rookie move, in the time it had taken him to circle the building anyone or anything could have got inside. He would have to be more careful in future if he was going to survive. Looking back over to the wandering zombies, they had not moved much; in fact, sometimes they just stood still aimlessly. He re-entered the building locking the door behind him.
On returning inside, he quickly locked the door and then brandishing his makeshift weapon proceeded to check the building for any unwanted visitors. Luckily for him, there were none, breathing a sigh of relief. He asked himself how far spread was this, was it just a small amount of people infected or had it spread through the city? There was a TV in the break room. He quickly went there and turned on the TV, why had he not done this before? BBC One, it was showing the news. The title rolled by at the bottom of the screen continually. It read viral pandemic sweeps the UK and Europe, possibly further, mass panic and rioting. Death toll rises. The screen showed chaos on the streets in various cities, the police are unable to gain control. In fact, the police seemed to turn on themselves as did the military. Dropping their weapons and attacking with their teeth. This went on for about ten minutes then an official looking person came on.
"The prime minister is asking people to stay in their homes for their own safety and that the military will soon have everything under control," he informed, but he didn't look convinced and kept looking over his shoulder.
Sweat was pouring off him soaking his white shirt. Recognizing the same growl and moaning sound as the office zombie made somebody lumbered in from off-screen, maybe the soundman because there was a thud.
"Oh no, please leave alone," he pleaded, blubbing and holding up his hands in defence.
This made little difference to his attacker who just started biting his fingers off, enjoying the offered meal. He screamed high pitched like a girl. Another walking corpse entered the fray, most likely the camera operator because the view was off centre. Eager not to miss out and proceeding to chew off the man's face. The screen went blank, and then video looped back to the previous video showing the riots. All the other channels were either blank, service will resume shortly message or similar looped news reports. The radio channels were just the same. He turned it off and flopped down on the sofa. Silence...
He sat there for several hours, dazed, dumbstruck, and full of despair. Sitting on a sofa, not knowing who he was or where he was. Did he have a family, a partner and was he a good person or a bastard? Of course, he had no answers to any of these questions. An ember began to burn deep inside of him. He would not give up, but do his best to find out. Something else struck him it had been days now and he did not seem in any way infected, was it airborne, or through bodily contact? He had breathed the air, been in close quarters with them. Looking down at his arm, you cannot get any closer than that, referring to the bite wound. He did not even feel weaker. In fact, he was sure he felt stronger. Could he be immune? Maybe he would have to wait and see.
It was time to do the job he had been putting off, clean up the mess in and around the office. He found a packaging area with polythene sheeting on a roll, bubble wrap and loads of tape. Starting by shovelling the smaller solids into a square of polythene, when this was full he folded it over. Effectively making a parcel and using a handy tape dispenser made the job easier. Deciding to double wrap it to make it more secure and then repeating the process with the actual bodies. Another handy find was a large plastic tote with wheels then managing fit all the packages into it. The man was by far the heaviest, but with some grunting and swearing, it was done. He decided to push the cart out through the rear fire exit after finding the panel, which controlled the fire alarm. After emptying the cart he left the bodies outside. They did stink and was glad to be rid of them, returning inside with the cart, which might come in handy in the future. Then he secured the doors and started to mop up the blood, shit and vomit. This was probably the hardest part because of constantly changing the water; the stuff that went down the toilet was pure gross. He even had to mop the wall. Finally, after throwing the disgusting mop head away, fitting a new one, and going over it all again, with boiling water from the kettle and disinfectant, he was satisfied with the job and he had earned a brew. It was starting to get dark now so he turned on the lights and sat back in front of the TV. Scrolling through every channel in search of something new, but having no luck. His eyes eventually became heavy and he fell into a deep into sleep...
He woke up with a start, mouth dry. The lights were still on and the TV still repeating its loop and the clock on the wall showed it to be one thirty-seven a.m. Heading for the tap he filled a pint glass of water and drank it straight back, refilled it and drank more slowly. The thought entered his head that the water could be infected, but this seemed academic now, as he had been drinking it for days. He stretched his body and surprisingly he felt wired, full of energy like he needed to be doing something. Walking through to the office, he sat down with his water in front of the PC, powering it on. The screen came to life, windows ten came to life. He always preferred windows seven, less garbage ware attached and no forced updates. Looking to the bottom right of the screen there showed that it had an internet connection. Immediately clicking on chrome, and then typing in UK news. Quickly a list of titles came up he clicked on the most up to date one. This gave more information than what was on the TV, detailing the when people were infected the incubation period was short only two to three hours of sickness. The sickness was described as severe flu-like symptoms along with an intense headache and vomiting. Death was soon to follow but after only minutes patients coming back to life, however not as they were before.
"No shit Sherlock!" he added.
He saw a link titled;
DOCTOR OSWALD'S SHOCKING LEAKED RESEARCH VIDEO.
Automatically he clicked on this link and it started to play. A figure dressed in a white hazmat suit complete with full-faced black respirator mask. He presumed that the figure was Doctor Oswald but there was no way of telling and for some reason, there was no audio. Maybe there had been at some point but it had been lost at some point. Centre screen was an operating table complete with the subject strapped down and completely secured. Even the neck was strapped down securing its head complete with snapping teeth. The subject was a zombie of course and he felt fascinated as this time he got to study the thing in greater detail as before in the office he had initially been in shock and froze in place, as well as avoiding being its lunch. It was completely naked and its skin was slate grey with a slight marbling effect where the veins showed blue through the skin. The things eyes were grey and misted over, probably why they did not appear to see very well. It thrashed against its restraints causing the skin to break where the straps held it down. However, this did not seem to bother it, still intent on getting towards a potential meal. The doctor seemed ready to commence his experiment now and selected a scalpel from the tray of surgical implements. Without ceremony, he performed one straight incision from sternum to the pubic bone in a fluid movement. A clean-cut appeared then welled with blood spilling over onto the outside skin. Then internal organs began to push out the open wound with nothing to hold them back. The doctor decided t
o help them on their way pulling out the intestines which was no small feat unravelling the long strands. In the end, he just reached right in and pulled them out on mass including the bowel. When completed he cut both ends releasing blood, partly digested food and shit. Then the zombie showed no reaction or deterioration. So doctor Oswald continued cutting out the liver, kidneys, stomach, bladder, pancreas, gallbladder and spleen. He held up each individual item to the camera before throwing them unceremoniously into a steel bowl. The thing was still unaffected; apparently no need for these organs. He then moved up to the chest performing another straight incision from thorax to sternum. Putting down the scalpel he picked up a circular saw and proceeded to cut straight through the rib cage tracing his cut, more blood pooled out. Next, he inserted a device that opened out the ribs and held them out the way. The heart and lungs were now visible. The doctor now picked up the scalpel again, cut out each lung and lastly the heart holding the bloody thing up to the camera, and then threw it away. He then gestured to the still thrashing zombie allowing the shocked audience to take it all in. Now he picked up the saw again and cut through its neck completely severing its head. The as if to prove his point he held up the severed head by its hair and up to the camera. It seemed to look directly at the lens as if eyeing its audience as a potential meal chomping its teeth together in anticipation...