Patient Zero

“Is it ready?” a cold voice echoed through the halls of the hospital. “Almost,” a small man shuttered in response. He could hear the cold voice’s footstep walk down the corridor, approaching his lab. A chill ran down the doctor’s spine causing his skin to freeze and his muscles to tense. “I wasn’t expecting you until next month, sir,” he said to the phantom man approaching. “The schedule has changed. The others want human testing to begin immediately.”

A growl, cloaked in mucus and blood, heaved from the boy. He lay on his back, still as a corpse. Slowly his chest expanded outward, and then what seemed like an inhumanly long time, retracted again. At the same pace and depth, the boy breathed rhythmically every forty seconds. Dr. Krane watched the boy from another room. Asha stood next to him with her arms crossed. “Thank you for letting me see him,” Dr. Krane said quietly.

Dr. Krane marched through the abandoned hospital halls, accompanied by four security guards. With this being his creation, he was supposed to administer the cure. He stayed far behind the line of security guards. One man, a tall fellow, was at the front. He had dark skin and a black short-sleeved shirt. A Kevlar vest covered his torso. He had black gloves on, which gripped a large automatic rifle. The team moved quickly.

I wish I could say this story was a happy story. I wish there was a good guy and a bad guy. And in the end, the bad guy loses and the good guy wins, saving the day, the girl, and the world. But I cannot say such things for this story hasn’t a single one of those elements. The only similarity from that story and the one I am about to tell is the bad guy. However, in this story, there isn’t just one bad guy. There are many: a group formerly named; Sanctity.