Adaptive Instinct (Survival Instinct) (16 page)

“I heard they didn’t tell her what was going on,” one of Bryce’s dad’s companions said to the others.

“She wasn’t very popular,” Bryce’s dad agreed.  “Still, to just leave her out there?  Nobody’s even reported picking her up for one of the programs.  She’s been presumed dead.”

Dead?  Who’s been presumed dead?  And what programs was he talking about?

“Are you kidding?  That woman could eat nails for breakfast.  If she’s dead already, then it’s worse than we anticipated,” another man said in a jokey sounding manner.

Who’s dead?  And what’s worse?  Bryce was about ready to speak these questions aloud, when the group of men approached a doorway.  Bryce’s dad placed his hand on a scanner pad and used the other to stick a card into a slot.  The door opened, and the men went inside.  Even though every fibre of his being screamed at Bryce not to follow, he dashed forward before the door could close.  The moment
that it clicked closed behind him, Bryce wanted to go back through it.

On either side of a long hallway were Plexiglas cells, and inside of them were monsters.  Monsters trying to disguise themselves as humans and failing.

Bryce screamed, and screamed.

7:

Nicole Hui-Chang, or just Nicky to those who knew her, watched as the prisoners were released into the general population for the first time.  She didn’t think any of the prisoners should have been kept around.  All of them should have been shipped off or executed.  Many of the prisoners were driven to Leighton South Correctional, but a few were lined up and shot a distance down the road.  Somebody high up in the company had decided some of these criminals were far too destructive as well as useless to their new world, and that they should just be killed off.  Not a hard decision for people who had released the deadliest virus man had seen thus far.  There was one prisoner in particular whom Nicky was worried about: Orson King.

Like all the other Marble Keystone mercenaries in the prison, Nicky had read all the remaining prisoners’ files.  Some of them didn’t seem too bad, maybe just problem citizens, ones they already had experience in dealing with.  Orson however, he was bad.  Real bad. 
Apparently, he got along with all the prisoners, and the guards had never had a problem with him, which gave him bonus points for the selection process, but the main thing that got him chosen was his IQ.  Despite problems throughout school, the man had a high IQ, which was one of the things the Keystone executives were looking for.  There was a list of desirable traits, which they wanted protected more than others.  They wanted these genes to be passed on to the next generation of humans.  No one seemed to notice that Orson used those smarts to manipulate people.  Nicky had voted against him staying, but she was out-voted.  The others thought that his mean streak was either gone, or could be controlled.

Nicky watched from a higher floor, across the gap, as Orson stepped out amongst the people.  The look on his face was subtle, but Nicky could still read it.  She had experience with men like him, ones that were smart enough to get away with things, and they knew it.  He was going to be a problem.

“Nicky?” a soft voice spoke beside her.

Nicky turned to find Georgia standing there.  Georgia was a middle-aged woman in Nicky’s ward.  The Keystone mercenaries had split up the entire prison into sections with one of them in charge of each section.  Nicky had the entire north side of the fourth floor in the general population area.  It was a large section; general population was a huge hall with several branches off the main sections, but so far, she hadn’t had too many problems with its occupants.  Not as bad as what some of the other guys had to deal with anyway.

“Billy’s hand has swollen up really badly.  Could you come take a look?”  Georgia was the kind of woman who always made other people’s business her own business.  Sometimes it could be irritating because she told Nicky a lot of useless stuff, but a few times, her nosy behaviour had come in handy, and Nicky could step in before things got too bad.  This might be one of those times.

Georgia hurried off, weaving through the people milling about, and leading Nicky to Billy.  Nobody was sure what was wrong with Billy; he never moved unless you coaxed him along, he never spoke,
and he had to be fed.  It could have been a mental handicap, or total shock.  Nicky was banking on the mental handicap.  All the shock-people had shown some sign of comprehension and life at least once.  Billy never changed.  At least they were able to find out his name because he had his health card in his pocket.  In the photo on it, he had the same blank expression.

Nicky entered the cell that Billy was in.  He was sharing the space with two other people and had drawn the short straw that had him sleeping on a foam mat on the floor.  Nicky mentally referred to this cell and the one next to it as the hen houses.  Georgia wasn’t the only one who stuck her nose where it didn’t belong.  She had managed to find three other gossips, and the four of them were as thick as thieves. 
Fortunately, the hens had taken it upon themselves to look after Billy.  One was middle-aged like Georgia, one was an old crone with wispy blue hair, and the third was a teenaged girl who had probably been converted by the others.  Nicky shooed the hens back from where Billy was sitting on the edge of a bunk.  He was wheezing slightly, which was unusual.  His thousand-yard stare was currently fixed on a point between his feet.  Nicky kneeled in front of him.

“I’m going to take a look at your hand, Billy.”  Nicky tried to talk to him when she could.  Most people treated him
as if he weren’t there, but Nicky understood that regardless of what was wrong with him, he might still be able to hear and understand speech just fine.  It may just be that the connection between his brain and his body was faulty.

Nicky gently took hold of Billy’s elbow and lifted his arm.  When anyone moved his limbs, he would hold the position for at least a minute before going slack.  With his arm raised, Nicky was able to clearly see his hand in the light coming through the small, high-set window. 
As Georgia had said, it was swollen and an angry, puffy red.  The hens hovered around while Nicky inspected the hand, gently turning his forearm to turn the hand without touching it.  She didn’t know if he could feel pain or not.  She spotted the problem.

“He’s been stung by a bee,
” Nicky told the hens, carefully plucking the stinger out.  The bee’s body was just under the edge of the bed.  “It’s likely he’s having a minor allergic reaction to it.  Do any of you have an EpiPen?  We don’t want to risk his breathing getting any worse.”

“No, but Brewster down the hall
has one,” the teenage hen clucked.

“Can someone go get one please?”  That was what Nicky disliked about the hens the most
. You
always
had to tell them what to do.  If it didn’t involve speaking, they didn’t act on their own.

The teenager ran off, her eyes wide as if Billy might drop dead if she didn’t get the EpiPen instantly. 

“You’ll be fine, Billy,” Nicky tilted his head up so she could look into his eyes as she talked to him.  “The EpiPen should help bring the swelling down, and make it easier to breathe again.  I’ll send Dr. Owen to come take a look.  He should be able to give you an ointment that’ll soothe the pain.”

The teenage hen returned and handed Nicky three EpiPens.

“I only needed one, thanks.”  Nicky took the cap off one and used it on Billy.  She could see the swelling go down a bit, and the angry red colour lessen.  His wheezing also subsided.  She then turned to the hens.  “When I send Dr. Owen down, I’ll tell him to bring one of our excess EpiPens.  He’ll teach you all how to use it so that if Billy is ever stung by a bee again, you’ll be able to do it yourselves.”

The hens fluttered and stirred, whispering quickly amongst themselves.  The idea of having to use an EpiPen themselves was stressful, but they were also excited that Dr. Owen would be coming.  There were six doctors in the prison, and Dr. Owen was voted as the most handsome.

When Nicky stepped out of the hen house, she was confronted by an angry-looking Brewster.

“Ah, Brewster, I believe these are yours.”  Nicky handed him the two remaining EpiPens.  “We’ll replace the one we used.  I’m not sure how much you were told, but Billy was having an allergic reaction to a bee sting.”

“Don’t know why you waste medicine on his brain dead ass,” Brewster grumbled as he wrapped his big mitts around the EpiPens.  His attitude toward Billy was common among the population.  “We should just toss him out to the zombies.  The change would make him smarter.”

“Hey!”  Nicky glowered up at Brewster.  Like most of her relatives who lived in Hong Kong, she was petite, and Brewster was a massive mound of muscle.  Still, he flinched back when Nicky scolded him, jabbing at his big chest with her finger.  “I don’t like to hear that kind of talk.  How would you feel if we threw you out to the zombies, huh?  I’ll bet you wouldn’t be too happy about that.  I mean, what do you do around here other than complain, hmm?  You seem to be doing more bad for the population than Billy is.  I think if we’re going to toss anyone out, you’re closer to being on that list than he is.  I’m tempted not to replace your EpiPen for that remark, but because I’m so nice, I’m going to do it anyway.”

Brewster visually shrunk into himself.  Nicky may be small, but she could be very intimidating when she needed to be.

“Sorry,” Brewster mumbled and shuffled off back to his cell.

Nicky sighed and turned back to the railing.  She couldn’t spot Orson anywhere; he had disappeared to some place else.  The prison looked a lot different from when they had first showed up.  People went in and out of cells at will, Christmas lights were strung around the railings to provide illumination at night, sheets and clothing hung across the fronts of cells for privacy, more sheets and clothing were being dried over the railings and on strings strung across the gap.  Nicky was reminded that she should probably clean her own clothes soon.  It was just such a hassle though, having to do it by hand and then hanging it to dry.  There were large laundries in the prison, but they had all agreed not to waste the generators by running them.  Besides, people were living in there now, and the noise would be disrupting.  Nicky figured that as time went on, there would be more and more lines hanging across the sunlit gap.  She looked up at the sky through the massive skylight window running the length of the hall.  The good weather had been keeping up.  She wasn’t looking forward to the rain, or even worse, the cold and snow.

“Hey
, Nicky!” another voice called to her.

She rubbed the space between her eyes.  Couldn’t she just get a few minutes to herself?  She looked over and this time saw James Brenner coming toward her.  James was another Keystone mercenary.  He was in charge of the people living in the laundry room, so it was no surprise that it was him calling to her.  Nicky believed that people had a connection to one another that they weren’t aware of, and that was why you could be randomly thinking of someone just before they called, or you could have a conversation with someone about something, and the next person you talked to would mention the same thing.  James trotted up to her, avoiding a toy dump truck
some kid had left precariously close to the edge of the drop.

“I’ve been looking all over for you.”  He sounded slightly out of breath.  He must have run up all the stairs and jogged down the length of the hallway.  “Your radio is off again.”

Nicky looked down at her belt and noticed the switch was indeed off.  She had turned it off while trying to resolve a dispute about a blanket because some of the other mercenaries were talking about the prisoner release on the main channel, and it was distracting.  She turned the dial back on.

“So what’s up?”  Nicky hoped it was nothing.

James looked around cautiously, checking to see if anyone was listening in.  They were still close to the hen houses so anything that was said had to be worded carefully.

“Well, it’s time for a meeting.  There’s a load of stock coming in from the school, and we need to organize where it’s going.  Plus, we should all update each other on what’s been happening this past week.”  James used a code word when he said stock.  Anyone overhearing that would assume they were discussing supplies, when actually they were talking about people.  And he said they were coming from the school, which was another camp they had set up like the prison.  Something must have happened at the school if they were coming here.  The prison had already taken on more than they had planned when the other camps had to evacuate.  Some locations, they had just lost contact with completely.  The school had been the last one.

Nicky rubbed the back of her neck, and then gestured for James to lead her to the meeting.  As they left, she pushed the toy truck away from the edge and reminded herself to talk to Dr. Owen before the meeting started.

***

The meeting was being held in the prison warden’s office.  The space wasn’t very large, but they had cleared out all the tables and filing cabinets earlier, and with just folding chairs, everybody was able to fit.  There were twelve mercs, including Nicky and James, who were wards of different sections of people, the head of the medical team, Dr. Milo, the mercenary in charge of outer wall defence, another mercenary in charge of the teams that went out for supplies, and another in charge of inventorying supplies once they were inside as well as their distribution. The warden of the prison, who wasn’t really in charge of anything but knew the layout better than anyone, sat on one side of the table, while Crichton, the mercenary who oversaw everyone and spoke directly with the head base of operations, sat opposite.  Eighteen people in all.

“In case you haven’t heard,” Crichton began as soon as the attendees had taken their seats and the door was closed, “the Palmview Elementary School has been overrun.  Over half the people there were killed or are unaccounted for, while the rest are coming here.”

“How many exactly?” one of the other ward leaders asked.

“Have they checked each other for infection yet?” Dr. Milo asked immediately after him.

“Sixty-eight and no.  We’re going to have to set up a procedure to get them all checked and processed.”

Dr. Milo nodded, knowing that was his job.

“We’ll try to get their doctors and scientists through first so they’ll be able to help with the testing.”

“They had scientists there?” James asked.  As far as anyone knew, the school had been holding just refugees.

“Yes.  That brings me to another point.”  Crichton sighed, collecting his thoughts briefly.  “They weren’t just holding survivors there.  They were running some experiments.”