The Product Line (Book 1): Product (19 page)

Years and years of planning and millions of dollars have gone into this building, into this room. The Farm is full of familiar faces, crops he has helped to bring in over the year, chemically entombed into a life as a food source. There is so much attention to detail, so much that has to have been planned out before it could have been constructed that Ernie becomes aware of something that he struggles to accept, but knows in his core is true… this is not the only Farm, or at least not the first. It can’t be. Building a facility like this, to house this many, would have taken decades of planning and coordinating. New York is not the kind of place where you can secretly build a medical facility capable of housing hundreds of sedated people. This has been a work in process for quite a while, but while it was being built, there must have been another location. A proof-of-concept facility that likely lacked the sort of humanity and organized planning that went into this space.

Gideon walks over to Ernie and begins to escort him into the room, toward the hub of tubes and bodies. The electronic buzz of pumps and machinery paint the room in a sort of background static and hydraulic machinations.

--This is what we have worked to build. This facility means that we as a community are stable, that the city is safer—for us and from us. It means that numbers stay low, that there is no more unnecessary killing.

Ernie nods. He understands the logic behind the Farm, and deep down he enjoys exacting his personal vendetta against the masses of nameless bangers in the city. Ernie knows that his responses will directly impact his well-being. How he reacts to Gideon and how far he tips his hand will in every way determine his fate. But Ernie is not a generally fearful person. He does not often find himself holding his tongue or swallowing his opinions. More so than all of that, he has a need, a deeply burning desire to know what it is that is going on. He yearns to have knowledge that exceeds his place in the Organization.

Ernie swallows before speaking, knowing that what he says may very well be the last words that leave his lips. But fuck it, he should have been dead a year ago anyway.

--This isn’t the only Farm, is it?

His words clearly take Gideon by surprise. Gideon knows that Ernie is sharp, that he has an aptitude that has always been squandered by the trappings of common vice. In his new infected state though, more of his potential is able to shine through. Ernie continues.

--This space. The planning. It couldn’t have happened overnight. There are years of labor and red tape and preparation just to set up the space itself. And, knowing you, your own acumen for business, I imagine you would have had to start somewhere… A proof of concept. An initial step into harvesting and maintaining crops, where you could hone the system to find what works and doesn’t. It’s a great idea. Really the only way to do it when you traffic in… well… what we traffic in.

Gideon nods.

-- It is the only, but it isn’t the first. The first Farm was at best barbaric, the beginning step towards a system that could work. Inhumane. But the goal could be made nobler, or at least justified. You can set out as a principled man and find very quickly the flexibility that you have with your ethics when faced with the reality of challenge and adversity.

--Yes, great things are built on a foundation of death. I’ve read that half the buildings in the city generated double and triple-digit death tolls just in the process of erecting the monuments to mankind’s progress.

--Exactly. It was the endgame, the final goal that I concerned myself with. At first I fought the concept, thought that we could exist without the Farm, but it was impossible. The only hope we could have was to mitigate the damage of this curse. I did my part and learned what we needed to progress, how to progress, how to improve conditions and ensure that so many more would be viable and able to survive in a painless existence.

Ernie shakes his head in agreement. Reality is harsh, bad things happen, life is difficult—whether you end up a single parent raising more kids than you can handle, battling some sort of life-ending and crippling disease or some vegetative former gangbanger in the Farm. Life is hard. No one gets out without their bumps and bruises. No one makes it unscathed. Ernie continues.

--So what happens now?

--It depends, really.

--On what?

--Your eyes. I have seen those eyes before. Very few in the Organization have and fewer still know what they mean. I’d prefer to ensure that the narrative given to them stays unchanged. I will expect your cooperation with this.

--What about my eyes?

--Ernie, do not take me for a fool. I don’t know how… but I suspect that you are not just infected now, but are a carrier. You are contagious. A hair’s breath away from loosing the demon. There have been very few that I know of who are carriers.

--What? Like Jules and Chucky?

Gideon eyes Ernie suspiciously, and lets out a reluctant nod.

--Few as the number may be, there have been others, peppered throughout time. If I were forced to connect the dots I’d say something happened that pushed the Virus to shift from stable to seeking a new host. Then you fed, passing the infection on to your meal.

Ernie isn’t certain how to respond to the painfully accurate retelling of the events leading up to this conversation. And he definitely feels conflicted about bringing up the other farm…
So many eyes like mine.

--You said that how we proceed depends. What does it depend on?
--On whether or not you locate the boy. The one eating half the city.

Ernie nods. Not sure he fully understands how Gideon can know so much. Ernie swallows the uncomfortable small talk brewing in his head.

--OK. I’ll find him.

--I know it goes without saying, but in case you were wondering, my generosity toward your daughter can just as easily become scorn, and no one wants that. So to be certain we are all on the same page, let’s set a timetable on this. Bring me the boy, or what remains of him, by the end of the week.

--That gives me less than two days.

--Yes, it does. Come, I imagine you’d like to get started.

Ernie and Gideon make their way out of the Farm. Gideon presses several buttons on the security panel and the doors close slowly behind him. Gideon grabs something from his pocket and presents it to Ernie. It is a larger twenty-dram vial of product.

--In case you need it. We don’t need more infected out there. Keep it in check.

Ernie nods, maneuvers back through the foul scent of intake, where Gideon lets him back into the main building. Ernie quickly heads down to the garage to start his efforts to find the infected punk out killing the city.

***

With the sun now filling the sky, spilling its light on the city below, Ernie knows full well that his ability to locate the boy is more than hampered. At best he might be able to sneak through the subways, but to where? To what end? Where will he even start his search?

Back to Morris Heights. Which will undoubtedly be crawling with police and dogs and all sorts of other organized people looking for the same thing Ernie is, only most of them will be errantly looking for an animal. Not a person. It will probably take several hours before the coroner will identify that the bite marks on all the victims come from a human mouth. And longer still for them to even begin to grasp what could be out on the streets. Some will think it was some crazy kid hopped up on bath salts, or maybe a dog gone rabid, but certainly no one will expect the truth. So, hard as it is to stomach, Ernie is going to have to use what little time he has to his advantage to track down this newly infected punk before the kid really starts to figure out what is going on. Whatever it’s worth, this is the best time and best chance for him to gain some ground in his search.

After leaving the Organization’s main building Ernie heads toward the closest subway intake. It’s more than a block away, but thanks to a small piece of luck the sky is overcast. The light diffuses slightly through puffy grey clouds holding onto rain, waiting to empty their contents on to the ground below. Still, even with the filter of rain clouds in the sky the light coming through burns like fire. So Ernie does his best to stick under the awnings of the building and tuck tight against walls of storefronts and apartment walk-ups. His pace is determined, fast enough to be a little remarkable but not so quick as to draw overwhelming attention—well, any more than an aging, intensely photophobic person would do. Once again he finds himself thankful that he lives in a town where eye contact is almost always avoided.

As he ducks down into the entry for the Number 5 Lexington Express Line heading north to the Bronx, he realizes that the chances of him being successful in tracking down this rogue are at best unlikely. He tries to think on how all these revelations may well be intertwined: the other infected in the city, Gideon’s candid awareness of Ernie’s predicament.

As the train pulls into the station Ernie’s visage has returned to its handsome prime, though the effects of the sun are starting to stir his need to feed. He can feel the first tingle of pressure from the Virus, its gentle nudge for him to take in more blood. The sun always seems to burn through the product more than injury does. Ernie can mangle several bones in his body and be good with just a few drams, but staying in the light, it takes more out of you.

The amount Gideon set him up with is more than enough to last him over a week, but he will need to meter out its usage. It’s a dangerous game for him to go without, and he is still not aware of what will happen if his hunger pangs go beyond a simple nudge. He decides that he will shoot up before getting all the way into the city, but his needles are still at the house and his emergency spare was destroyed when he drained the banger last night.

The easiest thing to do is to locate some needle chucked somewhere by some dopehead. Years ago this would have been a much easier prospect, but now that New York has taken a vested interest in making the subways more family-friendly he will have to do some foraging to locate anything.

The best place to look is near the ends of the subway station loading area. City workers are notorious for taking shortcuts with their cleanup and he is not the least bit surprised when he quickly identifies a needle sticking out from some trash that has just been swept down on to the tracks. He waits for the platform to clear out a little and quickly and inconspicuously drops down onto the tracks. He grabs the needle and pulls himself back up onto the platform in a feat of amazing acrobatics.

As he looks at the needle he is sickened by what he sees. It is rusted and bent, the lingering contents of God only knows what congealed and hugging on to the interior plastic walls of the barrel and plunger. Only a crazy person would stick something so disgusting into their arm. But Ernie knows full well that there is nothing he can throw at the Virus that it can’t kill. He can empty a syringe full of Ebola straight into his bloodstream and the Virus will devour it a moment later.

So with this in mind he tucks under one of the sections of stairs—most have been encircled in chain link, but he quickly finds one that has an opening. He settles into the space and tears off a piece of caution tape that has at some point blown into the gate to tie off. He draws out a few ccs into the needle, looks around to ensure that no one is watching and eyeballs the dirty plastic full of crimson.

Addicts will often talk about a love affair with the needle. That the greatest point of anticipation comes from loading up their needle and finding a vein, as if the pinprick of pain is the toll that they pay for the euphoria of its substance. That the rush begins not with the drugs hitting but with that brief moment of anxiety right before the drugs kick in. Ernie is no different. He may be a man incapable of catching a traditional high anymore, but he has always been an addict in one sense or another, be it booze or this new master. He finds a vein, presses the slightly deformed needle into his arm and pushes down on the plunger.

Typically, using again so soon would simply mean that there is no bliss, only the enlivening sense of vitality and the expansion of senses. Since his brush with the Rage however he finds himself not in a state of bliss, but convulsing in pain, with only faint wisps of the bliss nipping at him. It’s as if the Virus is telling him that it needs more, that more would mean that he would be rewarded with the bliss. The pain is so intense though that he doesn’t dare go for a second dose.

His mind is bombarded with senses, a very strong expansion of his already intense consciousness of the world around him. Heartbeats, conversations, footsteps, car engines, music, scents of food and garbage and urine. A vast world of input stops his thoughts, filling him up with sense memories and rendering the world around him inside his mind. He tries to swallow down his awareness, to focus on what is nearby, to block out the disharmony of noises and smells and tastes filling his awareness.

With the Virus sated and the pain subsided, he scoots back out from under the stairs and heads over to the platform to board the next train. A pretty girl stands at the station thirty or so feet from him, smiling at him coyly. He returns the look, almost out of obligation. Her pulse flutters at his smile as she tucks her hair behind her ear. He can sense her visceral reaction to his subtle flirting. Hear her swallow down her excitement. Smell the musk of her body as it fills the air with pheromones and bombards her system with oxytocin. See her irises expand and contract in excitement. He is more aware of her body’s reaction than she is.

The girl returns to listening to the music on her iPod, some sort of electronica that Ernie can hear in his head as if he were the one wearing headphones. She continues to steal looks at Ernie. However, he has no interest in continuing the demure advances.

Ernie steps up to board the train when he hears it rumbling into the station but it is a solid two minutes before it actually arrives. Ernie, unfamiliar with his heightened senses, believed it to be far closer than it actually was. The train’s squeal nearly deafens him as it approaches.