Chapter Ten

After we relocated to a quieter corner of the camp where we could sit in a trio of lawn chairs and eat the first hot meal we'd had in a week, Commander Trent summarized the situation for us from an insider perspective. He could do that because not only were we infected like him, but who the hell was going to stop him?

"The CDC and FEMA had advance warning from overseas, so they grounded flights on day one and rerouted all the incoming flights to Long Island. Everyone on my flight and, from what I can tell, every other flight that day, was put into isolated quarantine. Those who showed symptoms of being ill were immediately carted off. I have no idea how the quarantine was broken. All I know is one minute I was on the phone trying to find out the reason for the quarantine, and the next minute my holding area was attacked by half a dozen psychopaths. I wasn't bitten, but enough blood was flying around I was infected anyway and eventually fell over. By the time I woke up, the worst was already over."

"Two days," I said and he nodded to confirm.

"That's how long it seems to take for lich to change," he replied. "Anyway, I was in the middle of reporting in by cell phone when I saw myself in the mirror. Thankfully, my CO is a smart one. When I told him I thought I might be a zombie, he went silent for a second, then said, 'Well, here's what you're going to do.' I spent the next few days scouting the city and reporting any pockets of survivors I could find. I know for a fact he acted on the information I provided, because I waited around to make sure the survivors were evacuated. Lots of helicopters were still in the air at the time. Not so many now.

My CO kept me informed on what was happening everywhere else. Whomever gave the order to start evacuating ahead of this thing should be given a medal. The Mississippi river became the front line. All the bridges were blockaded and charges were set. We knew it'd take an hour for people to change, so they intentionally set up the first evacuation sites a two hour walk from here. It worked for a while, but then the number of people who were infected started to outnumber the uninfected. We had no choice but to blow the bridges and pull out.

I was still in New York at the time. It was bad. Around day six, it was clear there was no one left for me to find. I found a secure rooftop and cleared it, then called for my own evac. They took me to a secure lab on an medical ship where I spent a few days getting poked and prodded by every doctor under the sun. I swear I heard the word 'fascinating' so many times I wanted to draw my weapon. I can only thank Christ someone in charge thought I'd make a better soldier than a guinea pig. You should know they had several others like me on board and a few immunes, too. They were mostly soldiers who reported in after being bit and had the good sense not to suicide, but there were a handful of civilians, as well. A vaccine is already in the works thanks to them."

"What about a cure?" I asked.

Commander Trent shook his head. "Nothing yet. From the information I was given, blocking it out entirely is easy compared to eradicating it from an already infected host. It has to do with the cell structure. When cells multiply in a normal human, they split and they're free to act according to their biological programming. In the infected, that doesn't happen. Cells are networked together by the virus and their blood gets locked into place by an invisible spider web. It takes an hour for the virus to spread between healthy cells and make everything to stop moving. After that, the virus takes control, moving people around like puppets."

"It sounds more like a parasite than a virus," Hanson commented.

"The boys in the lab agree and that's how they're treating it."

"And lich? What happens to us?"

"The web is flimsy and we can break it. Don't ask me how. The boys in the lab couldn't figure it out while I was still there, either. We just do. If you stay still too long, the web has time to strengthen and that's when you might start feeling stiff, but so far none of our lich have been taken over completely. One guy volunteered for an induced coma to test it. We kept him under for a full week and he was still able to shake it off when he woke up."

"My heart? My lungs?" I prompted.

"Those are some of the fascinating things the doctors commented on. The virus is very efficient. It transmits oxygen to our cells at a higher rate, meaning we don't have to breathe as often. Our lungs are mostly an accessory now. You might start noticing your strength improving as time goes by and your healing rate will skyrocket. Those are other side effects of the heightened cell efficiency. As for your heart, it's been completely taken over by the parasite. It beats when the parasite tells it to beat, rather than listening to the natural input from your body. Think of it like a tiny little parasite factory. Clean cells go in and infected cells come out."

"What about the brain?" Hanson asked. "I thought you have to shoot zombies in the head to kill them."

"That's stories. Destroying the brain only slows down the virus. Have you ever seen a zombie movie where severed hands can move on their own? Those are the kinds of zombies we're dealing with here. The virus—the zombie parasite—is like a hive brain permeating every speck of blood it touches. They tap into our brains because our physiology forces them, but once the human brain is destroyed the hive brain takes over and they can still get up and move. The only way to permanently kill a zombie is to burn it to ash or freeze it solid. That's one of the reasons it was decided to make the evacuated area so wide. It's easy to see a zombie coming, but what about a severed finger crawling across the ground or a bird flying off with someone's entrails? Our only hope is to keep these fuckers as far away as possible and pray the Quarantine holds long enough for a vaccine to be distributed."

"Can the blood move on its own?" I asked.

"Fuck, don't give me nightmares, kid. No, the bonds aren't strong enough to manipulate cells like that. It needs meatbags to contain it and flesh to manipulate. The only good news I can offer is the virus dies when the cells attached to it dies, which means people can't get infected by dried blood. Eventually, people will be able to safely reclaim the West Coast, though I doubt anyone will try for at least a decade."

I looked over to see what how Hanson was reacting to everything, but his expression was a hard, blank mask.

"Why are you telling us all this?" I asked to keep the conversation going.

"Why do you think?" the Commander replied with another kindly smile.

I had a feeling I already knew the answer, but I wasn't ready to say it out loud. From Hanson's tight-lipped expression, neither was he. "What are your plans now?"