Pulse (11 page)

Eventually she lost interest in Sam Price and focused on the guards. Her nails broke against their plastic face guards as she clawed.
One guard panicked and shot her in the head.

At a glance her stomach wasn't as bloated, her symptoms overall lesser than the
husband. When they carted her body away for an autopsy, they discovered parasites only a centimeter in length; that was a fraction of the smallest they found from the daughter's body. They hadn't matured for whatever reason. Incompatible genetics, Marla said. The parasites were alive and her body was moved to a separate cell where scientists would study how long the parasites could live in a dead host. The two techs had just enough time to see her sweating had stopped; all that was left on her skin was old and dried. It meant that, technically, they wouldn’t smell if they washed the residue off.

But on that fourth day, when the male host should've woken up or exploded, or
something
, like the female, he did nothing. He was still alive and his stomach showed signs of parasitic activity, but the big bang hadn't happened yet.

What was he missing? What made the first generations of hosts go insane, but not manifest the parasites in their fullest form? It wasn't a generalized step in their evolution. The spread of infection had crossed into North Dakota's bordering states, and while some reports of the parasite had occurred, most were still exhibiting merely violent behavior.

He shuddered. The lack of predictability or logic scared him. Things he was positive about before were being challenged on almost an hourly basis.

His lunch had grown cold. He stared at the cheese steak sandwich and imagined a microscopic parasite lurking within. The thought of a multitude of parasitic specimens in a lab nearby did nothing to soothe his nerves.

Gina was even more worried. Their twenty-two years of marriage hadn't been easy and with everything going on, it was made worse. Adam had only been home twice since the start of the infection, and it was only to get a change of clothes.

The second he stepped through the door Gina was on him. They fought. Gina wanted to drive three hours north to pick up their daughters from the university and stay home. He said no; they were tough and would be okay. His true reasoning was selfish; first, he had high hopes the infection wouldn’t reach them. Second, he simply didn’t have the time to leave his work to pick them up. He hadn’t felt more useful or like himself until recently. Coming back home, even if he did care about his daughters, created a sense of dread for him.

In a desperate attempt to reassure her and end the argument, he said they took after her in that they were strong and persevered. Feeding into Gina’s vanity usually helped end their fights.

That had been a bad move, apparently, because Gina started screaming about how he never cared about her or their daughters. Adam couldn’t—
wouldn’t
—take the abuse. He packed his suitcase with anything he thought he’d need for the next few weeks and left without another word to his wife. In the grand scheme of things, his fight with her meant nothing. Adam wished she would understand that.

Later that day Helen and Madeline each texted him individually, saying they were on a Greyhound home after a hysterical call from mom. It wasn’t a courtesy notification, or that they wanted to know if he was okay. Instead they wondered when he’d be home so they could use his car. The request wounded Adam, but he knew they were always on Gina’s side. This shouldn’t have surprised him. 

Now he sat at his desk, reviewing what happened with the female host and everything they had up to date. In front of him the Word document was blank, save for the standard header and footer. The cursor blinked. This far into the infection, he’d hoped he would have more to say. More results and contingency plans.

With no real ideas in his mind, he began typing, hoping something would come to him. Perhaps if he used enough big words and terms, his bosses wouldn't bother reading that he had no concrete news to report.

Lindsey Price was dead. Marla was devastated by the loss, not only because Lindsey was a person, but because Marla developed an irrational idea that she could save her before she woke up from her coma.

There was that, at least.
Her advancements in planning a framework to synthesize a cure. She was sure she was close to something. Her ideas were solid, but it was the execution and logistics that were holding her down. Even though she disliked Chandler, she was going to ask him and Suresh to assist her. She simply couldn’t do all the work on her own.

Everyone’s workdays were long, some people sleeping in their offices or the break room. The stale scent of unwashed bodies, coffee, and energy drinks was becoming noticeable. Marla liked to work herself hard just like everyone else, but there came a point when your brain was ineffective and needed to recharge. Today was one of those days.

She was taking a half day at home before she planned on returning to the lab to get down and dirty and start synthesizing. As usual, the second she walked in and was embraced by the familiar scent of her lavender potpourri and even the smell of Doom, she felt better. With a takeout order of enchiladas, chips, and plenty of salsa and guacamole before her, she ran down the idea for the cure again.

A variety of a
ntihelminthics were used on the infected the moment the CDC discovered it was a parasite. They were simple enough; administered orally, they would cause a chemical reaction in the parasite that would kill the larvae. Some antihelminthics were ovicidal, killing the egg. None of the existing antihelminthics proved effective. People had given up quickly because it was presumed
Anisakis
larvae couldn’t survive inside the human body, rendering the drugs useless. But this was
Anisakis Nova,
as Dr. Baker called it. This was different.

Marla looked at it this way: t
he worms were resistant to known antihelminthics. It was obvious an alternate drug must be created to combat it.

That was ex
actly what Marla intended to do.

She believed she could synthesize a
chemical that would stop infection. All antihelminthics were similar; they stopped the parasite from developing from egg into adult form by blocking their ability to digest nutrients.

But she had her work cut out for her. She needed to know what
exactly
was stopping the current drugs from working and how to trick the parasite into absorbing it. She needed ample test subjects in stage 1 to test the drug on, assuming she could create it. The worms grew so large, so quickly, she knew the only chance they had of killing them in body was in the stopping them from fully maturing. She needed to create a resilient, superior version that would kill them in egg stage, or at the very least stop them from growing.

When Marla started thinking about it all, a moment of panic rang through her entire body. It
was all possible if she had enough time. Research like this took months, more likely years. It required identifying the exact mutation of Anisakis to Anisakis Nova, then figuring out how to counter that specific change.

But time was
what everyone was in short supply of. The infection was spiraling out from North Dakota at an exponential rate. It would be in Georgia before the week was out if authorities weren’t able to contain it. She knew the government had stockpiles of antivirals that would only be used under pandemic circumstances. But that was for influenza, not a parasite. Yet the principal would most likely be the same; if she came up with something that she believed
could
work, the desperate need for it would bypass most testing and it would be administered immediately to prevent further devastation on the country.

They’d literally be brewing up something in the lab and sending it out.

The food started to taste flat as guilt cropped up. Here she was, relaxing and eating, when she could be at the lab. It was conflicting; she knew she needed to rest but she didn’t want to.

Marla put the leftovers in the fridge and locked Doom in the bathroom with his litter box and food. She needed as much
uninterrupted sleep as she could manage before going back.

Diane wasn't going to take her kids to the quarantine zone no matter what any news anchor or government official told her. Her sister's cousin told her they were killing infected people at the quarantine zones. Then her brother's second wife told her the only thing to do was to outrun the infection to the coast.

She had to move fast if she was going to meet up with
Sean’s family. Spokane was a hell of a drive away from the coast of Washington, but it was her kids and she'd do anything to keep them. Ever since Sean left the picture she was much happier.

No daddy and two girls? Plus the fact that she got an injury "on the job" a few years back? The welfare checks were fat and did her just fine, especially when she managed to sell a little weed on the side. The kids were her ticket to the good life—she'd have another if she could—and no one was taking them away.

But what she'd seen at the bus depot was enough to make anyone afraid to go it alone. Sean was the muscle in the relationship. If anyone ever looked at Diane wrong it was Sean who beat the hell out of them. She was happier without him, but she'd kill to have him watching her back since all this virus stuff started happening.

The sick people were everywhere. They were ripping people apart like they
were nothing. There was so much blood and so much screaming, it was a wonder she made it out alive.

After the scene at the depot, Diane knew she had to get a car and get herself out of there. On her own. She put Brandy and Miley in a safe spot by some Goodwill donation bins and stalked a Rite Aid parking lot for someone weak. Eventually an older lady showed up by herself. Diane pulled a knife on her, the very one she'd stolen from Sean, and hijacked her car.

Diane dragged the girls to the car. She almost had to carry Brandy, who stumbled like she was drunk. She'd kept saying she was sick. The second Diane got her into the car she fell asleep and stayed that way as they crossed the mountains. Diane wasn't sure if it was that Miley, the baby, needed to be changed or something died in the radiator, because there was a righteous stench in the car that was making her sick, too.

It had been seven hours driving. They got rerouted five times because of traffic revisions. Diane needed to take a break. Her body was stiff and Miley had been crying for an hour straight. For a two year old she sure was dependent. Diane would leave Brandy alone for an entire day at a time when she was four, and nothing bad ever happened. Taught her to be independent. Like her mama always told her, you can't take care of yourself, you can't take care of no one.

She pulled over on a truck runaway ramp and got out of the car. The fresh air felt good. Then she realized how quiet it was.

Miley stopped crying.

She went to the backdoor and peered through the window. Brandy was awake, staring straight ahead through the windshield. Miley…

Miley wasn't moving.

Diane tried opening the door but it was locked. She tried the driver's door, but it was locked, too. The keys were inside.

"Brandy," she screamed. "You let me in right now!"

Diane tried the other doors twice. Her daughter didn't flinch as she beat her fists against the window, screaming for her to let her in. After ten minutes, Diane gave up. She sat on the gravel and took out a cigarette, wishing she had something better to soothe her nerves.

"Can't take care of yourself, mama?"

Diane yelped, stumbling to her feet and spinning around. Behind her stood Brandy. But something was off. Her eyes were bloodshot and it looked like she'd puked on herself. But that wasn't going to save her from the beating Diane was about to deliver.

"You little shit, what were you doing in there?"

"Can't take care of yoursssself, mama? Mama?" Her voice sounded broken. Like she was having to think hard for every word, forgetting them as she spoke.

Despite the fear welling inside her, and her instincts telling her not to, Diane stepped up to Brandy and raised her hand to slap her.

Then she saw the flash of a blade just as Brandy rammed it into her lower abdomen. She dropped to her knees, the blade sliding out of her body as she went, pressing her hands against herself to stop the flow of blood.

"No more babies for you, mama." Brandy dropped to her knees, bringing the knife over her head. She brought it down, plunging it into Diane's stomach. "No more babies. No babies."

Diane's blood splattered her daughter's face. The world was starting to fade.

"Hate you," Brandy screamed with each
drop of the knife. "Hate you."

The day the first incident of infection popped up in Seattle was the beginning of the end. Before that, Dom's hope the parasite wouldn't reach Washington never wavered. Part of him thought the government would take care of it eventually, that it was only a matter of time before it was under control. When he watched the news, he felt anxious and angry, but it was just the same as when he saw footage of war or natural disasters. Yes, it was tragic. But at the end of the day it didn't affect him. It wasn't a few blocks away threatening his life and the lives of his loved ones.