The Red Phoenix 12: Strength Comes in Numbers (4 page)

“A freak accident?” asked Aldridge.

“Sure,” Hart responded.

“I understand,” stated Miles. “Aldridge will suggest adding a combustible substance to the experiment, which will cause an explosion in the lab. This source of energy will be the new pretended specimen born.”

“I like it,” stated Aldridge, after thinking on it. “It’s not exactly what I had in mind, but it sounds good. Plenty of room to cover things up a bit. When do we begin?”

“Well, first we need to get it secured into the lab at Sector Nine and find out what it’s made of,” Miles answered. “Then we’ll know what we’re really dealing with.”

“Let’s get started,” stated Aldridge, sounding eager.

***

A few months later, Aldridge paced around a spacious lab at N.A.S.A. with a set of locked double-entry doors, watching Miles and the others experiment with the apparition as it floated inside a square-shaped, three-hundred gallon glass aquarium that was bordered with metal stripping.

Hart sat at a computer terminal, watching the readings of the energy specimen on his screen like he didn’t want to miss anything. Miles controlled a pair of robotic arms that reached into the glass case. Heaton paced the floor with a clipboard, writing something down while Dunn stood at a counter, pouring a red fluid from a glass flask into a green fluid in another one.

Miles moved the robot fingers close to the light with caution and care. The light zapped his metallic-covered arms and hands with tiny streaks of purple lightning bolts.

“Hmm,” he said, withdrawing his metal hands.

“What?” asked Aldridge.

“It’s very sensitive,” Miles answered. “It doesn’t like to be touched, fondled or played with. I’m guessing that it doesn’t like being in this glass containment either.”

“Well, here is something new,” said Hart, staring at his computer screen, sitting at his desk.

“What do you got?” asked Aldridge.

“It contains a high content of tritium, ninety-seven point eight percent,” Hart answered.

“What does that mean?” asked Aldridge.

“Well, it would explain its self-lighting ability, especially in its core, which is one of tritium’s qualities,” stated Hart in a concerned tone.

“And?” asked Aldridge, noticing Hart’s expression of fear.

“Tritium is an important component in nuclear weapons,” Hart commented. “My assumption is this energy is highly combustible and if its elements do match that of tritium, there is no telling what could happen if it caused an explosion.”

“Are you thinking toxic fallout?” asked Aldridge.

“Very possible,” Hart answered. “Maybe even deadly if the fallout vapors were inhaled.”

Aldridge watched his wonder of bluish vapors inside, wondering if his dream was ever going to take flight. He looked at his forearm, noticing a mosquito near his elbow, preparing to draw his blood. He flicked the insect away from him.

“Only in Texas are there damn bugs in a secured science lab,” he mumbled, noticing a gas mask on the desk next to a cactus plant the size of a prickly cucumber in a flowerpot on Hart’s desk.

Aldridge put on the gas mask to help dissolve some of his boredom, toying with the open metal chest.

“How do I look in this, Hart?” he asked.

“Like you’re ready for chemical warfare,” Hart chuckled, typing something else on his keyboard.

“This metal chest is something, huh?” asked Aldridge, looking it over.

“It certainly would have caught my attention had I been on the moon,” Hart responded, scanning through more screens.

“I’m going in for another try,” stated Miles in a confident tone, moving his robotic-hands closer to the light.

“Stanley, maybe that’s not a good idea,” stated Hart, fixing his glasses, leaning back in his chair.

“Stand by, not to worry,” stated Miles. “I just want to see how it handles aggressive physical contact one more time. It’s been so damn moody with me.”

Heaton stepped up next to Miles to watch.

“Hart is right, Miles,” stated Aldridge through the gas mask, setting the metal chest back on Hart’s desk. “Maybe it only wants me to be near it since I’m the one that set it free.”

Miles grasped the light with both hands like he was choking it. The entire lab lit up with a bright, white flash like the sun. The glass case exploded with a sonic boom, shooting glass outwards, incinerating Miles and Heaton in a flash. The force threw Aldridge across the lab until he hit the wall, collapsing to the floor behind some control panels. Hart was thrown out of his chair in a backward somersault, landing on his face. Dunn and his glass display were blown against a wall, shattering all over the flasks, cutting Dunn’s face, arms and chest with bleeding lacerations. He fell to the floor on his face unconscious.

The phantasma drifted upwards to the center of the room, fluctuating colors from white and blue vapors to red vapors like it was angry from being mishandled. A green, thin, murky mist billowed from the apparition as it continued to change colors, permeating throughout the lab within seconds.

Aldridge picked himself up in shock, breathing heavily, frightened. He looked at the misty light, changing from red to blue vapors that was levitating towards the ceiling, echoing louder with whispery sounds. He whimpered as his eyes watered, watching the thing that was going to bring him everything he ever dreamed of but had just become a nightmare.

Hart got up and looked up at the light, breathing in the green mist that was like a blanket of fog throughout the lab. Dunn was still unconscious on the floor.

“What the h-hell happened, Aldridge?” Hart stammered, gazing at the apparition, scared.

“I think we pissed it off,” Aldridge replied, worried.

“We need to get—”

Hart sounded like he was choking, holding his throat before he dropped to the floor, gasping for air.

“Hart?” asked Aldridge, trying to help him.

Hart went unconscious. Aldridge looked across the lab in awe, watching something in the form of an insect grow larger on the floor until it was an oversized, mutated creature with long legs, wings and a sharp needle-nose. He watched the giant mosquito flap its wings, shrieking, flying out of control from one side of the lab to the other, ramming itself into the walls like it was looking for a way out.

Aldridge ran to the exit door, screaming, hitting the green button, pressing his back against the set of double metal doors. The mosquito flew at him. He moved out of the way just as the mosquito’s sharp needle-nose stabbed through the door where he stood. He crawled under a desk in the lab as the mosquito pulled its sword-like nose out of the metal door, flew across the lab and landed on top of the desk like it weighed three-hundred pounds.

The mosquito stabbed its nose through the top of the desk multiple times as its blade-like proboscis missed Aldridge’s shoulder, arm then his head by an inch, causing the man to scream at each plunge. He put himself on his stomach, panting, casting his eyes at Hart and Dunn who were beginning to transform into something underneath a thin layer of green mist.

Both men’s heads grew twice the size they were before, their hair changing from middle-aged dos to bald. Their ears meshed into bulky cheek bones that grew, widening their skinned-over faces. Their eyes moved to the sides of their heads, changing to dilated black and red pupils. Their noses flattened as their jaws and mouths grew larger with sharp teeth protruding. Their chests, arms, legs and backs became bulky and muscular, rising up the sides of their necks, ripping their shirts, lab coats and pants off their bodies. Their hands turned into vicious, four-fingered claws. Their mid-sections changed from pot-bellies to narrow torsos with bone and muscle tissue visible. Their muscular thighs and calves were ripped and defined as their feet changed to arched lumps of skin and bone with three-claws. They looked identical.

The creatures’ heads turned to Aldridge and roared. Aldridge screamed again as the double-set of doors opened. Just as the creatures moved towards Aldridge, the giant mosquito flew at them, poking its long needle-nose at them multiple times, badgering them. Aldridge made his escape, crawling out from under the desk then running out the door, still wearing the gas mask.

The creatures fought with the crazed, mosquito-like animal, swinging their fists at it as the lab doors closed.

***

“Help me!” screamed Aldridge, running down the corridor, ripping off his gas mask.

Employees walking by, wearing lab coats, stopped in awe, watching Aldridge run down the corridor like a maniac.

***

In the lab, one of the creatures struck the mosquito with its fist, knocking it to the wall on the other side of the room, causing the insect’s body to split open, making its inner fluids splatter on the wall before it fell dead on top of a control panel, oozing out more of its fluids onto a computer terminal, which dripped to the floor.

The metal lab doors blew open, making a tumultuous noise, shattering parts of the doors, wall, framing and wiring onto the floor of the corridor.  The other employees stood frozen in fear, screaming at the awful sight of the enraged beasts.

“Somebody help me! Get security now!” Aldridge screamed, running for his life.

The creatures roared as they ran after him down the corridor, slicing and striking at employees who stood in their way with their sharp claws, causing some of them to be thrown to the left against the wall, others forced to the right, while some were knocked down, crushed by the weight of their feet. The creatures shortened the distance between them and Aldridge as he hurried around a corner, screaming for his life.

“Security! Dammit, get me security!” shouted Aldridge, still running.

Officer Ahmed Hakim and his brigade of armed officers came around the corner, heading towards Aldridge.

“Officers! Thank God! They’re coming after me! Help me, dammit!” cried Aldridge in a panicky voice.

“What is it? Who’s coming after you?” asked Hakim in an intense voice.

The sounds of the creatures stomping up the corridor alarmed the officers as they came around the corner, roaring. One of them grabbed a screaming woman, picked her up, bit her on the neck then threw her at the officers as if she was weightless. The woman’s body forced a few of the officers to the floor, knocking them over.

“Out of the way, Aldridge!” said Hakim as he and his guys aimed their weapons at the frightening, shrieking creatures coming right at them.

Aldridge stepped to the rear of the group of officers, sobbing as he watched one of the creatures fall dead from bleeding bullet holes in its chest and head, knowing it was either Dunn or Hart. The other creature came running at them, roaring and slashing. The officers shot up the second creature with multiple gunshot injuries, causing it to stagger until it fell to its knees. Hakim reloaded another magazine in his pistol then emptied it on its head and chest.

The second creature collapsed to the floor, breathless and unmoving. The officers approached the motionless creature with their guns trained on him, their eyes intense, breathing hard, making sure it didn’t a move or take a single breath.

Just as the officers thought the fight was over, they heard a growling behind them. They turned, watching the woman who was bitten and thrown change into a creature, growing a bulky head, muscular arms, chest, legs and back as her blouse and dress ripped off her.

“Oh my God,” said Hakim, aiming his gun at its head.