Dean Carter - Blood Water

They called through the open door to see if anyone was around. No answer.

‘Doesn’t look like there’s anyone in,’ Sean said. ‘What should we do?’

‘Well, we can’t just stand here and get wet.’

‘What if something’s happened though?’

‘Like what?’

‘I don’t know—’

Suddenly there was a sound like breaking glass from somewhere inside the building.

‘Come on,’ Sean said, starting to turn away. ‘I don’t like this, let’s—’

Another crash of glass. They stood there, unable to move. Finally James pushed the door further open.

‘I don’t think we should go in,’ said Sean.

‘Someone might be hurt.’ James clearly expected him to follow.

Sean had no reply to this, but he still didn’t want to go inside. He had a really bad feeling about the place, but out here he was growing colder and wetter by the minute. He had to get under cover, and if James was determined to go in, maybe it would be all right.

It seemed somehow colder inside than out, and darker too. The rain had penetrated the building, but not enough to flood it; the floor was covered with only a thin layer of water. They walked into the reception area and saw a large notice board with posters and leaflets pinned to it – Walks with Wildlife and Discover Algae with the Expert were displayed amongst others detailing more courses and activities. However, it was clear that nothing was going on right now: the place was deathly quiet.

Sean followed James along a corridor, then into a long room that looked like a laboratory. At first everything seemed normal, but as they moved through to the far end they saw smashed test tubes and other equipment littering the floor.

‘What happened here?’ Sean asked, taking care not to tread on any glass.

‘Don’t know,’ James said. ‘This is weird. I’ve never seen anything like this before. The caretaker usually keeps this place spotless, and everything was fine when I left last Wednesday.’ He went across to a whiteboard, which had recently been rubbed clean. In front of this was a desk covered with sheets of hastily scribbled notes and what looked like chemical formulas.

‘What’s all that?’ Sean came and stood beside his brother, peering down at the notes. The two words that seemed to crop up more than any others were ‘specimen’ and ‘host’ – though the handwriting was often illegible: perhaps the writer had been in a hurry.

‘Must be important if they were rushing to write it all down.’ Sean picked up one of the pages and tried to read the scrawled text.

‘It looks like Dr Morrow’s handwriting,’ James said.

‘Who?’

‘He’s one of the scientists here. I help him out with his research from time to time.’

‘What sort of research?’

‘Oh, just… stuff. You know. Lake stuff. This, though…’ he said, leafing through the papers. ‘This is strange…’

A word written in red capital letters on some lined paper caught Sean’s attention: dangerous. He pointed it out to James. They looked at each other in bemusement, then both felt a chill – as if they were no longer alone.

‘Did you hear something?’ James asked.

‘No, but I think…’

They turned round slowly and saw a figure in the doorway. A bearded middle-aged man was watching them; his white lab coat was smeared with what looked like blood, and in one hand he held an axe. His expression was blank. Sean watched his shoulders rise and fall as he breathed, and wondered if he was mentally ill. Then the man spoke.

‘James… Sorry, I thought you were…’ It was a whisper, a painful rasp. ‘Don’t go.’ The man seemed to come to life now. He slowly lowered the axe and leaned it against the door frame before coming forward as if hoping they wouldn’t notice it.

‘Dr Morrow?’ James had been working with the scientist for several months, but he looked very different now – tired and drawn.

‘What’s going on here?’ Sean asked.

Morrow approached them slowly. He seemed in no fit state to pose a threat, so they remained where they were. He looked briefly at the notes on the table, his eyebrows raised, then shook his head.

‘It’s gone.’

‘What has?’ James asked.

For a while there was no answer, then: ‘The specimen.’

‘Specimen?’ Sean asked.

‘Yes. It’s gone.’

‘No,’ James said. ‘How? What happened? Where’s everyone else?’

‘Everyone else?’ The man looked directly at him now, as though seeing him for the first time. ‘They’re dead. They’re here, but… they’re dead.’

James exchanged a worried look with his brother.

‘For some reason it went crazy.’

‘What is it?’ Sean asked.

‘It’s an organism I discovered lying dormant in a pool near the lake a few days ago. I couldn’t identify it – it appeared to be a type of sea slug, but after further study it became clear that it was a new form of life entirely. I dedicated all my time to examining it. Imagine my surprise when I found that it could enter the bodies of other animals and control them, even learn from them. But it seemed restless; it didn’t like being kept here. All it needed was some idiot to come along and set it free. And that’s exactly what happened. Holland became infected. I wondered if the specimen could take control of a human being, but I… I never wanted it to happen. Oh, God.’

‘Infected?’ James really didn’t like what he was hearing, and neither did his brother. Sean was remembering the incident by the bank of the swollen stream, and was beginning to wonder if it had been real after all.

‘The specimen got inside Holland’s body. It was able to make him do anything it wanted. I locked myself in my room when I saw what it was doing to him. He killed the others in a terrible rage, then stormed out. I waited until I was sure it was safe, then came out.’

‘He didn’t come after you?’ Sean asked.

‘No. Thank God.’

‘This all sounds so…’

‘Insane? Yes, it does, but that’s because this thing is something no one has had to deal with before. This is a new life-form, or at least one we haven’t identified yet.’

‘I think I saw this Holland guy,’ Sean said. ‘By the stream in the park. He looked terrible, like he was really ill—’

‘What? You’ve seen him?’

‘I think so.’

‘How did he get there? Unless… The river.’

‘What about it?’ James asked.

‘While that thing was inside him Holland kept screaming the word "home". Perhaps it made him go back to find the pool where it had come from. You… You didn’t approach him, did you?’

‘No. He mentioned the centre. I think he might have been trying to tell me where he came from. Then he slipped back into the water. Although before that he was violently sick, with blood and everything, and the… that thing fell out of his mouth.’

‘The specimen? Perhaps it left his body because he was no longer of any use… I can’t think of any other reason why it would leave its host.’

‘I saw it move. It was disgusting. How did it get inside him?’

‘The same way it got out, I presume,’ Morrow said. ‘Through his mouth.’

‘Oh God… Mr Phoenix, my teacher, said he might have a look by the stream to check out my story… What if—?’

‘We have to find your teacher and make sure he hasn’t been infected. Where will he be now?’

‘At school.’

‘The High School?’

‘Yes.’

Morrow and James exchanged concerned glances.

‘There are hundreds of kids there right now,’ James said, ‘and this rain is going to cut the whole town off soon. They’ll be trapped. If we go there we’ll be trapped too.’