Scott Sigler - Infected

Dew started to shout a warning, but it was already too late.

Mal threw his coat on Brewbaker, trying to smother the flames. The hatchet shot forward again-burying itself deep in Mal’s stomach. Even over the Sinatra, Dew heard a muffled chlunk and knew, instantly, that the hatchet blade had chipped the inside of Mal’s spine.

Dew took two steps into the flaming bathroom.

Brewbaker looked up, eyes even wider, smile even wider. He started to say something, but didn’t get the chance.

Dew Phillips fired three. 45 rounds from a distance of two feet. The bullets punched into Brewbaker’s chest, sliding him backward on the blood-and gas-slick floor. His back slammed into the toilet, but he was already dead.

“Converge, converge! All units move in, man down, man down!”

Dew holstered his weapon, knelt, and threw Mal over his shoulder. He stood with strength he didn’t know he still possessed. Brewbaker burned, but the flames hadn’t spread to his right arm. Dew grabbed Brewbaker’s right hand, then stumbled down the flaming hall, carrying one man and dragging another.

Dew staggered out of the burning house. Winter air cooled his red face, while inferno heat singed his back through his suit.

“Hold on, Mal,” he said to the bleeding man on his right shoulder.

“Hold on, ace, help’s on the way.”

Dew slipped on the unshoveled sidewalk and almost pitched into the snow-covered lawn, but he recovered his balance and made it to the curb. He crossed the street, stumbling like a drunk, then slid Brewbaker’s body into a shallow snowbank, where it hissed briefly like a match dropped into a stale drink. Dew knelt on one knee and eased Malcolm onto the ground.

Mal’s once-white shirt was a sheet of red around his stomach. The hatchet had gone in deep, deep enough to cut through intestines. Dew had seen wounds like that before, and he didn’t have much hope.

“Hang on, Mal,” Dew whispered. “You just remember Shamika and Jerome, and you hang on. You can’t leave your family alone.” He held Malcolm’s hand, which felt hot and wet and was covered with puffy burn blisters. The screech of tires split the air as several nondescript gray Chevy work vans slid to a stop. The van doors opened; a dozen men dressed in bulky chemical-weapons gear leaped onto the slush-wet pavement. They brandished compact FN-P90 submachine guns and moved with practiced precision, rushing to set up a perimeter around Dew and Malcolm, around the burning house. Some of the men rushed to Malcolm’s side.

“See, buddy?” Dew said. His mouth was inches from Malcolm’s ear.

“See? The cavalry is here, you’ll be at the hospital before you know it. You just hang on, brother.”

Malcolm let out a groan. His voice sounded whispery, like windblown paper scraping against dirty concrete.

“That…asshole…dead?” Malcolm’s lips, or what was left of them, barely moved when he spoke.

“Fuckin’-A right he is,” Dew said. “Three in the ticker, point-blank.”

Malcolm coughed once, sending a wad of thick, dark blood shooting out onto the snow. The men in chemical-warfare suits hurried him to one of the waiting vans.

Dew watched as the soldiers loaded Brewbaker’s smoldering corpse into another van. The remaining soldiers moved Dew to the last van, half helping him, half pushing him. He got in, heard the door shut, then heard a small hiss as the sealed van became negatively pressurized. Any surprise leaks would let air in, not out, in case Dew was contaminated with the unknown spore. He wondered if they’d have him in the airlock again, watching him for days on end, waiting to see if he showed the few known symptoms or-even better, kiddies-developed new ones. He didn’t care, as long as they could help Malcolm. If Malcolm died, Dew didn’t think he could forgive himself.

Less than twenty seconds after the vans had screeched to a halt, they tore down the street, leaving the burning house behind.

After a journey of unknown distance, unknown time, the next batch of seeds dropped from the atmosphere like microscopic snow, scattering wildly at the tiniest breath of wind. Wave after wave washed through the air. The most recent waves had been close to success, the closest yet, but still hadn’t caused the critical mass needed to accomplish the task. Changes were made, new seeds released. It was only a matter of time until things were right.

Most of the seeds survived the feathery fall, but the real test was yet to come. Billions died at the touch of water or the kiss of cold temperatures. Others survived the landing, but found conditions unsuitable for growth. A scant few landed in the right place, but wind, or the brush of a hand, or perhaps even fate, swept them away.

A minuscule percentage, however, found conditions perfect for germination.

Smaller than specks of dust, the seeds tentatively held their place. Rigid microfilaments ending in Velcro-like hooks helped each seed stay fast to the surface. With the fortuitous landing began a race against time. The seeds faced a nigh-impossible task of attaining self-sufficiency, a battle for survival that started with a minuscule arachnid.

A simple mite.

Demodex folliculorum, to be precise. While microscopic, a Demodex is larger than the dead skin upon which it feasts. So much larger, in fact, that it can ingest a tiny flake in a single bite. The mites hide in hair follicles, mostly, but sometimes at night they slide out and crawl around on the hosts’ skin. They are not some parasite found only in dirty Third World countries where hygiene is a luxury, but on every human body in the world.

Including the host.

The host’s mites lived their entire, brief, skin-gobbling lives without ever leaving his body. In their incessant feeding frenzy, some of the mites came across the seeds-which looked suspiciously similar to flakes of human skin. The mites gobbled up the minute seeds; just another mouthful in an endless and bountiful banquet of dead flesh.

The mite’s digestive system hammered at the seed’s outer coat. Protein-digesting enzymes, called proteases, ate away at the membrane, breaking it down, weakening it. The membrane ruptured in several places but did not dissolve completely. Still intact, the seed passed through the mite’s digestive tract.

And that’s where it all began, really-in a microscopic pile of bug shit.

The temperature hovered around seventy degrees much of the time and often reached eighty degrees or more with suitable cover. The seed needed such temperatures. It also needed certain measures of salinity and humidity, which the host’s skin unwittingly provided. These conditions triggered receptor cells, turning the seeds “on,” so to speak, and preparing it for growth. But there were other conditions that had to be right before germination could occur.

Oxygen was the main ingredient in this recipe for growth. During its long fall, the airtight seed coat prevented any gases from reaching the contents contained within, contents that-were it biological-might have been called an embryo. The Demodex mite’s digestive system, however, ravaged the seed’s protective outer shell, allowing oxygen to penetrate.

Unthinking, automated receptor cells measured the conditions, reacting in an exquisitely intricate biochemical dance that read like a preflight checklist;

Oxygen? Check. Correct salinity? Check. Appropriate humidity? Check. Suitable temperature? Check.

Billions of microscopic seeds made the long journey. Millions survived the initial fall, and thousands lasted long enough to reach a suitable environment. Hundreds landed on this particular host. Only a few dozen reached bare skin, and some of those expired before ending up in bug feces. In all, only nine germinated.