Kenn Crawford - Dead Hunt

“I don’t understand,” Lucy said, looking from Robin back to Michael again.

“Lucy,” Michael rubbed her cheek gently. “You can’t die.”

“Well, I didn’t plan to, if that’s what you mean.”

“No, Lucy,” Michael told her softly. “You cannot die.”

She looked at him puzzled.

“Lucy, you are unable to die.” Michael explained, “I could stab you in the heart right now and it would not kill you. The virus won’t let you die. It needs you alive, so it will protect you. It needs you to spread the infection to others!”

“Stab me in the heart?” Lucy asked, more confused than ever.

“It will hurt,” Michael told her. “It will probably hurt like hell, but it will not kill you. You are the host, and the virus needs you to live.”

“Great,” Lucy said, barely audible as realization set in. “I got it. I’m the four horsemen rolled up into a perky cheerleader with a deadly kiss. But why am I here?”

“To be cured,” Robin answered. “Once you and Michael complete the transfer I will instruct Michael how to make the antidote. With it you can save yourself and humanity.”

“What if I don’t believe you?” Lucy told her. “What if I just say ‘Fuck it!’ and let them bomb me? Surely, I can’t live through that?”

“They are not bombing you, Lucy,” Robin informed her. “They are bombing the island. If the bomb does not land almost directly on top of you, you will most likely survive. You will be badly burned with radiation. You will feel extreme pain, but you will live. The bombs are ineffective against the virus. It is water-based, and it can travel through fresh water at lightening speeds. Every time it rains it spreads that much faster. By now this entire island is infected. The only thing keeping the virus from spreading to the mainland is the salt water that surrounds it. But, once they made the announcement when the island was going to be bombed, thousands of people fled the island. If one infected person gets off the island, the entire continent will be lost because there will be nothing to stop the spread.”

“Wait,” Michael asked, “what announcement?”

Robin played an audio recording.

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is Clay Buffer for ATN News with this important Emergency Broadcast. We will be going off the air immediately following this broadcast. The M Virus has grown to epidemic proportions. The Prime Minister has ordered the complete sterilization of Cape Breton Island. I repeat, The Prime Minister has ordered the complete sterilization of Cape Breton Island. The US National Guard and the Canadian Armed Forces are posted at the Causeway to assist in the evacuation. The Prime Minister has authorized the use of nuclear force to kill the M Virus. Get to the causeway if you can! May God have mercy on us all.”

“My primary concern,” Robin told them, “is that my father’s work is completed.”

“What do you want us to do?” Michael asked as Lucy curled into his arms.

Robin looked from Lucy to Michael and said simply, “To give me life.”

They didn’t have much time. Robin told them the bombing was to commence at 2300 hours. The military was waiting for the winds to shift so the fallout would blow east and dissipate harmlessly over the Atlantic Ocean. It was noon, so that gave them eleven hours to do what Robin wanted and get their collective asses to the Causeway.

Robin’s plan, in theory, was relatively simple, due mostly in part because her dear father, the late Professor Heslin, had already planted the necessary seeds. The cryo-preservation canister had its own computer that was already programmed to ‘wake’ the real Robin when he activated it, and it was programmed to download all the data in the storage drives to a tiny chip that he implanted in the real Robin’s brain. Heslin wanted all the conversations he and Robin had to be implanted into the real Robin’s brain as memories.

In theory it made sense; in reality, Heslin was a twisted fuck. The death of his daughter had warped his brilliant mind. Years of talking to a computer as if it was his daughter hadn’t helped Heslin much in the reality department. Dump data onto a chip in a living brain, actually, a dead brain that he planned to reanimate with a formula that was turning people into cannibalistic zombies? Not exactly Daddy of the Year Material, but it did raise a lot of questions as to how far a parent would go for their child. And how far was too far?

While they prepared everything, Lucy learned that most of the information Robin gave them was from Lucy’s own blood. Lucy realized that Robin didn’t actually know if she was infected until after she got the blood and tested it. When Michael questioned Robin about infecting someone with a kiss, Robin simply scanned her databanks, learned what a kiss was, why people kissed, associated that kiss with love and, because of her limited understanding of her father’s love for her, Robin put the necessary pieces into place and promptly lied to Michael for her own benefit.

“Remember the cellar,” Michael warned her in the video.

In the cellar Robin had lied. It wasn’t until after Robin got Lucy’s blood that Michael realized she lied to him. He didn’t know if Lucy was infected. He didn’t know if the formula she instructed him to make would slow down the turning process, as she said,or if Robin infected him with the same strain of virus to turn him into a host too. Lucy knew Robin may have been originally created with artificial intelligence, but the depth of her sneakiness knew no boundaries. Lucy also knew the lengths Michael would go to, and the risks he would take for her knew no boundaries either.

The both knew they had no choice but to trust a computer that could not be trusted.

“It’s ok, Luce, we’re going to be ok,” Michael reassured her, snapping her back to reality.

She looked into his eyes. “I don’t have your strength Michael. I’m…I’m scared.”

Without saying a word, Michael leaned down and gently pressed his lips to hers. She bathed in the beauty of that sweet and gentle kiss. When their lips parted, he smiled a gentle, loving smile.

“I am sorry I had to bring you back to this place,” he said with softened words. “But I didn’t know what else to do.”

“It’s ok, Michael,” she reassured him. “I would rather die here in the arms of someone who loves me, than…” Lucy didn’t finish her sentence. Michael did that finger to the lips thing again.

“You are not going to die,” he promised her. “I won’t let it happen.”

She believed him.

Lucy enjoyed the reassuring strength of his arms for a while longer, then motioned that it was time to get back to work. Heslin may have put all the pieces in place, but they had to manually load the terabytes of father-daughter data streams from backup drives and load it into the cryo-computer. Robin helped in that process, but the physical moving of storage drives was something she could not to. As sophisticated as she was, she still needed humans to do physical tasks.

Lucy learned that, to Robin, she was little more than bait. Michael possessed the knowledge of computers and science to help Robin, but Robin had to make sure Michael would help her. Lucy was Robin’s insurance policy that he would help.

Lucy watched Michael working tirelessly in the cramped basement, crawling under service panels in the lab, then back down to the basement and every other task Robin set him to do. Lucy couldn’t help but admire his determination. He never complained; he never faltered. Robin told him what to do, and he did it. And he did it all for Lucy. Lucy felt a funny sensation twirling in her stomach that she never felt before, and, as she watched Michael crawl under yet another service panel, it didn’t take her long to figure out what that sensation was. Lucy walked over to Michael and pulled him out from under the service panel.