Transient - Complete Book One (Episodes 1 - 4) (Transient Serial) Page 23

  Drew added,“So they can take credit for our survival.”

  “If we’re alive on February 14,”Rae said,“they’ll let us go then, to prove they can cure death.”

  “But they need our help,”Drew said.“To sell the next step. A cure. We’ll be the proof positive. The transients who were supposed to die but instead were saved. And became true believers. Like the Roman Saul becoming the Apostle Paul. A startling conversion and a great story to help sell the new product.”

  “Which isn’t a product at all,”said Benny.“Junk science. Placebo effect. Voodoo. Whatever it is, they’ll have the world convinced.”

  “But what if it’s really true?”Danielle said meekly.“What if they really have come up with a cure?”

  Before Rae could answer, the door opened, and two new visitors stepped in.

  Chapter 25

  “The deal is pretty straight-forward,”Logan said, as Jenny handed out copies of a document.“You agree to undergo experimental treatment here at OBK. The treatment will be recorded and publicized. If it’s successful, and you live past your current expiration date, you agree to work with OBK in their outreach efforts. You will earn a six figure salary per year, plus travel expenses, plus the opportunity for travel outside the United States if required.”

  “We went to Paris this year,”Jenny gushed.

  “And Rome,”

  “Oh yes. Rome was amazing. Rae, you would love it there. The Italian boys were so dreamy, my god.”Jenny giggled as if they were still a pair of schoolgirls in class together.

  “Take your time to look things over,”Logan said.“I know you must be hungry.”

  The door opened again and three caterers stepped into the meeting room, handing out plates of appetizers. There were vegetables and finger sandwiches, pastries and meats. There was even wine and beer.

  A little early to be celebrating.“No thanks, I’m not hungry,”Rae said.

  Drew waved his plate away, but the other three devoured as much as they could.

  “No this is what I call a meal,”Halldor exclaimed.

  Rae ignored the munching noises and concentrated on reading the fine print of the agreement. The more she read, the more her heart fell.

  They’re trying to buy us off

  “I’d like to review this with my lawyer,”Drew said.

  “No lawyers. It’s really a very straightforward agreement.”

  “Then I’d like to talk to my accountant.”

  Logan stared daggers at Drew then chased it with a smile. I’m afraid that’s not possible.”

  “There are a few deal points here that I think we should negotiate.”

  “No negotiations.”Logan was beginning to lose his charm.

  “So what you’re telling us,”Drew summed up,“is that this is a take it or leave it deal. We can’t consult our lawyers, our accountants, or our next of kin. We can’t leave this building, and we can’t -”

  Jenny said,“That’s kind of a harsh way of putting it.”

  “It’s a harsh deal, no matter how you like to phrase it.”

  Logan sighed.“The five of you are going to die soon. OBK is offering you a second chance at life. At a good life. A prosperous life. The kind of wonderful, amazing life Jenny and I have been living since we met them. A life anyone would envy. Especially someone in your position.”

  “My position,”Drew stared at him,“is that I have a pen in my hand and a gun to my head.”

  “No need to be so melodramatic.”

  “But he’s right Logan,”Rae whispered.“This is life or death.”

  At the sound in her voice, Logan’s face changed a little.“You don’t have to sign it right now. You can take the agreement back to your room and talk it over.”

  Drew stood.“Then take us back to our room, and we’ll talk it over.”

  He went for the door and opened it. There were guards waiting on the other side. The others followed Drew out.

  Rae felt a tug at her arm. It was Logan.

  “Wait,”he said.

  She paused at the door, and turned to face him. She saw the concern in his eyes.

  He still has feelings for me.

  But he was no longer her friend.

  He had betrayed her. If anyone could have championed her in public, it was Logan. If anyone could have supported her on the steps of the OBK HQ…anyone could have supported her when she most needed it, it was Logan.

  And you betrayed me.

  “Just think it over Rae,”he repeated.“That’s all I’m asking. You don’t even have to represent the company. Just go on television and make a statement.”

  “Saying what?”

  “That you were wrong about the cryptograph. That OBK is here to help people, to save lives. Show the world that you stand with us and all your troubles will be over.”

  Rae shook her head.“Goodbye, Logan.”

  Back in their room, only Danielle argued for signing.“I don’t want to die.”

  “If we give in to OBK, our lives mean nothing,”Halldor said.“I don’t want to die, either. But I want my life to stand for something.”

  “I want to live too,”said Benny.“But I don’t want to live a lie.”

  “Oh god….”Danielle was sweating profusely, and breathing hard. She seemed about to faint.

  Rae reached out to steady her.“Danielle?”

  She ran into the bathroom, and slammed the door behind her. Rae heard the toilet seat go up, and the sounds of Danielle retching. She stayed in the bathroom for about half an hour. By the time she emerged, pale and sweaty, Halldor and Benny were both looking weak too. Halldor sat on the floor beside the toilet, waiting for the feeling to pass. Benny insisted he was fine, and stayed in his bunk.

  Food poisoning,Rae realised. She glanced at Drew who’d figured it out to. Neither of them had eaten the food.

  The message was clear: take the agreement because you don’t get to take your chances.

  Chapter 27

  Rae pounded on the door.“Help! Guards! Doctor! Somebody!”

  Her hand hurt, and she’d almost cried herself out. She felt weak from calling out and wondered why no one answered. Drew had already tried breaking the window, but the glass didn’t shatter. It warped and warbled under the constant blows of the chair, but the glass was bulletproof and chair-proof, and proof against his rage.

  Danielle had slipped into a coma some time in the night.

  When Rae rose at sunrise, she found Danielle’s laying cold and clammy in the bunk.

  Oh God…is she dead?

  Though then Rae thought she detected breathing, but it was so faint that she might be imagining it.

  Both Halldor and Benny were deathly ill, and fading fast. Now and again one of them would moan under the covers or mumble something unintelligible, but mostly they were silent now. They lay motionless under their covers, slipping towards eternity.

  The boys needed a doctor, but all Rae could offer were prayers. She had never been religious, but the pall of death brought to her mind ideas of God and his angels, the devil and his demons. But she felt powerless to stop their corporate captors, and even more powerless to stop those two brave boys from departing their lives.

  She throat was raw. She could no longer force the words. Yet they echoed inside her.

  Help! Doctor! Somebody!

  When Rae and Drew were both too tired to move, too weak to call out, they sat at opposite ends of the room, she at the door and he at the window and stared at each other.

  “They’re killing us,”he whispered, his voice guttural and wracked with grief.

  I think Danielle is gone. Halldor and Benny won’t survive the night. How much longer do Drew and I have?

  “They didn’t bring breakfast or lunch,”Rae observed, not for the first time.“They’re just waiting for us to die.”

  “We rejected their offer,”Drew said.“We’re no use to them now.”

  Rae felt an overwhelming sense of despair.“What if we were wrong, Drew?”


  “What do you mean?”

  “About the cryptograph. What if it works like they say? What if it’s not the test that’s wrong, but us?”

  “Rae, if Danielle’s dead she just disproved the test. Her expiry date is still months away.”

  “But no one knows that.”

  “We know it,”Drew said struggling to his feet.“And so help me God, the world will know it, too.”

  He went in to the bathroom and Rae heard him peel back the linoleum floor and remove some wood planks. There was a momentary pause, and then she heard the sounds of him moving around inside the hole in the bathroom floor. Then he reversed the sequence, replacing the wood and then the linoleum. He came out of the bathroom carrying a small medicine bottle. It was a glass bottle, and Rae could see a small amount of powder inside.

  “What’s that?”she asked.

  “Tetradotoxin,”he said.“I stole it from the lab.”

  “When?”

  “A while back, when I was getting tested.”

  “Can it help Halldor and Benny? They’re dying, Drew If you have medicine to help them—”

  “It can’t help them,”he said dejectedly.“It’s not medicine, it’s a poison. It might even be what’s killing them now, though I doubt it. The symptoms don’t seem to match.”

  “Why do you have it, then?”

  “It’s for us.”

  “Poison?”

  “Tetradoxotin is a neurotoxin. Made by the puffer fish. The Japanese eat puffer fish. They call it‘fugu.’A rich delicacy, but it was the only food the Emperor of Japan was forbidden to eat, because for many men it was their last meal.”

  “What does it do?”

  “Paralyzes, then kills you.”

  “Lovely.”

  “But it’s not always lethal. In small doses, it’s survivable. In Haiti they use a tetradotoxin powder to simulate death. The patient is temporarily paralyzed, and to all intents and purposes they appear dead, but under proper supervision by a Haitian witch doctor, the patient comes back to life. Those who survive the ordeal are called‘zombies.’That’s where the word comes from.”

  Rae stared at the tiny glass bottle.“Are you suggesting we take that?”

  “Yes.”

  “And become zombies?”

  “Sort of,”he said.“OBK is waiting for us to die. They expect us to die. We didn’t eat the food, but they may not know that. Tomorrow, they’ll send the guards back in here, and discover us all dead. Only, two of us won’t be.”

  “If it works.”

  He nodded.“If it works.”

  “So what’s your plan?”

  “Not much of a plan I guess,”he admitted.“The idea is to fake our deaths, let them remove us to the lab or the mortuary or wherever. Then we wake up, and escape.”

  “What if they cremate us?”

  “That would be bad.”

  “Or start performing an autopsy?”

  “That would be even worse.”

  “Do you have a better plan?”she asked.

  “No. Do you?”

  “No.”

  “It’s not too late to change your mind, Rae. About OBK I mean. It’s a sweet deal. Lots of money, flying around the world, spreading the gospel of cryptograph ...”

  “Living the lie, you mean.”

  “It’s an option. Sign the papers. Swear allegiance. At least you’d still live.”

  “We’ve come too far for that,”she said, deciding.“What do we have to do?”

  He held up the glass bottle for her to see.“It’s a powder. You could put some on your tongue, but that might be too much too fast. Most people who ingest it like that die.”

  “What’s the alternative?”

  “Put some on your finger. Let the poison absorb through the skin. That way, it will enter the bloodstream slower.”

  “Okay,”she said.“Let’s do it.”

  “I’ll go first. But we’ll have to hide the evidence. Follow me.”

  He went back to the bathroom and Rae followed.

  Drew peeled back the linoleum and loosened a wood plank, creating a small gap in the floor. He placed his thumb over the open top of the glass bottle, and turned the bottle over, letting the powder touch the skin.

  Then he handed the bottle to her.“Quickly now.”

  Rae put her thumb over the opening, and turned the bottle upside down, then back again. She handed him the bottle.“Here.”

  Drew screwed the cap back on. He seemed to having trouble with his fingers. He tossed the bottle through the hole in the floor, then replaced the wood and the linoleum.

  Rae stared at her right thumb. She studied the residue of white powder. Almost immediately, her thumb began to tingle, and then numb.

  “Feel anything?”he asked.

  “Starting to.”

  He embraced her quickly and she clung to him, even as all feeling began to slip away from her.

  “Get into bed, before it takes full effect.”

  The numbness spread over. As she walked back to her bunk-bed, her right arm went numb, and then the entire right side of her body.

  Rae collapsed onto the mattress, no longer able to control her right side.

  With her left hand she tried to wrap the blanket over her, but she was almost fully immobile now. She stared up at the bottom of Drew’s mattress directly above her. Her eyes remained open. She worried about them drying out, so she tried to close her eyelids, but it took all of her concentration. The muscles under her eyelids were the last under her control.

  Darkness fell slowly across her field of vision.

  She heard Drew trying to climb up to the top bunk. He was struggling on the ladder. Above her, the mattress trembled.

  She heard a loud thump on the floor.

  He fell.

  She wanted to open her eyes again, wanted to turn her head and see him, try and help him get back up. But she couldn’t move now, and she couldn’t cry out. She was still fully awake, fully conscious and aware of the room around her. But her breathing had stopped, and all her muscles had stopped working. She wanted to hold Drew’s hand again, and tell him it would be okay, that they were going to be together soon but she couldn’t move or speak or breathe.

  All Rae could do was think, and even her thoughts were dying now.

  Chapter 27

  Her first breath seared her lungs like fire, and shocked her awake. She felt the weight of fabric around her. The stale air smelled of vinyl.

  Rae tried to move her arms. Her limbs were sluggish. She twitched her fingers then moved her right hand in circles at the wrist. Raising her right forearm she brought her hand to her stomach. Under her hand, the flesh of her stomach felt cold.

  I’m naked, she realised, but then felt a cotton hem just below her breast. My shirt.

  She lifted her right hand up, pushing against the vinyl. The bag was loose around her, but there wasn’t much air inside and she needed to breathe again.

  A body bag.

  The metal zipper scraped against her knuckles. She followed the metal line up toward her face, and found the end of it near the top of her head. There was a small hole where the zipper ended. She worked her index finger up through the hole, then tried to widen it. Slowly she unzipped the bag, letting the light and air inside.

  Her left hand was coming alive now, and she used both hands to unzip the bag to the level of her waist.

  Rae tried to open her eyes, but the lids seemed to be cemented together. She raised her hands to rub the area. The lids opened and she blinked against the cold air the dim light, which seemed brighter than it probably was.

  For a long time she lay on her back, with the body bag open around her. She gazed up at the ceiling and recovered her breath. It was white, with soft paneled tiles. It looked like the ceiling of an office or hospital or lab. Florescent lights hung down from the ceiling, but the lights were off. It felt like night time, but she could not be sure.

  She spent a while testing her body. She wiggled her toes and moved her feet in
wide circles at the bottom end of the bag. She still had her shoes on and appeared to be wearing the clothes she wore she when she’d taken the poison. She bent her legs slightly at the knee, and relaxed them again. Her muscles were sore and her joints were stiff. She lolled her head to the right, but all she could see was the side of the bag. She lolled her head left, and the view was obstructed just the same.

  After a long while, Rae raised her upper body up and propped herself back on her elbows.

  The room seemed to be part of a hospital or a clinic. It was a large, long room, built for storage. The long walls on either side of were lined with cabinet doors, but the cabinets themselves seemed to be sunk into the wall. She was lying on top of a low table. There were other tables in the middle of the room, at least a dozen of them. Each table had a body bag on top, and each bag appeared to conceal a body.

  This is a morgue.

  She felt pretty sure that she still was in the same building as before and Rae doubted that the OBK doctors would allow their dead outside the building for coroners and other lab staff to examine. OBK was first and foremost a research institute, and corpses were no doubt fertile grounds for that.

  Drew, she remembered. I have to find him.

  It took all of her effort to sit up straight. She felt slightly nauseous. She let the feeling pass, then swung her legs out of the bag and over the end of the table. Then she put her feet on the ground and stood up, still holding the table for support.

  Rae walked to the nearest table, and unzipped the body bag on top. Inside was a girl she didn’t recognize, a redhead with freckles. Her face was pale, her skin lifeless.

  Who are you?

  She zipped the bag back up, and moved on to the next, and then the next. Each bag contained a young man or woman about Rae’s age.

  What are they all doing here?

  When she finished checking all the body bags on the tables, she moved to the cabinets along the walls, working systematically. She opened each drawer and pulled it out. Inside was a tray with another body bag and corpse. She unzipped each body bag, checked each face, and moved to the next one.

  No, no, no, no…