The Fall: Victim Zero

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Book: Read The Fall: Victim Zero for Free Online
Authors: Joshua Guess
black SUV screeched to a halt in front of the house. Sandy took the suitcase and diaper bag, loading them into the shiny truck as the other agent pulled the car seat from Kell's sedan. In less than a minute they were off, Kell's heart hammering against his ribcage but somehow less stressed than he had been in days. The worst might be here, but his family was with him where he knew they were safe.
    “What's the situation?” Kell asked. “Anyone know the details?”
    The driver looked at them in the rear view, his eyes flat and empty. “I've been instructed to have you call Agent Jones at your earliest opportunity,” the man said before settling his gaze on Karen. “I'm ordered to tell you, Mrs. McDonald, that from this moment on anything you hear or see is to be considered classified information. Revealing that information will result in harsh punishment, is that understood?”
    Karen's face tightened in anger, but she nodded.
    Jones answered immediately, and didn't wait for pleasantries.
    “McDonald, good. Your patient died.”
    It took a few seconds for that information to process. His patient? “What, do you mean David ?” Kell said. “What happened to him?”
    “ He committed suicide about an hour ago,” Jones replied. “He left a note, not that it matters. The point is, he didn't die from Chimera. He took his own life.”
    “ Then why is this a priority whatever?” Kell asked. “If Chimera didn't do it, why are we on our way to the lab?”
    “ Because,” Jones said. “He didn't stay dead.”
     

Part Two : Precipice
    We climbed, he going first and I behind,
    Until through some small aperture I saw
    The lovely things the skies above us bear.
    Now we came out and once more saw the stars.
       Dante's Inferno, from the thirty-fourth Canto

Chapter Five
    Karen and Jennifer safely tucked away in his office, Kell went to visit David Markwell.
    What used to be David Markwell, anyway.
    The stench hit him before he even made it into the room. Bodily waste. David had done what all people do when they pass on, but the thing that had risen in his place seemed to have no sense of its actions. The plexiglass was smeared with feces and urine.
    Kell watched the thing try to reach him; screeching and thrashing against the barrier, it seemed to feel no pain. Its face was nearly black—David had hung himself with the bed sheet still dangling from his neck—and his eyes were glazed. The shy intelligence behind them was gone. Whatever Kell was looking at, David was no part of it.
    Kell was staring the the gaping red gashes on the walking corpse's fingers and hands when Jones walked in the room.
    “What do you think, Doctor?” the agent said.
    I want to vomit, that's what I think. I want to weep for this poor kid.
    “It doesn't feel any pain,” Kell said instead, pointing at the gashes. “It's been shredding itself against the holes in that plexiglass for ten minutes now, but hasn't so much as blinked. Coordination is reasonably good, though the subject seems to focus solely on aggression. I won't stick my hand in there to prove it, but I'd guess it's hungry.”
    Jones recoiled, the first honest reaction Kell had seen from the man. “You mean it wants to eat us?”
    “Yeah, that would be my guess. Brain activity seems to be rooted in the lower functions. Aggression and hunger are linked. I could be wrong, of course. Feel free to test my theory.”
    Jones scowled. “I wasn't asking for your thoughts on Mr. Markwell, at any rate. I want to know if you think you can stop this.”
    Kell gaped. “Seriously? What do you think I've been trying to do since you dropped this whole thing on me? I've gone over it from every angle, Jones. This,” he said, waving a hand toward the wretched thing that had been David Markwell, “is something I can't even explain, much less fix. For the love of God, man, we have to tell people. He's not going to be the only one.”
    Jones simmered. There was a war on his face between forced

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