Zombies! (Episode 4): The Sick and the Dead (2 page)

"Good morning," the first of the two men greeted them. He had a wicked bright smile that highlighted his round face. He wasn't nearly as good looking as he thought he was but his overinflated sense of self seemed to work for him. He was exceptionally well groomed, wearing a grey suit with just the barest hint of pinstripes. A dark dark dark red tie hung from his neck, outlining a pinkish shirt. It cried out,
real men wear pink
. He introduced himself as Louis Juarez, representing the public image of
Candid Pharmaceuticals
. The other man, much more stolid, wore a standard blue business suit with a matching tie. There was nothing exceptional about Joseph Solomon, attorney at law, beyond the rock solid stance he took against all things that did not coincide with the best interests of his client, the aforementioned
Candid Pharmaceuticals
.

Everyone shook hands.

Everyone smiled.

Everyone was a friend to everyone else.

And then it began. Mostly, the lawyers bandied back and forth. They spent the better part of forty five minutes discussing
Head Shot
and why, legally, they should or shouldn't be forced to implement a recall. The representative, Juarez, stayed mostly silent. It didn't take long for Luco to realize that his job was to observe the proceedings and spin everything properly so that
Candid
didn't come out looking like the bad guy in all of this. To his credit, Lochschenborg fought the good fight. He was loud when he needed to be and rational when the situation called for it. He offset Seaver's inexperience with his own knowledge and understanding of the
the game.
But after forty five minutes, Luco became impatient. She was caught between the need to get back to work and the need to make sure that
Head Shot
was pulled from the shelves. Another five minutes and she was sure that her side was losing this battle. Seaver's incompetence was so blatant it almost seemed intentional. And he kept looking over at her as if trying to see if she approved of him. She didn't. And she waited just long enough for him to say
There just doesn't seem to be any legal reason to force a recall
before interrupting.

"Excuse me," she said to them, but not in the polite way that asks for an allowance of the interruption. She said it in more the way people say excuse me to alert morons to the fact that they are, in fact, morons.

Four heads turned in her direction.

"Dr. Luco?" Lochschenborg addressed her. "Do you have something you'd like to add?"

From her purse, she pulled a small bottle of
Head Shot
and presented it to them. She looked at Juarez, rather than at the hired lawyer. "Your label says that your product is a defense against the zombie virus. Do you have any research to back that up?"

"Ma'am," said the laywer. "There's a disclaimer on the bottle indicating that no definitive research has been…."

"Have you done
any
research?"

"We're not at liberty to say."

Seaver shook his head. "Unfortunately, Dr. Luco…"

"You shut up," she said. "I don't think you people recognize the severity of this situation. Mr. Juarez, Mr. Solomon, your ignorance, and the ignorance of your company is astounding. Somebody like you, Mr. Juarez, deciding on a marketing ploy with absolutely no information is criminally irresponsible. There is no zombie virus. It's an infection. We treat it with antibiotics and even they have very little effect. Your medicine probably isn't even strong enough to treat the symptoms."

At least Juarez seemed affected by her remarks. Probably, his discomfort was due to the fact that he couldn't readily see his way clear to explaining how a pharmaceutical company could suggest an anti-viral for a bacterial infection. But the lawyer was one step ahead of him. "Unless I'm mistaken doctor, you haven't trademarked the zombie
plague
and therefore can't really speculate on what it is
Head Shot
is designed to treat."

This floated about the room for a moment. It passed through the minds of each individual present and was interpreted differently. Seaver was impressed with the legal loophole Solomon was suggesting. He learned something. Lochschenborg felt defeated by the constant barrage of litigious blather that prevented him from doing his job, which was protecting the public. Juarez was actually trying to reconcile the conflict between what was his job and what was clearly the right thing. Dr. Luco was stunned.

"Are you kidding?" she asked. "Are you trying to argue ownership of the disease? Listen to me, Solomon, you can fucking have it."

"Dr. Luco, please…"

"No, no. I mean you can have it. And when you're strapped to a table and moaning in pain because you know you're dying, I'll be sure to get you a double dose of
Head Shot
. And maybe a nice warm glass of milk to go with it."

He stopped talking after that but not because she'd managed to put him in his place. He was too controlled for that. Her comments had convinced him that she wasn't worth his time.

"I think this conference is concluded," Solomon said, rising. "Unless you wish to file a formal injunction,
Candid
will continue to distribute
Head Shot.
And just so there's no misunderstanding, any public attacks against
Head Shot
will be considered slanderous or libelous and we will press charges."

"I have an idea," Luco said and paused. They all turned to look in her direction, even Solomon who was more inclined to dismiss her. She waited just a few moments until she was sure that she had their attention. Then she offered, "How would you like to have a tour of the facility?"

"I think not."

"No, really." She addressed Solomon directly. "You and Mr. Juarez should come down into the complex and have a look and what the
doctors
are doing. You should also see what the patients look like so you can go back to your jobs with a clear conscience."

Solomon puffed out his chest and turned to leave. "That will not be necessary, Dr. Luco."

But Juarez hesitated. "Can we really do that?"

She looked at him and grinned. "Absolutely."

***

SHE
led them to the stairway that would take them down into the labs. The staircase was well lit but, for once, Luco wished for dim lighting. Just to set the mood. This ploy was a Hail Mary attempt at appealing to their consciences. Solomon was likely untouchable. The things he would see might rattle him, but once back in the comfort of his own life, his brick wall will be rebuilt at blinding speed. Juarez was something else entirely. A lasting impression left on him would mean something. It meant everything. She needed these people leave there with the impression of impending doom, the understanding that there is no comfort to which they can return. The lighting at the bottom of the stairs suited her purposes much better. As she led them through a second set of security doors, and the dimness enshrouded them, she could feel their apprehension grow.
Let it build
, she thought.
I'll start them off light and give them a finale they'll never forget
.

The underground complex was comprised of several main areas, including living and recreation space should circumstances warrant that staff be required to spend an extended period of time down there. Certainly, none of those areas were on the tour. No, the first place she took them was the morgue. Before the zombie plague, this complex had been used to study infectious disease, mostly different strains of the flu. The morgue, a large room with three rows of drawers, had been expanded to accommodate the number of dead. Previously, if there were four occupants in the morgue, it was considered a packed house. Not anymore.

On the outskirts of the morgue proper, they passed a thick steel door with a tiny window. Not by accident, Luco glanced through the window as she went by. The others, following her lead, also glanced in and were horrified by what they saw. This room, known by the staff as the
Butcher Shop
, had four medical tables, each with a body on it. Though the bodies were covered by drapes, the drapes were stained dark brown. The tables had runoff trenches for fluids that leaked during autopsies. Buckets lined one wall and though it was impossible to see what was in them, there was definitely
something
in them.

"What's that room?" asked Juarez, his façade replaced completely by an expression of anxious wonderment.

Luco stopped, feigned surprise at his question. "At one time it was an operating theatre. We used it for the occasional autopsy but it largely went unused."

"It looks well used now," Solomon said. He'd brought a handkerchief up to his nose as if to ward off the awful smell. But all they could really smell was disinfectant. Any odor would be contained behind the steel door.

"It is, Mr. Solomon.
Well
used. You see, we've been conducting research on the dead. The dead that
stay
dead."

"What kind of research?" Lochschenborgh asked with an edge to his voice.

"We need to determine the extent of the contagion. We take regular samples from the dead and test them for signs of living bacteria."

"Samples?" Juarez glanced back toward the
Butcher Shop
. Though they were well out of range of the window, he could see the interior in his mind's eye.

Like a mad scientist, Luco continued with a tour guide's affectation. She did not enjoy cutting pieces out of the dead but she felt it was important that she maintain the air of familiarity with what she considered to be a horrible place. "Without a functioning circulatory system, the bacteria tend to collect in different parts of the body. We have to take cuts of the flesh and the organs and even the bone to see if there are still active bacteria." When no one asked, she added, "There are. In our oldest specimen, which is a month old and was…
disabled
before it could turn into a zombie, there are still active and reproducing bacteria all over the body."

She turned away from them. Then, as an afterthought, she said, "Although we haven't tried giving the patients regular doses of
Head Shot
."

Without any further delay, she led them into the morgue. There were two doctors in there, a man and a woman, each nondescript in a white coat with a name badge. His hair was short and hers was pulled back into a pony tail. They glanced up as the troupe walked in, but gave them no further attention. The four armed guards didn't regard them at all.

"As you can see…" Luco began before being interrupted by Juarez.

"Why the guards?" He stammered out his question as if he wasn't quite sure that he should ask it. Poor, slick Louis Juarez was probably a crackerjack PR guy, but he was no match for this reality. He was, however, giving her every opportunity to give them information without having to volunteer it.

Luco smiled in spite of herself. "Like your product suggests, you can put down a zombie with severe head trauma. A bullet does the trick nicely. You see, the bacteria actually maintain a symbiotic relationship with the human. Once the organs fail and the undamaged brain dies, they can restart the motor functions and use the host to feed themselves."

Solomon harrumphed. "And the guards?"

She looked at him demurely. "Every once in a while, you think one's brain has been damaged enough to keep it dead only to learn that it hasn't. You need to be very careful opening these drawers. We learned that the hard way."

That sank in as they looked around the room, noticing the security features that wouldn't normally exist in a morgue. There were heavy doors at both ends of the room and lock down switches for
just
that area. Luco pointed out that each drawer was labeled with a name and date. The bodies were arranged in chronological order according to date of death so that they could keep track of the bacteria's age when they were finally moved into the
Butcher Shop
. When she was done with her oration, she asked them to gather around one of the drawers.

"You're not going to open that," Solomon insisted.

Luco gave him a hard look. "When you leave here, Mr. Solomon, you will have a very clear idea of what it is you're defending. I promise you that."

He swallowed but did not reply.

As she reached for the drawer, the men, especially Seaver, noticed that two of the guards readied their weapons. She pulled it open without hesitation and revealed a male anywhere from forty five to sixty years old. He was naked but covered with a sheet. Some of his hair had fallen out, literally
fallen
out. The exposed portions of his scalp were red and blistered. The remaining hair was almost entirely white but was, or had been, thick and soft. A black and white mustache, thick with dried gore, was plastered to his upper lip. Through his forehead, left of the nose, was a bullet hole. Another, almost dead center, looked a bit more recent.

"This is Mr. Radcliffe. His drug purchase went bad. Very bad. That hole just above his left eye was given to him by police at the scene. It was an execution shot and should have done the job but the bullet went in at an odd angle and ricocheted off of the eye socket. It damaged the brain enough to stun the zombie for almost twenty four hours. In that time, no less than twelve people had their hands on him. Saturday evening, Dr. Mwabi opened up this drawer to have a look. Despite a shattered pelvis and two broken hips, caused by a fallen shelving unit, and a bullet in the head, the bacteria managed to repair this zombie well enough that it sprang out of the drawer and bit Dr. Mwabi on the cheek. Dr. Mwabi died yesterday afternoon. You'll get to meet her in a little while."