A geiser of red spurted up and spattered the ground. The doctor convulsed and gurgled, blood bubbling from his mouth to trickle down his cheeks. His eyes glazed and body stopped moving.
Silence drenched the room.
The horrific stillness froze my lungs. I glanced at Rekkan, seeking his warmth. His eyes fixed on the doctor.
Several tiny black hairs poked out from the ear the doctor had been clawing. No, not hairs. Legs. Shiny red eyes followed, and then erratically twitching wings. A housefly.
I remembered the buzzing behind Door B — a buzzing that had now overtaken the lab. You won't add me to your army. Your flies can't control...
I breathed the words at the same second they passed through my mind: "The new Implant is in the flies."
The fly's wings flitted together, a weak false start, and its front legs shimmied. Another flutter of wings, strong enough to generate a buzz.
Rekkan stomped on it.
When his boot lifted, the motionless insect plopped down on the bloody tile, an innocent speck of black. Ignoring Rekkan's growl, I crouched in front of the fly and plucked it off the ground. I tilted my head to examine. It didn't look like a mind-controlling Implant. It just looked like a smashed little body.
Harmless as a fly.
I pushed to my feet and scanned the room. A host of toiletries spotted the tables, a haunting contrast from the carnage. Deodorant, make-up, hand lotion, eye contacts, shaving razor...
I glanced at Rekkan. "Do you think Doctor Vizan was living in this —"
He snatched my arm and yanked me back, eyes fixed on the corpse. An eyelid twitched, and another fly wriggled free.
Several more flies wormed out of the doctor's ears and nose.
Rekkan spun me around and shoved me toward the door. "Go!"
I stumbled through the doorway with Rekkan right behind. He slammed the door shut behind us, chest heaving and face pale.
Fuck, I had never seen him so scared. He was a soldier and a recluse. Calm, collected, confident. He always knew what to do.
His fear terrified me.
In a feeble attempt to ease the tension caging him, dark humor tumbled from my numb lips. "Well, I guess we can't blame Mekkar anymore for being so afraid of..."
I swallowed the last word.
What if Mekkar feared flies because he knew they carried Implants? Because he had created them?
Rekkan's shoulders straightened and jaw set. A return to soldier-mode, perhaps, but a grim one. A soldier who didn't like his odds. "We need to get everyone to a central area before the Implanted attack."
I drew a shaky breath. "Yeah. The cafeteria?"
He nodded. "You warn the Southies, and I'll run back to the Northerner corridor. Anyone who has weapons needs to bring them. And... maybe fly swatters."
I scrubbed a hand over my face. "But we still don't know who the Head Chef is. What if he comes too?"
"Let's hope he does. If he's with us, we can watch him."
"And if he tries something?"
"Then I kill him." At my raised eyebrows, he said, "What? You think I can't handle Uzmed?"
"I'm... less worried about Uzmed."
"Hey." His fingers skimmed my cheek. "You know who my top priority is. If anyone is a threat to you, I won't think twice. Relative or not."
I swallowed to wet my dry throat. "Yeah, same. If anyone threatens you, I'll kill them."
His lips twitched. "Oh, is that right?"
"What? You think I can't —"
His lips crashed into mine.
He kissed with a hunger I wasn't accustomed to, at once devouring and savoring. He threaded one hand through my hair and pressed the other against the small of my back, drawing me into his solid warmth. When his rough fingers slipped under my shirt and grazed my bare back, a whimper escaped my lips, and my body melted into his.
He withdrew, dark eyes fixed on me and jaw clenched with the effort of restraint. His desperation lit my core and tingled over my skin, but it also sparked a flutter of unease.
The kiss felt like a goodbye.
"We'll see each other in just a few minutes," I said. The tremble in my voice turned the statement into a question.
"I love you," he replied.
My brow furrowed. "I love you too, Rekkan. But —"
"Go." His low growl left no room for refusal — more army commander than lover. "Warn as many people as you can, but if you see an Implanted, run. And if any Southies don't listen to you, you leave them behind. Get yourself to the cafeteria fast. Understood?"
He waited for my nod. Then he pivoted and jogged back toward the Northerner corridor.
I darted in the opposite direction. As I careened right down the Southie corridor, sweat trickled down my back, and my breathless voice rasped.
"The patients are Implanted! Grab your weapons and fly swatters, and run to the cafeteria!"
Faces flashed past me as I ran, staring in frozen bafflement. Strangers I now knew. Razalu. A woman who worked in the kitchen. Kazap and his uncle. Zhina.
Wait, fuck. Zhina?
I reared to a halt, heart thundering. Purple spots freckled her bald head and pudgy arms, but she didn't look like an Overcooked. She looked as puzzled and frightened as everyone else.
"Zhina? How did you escape the infirmary? Are you...?"
Are you you?
Her eyelashes twitched, and the corners of her mouth tugged upward as though pierced by fish hooks. "Sweet Zafaru, Zhina is not here right now."
I clamped down on a whimper. Now was the time to demonstrate how much I had grown — my fearlessness, my determination, my self-defense skills. Now was the time to summon that powerful voice inside.
Shit, I'm fucked. Shit, I'm fucked. Shit, I'm —
Really, Zafaru? Still?
Not-Zhina barreled toward me, teeth bared and fingers hooked like claws. A snarl ripped from her lips.
I dodged a blow, ducked another, and pranced back a few steps. The confused murmurs of the other Southies around me escalated to a panicked rumble, and a growing patter of feet took off toward the cafeteria. Zhina's eyes never left me.
In my lessons with Uzmed, I always practiced with a knife. Now I held only the dead fly. And after one more dodge and another backstep, my shoulders smacked the wall behind me.
My ass hit the floor, and her nails screeched against the wall just above my head. She cocked her head at me, curls bouncing and green eyes gleaming. Delight rippled over her purple-spotted skin.
"Ah, Zafaru," Zhina cooed, the soft assonance echoing down the corridor. "Don't be afraid. This will all be over soon."
YOU ARE READING
Human Bait
Horror"It's true what they say about you, isn't it? You really did sip tea and smile as you watched humanity fall apart." "Nope," he said. "I sipped whiskey." Eight years into the Infection, a spunky idealist convinces a hardened recluse to help him save...
