Patient Zero
I am the original, the first, the source. But that’s more what I became, not what I was.
When they first found me I was like millions of others, a broken man dying of HIV. They offered me a solution, a potential experimental cure. So I agreed, happily. I endured the prodding, hell I welcomed the injections. I was desperate for life.
They dubbed me a genetic marvel, I was acceptable for their cure. Had I not been so eager, I might have noticed the shadiness. I might have seen the false smiles plastered on the doctors faces. I could have realised that their cheerful words masked dark thoughts. I should have known their cure was just a repurposed virus.
But I did not. I eagerly took their “cure”. Within a week my body was not my own. I had traded one death sentence for another. You have no idea what it was like, the virus took control. The horror I felt, trapped within my own mind, fully aware but incapable of control. Screaming as my body committed atrocities.
They quickly realised that they could not keep my hunger satisfied. The virus was insatiable, their food did nothing to stop it. But then, the faithful day came, a chirpy young nurse came a little too close… and… and I devoured her. Without remorse. I was a prisoner in my own mind while my body was a monster.
But while I was a monster, she became something much worse. During the autopsy she awoke from her death slumber. The pathogen raged in her body. She tore the medical staff apart. Crimson arcs of blood sailing through the air where she cut them down. But once they were all dead, it became clear that her hunger was still not sated. So she set her eyes on the world.
This was the start of the end. I was Patient Zero, the original. The curse in my blood caused all of this. The pathogen I set loose caused the world to burn. If you’re reading this, I’m so sorry.
-Patient Zero.
Just a piece of fiction
“Elly, why am I here?” He asked.
She made no response, no movement whatsoever. He couldn’t quite make out where they were. Some apartment, long abandoned judging by the shattered remnants of once ornate pieces of furniture. Or perhaps this damage was her doing. The only light in the room was a lone lunar ray peeking in between ragged remains of purple drapes. It seemed to illuminate her face, no, more than that, it made her face sparkle. Why was her face sparkling? He tried to get out of his seat. The bindings on his wrists and ankles cut into his skin. He yelped in surprise more than pain. The yelp brought her back to reality.
“Why did you leave me?”
“Is that what this is about?” He asked calmly.
She took a step forward, “What else would it be fucking about?”
Had he been paying attention he would have realized why her face had appeared to sparkle moments before. Her features were drowned in her own tears. But he did not notice these things for he was now staring at her right hand, or more precisely the gun held within it.
She took another step forward and pressed the pistol right against his forehead. He gulped loudly. He could feel his clothes begin to soak with perspiration.
“Wh-wh-why did you…did you leave me?” She was crying now. Her words, a mess of fury and sorrow.
“I had to go, I loved you.”
She smacked him across the face with the gun.
“LIAR!” She shrieked, no tears now, just rage. “You were bored, wanted to find a floozy for some fun!”
“No, what, never. They had found me, I had to go.”
Silence descended in the room as she pondered his words. Finally she spoke, “Why didn’t you leave a note.”
“A note?”
“Yes a note, some fucking words! You know so I didn’t think you were dead!”
“I didn’t think…”
“No you didn’t.” She was crying again. ” I mourned for you, do you know that. I thought you were dead. That was… that was awful. But then to find you with her, that, that is not fair. Why a family with HER? I-I-I just I can’t, no I can’t.”
“Elly, I’m sorry”
Those words seemed to compose her thoughts slightly. She strolled towards him. Tears still streaming from her eyes. She held the gun to his head. “Not as sorry as you’re about to be”
She would have done it, she knew it and so did he, were it not for a knock on the door. The sound startled Elly, she half jumped half fell backwards.
“POLICE, OPEN UP!” Someone shouted from the door.
“Of course, she did this for you.” Elly muttered.
“What?” He asked.
“The bitch you chose, the one that loves you like I did. She’s worried for your safety, she must have sent for them.”
“Elly, I…”
“SHUTUP!” She sighed as the banging grew louder. “I’m not going to kill you.”
The bound man almost smiled, but he quickly smothered such facial movements in case it would set her off.
“I’m not killing you because that’s too easy, it doesn’t punish you. But I can’t go on, not like this, not anymore.”
She brought the gun level with her own head.
“ELLY WAIT, STOP!”
She was crying now, sobbing between each and every word. “You used to love me… I’m…I’m sure of it. Whenever happiness creeps up on you, I want you to remember this, look at me, remember my face right now. And if you wonder what caused this, I…I want you to know that…that this was, all… your… fault!”
“ELLY NO!”
She pulled the trigger.
A place in my memory…
A smell of salt in the air, intoxicating and exhausting. I remember the frayed edges of the waxy white board cutting into my skin. The salt water seeping into the cuts, making my hands sting like they were burning. But I didn’t care.
I glanced behind me, an endless expanse of grey sea that stretched out in all directions to become the atlantic ocean. In the distance a small mound of water moved across the sea. Others saw it too. We all tensed ourselves, bodies lay low, shoulders parallel to the board and feet over it’s edge allowing our toes to just breach the surface of the water.
Staring back at the wave, I know that this is my place, this is where I’m in my element. The wave continues on it’s lazy approach, seeming to be little more than a ripple. But then as if by magic it suddenly doubles in size, revealing its deception. A wall of water tearing towards us. Froth beginning to spill from the surface. My arms tear through the water, trying to build up speed. I have to catch it, my only thoughts are on catching it. The board starts to be raised up the wave. My arms ache from the strain. Then a rush, I’ve caught it! A spray of white foam and the wave breaks. I jump to my feet, adrenaline courses through my veins and I feel like a god as I ride this wave back into the shore.
Don’t leave me
“Run!”
“Which way?”
“Through that door!”
I don’t have time to look, she barrels into me and throws me through the door. It’s wooden nature shattering beneath our combined weight. A hail of bullets tear through the air. But she doesn’t stop, her momentum never ceases. She is a champion, a juggernaut of destruction, a hero. She rolls with our fall, while I lay sprawled in a heap, and rises to her feet in one fluid movement. Those nearest her are felled by her blade, others by the pinpoint accuracy of her pistol. She tosses a phone to me.
“Call him,” She grunts as she bisects a soldier. His blood spilling out in a crescent arc behind the gleaming sword.
I sigh deeply as I watch the carnage, we shouldn’t have come here. This was all my fault. They were dead. Whether we tried to rescue them or not was irrelevant now. Whether our intentions were pure or not, they were dead and it was all out fault. How could I tell him that? But I know I have to, so I dial the number.
Ring… Ring… Ring…
“Whats taking so long?” Beth calls to me over gunshots.
“It’s ringing.”
She grunts her response.
“I’m sorry.”
She doesn’t even look at me, two more enter. They see her and try to raise their guns. But Beth is faster. Both are dead before they fire a single bullet.
The phone stops ringing. “Hello?”
“Hi Jeff, its me. We’re trapped in camp 217, we need evac now!”
“Did you get them.”
“I’m so sorry Jeff, I didn’t… they didn’t… we were… they’re dead…”
“It’s OK! You tried your best.”
I smile when he says that, but I can hear the pain in his voice, he was so sure we’d get his brother out alive. I had given him false hope.
“Where do you need me?”
“Where do we need him?” I call out to Beth.
She does not look at me as she continues her deadly dance. For that’s what it looks like to me. She spins, sword in hand, and limbs are severed. Her snow white skin is blemished with red droplets belonging to the fallen.
“End of the runway.” She shouts.
“You get that?” I ask jeff.
“Yeah I got it, ETA 7 minutes, Jeff out.”
As the last soldier falls I clamber to my feet. She nods and I follow. As we leave the death camp through an old metallic door I hear a click. Beth tosses a grenade behind us and seals the door.
“Never can be too careful.” She smiles, well she tries to smile but its hollow, broken. She wont say anything but I know she’s thinking it too, if we had just left well enough alone, they might still be alive.
We hear the low rumble of an approaching helicopter. After the day I’ve had the sound of the rotary blades slicing through the air is music to my ears. I can see Jeff landing his helicopter just at the end of the runway, just outside the range of their defenses.
“It’s Jeff.” I start pacing forward.
“Hold on a second Sparrow.” Beth says as she holds me back, “Once we start, they are going to be all over us, this is a sprint. No stopping. Are you ready?”
“As ready as I’ll ever be.”
She nods her approval, and with that we are off. Running as fast as our legs will take us. We haven’t taken more then ten steps when sirens begin to wail.
“Keep going!” She urges me.
Before I can reply the ground explodes beneath us. I’m tossed through the air like a rag doll. My vision is nothing but dust, spinning terrain and fire. Then there’s nothing, blackness. I open my eyes to find I’m behind some mass of metal, and shes standing over me, firing at our perusers.She’s covered in blood but still she doesn’t stop. She can’t. She is the embodiment of destruction, absolute.
She pulls me to my feet. “This is where we part ways Sparrow.”
“What? No? You can’t!”
“I have to, my destiny was never to see it through to the end, I understand that now. I was only meant to safeguard you, we all knew that from the start. You’re the one thats important. You can stop all this, save countless innocents.”
“But it’s me they want, let them have me and you can get away.”
She hugs me, gunshots ring in my ear. She’s firing over my shoulder.
“That would be to waste everything. Think of our friends, their deaths mean nothing if you’re killed now. They died to keep you safe. Show them gratitude by living, show me that gratitude.”
“Please don’t leave me…”
“This is the way it has to be. Tell Jeff, I’m sorry and that I love him. Sparrow you are an amazing person, I look back on our time together and I have no regrets, it was an honor protecting you.” A bullet whizzes past my face. “She pushes me behind her. “Now go! I’ll make these bastards pay for what they did.”
With that I run and I don’t look back as she turns to face our foes. I sprint from the sound of gunfire. I slow to a run as explosions of detonating grenades fill the air. I don’t stop as I hear her cry out in pain, not once but twice. Tears roll down my cheeks when I hear her scream, but still I don’t look back. I clamber onto the helicopter and make the mistake of turning to survey the carnage as we pull away through the sky. There she was, on her knees. The flick of a sword and her body falls asunder.
I watch as a juggernaut is halted, as a hero is destroyed and as my world crumbles.
