CHAPTER 0
Tick, tock, tick, tock. The constant rhythm of the clock echoed through the dark room. There was a silence, the type of silence that let minds wonder and roam. The silence that destroys the mind's restraints allowing it to be set free. The flickering of lights disrupts the odd calmness of the room. The bright light uncovers the darkness to reveal a bleach white room. The room, perfectly square, had no doors or windows. All it had was a single bed located in the middle of the room, and a clock aligned with the bed on the north wall. The walls looked as if they were pearls, bright white pearls. It was a solid white with a slight sheen. The bed had a glass frame that elevated the mattress about four feet off the ground. It had bright white sheets covering it.
There was a man resting upon the bed. His eyes were still closed, and his body stiff. He had a very fair complexion, and dark brown spiked hair. His eyes open quickly, and underneath those pale eyelids were absolutely gorgeous eyes. His left eye was a light gray with spec of ice blue, and his right eyes was basically opposite of his left, it was ice blue with specs of light gray. Not only his eyes were gorgeous, he in general was. He was dress in a very uniform white suit. He sat up in the bed, and swung his feet around to the left side of the bed and let them dangle. All of his movements were strangely perfect and mechanical. Oddly, music started playing. It was Beethoven's famous piece, Moonlight Sonata. The man pushed off the bed with his arms, lifting him a little into the air, and his feet hit the floor. He walked straight to the wall, and raised his hand 6 inches away from a certain spot in the wall. Part of the wall slide back, there was a roomy closet filled with shoes, suits, and a few other things. He pulled out a pair of clean shoes, and put them on. There were three medium sized wallets on the shelf; he picked up the one to the very left. He opened it up and scanned its contents to make sure everything was there: an ID with his "bella" face and his name, Benjamin Legnanellaf, and another small plastic card. As he turned away, the door slid shut. He walked to the opposing wall, and repeated the same process except this one opened to a hallway which he walked down. The hallway was wide, and long. There were many doors. He passed 15, 14, 12.5, 12, 11, and then he reached an elevator. He entered the elevator, which was basically the same as the hallway, white roomy and bright. There was a person in the elevator they exchanged a few awkward stares until they reached level three where she got off. He got off at level 0. He examined and looked around the elevator, and spotted a nearly undetectable camera. He made a sharp left until he reached a glass door. He stared out onto the large city of Archangel. It had everything: towering buildings, huge commercial jets traveling way high, local hover cars making their way down each air street, and humans dressed just like him trying to make their way to wherever as fast they could. Before he stepped out the glass door, he grabbed a messenger bag with the number 16 on its side. Benjamin opened the bag to see a small light laptop, a gasmask, and a sterilizing soap. He slipped his wallet into the bag, and stepped out. As soon as he stepped out he was hit with this awful smell. The air smelt like toxic fumes and rotting items. He tried to ignore it to the best of his ability but ended up squinting his eyes now and again.
"Wow," he thought to himself, as he looked up into the purple tinted sky and a large red sun. He carried on down the street trying to avoid hitting anyone in the process of trying to make it to his work. He searched through the crowds he was just simply looking for a familiar face. The sidewalks were full of apathetic people, as they purposely walked down the sanitized street.
Finally, he reached his destination. He smirks as he enters his workplace. "BEN!" his friend called across from the room. It was his good friend Jason. Benjamin walked to him to give him a friendly hug, but was distracted to see Callie. She was working steadily, consumed in her work. Callie looks up briefly and sees Ben looking at her. She smiles at him and continues working.
"Hey, friend ,how have you been? Haven't seen you in awhile!" said Jason.
"I've been quite alright. What about you?" said Benjamin, coldly. His interest was somewhere else.
Jason and Benjamin continued into a conversation. Jason was the one mostly talking, and Benjamin kept looking over towards Callie. Occasionally, Callie would look up and their eyes would meet. The red tints of Benjamin's face would show, he was blushing. Jason was called to his desk to continue his work. Ben approached Callie sheepishly. Callie glanced up to see him walking over. She took time to examine his face, his eyes, his hair. In the brightly illuminated building he basically glowed because of his pale skin. His hair was perfect as usual. His black brown hair made a huge contrast against his white skin. Above his abnormally long and pointy nose were his absolutely beautiful eyes. The contrast just brought even more attention so his eyes! It would be hard not to notice, and not to look. When she glanced up her bright green eyes smiled.
"Hi …. Callie..," he would look up at her then at the floor, his standing position was quite awkward, "I saw you working so hardly… I thought you might want to go for a break before I check in"
She arched her eyebrow looking sharply to the left to see Jason talking rapidly on the phone, and looked back up him and opened her mouth about to speak and paused in amazement, "Sure!"
Callie quickly put up her things and grabbed her bag. Together they walked out of the work building.
"Hmmm… I'm thinking coffee… is that okay with you, Callie?" Benjamin said eagerly. He LOVED coffee with a great passion.
Callie said with a bit of cheer in her voice "That's perfectly fine with me, Benjamin" She shift her eyes when they kept addressing each other with their names. She thought of how odd it was, and formal. Why would he be formal? After all, they are friends. Maybe he's just nervous.. but why would he be nervous? Thoughts rushed through her head. And all the while Ben was slowly making himself walk closer and closer to Callie, and her being deep in thought did not notice a thing. He smirked when his hand brushed against hers, and she still didn't notice. He stared blankly nearly hypnotized looking at her eyes. They were filled with question. He loved the way her hair was, tied back and straight with little of her bangs covering her face.
WHAM! Benjamin ran into a pole. Callie turns her head, and sees Ben sitting on the ground rubbing his head. Callie giggled, and offered her hand to help him up.
"Want any help, Mate?"
"Umm… Sure… ouuuch"
Callie snatched him up. Ben came up flying through the air, he landed on his feet with a great thud. There was a large red bump on his head.
"Are we about there?" Callie said impatiently.
"Yep, yep. I see it now" he pointed to a white mug sign down the street.
Callie hurried her walk, almost skipping in between people. The loved when people gave her weird looks because she knew their thoughts "Wow, what a strange little girl!"
They heard sirens. Callie looked at Ben worried, and moved closer to him in fear. He hugged her and asked "What's wrong?"
"I don't know, Ben. I just hate sirens they make me scared… and and I heard there was another outbreak this morning… and and and and the oxygen toxicity level raised 5 percent in some areas!" she blurted out.
The siren got louder, and louder. They decided to stand there and see what it was about. The crowd moBeng down the street toward the siren was large. The ambulance turned the corner and three men stepped out, all dressed in suits covering their whole entire body. She was even more worried, and then she was the toxic warning sign ambulance.Wait, she thought, that's not an ambulance…that's a containment vehicle!! Callie nearly fainted into Benjamin's arms. The coffee shop was just a few feet away.
"Let's go ahead and go to the shop. It will be safe in there, and we can watch through the glass" Ben stated. Callie nodded agreeingly, and the both entered to shop to take a seat by the window.
"Ben… do you have any idea what is going on??" her voice going in and out. Callie was terrified of these things.
"I'm not really sure…. I heard someone in the office talking about seeing a rat this morning.. which you know is crazy they went extinct after the nano-virus," he paused "but …what if this they REALLY did see it.. it would probably still be infected… "
Callie shivered as she thought about it, and they both thought it would be safe to go either one of their house and watch the hourly broadcast.
They exited the building together, and both of their eyes never left building until it was completely out of sight.
Ben's place was the closest. Benjamin and Callie were both frightened. In his way in he carelessly placed his bag on its resting place, rushed into the elevator with Callie following, walked up to his door and raised his hand part of the wall slid back and let the scanner scan his eyes.
A computerized voice said, "Denied".
Benjamin was furious.
"HOW could it deny me?! This is MY room, MY room! What is wrong with this stupid scanner!" he complained.
Callie stared at him blankly, and leaned in to inspect it. Mistakenly she leaned in too close and, it scanned her eye and said "Please enter the lobby for further assistance. The software is malfunctioning". Benjamin just still as mad, decided to try one more time. He leaned in, and it the scanning light let out this extremely sudden bright light. "Access granted" the computerized voice said as the door slid open. Benjamin flew back in shock of the light, and continuously rubbed his eyes. Callie helped him up and said "Sind sie in ordnung?". Momentarily, he stopped rubbing his eyes to look at Callie curiously. "I think you …just spoke … old German" he said with one eyebrow arched.
"Yea, my father was one of the last people who knew it. He taught me, and I can speak it fluently. I know, I know it's rare and odd, but I love the sound. I was just trying to ask if you were okay."
"Ohh.. okay.. I'm fine, I think. I have a terrible headache" he moaned. They entered his room. Callie propped herself up on his bed, and sat there waiting for him to turn on the daily broadcast. He pressed a small round camouflaged button on the wall, and it started playing. He had to press a few numbers on the keypad in order to go to the right channel. The quality of the image was perfect, absolutely perfect. The sound was crisp and clear. All and all, it felt like you were standing right next to the reporter and as if you two could start an engaging conversation.
You saw the reporter standing in front of the building they just passed with the containment vehicle out front. The purple tinted sky was much darker than early today, and the moon was in the sky but very dull. The reporter kept looking back every now and again, while reporting. She started out by saying "I'm reporting from Mayehm Street, and behind me you see a containment vehicle. Recently, there was suspicion of a nanovirus outbreak. It still has NOT been found, but they are investigating right now. If you have any information…"
"AH! I can't believe this. How could they let this happen again?! I don't want anything to happen, Ben. You know what happened last time.. I never want that to happen to me again, nor anyone else" Callie sat there looking over at Benjamin signaling for him to come sit next to her, and he did. She rested her head on his shoulder and sighed.
"Oh! I had this article on my hard drive.. it said something about a 'cure' but I'm really not sure what it was, if it would work … but I really hope it will."
Benjamin sat up and dashed over the other side of the room, where he placed his hand on a highly sensitive electricity detector. It received information from his brain in electrical currents. The article soon displayed on the screen in front of him.
Callie walked over there interested, and Benjamin stepped aside to make room for her to stand near. The article talked about the invention of the nanovirus. It was about 60 years back. The Chinese developed it. It was 'invented' to increase the memory of human brains, well really anything with a brain. Instead, it caused some parts of the brain to swell and caused either instant death or unusual behavior. If you didn't die, you either became suicidal or homicidal. The nanovirus killed over 5 million people. Although, some say that the Chinese purposely made it lethal. Even though majority of the people trust Chinese's products, over 75% of North America's and Europe's supply are shipped in from China.
If a city has one infection it goes into quarantine. And if they city reaches over 30% infected it is then 'sanitized' meaning that they would have to drop a bomb on the city. Thus killing and destroying everything.
Ben and Callie worried so much. They knew if the quarantine was found it would be nearly impossible for them to escape, and if the infection was there it would spread rapidly. Their own family, friends, and coworkers would suffer. Callie lost her brother to the infection 10 years ago. He was the one of the people that became homicidal. Ollie, her brother, chased Callie with a kitchen knife, but he ended up tripping on it and fell. He bled to death on the liBeng room floor. Callie did not like to talk about it; it was VERY rare for her to, but one unusual night Callie told Ben the whole entire story. She said that in his eyes were filled with confusion, regret, and anger, like he was trying to fight the virus but it was too strong. One has to think, if he was somewhat aware how he was feeling. If someone or something was controlling you and you could do nothing at all – how would you feel? If someone or something was controlling you and you could do nothing at all and YOU were trying to harm someone that you loved – how would you feel. Benjamin had a great amount of sympathy for Olli and Callie on that night. Ten years back he didn't know her, nor did he live in this area. Benjamin just moved to this city 6 years ago. Before that he loved in a city called Xining . It was near the first outbreak. His Mother ,2 Brothers, Father, and his sister all died. Although, no one knew this but him, he liked to be secretive, and did not like to draw attention to himself. Another thing was he hated to receive pity from others. Benjamin knew Callie's pain, and hated the people whom created the nanovrius. They killed so many people, so many people.
Callie looked over at Ben and said "Ben, What happens if it comes back? What are we going to do?"
He paused before saying anything "IF it is back, we're not going to stay here so we can die! I can't lose you too…" he stopped regretting opening his mouth.
"Wait..whaa? Lose me too? What are you talking about, Ben?"
Ben sighed, and nodded his head as a gesture that he wasn't going to say. Callie looked at him and said, "Please tell me…please"…
The conversation was disrupted by the loud sign of electricity shutting off. It was completely dark. Callie involuntarily shrieked. "WHAT is going on ?!" Ben yelled and frantically struggling to find his way around the room.
"I don't know, Ben..but whatever is happening cannot be good!" she frowned, and thought to herself.
Suddenly, the broadcasting came back on and the reported started to talk: "Hello, citizens of Archangel this is an emergency broadcast and I repeat this is an emergency broadcast. There is an outbreak of the nanovirus in our very own city. Supposedly, they found a few rats underground. EVERYONE is in danger, and as most of you know if the nanovirus enters your system you're immediately affected. Archangel is now officially in Quarantine…" the broadcast continued but the signal was growing weaker. The government decided it would be better for that no communications could be made; it would make it much more difficult to escape and lower the risk of the infection spreading outside of the city. Callie was nearly having a panic attack and Ben was sitting there thinking "What can we do, what can we do". Benjamin looked up at the screen to see it flickering off and on, but the camera was on the ground and in the distance you saw people running from others, and bodies laying in the street dead(?). The nanovirus was real again, almost forgotten and put to the side. Not anymore though, it was back and serious. Callie and Ben HAD to figure out a way to get the 'eff' out of there. Or they had no chance of survival.
"BEN, BEN, Ben!!!," she cried out, "How are we going to get out of this, how?!"
"I don't know… Callie.. I don't know! I wonder where Jason is."
KNOCK! KNOCK!
"Hey, MAN, let me in! It's Jay. I couldn't find Callie… "
Ben let out a sigh of relief, and yelled back to him "She's with me, Jay. I just..don't know how I'm going to let you in..the power is out..remember?"
"Yea, I do. I'll just have to do a second system reboot for this floor. Give me a second, it may take a few."
You heard his footsteps become more and more silent until no more. Callie was truly freaking out, she was sitting in the corner , and pulling at her hair. Benjamin looked at her and thought. He decided to go sit with her. So, he did: walked over there, sat down next to her, letting her rest her head on him as he moved his arm around her waist.
"Callie, are you alright?"
She sobbed into his chest, "Yes, yes I'm fine.. I guess". They sat there enjoying the silence, and hours later the power turned back on, and Jason returned soon after.
"Okay, Ben, Let me in"
"Let yourself in. You know the passkey."
Jason entered it, and walked in and immediately looked at Callie and Ben and then shook his head and ignored it because of the current situations.
"Okay, we seriously need to make a plan. But in order for this to work I need to do some research."
He plops himself down at the desk that was behind a wall.
"That's fine, go ahead.."
Callie and Ben tried to give him silence so he could concentrate. Ben and her were both drifting in and out, their eyelids growing heavy. Ben fell asleep with Callie in his arms.