Well alright! I'm glad you people like this! It gets better, believe me. I'd like to clear something up, though. As usual, this is strictly a non-romantic fic – as I have told my friends, "Romance gets in the way of the horror". True, ne? So there isn't a relationship between Wufei and Quatre but there are certain parts that could be considered hints at that. Okay, enjoy!
Virus
Continued
3. Changing the Dragon
Again Wufei had to struggle to open his eyes but this time he could have sworn he saw something slide sideways out of his field of vision when he did. He checked either side of himself and saw no one but he was sure he had seen something move. Blinking in confusion, he saw it again – two large dark objects sliding away to the sides. He jumped up and spun around and around but there wasn't anything moving in the room but him. After waving his hand dismissively he exited his room. It took him a good deal of time to find the bathroom even though it was just two doors down and the hallway was straight. When he reached it, he stared into the mirror just as he had done the previous morning. His eyes widened in horror as he caught sight of them, waking him up from his daze immediately. He slammed the door shut and locked it, making sure that nobody – namely Duo – was in the bathroom with him and that nobody could get in. His eyes now appeared to be hazel-orange. This was extremely noticeable, even from a long way away. A million thoughts and questions raced through Wufei's mind. He knew at that moment that there was definitely something wrong with him. He fell back against the towel rack, wheezing noisily, never taking his eyes off of his reflection. The sound of someone knocking at the door made him jump. Quatre's voice floated into the tiny room.
"Is anybody in there?" Quatre was silent a moment then he tried the door knob. Finding it locked, he knocked again. Wufei couldn't find his voice. He was still too shocked from his discovery. 'Don't panic,' he told himself. 'Panicking is for weak little children. Get a hold of yourself.'
"Uh…go away! I'm using the bathroom!" Wufei yelled at the door.
"Wufei? Geez, I thought nobody was in there. Why do you have the light off?" Wufei looked up at the light switch. The light was off. The whole time he had thought it was on.
"I-it's none of your business! Go away!"
"Is everything okay in there? Are you feeling sick again?"
"No! Now leave me alone, you baka weakling!" With a heavy sigh, Quatre walked away from the bathroom, leaving Wufei to come up with a solution to his problem. Wufei decided that he would put on a pair of old sunglasses he had. Wearing those, the others wouldn't be able to tell the color of his eyes and as an added bonus, light wouldn't be able to get into his eyes quite as much. The others would consider it strange of course but they would think him having orange eyes was even stranger. He opened the door carefully and peered around the wall in the direction of his room. Taking a quick glance in the opposite direction to make sure he wasn't being watched, he stole silently across the carpeted floor to his room and began his search for his sunglasses. His fingers closed around them as he tore apart a drawer and he snatched them out and hurriedly placed them on his face. Breathing a small sigh of relief, Wufei turned to go down to the kitchen. Just then Duo, who felt like a good chase but not like doing anything sneaky, hopped in front of Wufei.
"Look at this, Wufei!!" he cried, thrusting a very explicit picture into Wufei's face.
"KISAMA!!" Wufei screamed, grabbing his nose. He reached for his katana to teach Duo a lesson but stopped when he noticed the way Duo was staring at him. "What?!" he demanded. Duo's arms fell to his sides as if he was in a trance.
"Your nose…"he said.
"Yes I know it's bleeding, thanks to you!"
"No, your blood…" Wufei pulled his hand from his nose and looked down at it. It was covered in blood, but the blood was dark. Very dark. In fact, it was so dark that it looked black. Duo backed away from Wufei, shaking his head.
"Oh man, you need to be in a hospital." he mumbled.
"No! I'm not going back there! Don't tell anybody about this!" Duo shook his head a few more times then bolted from the room. Wufei gave chase and tackled Duo just as he reached the stairs. He slapped a hand over Duo's mouth so he couldn't call for help. Duo fought for his freedom but managed only to knock Wufei's sunglasses off and flip himself onto his back. Wufei glared angrily at him and when Duo discovered the change of Wufei's eye color he struggled even harder to get free.
"Stop it!" Wufei hissed at him. "You will not tell anybody about this. If you do, I won't just cut off your braid, I'll cut off your head! Is that understood?!" Duo nodded and Wufei released him. Duo strolled nonchalantly down the stairs and Wufei pivoted around to go back into his room. He tensed in fury as a cry rang out downstairs.
"WUFEI'S GOT BLACK BLOOD!!!" It was very clearly Duo's voice. 'I will enjoy killing him.' Wufei thought bitterly. He heard Quatre's muffled voice followed by the sound of feet approaching rapidly. Not wanting to be tackled by Heero and Trowa again, Wufei tore down the hallway to Quatre's room. They wouldn't think to look for him there. He listened intently as the footsteps moved in his direction then stopped. They had reached Wufei's room. Wufei ducked into Quatre's closet and closed the door. He wondered why he was hiding like a little weakling but he found the dark, closed-in space to be rather comforting. He stopped listening to Heero and Trowa's footsteps as he snuggled in amongst Quatre's clothes and other miscellaneous belongings. He didn't even notice the content smile creeping across his face nor did he notice the footsteps creeping closer to his hiding place. He came back to reality with a start as the closet door was yanked open. Without thinking about it, Wufei hissed at Heero who was responsible for opening the closet. He was dragged violently from the closet and taken to one of Quatre's many cars.
***
"Well, we've run several diagnostic tests on your friend, and we still haven't determined what's affecting him. However, we have discovered a symptom that we missed yesterday." The same doctor that had treated Wufei the previous day had examined him again today.
"Yeah, so did we." Duo murmured, referring to Wufei's blood.
"What did you discover?" Quatre asked the doctor.
"His DNA is mutating."
"WHAT!?!" all five of the pilots cried at once. Wufei had heard the doctor's statement through the door.
"Um, he's not talking about you, Wufei." Quatre called.
"I'm not stupid! I heard what he said!" Wufei shouted back. Quatre sighed and turned back to the doctor.
"How can his DNA be…mutating?" he asked.
"That leads me to our other discovery. Very tiny microorganisms are finding ways into his cells and even getting into his nuclei. We know that they're causing his DNA to mutate, but we're not sure how they're doing it."
"Do you know what the mutations are going to do to him?"
"Unfortunately, we lack the knowledge to predict what the results of the mutations will be."
"Can you tell us why his blood is…that color?"
"We doubt that the color change of his blood is a mutation. We believe that it's simply the result of the presence of the organism."
"What about his eyes?"
"That is definitely a mutation."
"How will this affect his mind? Will he still be able to talk and do other things like that?"
"We're not sure how it will affect his mind. We know that his brain cells are not exempt from the organism and that it was slowing down his brain activity, but now we don't know what it's doing to him."
"Is this…permanent? Can you treat it?"
"We…might be able to come up with some method of treatment, but it seems a bit unlikely. After all, the world has never encountered an organism small enough get inside the nucleus of a cell, let alone its chromosomes. Do you have any idea where this organism might have come from?" The four pilots that were talking to the doctor tensed at this question.
"Uh…thanks for all your help! We'd like to talk to Wufei now!" Quatre blurted, herding the doctor away from Wufei's hospital room while the other three pilots snuck inside of it. After the doctor was well away, Quatre came back and slipped inside also, locking the door behind him.
"We've got to get him out of here." Quatre told them.
***
The diagnostic tests the hospital had run on Wufei had literally taken hours so by this time it was already well after noon. At approximately 3 o' clock that afternoon, the four normal and healthy pilots attempted to sneak Wufei out of the hospital through the window in his room. Wufei didn't fight his friends this time – he was glad to be leaving the hospital. He would've struggled against them with all his strength if he had known where they were taking him, though. It had been unanimously decided that Wufei should be taken to Dr. J. Taking Wufei to another public hospital would only further jeopardize their security and Dr. J had access to more advanced equipment anyway.
Wufei squirmed uncomfortably in his seat as the car bumped along the road. He had been doing that for the entire ride and it was starting to annoy Heero.
"Stop squirming!" he growled. Wufei said nothing in response. He just continued to writhe and wiggle, making occasional pained grunts. Duo turned around in his seat.
"What's his problem?" he asked Heero, not really expecting an answer. Just then the car entered a tunnel. Wufei quieted down and stopped moving. Duo stared at him and he stared back at Duo. Then the tunnel ended and Wufei jerked back as if trying to avoid something. It took everything Heero and Trowa had in them to hold Wufei as he crammed himself back against his seat, curling his legs beneath his body protectively. Duo watched Wufei with mild amusement as he tried to escape his invisible enemy. He was shocked when Wufei hissed at something on the floor of the car. He glanced down but saw nothing.
"What?" he asked Wufei. "What are you hissing at?" It took a moment for Wufei to answer the question as though he couldn't process the words and remember how to respond.
"I…I hissed at…nothing. I don't hiss." he said finally.
"Alright, then what are you afraid of?"
"I am…afraid of nothing."
"So then why are you all bunched up on the seat?" Wufei's gaze once again traveled to the floor of the car. Duo heard him whisper something in Chinese. Trowa's only visible eye turned downward. A somewhat disturbed expression formed on his face.
"Hey, what did he say, Trowa?"
"…The sun…" Trowa mumbled.
***
There isn't much to be said about what happened when the pilots reached Dr. J's laboratory. The situation was explained quickly and Wufei was put through more testing. By the time it was all completed, however, it was nearly 10 o' clock at night. Wufei had had an episode earlier and had destroyed all of the lights in one section of the lab. He now sat in the corner of that particular area, glaring at his fellow pilots and Dr. J to make sure they didn't approach him. As he was staring at them, he began to salivate. He'd never noticed how hungry he was before. He hadn't eaten in two days but that was no reason for him to be considering eating another human. The hunger gnawed wolfishly at his insides but he only hugged his knees close to his body and continued to glare at his friends.
"I don't know what to tell you about your friend," Dr. J was saying. "But it's very clear that he has been affected by some alien organism that's trying to pass itself off as a virus. A virus will enter an organism and consume everything it can, which is what this thing is doing. Or at least, it was doing that. Now, it's replacing what it took with…other things. It seems that this "virus" has no intention of leaving your friend's body. I'm not sure but I believe that it's trying to enhance Wufei to meet its living requirements. If it succeeds, it won't ever need to leave his body which will further its chance of survival. I just don't see why this is affecting his mind so greatly."
"So can you do anything to get rid of the virus?" Quatre asked hopefully.
"It will take some time, but I may be able to create some antibiotics to combat the organism. However, I will need a sample of the specimen." All the attention in the lab turned to Wufei. Wufei remained silent and kept glaring at them. He ran his fingers over the blade of his katana without breaking eye contact. No one was leaping at the chance to try to get some of Wufei's blood, which was the only place the virus was residing. Dr. J pulled a small gun from his lab coat and handed it to Heero.
"This gun has tranquilizers in it." he told Heero. "You know what to do." Heero took aim without hesitation. He pulled the trigger and the dart flew through the air. Wufei's hand moved in a blur and easily seized the tranquilizer in mid-air. Everyone gasped at this. Wufei flicked the dart carelessly to the side. Heero fired the gun again. This time Wufei deflected the dart with his katana. Frustrated, Heero pulled the trigger again and again but nothing came out. Dr. J cleared his throat.
"There were only two darts in it." he said. Heero scowled at Wufei who smirked at his failure. The other four pilots and Dr. J tried everything they could think of to get a sample of Wufei's blood. They begged and pleaded, they tried to take it by force, they tried putting tranquilizers in food, they tried putting tranquilizers in water, they tried putting tranquilizers in food and water, but absolutely nothing worked. When the clock displayed 12:00pm, they gave up, locked Wufei in an observation room and went to sleep right there in the lab. They had to sleep in another room so they took turns guarding Wufei. Quatre kindly offered to take the first watch.
Later that night, an Earth shattering crash yanked Heero from his sleep. His stomach sank, laden with suspicion and worry. His suspicions were confirmed as he and the others got up and ran into the room where Wufei was being kept. There was a trail of broken shards of glass leading from the window of Wufei's observation room to the door of the lab. They moved hesitantly towards the broken window and peered into the observation room. Quatre lay unconscious on the floor, even more glass strewn about him and a small puddle of blood mixed in. The door to the lab was open, but it was squeaking softly. Heero figured that Wufei had just left it open since he had obviously 'stepped out'. Leaving the others to help Quatre, Heero crossed the room to the still squeaking door to shut it. He had to exit the lab to get to the door because it was open all the way, so he couldn't even see it before he was outside. But when he did get outside of the lab, his jaw dropped. The heavy steel door was bent severely and was lying on the floor, having been ripped from its hinges. The squeaking was the door toggling to and fro against the wall, being balanced only on two of its corners. It finally lost the wavering balance it had had and fell completely to the floor with an impossibly loud clang that attracted the attention of everyone else. The other three pilots and Dr. J ran to Heero's side.
"He's gone." Heero told them. They weren't sure if he meant that Wufei was gone from the lab – or if he was gone forever.
*Well, did you like that? I hope so. Reviews mean chapters, people! The next chapter is where it starts to get graphic so brace yourselves, everyone!*