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Episode 5: From Hell – Part 1 Sanctuary
"Hurry up people, we don't want to be late," Adam said as he walked towards the helix.
"A whole week in London!" said Josh excitedly.
"Yup," Jesse agreed. "We're gonna have some fun."
Adam had been invited to an international genetics conference that was being held in London.
"This must be something big," Emma said to Adam as they entered the Double Helix. "You seem pretty excited about it."
"It's very big," Adam said, a big smile on his face. "The world's top scientists are going to be there and each one of them are going to share their experiences with DNA restructuring and genetic manipulation.
"Sounds fun," said Brennan, a touch of sarcasm in his voice, as he prepared for take off.
It had been a few hours since they had taken off. Brennan stifled a yawn, switched to autopilot and turned around. The others had fallen asleep, all except Adam who was going through some data on the screen in front of him.
About three hours later, Brennan set the helix down on a landing pad in some field somewhere around the outskirts of London. There were couple of private jets parked nearby. As they exited the helix, a short slightly balding man in his early forties walked up to them.
"Dr. Kane, it's good to see you again," he said in a thick British accent, extending his hand forward.
"It's good to see you too," said Adam, shaking his hand. "This is Dr. Edward Atherton," he said as he introduced the rest of the team.
"This way," Atherton gestured with a sweep of his hand towards a limo waiting for them. "Let's get you checked into the hotel. It's not far from here and I am sure you must be tired from your flight."
The limo pulled into the driveway of the hotel Avion. The hotel, set up outside of London city, was overlooking a steep cliff. Brennan whistled softly as he took in the surroundings. The place was enormous. The hotel itself was a magnificent building, about thirty stories tall. The walls were a sparkling white. The carvings on the building made it look like it was taken straight out of the medieval times. A wide ledge surrounding the roof on top had stone gargoyles perched all around it.
There was a huge lawn out front. In the centre of the lawn was a large fountain, a three-foot deep circular pit with a slightly elevated marble path surrounding it. A pillar made of white marble was in the middle of the pit. On top of the pillar were five marble fish set in a circle facing outwards with their mouths wide open and water pouring out. A high wall surrounded the complex. Around the entire perimeter there were trees and plants of all varieties.
The inside of the hotel was even more so if not as breath-taking as the outside. The entire lobby floor was covered by black marble flooring. There was a lounge to the right with plush furniture and to the left was a bank of four elevators. Straight ahead was the receptionist's desk.
"Boy, they sure went all out to accommodate us," said Jesse.
"Dr. Grant is the owner of Hotel Avion," said Atherton. "The entire hotel has been reserved for the invitees of the conference. Ah, here he comes now."
Walking towards them was a gentleman in his fifties wearing a dark blue suit and rimmed glasses perched up high on his nose.
Adam smiled.
"I was hoping you could make it Adam," said Dr. James Grant shaking his hand.
"I wouldn't have missed it for the world."
"The preliminary meeting will start in half an hour. Why don't you freshen up and I will see you in the conference room."
"All right."
Adam walked into the conference room. There were about twenty people in there. He sat down in a chair as Dr. Grant, who was sitting at the head, presiding over the meeting, started introducing everyone.
While Adam was at the conference, the others were sitting in one of the rooms. Josh was staring out the window overlooking the back of the hotel. There was big swimming pool in the shape of the figure eight in the centre and a couple of tennis courts at one corner. At the back was a gate, beyond which was a large golf course. He grinned. They were sure gonna have some fun.
"Let's go into town tomorrow," said Brennan. "We can explore London while Adam enjoys his boring conference.
The others agreed.
The next day the team went into town sans Adam who was at the conference. They visited Madame Tussaud's wax museum and a few other places and then had lunch at an exquisite looking Italian restaurant.
After lunch, as they walked down one the many streets of London, Jesse spotted a newspaper vending machine and went over to buy a paper. He came back looking quizzically at the headlines.
"Hey, check this out." He pointed to the paper.
'JACK THE RIPPER IS BACK' was the bold print on the front page of the London Times.
"No kidding," said Brennan.
"Who's Jack the ripper?" Josh asked.
"Jack the Ripper was a serial killer who killed a bunch of people in London around 1888," Shalimar told him.
"Mutilated them is more like it. No one knows his real name though, 'cause he wasn't caught," said Brennan.
"But, if that was in 1888, how can this be him?" asked Josh.
"Good question."
"What does the paper say?" Emma asked trying to peer over Jesse's shoulder.
"It says...two people were found murdered near Leicester square. They were both practically ripped apart. Their throats were torn open.....like something...ate them."
Jesse raised one eyebrow.
"Doesn't sound like a Jack the ripper style of murder," said Brennan.
"No it doesn't," Jesse replied.
Shalimar frowned. What was that sound she heard? Some kind of rattling. She tried listening for it again, but there was nothing.
Emma, looking at the picture of the mangled bodies in the paper, made a face.
"How could someone do something like that," she said, a disgusted look on her face.
Suddenly, there was a loud scream, startling all of them.
"It came from over here," said Shalimar heading for a narrow alley.
The others followed her into the alley. Right at the back of the alley, there were two kids, a boy and a girl, both about fourteen or fifteen years old, standing there. The boy, a tall, red haired kid was standing with his jaw wide open and the dark haired, pretty girl next to him, had her hand over her mouth and her eyes wide with shock. On the ground in front of them was a body lying motionless. They walked over to the body. It was man probably in his forties. The way he was dressed, he looked like a rag picker. His face was pale and he was bleeding from the neck. He was definitely dead. Brennan bent down to check his pulse anyway. When he found none, he looked at the two kids.
"What happened here?" he asked.
The boy, recovering from his shock, spoke up. "We don't know, we heard some scuffling in here and came to see what it was all about. We found him lying here."
"S-something went over the w-wall," the girl stammered.
"What was it?" Emma asked gently.
The boy shook his head. "We don't know. We didn't get a good look at it."
Jesse and Shalimar bent down to examine the body.
"I need the two of you to go find a phone and call the police," Brennan said to the two kids. He turned and looked at Josh. "And you go with them."
Josh started to protest, but took one look at Brennan's grim face and decided against it. He followed the other two as they ran out the alley.
The kids found a phone in the store nearby and made the call. The boy spoke on the phone, he seemed pretty calm as he told the officer on the other end of the line what had happened. After giving the address, he put the phone down and turned to Josh.
"I'm Johnny Matthews," he said. "And this is my friend Claire Grant." He offered a handshake.
Josh shook his hand. "I'm Josh Valentine."
"The bobbies ought to be getting here soon."
"I thought you called the cops," Josh said, puzzled. "Who's Bobby?
The girl giggled. "A bobby is what we call a policeman."
"Oh."
As they were leaving the shop, Josh stopped near the newspaper stand.
"Hey, look at this."
He picked up a copy of 'The Sun' off the rack. The headline on the front page said,
'IS DRACULA FOR REAL?'
There was a picture of a young man in his mid twenties underneath the headline. The guy looked like all the blood had been completely drained from his body. His face looked slightly bluish and his lips were a pale blue. There were two round bloodied spots on his neck that looked like a vampire bite.
"Man! This is some weird stuff," said Josh. "Wait here for the police, I'd better show this to the others."
He dug into his pocket for some change, paid for the paper and hurried off.
Shalimar bent over the dead guy. He had slashes on his face and punctures on his neck from what looked like teeth marks. What ever had attacked him had pretty sharp teeth.
"He was poisoned," she said standing up. "Possibly snake venom."
"Are you sure?" asked Brennan.
"I'm positive. I can smell the dried up residue."
"You think a snake attacked him?" Jesse asked. "I don't think a snake could've done that."
"Me neither," said Shalimar. "I have no idea what did this."
Just then, the Josh came running into the alley.
"Guys, take a look at this," he waved a paper in the air.
The others took in what was on the paper.
"This can't be a coincidence," Jesse said.
"New mutants?" Emma asked.
"Probably," Jesse replied.
"I can't see what else it could be," Brennan said matter-of-factly. "In any case, we'd better gat back to the hotel and show this to Adam."
There were sirens coming from behind. The police.
After giving their statements to the police the team had left for the hotel.
They couldn't find Adam anywhere. He wasn't answering his com-link. They had searched practically the entire hotel. Their rooms, the conference room, even the golf course, but he was nowhere to be found. The hotel staff didn't know where he was either. They had come across some of the other scientists, but all they had said was that Adam had gone somewhere with Dr. Grant. They didn't know where.
Brennan and Josh had just exited the elevator onto the lobby when they saw Dr. Grant hurrying past.
"Dr. Grant!" Brennan called out.
The older man looked back without stopping and said, "I'm sorry, I don't have time to speak with you right now."
Brennan and Josh looked at each other for a second and then Brennan rushed after Dr. Grant.
"Hey, wait a minute!"
Josh didn't go after him. He had noticed someone else. He walked across the lobby and stopped in front of a girl sitting on a couch.
"Claire?" he said.
The girl looked up.
"Hi Josh!" she smiled at him.
"What're you doing here?"
"My grandfather owns this place."
"Dr. Grant?"
Claire nodded in reply. "Are you staying here?" she asked.
"Yes. We're here for the conference. We're actually looking for someone. Maybe you can help us find him?"
"Sure."
He explained the whole situation to her.
Brennan hurried after Grant who disappeared around a corner. As Brennan rounded the corner, he noticed a door to the left swinging shut. It made a clicking sound as it closed. He walked over to the door and tried to open it, but it was locked. Probably some kind of automatic locking mechanism, he thought. Just above the door handle, there was a slot for a card key. He looked around to make sure no one was watching and then sent a spark of electricity through the slot. He then pushed the door open and stepped inside. There was a long corridor to the left and Grant was nowhere to be found. He cursed under his breath.
"Brennan!"
Brennan turned around to see Josh coming towards him along with the girl they had met in the alley earlier in the day.
"What's up?"
"This is Claire Grant," said Josh introducing the girl. "She's Dr. Grant's granddaughter. She thinks she knows where Adam might be."
"You sure?"
"I have an idea where he might be," said Claire.
"Guys," Brennan said into his com-link. "You'd better get down here, quick."
They walked down the corridor where Dr. Grant had disappeared. Claire was in front leading them. She suddenly stopped and tapped on a few tiles on the wall to her left. Then she placed her palm on one tile and pressed it. The tile went in a couple of inches and then slid down. There was a keypad inside. Claire typed a code on the keypad and a section of the wall to the right of the keypad went in a bit and opened up sliding in both ways like an elevator door.
"This lift will take us down to grandpa's laboratory. Come on,"
They stepped into the lift and the doors shut. A panel opened on the side. There was a retinal scanner in it. It scanned Claire's eye and cleared them. The elevator started moving down. There was another door at the back. A few seconds later it stopped and the back door opened up. As they stepped out into the lab, two guards came in from either side. They hesitated in their step a bit when they saw Claire, but then levelled their guns at the others. Dr. Grant and Adam were standing at one end looking up at a large screen. Grant turned around.
"Claire! What are you doing here?"
Then he noticed the others.
"It's okay," he said to the guards. "Let them in."
"Adam, we've been looking all over for you," Emma said. "We were worried when you weren't answering you're com-link."
"I'm sorry about that," Dr. Grant said. "There's a communications jammer set up in here. All communications from here can only be made from that console." He pointed to a station to the far end of the room.
"We've got a serious problem here," Adam said solemnly.
"Yeah, we know," Jesse said.
Dr. Grant walked over to a computer console and tapped a key. The big screen above him flicked on.
"The experiments that we were doing here involved grafting animal DNA over human DNA," he said. "We had three volunteers for the project."
As he spoke, a graphical view of DNA spliced over DNA was shown on the screen. That was followed by three-dimensional views of the faces of the three volunteers. Two men, both in their thirties, one with dark hair and the other a blond and a woman, also in her thirties with dark hair and piercing blue eyes.
"Mark Richards," he continued indicating the blond guy. "Craig Travis and Natasha James. The DNA grafting took place about two months ago. Unfortunately, it did not go the way I had intended it to. There was a big mistake in our calculations and this was the unexpected result."
The three faces on the screen morphed into horrific images. Dr. Grant tapped a few keys. The screen focused on the face to the left and zoomed out showing the entire body. The creature on screen had fur all over its body except the chest and upper abdomen, which were covered in scales; sharp teeth with two canines were sticking out of the mouth. It's eyes were yellow. The figure rotated on a vertical axis. There was a thin lizard-like tail sticking out from it's behind, curling up in circles.
"The animal DNA that was grafted onto these three people gave them the qualities of those animals," Grant said. "Mr. Richards here, has the power and ferocity of a Wolverine combined with the camouflaging capabilities of a Chameleon.
"A Chameleon?" Josh said. "That explains the weird looking tail."
He tapped another key. A second figure replaced the first. This one was clearly a female and her face looked pretty much human, though colour of the skin had turned dark. She had pale blue eyes, bat like ears and fangs like something out of a vampire movie. Her nails were shaped like deadly looking claws.
"Miss James has the abilities of a Vampire Bat and the strength of a Grizzly Bear."
Grant tapped a key again and screen switched to the third and probably the most gruesome looking figure of the three. The creature was covered in scales, with a long tail hanging down between its legs. The tip of the tail had a rattle.
"And finally, Mr. Travis, who has the combined DNA of a spitting Cobra and an Eastern Diamondback Rattlesnake."
"I think we came across this one's handiwork today. I thought I had heard something rattling." said Shalimar.
"I heard the rattling too," Claire spoke up.
"You were there?" Grant asked her.
"Yes, Johnny and I found the body."
Dr. Grant gave his granddaughter a stern look.
"Claire, I forbid you to leave the hotel premises until this is over," he said.
"But..."
"No buts. These creatures are very dangerous and I don't want you getting hurt."
"All right," she sighed.
Dr. Grant turned to Adam.
"It was never meant to get out of hand this way. I don't know how we could have miscalculated to such an extent." He shook his head. "I didn't find out about them escaping until this morning and I have absolutely no idea how they could have done so without raising the alarms."
"We can't worry about that now," said Adam. "We have to figure out a way to catch these things."
"I had taken the precaution of having Dr. Atherton implant tracking devices in them in case they did escape. However, the trackers don't seem to be working."
"Maybe I can help with that," said Jesse.
Atherton, who was standing to one side, gave a curt nod. "We would appreciate that," he said. "This way."
Jesse followed him as the others headed for the elevator.
"Shalimar, Brennan, Emma," Adam said. "I want the three of you to check out the crime scenes and see if you can pick up anything.
Brennan led the way down the narrow lane behind the nightclub. The Wolverine man had struck here. They had checked out the other two places and had found nothing. Shalimar's eyes turned yellow as she scanned the area.
Suddenly Emma stopped in her tracks. She sensed something. She couldn't tell what it was.
"What's wrong Emma?" Brennan asked.
"I don't know. I'm getting this feeling, like we're being watched.
Shalimar turned around abruptly sensing movement behind her. Her eyes went wide.
"Behind you!" she yelled.
Brennan whipped around to see a part of the wall leap towards him. Before he could do anything a big ball of grey fur smashed into him, knocking him down. Dazed, he looked up at his attacker and got a brief glimpse of the of a row of sharp, snarling teeth before a large clawed fist smashed into the side of his head knocking him out.
"Are you here on vacation?" Josh asked Claire.
They were sitting by the window in one of the rooms looking out over the golf course. It was dark outside and there weren't many light posts outside. The area outside was illuminated by the moonlight and it looked pretty spooky.
"No. I stay with my grandpa," Claire replied.
"What about your parents?"
Claire lowered her gaze to the floor.
"They died...in a car crash."
"Oh...I'm sorry. I know how you feel. I lost both my parents too."
They met each other's gaze for a second. Suddenly there was a sound outside. Claire turned to look out the window.
"That's one of them!" she said.
"What! Where?" Josh looked out the window.
"Come on," she said.
He turned around. Claire was headed out the door.
"Hey, where're you going?"
He jumped up and ran out behind her. She was headed down the stairs. He ran after her.
"Wait."
Claire walked out onto the back lawn of the hotel and towards the golf course. Josh came up running behind her.
"Adam told us to stay in the room," he said.
Claire turned to face him and raised an eyebrow. "Are you saying you're afraid?" she said.
"Hey, I'm not afraid of anything," Josh said indignantly.
"Well then, come on."
They walked a few metres till they came to the spot where Claire had seen one of the creatures.
Josh looked around. There was a clump of trees behind him. He turned to face Claire.
"I don't see anything," he said.
Claire's eyes went wide with surprise. She opened her mouth, but nothing came out. She lifted her hand and pointed to something behind him. Josh turned around, but not quick enough. Something smashed into the side of his face. Claire screamed. Josh barely noticed a black figure over him before he blacked out.
As the wolverine man knocked Brennan down, Shalimar rushed over to help him. Just then another creature came down the wall hissing and it blocked her path. It was the snake man. He hissed at her, a thin, fork like tongue worming out of his mouth. Then he opened his mouth and spat venom at her. She moved away just in time and the venom splattered on the wall behind her.
As the wolverine moved towards Emma, she sent a psionic blast at him. The blast knocked him back, but didn't seem to have done any damage. He shook his head, trying to clear it and then moved towards her, baring his teeth and snarling.
"Dr. Grant." Atherton's voice came over Grant's com-link.
"Yes, Edward."
"You better come down here. We found something."
"We'll be there."
Dr. Grant and Adam made their way down to the laboratory. As they exited the elevator, Adam noticed a figure lying on the floor.
"Jesse!"
Before he could take another step something cracked against the back of his head and he crumpled to the floor. Dr. Grant looked at the attacker, his eyes wide with shock.
TO BE CONTINUED.......
END OF EPISODE 5
This is a two-part episode. Hope you like it. Please review.