Chapter 21
A cure? The words echoed around in my head as whispers from the dead began all around me, growing louder and louder, becoming shouts, warnings. My world grew fuzzy and I dropped the cell phone onto the floor. The shouts continued and my vision became more blurry until I had to close my eyes. The whispers slowly died until they eventually disappeared. After a moment of silence, I opened my eyes.
What the heck! I thought, this is not happening, not again. It can't be happening, I'm not asleep.
But it was happening. For some unknown reason I was enduring another of my out-of-body experiences, while I was still awake. This was getting strange. I was sitting in the same room, but the date on the calendar said it was the 25th March 2021, a week from now. The TV was on, the news showing, something about the new suppressant. I listened to the newscaster report about the suppressant was having the exact opposite effect than what it was made for. Instead of slowing the virus down, it was speeding it up. Our kind was dying twice as fast as before. I heard the whisper urging me to delve further into the future. I closed my eyes…
And opened them onto a completely different scene. I was standing outside in the street, looking into the window of a shop full of TVs. There was a broadcast from the president. His face was grim as he addressed the country. I listened to his speech, listened to his words waiting for the next piece of information, and then it came. The announcement was that with the population of the Altered diminished and the virus' host supply extremely low, the virus had mutated and was now infecting humans and that no cure was to be found. But the worst thing was, humans had no immunity to the virus whatsoever. The whispers started and I closed my eyes again.
The next view was even worse. The streets were abandoned, the shops were shuttered closed, boards of wood were covering the windows and doors and there were cars left abandoned in the street. I looked around and found one of the stores still open, it was the same one from the other visions, the one with the TVs in it. Most of the TVs had been stolen, or were broken. One was still working and had a video playing. The video was grimmer than the speech given by the President. It showed views of New York, people who had lain down and died from the disease, littered the streets. Traffic was still backed up on the roads, but their drivers had either abandoned their vehicles or had died at the wheel. It was all so disgusting and slightly horrific. What made it worse was the fact that the video was being narrated by a surviving human. It seemed that some people were lucky enough to have survived the epidemic. All of this because someone had decided that they didn't want to share a world with our kind. This time the whispers from the dead didn't come, but it was Skye's voice that penetrated my vision.
I snapped out of it and realized I had dropped the cell phone on the ground and picked it up. A frantic Skye was on the other end, repeating my name over and over, trying to get my attention.
"Skye," I said, still shaking from the vision, "What ever you do, do not get any injection for the suppressant, at all. It will only make things worse."
"Blaze," Skye replied, "I was worried, I heard the phone drop and you didn't reply, what is going on there?"
"I just had another vision," I answered, "This suppressant will only make matters worse. Do not let them inject you with it. I'm afraid it's already too late to stop what is going to happen…"
Chapter 22
"What is going to happen?" Skye asked, "Nathan, what did you see?"
I stood there quietly, not answering her question at first. I mean, how can you tell someone that you've just finished seeing the end of all civilization as we know it? If anyone knows the answer, please, tell me now.
"I saw…" I hesitated in telling her, but I had to, "I saw that things might get worse, a lot worse. The virus may destroy most of our population and then infect the humans."
"My god!" Skye gasped, "Is it that bad?"
"It's worse," I replied. "From what I saw after that, all civilization on earth as we know it will be devastated. It won't recover. We may be looking at the end of the world unless something happens to stop it."
Both of us went silent. Myself to ponder my next move, what I was going to do next to try to prevent what I had just seen, and Skye, to absorb the information that I had just told her.
"Skye," I said, breaking the silence, "I want you to be safe. I want you to keep everyone there safe. Promise me that if things get too bad, you will get out of here, you will go somewhere safe. Please promise me that."
"Blaze…"Skye replied.
"Skye," I said again, "Please promise me. Please."
"Alright," Skye replied, "I promise. Be safe…"
"You too, Skye," I replied as I hung up the phone, then whispered to myself, "Be safe."
I walked back to the room Dark had lent me and placed my cell phone down on the bedside cabinet. I collapsed onto the bed and stared up at the roof. Before I had been tired, now I was too scared to go to sleep. I was afraid of what I might see in my dreams. I had to stop it from happening. I had to stop this virus from killing all those people, from destroying civilization as we know it. Tomorrow I was going to go check out the blank spot on the map. The one that all the dead bodies were all centered around. I was sure there was a lab or a base there. I had to find out what was going on, before things got out of hand. We needed a cure soon, within the next week or so, if I was to stop the things I saw from happening. Eventually I drifted off to a dreamless sleep, no thoughts or visions penetrating the shroud of darkness that engulfed my mind.
Chapter 23
I woke to the smell of bacon wafting through the apartment. It was something I should have been used to, what with our household so full of people always rushing around in the morning. Surprisingly it wasn't Skye who cooked it, but Dark. To be honest, Dark is a really good cook; he should open his own restaurant, if we all survive what's going on now.
I dragged myself out of bed and stumbled down the hallway to the shower. Once it was warm I hopped in and let the hot water run down my back, feeling my muscles relax slightly, feeling my feathers become saturated and heavy from the water. I spent most of my day with my wings tucked up against my back, always afraid to show what I was, in case my family was targeted by one of the groups that wanted us dead. Here, people were too busy about surviving to worry about which group people belong to.
Once I was finished, I hopped out of the shower and dried myself off, flapping my wings to dry the feathers. I threw on a new pair of jeans and a t-shirt; slipping my wings through the slits, leaving them open to dry properly. Trying to fly with wet wings is not fun, the damp feathers added extra weight to carry around. I looked up and saw my reflection in the mirror. My dirty blond colored hair was matted and damp, plastered to my head and looking like it hadn't been combed in my entire life, which it hadn't. My eyes, an unnatural pale violet color that definitely didn't come from my genes, were haunted by dreams that no-one should have to endure.
I hung my towel up on the rack and walked into the kitchen to find Dark at the stove cooking the breakfast that I had smelt earlier. I walked over to the table and picked up a piece of bacon and toast and began to eat. I was hungry from the flight here last night and hadn't eaten anything since their stop halfway to the city.
"Sleep well?" Dark asked me.
"Like a rock," I replied.
"You know," Dark said, "having the ability to know the future doesn't give you the power to change it. Sometimes all it allows you to do is prepare for what is coming."
"Huh?" I replied. I know, not the most intelligent response, but my brain was still half asleep.
"I overheard your conversation," Dark said, "With Skye was it? Who is she?"
"Yes," I replied, "She's my life partner."
The Angelan used the term life partner instead of wife or husband, considering that the Altered weren't given any privileges in that area, but mainly because it referred to the bird nature of the Angelan. With birds, when they choose a partner, it's for life, without the huge unnecessary weddings. If someone is willing to love another, there is no need to perform a fancy ceremony. You know that you love each other; people only have weddings to make their love legal in the eyes of the government, or they are insecure about their love and have to confirm it is really there.
"I couldn't bring her with me," I continued, "I don't know if she has immunity or not. She's at home taking care of our daughter. If I'm guessing correctly, she should at least have partial immunity to the virus."
"You have a daughter?" Dark asked me, "How old is she?"
"She's two months old," I replied. "Has her mother's eyes."
"She'll be fine," Dark replied, sensing the sadness in my voice, "Both of them will be."
"I don't mean to sound negative," I replied, "but I hope so, I really hope so."
We both sat in silence as we ate. A moment later Flame walked in Her hair was damp from the shower and she had her wings slightly open as well to let them dry.
"You wouldn't happen to have a hair dryer would you?" She asked.
Both Dark and I burst out laughing.
"What?" She asked.
"In case you haven't noticed," Dark replied, trying to keep a straight face, "This is a bachelor pad; I doubt you'd find a hair dryer anywhere in here. I thought you'd be able to tell from the state of our hair."
Chapter 24
I sat in a tree, just outside the perimeter of the blank spot that was on my map, although it wasn't so blank in real life. I had left Dark's apartment half an hour after I had finished breakfast and had half flown, half walked through the forest, passing the quarantine borders and headed to the area that was blank on the map.
When I had arrived at the edge of the spot on the map I had climbed the tallest tree in the area and was sitting there now, staring at the laboratory / base, whatever it was. I was unsure because I could see whitecoats scurrying around looking busy and professional. Crates were stacked outside the buildings. Some of them were normal packing crates, but my blood ran cold when I saw the dog crates stacked against one building. They were similar to the ones I had been kept in back at Eden, my birth place, the place where the second generation were first discovered.
But the thing that confused me was the military presence around the base. What was the military doing here? I couldn't understand that. Weren't they trying to cure the disease? Then why were they helping the whitecoats? Were they making the cure here? I decided to take a look and see what was going on. I slowly crept out of the tree and over to the wired fence surrounding the place. I had found a section of the fence that was temporarily unguarded for a window of about three minutes. No guards were around the area and the cameras were all turned away from the fence. I jumped over the fence, crept over to the closest building and flattened myself behind the crates as the guard came around the corner for his regular sweep of the area.
Once he was gone I crept around the building and took a look around, trying to find a way into the building. The place was a flurry of activity; I doubt anyone would have noticed an intruder except for the guards around the fence. The rest of the place was in chaos. People were frantically scurrying around from one building to another carrying their clipboards and pens. I was about to move when a group of soldiers approached the helicopter pad in the centre of the grounds. A few minutes later I could hear the beat of helicopter blades on the air and the guards stood to attention. The helicopter flew in from the north and landed on the pad. A well-decorated soldier rushed up to the door and opened it. I had to see what was going on, but it was nearly impossible with the clothing I was wearing.
A guard got a bit too curious about what was going on in the main yard and came close to my hiding spot. Luck seemed to be on my side; his uniform looked to be about my size and I could probably pass as him, if no-one noticed my eyes and I never showed my full face. I quickly grabbed him while people were preoccupied and knocked him out with an elbow to the forehead. I stashed him in a nearby crate, quickly put on the uniform and equipped myself with the guard's rifle.
I stepped out from the crates and into the guard's previous position just as the camera came around. I continued walking forward so that I could get closer to the entrance of the main building. I was about to enter when a face caught my attention in the helicopter. I would recognize him anywhere. His face was on the television when our kind was first found. He was the one who wanted us all locked up and kept under control. Then I began to put the pieces together. This place was where the virus was created; where whitecoats were running all over the place with protection from the military. They weren't trying to find a cure; it was the military that made the virus, to control our population and now that they realized that it could become a threat, they were trying to find a cure. It was his face that gave me the final clue. It was him… Secretary of Defense John Marsten...
Chapter 25
I could barely keep control of my anger at what this idiot could do. He was the one who had authorized all this. He was the one who had put Skye's and Max's lives at risk. I so wanted to punch the arrogant politician's face in for what he had done. Right now he was standing across the field from me with a professional look on his face. He didn't realize that he had set in motion events that would lead to the collapse of all civilization as we know it.
I pushed my anger aside and focused on getting inside the building unnoticed. I found the ID card that I had snagged, swiped it through the reader and pushed open the door. I walked down the bland white hallway until I reached an elevator and pressed the call button. I walked inside and traveled down to the living quarters. I knew that to get into the labs I would require a whitecoat's ID, which meant another change in clothing. How great.
The elevator reached the living quarters and I walked out of the cart, no-one paying any attention to me; I was just another guard coming off shift. I walked down the corridor looking in rooms for a suitable ID card that I could swipe for myself. About halfway down the hallway there was an open door and a lab coat had been discarded on the floor. I picked it up and placed it on the door to the room, swiping the ID as I did so. I continued down the corridor and came to the locker room. I quickly changed out of the soldier uniform and into the all-whites of those that worked in the labs. I looked at the ID and cursed myself. I was not going to be able to pass as a female lab technician. I walked back out into the hallway and looked around the area. Spotting nothing easy to swipe, I resorted to drastic measures. I walked up to one of the closed doors and checked it, but unfortunately it was locked. Thank god, Falcon had taught me how to pick locks, although I had to confiscate his lock-pick pack when I caught him trying to pick the lock on our front door after sneaking out late at night.
I pulled that pack out of my pocket under the whites I was wearing and pulled out two slim tools to work on the lock with. After a moment I was able to pop the lock open and I entered the room. It was plain and barren as if no-one was living in there, but there was. I could hear them breathing in their sleep. I looked around the room until I saw the coat up on the wall hook. I slipped over quietly and picked it off the shirt, making sure I could at least pass as this person. Thankfully the answer was yes.
The rest of the infiltration was a piece of cake. I made it into the lab without any problems. Most of the whitecoats were too busy preparing for the arrival of the Secretary of Defense to notice me; I was just another work mate in a hurry to be ready. I hurried past workstations; some clean, freshly tidied, others were in the works of being cleaned and the last lots were just war zones, total anarchy. I hurried past them until I reached another elevator that led deeper into the facility. I swiped the card and entered the elevator, selecting the floor that had 'mainframe' written above it. I wanted some answers and I was darn well going to get them.
The door opened and I walked out into a white sterile room that was used to remove any static electricity that could damage the computer mainframe. After it was complete the door on the other end of the room opened onto a large spire in the centre of a circular room. A catwalk was extended to the main computer access point. I walked along it and reached the terminal, quickly accessing the computer and looked through the information stored on the mainframe. The data was near endless and I couldn't believe such a computer system existed. I had set up computer systems in two separate places that were capable of sorting through information, but not even they could hold all of this. So I decided to look only for the files I needed…
