The Doomsday Strand

Chapter Seven

Kidman started by hooking Jack and Lillian up to vital sign monitors, which displayed the output on one of the monitors at the computer station. Jack's heart rate was stable, while Lillian's was almost stopping. There were other vital sign readings that Hunter didn't recognize, but he knew that Lillian's weren't normal.

"I need your help here, Agent Black." Kidman said as she prepared an injection. "Hold the girl down."

Hunter held Lillian down by the shoulders as Kidman injected something into her arm. Lillian shook violently, nearly knocking Hunter backwards. After a few seconds of struggling, Lillian settled down again, and her vital signs stabilized. A little color returned to her cheeks, and her breathing stabalized.

"What did you give her?" Hunter asked.

"A little something to buy her some time." Kidman said, reaching for another needle. She used this one to collect a sample of Lillian's blood.

"Have you ever stopped an alien virus outbreak before?"

"A few. The viruses I've seen all caused light flu symptoms. Headache, low fevers, that kind of stuff. In all those cases, we blamed the outbreak on radiation and chemical leaks. But what this girl has? I've never seen anything like it."

Kidman injected Lillian's blood sample into a small, metallic capsule she took from her pocket. She inserted the capsule into a port in one of the computers, and in turn one of the many monitors started to flash text as the blood was analyzed.

Hunter watched the text on the monitor as the computer did it's magic. He didn't understand a word of what was being shown to him, but he knew it all had to do with medicine. Kidman watched the screen too, muttering mental notes to herself as the text flew by. After about a minute, a phrase that Hunter understood showed up on the screen: 'No viral pathogen found'.

"Oh, Thank God." Kidman said, putting a hand over her chest. "It's not a virus."

"Then what is it?"

"The computer will tell us. It could be radiation poisoning, but I'm not sure. She should be showing signs of hair loss and skin peeling if that were the case."

A couple more minutes passed as the computer did it's work, flashing loads of text on screen. Hunter paced around the room impatiently, and even took a sip from his rum canteen. He wanted nothing more than to just finish his mission and go home. It had been a very long day. When he turned back towards the monitor, he saw that the text had stopped. A single sentence was shown on screen: 'No cause found'.

"What does that mean?" Hunter asked. "Does that mean she'll be okay?"

"It means that whatever she has hasn't been discovered yet. I'm going to do a few more tests on her. Tissue sampling, biometric tests and DNA sequencing."

"If it's not viral, does it mean I can go?"

"Protocol states that a field agent has to stand by while a medical officer is in possession of a living witness, so no. If you're going to stand here and bitch about, I'm going to have to ask you to wait downstairs. You can take your friend with you."

Kidman pointed to Jack, who was starting to show signs of waking up. 

"Don't kill him." Kidman said. "Until we knew what this is, I need him alive."

...

Jack woke up with a throbbing pin in the pack of his head and the slight taste of blood in his mouth. He was sitting in a chair with his arms tied behind his back. There was nobody else in the living room with him, and the front door was wide open. He listened for anyone else in the house, and deciding he was alone, stood up with his hands still bound to the chair and made for the door. He stopped immediately when Hunter entered the house.