The Virus Within: Secrets Unraveled (Book 5)

Ch 19: A Story From The Past

The lightbars were too bright to take my sunglasses off, so I squinted at the faded printing on the photocopy. One section looked like comparisons of triggers between the ranks, several pages mentioned the development of a cure or something to block the regular zombie triggers.

One page had a detailed account of a Nightstalker's healing rate based on one's movement when recovering from a shotgun blast to the leg. The hair rose on the back of my neck as I read about an event that looked exactly like an outsider's view of when I'd been shot.

I didn't recognize the handwriting, and it definitely wasn't Nina's. With a frown, I opened the sealed original document and sniffed, but the papers had been handled by dozens of strangers over the last few months which made it impossible to pick up something that might be three years old. Rage began trickling through my veins, but it was focused since there wasn't anything I could do at the moment, even if my hunch was correct.

Picking up the photocopy again, I held it through the back window and demanded, "Is this Louise's handwriting?"

The light in the cab flicked on, and a growl confirmed my suspicions even before Daniel said, "Yes. Was that in the lab?"

"Yes. I grabbed all the papers on the tables, but we might need to go back another day in case I missed something. I saw something about them using drones for a delivery system, and it might explain what happened in those towns. Let me see if I can find those papers."

I set Louise's notes to the side—I wanted to read more and discover exactly how much she had learned about me—and searched for the correct folders with the drone papers.

I leafed through them but it mostly looked like the mechanics for building a drone capable of carrying a pressurized tank. Nothing about what it might have carried. All three folders held similar papers.

The majority of the other folders were from the other two tables. I selected some that had been close together. Oddly enough, I didn't see a clear project name although they seemed similar and talked about triggers a lot. Several different sets of handwriting outlined different plans.

"They were definitely trying to create something they could spread through the air," I told Daniel. "It almost looks like different groups were trying to use their own ideas to reach a common goal."

I grew frustrated as I sifted through more and more scientific gibberish that made no sense to me but was probably clear as day to someone like Nina. Giving up on that group of folders, I grabbed more out of the bin.

Five folders later, I opened a notebook and finally found something that resembled a journal instead of the ingredients list on the back of a candy bar.

The very first page made me growl, then mutter, "Some traders found the notes in a washed-up van about six months ago. They were in a waterproof case. Blast it."

"I didn't even think to check the van after seeing the wet papers fall out."

"Especially not while Regan was coming to terms with his old friend's death," I agreed absently, still skimming each day's summarized events and progress. "Well, the good news is that they didn't have an actual sample of Terror blood or know the exact triggers, but they had dozens of Runners and a feral Nightstalker locked up somewhere."

"I knew this group had caught a feral Nightstalker. They even asked a sane Runner to try feeding it animal blood, but the Nightstalker was definitely feral and it didn't work."

The moon drifted through the sky as I leafed through months and months worth of experiments and chemical interactions. It was easy to tell which days he had called Nina, since her name appeared every week without fail.

Altering my voice so Daniel knew I was reading, I quoted, "'We believe we know enough to begin working on our projects. After much consideration amongst ourselves, we split into three groups. Two groups will work on a serum that can be dispersed in the air, and the Lorrelie brothers will alter the sanity serum to create stronger zombies. Tib tries the best he can, but as a Runner, his attempts to guard the Stronghold are limited against the higher-ranking zombies.'"

"Tib is a sane Runner who lived there. Did you see him?" A note of worry lined Daniel's voice, but unfortunately for him, I didn't have good news.

"There was no sane or pure-blooded Runner present. Just a dozen or so unranked ones."

"I hope he's okay. What is the airborne serum supposed to do?"

"I haven't figured that part out yet. He doesn't say much more than "reduce the feral threat". There are a lot of chemical names and terms here that I don't recognize or understand."

The journal suddenly got a lot more detailed as he jotted down the summarized results of their tests.

"They were testing on the feral Runners locked in a building down the road," I said. "The serum made them drowsy and as slow as regular zombies—I guess that's what the serum was supposed to do—and the regular zombies were even slower. Oh, look at this... 'After dozens of successful aerosol serum tests in controlled environments, I sent the groups out for field tests. Derby's drone broke before they could deploy the mixture, so they lured a dozen zombies into a barn. They said it was successful, but they are oddly quiet and are heavily revising their formula, so I have my reservations.' That was just over a month ago."

"Wren and Jax," Daniel murmured.

"Vernon's group successfully quieted the zombies in a small town, so Derby has abandoned his research and joined their group. They have made a large batch of aerosol serum and will test it in a city. I had to drive the notion of Spokane out of their minds—too few roads and too many zombies. They picked a town called Kennewick, which used to be home to roughly a hundred thousand people. They have packed everything and will leave in the morning."

"When was that?"

I double-checked the date. "Just over a month ago, and one week after the barn test."

I kept reading and found an interesting entry. "Four days later, he says, 'What I once counted as a success might need refining. The zombies that received the last version of the aerosol serum are no longer as calm and slow. I rechecked the triggers, and all seem to be correct, minus one that has reverted to normal. When the group returns from Kennewick, we will have to investigate more. Their efforts in the city might have been for naught.'"

Daniel slowly said, "If they spread that serum over the entire town, that is a lot of unranked zombies."

"Yeah... The next entry mentions that someone was bitten by a zombie and volunteered to take the refined sanity serum instead of the cure."

"And?"

"The journal stops."