Taken - Lost (Book 1 of the Taken Trilogy)

Prologue

Monsieur Raoul Paraguay stood in the Viewing Room, which looked out into the Testing Room. He was sure that this time, his experiment would work. He had taken the most deadly diseases ever discovered, among which the Black Plague itself looked like the common cold, and he had reversed them to the point that instead of taking people's lives, it would extend them. He called it the Miracle.

It had been three years to prove he was ready for testing the Miracle on human beings. Before, he had tested it on wolves and lions, chimps and rattlesnakes. The Miracle had pushed Death's scythe away for all of them. At last, he had a human volunteer. Boone Durand, an unemployed fellow who was in it for the €3,000 compensation, not the honor that it would bestow upon his name. The first near-immortal human being, and he was in it for the money. Paraguay pushed the faint whine of annoyance to the back of his head. The reasons for testing didn't matter. The fact that it was happening did.

As he gazed through the window, Durand in the Testing Lab below swallowed the pill (in a rather unceremonious fashion, in Paraguay's opinion, but no use crying over spilt milk). This was the pill that had been five years in the making. The pill that would save humankind. Paraguay felt an intoxicating rush of power. Paris would be known as the start of human immortality.

At least, that was what he thought before Durand began to scream. It was the most anguished cry in the world, and all Paraguay wanted was for it to stop - that was, until it did. Because when the scream stopped, Durand doubled over in silent, horrifying, convulsing misery. He was not silent because the pain was fading, but because the pain was so total and dominant, soaked with his own blood and tears into every fiber of his being, it was beyond words. His limbs were moving of their own accord, sickening crunches made it seem as if his bones were performing surgery on themselves with no knowledge of anatomy. His skin had turned red and was blistering so quickly it looked like his flesh was foaming. The monster, for that was what it was now, a being that had replaced poor, unwitting Durand's body with its own, seemed to have accelerated decomposition itself. The thinning red hair on Durand's scalp shed itself. Paraguay thanked God that he could not see Durand's face as he looked on in horror, every cell in his body paralyzed by fear. Finally, blessedly, the transformation stopped. The monster was still.

Paraguay started to move away, the paralysis broken. But then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw the monster move. He peered out into the Lab to see Horror's face itself.

The eyes had green corneas, red irises, and slits for pupils. The flesh was pale and mottled purple. The nails had turned into claws and the teeth, fangs. And the face was almost entirely obscured by pus-filled welts the size of golf balls. That thing was not human. The creature screeched and lunged for the cast-iron door, ripping it off its hinges. Raoul knew where it was going. The screeches were getting closer. He gripped his phone and dialed his family's number.

"I- I am not going to be coming home." After those first eight words, the reality of the situation hit him square in the lungs, forcing his goodbyes to babble out of him, hoping desperately there would be time to say all he needed, all he yearned, to say. "Sweethearts, I have made a big mistake, and I'm not ever going to see you again. I love you so much, and I want you to know that. Please protect the people who need protection, and stay strong for me, okay? Charlotte, Elaine, you two take care of Michael. He needs two great big sisters to take care of him, and Angela, I need you to never give up, for the kids. This mistake - no one will be able to fix it. Leave the country, as soon as you can."

He hung up his phone after he left the message. The creature burst through the door and ripped at his flesh and all he knew was pain, his body was killing him, agony was all he was, he wanted death just to end the pain -

And then he was Taken.