Paradise Lost(ONC Entry- Unfinished)

Part 19: Dr. Fox

Jerry tried to refocus his blurry eyes. He still couldn't move, couldn't blink. Dust accumulated on his dry eyeballs, leaving them dry and irritated. Despite the discomfort he'd fallen asleep again.

Through a grey coating obscuring his vision he could see he was still in hydroponics. Jackson had moved Jerry once, from the failing apple grove to a section he didn't recognize. It was barren and covered in dust. There were others there. All like him, all living statues.

Time was hard to track in his frozen state. Eventually Jerry started to doze off again, a strange sensation when he couldn't close his eyes. Movement amidst the field of statues shook off his torpor. Figures moved into view. They weren't the right size to be Jackson. One was too short, the other too slim. Jerry tried to cry out, tried to make a sound, any sound, but all he managed what a hoarse wheeze. He needed water badly. Regardless, the figures ignored him. Whatever Jackson was doing in hydroponics he had help.

The figures carried a body between them, adding to the collection. What little he could see from the man's attire he must have worked in one of the cafeterias. Jackson had done the same more than once, but this time was different. This time they took a body away with them.

Jerry waited for the figures to return, marshaling what little strength he could muster in preparation. He was determined to get their attention. He waited.

And waited.

And waited more.

Just when he was ready to give up he once more glimpses movement among the statues. This figure was different, it ducked and dodged as if it were trying to avoid detection. Curious, Jerry watched the figure move from person to person. It felt like an eternity before the figure approached him. What he thought might be a hump proved to be an oxygen tank. A tank connected to a mask.

Excited, Jerry shouted with all his might. A sickly cough escaped his lungs. The masked figure jumped back, eyes wide. The hood of his poncho fell back, and Jerry was able to get his first real look at him. It was Gary Hodges. Gary got to his feet and used a rag to clear the dust from Jerry's face.

"Fox, you idiot! You can't be here." He looked around before ducking out of sight.

Despair truly set in for Jerry. He didn't have enough in him to call out again.

When Gary returned Jerry would have cried with joy if he wasn't so weak and dehydrated. Hodges produced a syringe from the confines of his poncho.

"I only have one of these, fool. Don't make me regret this?"

Jerry couldn't ask him what he intended to do with the needle. Gary jammed the syringe into Jerry's chest and pressed down the plunger. Fire poured into his heart, and through his bloodstream. The fire swept through his core and out to his extremities. Jerry took an agonizing breath, and regurgitated a stomach full of yellow pus and champagne colored liquid.

He collapsed, and lay shaking on the dust-covered ground.

"It worked!" Gary nudged Jerry with his foot, and stepped around the contents of his stomach. "I can't touch you until we get you cleaned up. If you want out of here, you're gonna need to walk."

"I... I can't move," Jerry said. He paused in surprise. "I'm t... talking. I can talk."

"Yes, idiot, but can you walk. I won't wait for your friends to come back."

"I'm coming, ev... even if I have to crawl."

Jerry struggled to his knees. It took him three tries to get to his feet and, true to his word, Gary didn't offer a hand.

"Let's go. There's a dozen of those fake men running around here." Gary pulled up his hood. "Don't touch anything."

Garry led them through the field of frozen bodies and through to a section which had been under construction before the fungus took over. They skirted mounds of construction beams and strange alien growths and finally stopped at a dust-covered span devoid of any plant life. Gary looked around as if he feared being watched. Once he was content that they were alone he flashed the open space. The air shimmered, and a small shack rippled into view.

Jerry hadn't expected the structure, but a hidden hideout seemed actually the kind of thing Gary would build.

"Wait here," Gary said, pointing to an X he scratched in the dust.

"What if someone comes?"

"You go back to the garden." Gary shrugged and disappeared inside.

Jerry didn't have to wait long, the man was quick and returned with a crate.

"Everything off." He opened a bio-hazard bag. "Goes in here. All of it."

Jerry chuckled, but Gary made it clear he was serious.

"But, I-"

"All of it or I leave you out here."

With arms suffering from minor atrophy disrobing proved far harder than Jerry expected. Gary watched from a distance. Once the clothes were safely sealed away, he produced a hosed canister. Before Jerry could inquire, Gary blasted him with the contents.

"Fuck, Gary! This stuff burns!"

"It's supposed to," he replied before firing another blast. "Anti-fungal delouser. Mostly active lye."

"Gary, it's acid!"

"Mostly. You'll live." Gary empties the contents with his final blast. He studied Jerry with a collapsible pointer stick. "Yeah, you'll live. Come on. We'll do your feet inside the door."

Jerry followed reluctantly. Gary Hodges had always been considered eccentric, but being naked and covered in burning acid Jerry Fox realized the man was just plain crazy. A crazy man who'd saved him. Jerry was in no position to complain.

Inside, Gary slammed the door and typed a key code into the security pad. The entire shack shook, and a low hum filled the air. Jerry was sure the light cloak had reactivated, a technology that was supposed to be speculative. He wanted to ask Gary about it, but he had more pressing questions.

"Gary, what's going on?"

"The ship is being overrun... just like I said it would."

"You said we were going to boarded by croabarbos pirates or eaten by flesh farmers. Not this. Whatever it is."

"Either way, I was right."

"Maybe... how did you know an adrenaline shot would counteract the paralysis?"

"Not adrenaline, fungicide."

"What?"

"The ship's infested with fungi, idiot."