White Trash Zombie Apocalypse Diana Rowland

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.A shiver ran through me.I d seenenough redneck prejudice to knowexactly what the outcome would be. Well, that sucks. Yes, it does, he agreed, then gaveme a faint smile. Come on, he said,heading for the door. It s freezing inhere, and the conversation topic doesn thelp.He dimmed the light before exitingwith me into the warmer hallway. Fortunately I ve made somebreakthroughs with respect to conductingresearch on non-zombie test subjects.Which is important since it doesn t riskcrippling or disrupting the parasite in atrue zombie. That s what happened to Philip! Isaid, smugly pleased that I d guessedcorrectly back when Charish messed himup.I even told Philip so at the time, buthe was too busy trying to kill me tolisten.Dr.Nikas nodded. Experimentalfood combined with parasite stimulants.A very ugly cocktail for a zombie.Long-term effects on the parasite. What does that mean for the two hemade? I asked. Tim Bell and Roland.I, uh, ran into them at the Gourmet Gala.I made a sour face as I remembered thatfun encounter. Bell was screwed upand confused, I continued. At onepoint he grabbed cake instead of brains,and then it got ugly. I don t know, Angel, he said,looking sincerely troubled. I ve neverseen a case like it, and I don t have muchto go on other than Brian s report of theincident.Bizarre, erratic behavior.Iwould need to run tests on them.I bit my lower lip as I thought. Youknow, I had to maul the hell out of Philipto turn him, I said, remembering howhorribly natural it had felt. The wholething took a while maybe fifteenminutes at least, and Marcus told methat s the way it is supposed to be. Dr.Nikas gave a nod of agreement, and Iwent on. But Philip turned those two ina couple of minutes with one or twodeep bites.Did it have something to dowith the parasite stimulant Charish gavehim along with the fake brains?Dr.Nikas smiled. Exactly what Iconcluded based on what I knew.I amquite certain their parasite is crippled.Then he exhaled, smile fading. Impulsive creation of zombies,especially damaged ones, is not goodfor our kind.Very risky on many levels.Those two are poster children for why Idon t test alternative brains on truezombies.That reminded me of Dr.Nikas searlier comment about breakthroughsusing non-zombie test subjects. Wait.You have regular humans eat fakebrains? I made an eeeeew face. Oh, heavens no, he said, and madejust as much of an eeeeew face. At leastI would never do that.There is a way tocause a regular human to adopt variousaspects of the zombie biochemistry,mimicking zombie traits for shortperiods without actual introduction ofthe parasite.Quite fascinating really.Ihave a small number of volunteers fromour people with whom I work.Someemployees, some family members ofzombies. That s pretty damn nice of them tovolunteer for a study that won t directlybenefit them, I said. It is, he agreed. But they all trulybelieve it s for everyone s benefit tofind an acceptable alternate for brains.Made sense.I could totally seemyself volunteering if it was my dadwho was the zombie. However, he added, it simportant that they be monitored closely,since it can be dangerous to mimic theparasite activity for too long.It limitsour work somewhat, but I would have itno other way.Yep, I definitely liked Dr.Nikas.We re-entered the main lab area, andI continued to shamelessly gawk ateverything.Maybe after I got my GED Icould start taking some college classesin biology or something like that? Imean, why the hell not? I needed to startlooking beyond the next decade or so. Pietro told me you weretranquilized last night, but that it wasdifferent from your previous experienceof being tranqed, Dr.Nikas said.Hepeered at me with naked curiosity. Would you mind sharing yourexperience? I wouldn t mind at all, I said, thenproceeded to tell him everything,including how I d gone completelyunconscious, the brains tasting awful fora while, and the injuries not healing atfirst.As I spoke, Dr.Nikas s eyes took ona faraway look as if he either wasn tpaying attention or was deeplyprocessing what I d told him.I wasfairly sure it was the latter, and Iremained quiet after I finished.After a moment, his gaze came backto me. This is new.It seems as thoughSaberton has found a way to efficientlytranquilize the parasite withoutdamaging it, hence the lack of healingeven with brains available, and thetemporary revulsion to brains. That s bad, huh? I put the piecestogether. Bad mainly because you can tdo it too, and also probably because youdon t have an antidote since it s new.He gave me a sharp look, and I hadthe feeling he liked that I d put ittogether. Yes.Exactly.The ability totranquilize the parasite could beextremely useful in research or evenongoing zombie care, he said,expression going grim. And if Sabertonor others have this tranq, and we don thave an antidote, well, it s extremelydangerous.I pursed my lips. Would it reallyhelp you to have some of my blood?Surprised relief shone in his eyes,and he gave me a simple grave nod. Yes, it would.At the minimum, we arecurrently at a disadvantage because theyhave samples of your blood and I don t and I don t know why they wantedyour blood, which puts us at even moreof a disadvantage. He exhaled. Plus, ifthere is even a trace of the tranqremaining, it could be invaluable. All right then, I said. I ll give yousome.Because I really don t want thosefuckers to have any advantage. Angel, I know you don t know me,Dr.Nikas said, face and voice serious, but I give you my word that I won t useyour blood against you in any way [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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