Welcome To The Umbrella Corporation

Chapter Eleven

Each time, it became easier. The trespasser was the first, but not the only one. After him came the homeless man, a hitch-hiking vagrant the guards found walking down the road leading toward Raccoon City. After that, Marcus arranged to fire one of the janitors at the mansion, and then had him sent to the lab on his final day. Marcus winced in horror and disgust when he fed the trespasser to the leeches, his stomach twisting at the thought of the horrible crime he was committing. But he eagerly awaited sending the janitor to the leeches, and watched them kill the poor man with fascinated intensity, spending almost that entire evening writing notes, combining what he learned with what he already knew about the leeches’ behavior.

While they could kill and completely devour a small animal like a rabbit or a cat, the leeches could not eat an entire human being. After chewing through the victim’s abdomen and chest cavity, they were sated. The victim became reanimated shortly after. Marcus burned them and sent the charred bodies to the treatment plant.

The leeches were more important to him than the lives of innocent people, they were more important than his career, they were more important than anything he had ever known. Studying them, learning about them, experimenting with them, and feeding them became an unstoppable obsession. He abandoned all his other responsibilities in favor of the overwhelming desire to study his precious leeches.

He spent hours just watching them. He slid his chair next to the terrarium in the main lab and just watched them, like a child watching a tank full of swimming, glittering goldfish. And incredibly, the leeches seemed to watch him as well. Sometimes, they lined up in the terrarium and sat still, staring at him with their black, glass-like eyes. Marcus felt sure that they were studying him the same way he studied them.

He was their creator, their benefactor, their caretaker. Marcus had never married, never had children of his own. But the leeches took the place of family. They were his children and he was their father.

He forgot completely about giving Spencer updates, and began to just ignore the messages on his answering machine. He never answered the main phone, just the security phone. He stopped visiting the labs, stopped even faking an interest in the work the other scientists were doing, stopped even making an effort to perform the other responsibilities of his job. He became a hermit, a self-contained shut away. He spent 20 hours a day working with the leeches, with four hours of sleep in between. By now, he had four tanks with four different breeds growing simultaneously, and he tried desperately to give his undivided attention to each one. His lab became a cluttered mess of scrawled notes, designs, essays, diagrams, and reams of wrinkled computer print-outs.

And then, the breakthrough he had been working for. After dissecting yet another specimen, he made some slides and put them under the microscope. His hands trembled uncontrollably as he adjusted the magnification, as the squirming cells came into focus. His eyes widened in amazement at what the leeches had become, what their DNA had transformed into.

The Progenitor was no longer evident in the DNA. It was fused completely with the leech DNA, bonded to it like nothing Marcus had ever seen before. With a start, he realized that the DNA was now totally intertwined. His leeches were no longer infected with the Progenitor, they were combined with the Progenitor. They were one organism. The leeches and the Progenitor were now the same thing.

Marcus fell back into his chair and let his arms hang limp at his sides. He felt out of breath. After constant long-term breeding of the infected leeches, he finally achieved success. He accomplished his goal. The Progenitor was now fused with the leech DNA, creating something totally new, totally unique.

He stumbled out of his chair, almost falling on his face. After so many days with barely any sleep and poor diet, he was weak and perpetually exhausted. But he couldn’t stop now, not when he was this close.

He slid a metal containment tray into a slot under the terrarium and lured two of his leeches into it. After fastening the front panel, he slid the tray back out and carried it down the dimly lit hallway. Trying to hurry, he tripped on a stray cable and nearly dropped the tray. He got up gingerly, rubbing his knee, which had struck the floor. Being more careful the rest of the way, he reached one of the observation rooms and set the tray down.

In the supply room where the animals were stored, there were only two rabbits and a few birds left. He had ordered more lab animals a few days before, but they weren’t in yet. He was about to take one of the rabbits when the urge hit him. He had fully intended for the janitor to be the last human host, but this was important. The leeches were now fully integrated with the Progenitor virus, and he had to see what effect that would have on the virus’ infectious properties. This was the most important test he had to do, and he didn’t want to do it with a rabbit or a bird, he wanted to perform the experiment with a human host.

He grabbed the security phone and dialed. “Send someone to my lab,” he said as soon as it picked up. “I need help with something.”

Waiting for the guard was torture. After a painfully long wait of ten minutes, a guard buzzed in the rear entrance to the lab. Marcus ushered him in and led him down the hallway to the observation room. The ventilation duct cover was off and lying on the floor.

“Something in the vent is making noise,” Marcus said, pointing up at the vent. “I think one of the filter panels is loose and rattling around in there.”

“Why don’t you call maintenance, sir?”

“I can’t have some repairman in here,” Marcus scoffed. “They don’t have security clearance. And I need this fixed right now.”

“What do you want me to do?”

Marcus handed him a screwdriver. “Just get on that chair, reach into the vent, and tighten the screws on the filter cover.”

The guard paused, looking uncertainly at the observation room. “Sir, are you sure that’s safe?”

“Of course it’s safe,” Marcus said. “I would do it myself, but I hurt my knee the other day and don’t want to be standing on a chair where I might fall down. Besides, I’m not tall enough to reach the screws.”

“I mean, is it safe to be in that room? The ventilation system ...” The guard trailed off, but Marcus knew what he was thinking. The ventilation system connected to the observation and examination rooms was designed to keep fresh air circulated in the rooms to prevent build-up of possibly toxic pathogen levels and to filter the out-going air to remove contaminants. Even though the Progenitor was not primarily an airborne disease, it was purely a precautionary measure.

“The ventilation system is fine, young man. The filters are coated with organic corrosives that kill the virus when it comes in contact.”

“Okay, sir. I had to ask.”

“It’s alright, now get up there.”

The guard entered the observation room and climbed onto the chair. Marcus entered as well and positioned himself as if to hold the chair for him. When the guard reached into the vent, Marcus stepped back into the hallway and pushed the containment tray into the room. He unlatched the front panel and left, letting the door slam shut.

Startled by the sudden noise, the guard lost his balance and fell off the chair. He hit the floor flat on his back and smacked his head against the floor. Before he even tried to stand up, he scrambled to pull his pistol out of the holster, gasping for breath.

The leeches got to him first. One of them leaped up and bit onto his face, and he screamed madly, swinging his gun up. He fired twice, hitting the wall and the ceiling, as the other leech aimed straight for his stomach. He grabbed the leech on his face with his free hand and hurled it away, but the second leech slid between the buttons of his uniform and snuck inside his shirt. He shrieked frantically, trying to yank off the shirt and get the leech, while waving his gun at the other one, which was already crawling toward him again. It leaped up for his face once more, but he put his hand in the way and the leech bit firmly onto his wrist. He shook his hand, trying to get the leech off, while reaching into his shirt for the second one.

The gun went off again and the bullet struck the reinforced glass of the observation window, creating a series of cracks in a spiderweb pattern. Marcus jumped back and screamed.

The guard swung his hand and hit it against the wall, knocking the leech off. He finally succeeded in yanking his shirt free, the buttons popping off one by one, and grabbed the leech trying to burrow its way through his undershirt. He tossed it away into the corner and fired the gun, missing it twice, before hitting it. The leech exploded with the force of the bullet.

The first leech leaped back on his face and went right for his eye. He screamed in agony as he pulled it loose, his eye still in its small teeth. Blood gushed down his face. Half-blinded, he emptied the rest of the clip at the leech without hitting it. Once more, it leaped for his face. He struggled to pull it free, but the blood and slime made it too slippery to hold onto. He howled in pain as the leech dug into his eye socket. Blood and gore was smeared across his face and down the front of his ripped uniform, and all over the floor and walls where he struggled to free himself from the leech’s fierce grip.

Finally, his body spasmed and jerked wildly as the leech dug its way inside, and his arms and legs flailed uncontrollably, splattering more blood around the small room. The seizure lasted a few moments, and then his leg kicked one final time and was still. His hands, balled into fists, slowly uncurled.

Marcus touched the cracked window and let out a deep breath. He closed his eyes and let himself sink to the floor, exhausted. It was done. Now, he need only wait to see what would become of it.

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