novelraw Chapter 440: What The?!?
Chapter 440: What The?!?
"Is it the battery?" Alexei asked as he narrowed his eyes on the soldier with the scanner. It both amused him and worried him that they were so willing to dismiss so many warning signs for the sake of not having to do more paperwork.
Then again, he didn’t blame the soldier... paperwork was not fun.
"No, I just changed it," the soldier replied with a shake of his head. He tapped the plastic casing again as if sheer stubbornness alone would resuscitate it.
When nothing happened, he let out a long sigh and put the scanner away. "Whatever. Lab’s going to run you anyway. You"—he gestured at Alexei—"answer the questions. Anyone sick? Fever, tremors, disorientation, body aches, pain, or recently dead?"
"No," Alexei replied. He didn’t even blink at the long list of questions.
"Anyone been bitten, scratched, or directly exposed to bodily fluids from a confirmed positive?"
"No," he repeated.
"You sound very sure." Now it was the soldier’s turn to narrow his eyes at Alexei as if waiting for him to screw up somewhere.
"We’ve done this before," Alexei said with an amused smile on his face. "The questions never change, no matter how many times you ask them."
The soldier studied him for another moment and then nodded toward the tents. "Secondary intake’s that way. They’ll clear you or quarantine you. Which one happens will depend what their machines say."
As the five of them walked away and toward the secondary intake, Aerenyx made a low sound of displeasure. "Their machines don’t know what we are," he reminded them. "How are they supposed to work properly?"
"Let’s keep it that way," Zubair replied. "Besides, if their machines screw up too much, then its all that much better for us."
They passed through the barrier and into the shadow of the tents.
The air abruptly cooled as the generators pushed climate-controlled air through the canvas structures. Underneath the smell of bleach and alcohol, Alexei could still detect older scents: iron, old sweat, fear that had dried and cracked under fluorescent lights.
It smelled too much like the last CDC facility.
His creature shifted at the memory of cages and concrete. He pushed the sensation aside. This was not the same place, and they were not the same people.
Inside the first tent, rows of plastic chairs were bolted to the floor to prevent anyone from rearranging them. A few were occupied by civilians waiting for results.
One man sat with his head in his hands, a wristband marking him as "pending." A woman clutched a toddler who coughed wetly against her neck.
A technician in a stained lab coat looked up from a tablet as they entered. "Inner lane," she said, more to herself than to them. She ran her eyes over their posture, clothes, and the fact that none of them seemed remotely intimidated. "Which one of you is in charge?"
The question made Lachlan’s mouth twist, but he kept whatever he was going to say to himself.
Alexei could have stepped forward. So could Zubair. Instead, Sera took a single, quiet step that brought her half a pace ahead of them.
The technician blinked once. She didn’t seem to know why she’d chosen that question or why she believed the answer without needing to hear it. She cleared her throat and tried again.
"You’ll need to go through biometric screening and blood sampling," she said. "If any of you flag, you get separated for observation. Standard twenty-four hours."
"Twenty-four hours is not an option," Alexei said.
"Then you shouldn’t have come through this sector," she replied.
Sera watched her with mild curiosity, as if examining an insect that believed itself dangerous. "Do your machines ever say ’no’ when you want them to say ’yes’?" she asked.
The technician shifted her weight. "Sometimes," she admitted. "But they’re more reliable than people."
"People built them," Sera reminded her gently. "They break the same."
The tech opened her mouth, closed it, and then gestured toward a secondary partition. "Fine. Quick scan first. If that clears, we’ll see about the rest. Inner route’s through there."
They were led into a narrower space where a larger console sat connected to a cluster of wires and scanners. A gurney occupied the far side. A sheet-covered body lay on it, straps binding the limbs in place. A monitor beside it displayed faint, erratic signals.
Alexei’s attention lingered on the sheet. The shape beneath it twitched once, more reflex than movement. He recognized the pattern now: slow, wrong awakening, then whatever Region T did to stop it.
"Don’t mind that," the technician said, noticing his glance. "Residual neural activity. We’re recording late-stage reanimation signatures."
"You’re watching it wake up," Lachlan said. "While tied down. That sounds like a fun party."
"It’s necessary," she said, a little too sharply. "Or do you want that thing to wake up while you are trapped here and an easy meal?"
Necessary for who? An easy meal for who? Alexei thought, but he didn’t say anything out loud.
The tech pointed to the larger console. "Stand on the marked plate, one at a time," she said. "It’ll read for heat, respiration, cardiac rhythm, and a few signatures we’re still classifying. Any anomalies ping red. Green and you move on."
Zubair stepped onto the plate first. The console hummed, lights flickering across its surface. A picture painted itself in numbers and colors, all of which meant nothing to him. The tech studied the display, her brow furrowing.
"Your baseline’s high," she said. "But within range. Probably a weird metabolism. You’re fine."
Lachlan went next. The machine hesitated before outputting anything, as if considering its options. A spasm of static danced along the edge of the screen, then settled into green.
"You’re burning hot," she said. "Adrenal output’s high, but that’s expected in this region. Stress load... normal enough." She sounded disappointed, like she’d expected something more interesting.
Aerenyx stepped up without being asked. The console’s lights flicked on, flared, and then dimmed almost to black. The monitor on the gurney behind them spiked violently at the same moment, the sheet jerking as the strapped body tried to arch.
The technician snapped her head toward the sound. "What the?!?"