High Water Read online

  Protozoa weren’t all that smart. At least not smart enough to carry out their life cycle without very specific, time-tested methods. They followed steps found to be successful by their predecessors, much the way that bees had learned to use the sun as a reference point for their feeding. In the case of bees, the insects had even developed organs to help recognize a great big ball of light in the sky. For the parasitic protozoa, physiological characteristics were often recognizable, either chemically or otherwise. Crucial steps in the tiny organism’s life cycle were taken when those areas were reached.

  In his work, Pete had found that Plasmodium hopped out of the salvia during a mosquito bite and made its way to the liver. There the protozoa shed a protective sheath and began reproducing. The first step in the life cycle completed, it swarmed the bloodstream in the thousands. That’s where, as he’d explained to Liz earlier, the Plasmodium protozoa would start munching on oxygen molecules in the red blood cells.

  Pete’s research specifically sought to head off the disease at the liver, before it ever got to the munchies, by giving the newly introduced protozoa bad signals. He mused that it was kind of like giving the new guy at the office the “bathroom key” and sending him to everywhere but the bathroom. His advisor had originally cautioned him against his route of research in regards to the liver. The liver was fragile, especially in a society full of diabetes, alcohol, and diabetes caused by alcohol. Complex interventions were being developed that seemed to be more promising, but Pete was interested in a chemical solution and forged on.

  He tested, retested, and re-retested several promising compounds using immune-compromised mice. Protozoa floated around in the mice for about ten minutes before dying in successful trials. The chemical intervention had worked! However the compounds he experimented with were unacceptable for preventative or long term use in humans. While his avenue of research had been a dead end, Pete ultimately didn’t mind. His work became a tiny contribution to the grand sum of human knowledge. Maybe someone, somewhere, could use that information.

  Regardless, he now was an expert in protozoa life cycles.

  Feeling run down, he pawed at his eyes and shifted his weight to get some blood moving to his extremities. As he did so, Pete felt sweat become exposed to the air, giving him a chill that ran from his neck down his spine. He rubbed at his sore spots, thinking faster now while the darkness fueled his imagination.

  The madness plaguing these victims was fantastical, demonic… and distracting. A symptom like that could be caused by any number of things. The legends surrounding mass hysteria resulting from Saint Anthony’s fire were some of his favorite medical mysteries. It was said that in some medieval European cities fungi infected the water supply and made entire cities go mad. Even Lyme disease could cause mental problems given enough of a foothold.

  Madness alone wasn’t enough to identify the contagion. Therefore other symptoms had to be recognized as well. The cakey, running eyes were an interesting symptom. Toxoplasma gondii had some ocular side effects that might do something similar in the worst cases. Fortunately, Pete knew more than a little about Toxoplasma. It was closely related to the malaria-causing Plasmodium protozoa and could be treated with the same antibiotic. The antibiotic would destroy the former utterly, while taking longer to destroy the latter. Generally treatable, Toxoplasma was one of those infections that worried pregnant women and people with compromised immune systems. It simply didn’t have the aggressive nature of the malaria protozoa.

  Yet at the same time, it was one of the most prevalent protozoa in the world and present in as much of a third of the world’s population. That fact alone was staggering. One in three people were walking-talking carriers of a tiny, patient organism that didn’t have the best interest of its host in mind. He’d read the gamut of its effects in his research. In some more recent scientific inquiries, Toxoplasma was found to be manipulating its host into taking more risky behavior. Experiments involving lab mice were very revealing. Rather than fleeing from the musk of a cat, a mouse would run for it, as if they were trying to get themselves killed.

  The behavior made sense, considering the protozoa’s ultimate designs. Toxoplasma’s eventual goal was to make its way into the belly of the common housecat where it could sexually reproduce. The protozoa were one of those bizarre organisms that could decide whether to asexually or sexually reproduce, the latter only being possible in cats. Who wanted to do it alone when they could find another to do it with? The cat’s gut ended up being the romantic getaway Toxoplasma yearned for.

  The effects on humans were subtle but scary. Toxoplasma could allegedly increase overall aggression and the propensity for getting into dangerous situations. It was even blamed for suicides. Occasionally, accusations arose that housecats were making their owners crazy, because the cat passed diseased cysts out with its feces. Yet the effects were so incredibly subtle that they were hard to detect in the first place. In a way, that was even more frightening. If a third of the population was being driven to be more aggressive because of something nobody could see, it made something like world peace impossible. You might as well say international harmony was hampered by Illuminati brain-wave devices. Toxo was little more detectable.

  So Pete entertained the idea that it was indeed Toxoplasma causing the calamity here at Tahitian. But the strain would be virulent, something that nobody had ever seen before. Toxoplasma didn’t turn people into murderous lunatics. It didn’t destroy lives. But tonight, in a womb of evil like Tahitian Water Adventures, anything seemed possible. The disease he was encountering was certainly not something that pregnant women alone need worry about.

  Back in the moment and despite the danger, Pete spoke up, murmuring loud enough for Liz to hear.

  “You know what’s ironic? The Compari brothers cut corners and destroyed the lives of all these people. They aren’t alone. Not even close. There’s abuse and corruption and graft everywhere, but you, the trained paralegal, cannot get a job. Instead, you have to work for a business that has no respect for anyone or their livelihoods.”

  Moving away from the ledge, Liz scooted up close to Pete. Her fingers slipped between his swollen digits.

  “Pete…” she said, trailing off. In the dim light, Pete saw a shine to her eyes.

  “Yeah.”

  “I want to go with you when you leave town,” Liz said quietly.

  There it was, Pete thought to himself. It was what he had been waiting for ever since he’d gotten his job offer. Pete knew he should just feel relief that she wanted to go with him, but in the back of his mind, he was asking questions. .

  “You were always invited to come with me, Liz. You know that. Why did it take us almost getting killed for you to come around to it?” Perhaps he had put too much emotion into his voice, but he felt justified in his frustration.

  Liz was silent for a moment then slowly whispered, “I don’t know…” She continued, a little stronger, “I guess I was just scared of moving in together. I always feel like you’re moving forward, with your degree and this big career move. I’m just the plain, boring girl working at this terrible place.” She looked around the room, searching for something. Perhaps a way out of the building and her dismal career. “It all feels out of my control. Except for you, you’re the constant. And I don’t deserve that,” she said. Her eyes were a mix of regret and fear. A haunting scream echoed through the cavernous room.

  Pete touched her neck, and she turned back to him. Her eyes glimmered in the dark like twinkling stars. “Liz, I made way less money as a graduate student than you did, remember? You had to lend ME money for that car. Remember how I was so excited to have it, and the radiator blew in the first week…?” He trailed off, watching her reaction. He thought he saw a grin spread across her face and decided to spill his heart out.

  “I am so in love with you. When we get out of here, I want us to share a life together,” he whispered. He put his forehead against hers, grabbing her hands tightly.

  “Pete, I�
�m sorry. I’m so sorry,” she whispered. He closed his eyes as he pressed his face closer to her and cherished the warmth of her skin. For a second, the dread chaos below them faded away and he imagined a simple life together.

  Their moment of peace was jarred by the sound of a metal door being roughly slammed. Pete opened his eyes to see fear in hers. Shouts followed the breaching of the door. The world around them got a little brighter as the bright beams of flashlights cut through the soupy gloom of the water park.

  Pete and Liz both shifted to the edge of the railing to see heavily armed and armored figures pour in through the front entrance. He clearly saw a long gun in one of their hands, pistols in others. Liz grimaced as roars came from the infected individuals stalking the ruined park. The men were now fully inside but paused for a moment, as though really coming to terms with what was within. Pete’s heart almost stopped when the first shots thundered through the confines of the building. Echoes sounded like a hundred firing lines gone mad.

  The radical change Pete had been waiting for arrived.

  About a dozen men had breached the park. How many people had been at the concert, a few hundred? Pete and Liz had fought a dozen of these freaks and barely made it to safety. It was clear the cops had no idea what they were walking into.

  They could stay at the top of the tower, but he wasn’t too keen about the discretion of a scared person with a gun. There was no way to differentiate between infected and uninfected individuals in the low light.

  Pete clenched his hands into fists. The help they’d received seemed inadequate..

  As though the opening of the door had let in the signal, Liz’s phone chirped. She held it up to Pete. As usual, Walter was far from convivial.

  Side door

  It was going to have to do. Pete nodded at Liz, but they started at a scream of terror and a litany of curses coming from the dark directly below. A fusillade of gunshots lit the area to reveal at least a half a dozen infected. They were closing on a cop who was brandishing his pistol, his face frozen in hysterical panic. Several more shots were followed by the hair-raising cry of the unfortunate officer. On the other side of the park, a dropped flashlight lit a group of infected cruelly tackling a cop into the pool. Splashes rendered an array of shadows across the back wall.

  A hand fell on his shoulder. Liz was pointing at the front door. Only a minute into their operation, two of the not so special-weapons-and-tactics officers had reconsidered the mission. The cops retreated to the entrance, pumping shotgun rounds into the darkness. Their body language reeked of frantic desperation. Before they made it to the door, an infected partygoer slammed into them from the side, spilling one over. The officer’s gun clattered across the concrete. More infected materialized out of the darkness, and the cops died.

  With the doors wide open and the police entering the fray, the park had come alive. The building was haunted by shadow-born ghosts who were fearless when stalking the uninfected in murderous packs. Goosebumps stippled Pete’s skin, and he found his hands were shaking.

  “What next?” Liz yelled over the sound of horrendous fighting. An errant beam from a flashlight flickered across her face. Her expression was one part stubbornness, one part will-to-power.

  Her strength was a knife that cut through his fears.

  “We should move!” he shouted. Realizing that the authority’s next step would involve something more drastic wasn’t hard. Nor was imaging what an escalation would look like. High explosives would do the trick. Or a dumpster-full of thermite dropped from a helicopter, even better a nuke from orbit. Dangerous and dreadful as the ground might be, they couldn’t stay where they were.

  Liz recognized the danger too, and pointed at one of the slides. She yelled into Pete’s ear, “The yellow slide. We can make the run down it and get pretty close to the door. Maybe we can just climb up this,” she motioned to the panels that abutted the wall of the top of Slide Mountain, “and run down the slide!”

  “The fucking water slide!” he emphasized the penultimate word. Liz gave him a disgusted look, shouted something inaudible about “the damn water” and whether he had a better idea.

  He did not, and shook his head. That was all Liz needed to begin climbing to the apex of Slider Mountain. With strength and finesse, she found handholds on the various valves and pipes routing water to the slides. Pete waited for her to climb a few feet before starting up trying to follow her path. The equipment was covered in a rotten slime, making it hard to grasp. They struggled up for a minute, dropping down to the top platform of Slider Mountain.

  “Yellow slide,” she shouted, pointing at one of the dark tunnels. Like the others, it was a perfect circle of pitch black, a damp maw into shadow. Liz didn’t hesitate as she ran and flung herself into the darkness of the slide disappearing feet first.

  Pete did hesitate. His brain was still trying to process the deafening sounds of firearms and bloodshed. It was likely that the slide went directly into the pool below. Didn’t Liz know that? He pictured plunging them both into the lukewarm water, the protozoa running rampant through his body. He’d turn into another foaming-at-the-eyes monster.

  The sound of bare feet slapping against a metal stairway caused him to turn around. The infected man, a strong looking white guy with a receding hairline, seemed just as surprised to see Pete. With a high pitched yelp, the man engaged.

  They couldn’t afford to have one of these infected follow them down the slide. Keeping his assailant at bay, Pete played a waiting game. He wasn’t going to outdo his opponent with strength, not after fighting a half dozen of the infected. He needed an advantage. A long, wound up right hook gave Pete the time to block on the outside of the man’s arm, putting him slightly past his opponent’s body. With a smooth motion, he hooked the man’s forearm with the blocking arm and nestled it tightly in the crook of the opponent’s elbow. The man flailed, but was unable to strike Pete forcefully with the other arm. The opponent’s lack of leverage was the aim of the technique, one he had learned a few years ago as a blue belt. Squatting into the action, he used his free hand to bear down on the man’s trapped arm. His opponent’s elbow popped like a cork on New Year’s Day. The scream was ground with raw agony and the noise made the hair on Pete’s neck stand on end.

  A cold frustration swept through Pete, some barbarous awareness that the tormented cries weren’t helping them stay stealthy. He had to finish it. Sweeping the man’s leg, he guided him to the ground, and wrenched the broken arm in a completely different direction. Pete thought of bending a plastic straw back and forth until it gave out. He let go of the limb. The screaming continued as the man rolled around on the platform, trying to escape Pete’s pitiless savagery. Slamming a foot down on the man’s neck brought a sharp crack and then silence.

  Pete shook. He wasn’t sure if it was from the bonfire blaze of adrenaline in his veins, the ragged edge of his endurance creeping ever closer, or something happening in his heart. It was something dark. Realizing that he had already been away too long, he mimicked Liz and plunged into the slide feet first.

  The gunshots and cries were immediately muffled by thick plastic walls. Thankfully the water was off for the night. Without the water jets on, he occasionally had to propel himself downward with his feet in an awkward crabwalk. Wet heat seemed insulated inside, and before long, Pete was drenched in another coat of sweat. A dehydration-induced headache started to push from behind his eyes, he longed for cool water, but he knew better. There was no water within a dozen miles he’d be willing to drink until it had every microbe boiled out of it over a scorching blue flame.

  The friction of the slide burned his ass and the winding meant he had no idea where the canal was going to dump him out. The way plunged downward, only to twist and continue downward again. The roof disappeared after the embankment finally leveled out. He was relieved to see Liz crouched at the end of the slide. She was trying to meld into the darkness, keeping an eye on the hunched figures that skittered by. Shadows sought out the battl
e raging elsewhere. Fortunately, the slide did not end in the pool. Pete was silently grateful that his girlfriend had worked in an epic shithole like Tahitian long enough to know that.

  Pulling himself into a crouch, he crawled over and put his hand into Liz’s. She squeezed his fingers tightly. Pete recognized that she had stayed in hiding, waiting for him to finish the fight, when she could have run. The trust she had for him pulled at his heart. He knew they were closer than ever to getting out of the nightmare.

  Their goal was the locker room door about ten yards away. Gunshots were becoming less and less frequent with their side of Tahitian seemed dim and quiet. The action was wandering elsewhere. Still, the prolonged break in the gunfire scared Pete more than the gunfire itself. He wordlessly put three fingers on her shoulder, removing one finger at a time. They both simultaneously leapt up to sprint for the door, hand in hand. A loud screech from somewhere behind them told Pete that they had been seen. He pulled Liz even faster, the door only feet away. He grasped the handle to find that it was locked.

  Liz didn’t wait for him to say anything, she already had her keys out. A mad mantra of “MY JACKET, JACKET, JACKET, JACKET,” came from their pursuer. Turning around, Pete put his swollen hands up on guard. Out of the darkness came the small girl with pigtails, one eye completely cut in half.

  “Back for more?” he asked her. Pigtails sneered. But the girl wasn’t careful, making it easy for Pete to throw a kick before she could close in. Pigtail’s knee buckled, but she hopped toward him, throwing herself into a counterattack. He guessed correctly that she would throw a wide right punch. With her right arm rendered harmless by a quick block, he stepped sideways between her legs. Crouching into the movement, he then delivered a devastating uppercut. Pete rose to give extra propellant to the punch. The result was an explosion of blood and teeth that threw Pigtail’s head back and brought her a few inches off the ground. She landed in a heap, her jaw radically askew. Pigtail wailed in pain while she tried to move her head. A bloody chunk of her tongue had sliced off by her teeth and tumbled out of her mouth to the floor.