“Of course,” Dr. Downing said, fast forwarding again. “However, after this had gone on for some time, I sent in guards to restrain him again. And…watch.”
The two guards entered fast when Darren’s back was turned. They were wearing some sort of full-coverage white body armor including helmets and gloves. They looked like they were suited up to work with an attack dog. They also carried clear plastic shields, and one of them was carrying an air injector presumably filled with a tranquilizer.
A third guard shut the door when they were barely in the room, but before they could even approach the subject, Darren turned, showing more coordination than had previously been evident, and charged, screaming a ululating cry of what sounded like rage and pain. He hit the shield of the guard with the syringe so hard the man was thrown off his feet, and the patient fell on top of him, screaming and scrabbling to get past the shield.
The guard flipped the syringe out from under the pile and the second guard picked it up quickly then fell onto the patient, pinning him between the two guards and injecting him in the back of the neck.
“And that’s about it,” Dr. Downing said, turning off the video. “The patient is fast and strong beyond the norm, but very clumsy. In part, I believe, because of the lack of reflex response. The patient’s balance is particularly bad probably because, at some level, he has to think about standing up. It’s notable that when the patient has had to be…restrained, he falls down quickly and tends to fight on the ground. The precise symptoms have never been recorded in literature. I’m considering doing a paper on them. It’s possible it may be an entirely new psychiatric condition. If so, I’ll have to name it.”
“Chattanooga Zombieitis?” Kurt asked.
“Thank you for your input,” Dr. Downing said dryly. “But…no. Among other things, ‘itis’ is the suffix for irritation and swelling.”
“Neurological indications?” Barb asked. “For laymen?”
“Due to the nature of the problem, we were, fortunately, able to fund a full neurological workup,” Dr. Downing said. “Various tests I won’t detail. Certain neurotransmitters appear to be out of sync as well as various hormones. Testosterone and adrenaline levels are abnormally high, for example. Dopamine levels as well. Which may explain the lack of reflex response. Glutamate appears to be inhibited and certain portions of the brain are acting in uncharacteristic ways. Mid- and rear-brain activity is overexcited, while forebrain activity is virtually quiescent. The medulla in some of the older patients appears to actually be swelled. We’re monitoring that because we’re afraid that if the condition progresses it will lead to death.”
“Forebrain is conscious thought,” Barb said musingly. “Mid-brain is sort of higher animal, the puppy brain, and rear brain is the old animal, the lizard hindbrain.”
“In layman’s terms, more or less,” Dr. Downing said.
“So…they’re thinking like animals?” Kurt asked.
“I would hate to put it that way in any sort of report,” the neurologist said. “But…yes. Very angry and vicious ones.”
“What about treatment?” Kurt asked.
“So far there doesn’t seem to be one,” the neurologist said. He seemed indifferent to the possibility.
“Trust me, Kurt,” Barb said. “These things are beyond treatment. Not. Alive. Take my word for it.”
“Wait,” Kurt said, his brow furrowing. “PCP is a glutamate inhibitor. Right?”
“An NMDA uptake inhibitor,” the doctor corrected. “But it has the practical effect.”
“So it’s like they’re on PCP?” Kurt asked. “Sort of PCP zombies. Ouch.”
“Again, I did not say it,” the psychiatrist said. “But the effects have some similarity to PCP overdose. That was the initial finding of the admitting doctors. But it’s not PCP. What it is, we’re unsure. As I said, psychotic break, homicidal, cause unknown.”
“Double ouch,” Kurt said. “Cannibalistic PCP zombies.”
“And I don’t think that will be in any reports, either,” Barb said, nodding. “Good summation. That’s enough.” She looked at Downing and snorted.
“I don’t know exactly why you let that thing ride you, but you did. And apparently with some understanding of what you were doing. It wasn’t a good choice. It wasn’t even an intelligent choice. But it was a choice. And for that, Doctor, you are damned.” She chuckled and shook her head. “Literally, not figuratively. How you could have been that stupid, I don’t know. I’ll just mention, in passing, that Jesus is pretty forgiving. If you can get your head around getting that…thing out of you, you might just be forgiven. On the other hand, if you keep on your current path, you’re choosing one life of whatever it gives you in exchange for eternal torment. Again, your choice. But I’d suggest that you start thinking about alternatives.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Downing said, frowning slightly.
“Me, I’d damn you and be done with it,” Barb said. “But I tend to be rather Old Testament. Jesus is the forgiving one.”
“So,” Barb said as they headed back to the office. “Tell me about PCP. You said you were a street cop once, right? Ever deal with it?”
“Rarely,” Kurt said, holding onto the door handle as Barb weaved through traffic. “It’s not as big as it was in the eighties. When something gets a bad street rep you know it’s bad. But, yeah, I had to handle a couple of guys on it.”
“How bad?” Barb asked, slipping into a narrow gap between a semi in the left lane and the truck ahead of her in the right. “I hate semis that go slow in the left lane and just barely pass other trucks.”
“Pretty bad,” Kurt squeaked. “They don’t feel any pain so when you hit them with a K-11 it’s like you might as well not even bother. They’ll dislocate their own bones if you put them in a lock. You pin them to the ground and they end up doing one-handed cop push-ups. They get ahold of you, and you’d better have some good escape techniques. They bite like nobody’s business. Lost a chunk of flesh on my forearm to one. You start to recognize the signs after a while and call for backup if you’ve got time. The best bet is to do a Rodney King on their ass, but departments frown on that. And, hell, hitting a guy on PCP with truncheons just pisses him off. You get enough Tasers on one, you can knock him out. That’s about your best bet, five or six Tasers more or less simultaneously. And hope he’s got a good heart.”
“Don’t have to worry about killing these things,” Barb said. “They’re not human anymore.”
“You think you’re going to find anything in here?” Kurt said, setting down another stack of folders.
“I have no clue,” Barb replied. “I hope so.”
“Because one thing you’ve probably noticed is that these attacks have been getting closer and closer together,” Kurt said. “The first one that we’ve pinpointed as being similar in nature was two years ago. Then a year after that. Then three months. Then four in the last six. The last three in the last two months. That’s when we got called in.”
“I’ve noticed the pattern,” Barb said. “I’m looking for any indication of what may be causing it.”
“That’s what over a dozen agents have been doing for the last two months,” Kurt pointed out.
“They weren’t looking for what I’m looking for,” Barb said. “Most of this seems to be looking for an environmental cause. A drug that’s not detected by the usual tox screen. Some environmental toxin they’ve been exposed to. You’re not going to find a mystic cause by taking a surface swab. The good news is, it’s not movie zombieitis.”
“That would be bad,” Kurt said. “You’re sure they’re zombies?”
“That or something damned close,” Barb said. “Did they go nuts then lose their souls? I suspect it’s the other way around.”
“So what are you looking for?” Kurt asked.
“I’m not sure,” Barb admitted. “Patterns that normal investigators would dismiss. Unfortunately, so far I’m going over tilled ground. All males in their twenties.”
“Tilled,” Kurt said.
“So I’ve noticed,” Barb replied dryly. “Mostly students at the University of Tennessee, Chattanooga branch. All residents of the Chattanooga area. But none of them from the same area of Chattanooga.”
“UTC is a commuter college,” Kurt said. “Most of the students don’t live on campus. They’re making more dorms but it’s still mostly commuters. That’s just FYI.”
“Thanks,” Barb said. “Some of the information I need about them isn’t even in these files. The investigators
