Thursday Prompt 8/28/2018 Carrier
burried deep in a top seceret bunker there is a medical testing facility, and there in lays Vulpes Trotus, a plauge of man-made origin that will sweep the world clean of homo sapiens sapien...https://www.furaffinity.net/view/28431193/
"I write almost always in the third person, and I don't think the narrator is male or female anyway. They're both, and young and old, and wise and silly, and skeptical and credulous, and innocent and experienced, all at once. Narrators are not even human - they're sprites." - Philip Pullman
Thursday's Prompt
Carrier
8/28/2018
The guards stood watch over the shape on the floor. Bound and gagged it wasn't going far.
"do you think it's contagious?" doug asked. Bob shrugged
"they wouldn't gag it if it wasn't..." he replied, rifle at port arms
"but wouldn't they? I mean look at it."
"that's our job, remember? To look at it and make sure it doesn't get out of this room." bob shrugged. He wasn't a complicated man.
"why do you think they made it?" doug asked.
"I don't think. And neither should you. We're guards, aight? We don;t ask why they make anything. We just guard and we don't ask questions"
"well, yeah.. but there's got to be a reason for this." and he gestured to the bound form on the floor, struggling with the chains and the gag. Doug never took his eye off of it as bob turned to look at him.
"look, ok. This isn't black mesa. This isn't raccoon city. This is a top secret government medical experiments lab, and we are guards. We don;t ask question if we wanna keep our jobs." bob turned back to the thing on the floor. It'd managed to wiggle a bit closer to them, squirming and hog-tied.
"yeah but...": doug started to ask as he turned to bob.
"No. No buts, dougy..." he turned to doug "this isn't a 'but' kinda detail, aight? We have a job to do and I mean to do it."
"I know but...." bob interrupted
"Again with the buts, dougy. We're guards. We guard. This..." he turned to glace at it. It was a bit closer but still bound and gagged so he looked away from it. It creeped him out a bit with all the red showing "This thing here is a valuable piece of governmental research" he waved the barrel of his M4 carbine in the general direction the shape was "and you and I don't axe no questions..." doug was still watching the thing "ya hearin' me dougy?"
"yeah yeah I hear ya... but still man. It's like all them fan-fictions you read on the net, right?" bob stepped in front of doug blocking his veiw of the creature.
"I don't read nothin' on the net." he leaned in close "Got it?"
"well I.."
"No dougy. No buts. I don't read nothin' because I ain't paid nothin' to do no readin'. If management wanted me to read they'd tell me to read and pay me to read."
"Bob... it's...." but bob wasn't listening
"Dougy would you just shut up a minute? Aight?" he paused for half a second "We. Are. Guards. Got it? We guard. This thing is to be watched to make sure it don;t get loose."
"Bob I..."
"And we ain't readin' nothin' about to fictitious fans on no internets, copy?"
"yeha but..."
"And it's not our jobs to question what top secret governmental scientists cook up in an off the book lab in some undisclosed location. Am. I. Right?"
"Bob, seriously..."
"No gawd damn it dougy. I'm serious here. Look at me!" he bellowed in doug's face pulling the mans eyes away from the creature for the first time."We don't axe no questions. We don't read no internets, and we don;t get distracted by this thing."
"Yeha I know but..." bob talked over him
"and this is why we are guards, Dougy. We guard. That's our... " he paused as the pain went up his leg. It took him a minute for the pain of the bite on his unprotected calf to register. He looked down into those curiously golden eyes as the triangle shaped red furred ear twitched
"aw crap." he said even as whatever had changed this scientist into the red furred thing on the floor, pulsed into his veins.
"Well?" Alister McCarthy asked from the control room looking down on the test subjects 'B' and 'D' as they were each bitten in turn. A single bite was all it would take.
"both subjects exhibiting the usual fight or flight reflex." the technician stated as he took the headset off.
"And?" Alister prompted.
"and they just discovered that their issued rifled only fire blanks." they watched. The altercation only took a minute while the test subjects succumbed to the process. The technician looked at the old fashioned chronograph on the wall. "58 seconds to onset of first symptoms."
"Exactly on schedule. It would seem that pathogen 'Foxtrot' works and is completely communicable."
"that would appear to be correct, sir. All 93 test subjects are infectious through to the 10thgeneration. Latest bio-scan of this host suggested that it was still within tolerances for the original pathogen injected into patient zero." McCrthy Smiled as the fox-girl creature stood and stretched languidly, knowing that she was being watched through the one-way glass. The two guards we curled up in fetal positions in opposite corners as the fever set in, and they had ripped off all of their clothing even before the fur started to grow on them.
"Interesting..." McCarthy noted as he leaned forward to speak into the micorphone
"well done, Michelle. You may leave now." he grinned as the hidden door opened allowing the fox-girl to sashay away. The tech looked at him "you have something to ask?" McCarthy asked releasing the mic.
"I was just wondering sir..." he swallowed hard.
"Go On, Felix. You know I value your input..."
"well sir... I was just wondering when I would be allowed to... To join them sir." he asked nerviously. McCarthy glared at him for a moment, and laughed
"Why Felix. I didn't know you were a closet furry!"
"No! Sir, it's not... well.. I mean yes but that's not" he was chuckling, but trying to not show his terror "well it's just..." he pointed his finger in the room where the 'guards' were already sprouting fur "I mean.. Look at them! Who wouldn't wanna be anthropomorphized?"
McCarthy turned and looked through the window as he lost all expression on his callused face.
"Yes." he said slowly "Yes indeed... who wouldn't want to be a member of vulpes vulpine sapiens?"
he considered for a long moment.
"Eventually, Felix... we will all be. It is only a matter of time before this is allowed to spread." he smiled and it was not a nice smile... "Then the failed experiment that is homo sapien sapiens will be no longer as Vulpes Vulpine takes over." he glanced tot he technition "did not you do the computer modeling for how the vector would spread?"
"No, sir. That was Karl."
"Was it?"
"yes, sir... he was allowed to join the skulk last week."
"Ah. Yes. Now I remember... Anyway, he said it would mirror a zombie outbreak, without as much bloodshed because we don't need to kill our prey." McCarthy twitcheed an ear at that... a good job "Besides the fact that I know where pizzas grow." he chuckled, then glanced at Felix. "well, I supposed you have waited long enough." Felix beamed "your hand please..." as Felix stretched out his hand to Alister McMarthy's waiting fangs. It would be a matter of moments until the vector took him and changed him.
Soon he to would be a member of the skulk, and a Foxtrot carrier