What It Takes (To Survive) Ch 2

Story by Nimh Sidhe on SoFurry

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What It Takes (To Survive) is a horror story following several groups of survivors during an invasion of monsters that erupt from the body of seemingly random victims.

Part 1 follows three groups of survivors during the initial invasion of these creatures.

Chapter 2 follows Effie Woods, a retired army medic that works for a paramilitary organization called Breakstrat, as she leads a sixteen person crew of tech and biomedical experts during the first day of the outbreak. Effie's crew must find patient zero and contain the outbreak before it begins, but having learned about the incident over a week afterwards, it might be too late.

Content Warning:

WITTS will contain graphic instances of violence, blood and gore, sex and sexuality, rape, death, and suicide.


Chapter Two: Effie

"I didn't think that she _could_sleep," One of the men whispered to another, "I coulda sworn she was a robot."

"Or a demon," Said another, leaning in to join the conversation.

Effie sat with her back leaned against the wall of the transport, hat over her eyes, fighting hard against her desire to smile. Of course, she had a will of steel--no emotion as simple as amusement would break her. The men around her continued throwing guesses as to her fantastical origins ranging from pre-historic Illuminati goddess to alien invasion. After a small break in conversation, the sole female of the group spoke up, "Maybe she's just a bitch?"

With that, Effie couldn't hold back her smile anymore, two men noticed with a quick "oh, shit" mutterings as Effie lifted her pointer finger, "Ding, ding, we have a winner!"

She lifted her hat as several men started laughing, others shied away, and the female across the transport, a human recruit, blushed fiercely as one of the giggling wolves nudged her and a monkey man angrily dropped a ten dollar note into a feline man's hand.

"Quiet," Effie said, her tone a mere conversation volume, however the power behind it quieted the rather loud din that had begun to grow out of control, "Private. What is your name again?"

"G-green, Ma'am," The recruit stuttered, "L-leah Green."

"Well, Luh-leah Guh-green," Effie lifted a finger at a couple of the men who chuckled, a threat that they knew too well,"Welcome to Breakstrat. How'd you get in, if you don't mind my asking."

"I-I didn't w-want to wait for j-job to open in the Army," Leah said, obviously trying not to fidget, "I was offered a job here w-with similar benefits."

"The Army, eh? Well, I came from there myself, four years in, four years out. I'm glad this could be our first interaction," Effie widened her mouth in as sweet a smile as her mouse face could give, but the effect was anything but positive, "I'm sure we'll get along famously."

"Staff S'arnt," One of the men, a rather well mannered rabbit and one of Effie's sergeants, said from the driver seat through a sliding metal screen just as the silence grew unbearable, "We are arriving in approximately four minutes."

"Thank you Sergeant Hunt," Effie grabbed one of the leather handles above her and stood as the metal slid shut again. She was not very tall, standing shorter than most of the men even as they sat, however she was definitely the most intimidating of the group, "Alright, children! I need everyone on their best behavior. You are not to speak unless you are spoken to. Remember, you represent Breakstrat, but more importantly, you represent me and your sergeants. Understood?"

"Ma'am, yes, ma'am," The group droned.

"Good, now, when we arrive, you will await instructions from this convoy," A similar drone in reply, "Great. Now I assume you have all read your briefing, but for the illiterate amongst us, I will reiterate: This is a mission given to us by the CDC. At all times within this laboratory, you will wear your biohazard masks and suits. You will not talk about this mission outside of the faces you see here with you today. Understood?"

"Ma'am, yes, ma'am!"

Theconvoy came to a slow and a stop before moving again shortly after, the metal lid slid open again, "Ma'am, we've arrived."

"Alright, Sergeant Smith," A brutish looking tiger sat straighter, "Keep these men in line until I return. Sergeants Hunt and Reid, you're with me."

The gray furred rabbit man and a tall pine marten with a thick Scottish accent stepped out from the front of the convoy as Effie exited the rear door. A slender wolf man in a white lab coat approached the convoy as the two sergeants fell in behind Effie and the convoy door closed, "No gunna lie, mu'um, dis 'ere given me hooror veibes."

"Yup, put those thoughts aside, Reid," Effie walked to meet the man, lifting her hand to be shook, "Staff Sergeant Effie Woods from Breakstrat Corps."

"O-oh, Doctor Riley Miller, Ma'am," The wolf grabbed her hand roughly and shook once before returning his hand to fidgeting with a button at his wrist, "W-we have a briefing room set up separate from the laboratory, b-but we'll open the lab after the briefing and give your men a tour. Thank you for being so quick to respond. If you would get your men together, time is very much of the essence here."

"Alright, Doctor. This is rather quick compared to what we are accustomed to, but we will return when we've geared up," With that, she turned on her heal and walked with the other two sergeants back to the convoy, "Men, attention. Gear up, we're heading to briefing. Hazmat and PDW only."

She stepped inside and grabbed her hazmat suit and stepped back out to suit up, not wanting to be "accidentally" nudged by the various men surrounding her. Almost immediately, the other female, Leah, stepped out with her with a bag in hand, "Staff Sergeant, if I may?"

"Little late to be asking," Effie reached over and pushed the door shut leaving the four of them separated from the group of men, and she continued in a softer voice, a more comfortable voice, "Listen here and listen good, Kid. I've not been at this long, but I can tell you for sure that these men will eat you alive if you don't grow a pair."

"M-ma'am?"

"The only reason I'm in the position I am is because I proved to them I have a stronger spine and a bigger dick than these retards," Effie smiled and gave a nudge to Sergeant Hunt, "Right, Victor?"

"Your work face has to always be a mask," Hunt said in a much more effeminate voice than he had spoken minutes earlier, "It's your first day, but that stutter's gotta stop, Sweetheart."

"So eider haf a stroonger speine an' bigger dick," Reid continued, "Or pretend ye do."

"Y-yes, Sirs!"

Hunt rolled his eyes, "I got your back for now, but get it together or fall behind, Honey."

"Yes, Sir," Leah took in a breath and let it out in a shaky exhale, "Can I ask a question?"

"Shoot," Hunt put his deeper voice back on as he affixed his mask.

"What's a PDW?"

"Oh foor feck sake," Reid reached to his belt and retrieved a simple Beretta pistol, "Dun they teach ye anything at basic? Et's a simple pistol or short barreled rifle, lek an SMG or sommat."

"Right," Leah nodded, having jumped at the swift drawing of the pistol, "What does it mean, though?"

"Personal Defense Weapon," Effie said, affixing her own mask, "Now go get yours and tell those faggots to hurry their asses up."

Within a few minutes, the group, which consisted of Effie, her three sergeants, and four grunts under each of them, headed towards the briefing room with the nervous doctor leading the way, rambling about the size of the party.

They made it to a large room with two other lab coat wearing doctors and a projector screen between them. The man, a tabby with half an ear missing, gestured broadly to the room for the men to be seated as the woman, a red squirrel with black splotches on her labcoat, set up the projector.As soon as the group was sat, Effie in the center in the front chair flanked by her sergeants, the two began their briefing.

"Two years ago we happened upon a strange living yet not living specimen," The woman clicked a button on a handheld device and an image of a reddish mess of flesh that seemed to grow small spindly appendages in various spots on its amorphous form, "Some of our aquatic field researchers happened upon a cave which only had an entrance from underwater, and they decided to explore it and report back findings to one of the land teams. They found a large mass similar to this creature, however..." She clicked the button again and a video took the image's place. An image showing two divers in front of the cameraman moved slowly towards a pulsating blob of flesh that looked like a supersized version of the smaller creature. However, after a moment of awefrom the divers, one of the thick spindles struck out and impaled the closest diver as the cameraman and the second rush away in fear, "The specimen killed one of our best researchers. However, in self defense, another threw their oxygen tank at the biomass, causing it to explode and burn the biomass until it became this," She clicked again showing a video of the smaller blob as it rolled around its glass enclosure following around scientists as they walked by, any that got too close got a spindle prod against the glass, "It seems obviously hostile, however there were plenty of instances where it seemed curious," Another video, one scientist, a female, pressing her finger to the glass and moving it up and down caused the creature to press against the glass and follow the finger until rolling back and creating several spindles from its form and moving around in seemingly random fashions.

"It seemed to like a certain few of our scientists," The cat continued, a thick Russian accent coming out, "So we kept only those who it liked on the enclosure team. It did not grow. It does not seem to eat. It does not drink. It does not appear to breathe. It is similar to a virus in this way, however we do not see any moral way to test if it can metabolize in a host.We know next to nothing about it beyond this."

"Nah where do we come en," Reid interjected, "Need ta see if et likes oos?"

"No," The woman continued, "We need you because we stopped research on the specimen and instead have been keeping it contained until we could fund it more thoroughly. However, we stopped in on our weekly checkup... and it was gone."

Another click. The video showed a thin hyena woman sneaking around in the lab looking at the specimen, taking picture after picture, "This woman showed up a week ago," The video crackled with static before returning and the woman and specimen were both gone, the cat continued, "And had help. This is what could be recovered from our backup files."

"So you want us to find this girl?" Effie broke in this time, "Why can't you go to the police?"

"We went to the CDC first, Ma'am," The wolf nodded nervously, "They were who hired you, right? We need to make sure this creature gets contained because... well..."

Another image, an autopsy room of a human man with his midsection blackened and necrotic, and the Russian cat continued,"This is the autopsy of our scientist. Much to our horror, he did not die quickly after being stabbed. He died of his injuries after the biomass was burned nearly an hour later during recovery of our researchers. We fear this creature may be parasitic in nature, and we need to make sure she did not get infected by it. Then, when we are sure that she is okay, we will turn her over to the police, and we need you to recover the specimen. Now, if you would like, we could tour the lab, but I would be much more interested in you all going out there _now_and searching for this girl."

"And who is this girl?" Effie asked.

"Cassandra Wright," Sergeant Smith spoke up, jabbing at a tablet, "Facial recognition came back. She is a field journalist for a clickbait website. Probably trying to uncover some major conspiracy like aliens or a new bioweapon, however, there is not a single post on this website about the specimen. Either it didn't fit the bill of what the site was looking for, or she was looking to go bigger with a legitimate news corporation."

"Or worse, it got out," Hunt speculated, "Let's hope that's not the case."

"The fact that we have not seen any evidence of its release may disprove that hypothesis," The cat scratched at his half-ear, "But it is not beyond reason to believe this, and given that it is in the hands of a civilian with little knowledge of its origins, I would say that it is rather likely. As such, I recommend caution."

"Now this sounds like a job for maybe one squad, why did they send so many of us," Smith asked, turning his tablet off.

"Scouring is part of the mission," The squirrel woman said, "We need someone to find the woman, and someone to search for the specimen in case it did escape and didn't simply... latch onto the woman like we would expect of a parasitic or viral organism."

"And this is all the information about this specimen you can give us?" Effie stood and looked out across her men, "I don't like going in blind, Doctors."

"Unfortunately, that is all we have as well."

"We'll make do," Smith spoke out, "Questions from the crowd. Now is the time."

After a few seconds, Leah's hand slowly rose, "What do we do if we find the specimen? Either if it has escaped or if it has attached to someone?"

"If it can be recovered, it must be recovered in an air-tight and sturdy container," The squirrel woman walked over to a closet at the end of the room and pulled out a small, transparent cube, "We made seven of them in the case of you finding it. However, if recovery is not possible, burn it. We cannot risk it reproducing and spreading. If it has infected someone, bring that person here immediately, and we will have a mobile biohazard containment facility set up in our lot."

One of the men, a monkey with Smith's tech crew, raised his hand, "Do you have any leads on who may have allowed her entry? Or do we have any idea what happened to the rest of the security footage? Perhaps if it were not properly erased, we could recover it to get a better idea of what happened with Wright and what they planned on doing with the specimen."

"Yes, you may speak with our security team about that," The cat man spoke up this time, "And should you find out who let this person in, please report it to me. I will handle the discipline and law enforcement relations."

After almost a minute of silence, Effie spoke out again, "Alright, Doctors. We will get to work right away. Smith, you and your men will work on CCTV and facial recognition as well as recovering security footage. Reid, you and your men along with PFC Long and Private Green from Hunt's groupwill cover the lab and find any trace biomass and scour the immediate area and any locations we give you once we recover video of Wright and her recent locations. Hunt, you and the last of your men will join me in hunting Wright down via DMV records and talking with her employers. Doctors. Any final words?"

"Good luck, and stay safe," The squirrel woman gave a curt bow before gesturing towards the cat, "Doctor Volkov will escort Sergeant Smith's team to the security room, and I will escort Sergeant Reid's team to the lab. Doctor Miller will escort you back to the exit."

The group filed out, following their respective guide to their destination. Effie and her crew were escorted to the same parking lot they had come in and the doctor showed them to a sleek gray SUV, "They said to provide you with transportation, so uh... here ya go!"

Effie grabbed the keyless fob from the man and looked over to Hunt, who rolled his eyes and grabbed it from her, "Fine. I'll drive."

Four Hours Later

The group pulled up to a worn out looking apartment complex on the edge of the middle class neighborhoods of Torolian. It had taken significantly less time than Effie initially thought it would. She and Hunt were not all that intimidating as a mouse and a rabbit to those outside of the crew, but with two muscular wolves following on their rear flanks dressed in official looking military garb, it was easy to get information from Wright's employers, butthe original address was obviously abandoned--a much nicer apartment further into the middle class district. However, after a quick trip to the post office, one of Hunt's frequent partners was more than happy to give away her forwarding address for the price of a dinner date with his "work voice on".

The four piled out, each checking their PDW magazines, the tips of the rounds tinted a dark red, indicating incendiary rounds. Within a few minutes they were stepping out of an elevator onto the fifth floor. Apartment 504. Effie knocked and stood at attention at the center of the door where she would be easily visible from the peephole. Without a response, she knocked again, and announced herself loudly, "Ms. Wright? This is Effie Woods from Breakstrat, do you have a moment to speak?"

Another minute went by and the door opened with a chain holding it shut. Half a male hyena face appeared, "What's a Breakstrat?"

"We are a contract paramilitary organization hired by the Center for Disease Control," Effie gave a sweet smile, "May we come in? We need to speak directly to Ms. Wright."

"I'm her brother," The man said, "Why not speak to me?"

"Because you are not the one that we need to speak to," Effie's smile dropped a centimeter, "It is imperative that we speak with Ms. Wright."

"Go away," The man said, closing the door.

Effie looked over to Hunt, who rolled his eyes and gestured at the door. She knocked again. Waited. She knocked again. Waited. Nothing.

Hunt let out a sigh and walked up, knocking heavily on the door and drawing his taser from its holster as a pair of heavy footsteps sounded and the chain slid across the door, "I said to go a--"

Hunt held his taser at the man's bare chest, mere inches away as the man's hands slowly went in the air and he backed up a step, "We have authority by the CDC to search these premises for potential biohazards. Should you stand in our way, we will be forced to detain you, sir. Stand down, or I will make you."

Effie held back her smile as the man turned his gaze to her and noticing the two large wolves standing behind her. This was not exactly within their power, but the man didn't know it, and it saved them precious time avoiding the bureaucratic means to this end. She shrugged at the man, "I thought I would give you the chance to do so willingly."

"Fine," The man said, stepping back into the apartment, "Come in, I guess."

Hunt smiled his most pleasant smile and holstered his taser, "Thank you for your cooperation, Mr. Wright."

Standing now in a small, empty room save for a single couch, a mini-fridge, and a television lying on the floor, Effie brushed past the hyena as the wolves walked up and handcuffed him "for his own safety". On the couch was a familiar face, the hyena woman from the tapes, watching a rerun of The Price is Right. She lie nude on the couch, which seemed odd to Effie, given that her brother inhabited the same room, but more odd was that she didn't respond to the group's intrusion.

"She's been like that for two days," The woman's brother said, noticing Effie's confusion, "If you really are from the CDC, you should know what would be wrong with her, right?"

Effie shook her head as she inspected the woman. She had a fever most likely, her eyes were bloodshot and her fur thick with sweat and drool. Effie continued examining the woman, ignoring the brother trying to come up with various excuses for her condition. Hunt joined her a moment later, "Fever. Subconjunctive hemorrhaging. Hypersalivation. Dead to the world, poor girl."

The mouse woman nodded and adjusted her mask, noticing a thick liquid moving down the woman's leg, "I'm pretty sure the specimen has made its home. Definitely an endoparasite, unless it moves from host to host. Looks like she's in a heavy heat, to top it off."

"Yeah," Hunt shook his head, pointing at a dark, wet spot on the couch below her, "She's soaked. It's possible that the specimen releases some kind of... aphrodisiac?"

"Possibly its way of moving from host to host or reproducing," Effie pulled off her pack and grabbed a small blanket from her first aid pouch, "Here, help me cover her up, Victor. We gotta get her back to the lab."

Hunt wrapped the blanket around the woman, ordering the men to take the brother to the car and run the air conditioning. With Effie and Hunt on either side of the woman, they fireman carried her to the SUV, loading her in next to her brother and the wolves sitting in the third bench behind them. Hunt jumped into the driver seat and Effie into the passenger, "It's been a while since we've had a mission that took full advantage of our biomedical history, eh, Vic?"

"Kind of exciting," Hunt gave a quick laugh, "Getting back into the game, that is."

"Hey, maybe they'll let us stick to the CDC jobs if we do well in this mission," Effie gave him a quick jab.

"Hey, guys," The hyena spoke up, "Do you know what's wrong with my sister?"

Hunt went quiet for a moment, looking over to Effie, who nodded and shrugged--the bait worked strangely well, "Well, she's unresponsive and is obviously running a pretty damn high fever, so let's hope the fever isn't melting her brain."

Effie looked in the rearview mirror and watched the two wolves open a silent bet. The one behind Effie and the girl pointed at the brother, then pressed his finger into a circle he made with his thumb and index finger, and finally pointed at the unconscious girl. The second wolf shook his head and mimed a disagreement.

The man fidgeted with his cuffs, "Oh, shit. Can you do anything? I've been feeding her shitload of ibuprofen and Tylenol, but it doesn't seem to help."

"Then the fever is growing out of control and needs to be regulated with something stronger," Hunt let out a sigh, "Now, while we're driving there, I'm going to need you to answer some quick questions, and I need you to be entirely honest with me, understood? If you aren't, your sister could die."

"Jesus Christ, Cass... What have you gotten us into," He took in a deep breath and let it out, and Effie stealthily removed an audio recorder from her breast pocket and hit the record button, watching the first wolf in the back of the vehicle hold up two fingers and a ring he made with his whole hand, indicating twenty dollars, "Alright, hit me."

"First, when did this start?"

"Uh, four days ago. She started running a fever, so I kept the windows open and bought her some meds to make it go down. Got her to like... four pills at a time, and it stopped helping."

"Did she go anywhere for her work that seemed abnormal?" Hunt looked into the rearview mirror, "Like the sewers or a laboratory or something?"

"Yeah, some old screwball she met at a bar that wanted to impress her said they found an alien and he wanted to show her. She always wanted to make it big, but stupid Torolian Times didn't want anything to do with her piece. Said she didn't have any evidence. But the night she came back from the lab she was all..."

Hunt waited a moment and pressed, "All... what?"

"Look, man, don't I need a lawyer or something?"

"I'm not police," Victor let out an irritated sigh like a disappointed father but with an amused twinkle in his eye that only Effie ever noticed. This was a game he played well, "I'm a biologist and paramedic for a paramilitary organization. I don't give a fuck about your lawyers, I'm just trying to save your sister's life and any sorry sap that might have caught what she has. Now answer the gods damned question."

"Alright, alright," The man shifted in his seat again, "Look, don't go judging us, alright?"

"We have better things to do with our time," Effie butted in, watching the two wolves get invested silently in the confession, "Like figuring out how she got sick to begin with and who all she's infected."

The man pulled in another breath and held it for a moment, "She came back the next day horny as hell. Now, we're only half siblings, and I hadn't been with anyone for a couple years, so... I just kinda... let it happen. But she kept wanting more and more, and it was impossible to say no to her. We moved 'cause she got all paranoid about the alien scientists finding her, then she just went all... catatonic out of the blue two days later."

Effie held back a smile as she saw one of the wolves roll his eyes and discreetly hold up his middle finger at the first wolf who would soon be twenty dollars richer, "Why didn't you take her to the hospital?"

"Do I look like I have health insurance?" The hyena gave an incredulous laugh, "She's an unpaid intern at that stupid clickbait website, and I work retail part time. She thought she could get a lucky break with TT, but they laughed her away when they found out she was part of FuzzFeed. A hospital visit would put us in debt for a decade. Up until you guys showed up, I figured I could handle it."

"Well at least she didn't expose too many people to whatever this is," Hunt said to Effie before returning his attention to the brother, "Have you been the only one she's fucked?"

"Jesus fuck, man... Yeah... Far as I know."

"Well, we'll need you to get tested for this as well, then," Effie stated matter-of-factly, "You been feeling any hypersexual drives similar to her?"

"No," The man leaned back against his chair, "Look, I'm done. Just help my baby sis, alright?"

The vehicle went quiet, and within a couple minutes, they pulled up to the security booth of the laboratory. Recognizing the car, the guard waved them through. A large yellow tent with a long tunnel attached waited for them. With a bit of maneuvering, the scientists attached the tunnel to the side of the car, and soon Hunt and Effie were fireman carrying the comatose girl through the quarantine zone.

Halfway down the tunnel, the two stop, "Shit, she's seizing!"

Several of the scientists and two of Reid's men start rushing down the tunnel, as they got closer, Effie shouted more instructions, "She's burning up! It's possibly a febrile seizure! Find something to bring it down!"

"Oh, shit," The brother moved closer, having to be held back by the two wolves, "Cassie, hang in there!"

Just as the doctors got close enough to help the woman, her abdomen split open, a long, knife-like mass of tissue erupting from the hole. Effie and Hunt immediately step away and pull their PDWs from their holsters. The woman's body split further, from sternum to pubic mound, more knife-like appendages sliding from the corpse. Within a few seconds, a large, centipede-like body made entirely of what looked like muscle and bone pulled itself out of the body and moved to face the girl's brother. Before anyone could react, the centipedal creature stood on the hind half of its legs and its torso opened up, revealing large, razor sharp teeth. The monster lunged forward, grabbing the man with its knife legs and sunk its teeth into him. A loud, gurgling shriek filled the air as blood sprayed outwards towards Effie's team, viscera falling to the ground below the man as the shrieking came to an end with a second crunch of the teeth.

Effie shook herself from her shock, "Open fire!"

At once, Effie's team and the two of Reid's fired round after round into the meat bug. As each round impacted, sparks erupted and a shrill screech filled the air. The creature turned towards one of Reid's men and lunged again, but with greater distance, the mercenary reacted with a dive to the side, causing the creature to instead hurtle through the side of the quarantine tunnel. More screams. The men and Effie rushed to the tear and opened fire as the creature lifted one of the security guards into its elongated maw. Each mercenary stopped and reloaded, one of the wolves stopped to cut a hole on another part of the tunnel to allow another firing position.

The monster crushed the guard within its dagger-like teeth, using the legs lower to the ground to grab any falling viscera to shovel back into its mouth. The mercenaries opened fire again, and the monster shrieked louder, small bits of flame erupting on its fleshy outside. With another volley of shots, the creature dropped to the ground, an arm and a leg hanging from its clenched teeth.

"What in the fuck was that?" One of Reid's men yelled.

"Hell if I know," Effie nearly whispered, holding her Glock level with the creature that sizzled but lay lifeless on the ground, "Holy fuck...."

"What the hell is going on out there boss?" Effie heard over her radio, Smith's gruff voice on the other end, "I heard shots fired."

"Shots fired, the specimen seemed to grow in the suspect's body," Hunt replied, also not dropping his guard, "Watch the footage, I'm pretty sure there's cameras in this tent."

There was a few moments of silence before Smith jumped back on the radio, "Jesus H Christ. I'll send some men, full gear, to keep watch over that thing. I need you back here, Staff Sergeant."

"Copy," Effie kept her gun raised. The creature seemed to twitch and five more rounds slammed into the creature and it stilled again. Three minutes later, Reid and three more men walked carefully towards the creature with FAMAS rifles trained on it. Effie nodded towards Reid, getting a small nod back. She lowered her pistol slowly before holstering it and patting Hunt on the shoulder. Lowering his, he followed his commander towards the security room.

Smith was out of his chair before Effie stepped her first boot into the room, "Watch."

With another key press, a video began playing, similar to the one they had seen earlier in the day, however, it didn't cut out. After taking several dozen pictures, the woman looked around and stepped closer to the case, slowly pressing her hand to the glass. The specimen pressed itself against the glass and followed her finger as she traced it along the transparent surface. She smiled, an open-mouth, amazed type of smile and pressed her hands to her face. After another few minutes of playing with the creature, Cassandra looks at the controls and, with a bit of trial and error, the glass case slowly unseals. She lifts her hand up and the specimen latches onto her hand, quickly slinking up her arm and latching onto her face, morphing its shape and crawling into her nostril, causing the girl to fall over, unconscious. A few minutes later, the girl stands up, looks around, and grabs the glass case before rushing out of sight of the camera.

"Okay, so she released it. Old information," Effie shook her head, "but what then?"

Smith shook his head in return and moved the mouse, clicking on another video and bringing it up to the screen, clicking play on it. The image showed the back alleyway of the facility. As if unaware of the camera directly above her, Cassandra sits down on the ground and undoes her pants, pulling them off and immediately begins masturbating, her head conveniently censoring the details. Effie glared at Smith, who held up a hand, "Hold on. I'm not getting off on this."

Smith fast forwards the video slightly, Cassandra standing and moving back and forth across a small area as she rubs at herself, eventually sitting down on the opposite side of the alleyway, her head no longer censoring herself with her legs spread wide for the camera, two fingers in her tail hole while the first hand busied itself with her clitoris and occasionally sliding a few fingers into her vagina. Smith slowed the video to normal time at this point, causing Effie to give a warning sigh. However, a minute later, she tenses up, pressing her hand between her legs and rolling around, mouth agape. After another minute, she lay back again, her legs spread wide for the camera, and... four small blobs of flesh... four smaller versions of the specimen, crawled from her nostrils and scurried away.

"So they do reproduce that way," Hunt whispered, almost to himself.

"Seems like it, but the video isn't done," Smith fast forwarded again, showing the girl once again start in on herself, however, a few seconds later, another figure walks into view. From his clothing and disheveled state, Effie assumed the horse man was homeless. The man made himself known, and Cassandra immediately closed her legs and huddled against the wall, causing the man to hold up his hands, then pull the blanket from around his shoulders and hold it out to her. Standing and taking the blanket from the man, she leans in and kisses him. It wasn't long before she had him on the ground and his penis in her mouth.

"Man," Hunt looked away and shook his head, turning his back to the monitor, "Makes you that damn thirsty, eh?"

"She went after her own brother, remember," Effie said, causing Smith to give her a questioning look. Ignoring that, Effie watched the video intently now. It didn't take long for the man to ejaculate, but it was obvious Cassandra wasn't finished with him, immediately turning around and mounting the man, drooling his ejaculate over still clothed chest and his bare belly. A few dozen thrusts later, she again curled in on herself and dropped on top of the man's chest, five more of the tiny creatures slid from her nose, one jumping out and crawling into the homeless man's nostril. He didn't seem to notice, however, as he reached down and kept pumping until he finished again, pumping once or twice while holding his partner down on his member a few times, but appeared to get self-conscious quickly, immediately pulling his trousers on and dropping the blanket on the hyena woman and rushing away, two small specimens crawling from his nose as he left sight of the cameras.

"This... this is bad, Woods," Smith said quietly.

As if on cue, sirens raced by. Effie left the security office and looked around. Two police cars raced past with three ambulance in tow. A dark feeling crept into her stomach and she swallowed, "This was left unchecked for seven days."

"Nine days, ma'am," Smith corrected.

Effie sat down back in the security office and looked up at Hunt, "Looks like we got that job in biomedical, Vic..."

Victor stared, stone faced in the direction of the quarantine tent on the other side of the property, letting his work voice slip away, "Please, Eff... Don't do that..."

"Smith. Send out warnings to police bureaus and Breakstrat offices," Effie pulled her phone from her pocket, turning on the screen to see a picture of herself and her fiance, and she felt a bit of silent relief that he was out of Torolian on his business trip. That was going to keep her mind in the game, "We need to act fast, and we might be able to contain the contagion to the county. If lady luck is on our side at all."