Infected
 
A half hearted attempt at a horror story by Taveena

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"Damnit!" Laura said, under her breath. She clambered back down the air vent to the large interesection her small group occupied. It was about the size of a small apartment, but only half the height - the walls had been easy enough to expand. She crawled over to the small matress that was currently being watched over by their medic, Jeremy.

"Status update?" he asked, without looking up.

"Infected on the move. Heading north - we're going to have to starve today, I don't think I can get to their supplies," she replied.

Jeremy rolled his eyes. "You should really take more, Sam really needs nutrients at the moment."

"I'm not effing Lara Croft," growled Laura, "I can't fight off 15 Infected at once. All I can do is run, and I don't really want to lead 'em back here!"

"Jeez... calm down."

"How's Sam doing?" she asked.

"Not good," Jeremy said, suddenly serious. "The infection's spreading fast."

"How long until he becomes... one of them?"

"He might not. You survived."

"You know why I survived. I WANTED to infect myself," she pointed out. "There's no way he can cope with it. I mean, look at him."

Jeremy turned back to the bearlike man lying on the mattress. "He'll live. Hopefully the bots won't take TOO much muscle," Jeremy said, squeezing Sam's disturbingly soft bicep.

"Of course he'll live. If you got infected I'd be worried about that. I just don't think he'll be able to cope with the switch."

"How much does it really matter these days, though? Is there really any difference?"

Lara glared. "Yes, there's a bloody big difference! Do you think I would've bothered to infect myself if there wasn't?"

"He'll still be himself. I know it," said a young voice. The small girl the voice had come from stepped out of the shadows.

Lara exhaled. "Nicky, you're back..."

"No shit, Sherlock," said the girl.

"But... where's Kay?"

Nicky sighed. "The Infected got him. Once they're done with him, they'll either recruit him or kill him. And there's nothing we can do about it."

"How did you get away, though?" Jeremy asked.
"They're not completely insane. Well, not all of them are. The leader ordered them not to kill me..."

"Huh? Why?"

"I... think it was Tom," she said. There was a pause.

"Well, he was always a good leader," Jeremy said, "It's not surprising he'd keep doing it."

"But they took Kay."

"It was either me or him. Tom's subordinates wanted Kay, because I'm already infected and I didn't join them. And I'm stuck like this," she sighed, gesturing at herself.

"I still say it's interesting how the bots messed up like that," Jeremy said.

"You'll say that when you're looking at a bullet in Laura's chest," Nicky said.

"Hah. Like he'd be looking at the bullet," Laura said.

"I hope I will be, I'd hate to accidently remove THOSE by mistake," Jeremy joked. Lara hit him in the head. "What, so you're allowed to make boob jokes and I'm not?" he whined.

"Yes."

She turned to Nicky. "Any sign of Rob yet?" she asked, suddenly tense again.

"No, not yet," she said.

"Crap. He should've been back an hour ago," Jeremy said.

"He might not be coming back," Nicky said, looking down. There was a pause.

"We probably shouldn't think about that. It's not gonna help morale," Laura said. "Any word from Tina or Aaron?"

"Um, nothing from Tina," Jeremy said, "but we got a text from Aaron. Nothing we didn't already know, just all the Infected are moving south."

"Huh," said Laura, "Maybe we'll be able to stop living in the air-"

"Crap. Swelling's started," interupted Jeremy, placing his hand on Sam's chest.

Nicky groaned. "Urgh, this'd be so easy to deal with if the effing medlab was ours."

"Nicky, there are FIVE of us left. There's somewhere over two thousand Infected in here," Jeremy said.

"The medlab is locked. The Infected have no keys. We do. We can hold out there for much longer than we can here."

"Atleast here we're hidden, we're totally screwed if any of the-"

"GUYS! Sam needs attention!" Lara barked, and indeed, Sam's breathing was getting very ragged.

"Fuck... not good," Nicky said.

Jeremy glared at her. "How would you know?"

"Ragged breathing is diaphragm reduction. It's hitting his muscles HARD."

"Oh, fucking JOY," Jeremy said, "How the hell are you meant to do CPR when they're partway through THIS?"

"Would it really be any different?" Jeremy shot Nicky a glare.

"Urgh... look, it's only gonna be about 20 seconds to the spasm. Gonna need all you guys to hold him down... Sam's fucking TANK, do everything you can to hold him in place."

"Oh, joy," Nicky said, before sitting on Sam's arm. Laura grabbed both of his legs, while Jeremy took the other arm.

"Spasm in 10... 9..."

"Say what you like about the virus, at least it’s predictable."

"4... 3... 2... 1..."

Sam suddenly went rigid, before beginning to shake, as though he was having an extremely violent epileptic fit. Nicky and Jeremy were clearly having difficulty keeping his limbs where they are, whereas Laura seemed to be calmly gripping hers. The only hint of stress was her slowly reddening face and a single sweatdrop.

"Come... on... nothing... broken... yet..." strained Jeremy.

"Don't jinx us, moron!" shouted Nicky. Laura stayed quiet.

Laurass jumped slightly in response to a particularly violent jerk, trying to hold her grip. Nicky was thrown off the arm.

"NICKY! GET BACK ON THE ARM NOW!" Jeremy yelled.

"I can't! He's flailing too much!"

There was a sickening crack from Sam's free arm.

"Shit," Jeremy swore, "Gonna need a splint for that. Nicky... just try to contain the damage."

A pop from Laura's left arm and a moan was all they heard before she fainted.
Jeremy quickly glanced at her before forcing pressure as hard as he could on Sam's free arm.

"Nearly... ov-" he began to say, before a particularly violent spasm threw him against the wall of the cramped pseudo-room. The last thing he saw was a tall figure with red hair running at him. He didn't think very much about it before he fainted from the pain.

Laura blearily pushed her eyes open, still wincing from the pain in her arm. "Laura? You alright?" Jeremy's voice called.

"What? Yeah, I'm fine. Just gimme a minute -"

"You'll be fine," said the redhead, a note of disdain in her voice, "Jeremy got your arm back in place just about straight away."

Laura sighed. "So, Rob. Infected got you?"

"Yup. They're, uh, not as advanced as we thought, fortunately," she said, tucking a strand of her hair behind her unnaturally pointed ears.

"Howso?"

"They've gone back to using spears. I don't know why, I really don't - they still speak english perfectly and they seem just as intelligent. Something about tribal society and apocalypse just seems to make people tie stanley knives to brooms," said Rob.

"Rob..."

"Yeah?"

"I... nevermind." Rob gave Laura an odd glance, before turning away.

"Alright, I guess. I was awake for about 3 days straight, so if you don't mind, I'm gonna get a nap."

"'kay. Have a nice nap."

"I will."

Rob sat against the wall before nearly immediately falling asleep.

Laura took a good look at Sam. He now had a cast on his broken arm, but his muscles had nearly completely faded, leaving him stick thin. His hair had grown about half a metre in a few minutes. His face had lengthened and thinnened, and his ears had become pointed. However, the bit that drew Laura's attention was the two small mounds of flesh under Sam's now oversized turtleneck. Her gaze passed from Sam to Nicky, then Rob, then to her own reflection in the distorted steel that made up the wall of the vent.

"Who the HELL," Laura said, talking to no-one in particular, "had the brilliant idea of making a plague that turns people into FEMALE ELVES?"