Fight the Future by Chris Carter Read Free Book Online

appeared, suited up, his head obscured by the cumbersome mask. He pushed aside the clear plastic hatch and stepped out as the Cigarette-Smoking Man approached him,
    "You've got something to show me."
    Dr. Bronschweig nodded. Not even his mask could hide his excited expression, or the nervous tone edging his voice. "Yes."
    He pointed to the hatch, the ladder that could be glimpsed now leading into the earth. The Cigarette-Smoking Man slung himself down the hole, moving awkwardly in his suit as he went down the ladder. A moment later Dr. Bronschweig followed.
    They were inside the cave, a frigid chamber lit by an array of halogen and fluorescent lights. "We brought the atmosphere here back down to freezing in order to control the develop-ment," he explained.
    "And that development is like nothing we've ever seen…"
    The Cigarette-Smoking Man stood beside him, catching his breath. "Brought on by what?"
    "Heat, I think. The coincident invasion of a host—the fireman—and an environment that raised his body temperature above 98.6."
    He motioned the other man to follow him to one end of the cavern. Two portable drilling rigs had been set up on the floor, their pistons moving silently up and down, like macabre rocking horses. Behind them, more plastic sheets hung from the ceiling, to form an eerily glowing drapery of cool blue lit from within. Dr. Bronschweig hesitated, then pushed away the plastic.
    "Here—"
    The flickering blue light revealed a gurney, draped with the ubiquitous plastic but differing from the others the Cigarette-Smoking Man had seen in one regard:
    There was a body on it. A man, unclothed, his body covered with a filigree of tubes and cords and wires that led to a battery of monitors lined up against the cavern wall. There was a muted drone as the equipment registered his vital signs, the rhythmic pulse and sigh of respirators and the metronomic beat of a cardiac ventilator monitor-ing his heartbeat. The Cigarette-Smoking Man quietly stared down at its occupant.
    "This man's still alive," he said. He stared at the body before him. The skin was nearly translucent, a clear gray aspic of tissue and muscle fibers. Beneath the surface, veins and capillaries were clearly visible, pulsing slightly, blue and crimson strands threading along arms, legs, and thickening like rope at the man's neck. "This man's still alive …."
    Dr. Bronschweig shrugged. "Technically and biologically. But he'll never recover."
    The Cigarette-Smoking Man shook his head. "How can this be?"
    "The developing organism is using his life energy, digesting bone and tissue. We've just slowed the process." He reached to grasp the swivel neck of a lamp, redirecting it so that it shone directly on the fireman's torso. Beneath the smooth spongy planes of his chest, some-thing moved.
    The Cigarette-Smoking Man grimaced.
    On the gurney, the body of the fireman shud-dered. A ripple seemed to race through it, the glistening translucent skin shuddering the way a sea nettle does when it flounders upon a beach. The chest heaved gently, as though something inside had moved and stretched. A closer look revealed a hand attached to what had to be an organism.
    Then the darkness blinked . Just once, very slowly; and resolved itself into an eye, almond-shaped, watchful.
    The Cigarette-Smoking Man gazed at it, his mind working frantically as he measured all the possibilities of what was before him, all the consequences…
    "Do you want us to destroy this one, too?" Dr. Bronschweig was asking. "Before it ges-tates?"
    The Cigarette-Smoking Man waited before replying. "No," he said at last. "No… we need to try out the vaccine on it."
    "And if it's unsuccessful?"
    "Burn it. Like the others."
    Dr. Bronschweig frowned. "This man's fam-ily will want to see the body laid to rest."
    The Cigarette-Smoking Man made a dis-missive gesture. "Tell them he was trying to save the young boy's life. That he died hero-ically, like the other firemen."
    "Of what?"
    "They seemed to buy