They first found the virus in a horsefly and declared it a mutant, though its back was split in two by a newly formed mouth whose serrated teeth snapped at anything moving. It wasn't anything to worry about at all, just something odd that nature threw up that clearly won't survive outside of a lab, let alone long enough to breed.
When the bones of hundreds of wild animals were found scattered about the area with teeth-marks too small to be anything but other altered horseflies, they soon changed their tune and began to hunt for the swarm. In the meantime they tested the captive insect's genetics to find whatever alteration this was and found, instead, a virus that was adding new sections of DNA into the fly.
While exploring the possibilities of it spreading to other similar insects, they neglected the signs and news stories of similar corpses - all wild animals and all with the same style of incision along the spine. The cause of death was ruled as blood loss, no culprit named and no tests done until it was too late.
By the time one member of the horsefly's research team had found one of these corpses in their own back yard - their own cat, no less - and begun to put two and two together the virus had mutated beyond their recognition. They thought it was a new strain at first but the original template still existed within the cells, not dormant but in a constant state of progression, aggression and regression so as to hit as many animals as possible.
The human cases didn't come along until the final days of the viral takeover. It changed too fast for them to anticipate which species it would take next or begin to work on a cure for the original horsefly, let alone a human.
The first corpse was reported to the local police and found to be a former officer. It took twelve bullets to bring him down with the majority going to the head and upper torso. His head had been utterly decimated but the witness and shooter, his former partner, claimed that up until the point where his spine had split into that gaping mouth, he'd just been normal. Now bullet-ridden and still trying to get up, very much alive.
Other cases began to appear around that area. Firstly his partner who was exposed to the infected blood, then the precinct who had been in contact with him afterwards, then the hospital staff who checked him for any injuries, then his family and their friends and their friends' families and so forth until one shooting snowballed into a plague of mutated creatures who still answered to their names and still tried to go to work.
When the bones of hundreds of wild animals were found scattered about the area with teeth-marks too small to be anything but other altered horseflies, they soon changed their tune and began to hunt for the swarm. In the meantime they tested the captive insect's genetics to find whatever alteration this was and found, instead, a virus that was adding new sections of DNA into the fly.
While exploring the possibilities of it spreading to other similar insects, they neglected the signs and news stories of similar corpses - all wild animals and all with the same style of incision along the spine. The cause of death was ruled as blood loss, no culprit named and no tests done until it was too late.
By the time one member of the horsefly's research team had found one of these corpses in their own back yard - their own cat, no less - and begun to put two and two together the virus had mutated beyond their recognition. They thought it was a new strain at first but the original template still existed within the cells, not dormant but in a constant state of progression, aggression and regression so as to hit as many animals as possible.
The human cases didn't come along until the final days of the viral takeover. It changed too fast for them to anticipate which species it would take next or begin to work on a cure for the original horsefly, let alone a human.
The first corpse was reported to the local police and found to be a former officer. It took twelve bullets to bring him down with the majority going to the head and upper torso. His head had been utterly decimated but the witness and shooter, his former partner, claimed that up until the point where his spine had split into that gaping mouth, he'd just been normal. Now bullet-ridden and still trying to get up, very much alive.
Other cases began to appear around that area. Firstly his partner who was exposed to the infected blood, then the precinct who had been in contact with him afterwards, then the hospital staff who checked him for any injuries, then his family and their friends and their friends' families and so forth until one shooting snowballed into a plague of mutated creatures who still answered to their names and still tried to go to work.
No comments:
Post a Comment