CHAPTER ONE - TEST SUBJECT

There was a sore pain burning into the back of his skull. It felt as if a horrible weight was pressing upon him and he heard his voice gasping in pain from his lips. Something heavy was clamped onto his neck but it wasn’t until he tried to shake it off that he realised that it was his head.

Slowly B opened his eyes but instead of giving him a clear view they presented him with a strange, distorted fuzz of blurred images. The colours and shapes had mingled together until they formed nothing recognisable. He moaned as the light began to make his head grow even heavier. What had happened? The last thing he remembered was being in his room and someone had broken through the window… Jonathan.

He opened his dry lips to talk but nothing came out. “Dad?” he whispered, his voice so faint that he could not even hear it himself or be certain that he had even spoke.

He tried to stare at the room that surrounded him but he could see nothing but a blur. Nothing would come into focus so he could not even guess where he was. The only thing he knew was that he was lying on a hard board or a table perhaps.

His arms and legs were aching desperately and felt sore because he had been lying here for so long. Weakly he tried to move them but to his frustration he found that they were restrained by ropes which stopped him from moving more than a few inches. His clammy hands struggled to try and seize the ropes but they had been tied about his wrists so that he could not reach them with his fingers. He tried to kick out with his feet, but the efforts were feeble and he could not free himself or reach out much more than he could do with his arms.

He tilted his head slightly, but the tiny movement sent burning pain shooting across his face so that he gave out a pathetic, weak cry.

“Awake are you, my pretty?” The condescending voice seemed to come from the darkness about him.

Something inside of him lurched as he realised that he was not alone. Unconsciously his hands began to struggle at the rope again. The voice sent a cold wind blowing across his soul. It was a quiet voice and had a strange caring, kindness about it. Somehow though, B still associated it with malevolence. It was like a fluffy cat ready to scratch him.

B’s eyes slowly flickered open and he felt his head throbbing in protest at the light above him that seemed to emit from a glowing blob high above his face. He turned his face away from the glaring light and tried to decide where the speaker was standing.

His head was throbbing so hard now that he thought he might scream. His skin was burning as if flames were creeping across his skin and consuming him as they did. He could feel the heat inside of his blood as it sent drips of perspiration oozing from his body. He closed his eyes again, returning to the soothing darkness. He thought back to Brian’s house. It seemed so far away now that it all seemed like some vivid dream.

He shivered slightly. He could feel the flushed heat of his skin that made him nauseous but inside he was shivering. Everything hurt…

“What have you done to me?” he whispered to the shadowed speaker who was still hiding in the blurred mess of the room. He had not felt this ill before.

He heard footsteps slithering towards him. Each step sent off an echo that bounded about his skull and made him moan once more.

“I? I have done nothing. The symptoms of your illness are just beginning to manifest themselves more violently now,” the voice replied softly. It wasn’t Jonathan’s voice. This was someone new. What had happened to Jonathan? The last thing he remembered was him grabbing him and then something had pierced his neck like a hypodermic needle…

B opened and closed his mouth a few times, trying to dampen his tongue so that it did not stick so uselessly to the roof of his mouth. “I don’t have an illness,” he replied.

“Don’t you?” the voice sniggered. There was a movement to his right and he felt someone leaning closer to him. “What about the way you’ve been feeling lately?”

B gulped slightly and turned his face away from the teasing voice. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he lied.

“You mean you haven’t noticed the vomiting? The coughing? The fever?”

B jerked slightly as he felt a cool hand pressing against his forehead. The fingers were soothing to his heated skin, but at the same time he wanted to wriggle away. He almost expected each individual finger to transform into some hideous serpent’s head that would bite him.

Slowly he opened his eyes and was met with a hazy fuzz again. He blinked a few times and tried to draw the pink blob in front of him into focus. Slowly it formed itself into a human face with dirty blonde hair that reminded him of Brian’s. Brian…Was he coming for him? Had he even heard B screaming fro him when the window smashed?

“You’re a very poorly boy aren’t you?”

B’s throat felt tight. “How did you - ?”

His companion cackled and his hand softly stroked B’s face. “Don’t you worry. I’ll look after you. You’re important to me and my work.”

B’s mouth was dry and sticky. He wanted water. Cool water that could help him to form words… and to scream for help. “W-work?” he stammered.

“Yes…”

The hand trailed from his face and instead the fingers traced a line down his scarred arm b found himself shuddering slightly as he realised what lie just beneath the skin. He gasped slightly and his eyes widened. “The virus…” he whispered.

The man laughed again. “Clever boy. I can see why your father is proud of you.” Again the hand was on his face, but gave a cry as he turned away again to dislodge the creepy hand. His heart was hammering hard. The virus? How could he have caught it?

He tried to talk again, but this time only a mumble was audible.

“Sleep. In the morning we’ll begin.”

B could feel the darkness lurking, ready to catch his mind and to pull it down into a pit of dreadful dreams. He was suddenly beginning to realise what had happened to him. “Begin?” The word was little more than a breath. Something in the way the man was speaking made B want to curl himself up into a ball so that he could try and hide from this frightening person. He began to whimper, wishing that Brian could be with him.

Above him though came the words that frightened him the most. He was about to relive his worst nightmare again.

“I am a scientist and you are my new test subject.”

He was five years old again. He was cowering in the corner of his cell, begging for them not to take him and hurt him with the needles like they always did. “No!” he begged. “Please no!” He was quivering. A tiny child lost in a terrifying dream which he could not wake up from. A strangled cry escaped his lips.

“Shush now. I’ll take care of you.” There was a twinge of menacing laughter to the voice. “I’ll take very good care of you.”

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