The Outbreak (Zombie Chronicles, Part 2)

Please read part one of this first!

“Good morning class! As this is our first day of the semester, I brought a small gift for each of you.” The students’ eyes widened as Professor Smith revealed two boxes of cupcakes.

“Please line up in front of my desk, there is one for everyone.”

While he was watching the students eagerly lining up and taking one cupcake after another, Professor Smith couldn’t help but smile a bit. He had added his perfected zombie drug into the cupcake’s icing. At first he had considered adding it to the dough, but the head would probably have destroyed all active substances, which would have made his experiment fail.

He could barely wait to see the results. It wasn’t very likely that he’d infect the whole class. Some of them probably had an active rabies vaccination. Others might be resistant in other ways. They would probably barely feel the effect of the infection, maybe have a fever for the next few days, but that would be it.

The others on the other hand…

The semester passed

One to three months. That was the average incubation time for rabies. It had been six and there was still no sign of success. No sign that his trial run had worked. Had the mixture been wrong? It had been hard enough to create a stable combination of the three components. The animal experiments had worked flawlessly and fast. What had gone wrong?

Frustrated and tormented by self-doubt, he entered his lecture hall. It was the day of the final exam. Those who passed today would leave his class for good and he would not be able to observe their condition anymore. For a split second, Professor Smith considered to just fail them all. But that would have raised suspicion and the dean would not be happy about that.

As he started to pass out the papers, the Professor noticed the fear in many of his student’s eyes. He was used to this. After all, his class on parasites and immunobiology was considered one of the hardest an undergraduate student could take. It was easy to fail and very, very hard to score a good grade. But it never stopped people from signing up.

The exam started and the sound of the hectic scratching of pens on paper carried Professor Smith into a daydream in which his experiment had worked and people finally started to appreciate him and his research. The military had an army compromised of fearless super soldiers created by him and there were several universities that carried his name.

Just as he was handed the Nobel Prize, a scream ripped him away from his visions.

“My eyes! MY EYES! The light, it burns so badly! Somebody help me!”

One of the female students held her hands in front of her eyes and was sobbing uncontrollably. Others were standing up and flocking around her, either to help or just watch what would happen. Then, all of sudden, another student went down with a scream. Then another one. And another one.

Finally, about half the class was lying on the floor, desperately shielding their eyes from the bright light of the neon lamps.

The rabies had kicked in. Finally. And the effect was stronger than Smith had expected.

The sudden stress caused by the exam had probably lead to a heightened production of adrenaline, which had weakened the immune system. That had finally lead to the outbreak of his pathogen, which was now turning his students into obedient creatures. Well, at least half of them. The other half was now frightened half to death, but Professor Smith didn’t care. He just watched the events unfold.

Slowly, the screaming stopped and the students became calm again. When they removed their hands from their face, the white of their eyes was stained with the red from burst blood vessels and their skin was puffy. They seemed restless.
And hungry.

The events that unfolded next were horrible. The sick students started turning against their healthy classmates and attacked them furiously, burying their teeth in their flesh. A symphony of screams accompanied the horror that happened in front of the Professor’s eyes.

This was not going as planned.

“STOP!” he screamed. “That is not what you are supposed to do!”

Dead eyes turned towards him. Suddenly, Professor Smith noticed that his creations couldn’t know that he possessed the only thing that would make their hunger go away. There was no reason why they shouldn’t attack him.

So he ran.

Sources for scientific info:
https://www.cdc.gov/rabies/medical_care/index.html
https://www.cdc.gov/parasites/toxoplasmosis/gen_info/faqs.html
http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs099/en/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1361287/ (how exams can affect the immune system)

Picture taken from pixabay.com

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