Tuesday, 9 January 2001
Artemis is called away to attend a rally in Atlanta for the "Artemis
Black Foundation for Sick Children and Orphans" that is being
broadcast simultaneously on his new website. He is followed by James
Price and his film crew.
Alex Drake is recalled to hospital in Wichita after a garbled message
from Temple General Hospital by a panicked surgeon who can't find
his watch. Drake goes under the knife about the same time the rest
of the team head to work.
On the way to work Jane sees her dead friend Kirsty Faber having
coffee at Starbucks. She stops the car and rushes over but when
she gets there it is not Kirsty. A simply case of mistaken identity,
Jane thinks and heads back into the office. Benedict soon arrives
and the pair spend two and a half hours waiting for Chuck to get
out of bed and roll in. In the meantime Jane researches Lilith,
and believes she may have discovered an amulet that will keep her
at bay, as long as they can find the right spell to create it with.
When Chuck finally arrives he is berated by Benedict for being
late, and the three take the 4-by-4 and head to the Twin Valley
Farm fifteen miles from HQ. Jane takes the pendant and the silver
dirk given to her by Archangel Mike. The team discuss what Quail
could be up to, and whether they are being manipulated by one warring
group of brain bugs to wipe out another.
No-one lives at the Twin Valley farm. It is a research lab surrounded
by fields that dwarfs the Prentice farm in Clayton, Idaho. There
are two silos, one barn and a ranch house surrounded by three hundred
acres of fields and a high electric fence. The team drive up to
the gate.
They are admitted to the site with out their credentials being
checked, and speak to the head scientist, Dr Gavin Robbins. Robbins
reveals how the farm is organised. There are five scientists currently
on the site. Robbins has been the senior scientist for two and a
half years, he was originally from Tallahassee and is a entomologist
by trade. Doctor Joshua Wilkes is a mycologist, and is obsessed
with the fungus growing over the barn. Doctor Emily Watson is a
microbiologist. Doctor Carl Brookes is a biologist. Doctor Perry
Butler is a botanist. In the winter there is very little to do,
but after the planters arrive in a few months the staff will increase.
In addition to the scientist there are three security guards on
during the day (Tony McGuff, Harold "Hal" Long and Freddie
Hayes) and five during the night (David Ford, Stuart O'Thewl, Stewart
Bell, Simon Cooper and Jake Griffin). There are also two secretaries:
Theresa Patterson and Jane Russell. All live locally in Wichita.
The agents check the visitor's log. One of the last people to sign
it was Michael Levin two months ago. There has been no visitors
in the last eight weeks. Benedict explains that the 'activist' who
destroyed the Prentice farm in Clayton is on his way to Wichita.
Robbins is happy to help in any way and the team arrange interviews
with all the members of staff.
All the staff (including Robbins) are interviewed in a private
room. The agents find an excuse to shine ultraviolet light at most
of them, but no brain bugs appear. Wilkes, a very thin crescent-shaped
man, bores them at length about a fungus he has found. Watson is
a relatively attractive woman tired of being hit on by socially
inept scientists. Brookes is an obese scientist who seems almost
a clone of Chuck. They swap pornography details. Brookes says that
Watson and Wilkes have access to fungal spores, and that Watson
has developed a virus that can kill mice and that probably can't
jump to humans. Butler is short and has a large mole, but is otherwise
unremarkable. None of them have ever heard of Richard Quail and
none of them have any time they cannot account for.
The agents conduct a quick search of the premises and find nothing
in the storm shelter beneath the barn or anywhere else on the site.
There is nothing on any of the internal cameras. It is getting dark
and Benedict suggests they all go home. Tomorrow they can search
the perimeter of the farm in the daylight. They drive back slowly
because Benedict broke the axel of the car on the journey to the
farm.
Wednesday, 10 January 2001
On the way to work Jane sees Kirsty again. She must be seeing things
and makes a mental note to talk to Artemis about it when she sees
him next. Chuck has slept at HQ in order to be ready, and the team
at the farm just after 9:00am. They are driven around the perimeter
by McGuff. Jane notices an area where the fence bends inwards as
if someone has scaled it, perched on the top and then jumped in.
However, they find no tracks.
There are now only two places on the site they haven't checked:
the crawl space beneath the ranch house and the attic. As none of
them will fit in the crawl space they opt to look in the loft first.
Jane goes up first followed by Benedict. It is extremely dark and
the light switch isn't obvious. Shining the torch around Jane notices
that there is an abnormal amount of cob-webbing hanging from the
ceiling. There is also mud on the floor. Chuck half-climbs the stairs
and pokes his head into the loft.
They hear a skittering in the darkness - something the size of
a rat. Jane is about to suggest they head downstairs when the three
of them are attacked by something in the dark. All three are bitten.
Jane feels light headed, she has been poisoned by something. Benedict
and Chuck are suddenly acting very out of character. Benedict wants
to stay in the loft and investigate. It is as if something is calling
to him.
When Jane tries to leave both Benedict and Chuck try to physically
restrain her. Ben acts with lightning speed, making use of second
nervous system. But Jane easily fights them off, she knocks Benedict
on his back and forces Chuck back down the stairs. Chuck pulls his
gun on Jane. She kicks it out of his hand, and then kicks Chuck
around the head knocking him unconscious.
Jane can still feel the poison working in her. She has a desire
to return to the loft but she is fighting it. Suddenly she can hear
a chittering from the loft and she knows that Benedict is in terrible
danger. Against her better judgement she goes back up the ladder
to save him.
In the loft she sees that an inhuman creature has appeared. It
seems a strange mixture of spider and worm with a huge mouth full
of fangs. Benedict is walking towards it a look of utter bliss on
his face. Jane takes her pistol and shoots the creature, but she
is not a good shot and although she hits it, she doesn't do much
damage. The creature bites Benedict who laughs in orgasmic delight.
The poison is still working through Jane. She fires again, misses
and then succumbs to its effects.
Jane is overcome with a feeling of profound happiness. She skips
up behind Ben and waits her turn. However, she has to share her
new found happiness and phones Todd to tell him the good news. She
says that he really should get over here and join in, because Benedict
is really enjoying being impregnated by this giant spider and he
would too. Todd realises the severity of the situation, but Jane
cuts him off as she steps into the creature's jaws.
A few minutes later Chuck wakes up. He is now free of the effects
of the poison, but doesn't know what to do. He phones Artemis who
tells Chuck to "deal with it". Suddenly Chuck finds a
gun pointed at his head. It is Doctor Robbins the entomologist.
He is working with the creature in the loft and tells Chuck to climb
the stairs. Chuck resists and Robbins shoots him.
Robbins performs first aid on Chuck because he wants him alive
and then realises he has a problem. There is no way he can carry
the 350lbs of lard that is Chuck up the stairs into the loft. While
he is considering the problem Chuck regains consciousness, sneaks
across the floor to where his gun is and blows Robbins's brains
out.
He phones Artemis. Artemis says that the west coast team have been
scrambled to help them, but they won't be there for a while. It
is up to Chuck to save Ben and Jane. Artemis can't help because
he is off to Florida to have his picture taken kissing babies. Todd
draws his gun and looks up into the loft.
He sees four skittering creatures heading across the ceiling above
him. He levels his gun and shoots them. When they die they change
into green vapour, just like the brain bugs. A nearby door opens
at the noise. It is the obese Brookes. He obeys Chuck's command
to stay in his office and Chuck climbs the ladder.
In the loft Chuck is confronted with the monster. A terrible tooth-filled
thing with an elongated abdomen for the impregnating of hapless
FBI agents. However, without the skittering creatures to poison
its victims, it doesn't seem to have any way to defend itself. Chuck
is a much better shot that Jane, and takes it down with one bullet.
The creature dissolves into a green gas. He then finds Jane and
Benedict's bodies. They are both alive, but each of them have three
pulsing grey mounds on their stomachs.
He can't move them on his own so he calls Brookes. Fortunately,
Brookes is too unobservant to notice the dead Robbins in the hall.
Brookes sees the wounded pair and uses the magic dirk and his medicine
skill to lance mounds. He makes a ham fisted job of it, and cuts
Jane quite badly but the three creatures within each agent dissolve
into a green mist. Brookes doesn't know what to think.
Even between them Chuck and Brookes are too weedy to carry the
unconscious agents downstairs, so they wait until Jane wakes up.
She is groggy and grossed out, however, she remembers being impregnated
as a happy memory. Very bizarre. She carries Benedict to Chuck's
office and they seal themselves in.
Jane and Chuck phone Todd and Artemis respectively. The west coast
team are not far away now. Benedict soon recovers. He points out
that Quail is still unaccounted for. The team hears a bubbling from
the hall outside and when they go out the blood from Robbins's body
has been displaced. There is an empty pouch at the base of Robbins's
spine. They reason something else is on the loose in the ranch and
organise all the surviving scientists and security guards into one
meeting room. Jane examines everyone for signs of an impregnation
but finds nothing.
Agents Rocaan, Ecks, Campbell-Robson and O'Connell arrive. Dominic
and Benedict coordinate a strategy. Rocaan and O'Connell remain
with the scientists and concoct an elaborate story to assuage their
fears. Benedict, Bradley, Bruce and Todd go into the loft where
Benedict discovers the desiccated remains of Richard Quail. Quail's
body has no internal organs he was obviously carrying this queen
brain bug, or whatever it was.
Jane deduces that the bubbling they heard earlier could have been
the creature inside the pouch in Robbins's spin dying, turning to
a gas and dissipating. In which case there are no other creatures
on the site.
Jane phones Levin and explains what happened. He has seen this
sort of thing before. It is all to do with the life cycle of the
brain bug. The large creature was a queen that implants fry into
human hosts. The fry grow into nymphs that eat their way out of
the hosts. The nymphs at the leapers that attacked the agents. Their
bite produces endorphins in the victim. The nymphs probably aren't
sentient and are controlled by the queen. Levin theorises that the
nymphs grow into adults but he doesn't know how. He says he has
also come across different forms of brain bug 'royalty' such as
thinker brain bugs that seem to direct the others. Jane asks why
Levin didn't tell her all this before, but doesn't get the answer
she wants to hear.
The case is over. Dominic and his team clear up the mess while
Jane, Benedict and Chuck head to hospital (again!). Todd insists
that he and Jane should do lunch very soon. He has something important
to discuss with her. Chuck and Brookes seem to have bonded on a
deep and worrying level.
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