Invasion

"This was to make sure none of the biological warfare agents got into the lab except in biohazard containers," Harlan said. "Obviously that's not our worry now."

"Where does the power come from?" Sheila asked.

"Nuclear," Harlan said. "It's kinda like a nuclear submarine. The whole place is independent of what's going on topside."

Everybody had to clear their ears as the pressure built up. When it was equalized with the interior of the lab, Harlan opened the inner door.

Sheila was flabbergasted. She'd never seen such a laboratory in her entire life. It was a series of three large rooms with walk-in incubators and freezers. Adding to her astonishment was the fact that all the equipment was state-of-the-art.

"These freezers are a little scary," Harlan said, tapping one of the stainless steel doors. ''They contain just about every known potential biological agent, both bacterial and viral." He then pointed toward another door with large bolts like a walk-in safe. "In there is a library of chemical agents. One of James Bond's villains would have had a ball down here."

"What's through those doors?" Sheila asked, pointing to pressure-sealed hatches with round porthole windows.

"That goes into confinement rooms and a sick bay," Harlan said. "My guess is that they considered such a facility necessary in case any of the people working in here succumbed to whatever they were trying to vanquish."

"Look!" Jonathan said, pointing toward a row of black discs positioned beneath an exhaust hood.

"Don't touch those!" Harlan said anxiously.

"Don't worry," Jonathan said. "We know about them."

Everyone walked over and looked at the collection.

"They can do more than infect people," Sheila said.

"Don't I know," Harlan said. "Come with me. Let me show you something."

Harlan led everyone to a short corridor off of which were several X-ray rooms as well as an MRI scanner. He opened the door to the first X-ray room. Inside the machine had been twisted out of shape as if it had been melted and pulled inward.

"My God!" Sheila said. "This looks just like what happened in a room in the student overnight ward. Do you know how this happened?"

"I think so," Harlan said. "I tried to X-ray one of those black discs, and it didn't like it. This may sound crazy, but I think it created a miniature black hole. My guess is that's how they get here and how they leave."

"Cool," Jonathan said. "How can they do that?"

"I wish I knew," Harlan said. "But I'll tell you how I explained it to myself. Somehow they have the ability to generate enough internal energy to create an instantaneous huge gravitational field so they subatomically implode."

"So where do they go?" Jonathan asked.

"Now you have to go way out on a limb," Harlan said. "And perhaps subscribe to the wormhole theory of the cosmos. In that scenario they'd be in another parallel universe."

"Wow," Jonathan said.

"That's a bit too much for me," Pitt said.

"Me too," Sheila said. "Let's get back to the lab." As they returned she asked: "And there's mice and myeloma cells available down here for monoclonal antibody production?"

"We've got more than mice," Harlan said. "We've got rats, guinea pigs, rabbits, and even a few monkeys. In fact, half my time is taken up feeding the guys."

"What about living quarters?" Sheila asked. As tired and dirty as she was, she couldn't help but think about the pleasure of a shower and a nap.

"This way," Harlan said. He lead them out into the main corridor and through a pair of double doors. The first room they came to was a gigantic living room, complete with a large screen TV and an entire wall filled with books. Next to the living room was a dining area adjacent to a modern kitchen. Beyond the dining room and leading off a central corridor were multiple guest rooms, each with its own bath.

"Hey, this is okay," Jonathan said, seeing that each bedroom had its own computer terminal.

"This is good," Pitt said, eyeing the bed. "This is very good."

Once Cassy had gotten way from the institute, she'd been able to find a car with ease. There were hundreds of them simply abandoned as if many of the infected people weren't interested in them any longer. The people seemed to prefer walking.

As soon as she got to a phone she'd tried calling the cabin. After letting the phone ring twenty times, she'd given up. Obviously no one was there which could only mean one thing: they'd been discovered. Such a realization had been heartbreaking for Cassy, and for over an hour she'd sat in her commandeered car feeling depressed to the point of paralysis. Her wish to at least speak once more with Pitt and the others had been thwarted.

What finally pulled Cassy from the depths of her torpor was a sudden stinging sensation in her nose followed by a series of violent sneezes. Instantly she knew what was happening; the symptoms of the alien flu were starting.