The Variant Effect Read online

  THE VARIANT EFFECT

  Part One: Skin Eaters

  G. Wells Taylor

  Copyright 2010 by G. Wells Taylor

  All Rights Reserved.

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This digital book MAY NOT be modified without the express written consent of the author. Any and all parts of this digital book MAY be reproduced or transmitted in any form and by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, provided that the original content is not modified in any way from the original work and that no compensation is received for any method of reproduction.

  Cover Design by G. Wells Taylor

  Edited by Katherine Tomlinson

  Website: SkinEaters.com

  I'd like to acknowledge John Griffith, Travis Playter, Jessica Danard and Craig Blair for sharing their enthusiasm for movies, horror, science fiction and fun. Your input was invaluable.

  I'd also like to thank the thousands of loyal readers and Variant Squad members from over 130 countries that made The Variant Effect Serial a success.

  More titles at GWellsTaylor.com and Smashwords.com

  ****

  For Katherine Tomlinson

  A great editor and friend.

  ****

  CHAPTER 1

  It was an old building in a rundown part of town-the perfect place to find a body. And it was the perfect place for Joe Borland to come bitching and moaning out of retirement. He wasn't complaining at the moment because he was half-cut, still drunk from the night before. The peppermints he chewed did nothing to hide the smell of cheap whiskey on his breath. He preferred a blended scotch, but had learned to drink anything he could afford on his pension. There was a time that being drunk was part of the job, but that was then. Since he got the golden boot, being drunk was part of doing nothing at all.

  The patrol car pulled up to the building and Borland struggled out of it adjusting his belt where it slung under his belly. His hernias were acting up again. He kept postponing the operation to get them fixed because his health insurance didn't cover non-life threatening injuries and illness, so he had to save for the surgery himself. When he weighed the issues of needing a drink and needing his hernias fixed, the drinks came out on top. The hernias only bothered him when he walked or rode in cars and he didn't do much of that anymore, but needing a drink bothered him every damn day in paradise.

  Borland didn't look retired at first glance. Sure he had crow's feet clustered at the corners of his pale eyes, his skin was an unhealthy yellow-gray and his gut was bigger than you'd find on any two active duty cops, but he had lots of dark brown hair in a tangled mass over a band of white that ran around back from temple to temple. His shoulders and arms bunched powerfully with muscle under his wrinkled beige sports coat. His pants were light blue, and cranberry colored where something had spilled on the left thigh after traveling down the front of his cream-colored shirt. A wide polyester tie swung from his thick neck and did what it could to draw the eye away from the stains. So he looked more unkempt than retired, more homeless than homebody.

  That was because Borland didn't care how old he was and he was as dressed up as he would ever be. The booze made him immune to criticism.

  The cop that drove him down nodded at the building and Borland winked his quiet thanks for the lift. Then he turned to give the gathered uniforms the once over. He saw disdain or curiosity on the youngest faces, and grudging admiration in none but one older flatfoot; a black officer he vaguely remembered, likely named Jenkins, who had twenty-five years on the force or so. Jenkins would remember the day.

  Borland walked up to him and frowned. Jenkins grinned, hooking a thumb over his holster. He squared his shoulders.

  Borland looked around, ticking off the points of protocol for dealing with Variant: Ziploc, Gas and Burn. The yellow tape was up and barricades rode the curb by the street. The public had been moved far back. The ground floor windows were sealed with thick tarps. Sheets of plastic billowed over those. A fire truck sat well away from the structure. If the wind were right Borland knew he'd smell accelerant. Uniformed officers stood on guard every 20 feet. They wore acrylic visors, bulletproof armor and gloves. The whole outfit was then secured beneath a clear vinyl coverall and hood. The bagged-boys carried 12-gauge pump action shotguns.

  Just past them, a big black van was parked behind a pair of cruisers. The side doors were open and the elevator was level with the sidewalk.

  "Where is the miserable son of a bitch?" Borland growled at Jenkins without turning.

  "Inside," said the sergeant, before pointing to a dark triangular cleft in the plastic and tarps. Borland grumbled and walked toward the building.

  CHAPTER 2

  He paused inside the elevator to wipe his lips then slipped the pint flask into his jacket pocket as the door screeched and slid back on rusted rails. A young bagged-boy stood there. His visor was fogged. Water droplets followed the creases inside his plastic hood.

  "Where's Hyde?" Borland rasped, stepping onto the sixth floor. He remembered how hot it was inside those bags, remembered a few rookies going over when something triggered the Variant Effect in them. You never knew what would do it and you never knew how it would present. A claustrophobic would not survive the storm in a bag.

  "In there, sir," said the bagged-boy, voice muffled by vinyl. He pointed across an open space to a door that might have been an office once. The building was a furriers' back in the Fifties. Tufts of hair still blew around the dusty plank floor.

  Borland walked over to the door; saw Detective Reiner leaning just inside. She was a nice enough looking broad, if a bit heavier than he liked. Of course, he only thought that way because he would never give her the chance to shoot him down. She watched him approach and held a finger up to her lips, then winked inside. Bright lights were burning down on the floor.

  Borland saw another bagged-boy shining the halogen spotlight. Its bright beam burned a circle on the floor in front of a man bent at the waist, wearing a long hooded coat with baggy sleeves. The dark material fell over his body and almost covered the archaic metal braces strapped to his legs and boots. He was leaning forward on rusted steel canes. The braces squeaked as he positioned himself, then carefully balancing, shifting both canes to one hand, the man gingerly spun the wing nuts at his knees. The braces shrieked as the weight of his long body folded them, and he slowly lowered himself to the floor.

  A heavy and outdated wheelchair sat about six feet behind him.

  "This wasn't Variant," whispered the man in the hood, his pronunciation was flawless-only the hint of a lisp. His hooded face hung inches above the floor. "Don't need me to tell you that." Bent over his canes and braces, Borland thought he looked like a broken puppet-or a half-killed bug.

  The man crouched over a great red smear. It looked to Borland like someone had made a snow angel only he'd used blood instead of snow. The arms and legs fanned out in a big arc. This wasn't fun though. The victim had struggled. A violent spatter defined the head-no halo. Borland sniffed the air and smelled his peppermints.

  The man on the floor studied the marks for several minutes until he said: "Borland you useless drunk. Force me in here and you come late!"

  "Do your job, Hyde," Borland snarled from the door. He kept one eye on the hall that ran in front of the elevator. It passed other old office doors before lurching at right angles to follow the building's contours. "Finish and go back to the home!"

  "Finished," Hyde hissed from under his hood. He levered himself up with his canes to bend his legs into shape and then tightened the wing nuts again. "Not Biters. ShoesÖ" He rose, gesturing to two partial sets of prints that stepped in and out of the stain-running shoes and something with a heel.
>
  "You sure?" asked Borland. "Stalkers?"

  "A Stalker wouldn't do it here. You should know that," the hooded man whispered, before backing away from the bloodstained planks. The shape on the floor was unmistakable. "Too much evidence left behind," he said gesturing with a cane, "here and there."

  "A copycat?" Borland asked, deflated.

  "Ya think?" The hood turned up slightly, the tone was sarcastic.

  "It's bloody enough for BitersÖ" Borland forged on.

  "Biters don't wear shoes, and they'd leave the clothing!" Hyde snapped, backing toward his wheelchair. The action raised his sleeves a couple of inches. The bagged-boy caught the forearms and hands in the halogen beam. The flesh was raw, just muscle and tendon, veins traced over them gleaming like wax. "You'd remember how Biters work if you weren't drunk all the time."

  "Not Stalkers?" Borland repeated, frowning.

  "Think! Ritual. There'd be a set up, a stove. Dinner table, someplace like home. Maybe flowers and music." Hyde paused to aim himself, and then fell into his wheelchair. The new angle allowed the light into his hood just enough to catch the scarlet jaw muscles and row of shiny yellow teeth. "The baggies have been over the building. It's sealed. No body. Nothing here. The footprints trail out on the stairs!" He dropped his canes across his lap and punched the arms of his chair. The bagged-boy with the light stepped away. "Why are you wasting my time?"

  "So it's justÖ" Borland frowned at the stain. "JustÖwhere's the body?"

  "Some crazy Jack and Jill used a knife to kill a guy and carry him off. Maybe they just hurt him bad. There's no indication of Variant Effect. Just signs of a bloody crime." He gestured at the stain on the floor. "Clear your head, Borland. Look!" Hyde turned his wheelchair, his raw fingers manipulating the wheels like hooks. "Not Biters."

  "That's it?" Borland hissed, sticking a hand in his pants pocket to press against a hernia.

  Hyde pushed his wheelchair past Borland to the door, and out.

  "That's it!" Borland shouted after him.

  The wheelchair stopped. Hyde mumbled something, and his head shook under the hood before he wheeled himself past the bagged-boy and onto the elevator.

  "Gotta earn your pension somehow!" Borland snarled. "You damn freak!"

  The elevator started down, Borland glared at Detective Reiner and the bagged-boys.

  "Protocol. Everybody out. Get the site ready for BZ-2!" he barked, leaving the room to look for the stairs. He fished around in his pocket for the flask.

  CHAPTER 3

  "Hold him there!" Borland shouted, pushing past the bagged-boys in the main entrance and stumbling onto the sidewalk. Hyde was just wheeling himself onto the van's lift. A uniform, his attendant, was holding the wireless controls.

  "You!" Borland squinted at the man's uniform: two stripes, uh... "Corporal hold him there!" Borland almost tripped, caught himself. He lunged toward the van and grabbed Hyde's wheelchair by the arm.

  "Don't wheel away from me!" he yelled, spinning the chair around. In the overcast day, he could see the glistening scar tissue on Hyde's jaw, neck and upper chest. "I'm retired too. I didn't call you in!"

  "You did!" Rawhide's voice grew harsh. "Reiner said as much upstairs."

  "No, no!" Borland bellowed. "Brass called me in about a possible Biter. And he said he called you in to confirm it."

  "You told him to call me in!" Hyde's words spattered out wet, sprinkled saliva over Borland's hands. "If you weren't drunk you'd remember!"

  "The hell with you!" Borland balled up a fist but just hung it at his side. "You drank your share."

  "Never on the job!" Hyde hissed, "Especially that job."

  "Like you never did!" Borland insisted.

  "I never got cranked before!" he snarled. "After yeahÖ"

  "Come on! Everyone got cranked. Booze, amphetamines, PCP was part of the job! We wouldn't go in if we weren't cranked!" Borland pointed his fist at the gathered bagged-boys. "I'm still getting cranked over it."

  "Fine, the boys needed to tighten their assholes, but not Captains." Hyde leaned forward, his lipless lower jaw was clear for all to see as he barked: "Captains don't get cranked, that's the rule. Things happen too fast with Biters."

  "The whole squad gets cranked and goes in." Borland leaned forward, stabbing the air with a finger. "Unspoken rule!"

  "You and your squad got cranked and that's how you got them skinned."

  "Ah, here we go." Borland punched the air. "Get over it sometime."

  "That's how they got me," Hyde hissed, "and my squad. You stagger into trouble with a head full of PCP and a gut full of booze, and who has to pull you out, eh Borland? Damn Biters ripped me and my squad rescuing your ass."

  "They got me too...getting you back out!" Borland growled, feeling a real itch for a drink-his crotch was heavy with hernias. He pulled his right sleeve up, wriggled his scarred fingers.

  "I see some marks on your arm, poor boy." Hyde laughed, his hooded head searching the space between them. He leaned back in his wheelchair, and pulled the covering off his left arm. It was only muscle and bone beneath...veins twitched over the red surface like blue wires. It was all scar tissue. "Let someone eat the skin off your groin sometime then I'll be able to sympathize."

  "You say that like it's a bad thing!" Borland slurred.

  "NEVER call me again! I've finished my service!" Hyde snarled. "I'm retired."

  "You know the deal, Rawhide!" Borland shouted, using the epithet, "Nobody gets out alive!" He stuck his jaw out. "None of them boys got out alive."

  "Thanks to you," Hyde said laughing, his hood dipped, one scarred hand picked at the palm of the other.

  "You want revenge you ugly chew toy?" Borland stepped up, flinging his jacket open. He ripped his .38 out of its holster and threw it on Hyde's lap. "Go ahead; put me out of your misery." He lifted his chin and opened his arms wide.

  Hyde's raw hand closed around the pistol grips. He lifted the gun, pulled the hammer back and centered it on Borland's chest. All around them, the bagged-boys had raised and cocked their shotguns. They were glancing at each other, uncertain of their target.

  Hyde didn't care. "You'd be surprised how many times I've had you in the crosshairs already!"

  "You what?" Borland leaned into the gun, felt the hard metal against his sternum.

  "I almost did it too." Hyde's lidless eyes shone out of the shadow, white and wet.

  "You almost what?" Borland bellowed.

  "Put you down like the sick dog you are, Borland." Hyde looked at the pistol, uncocked it and handed it back to him. "But you're already worse than anything I could do!" Then he set his skinless hands on the wheels, turned the chair. "You're worse than Variant."

  "Go to Hell!" Borland shouted, jamming his gun away. He watched Hyde's wheelchair slowly rise into the van.

  Borland took a step back and staggered, caught his balance and then glared at the surrounding bagged-boys. He stalked down the street. There was a liquor store two blocks over.

  CHAPTER 4

  Borland's legs grew steadier with each pull he took from the mickey. The bottle felt slippery in his swollen grip. He had also stuffed a pint bottle of whiskey into his inside jacket pocket, tucked it behind his big blister of a belly. Hyde always pissed him off. Always got right on him about the past. Why couldn't the twist of jerky put it behind him? He was still alive wasn't he? Didn't that count for something?

  But who was Borland to say? How was he to know? He had lost a fair bit of skin off the one arm, and a good-sized strip off his chest after he found out Hyde's squad was surrounded, and he charged back in with reinforcements to get him. It hurt likeÖeven being cranked, the pain from that had been beyond description. Hell, he still chewed up painkillers for it on the hot days. So he couldn't guess what Hyde was going through, getting skinned right down to his muscles and veins-ass over teakettle like that-stem to stern peeled.

  Probably drove the bastard crazy. It would drive anyone over the edge. Having a bunch of Biters holding you down
while the Alphas locked their teeth and started skinning. Borland felt a twinge of guilt for going at him the way he did. But he knew the man from back in the day, back when he had a skin to bruise and he knew that Hyde was living up to his name now, hiding from life by living in the past. What was the point of surviving? Otherwise Hyde was just a scar that everybody saw and everybody talked about.

  Borland drained the mickey before returning to the crime scene. That's what it was now, nothing special about it. Just a place somebody got killed. He tossed the bottle into a trashcan, and then opened a fresh pack of peppermints. He paused for a minute looking up at the big old building from the new angle, appreciating the bits of extra scrollwork around the windows, and the greenish copper roof eight floors above the street. They really made them to last.

  The bagged-boys hadn't found a body, just a stain. But Variant protocols had to be followed now that the wheels had started turning. Of course, they were rusty old wheels, and Borland knew that the cops on the scene would be waiting to hear whether they should BZ-2 the building and torch it or just cut out and burn the areas that had stains and might hold Variant contaminants. It was a long time since the day, and property values in the city were always climbing.

  He made his way to the front of the building, and walked up to a group of five bagged-boys gathered and gossiping. Borland wanted to give them lots of time to know he was coming, in case they were talking about him. He didn't need any more enemies, and he didn't have any friends.

  When the bagged-boys saw him they turned. Two fellows nudged and gestured to a third-an Asian face greeted him through layers of vinyl.

  "Me and the guys were wondering sir," the bagged-boy said. "Was that really Rawhide?"

  "Yep," Borland grunted, and then burped nodding. "Captain Eric Hyde in the flesh."

  "Old Jenkins said he was a hero back in the day," a bagged-boy with red hair piped up.

  "Yeah," Borland scratched at an armpit. "Lots of heroes back in the day."

  "You fought with him," the Asian face continued, "back in the day, against Variant."