Designated (Book 1): Designated Infected by Ricky Cooper Page A

rather disconcerting?'
    Fadei grunted, but pushed his weapon up onto his back,
the weapon lying along his spine as the barrel rested against the
base of his battle vest.
    'It may be disconcerting but it is also the only thing
that would stop you from having an Infected chew your face off and
rip out your lungs.'
    Anastasia gave a rather discomforted glance in Fadei's
direction before casting her eyes back to the screen as she looked at
the latest image. Tapping his finger against the image, Fadei pointed
to a small clump of cells in the bottom left hand corner. 'Enlarge
that.'
    The mouse's cursor skated across the screen as Anastasia
enlarged the group, the small tentacle like strands slowly drifted in
the ebb and flow of the blood sample as the Erythrocytes spun lazily
through the liquid.
    'See these things?' Fadei tapped the image again
pointing at the tendril-like barbs as Anastasia nodded. 'These ones
are, well more cone shaped and obviously split at the ends. Whereas
the others in the first lot were ridged and humped and looked like
octopus tentacles as I said.'
    Anastasia nodded, 'I can see that but what's your
point?' Fadei rubbed at the bottom of his chin, scraping away the
itch that had been building. 'Well, if they are supposedly Infected
with the same pathogen then wouldn't these things be identical?'
    Anastasia sat bolt upright in her chair stunned surprise
registering on her face as she realised just how dense she had been.
'I cannot believe I didn't see that before. I just assumed it was a
natural variation in the viral make up, but it's not, look!'
    She pulled up a third sample then a fourth, moving
quickly through a dozen more. Both saw that no two samples were in
any way similar. 'You do know what you have found here, don't you?'
    Fadei shrugged, 'No.'
    'This shows that the virus changes itself entirely at
the base level from host to host but,' she stopped as the realisation
dawned once more, 'it also means that there is no way we can cure
this.'

10

    Baker rolled round the corner, his rifle pulled tightly
into his shoulder as he exited the tunnel. Gunfire drenched the
corridor in a wall of sound, it fell upon him like the crashing of
the seas, gritting his teeth he snapped off his barrel mounted torch
the darkness sinking in as he sprinted towards the flickering orange
glow; his thumb dipped to the selector switch on his rifle and with a
gentle flick of the opposing digit changed the selector. Andrey
sprinted, clutching his AS VAL to his chest like a dying child as he
hurried down the corridors after Baker. His boots barely skimmed the
rough surface of the floor as he flew like a banshee. Spinning round
a corner he jumped, planting one booted foot on the opposite wall as
he propelled himself forwards down the corridor. He saw the shifting
shadowed form of Baker only metres ahead of him as he slipped his
rifle to his shoulder.
    Baker heard the approaching feet and grinned as he
dropped to a knee, the reinforced pad on his knee skittering over the
rough surface of the floor. As he hit the corner and spun round it,
he pulled his rifle tight to his shoulder, firing as he sighted on
the swarm of Infected at the end of the corridor. Andrey dug his foot
into the floor as he snapped to a halt beside Baker, both men firing
at will as they sent rounds down range and into the heads of any
Infected they could get a bead on.
    The heavy thump of a belt fed weapon filled the corridor
as Kingsley strode out the door of the office. The belt of the PKP
6P41 rattling as it was drawn up from the box beneath it. The machine
gun drove against his shoulder, over-and-over, as the bolt flew back
and forth sending round after round into the mass of bodies before
him.
    A whooping cry of exultation rolled down the corridor
drawing out the gunfire. Baker looked across the sea of writhing
bodies as they fought to push through the hailstorm of lead that was
being driven into them. Rawlings knelt in the doorway, his rifle
perched against