Ice Sheep
WRITTEN IN THE ORDER: SARAH, CATIE, IRENE, KATHRYN, KATE, JULIA, BREE, LAURA
Chris turned from the window, unable to watch the events unfolding. Reknown throughout the world as the only perons ever to survive being struck by lightning 25 times, Dr Chris Edwards was also famous for a momentous scientific discovers - he had found the oldest living virus, preserved in an iceberg in Antartica.
Chris closed his eyes hoping to block out the image of Julia's writhing body on the examination table. He wondered if the price of scientific discovery was worth her pain. He decided that it was, for the chance to learn about what was thought to be the precursor to AIDS. The chance to find a cure to this more simple version would allow great advances in the treatment of all retroviruses.
While Chris was lost in thought, nurse Sarah entered the room to check on Julia.
"She's getting worse, Dr Edwards," she called, but he was too deep in his reveries to notice. She would have to talk to Prof. Porter, Chris' research supervisor about his apparent lack of regard for Julia's health...
Meanwhile, Julia's sister Laura was on her way to Julia's house, unaware of her condition. She slammed her car door and walked quickly to the house, muttering angrily to herself. She knocked at the door and then waited... no answer. She was just about to knock again when she felt a tap on her shoulder. "You looking for Julia?" a man asked gruffly. Laura spun around and grabbed his arms. "YES! I need to speak to her urgently - do you know where she is?" The man nodded "Come on, I'll take you."
Laura wasn't stupid. She instantly whipped her mace out of her purse and sprayed it in his face. Rod screamed and took two quick steps back. As he rushed towards the hose in the front yard, Laura pulled the spare key out from under the door mat and ler herself in.
The house was spotless, as usual, and Julia's personal belongings were all missing. From this, Laura had decided Julia had gone away on holidays, without telling her. Laura was furious, and was on the verge of storming out, when the doorbell rang. It was Rod. He, having washed the mace out of his eyes, thought he should explain himself. He stopped Laura from slamming the door in his face with a foot in the door, and produced a badge.
"Miss, you misunderstand. I'm Detective Rod Howard, and I'm investigating illegal experiments performed by Dr Chris Edwards, and I think Miss Julia Scarfe is involved in some way."
Chris pranced gleefully down the stairs to the basement of the research centre. He plonked down at his desk and began typing on his laptop, thrilled with his results. His ICQ beeped, indicating communication from his long time research partner, Geordie Zhang. He was typing a response, when he felt the pang of cold metal sliding between his shoulder blades.
Behind Chris, Irene withdrew her dagger and wiped it clean on his top. She dragged his body towards the cold storage facility, where Chris stored his deceased experiments that were still of value. She left his body in front of a corpse of a woman with brown hair, who wore an identification tag labelled Maya Muthuswamy. Irene chuckled to herself, and slid out of the cold storage room.
Just then lightning struck the cold storage facility. This wasn't that unusual as it was the 26th strike since Chris opened his Ice Station two years ago. Chris' research had focussed on trying to link the odd Artic weather patterns with the dormancy of the AIDS precursor virus, but unfortunately his deadness prevented him from viewing the proof of his startling theory. As Julia stopped writhing, and lay frozen upon her table, a hideous mutation shifted in the puddle of blood next to the cold metal boxes. The creature that could only be known as Trev had just been spawned and it lurched towards the motionless Julia.
Suddenly from the bush Darren emerged chasing an ice sheep.
It scuttled off into the scrub, as Darren was distracted by the emmense silver construction which lay before him. Intrigued, he circled the monstrosity to find an entrance.
***
The chopper slowly descended through the tall spindily trees. The door swong open and a dark, burly character scurried to the large wooden trapdoor, secretly hidden under an acre (???? I can't read that word ance? ounce?) of scrub. Grabbing the nearby flaming torch which lightened the dank, stone tunnel, the seedy character scuttled along the passageway's twist and turns and threw open the heavy metal trapdoor, where he arrived outside Chris's cold storage centre. "Noooooo!" screamed the distraught man. "My lover! Gone, gone," screamed Matt as he saw the bloody body of his lover lying on the floor of the cold storage facility.
***
Darren chuckled in delight as he recognised the silver construction - it was the Edwards Institution. He pulled his mobile phone out of his pocket, punched in a number and waited for the ring.
Eventually, Catie answered.
"Yes, what is it?"
"I've found what you're looking for..."
***
On the other side of the world, a P&O curise ship sailed around the Caribbean Islands.
"It's easy, ladies. Just swing your hips and let the rhythm flow through your body." Greg said as he demonstrated for his dance class.
Suddenly, his phone rang. Greg answered the call and muttered a few words in surprise before exiting the dancing hall and jumping off the ship.
As he swam through the water, the passangers heard him scream a name. "Trev!"
"I wonder what that was all about," mused Laura, slightly annoyed at the disruption to her lesson. Suddenly, her phone rang. It was her boss, Kat the magnificent.
"I've got a mission for you, Agent Newstead. I've just received a call from Catie at Scotland Yard, and she's found Chris' hideout. I want you to go there and make sure nothing ever leaves that place."
"Yes Kat. I'll get off at out next port and call you from there, okay?"
"No, actually this is more urgent than that. We'll send a 'copter to take you there. Good luck Angent Newstead. This will be a dangerous mission."
***
Darren was making his way quickly and quietly along the maze of corridors, his fingers tightly clutching a crumpled envelope. He stopped outside room 726 and peered in through the open door. A grin slowly spread across his face, and he slowly crept towards the motionless Julia.
***
Greg began coughing again, having swallowed another mouthful of water. He was desparately wishing he'd kept going to swimming lessons when he was younger, the land was a long way off swimming doggy paddle. But he had to get away from the ship, he had to leave before it was too late. The phone call had been from Irene, explaining that she had killed Chris. She had then explained the mutation called Trev, and Matt's angst. He knew he had to kill Trev, Irene wasn't strong enough, and the monster had to be destroyed. He was, after all, the only living monster killer still in business.
Back on the ship, Laura had packed her things and grabbed Rod from the dance class who had stopped dancing after Greg jumped overboard and started playing a lively game of suck and blow. Rod sulked and Laura dragged him away, but was less irate as she explained why. He rushed to collect his bags so he could catch the same chopper as Laura to Chris' secret Institution.
As Darren crept towards Julia, he noticed a lump on her shoulder. The closer he got, the larger the lump appeared. Peering at it, Darren realised that the lump was taking shape. Julia was growing a second head!
Sarah walked down towards her private room in the Ice Station. She walked in, and paused to admire the pictures of herself, in various stages of undess. She was very proud of her past career as a stripper. As she began to close her door, Sarah heard a man's cries.
Greg tentatively stretched his body down and realised that he could touch the ground. He waded to shore and sat there panting. He reached for his waterproof bum-bag and removed a curry puff, which he ate whilst recovering.
Sarah entered Chris' office and stared at Matt, who was crouched over the body of... Faj, the most recent research failure. Matt was sobbing uncontrollably. "Why are you so distraught Matt, you knew what was going on here?"
"But it's different, Sare... different when... different when it's the only person you truly ever loved - I thought he'd be the one, that he would be cured..."
"What!!!" Sarah exclaimed indignantly. "How dare you!" "Does this mean you've been deceiving me for the past 15 years?" "Don't you love me any more?"
"Sarah, I've never loved you. How can I love you when you insist on exposing yourself to others on a regular basis... don't think I didn't know..."
"Well that's it then..." Sarah glanced coldly at Darren, the two headed Julia and the mutant Trev but she didn't see them. Instead she saw the shiny glint of sharp steel and strode purposefully over to a large knife. Moments later after slicing through matt's jugular she plunged the knife into her belly and ripped downwards.
***
After consuming two more curry puffs, Greg had supped sufficiently enough to notice that there was a strange red glow emiting from behind a large bush. He crept over and peered thru the leaves. He could not believe his eyes...
***
Meanwhile, Rod and Laura were being flown in the chopper. "Look, below!" Rod exclaimed, "that island is a rather strange shape isn't it?"
"It looks very couch-like," Laura said puzzledly. "Captain Lars - what is the name of that bizare island below?" Laura asked the secret service chopper pilot. "Oh that madam, is the Island of Lesbos."
***
Within the dank undercarrages of the Edwards Institute, a devious dark-haired woman scuttled along a dark passageway. Heaving open the heavy wooden door, she cackles "ha ha, the first step of my plan is complete!" she nattered away under her breath. "Irene 1, Chris dead".
Consulting the chart on her wall, she ran her finger along it "what next, what next" peering closer and mattering away under her breath.
"Ah yes, that's right..."
***
Professor Porter swirled the rasberry drops around in the glass bowl that sat on her desk. Kate had just finished giving the last snippet of information about Dr Edwards project to Kat.
She tapped her fingers on the desk and waited for the return call...
***
Darren pulled the bloody knife from Sarah's limp body and then tried to sever Julia's second head. He believed that in it was the cure for the AIDS virus. Meanwhile, Julia tried to stop him because it hurt. However, the only weapin near enough was a bowl of spaghetti which she flung at Darren's head. It was enough to knock him out, as it was a very large bowl. This gave Julia enough time to get away.
***
The red light Greg could see came from the front of a house, from which three ladies were sauntering.
"Excuse me, ladies, could you tell me where I am, and how to get to Antarctica from here?" he inquired.
"Well, I can tell you where we are, but you'll have to ask Kat here for directions to Antarctica. I've been here too long," said the first lady with a small smile. "This is the Island of Lesbos, and this is our home (or one of them, anyway)."
The second one continued, "Antarctica is that way," she said while pointing over the island, "You'll have to hurry to catch to next boat. It leaves in 10 minutes. You know, you should have known that Kate, you take it often enough to get back to your work home."
Greg, sensing the argument that was about to break out, made a hasty departure, "Thanks very much ladies, I'll be seeing you around then...."
***
Irene, meanwhile, had decided she needed to contain Trev (and therefore Julia) until Greg arrived. She returned to the room where Sarah had killed Matt, the last place she had seen the two-headed Julia. Unfortunately, while Irene had been checking her list, Julia seemed to have disappeared. Irene muttered angrily to herself as she searched the facility. The damned girl had left!! She raced outside to continue her search of the surrounding area on a ski-doo.
Greg, feeling strangely energetic despite his long swim (possibly due to the curry puff he had recently consumed), ran towards the boat Kat had pointed out. He couldn't wait to get to Antarctica. Would Irene cope for much longer without him? Time was running out, and Trev had to be destroyed.
***
Irene was still searching for Julia and Trev. During her search of the building she had come across so many gruesome corpses (Maya, Chris, Faj, Matt, Sarah) that she was beginning to feel nauseous, so the cool air outside was refreshing. "There can't be that many people left alive... they must be here somewhere..." she was muttering to herself. Little did she know just how close she was to finding them...
***
Meanwhile, Laura and Rod had flown over the Island of Lesbos, and were quickly approaching Antarctica, where Chris' Institute was. As the 'copter landed, Laura thanked Lars, their pilot, and she and Rod headed towards the building in question. "Remember what Kat told us," Laura reminded Rod, "Nothing can leave the Institution." As they approached the building, they stopped dead in their tracks. A faint rustling in the bushes had caught their attention and something seemed very very wrong...
Out of the bushes, burst an Ice Sheep, followed by Julia, followed by Trev, followed by Greg, who had previously had the good fortune to spot Trev the second he stepped off the boat. Rod and Laura acted quickly. Spotting that Julia had two heads, that Trev was some sort of mutant, and that Greg was frothing at the mouth and dribbling yellow gook (actually curry powder, but they weren't to know that), they both fired their semi-automatic machineguns at the three, gunning them down with military precision. Rod thenturned to wave goodbye to Lars, and Laura wept silently over the death of her sister.
"You knew it may come to this," said Rod once Lars had flown back towards the Isle of Lesbos.
"I know - I just didn't want to be the one who did it."
"Pretend that I did, then," Rod suggested. "Come on, there's still more to be done."
The two continued on towards the Edwards Institute.
Irene watched silently from the bushes. With Julia dead, she needed to check her schedule again. She just couldn't remember what the next thing she had to do was! Irene followed Laura and Rod into the Institute. Rod paused just inside the front door and pulled the sign-in sheet off the wall. He scanned the list of names.
"Well, Professor Porter has left for the evening, but she's the only
one," he reported to Laura.
"She's working with Kat, anyway. Come on."
The two continued through the institute. Presently, they came across several bodies.
"Hmm... dead.... dead... Hey, this guy's just out cold!"
Laura ignored the bloody body of Sarah, to peer at Darren.
"What's his name?"
Rod searched Darren's body for some identification, and came up with his Blockbuster video card.
"It says his name is Darren Waters."
"Better look for something else. There was that incident with the video-library card stealer."
"Yes, I remember hearing about that - Matthew Morrison or something?"
"Maya Muthuswamy," Laura corrected.
"Hey, here we are! This says the guy works for Scotland Yard."
"Better wake him up."
As the two attempted to awaken Darren, Irene crept past and headed towards her office.
***
After getting Darren's story, and confirming it with Kat, who confirmed it with Catie, Laura and Rod received instructions to extract him when they left the island. Laura collected several large containers of chemicals, andRod constructed a bomb which would obliterate the entire Institute. Darrentook the list, and went around making large crosses through the names of all the bodies he found. When all was in readiness, the three ran towards thedock.
"There was only two bodies I didn't see," Darren reported. "Sarah
Buckley and Irene Stamp."
"Well, if they're still in there, they'll be dead soon anyway."
"True enough."
The boat soon returned, and the three boarded. When they were several hundred kilometres away, the Edwards Institute exploded in a blazing ball of light. The three operatives settled down for their trip to the Isle of Lesbos.
***
"Well?" asked Catie impatiently.
"We IDed most of the corpses through dental records. Everyone was accounted for, except one."
"One?"
"Miss Sarah Buckley. We assume that she was so close to the heart of the blaze that she was vapourised."
"Very good. And the cure?"
"Unfortunately, without Chris to guide the operation, the cure to the virus was lost. It seems our operatives took the "the cure is in her second head" literally, instead of working out that the *knowledge* of the cure was there..."
"These things can't be helped, I guess," said Catie, calmly. "Are we going to begin operations again?"
"We need a new location," Kat replied. "But soon, yes."
"Marvellous. Keep in touch."
"I will."
***
On the Isle of Lesbos, Sarah, KatE and Kat sat around in the sun. Sarah hada large scar on her belly, from her impromptu abortion, but was otherwise in fine form, having taken up her former passion as an "exotic dancer" - and was far more appreciated by the inhabitants of the Isle than she had ever been by Matt.
"Are we going to let the others live?" asked KatE, lazily sipping her
lemon and lime (no bitters).
"No, I don't think so," Sarah replied. "Laura, Darren and Rod are in the process of being involved in a very nasty accident as their helicopter crashes in a remote corner of England."
"Really?" asked Kat. "How economical of you. I suppose Lars is the pilot?"
"Of course," Sarah replied with a laugh. "What about Catie?"
"She's too impatient," Kat replied. "She sent her own operative without checking it with us first. We need to do something about that."
"Easily taken care of," murmured KatE. "Chris' partner, Geordie, will shortly be coming down with a very fast acting and very deadly form of Escherichia coli. We "discovered" it at the institute. Catie could easilycome down with the same disease."
"Marvellous. So it's all taken care of then?"
"Every loose thread," confirmed KatE.
"Wonderful. How would you like to see my latest dance, in celebration?" Sarah offered.
"We'd be delighted, wouldn't we KatE?"
"We certainly would."
The three women arose from their lounges and headed inside.
THE END