The syringe held by the doctor in his hand was much bigger than any other they had seen before. It was almost as thick as the doctor's arm, and it was apparent, based on the experiences the others had seen the doctor perform before, that this wasn't going to be anything pleasant.
"So, do we have any volunteers?" The doctor slowly moved his head from one side to the other, staring into everyone's eyes.
By now, Kelly was mustering up her strength, trying to pull herself out of the chair. She pulled so hard that the skin had rubbed off around her wrist and was scratched slightly, but no matter what she wanted, she couldn't break free.
Kelly had already been through a lot due to the doctor's countless experiments, which the latter had performed to activate any superpower in her, but none of them had succeeded. Seeing the syringe and hearing the doctor's words, her mind went into flight and fight mode. She didn't want to go through it again; she didn't want to experience the excruciating pain like that again.
"You don't have to do this, I can convince them that we still need you!" Brandon pleaded. "You can keep the medicine and the disease that people have a secret, that way we have to keep you alive."
"And what will happen when you are all cured and don't need me anymore? Don't try to outsmart me, you monkey." The doctor glared at them as he looked back and forth between the two; there wasn't much time to pick.
"Pick me." Brandon volunteered. "I volunteer, and I'll take whatever crap you give me."
Brandon had seen the condition Kelly was in when he attempted to rescue her. He didn't want her to go through that again, especially since he had failed to help her.
"Great, it looks like we have our answer." The doctor smiled, but instead of walking towards Brandon, he stepped towards Kelly.
Seeing this, she began to scream at the top of her lungs, but as soon as the doctor placed his hand on her arm, she soon felt drowsy. It was an unusual feeling, the power of the doctor. Soon after, the syringe pierced right into her neck, and slowly, the liquid in it went into her veins.
"You Bastard! I said to pick me! I can't believe how evil one person can be!" Brandon shouted and screamed at the top of his lungs, "I said to pick me! Pick me!"
The liquid was halfway already into Kelly. There had been no changes yet, but who knew when or what would happen? That was right when the doors slammed open.
"Brandon!" It was Dave, and someone else also sprinted in
"KELLY!" This was Cody. He screamed and ran forward right towards the doctor. "Get your hands off her!"
Cody threw out a fist, but with his other hand, the doctor caught it. Cody was still a teenager, while the doctor was an adult, and the latter was better with his hands than expected.
"Go to sleep!" the doctor said, and Cody started to feel faint as he felt a strange energy enter him through the doctor's hand.
"Let me say the same thing to you, go to sleep."
Several bullets were shot out, hitting the doctor in the upper torso. His hand lost its grip, and the syringe came out of Kelly's neck, and he dropped it on the floor. It had surprisingly smashed to pieces as soon as it touched the floor.
Not the entirety of the liquid had gone into Kelly, but there was a good two-thirds of it that had flowed in her before shots were fired.
Stepping into the room, Pink had her mother on her back, Kun was in the room as well, and lastly, Zain walked over to the doctor with the handgun in his hand, the one he had used to shoot the doctor.
They were a little later compared to Cody and Dave because they were checking out the other patient rooms; that's where they had found Pink's mother, while Cody and Dave were closer to this room.
Kneeling down, Zain noticed that the doctor was still alive. He was bleeding and reached out a hand toward Zain.
"Save...me." The doctor mumbled.
"I don't think even a doctor can save you now," Zain answered. However, there was a chance that Zain could save him if he was to bite him right before his final moments, but Zain didn't want to.
Even if this person in front of him was superhuman, due to what he had done and the creations he had made, Zain didn't want to give the doctor any kind of hope. The others unstrapped both Kelly and Brandon while Zain watched the doctor take his last breaths.
Both Cody and Kelly had come to their senses, it took them a while to figure out what had happened, but it was clear they had been saved.
"Thank you...thank you so much." Kelly cried as soon as she could speak. Her eyes were teared up, but her eyes had light.
However, Brandon was watching Kelly carefully. It seemed like she was being her normal self at the moment. There was nothing strange about her yet; maybe it was due to the liquid not entirely going into her body.
Either way, he would keep an eye on her, as he was the only one who had heard what the doctor had said about the syringe. About it being his last experiment.
"We came here to get a cure from the doctor, and now he's dead." Brandon turned towards Zain as he continued, "The best thing we could do is take all the medicine in this place or make this place our second base with all the equipment inside. It's about an hour's walk from our base, so it's not too bad, but the problem is the zombies.
"Now that I think about it, it would be best if we were to get out of the place as well before the whole place gets overrun."
"There is no need to worry about that," Zain said as he stood up. "The Zombies, we have dealt with them. There will be no problem apart from getting rid of the bodies."
Brandon was trying to understand what Zain meant, but he could only imagine that Zain and his group had gotten rid of them all. Yet, based on the footage he had seen, that didn't make any sense.
How could they have gotten rid of all the zombies and headed up here at the same time? Of course, only Zain knew the answer to that, and that was due to his Horde Zombies. They had been given the task of killing the other zombies.
Due to the other zombies not attacking back, it was an easy task, and once all the zombies were taken out, Zain commanded the horde to head back to where Skittle and the others were, bringing his group back up again.
Although he couldn't directly see what the zombies were doing, the reason he knew the task was complete was simple, it was because he had finally received the reward from his quest.
[A gold card has been received]
Unlike before, Zain immediately decided to use the gold card.
[The gold card has been used]
[You have successfully acquired a new skill]
[Brain Eater]
[This skill can be used when consuming a human brain.]
[The skill allows the user to acquire a certain amount of knowledge from the brain that the user has eaten. It will also allow the user to filter through the last 24 hours of the brain.]
'It's just like I thought. All of the gold cards have been skills so far, and once again, it has given me quite a good skill to have. This skill is the same as what was used on Shark, but I guess it means I can use this on humans now as well.' Zain couldn't stop smiling as he thought about this skill.
There was no longer any need for him to ask people questions when he could get them from memory himself; the only thing that was limited was the time frame.
"Mother, did the doctor say anything about what your condition was or the medicine that he gave you?" Pink asked.
"No." She replied. "He just gave me the separate pills and some orange boxes."
It was a disappointing answer. She knew that, but it was the truth.
"Maybe we can take the pills and find another doctor or university student. If they know the medicine, then we could find out what is spreading to everyone back at the base."
"I think I might have the answer." Zain interrupted everyone again.
"Wait, Zain, are you a med student?" Dave asked.
"Umm... Not quite." Zain looked at the doctor.
"Why don't you guys make sure there aren't any more patients like Pink's mother? Rest up, and before we leave, I think I might be able to have an answer to your problem." Zain smiled.
Others noticed Zain was acting weird, but when had he not? However, a certain someone had gotten the gist.
"Alright, everyone, let's clear out of the room and do as Zain says, besides this room needs to be cleaned up as well. I'll leave that to Zain." Kun secretly winked at the latter.
Once everyone had left the room, it was time for Zain to try out his new skill.
****
Thank you for all the support so far on LUZ.
LUZ will be continuing on, and I hope to do more chapters for all my series as time free's up in the future.