Rewired: Project Insula

Chapter 16

It didn't take long.

In fact, probably about 3 minutes had passed since Evie had taken that much needed sip of the cool liquid, stored freshly inside the metallic can. Evie had craved the drink after seeing it everywhere that week and like a good consumer, she bought in to the advertisement. Well, Matt bought it for her, but she was the one that needed it.

Her eyes began to clench themselves shut to try and alleviate the pain that was pounding inside her head. Whenever they would open, bright white and pink lights would dart around her vision and aggressively pulsate until it was all she could see. Shutting out these lights and tensing her whole face seemed to somehow make the pain slightly more bearable.

People reacted differently to the drink, different minds needed rewiring differently. Some would take minutes, others it would take hours, sometimes days to even feel the effects; the latter being far less common.

Take Robert Harris as an example, the bakery driver. His effects began to set in almost instantly; within 10 minutes he had, involuntarily of course, killed two young boys, Mark Walker and Ben Wilson.

Another example being Thomas Jack, the homeless man who had set up refuge outside of a steakhouse down Camden. Thomas was the first case in the UK, of what would soon to be known as “Project Insula”.

It took around 30 minutes for Thomas to begin feeling strange, and around 45 minutes for him to cause enough of a ruckus that the public would end up calling him an ambulance. Although the people of London see lots of strange behaviour every-day, something was not quite right about Thomas biting the bricks on the walls, until a stream of blood and crumbled teeth began flowing out of his mouth.

By the time he arrived at the hospital and was transported to the Red Ward of the Psychiatric Intensive Care Unit, it was too late. Thomas snapped into life after being sedated, and brutally killed the three nurses, two paramedics and Doctor that were in the room with him; before heading out towards Meera and Rhys. He was taken down by the armed response team that arrived at the scene in just 6 minutes.

Evie, didn't seem to have the type of mind to withstand the effects of the drink, as within 7 minutes, the head pains and flashing lights turned to hallucinatory effects, both auditory and visual.

Again, this could be compared to the obsession that Robert Harris had with the “box”. He was adamant that it was his box, all the way up until the front of his car caused Ben Wilson's young brain to splatter all over his friend, seconds before he met the same fate.

Evie didn't care about the box, she didn't even know what it was, although not many would. Instead she was stuck in what seemed like a repeating loop of time, as her senses crossed over with one another, revealing the true reality of consciousness. She didn't realise, but she was experiencing first hand her consciousness get rebooted, although the original Evie probably wouldn't like the new version of herself.

Now 20 minutes in, Evie was now fully under the effects of the drink. Her old self buried for eternity in that loop of senses.

She was pacing madly around the lounge, flipping furniture furiously, scratching her skin in anger and screeching at random household objects. She had grown a particular distaste to one of Matt's shoes, which she had launched around the room seven times.

After a few minutes of Evie adjusting to her new brain, Alysha had finally woken from her slumber, no doubt to the noise of screeching and leather shoes hitting the walls. Too a baby, waking up is not pleasant. Normally they will wake up hungry or with a wet nappy; in this case both were true.

The crying began like a screeching violin, echoing throughout the small apartment.

Upon hearing this new and fascinating noise, Evie decided to go and investigate. Any kind of noise could mean people, and Evie just wanted to kill, kill, kill.

She whittled down the noise to be behind a door, next to the lounge television. With no time to waste, Evie sprinted towards the door and smashed it down effortlessly.

Inside was Alysha, her beautiful baby girl, stood in her crib crying. The crying soon stopped when she saw the sight of her mother, the loving twinkle in her eye as apparent as ever.

Alysha's short life stopped that night. The horrors yet to come would never be revealed to her. In a way, by killing her daughter, Evie saved her life.

…

“If what you are saying is true…” Matt trailed off, looking disappointed with what he was about to say.

“…which I fully believe it is.” He continued.

“Then yes, I do believe this is necessary” He finished, with a large pushing groan.

After Meera had come too slightly, enough to explain what had happened. Matt decided to move the body of PC Bailey from the car. His feet were tucked under Matt's armpits as Meera lifted his head.

Meera nodded in agreement, words unable to escape thanks to her breath being used up on this laborious task.

“I didn't have a clue that fountain pens still existed” he joked, nodding towards the pen lodged deep in PC Bailey's temple.

Matt suddenly dropped the body and a shocked expression overcame him.

“f**k did I just make a joke about a dead guy already?” He said, shakily.

“Don't worry, you get used to things much quicker than you would like.” Meera replied, slowly dropping the head on the floor.

“That part seems to be worse than actually getting used to things too.” She continued.

“I'm not sure I quite understand you.”

“You will” She replied, lifting the head up again and gesturing to Matt to lift the feet.

Matt was of a strong and athletic build. His biceps tensed in a satisfying way, the symmetrical tone of his muscles throughout his arms were emphasised thanks to the sleeveless vest he was sporting.

Meera found herself gazing at him for a second, she noticed how his darker complexion only complimented his well looked after body.

She shut her eyes as soon as she realised what she was doing.

She was right, getting over everything so fast was worse than actually getting over it.

After dragging the body over to a small doorway leading to what seemed like an alleyway, they dumped the man who was once a father of five and husband to a gorgeous wife. He led awkwardly with only his head propped up against the heavily graffitied metal door.

Both Matt and Meera took a few steps back to look at what they had done.

Matt stood with his hands on his hips and tears began to silently fall from his eyes. He wiped away the evidence quickly with a swipe of his hand.

“You alright?” Meera asked, placing a friendly hand on his back.

“Yeah…” Matt replied after some hesitation.

Meera rubbed his back to try and comfort him, realising the irony of how things had changed in the last 30 minutes or so.

“It's just my family. My wife and baby girl are upstairs and…” He stopped, wiping his eyes again.

“Well… I just hope we are going to be alright” he continued.

…

Meera felt like an unwanted visitor, heading up the stairs to the old apartment. Probably because of that split second of s****l attraction she felt whilst carrying a dead man, who she had killed with a pen.

She felt like his wife would smell it on her, she knew she would.

Matt's strides began to slow as they came to the 4th floor. Meera continued behind him but stopped as he did in front of her.

“W-what?” Matt gasped, hand over his mouth.

The front door to what she assumed was Matt's apartment was wide open. It was the first room you see when you come up on the stairs, with around 8 other apartments spaced out to the right, down the hallway; like that of a hotel.

Matt ran straight into his apartment, disappearing from Meera's sight. She carefully walked up to the landing, checking down the hallway for any more of these unwelcome visitors that she had become so accustomed too.

She peaked her head round the door, revealing a large open plan lounge and kitchen, beautifully decorated and very modern. Some of the furniture was flipped upside down and there was broken ornaments and broken digital frames, laying on the floor. She couldn't see Matt but assumed he had gone through what seemed like the only other door in the apartment.

She slowly walked in, checking the corners in the room. The door had been almost taken off its hinges, so she didn't even bother trying to close it.

“Matt?” She called, whilst slowly walking into the lounge.

No response.

She now began to get a little more anxious, hear heart started to beat faster. She could see small splatters of blood on the glass coffee table in the middle of the room, along with similar blotches spread around the carpet.

“Matt?!” She shouted with a higher sense of urgency.

She stepped passed some broken glass on the floor carefully, coming into the main lounge section where two cream sofas and the television created a small perimeter around the table.

A small metal object sticking out from under the sofa, shone underneath the light above her. She took another look towards the room that she thought Matt had gone into, and one look outside, before bending down to pick it up.

As she slid it from under the sofa, she felt liquid crash from side to side, inside this container. Upon realising what it was, she dropped it to the floor and let out a gasp.

“Matt!” She shouted.

“We need to leave quickly!”

She ran towards the doorway where Matt was but stopped at the entrance. Matt was sat in the middle of the floor, holding something.

He turned his body revealing a wet and almost deformed version of the face she had become used too in these past moments, it was the face of somebody in utter devastation.

Strange hyperventilating noises were coming from him, almost internal gasps of air filled the room as he sobbed and sobbed.

“My baby…” he said blankly between sobs, sending shivers down Meera's spine.

She could only see a mess of blood and flesh spread across the crib and onto the floor, leading into Matt's arms. The sight was enough to fully ruin the most tough person's life forever or make the most iron stomached violently sick for hours.

Meera left the room with that same vacant stare she had become so used to giving and went into the kitchen. She saw a sports duffle bag on the counter, unzipped the top and then emptied the contents on the floor. Still holding the empty bag by her side, she began ransacking all of the cupboards and drawers for any kind of blunt or sharp weapons.

Just as Meera was squeezing in one last item – a rather heavy rolling pin made of wood; she some footsteps approach from behind her.

Stood in the doorway of Alysha's bedroom was Matt. He had stolen Meera's vacant stare and was covered in his daughter.

He wiped a clumsy fist through his face, sniffling hard as he did; smearing Alysha's blood and flesh all over his face.

He sniffled one last time and finally spoke out.

“Where we going?”