“Not exactly,” Robin answered.

“Not exactly?” You dragged me back to this place, and the best answer you can give me is ‘not exactly’?” Lucy was livid.

“She didn’t know at first,” Michael explained to Lucy. “The only way to know for sure was to test you. Robin refused to tell me unless I brought you back.”

“So you save me from the monsters when I am going to become one of them anyway?”

“No!” Michael shifted from his defensive tone to a demanding voice she’d never heard before.

It made her jump. It made her listen.

“That computer bitch has the answers and would not tell me or help me until I brought you back. I couldn’t bear the thought that the person I love may be infected and spreading this disease without even knowing it, or worse, knowing she is spreading it and unable to stop it!”

Lucy pulled the top of the scrubs on. “Unable to stop it? I don’t understand,” Lucy said, looking deep into Michael’s sad eyes.

“Love,” Robin said, “is an emotion I do not fully understand. Humans will do anything to protect the person they love. At first, I could not understand why my father worked so hard on his project. I learned it was because he loved me so much that nothing else mattered. I knew if Michael felt that same love towards you, he would do anything for the promise to be with you again. I simply gave him that promise.”

“Am I infected?” Lucy asked again.

“You are infected Lucy. But, unlike those other creatures, you are a host. You will not turn into one of them. You will create them.”

Lucy looked at Robin, then to Michael not fully understanding.

“That’s why I had to bring you back, Luce,” Michael explained.

“If someone drinks from your glass,” Robin explained, “They will be infected. If they eat from your plate, they will be infected. If they kiss…”

“They will be infected,” Lucy finished. “I get it. How is this even possible?”

“The original virus did not enter Michael’s digestive system,” Robin explained. “It was a mutated strain that was introduced directly into his blood system from the bite. His white blood cells tried to break down the virus so the virus re-adapted to survive. When Michael kissed you, the mutated strain transferred to you. Your blood was not infected because you did not get bitten, nor did you ingest the original strain. The virus re-adapted itself to your untainted blood to make you a host. The virus will protect the host and let you do the rest.”

“I don’t understand,” Lucy said, looking from Robin back to Michael again.

“Lucy,” Michael rubbed her cheek gently. “You can’t die.”

“Well, I didn’t plan to, if that’s what you mean.”

“No, Lucy,” Michael told her softly. “You cannot die.”

She looked at him puzzled.

“Lucy, you are unable to die.” Michael explained, “I could stab you in the heart right now and it would not kill you. The virus won’t let you die. It needs you alive, so it will protect you. It needs you to spread the infection to others!”

“Stab me in the heart?” Lucy asked, more confused than ever.

“It will hurt,” Michael told her. “It will probably hurt like hell, but it will not kill you. You are the host, and the virus needs you to live.”

“Great,” Lucy said, barely audible as realization set in. “I got it. I’m the four horsemen rolled up into a perky cheerleader with a deadly kiss. But why am I here?”

“To be cured,” Robin answered. “Once you and Michael complete the transfer I will instruct Michael how to make the antidote. With it you can save yourself and humanity.”

“What if I don’t believe you?” Lucy told her. “What if I just say ‘Fuck it!’ and let them bomb me? Surely, I can’t live through that?”

“They are not bombing you, Lucy,” Robin informed her. “They are bombing the island. If the bomb does not land almost directly on top of you, you will most likely survive. You will be badly burned with radiation. You will feel extreme pain, but you will live. The bombs are ineffective against the virus. It is water-based, and it can travel through fresh water at lightening speeds. Every time it rains it spreads that much faster. By now this entire island is infected. The only thing keeping the virus from spreading to the mainland is the salt water that surrounds it. But, once they made the announcement when the island was going to be bombed, thousands of people fled the island. If one infected person gets off the island, the entire continent will be lost because there will be nothing to stop the spread.”

“Wait,” Michael asked, “what announcement?”

Robin played an audio recording.

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is Clay Buffer for ATN News with this important Emergency Broadcast. We will be going off the air immediately following this broadcast. The M Virus has grown to epidemic proportions. The Prime Minister has ordered the complete sterilization of Cape Breton Island. I repeat, The Prime Minister has ordered the complete sterilization of Cape Breton Island. The US National Guard and the Canadian Armed Forces are posted at the Causeway to assist in the evacuation. The Prime Minister has authorized the use of nuclear force to kill the M Virus. Get to the causeway if you can! May God have mercy on us all.”

“My primary concern,” Robin told them, “is that my father’s work is completed.”

“What do you want us to do?” Michael asked as Lucy curled into his arms.

Robin looked from Lucy to Michael and said simply, “To give me life.”

CHAPTER 20 – The Awakening

They didn’t have much time. Robin told them the bombing was to commence at 2300 hours. The military was waiting for the winds to shift so the fallout would blow east and dissipate harmlessly over the Atlantic Ocean. It was noon, so that gave them eleven hours to do what Robin wanted and get their collective asses to the Causeway.

Robin’s plan, in theory, was relatively simple, due mostly in part because her dear father, the late Professor Heslin, had already planted the necessary seeds. The cryo-preservation canister had its own computer that was already programmed to ‘wake’ the real Robin when he activated it, and it was programmed to download all the data in the storage drives to a tiny chip that he implanted in the real Robin’s brain. Heslin wanted all the conversations he and Robin had to be implanted into the real Robin’s brain as memories.

In theory it made sense; in reality, Heslin was a twisted fuck. The death of his daughter had warped his brilliant mind. Years of talking to a computer as if it was his daughter hadn’t helped Heslin much in the reality department. Dump data onto a chip in a living brain, actually, a dead brain that he planned to reanimate with a formula that was turning people into cannibalistic zombies? Not exactly Daddy of the Year Material, but it did raise a lot of questions as to how far a parent would go for their child. And how far was too far?

While they prepared everything, Lucy learned that most of the information Robin gave them was from Lucy’s own blood. Lucy realized that Robin didn’t actually know if she was infected until after she got the blood and tested it. When Michael questioned Robin about infecting someone with a kiss, Robin simply scanned her databanks, learned what a kiss was, why people kissed, associated that kiss with love and, because of her limited understanding of her father’s love for her, Robin put the necessary pieces into place and promptly lied to Michael for her own benefit.

“Remember the cellar,” Michael warned her in the video.

In the cellar Robin had lied. It wasn’t until after Robin got Lucy’s blood that Michael realized she lied to him. He didn’t know if Lucy was infected. He didn’t know if the formula she instructed him to make would slow down the turning process, as she said,or if Robin infected him with the same strain of virus to turn him into a host too. Lucy knew Robin may have been originally created with artificial intelligence, but the depth of her sneakiness knew no boundaries. Lucy also knew the lengths Michael would go to, and the risks he would take for her knew no boundaries either.