James Turnbow

Wade, his bloody, bloated corpse lying on the floor.

Along with it, feelings of guilt, sorrow, dejection.

Through the maelstrom came one word, directed at my dead friend.

Sorry.

Wade twitched.

His corpse sat up.

He asked.

I shook my head, trying to remember what movie it was from.

It was infuriatingly familiar, so close, on the tip of my tongue.

As I thought about it, the swirl slowed enough for my plan to resurface.

I couldn't help but smile.

Even from the grave, Wade was still the best friend I'd ever had.

I rushed away from the TV, still trying to remember the source of the quote.

At the rear of the lab, I punched in a code and opened the cooler.

I grabbed the two vials I needed and headed for a Class 2 safety cabinet.

Normally, this kind of task would have been done using a Class 3 biological safety cabinet to prevent possible contamination, but I didn't have the time.

Besides, if this had any chance of working, I would have to disperse it into the environment.

I was fairly confident it wouldn't be transferable to humans, but I had no time to make sure.

Injecting a syringe into one of the vials, I pulled out the biological weapon Wade had been working on, suspended in a 0.1% tween 80 solution.

I injected the high titer solution into a petri dish.