Chapter Seven
Addey read the official document with both interest and puzzlement. The cover page read:
PSA DOCUMENT
EXECUTIVE ORDER #18049
PAM COMPLEX
She flipped to the next page, entitled Origins Of PAM.
Dear fellow citizen, you are honored to be picked for this duty. Your country needs you. The PAM Complex is a simple acronym: protect all monsters. Yes, monsters do exist. They have from the beginning of time in one stretch of reality or another. Some monsters have recently popped up in existence: for example, ghosts. They have only been around for the past century. The walking dead, however, have existed since Biblical times. Jesus Christ really did return from the grave, but he was burned to death after murdering three disciples in cold blood. There are other phenomena on this island, and you’ll read about them too. For now, this order addresses the reason the government has banded together to contain these monsters.
The main reason we started this program is because the monster populations have grown. Monsters can blend into society so well that they’re a danger to our citizens. Another reason for the program is that the monsters must be studied. We must comprehend why the dead can walk. Why do ghosts exist? If ghosts and the walking dead exist, are they connected to the afterlife, and if so, can we coax secrets from them about the world beyond us? Maybe the hybrid nature of our residents can be used to cure diseases? The most pressing reason is people can’t handle the notion of living among monsters. Terrorists are feared in everyday media; imagine flesh-eating terrorists? Citizens will form brigades to hunt them out, and innocent people would die in their fervor. Chaos would reign.
The PAM Complex has existed since 1974, but in the United States, similar projects have existed in the form of underground bunkers and secret camps throughout the nation for nearly a century. These bunkers were simple wire cages to confine the monsters, but their escape was inevitable, and their demands had to be heeded. They were controllable with food and shelter fit for their needs, but their numbers kept increasing. So we created the island to harbor them safely. You will be face-to-face with the creatures during your work here. They are very real and are a constant threat to you.
What is your job then? The PAM Complex is designed especially for the monsters we harbor. We must keep them happy, and that means being well fed and busy. Imagine the animals of a zoo. They must be stimulated, cared for and medically treated and, most of all, their every need must be attended to. Our accommodations are as unusual as they are time consuming and complicated. Our staff is equipped to complete tasks including room service, meat preparation and habitat creation. You will be assigned a section and learn the ropes of the complex. You will be on call 24/7.
The next issue to hit upon is personal safety. You will be given a communication device much like a beeper. After every service stop or duty completed, you will dial a number that indicates to our comptrollers you are safe. If you’re in distress, there will be a number you can dial for backup. You will be equipped with a .28 caliber service pistol. The bullets will be coated with a garlic nitrate to repel vampire attacks. Also, you will carry a four-inch boning knife and industrial flashlight. Hand-to-hand combat is strongly forbidden. Use your weapons. Your death is not our responsibility. Being smart and using skill and cunning will serve you better than emptying your pistol. More often than not, the bullets will only stun or hinder the monsters momentarily. There are also chambers similar to panic rooms for distress situations. You can radio for help and take shelter in these units. Again, your safety is your own responsibility. There are no police here to protect you. Only your coworkers can help you.
Addey flipped over the page to a series of pictures. The first was the werewolf creatures Richard had showed her earlier. They were in a pack within a facility that mimicked woods—even moonlight, trees and a lake gleamed in the background—but it looked computer fabricated. The second page was a standing corpse in funeral attire. Half the face was white bone, the rest blackened skin busied with grub worms and a colony of mice festering in its chest cavity. The corpse was decades old, she guessed, a sneer and scowl built in where the remaining flesh held strong. The third page revealed a naked woman of feather-white flesh marred by protruding blue veins and red-and-black eyes (the red color the shape of two triangles side by side) swimming in a pool of blood. Her teeth were jagged and bent like jig hooks. The fourth picture puzzled her. Normal people in street clothes were gathered together on what looked to be a dance floor, but they were surrounded by a glowing purple fog. The colors were emanating from their bodies. They otherwise appeared human.
She turned the page and read on, unable to make sense of the strange picture.
The next heading read, The Dead.
The dead can return to life. There is no single or solid reason for their awakening. Our scientists speculate an assortment of causes. One, people didn’t always bury their dead in coffins or in the ground. People died without being discovered, and their bodies came back alive from a state of soul unrest. Earthquakes and flooding and other natural disasters are rumored to stir the dead from eternal slumber. A more educated reason: embalming fluid. The components of embalming fluid have been updated and changed time and time again because of the dead waking. The chemicals reanimate the brain, like a steroid, and stimulate life. This life can have two different levels of intelligence. The subhuman, dead for longer than a year, tend to rot out before they can do extensive harm to innocent civilians. They act out random and erratic behaviors. Violence ranges from cannibalism to mutilation. The other kind of dead are the freshly dead. They are functioning at a human level. Their skin can be treated and repaired to resemble normally functioning human beings. They do not crave violence, only the creature comforts of life: food, booze, sex and entertainment.
Dispatching the dead can be an irksome task. They can be dismembered and the brain removed, and they will still function. Douglas Findley, a Dutch scientist, boiled them down to blood and bile, and the substance slithered in liquid form. Don’t be mistaken: damaging the body can slow the dead down and save your life. True execution of the dead requires total incineration. The recently dead are harmless as long as their brains and bodies are medically preserved, but the extensively decayed must be approached with caution. They can be subdued with human meat and animal bodies. As long as they are fed meat on a regular basis, they will ignore you.
She peered out the window to rest her eyes. The ocean was as endless as it was entrapping. The werewolves were real, so why wouldn’t the dead be real? She was in serious danger, she kept telling herself. Her stomach churned, tightening in the anticipation of meeting the creatures she read up on. Richard said he expected great things of her. What would it mean to excel at the PAM Complex?
Having no answers, she read on to the next heading: Vampires.
Vampire is an easy classification of this hybrid creature. They have existed as long as the walking dead. Vampires are human beings with severe forms of anemia. Their blood runs thin or not at all in their veins. There are cases throughout history that point to humans born without hearts, and they eat their mothers’ uteruses and innards during the birth cycle to keep their bloodstreams fed. This form of hyperanemia, as it was named by Richard Salvati in Rome, can only be subdued by the massive consumption of blood. Humans born without hearts are not the only deformation these creatures exhibit. The deformations that affect both sexes of vampires include the growth of wings, enlargement of teeth, enlargement of circulatory system, extension of fingernails, mutation of eyes (including the shape of iris and a heightened sense of sight), paleness of skin and strange formation of a sticky, viscous fluid at their legs and fingertips that allows for climbing. And the females harbor abilities that males do not. For example, the female can lactate blood to sup males back to life and feed their children. Females can go into heat and release a pheromone that will render any human—male or female—submissive. The males do not have sway over their hosts except by brute force and fear. Vampires can perish by a series of methods. Your bullets are coated with garlic. This stuns the vampires but cannot kill them. Sunlight does nothing. Vampires can only die if their hearts or brains are destroyed or they are starved of blood for three months. (Citizen, you can see why hunting vampires in populated areas would be as dangerous as it would be unwise). The only method to subdue the vampires is to give them what they want, and that is blood. A glutted vampire is a harmless vampire.
She thought back to the refrigerator compartment. The stock of human limbs and organs did have a purpose. They fed these creatures and kept them “subdued”. The situation became realer with each passage she read. This wasn’t a fabrication. Two years was long enough to be here, but Richard had debunked that myth. She would be here forever.
She suddenly wanted a drink at that open bar.
Finish reading first. I have to know everything.
The next heading read Werewolves.
Werewolves are also of human origin. The werewolves have only existed for less than thirty years. The popularity of dog breeds and conceiving unnatural mixes has been popularized by the AKC and other breeder associations. A group in southern Kentucky decided to manipulate dog DNA even further. The group consisted of animal rights activists. They were also multimillionaires with the facilities and the equipment to create mixed species. The group labeled themselves “Humans and Animals for Equality.” This group decided to swap dog DNA with human DNA. This would blur the line between human rights and animal rights. What’s fair and unfair? Where do we draw the line between animal cruelty and human punishment now? What was created in Kentucky is the pack of wolves pictured previously. They slaughtered the activist group. The bred wolves escaped the facility and continue to pop up in packs across the United States. Never cross the alpha male or alpha female. They are the most dangerous. But if you kill either, you render the group helpless, and the pack dissolves and becomes less of a threat. Werewolves can die like anybody else, but with enlarged bodies, they can take fifty bullets and still fight back. The shock of blood loss and the ceasing of bodily functions can take up to thirty to sixty minutes to set in. Escape to the panic rooms is the best mode of survival.
The slumbering group in the chamber were dogs and humans bred together. “That’s just sick. Activists are okay, but extremists are douche bags.”
There was one page left, and she was growing more and more anxious for a drink. Her stomach rumbled with hunger despite the unnerving information. It would take time to sink in, and she couldn’t starve herself in the meantime. She needed all her wits and strength.
The final section read Ghosts.
Ghosts are harmless, but they can serve as a distraction to humans. They can haunt their tormenters or those who crossed them during their living years. Ghosts are essentially reflections. They can manifest themselves inside mirrors, glass and anything reflective. Ghosts can channel their energy into speaking as well, though it takes them time to save up ethereal strength. Ghosts originate from a person’s soul. Souls are essentially ghosts. The soul is a battery, if you will, that is charged up fully during life, but in death, the battery is weakened and needs revamping often. Speculation of the existence of these spirits is focused on the electrical and sound waves that are shot back and forth across the country. The spirits residing in the dead are shaken free by so many hertz of sound waves. This is also an explanation as to how ghosts recharge themselves. Scientist Jorg Orback determined a ghost can hold as many as one thousand volts of energy at a time. Ghosts reside on the island because in collective groups, they are at their strongest, and they are always trying to reach out to the living. Here at the PAM Complex, we acknowledge their existence, and this is the probable reason why they stay with us.
Thank you for reading the above entries. This is as unbelievable as it is true. The evidence is at the PAM Complex. Upon entering the facility, you will be assigned a work area and receive a crash course in your duties. You will be equipped with weapons, a room and a map of the facility. Please reserve questions for the classroom. You will be taking a week-long course in protection and engagement of our unusual guests. Any further questions should be addressed to the seasoned staff under Carl Brenner’s command, director of the PAM Complex.
Addey tossed aside the file and stretched.
She decided to go topside for a hard drink.