Making Monsters

The door to the laboratory burst inward in a sudden cacophony that briefly drowned out the incessant wail of the warning siren sounding up and down the hallway. Head of Research Security Shaun Price was the first through the door, his 9mm leading the way and two of his officers trailing close behind him, covering his flanks. The inside of the room was a hellish disco, lit only by the dizzying flash of the red alarm lights spinning overhead. The lighting revealed snatches of the scene; tables overturned, chairs tossed crazily across the room, glass from broken test tubes and beakers glittering across the linoleum like blood diamonds. Shaun reached around his hip to the maglite holstered on his belt and freed it from the clasp keeping it secured to his side, clicking the bright white beam to life in hopes of creating some semblance of stability in this chaos. There was a heavy chemical stench in the air which gave Shaun pause, wondering if maybe they should be wearing masks. A strong breeze was blowing in through the broken window at the far side of the room, however, and so he motioned his team to move forward, hopeful that good ventilation might provide some protection against anything harmful in the air.

A large metal crate squatted at the other end of the room directly across from the broken window. The crate’s door was bent outward and hung awkwardly on its hinges, leaving the space inside gaping open like the ominous mouth of some deep dark cave. Shaun passed the beam of his flashlight over the crate to reassure himself that nothing hid within. The space was empty, but around the edges of the door and smeared along the floor at the front of the crate was an unmistakable dark red stain.
“ Shit.” One of the other security officers murmured at Shaun’s back.
“Check the room for bodies,” Shaun said, “Look for survivors.”
The other two men split away, moving in opposite directions around the room. Shaun continued toward the crate, slowly shifting the beam of his flash light back and forth. As he rounded the corner of an overturned lab table, his light found the owner of the blood smearing the floor by the crate. He noted the body’s lab coat first, and then the hair; long and black, matted with blood, and splayed about as if being blown by an unseen wind; a woman. The body was face down, and so Shaun knelt to roll her over and check for injuries. The cause of death was immediately apparent. Much of the woman’s face was gone. A brief cursory inspection revealed what appeared to be teeth marks around the edge of the open wound that had at one time been her nose and mouth.
“Christ,” he whispered, swallowing back the bile rising in his throat. He quickly checked the woman’s badge and stood. “Dr. Takahata.” he called out, “Dead.”

“I’ve found one too,” one of Shaun’s officers said from where he was examining the underside of a desk about ten feet away, “Dr. David Critcher. You gotta see this.”
Shaun walked over, careful not to disturb anything in the event of a more detailed investigation. As he approached the other officer he bent at the waist and brought up the beam of his flashlight. The good doctor lay huddled beneath the desk in a fetal position. He was facing them, his eyes still open, still full of the terror of his last few moments. The man’s hands were grasping at something sticking out from his chest, just visible through the corpse’s fingers. Shaun didn’t need to pry the hand away to see what the object was. A barb, similar to the spine of a porcupine, protruded from the man’s throat. Shaun couldn’t guess how deep it went, but by his best estimate the spike had to be at least a foot long, and he was willing to bet there were at least three others sticking in the dead doctor’s chest.
“What the fuck were these people working on?” The other security guard asked as Shaun stood straight, rubbing at his eyes as if trying to wake from a nightmare.
“I don’t know,” he said, “Some kind of genetic research.”

“I’ve got a live one,” the third man suddenly shouted, waving Shaun over toward the broken window. Shaun hurried over, trailed closely by the other officer. As they approached, their associate pointed toward the base of the window where a small middle aged man sat huddled against the wall, his knees pulled to his chest with his arms wrapped around them. His cloths were in tatters, spattered in blood and some other fluid that must have been bile. He rocked slightly, emitting a soft sound that resembled some cross between a whimper and a nervous laugh.
“Sir,” Shaun said, kneeling down beside the man, “Sir, what happened here?”
The doctor didn’t respond. Shaun brought up his flashlight and could see the man was staring at something on the floor. As he turned, he saw an open book lying on the linoleum. He picked it up, looking first at the illustration dominating the top of the page. Looking back at him was a creature, one that did not, and could not exist, not in a rational world. It had the face of a man with a wide grin, revealing six rows of shark-like teeth. Its body was like that of a lion with a long sinewy tail. The artist had even added the barbs, sticking up from the tuft of fur at the end. Above the image in big bold font was the word “Manticore”. Shaun set the book down again, his mind in a sudden fog, unsure of what to think, yet as he watched the doctor’s trembling lips curve into a slightly manic smile, and looked up to see the claw marks scrabbling over the edge of the window seal in deep gouges, his stomach twisted into knots.