By now, you’ve probably heard of the popular TV show that portrays the Cordyceps fungus infecting humans and turning them into zombie-like creatures. But let me tell you, the real-life scenario is much more terrifying.
I work in a lab that specializes in plant and fungi experimentation. Our primary focus is on developing new drugs for the pharmaceutical industry, including everything from anti-aging remedies to creating the next “blue pill”.
However, we also received significant funding from the Defense Department, and their research requirements are much more sinister.
“How are the new test subjects doing?” Steven, our lab supervisor, asked as he approached me carrying a clipboard. He gestured towards the eight test rooms in front of us.
“Number four looks promising. And I think six and seven are starting to show signs”, I said, looking up from my workstation.
Inside the eight test rooms were five men and two women, one in each room, plus a single empty room. It was left empty after a rogue chimpanzee from the earlier phase experiments had managed to escape its cage and break the pass-through window, which is used to transfer materials and instruments between sterile and nonsterile rooms.
Steven nodded, a look of excitement on his face. “Excellent. We’re getting closer”.
In the cages, test subject one, two, three, and five, appeared to be behaving somewhat normally, pacing their small 8 by 8 cage, or talking to themselves. However, test subject four had remained motionless now for about two hours, lying on his side with his back to us with his chest rises and falls his only movement. Meanwhile, test subjects six and seven had recently become lethargic, barely responding to the electric shocks administered to their enclosure.
All of the test subjects had been exposed to a variety of chemically altered cordyceps fungus. Typically, cordyceps cannot infect humans due to our higher internal temperatures, among other factors. However, by modifying the fungus’s genetic makeup, we were close to changing that.
“Let’s keep a close eye on those three, report back to me if there are any updates.”
“Will do,” I replied.
With that, Steven left the room and I returned to monitoring the test subjects’ vitals on the screens. Interestingly, subjects four, six, and seven had significantly elevated heart rates, almost 50% higher than the others. Additionally, their endorphin levels, the body’s natural painkillers, were unusually high, indicating that they were experiencing intense pain, despite showing none of the typical outward signs.
“What do you make of this?”, I asked my lab partner, Mike, while pointing to the screen with my pen.
He looked over the vitals on my screen. “It looks like they are in intense pain. Those sorts of levels would be what I would expect to see if someone were on fire”, he said dryly.
“Yes, that’s what it looks like to me as well”, I replied.
Our test subjects were some of the worst criminals our Government had locked up. The advantage of working for the Defense Department, especially where we required human subjects, was there was no shortage of forgotten criminals – terrorists, murderers, and other violent offenders. These individuals were typically housed in maximum security prisons and were serving lengthy sentences, often for life.
While the use of human subjects in scientific experiments is, controversial, and subject to strict ethical guidelines, the Defense Department saw the need to conduct these tests outside the normal guidelines. Therefore, the rules no longer applied, and we had the green light to do whatever we needed to do to get the result.
“Let’s do a blood test and see if the troponin levels have increased on subject four, six and seven”, I said to Mike.
Mike nodded and left his seat to get dressed in his hazmat suit.
With the heart rate and endorphin levels so extremely elevated, I thought it could be possible that the Cordyceps is already spreading through the test subjects, paralyzing them while simultaneously causing immense pain. If my theory was right, then not only will we have successfully managed to infect the first even human with Cordyceps, but it would have taken effect within three hours of exposure.
Cordyceps is a type of parasitic fungus that primarily infects ants, as well as other insects such as beetles and caterpillars. The infection process begins when a spore of the Cordyceps fungus lands on the exoskeleton of an ant.
Once the spore is attached to the ant, it begins to grow long, branching filaments that penetrate the ant’s exoskeleton and start to invade its body. As the fungus grows, it releases chemicals that alter the ant’s behavior, causing it to become disoriented and leave its colony.
The fungus continues to grow inside the ant’s body, eventually replacing its organs and tissues with a mass of fungal cells.
We are not stupid – we know exactly why the Defense Department would want to, essentially, weaponize this. We do this because we are scientists, and pushing the boundaries of human knowledge in further understanding the world around us is fundamental to our role.
Now fully suited up, Mike entered the first test subjects room, number four, and activated the cage squeeze function. The cage started to close in on the test subject, squeezing in from front and back. This process meant Mike could get up and close to the test subject without risk to himself. But just as the cage closed in tight, locking the subject in place, his skin burst from multiple areas, and sharp, dagger-like spores fired out in all directions.
Panicking, Mike turned and ran for the door he just came through. I reached for the emergency lockdown button to prevent him from leaving and hit it a second too late. Mike ran out into the connecting corridor, screaming in pain. Some of the spores had penetrated his suit and were now drilling their way into his body, as Mike screamed and clawed at the holes, ripping his hazmat suit while trying to grab them out.
I activated the alarms and locked down my door as Mike thrashed about in the corridor. A few minutes later I heard security come running down the hall and yell at Mike to get down, but he was in too much pain to respond. The security guards, continued to yell at Mike, tasers drawn, when Mike suddenly started running at them. Without flinching, the both Security Guards tasered Mike, dropping him onto the floor. They then slowly approached him to restrain him, when suddenly Mikes body tore open and fired out more dagger-like spores.
“Impossible!” I yelled at the camera, as I watched both guards get hit by the spores.
The Cordyceps had multiplied and spread within minutes. The guards, now themselves in agonizing pain, ran back through the doors that they came from and into one of the main lab halls where more than a dozen researchers were working. Watching through the cameras, I saw the researchers panicking and trying to escape via the now-locked doors, as the two security guards thrashed around. Then, just like Mike, the security guards’ skin split open, firing multiple spores around the room. Most of the researchers had now been infected, and those that avoided being struck by the spores weren’t so lucky a few minutes later, as more spores went flying around the room. Soon, every researcher was infected, screaming and writhing in agony.
I stayed in my locked room for hours, watching as the infected slowly stop moving. One by one they collapsed to the floor or on tabletops, and I watched in horrified amazement as fungal growths started to sprout from the holes in their skin. I eventually put on a hazard suit, unlocked the door, and left the office, slowly walking toward Mikes’s still body. By now he was covered in fungal stalks and mushroom-like growths, and one had even grown right through his eye socket, popping his eyeball out to the side. But that wasn’t the worst thing. The worst thing was his other eye, which was fixated on me, had an expression of sheer terror and agony. He was alive, paralysed, and appeared to be feeling every horrifying moment as the Cordyceps slowly dissolved his internal organs and replaced them with fungal growths.
“I’m Sorry Mike” I whispered, genuinely upset at his predicament. Mike was a good guy, but I knew I couldn’t help him. The Cordyceps was devouring his internal organs as he lay there, so I did what any good scientist would do – I carefully took a sample of the growth from his eye socket, and a blood sample. I then carefully attached a mobile heart rate monitor to his arm through one of the ripped holes Mike had made earlier, and then slowly backed away back into the secure room, locked the doors, and awaited my rescue. The data I could get from Mike would no doubt prove invaluable for our next attempt.
So here I wait. It has taken longer than I thought to be rescued, it has now been about 60 hours since Mike got infected. The bodies are now unrecognizable lumps of fungal growths, and Mikes heart finally stopped registering a pulse around 15 hours ago, which means he was alive for 2 whole days after the infection. He did have multiple heart attacks during that time, no doubt from the pain of different organs turning to slush, but somehow he was kept alive. I have tried the internal lines multiple times, but no one is answering. It’s probably a security protocol I am unaware of. And I can’t see the cameras outside this part of the facility, but I am sure they are just taking extreme precautions, after all, the last thing anyone would want is for this to escape the lab. But I’m sure everything is fine.
At least, I hope it is.