and spitting at him, and he began to balance himself with his feet one behind the other.
He walked the wall like a tightrope and bid a fond farewell to his grotesque pursuer. It was just like Victory Tower. Only instead of being fifty feet up in the air with the clock chasing him, he had a crazed woman chasing him.
He kept his cool and made his way over to the right side of the Labyrinth, the woman wheezing after him through the rooms, and he jumped off the outer wall.
He landed on his side but rolled into a crouching position. As he stood up, he looked into an exterior window as the woman threw herself against it, smearing blood and saliva on the glass with her face.
“What the…”
He saw Sergeant Lorenzo running down the side of the maze toward him. “Private Birdsall, are you all right?”
“Yes, sir. What was…”
“Meet me in the debriefing room.”
“Sir, excuse me…”
“In the debriefing room. That’s an order, Private.”
Carl stood up straight. “Yes, sir. Right away.”
He walked off towards the debriefing room. The whole time he wondered if this was some kind of joke. Was that woman in makeup? Was this a psychological experiment? Did she have some kind of a disease?
He reached the debriefing room, and Lockwood was already seated. Carl saluted and took a seat. Lockwood was silent.
Moments later Lorenzo barged in. Carl looked at him expectantly.
“We’re waiting for my commanding officer, the leader of the ID Program.”
Carl waited. He wasn’t sure if he succeeded in the exercise or he did something wrong. Then someone else barged in…
“Pete?”
Peter was laughing. Lorenzo also looked amused. Lockwood was still wearing his stoic expression.
“With all due respect, does somebody want to tell me what the hell is going on?”
Peter put his arms out, and Carl stood up. Peter hugged him. “Hello, Carl.”
Lorenzo gestured with his hand toward Peter. “May I introduce Lieutenant Peter Birdsall, leader of the Insidious Drone Program?”
Carl was confused. He was surprised to see Peter, and he sure as shit wasn’t sure if he just heard what Lorenzo said correctly. The Insidious Drone Program?
“I-I don’t understand.”
“Holy shit, Carl. We’ve never seen anyone handle the orientation exercise in quite that way.”
“You said he was sharp, Lieutenant,” Lorenzo said.
“Wh-what orientation exercise? What was that?”
“That, Carl, was an ID, or an Insidious Drone, an undead soldier,” Peter announced with no small amount of pride.
“Un…dead? Like a zombie?”
“Yes, Carl. Exactly like a zombie.”
Carl looked around and wondered if he was on the set of a reality show. “This is a joke…right?”
“No joke, Carl. This is the latest in drone technology.”
“Drone? That was a drone?”
“Yes. It’s a long story. It’s a virus that causes the reanimation of dead cells. The result is a condition called Kluver-Bucy Syndrome.”
“Kluver…”
“Bucy. It’s caused by lesions in the amygdala that cause hyper aggression and sexuality.”
“Hyper…”
“The girl was my touch,” Lorenzo chimed in. “The Lieutenant told me you were afraid of women.”
“I-I’m not afraid of women.”
Peter put his hand on Carl’s shoulder. “Carl, they are the perfect soldiers. They don’t have to be fed, there’s no dehydration, and they’re relentless. All you have to do is drop several dozen of these suckers into a cave and they’ll swarm any terrorist hideout.”
Carl sat back down in his seat. He wasn’t sure if he was dreaming. This was all a little too much.
“So you’re telling me that the United States Army is using zombies to smoke terrorists out of caves? It sounds like a bad sci-fi movie.”
“What gave you the idea to cross the maze on top?”
Carl wasn’t sure who asked the question. It was Lockwood. In fact, it was the first thing the man said since they entered the debriefing room.
“Pete and I used to go to these corn mazes every autumn growing up. One we went to had two crosswalks overlooking the maze, giving you a chance to get your bearings and figure out the pattern. In this case, I figured out in the maze that it was a fractal pattern. But when I got up top, I saw I was close enough to the edge of the maze, so I hopped over.”
Lockwood’s stoic expression gave way to something else. If Carl wasn’t mistaken, he would’ve sworn the man was impressed.
Peter smiled in recognition. “Yeah, I remember that maze. Good thinking, bro. See, I told you guys he was smart.”
The rest of the day Carl was given a full tour of the program. He was introduced to Farrow, who demonstrated the technology and the role