SETTING: A NONDESCRIPT CLINIC IN AUSTIN, TEXAS
TIME: AFTER DARK

It had been a long, hard day at the clinic. The man trudged to the back of the building and plopped himself down on a large, cushy leather office chair, causing it to spin around. He was fiftyish, but still boyish in appearance, possessed of a seemingly unflappable self-confidence. Even so, he was not happy.

Damn, I hate being here. He thought. I'd much rather be back in London than stuck in this hick state. At least Austin is about as good as it gets here. I suppose it could be worse; I could be in Arkansas.

He sighed. "Damn that Brian Deer!" he said aloud. "If it weren't for him I'd still be sitting pretty, rather than being reduced to this." He reflected on his experience over the last few years, his head sinking into the leather of his high backed office chair. On the other hand, being a hero to all those parents of vaccine-injured children did have its advantages. Certainly, it had its rewards.

He sat up abruptly and looked at the pile of charts on his desk. So many vaccine-injured kids, so little time. If only the world understood. But he'd be vindicated. He knew he would. So what if he had had to accept hundreds of thousands of pounds from trial lawyers to do his work? It hadn't affected his objectivity. And so what if he had cut a few corners with his PCR assay? He knew he was right, damn it! He would be vindicated! The General Medical Council couldn't touch him. The truth was on his side. Science be damned! He knew the MMR causes autism and one day he would prove it.

Homesick and more than a little curious about what was going on in his home country, the man turned to the blue glow of his computer screen and started surfing the websites of British newspapers. Then, ever curious about what people were saying about him, he Googled his own name. He was not pleased with the articles that came up on the first page. He scrolled down some pages. His face darkened into a scowl, his lip curling down and a wrinkle forming around its edge with a snarl. "What is this?" he muttered aloud. What the hell are they doing to me--

He stopped abruptly.

The clinic was completely empty. Everyone had gone home for the night. The only noises that broke the oppressive silence were the whirr of his computer's fan and the gentle whoosh of the air conditioner. But there was something else? Was it real? He thought he heard something? Something like a footstep. The man listened.

Silence.

Click, click, click, click. He started typing furiously. I need to get this response out to those idiots at Age of Autism right away, he thought. They'll regurgitate anything I want them to. Click, click, click, click.

He stopped again and sniffed the air, his face scrunching with distaste? Who forgot to take out the trash? he thought, grimacing at the vaguely sweet smell of rotting meat. He now distinctly heard a scratching, like nails on wood. It sounded very close. Maybe even right outside the door to his office. Did he have an intruder?

Slowly, ever so slowly, he rose from his chair. It creaked loudly, and he exhaled abruptly as he froze. There was definitely someone or something out there. He spun around frantically, looking for a way out. Maybe the window. He moved to his left to head for the window. At that moment, the door swung open violently, crashing against the wall and driving the doorstop into the wall.

The man turned to see a vision of hell.

Skeletal and shambling, rotting flesh hanging in shards from glistening bone, all wrapped in what looked like a military uniform, it came. Reeking like death itself, its dead eyes focused on the man, and it came. With a gutteral cry coming from its unnaturally retracted maw of "BRAAAAAAIIINNNS!"** it advanced relentlessly. The man tried to sprint for the window, but, fueled by whatever unholy energy that animated it, the creature leapt to block his path. The last thing the man saw as the bony hands latched on to either side of his head were two things. First, he noted a red armband with a white circle and a black symbol in the middle. No! he thought. It couldn't be! The last thing he saw was the maggot-infested maw of the creature descending upon his skull with a crunch. Is that a moustache? he thought, as what should have been rotted teeth feasted on his gray matter.

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