Chapter 185 The Truth Revealed
The footsteps outside the base gradually faded away, and the remaining people in the safe house leaned against the door, panting.
Su Wanqing held the door handle with one hand and tightly grasped the backpack strap with the other hand. She waited until the metal locking sound of the entire safe zone completely fell before she allowed herself to loosen her knuckles.
Lin Che handed the bottle of medicine to Tong Yin. The little girl took it with trembling arms.
She closed her eyes, hummed softly, and drank it anyway. Lu Zhao leaned against the wall, constantly debugging the terminal to try to recover the peripheral monitoring data.
Xiao Ran fastened the bolt, turned around and pushed the debris piled on the ground to the door.
The survivors were busy bandaging the wounds on their fingers and legs.
There was no more gunfire outside, but the air was still filled with the smell of gunpowder, as well as the scent of sweat and disinfectant.
Su Wanqing checked the condition of the girl with the childish voice again. The girl leaned in Lin Che's arms, her forehead rough and red due to the effect of the medicine.
Her eyes were half open, her breathing was shallow and short, and a few words of mumbling in her sleep came out from between her lips and teeth, the content was intermittent.
"Apples, raindrops, keys... rewriting the rules..."
Su Wanqing squatted down and gently lifted the child up. She inserted the USB drive into the backup computer, watched the instructions pop up on the verification interface, and asked the child to read along with the recording.
The girl's throat was hoarse, but she repeated in a very steady voice: "Dawn, start."
The indicator light on the computer flashed and a new series of progress bars suddenly appeared on the screen.
Lu Zhao leaned in and stared at the screen, his brows slightly frowned. The other members of the team also suppressed their fatigue and looked up at him.
"The voiceprint and the spell match." Lu Zhao whispered, "Han Xue left a double lock, it seems she was waiting for this moment."
It took about thirty seconds to unlock the system, and a folder popped up.
Su Wanqing opened it without hesitation. Several audio clips, multiple text files, and a hidden video popped out of the pile of files.
She put the audio aside and clicked directly on the first paragraph of text.
The title has only two words: "Dawn."
Han Xue's handwriting was very neat: "Liming, real name Li Ze, chief scientist of the government's biological weapons research institute, one of the main initiators of the Eden Project, and designer of the main virus evolution program. He was asked to withdraw due to the 'ethical rejection order' and later disappeared."
Su Wanqing repeatedly confirmed, clenching her knuckles. Lin Che whispered, "He never revealed his identity. No wonder he knows the mechanism of the virus so well."
Lu Zhao stared at the screen and slowly scrolled down, and the content behind it appeared line by line.
"Li Ze advocates 'moderate controlled evolution' and believes that most vectors are uncontrollable. 'Apple'-X03 has a unique gene expression ability and is the only 'key'. All data point to: a girl with a childlike voice."
The screen flashed, and the audio and video playback interface popped up, automatically switching to a nighttime laboratory surveillance video.
Han Xue appeared in front of the camera, her voice steady: "You can see this means the base has been lost. Liming's real target is not the antibody, but X03 - the 'programmed gene' in her body. This is the product of his joint experiment with the government. The original hope was to create a controllable virus and force the preferred mutation."
The screen cuts to a set of database backups, and subtitles follow one by one.
"The 'evolution engine' manufactured by Dawn can couple with the key gene and push the virus into a completely new and uncontrollable variant. The virus was not released globally as a simple leak, but was pushed forward in batches according to the 'adaptation window'. As long as he gets X03, he can choose the next step - mass extermination, or reorganization of the human species."
Lu Zhao pursed his lips after reading it. "We can escape to the ends of the earth. Unless we completely destroy the data, we will become Dawn's experimental rats."
Su Wanqing switched back to the file and listed an internal report: "In addition to antibodies, the girl with the child's voice also carries a new type of RNA fragment. This fragment can automatically rewrite the information of the surrounding viruses under the stimulation of a specific frequency sound wave + code by external signals, and can actually trace the source and edit the replication template of all viruses. The project code name is: 'Re-Creation'."
Lin Che quietly watched the words jumping on the screen line by line. Ye's personality did not show up again at this moment. He seemed to be quickly calculating the pros and cons and risks in his mind.
Su Wanqing was speechless and could only read word by word: "The so-called serum is just a by-product - the one who can really decide who the world belongs to is Tong Yin herself."
Lu Zhao pressed the computer button, and a set of surveillance snapshots popped up on the screen: Liming and several researchers in white coats were whispering in a secret room, and a complex circular genetic formula was painted on the wall.
They go back and forth about "system parameters," "engine tuning factors," and "X03 critical response steps."
As the video was about to end, Han Xue appeared on camera again, speaking a little hurriedly: "If you come to this point, there are only two options left. First, use the 're-creation' plan to completely inactivate the virus and completely wipe out the source of infection in the world. Second, if you hand over Tong Yin, whoever controls her controls the future of mankind."
Lin Che's brows twitched. The atmosphere was so oppressive that everyone was silent.
Su Wanqing took a deep breath and opened the remaining files. The last secret military memo popped up in the center of the page: "X03 experimental subject positioning device has been activated.
It is planned to be brought back to the base after the attack. Using the key gene, design biological weapons in the area, control the rhythm of zombie mutation, and achieve the longest period of control and balanced epidemic. "
Xiao Ran looked up at this time, "They are not trying to cure the disease, but to use Tong Yin's genes as a programming tool to create controllable infected bodies at will?"
Lu Zhao nodded and said, "The military's final plan is not treatment, but weaponization."
He knocked on the equipment box twice, signaling everyone to quickly pack up what they could take.
The atmosphere became more and more solemn. The girl with a childish voice was holding the potion and whispering something even though she had a fever.
She was in a daze, but still occasionally uttered strange codes and instructions, and couldn't stop.
At this time, there was a noise outside the door in the distance. Xiao Ran approached the door cautiously, poked his head out a little, turned back and reported in a low voice: "The military has set up large-scale obstacle equipment outside, swept three batches of engineering vehicles, and at least two special operations teams."
Su Wanqing asked: "What's the situation with the zombies outside?"
Xiao Ran buttoned up his team uniform and said, "There are ten times more zombies than before. The gathering point is not random, but is guided by some external attraction - not just the noise, it is probably related to Tong Yin's genes. They are all moving towards the safe house."
Lu Zhao pulled up the aerial thermal imaging map on the secondary terminal. He put several layers together and said in a low voice, "We will form a siege on the periphery. The scavengers, the military, and the zombies will advance in three directions. Our safe spot can only hold out for six hours at most."
Lin Che did not interrupt and just held Tong Yin's head in his arms.
Su Wanqing touched the USB drive again and backed up all the files to the portable hard drive.
Xiao Ran threw a silent flash shelter to the door and gestured for everyone to be ready for emergency evacuation at any time.
Lu Zhao fastened the experimental equipment again, kept all the information close to him, and prepared the destruction instructions in advance.
Su Wanqing checked Tongyin's condition again. The little girl's fever had subsided a little, but her temperature was still higher than normal, and she kept muttering incomprehensible genetic fragments.
Her metal numbered bracelet began to glow with a tiny blue light, as if it was being activated by some remote signal.
Lin Che looked at Su Wanqing and said in a hoarse voice: "Her condition is getting more and more dangerous."
Su Wanqing pulled Tong Yin to a corner and said, "Once it breaks out, we must immediately block all entrances."
"How many backup plans do you have?" Lu Zhao asked. Su Wanqing prepared the several sets of advanced instructions left by Han Xue in order, then lowered her head and wrote the hard drive address on a piece of paper and stuffed it into the interlayer of the tactical backpack.
There was no extra space in the safe house, and everyone was fully armed. The atmosphere was extremely tense, and the only sounds were the hum of the computer cooling fan and the occasional spell from a child's voice.
Xiao Ran finally pushed the bolt all the way down and whispered, "The situation outside could change at any time. In less than six hours, the blockade will be tightened, and the three teams will come together. The zombie tide is a common problem for everyone."
Lu Zhao encrypted and backed up all the files and crossed out the destroy button.
"Wait another ten or twenty minutes. If the medicine doesn't work, we can only rely on plan two."
Su Wanqing calmly recorded every piece of data. The team sorted out all the remaining resources in a brief period of safety, and then erected the last steel bar at the door.
The sense of oppression outside the house gradually gathered, and the team members were silent, waiting for the next variable to arrive.
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