Free The World's Next Plague by Colten Steele Page A

items
such as guns and canteens, were still intact.
    If you did see the show, you probably also
know of the recovery of a camera and audio cassette tape belonging
to Manon Morales, the cameraman on the crew. Some of the more
mundane recovered footage from the video camera was used for the
television special and made it a spectacular success. What you have
never seen is the rest of the unbelievable video Rock’s team
recorded.
    After a few minutes of listening to the audio
cassette, the ribbon broke. I was not able to ever hear much of
what was recorded there, but I included what I did hear in the
story that follows. However, the video camera, after being charged
with our portable battery packs, remarkably still functioned. The
tape inside had been protected from the elements and was still
intact with all of its footage.
    When we returned with the camera and showed
the network executives the tape, they quickly confiscated it. As
far as I know it is still there in Archive’s archives somewhere,
but I doubt anyone will ever see it again. When I insisted they
show the world what was on the tape, I was summarily dismissed and
have had trouble finding a job with any of the other networks. My
career as a journalist may be finished, but I now have the time to
share the truth concerning my discoveries with the world.
    What follows is the fantastic adventure Rock
and the rest of his crew experienced put together from the footage
I saw on those missing tapes. From the video I was not able to tell
every detail, such as how the infection you will read about was
transferred to the first guide. These missing pieces are filled in
using educated guesses based on my experiences during the search
for answers in Brazil. Even so, much of the unbelievable account
you are about to read is true.
     
    ~ Prologue ~

    The howler monkey watched the men walk into
the clearing below. Like many young male howlers, he had
instinctively left his mother’s troop to lead a solitary life when
reaching sexual maturity. He had been searching for another troop,
where he planned to test his youthful strength against the group’s
dominant male in hopes of securing his own females.
    Weeks ago, the clearing had drawn him in with
its tempting fruits and leaves. These delicacies had been picked
clean in many other areas of the jungle by the birds and other
monkeys, but here there was no other competition. He warily watched
the odd creatures lying on the ground in the clearing while he ate
enthusiastically, but they seemed to pose no threat.
    In his experience, the large hairy jungle
spiders had never been a problem. The two species ignored and
avoided each other when possible; instinctively knowing an
encounter could be deadly for both. Unaware of the aggressive
nature of the spiders in this one small section of the jungle, he
went on about his business as usual. The monkey was startled when,
just after lying down in the bed he had built high in a tree, he
felt something large land on his back, and then experienced an
intense sting of fangs sinking into his shoulder.
    The primate reached up past his neck and
grabbed the spider, flinging it away from him. He watched
mesmerized as the spider spun away from him through the canopy with
legs spread wide.
    He felt the poison rapidly spread through his
body, and lay shaking uncontrollably in the bed of leaves and
branches before blackness overwhelmed him.
    In the morning he woke, weak and exhausted.
He would never be able to determine what had changed. He had lost
all memories of his life to this point, though he still maintained
his instincts. He was stronger and more aggressive. He had lost the
desire for food and drink.
    He had also acquired a single-minded hatred
for the spiders. He could sense them, even if he could not see
them. Their presence beckoned him. No longer concerned with the
agony of their sting, the howler went out of his way to attack and
dismember the abhorrent little creatures. It did not bring