Infected

The Xenopox Virus was created at MedUSA, a laboratory, in Oregon, though as a company, its facilities are spread across the globe. The base of the chemical concoction was the actual poison of the snake god, Ophion. In ancient times, anyone that Ophion bit would become snake people, reptilians. They would bite others, and the further away from Ophion’s original victim, the less human traits the victims would keep and the more of a reptile they would appear.

The original poison used had come from an ancient unearthed relic. Using the poison as a starting point, MedUSA began testing and tweaking the properties. The original idea of the board of directors and several of the scientists was to find a way to resurrect the snake god himself, perhaps by cloning. However, all attempts using the poison, failed. They then tested the poison on animals and people. By studying the effects on a microscopic level, they grew to understand the properties of the substance better. It caused mutations of varying types and degrees based on mixing with the DNA of different organisms. After the lab was destroyed by Siri Solen, the supervillain, Dr. Demented, found a new base of operations.

His own reasons for working with MedUSA were his desires to raise his wife from the dead. She had been in cold stasis since the fall of the Nazis in Germany. He tirelessly strove to find a sequence of Xenopox that would revive dead tissue. He had also spent much of his time studying the works of Johann Conrad Dippel. Dippel had managed to find a way of using electricity along with injecting Nightbred blood into a cadaver to return it to life. However, Dippel gave up the practice after Karloff, his first success, proved to be too dangerous. Not having the heart to kill Karloff, Dippel sealed the monster away and changed his focus to the new steam technologies of the day. Dr. Demented managed to find the monster but that victory proved fruitless for raising his wife. However, he used some of Karloff’s blood- formerly vampire blood, and found that it affected the virus. It could completely reanimate dead flesh or even subsume living flesh turning the victims into ‘blood mutants’.

Infected are one such product of this experimentation. In some cases, by injecting the Xenopox into recently killed or sliced flesh, the skin would mutate and become an organism of its own- a type of giant virus. These strange xenopoxian creatures usually ooze or pull themselves along a surface looking for flesh to connect to. Once located, they attach themselves to the host body and a fusion on a biological and molecular level occurs. Through his symbiosis the infected person becomes a puppet run solely by the virus which then attempts to spread. If female, it will attempt to impregnate itself on a male, whether he is infected or not. The infected woman quickly births many more of the same creature that subverted her. If male, the Xenopox virus fills his testicles with converted sperm and he will attempt to mate with any female human, infected or otherwise. Even if not infected herself, the woman’s womb will stretch as her body fills with miniature creatures and when she births them, more than a few are likely to attach to her body to ensure that she also becomes one of the infected.

These were humans that Dr. Demented experimented upon by injecting the new strain of Nightbred infused Xenopox. Like most blood mutants, Biters are randomly mutated and grow a range of adaptations and cognizance. Generally, they have oversized mouths with massive sharp teeth. Tentacles tend to grow out of the victim’s body and wriggle and lash. Contact with any of its contaminated flesh with unprotected skin can result in the virus passing to the new host. As with all blood mutants and Xenopox strains, the afflicted mutate within minutes, becoming a new creature altogether and leaving their humanity forever behind.