for her to nod before he looked away.
“Make the shots count. We need to conserve as much ammunition as possible.”
A man in a white apron came toward them with a spatula gripped in his hand. Frank fired a round and hit him in the cheek. The utensil fell as half the man’s face blew apart. A woman in shorts and a tank top made her way over and Lightfoot took her out with a well-aimed round to the nose. Another man, this one wearing a robe, ambled toward them. Carson fired and the sound of it echoed throughout the room.
“Boss, before you bitch at me, listen. We need them to come to us. We need to conserve ammo, so using this loud ass gun solves two problems. See, here they come, and I’ll have rounds left for my M4 and FMG.”
“Fine, just try not to deafen us, move to the side or something,” Frank said.
Frank tried not to look at the face of the people he gunned down, but a young woman made him pause. He remembered recruiting her from a promising career as a research scientist at some university. She’d talked to him about her plans to cure cancer and the grants she was being offered. Frank trumped them all. Sunset Inc. had deep pockets and wanted her. She was a rising star and now she was dead.
He wondered how many people were now dead because of him. Actually, he decided, they were dead because of Dr. Covington. That bastard caused all this to happen. Frank made a promise then and there the good doctor would pay. He didn’t know how or why, but that greasy haired scientist did something he shouldn’t have.
A thin layer of smoke wafted around the room. Bodies littered the floor and oozed liquids of all sorts onto the ground. Frank moved around the table and shoved the plastic chairs out of the way. He walked into the main area and looked around for movement. Nothing caught his attention. At least fifty bodies in various states of decay were sprawled out around him.
“Jesus, Frank, if this stuff got outside…” Selena didn’t finish the sentence, she didn’t need to.
“Let’s keep moving, we still have a ways to go.” Frank reached for the handle of the door and cried out in shock when it flew toward his face. Someone in a white suit and mask held a gun to his head.
“What the hell?” Frank said.
The man’s face registered shock as the gun lowered.
“Well, open it,” Smith said.
Arthur checked his Sig once more and blew out a breath, no more stalling. He turned the knob and pulled. In front of them was exactly what the map detailed, a boiler/back-up generator room.
Of all the levels they’d been on, Arthur found a small bit of irony in the fact this was the most poorly lit. They both turned on their flashlights at the same time, Smith following close behind him as he entered.
Something shuffled to their right and Smith fired blind hitting a pipe. A blast of hot water missed Arthur’s face by inches, and then trickled down to a stream.
“Be careful, the last thing we need is to survive the contaminated only to die by scalding,” Frank said in a somewhat joking tone.
Smith didn’t acknowledge him and moved toward where they heard the noise. Arthur followed her and saw the cause before she did. The ceiling had enough wires, pipes, and vents snaking through it to power a small city. When the explosion happened, someone must have been working on patching a hole in the vent, even though that didn’t make sense. The facility was top of the line, brand spanking new.
Arthur tapped Smith on the shoulder and pointed up when he had her attention. The shuffling sound continued as whatever poor soul in the vent tried to get out.
“Give me a lift?” She held out her hands ready to grip his shoulders.
Arthur laced his fingers together and did as asked. He didn’t bother to argue with her, she was doing this to spite him, or she was crazy. When she stood, he wobbled a bit, but maintained. She grabbed the side of the vent and pulled on an area punctured from the inside. A second later, a large hole revealed the feet of the now contaminated maintenance man.
“I’m going to yank on them, get ready to shoot when he hits the ground,” Smith said.
Arthur glared even though he knew she couldn’t see it. “Then you better jump, or I’m going to drop you on your ass.”
Smith struggled with the visible limbs for several minutes, finally freeing the thing from the waist down. Arthur eased her down and they both pulled the rest of the man free. Smith put a bullet in his head a second after it hit the ground.
She moved on, but Arthur stayed. Something about the guy wasn’t right. He used the tip of his shoe to flip him over and shined the flashlight on him. A patch with the crest of Sunset Inc. appeared on his left upper arm. He wore body armor and had what appeared to be a climbing harness on.
“Crap,” he said to himself. This was part of their rescue team. Things just kept getting better and better.
He stepped over the body and came face to face with one of the contaminated. A woman, based on the long hair, though her face had been sliced off. Arthur let out a scream as he fumbled for his FNP. Her arms wrapped around him and she snapped at his neck. The plastic of his mask fogged up from his rapid breathing and no matter how hard he tried to remain calm, it wasn’t possible when a corpse was trying to eat your face.
As she pushed him backwards, he tripped over the body of the dead man at his feet and fell. His elbow sunk into the chest cavity of the corpse. He gagged at the feel of cool organs being smashed below him like rotten fruit. The fact he had a protective suit did nothing to assuage his worries about being infected. The woman continued to snap at him and got hold of part of the strap keeping his mask in place. She wriggled her head and he freaked as he felt the buckles loosen.
Arthur punched her in the face with a gloved hand, and sighed in relief when the strap didn’t break when her head snapped back. He rolled her over, grabbed the Baby Eagle from his waistband, and destroyed what was left of her face.
Breathing heavily, he picked up his backpack as he stood. All the while, he cursed Smith under his breath, they would be much safer if she got over the incident with the patch and went back to operating as a team. Then again, he had to admit for a novice that she had become a rather good shot in very little time. He wondered how many secrets she was keeping. With a shake of his head, he discarded the thoughts as paranoid.
Arthur moved slowly through the corridors of humming generators and water heaters wondering why the emergency power was so screwed up on the lower levels. To knock out electrical and emergency back-up systems, the majority of damage would need to have been done here. Arthur examined the room with a critical eye. Some soot stains on the ground could be explained by poor workmanship. The sparking of wires in some places could have any number of explanations.
Careful to keep a lookout for any of the wandering contaminated, Arthur came across a bundle of Semtex. The timer on it read 1:00. He followed a red plastic coated fuse from behind, and found at least six more packages. He felt his gut seize as he glanced around. Smith came up to him from an area he hadn’t explored, her face ashen.
“You’ll never guess--” they both said at the same time.
Arthur waved his hand and pointed to the bomb. “I have no idea how this gets triggered, but I suggest we aren’t here when it happens. With the amount of fuel and other flammables in here, the whole place will fold in on itself.”
Smith shook her head. “Great, then you don’t want to know that I found several bodies in the back corner, all with one shot to the head. Someone cleared the floor and I doubt it was that idiot Benson.”
“I think I know who it was. The body over there is wearing the logo for Sunset,” Arthur said.
“The one we pulled out of the vent? Why the hell would the rescue team be in there? In fact, how the hell did he get in there? It wasn’t from this level, so whoever cleared the floor is--”
Arthur interrupted, fear of more hazards taking over. “But, we would have run into them…unless they went up? Or they went down and got what they needed from the server room? Hell, they could be anywhere,” Arthur said with resignation, “We missed our chance to get out of here.”
Smith laughed and Arthur cringed at how dark it sounded. “You think whoever did this was here to rescue us? They probably have shoot on sight orders, and you’re forgetting they might also be infected by now. Going one on one with a horde can be overwhelming if you remember. And please use that brain of yours, Benson probably called them in.”
