by Taylor, Dan
The world around Delta One came crashing down. He had always believed in HIVE and thought they believed in him. The organisation he had put his faith in and their serum he had injected himself with on so many occasions had failed him spectacularly.
“It looks like you are going to die Delta One. Your wounds are too much for the medics to fix you. There is only one way to save you and for once in your career I am going to give you something you have never been given before. A choice. You can choose to die here as a puppet of HIVE. They will give you a soldier’s funeral with marching and saluting and I imagine you will get your name inscribed on the wall dedicated to heroes. You will be remembered as a loyal soldier. Or alternatively, I could inject you with the Brain-Dead Madness.”
A look of panic was in Delta Ones eyes. A look of opportunity was in Dr Leitner’s.
“I will make sure there is enough so that you will be filly transformed. Not like those poor half-changed infected in Bayhollow. It will be like you are on a very strong worker bee serum all the time and you will have freedom. The freedom to think and live and choose to do things as you wish. The freedom to avenge those who have wronged you. You will no longer be a zombie to your masters but will be free. We will leave this place together and we will find Callum Jamison who almost killed you. What do you choose?”
“I want to live,” Delta One replied with pleading eyes, “Help me live and I will avenge my team.”
“As you wish,” smiled Dr Leitner, “I will help you live, but first you must die.”
Chapter 46
Escaping Camp Nectar had not been easy. First Klutz removed Delta Threes uniform and put it on. It was a bit baggy on him and the helmet didn’t quite fit so It nodded up and down as he moved like a giant human bobblehead. Callum asked for Lydia’s lab coat as he would not be able to fit in an of the HIVE uniforms and she in turn put on Delta Six’s uniform and swung her satchel with the laptop in over her shoulder. There was no way she was leaving this behind. When they left the large, white tent, the camp was a buzz with activity. They slowly made their way down the camp, ducking and diving between buildings and vehicles. They ended up crouched behind a Jeep, looking at the exit. High walls had been erected and it was guarded more heavily than Buckingham palace. Klutz and Calum probably had the strength to break through the walls but the noise would surely draw too much attention. Abel watched the hulking Callum Jamison who he did not trust. He was fidgety and clearly itching to get out this place. Callum reached inside a small hessian sack he had taken from the lab and pulled out a sliver of meat. He slurped it down like an oyster which seemed to calm him. Abel did all he could not to wretch. He was not going to argue with this beast, not right now at least. Abel scratched his chest through his shirt and felt the tender hand shaped bruise that was created on their previous encounter.
“We could create a distraction like before. Set off an explosion the other side of the camp and make a break for the exit,” Lydia suggested. Abel starred open mouthed. Who was this action woman and what had happened to Lydia Sato? “It’ very risky,” he replied, “We don’t want to hurt anyone.”
“I did think about breaking the wall down and running,” started Callum.
“No way,” broke in Klutz, “We would be shot in seconds, I can barely see in this helmet as it is, I would probably trip and run into the wall. Why don’t we go back into Bayhollow? Try to escape through the woods and leave where it is less guarded?”
“Nah-ah Hotel boy,” disproved Lydia, “If you think I am going back into the forest of the walking dead then you have another thing coming. Distraction still gets my vote. Or, maybe we could pretend to be HIVE agents and scientist and say we need to pop to the local pharmacy to get some drugs and equipment.”
“I know what we need to do,” Abel stated, “We need to do all the plans at once.” He explained in detail what they needed to do and prayed it would work.
Calum and Klutz split off towards the south side of the camp. Here was a fifteen-foot fence made of corrugated steel and behind that and six-foot chain link fence with razor wire on top. Callum laced his fingers together ready to give Klutz a boost. As Klutz put his foot on the laced hands, Callum drove his arms upwards and flung him over the first fence. He then threw the hessian sack full of meat over too. Klutz picked up the sack, then with his new-found strength, pulled apart the chain link fence to make a hole big enough for him to fit through. Klutz was back in Bayhollow and Callum was ready for his signal.
Meanwhile Lydia and Abel were carefully walking around Camp Nectar. Lydia had a set of car keys that were in one of the pockets of the HIVE uniform she was wearing. She kept clicking the unlock button and they were keeping their eyes peeled for any headlights flashing indicating a car being unlocked. They didn’t have to travel far. Adjacent to the exit was a small green which had been turned into a makeshift car park. It had about thirty vehicles inside. There was a mixture of civilian cars, Army Jeeps and HIVE trucks. A black Humvee with HIVE logos beeped. It had blacked out windows and a faint grey honeycomb decal on each panel. Lydia got in the front seat and Abel got in the back. He told her that it made more sense for a HIVE agent to be driving a scientist around. Plus, she was used to driving that big pickup truck so he knew she would be suited for the Humvee. Lydia tuned on the engine and drove towards the exit. She parked the Humvee on the road twenty meters away and they waited for the others to return.
Klutz felt a regret-stricken pang in his stomach. Maybe the journalist woman was right. It didn’t exactly feel safe in Bayhollow. Callum had ensured him that now he had the virus in him the infected would not try to attack him. This had been Klutz’s experience too with the infected woman he met at Bayhollow police station. He put aside his first impressions. He could trust Callum, he reasoned with himself. He was a doctor after all. Klutz knew he was too trusting of people in general. It was only yesterday that Callum had pretended to be Mr Smith and had bit and infected him.
Free from his chains and out of the tent, he felt lighter and quicker than he had been before. The scientist, Dr Leitner, was right. He was not the same person. He could feel it. In a strange way he felt like he was more than a regular human now. His senses and reactions were stronger. He ran through the woods with ease following the fence until he found a crashed and burnt out helicopter. On the tail he could make out the charred word ‘Skymouse’. Pinned to a tree by a broken helicopter blade was a man. His body was limp. He was near the quarantine entrance now and could see shambling bodies. As he got closer, they acknowledged him with a look and then carried on shambling.
“Hey come here. You guys need to follow me,” he whispered but they did not react. Plucking his courage, he tapped one on the shoulder but was again ignored. He opened the sack of human meat and pulled out a rump steak sized slice and waved it in front of them. This was a rump of Delta Three but Klutz blocked this knowledge from his mind. He had a mission to do. One of the infected perked up and strolled forward. It was greedily licking its lips and drooling blood. Klutz considered the monstrous form in front of him, ‘Christ, I hope that’s not what I look like’.
Klutz took a step back. “Easy now. Easy there. Follow me.” This sudden interest was noticed by four other infected who also started following. The four soon turned to twelve. Klutz started jogging to where he had been thrown over the wall making sure he was slow enough for the infected to see the piece of Delta Three he held above his head. When he looked back, he could see even more zombies joining. They seemed to materialise from the trees. The plan was to get one or two but it looked more like twenty were joining him. He herded them like the rats to the Pied Piper all the way to the hole in the chain link fence. As he stepped through, he caught his HIVE uniform on a broken metal fence link and tripped and landed on his front. He hit the ground hard. One infected jumped on him then another. They were piling and biting. The uniform was tough but it wouldn’t protect him for long. He held the meat bag tight. He stuck to his mission, others were relying on him. When it
felt like all was lost there was a loud bang as the wall behind him split sending pieces of concrete flying. This knocked the infected human at the top of the Klutz dog pile off. Klutz could see Callum towering above him. He looked even taller from the floor. He reached down with his strong arms and pulled Klutz up onto his feet.
“How did you know?” Klutz asked.
“I heard a loud thud that could only be the clumsy Klutz falling over. You know we only needed a few infected, right? We better move quick, vamos!”
Callum and Klutz fought their way past the hoard into Camp Nectar. As they ran towards the entrance a siren went off and troops marched towards the chaos. Near the exit they spotted the black Humvee. Abel opened the rear passenger door so they could see it was him. Klutz got in the front with Lydia and Callum joined Abel in the back.
Callum stated the obvious, “I think we may have created a bigger distraction than originally intended.”
Lydia drove towards the exit and over two sets of traffic spikes. They were trapped now and couldn’t reverse even if they wanted to. As they approached the barrier, Lydia wound down her window to speak with the military police guarding he fence.
“Identification please,” he asked loudly over the sound of the sirens and shooting.
“There is no time for that. We are evacuating these two scientists who are close to a cure for the brain-dead madness. We have to get them out now.” Replied Lydia.
The military policeman looked behind the vehicle. Two of the infected were walking towards the barrier with their arms outstretched. Conflicted between doing what is right and what is procedure he pulled out a handgun and gave the signal. The barrier lifted and the metal fence behind it swung open. Lydia drove through quickly. In the rear-view mirror, she saw the military policeman aim and shot the infected in the chest and head.
“You don’t think anyone will get hurt?” asked Klutz to Callum.
“No, it is fine,” replied Callum dismissively, “This is the Army and HIVE they can handle a few of these infected, no problem.”
Klutz watched through the back window concerned and sceptical as they drove away from the quarantine camp and Bayhollow.
Chapter 47
In the quarantine bay that Lydia had woke up in, Angela pulled the thin, white, bed sheets over her head. There was something going on outside. Gun fire and shouting. The noises were getting closer and every fresh gunshot sent a panicked chill down her spine. She started hyperventilating. This nightmare was supposed to be over. She had escaped the cannibalistic monsters in Bayhollow, but now the infected were chasing her into the safe zone. She wanted to run but her body was glued to the bed. At most she could rock back and forth. ‘I am a police officer. I should be able to handle any situation.’ She told herself unconvincingly. There was a shout from outside the window which was quickly silenced. ‘A soldier who had gotten caught and was now being eaten, no doubt’. They would be in the building is seconds.
A female army nurse pulled the sheets off the bed. She had mousy brown hair tied in a bun. The sleeves of her camouflage jacket had been rolled up, which gave a ready for action appearance like the woman in the American World War 2 propaganda poster, ‘We can do it’. “We have to go now” she pleaded with a slightly authoritative tone. “We have moved all the other patients and it is no longer safe here.” The soldier tried to lift Angela up gently but she refused to budge. The nurse then forced her to sit up. Angela was crying silently. There was no way Angela was going to walk anywhere.
“Ok, I have an idea. You wait here,” the nurse said as if there was any other option and ran out the room.
Angela waited as instructed. The noises from outside were getting closer and she heard a scream in the next room. Then lots of banging and then silence. She laid back down and pulled the thin, white, bed sheet over her head gain. The door of the quarantine bay opened and she heard footsteps in the room. She prayed that the Army nurse had returned.
Slowly Angela peaked out the sheet. Standing over her was a man dressed in a torn, ragged brown robe. Around his neck was a white vicar’s collar. His face was disfigured. He was missing his nose giving him two slits like a snake and most of his hair had been torn off. However, there was the unmistakeable, friendly rosy-cheeked smile of Vicar Pete Addison. Angela screamed and Pete pounced.
A minute later the Army nurse came in pushing a wheelchair. It was too late. Her patient had been infected and she had her orders on what to do. The nurse pulled out her hand gun and shot the vicar and Angela in the head.
Chapter 48
Lydia drove according to Callum’s instructions. Although he was foreign, he seemed to know exactly where he was going. They travelled to a small village only a few miles from camp nectar before he instructed her turn down one of the streets and stop. It was a typical small village made up of yellow, stony houses with moss covered, slate roofs. They had stopped outside a pub which had been decorated from the outside with mock Tudor dark wooden beams and pained white panels in between. The swinging pub sign curiously read ‘The Pavlov’s Dog’. It has a painted black Labrador looking solemn as it swung back and forth with the breeze.
“Ok, come on let’s go out. I have another car we can use,” said Callum as he was opening the passenger door. The rest followed obediently.
They walked into the pub’s car park. Towards the back was a large telephone pole with a dark green telephone wire roadside cabinet at its base. Callum opened the cabinet which was conveniently unlocked and picked up a rucksack that was hidden inside. In the front pocket was a set of car keys. Callum pulled out the keys and pressed the unlock button wildly until he spotted a cars headlight in the car park shine. It was a 2006, grey Volvo estate. ‘A purposefully inconspicuous car’ thought Abel.
Callum took off his lab coat, which was soaking wet from his exploding boils, and stored it in the roadside cabinet. He picked up a black polo jumper and black cap and put this on. Lydia, Abel and Klutz in turn removed their lab coat or HIVE gear too and hid these away too. Without questioning they got into the Volvo, this time with Lydia and Klutz in the back, Callum driving and Abel in the passenger seat.
Callum drove off and he was heading north.
“You are all very quiet. I though a police man and a reporter might have more questions. Do not worry. I will not hurt you. I am not a bad person, but circumstances have made me do some bad things, no?”
“Said every terrorist ever.” Lydia muttered before asking bluntly, “Where are we going?”.
“Stornoway, in Scotland,” replied Callum, happy that someone was talking to him. He knew how he came across and needed witnesses that he was not a terrorist and that his intentions were pure.
“Why?” relied Lydia.
“Because I have friends there. Friends who are not connected to HIVE and who want to help bring them down.”
“And who are they?” She insisted.
“They are an organisation who have been working hard to stop HIVE from releasing this virus on the world,” he replied not giving too much away.
“The virus you released you mean? How long have you been planning this Callum?” asked Abel. A very policeman-like question.
“What do you mean?” he replied.
“You, a HIVE employee, happen to be infected with the virus in a town that you knew could easily be secured by HIVE and you happen to have a bug-out-bag stored in town less than 10 miles away. This was a planned attack. It was an act of terrorism that had killed hundreds of innocent people.”
“Like I said, I have done bad things and yes you are correct. This was a planned event. An event which unfortunately spun wildly out of control.” The word event made Lydia’s toes curl. An event to her is a friend’s wedding, or a summer festival, not a terrorist attack. Callum continued, “I infected myself on purpose, in a quiet hotel in England. The plan was for me to be restricted to the hotel room and for HIVE to secure the place. At most the infection was not supposed to spread further than the hotel grounds. But I did not acc
ount for how painful the metamorphoses would be. My cries of pain caused one overly dedicated Hotel worker to come check on me who I attacked and in turn infected,” he gave a small nod to Klutz through the rear-view mirror, “In a panic I jumped out the window and that is where the brain-dead madness spread. I did not account for how easily spread this would be in a location so rural and with such a spread-out population. I also did not account on how much control the virus would have on me. It forced me to attack people. We had seen this is controlled situations but this new strain we created was supposed to give me more control. I also believed that it would stop my Hailey-Hailey syndrome. The boils I have. That was one of the reasons, although a selfish one, that I decided to be patient zero. As it turns out I needed a much larger does to fully control my actions, like I am now. Also, by making sure I consume flesh regularly the urges to release this monster inside me is satisfied.”
“And who told you it would cure you,” enquired Lydia who had taken out her laptop and was furiously typing notes on this conversation down.
“It was my hypothesis but Dr Schaf Leitner agreed. I have been his assistant for many years and I trusted him fully. This whole thing was his idea. He hates HIVE more than anyone.”
“But why? What possible justification could there be for what you have done?” Lydia continued to question.
Callum thought for a moment. “I will explain it in the same way Schaf explained it to me. Sometimes it is necessary to do something bad or even evil if it means stopping something even worse. Imagine there is a train that was out of control and was heading for broken bridge so everyone onboard was doomed. There is a train track switch that could change the trains course to safety but on the new course is a man sitting on the line. Do you have a moral duty to press the switch saving those on board the train but dooming the man? I think so.”