by Angel Ramon
She goes by Annette and continues to the controls for the treatment machine. Another dead bitten body can be found holding the second medal she needs. There is also a document, which is a journal of one of the treatment plant workers. Reading the document she finds out that this plant is privately owned by the Hybrid Corporation and the puzzle is solved.
After getting the medal she heads back to the panel and inserts the medals. After inserting the medals the waterfall stops and the door can be accessed. However, she still needs to get back to Angel and hops that he’s recovered or is close to recovering. She dodges the acid spit attacks by the huge spiders and she ignores them as intimidating as they look.
When she reaches the medical room, Angel is still lying there. However, he begins to get up slowly.
“Agghhh… Leslie you saved my ass, I owe you one. Did you find a way out?”
“Yes I did, how is your back?”
“Still stings, but screw it. It’s much better than before and besides we have to get moving. The faster we get out, the better our chances of survival.”
“You’re right Angel, besides I just found out this is a Hybrid owned treatment plant and I found Anthony’s wife. However, she fainted when she found out her husband is loose in the city. What worries me is that she mentioned that he will only get stronger and he can infect another body with the Broken Arrow virus.” Leslie explains.
“Damn, just another bastard we have to deal with. Anyway let’s get moving.”
Angel and Leslie head to the exit where by the waterfall. They enter through the door and they find a hidden tram station used by the workers of Hybrid. Leslie heads for the control panel and calls for the tram to come back to the station. After a minute the tram car comes to the station and the two enter the car.
The car begins to move to the other station terminal. Neither of them knows where the car will lead them to. All of a sudden they hear a loud noise and a claw breaks through the top of the car. The claw begins to wiggle trying to strike the two.
The two begin to shoot towards the claw trying to get the creature away from them.
“Shit that must be Anthony chasing us!” Angel screams.
“Shoot the hand!” Leslie replies.
The two of them team up on the claw and then it disappears. All of a sudden the claw tries to pop out of another part of the ceiling of the car. The claw goes for Leslie, but Angel shoots the claw enough to stop the claw from attacking her. The claw pops out of another part of the car and after the two empty their bullets to the claw. After that a finger falls out from the claw and whatever was attacking them can be heard jumping off the car.
After that jump scare the car finally gets to the station and they end up in a basement of an unknown area. Looks like another place they will have to investigate as they try to find a way out of the city to safety.
“I wonder where we are now, probably another Hybrid owned facility knowing our luck.” Angel says.
“Well we might have to split up so we can see if we can find a way out or at least some help.” Leslie replies.
“Perhaps, but lets stick together for now ok?” He asks.
“Alright.” She replies.
The two might not know where they are, but they know they still have a shot of survival.
Chapter 9
The two explore the area in the station where they just got off from. They head out of the basement using the stairs to go upstairs. When they get out of the stairway they find themselves at an art gallery/antiques boutique.
“An art gallery in Brooklyn? Now things are just getting weirder and weirder as the night goes.” Angel says in shock.
“I for one am shocked myself, although there’s a perfectly good explanation.” Leslie answers calmly.
“What would that be?”
“Well this art gallery is owned by the Hybrid Corporation. For me it’s no coincidence that this gallery is connected to the sewer treatment plant owned by…” Leslie asks Angel.
“Hybrid…” Angel answers.
“My point exactly and the chief brought all his art/antiques here. Why here and where did he get the money? Also why did he quit his true hobby of taxidermy for paintings and statues of abstract stuff?”
“To be honest, I can care less at this point the chief is probably dead and I just want to survive. Also I’m looking for my girlfriend.”
“Girlfriend?”
“Yeah, I have been with her for a long time. I told her to stay at the police station, but after our experiences it’s just as dangerous there. For the past two hours I haven’t been able to even get a call through to her. However, I’m confident we’ll find her or my partner will find her. Anyway, now that we know this is a Hybrid Facility, there bound to be more of these freaks and not to mention trenchy himself.”
The two walk carefully knowing that the gallery is large and worse rather eerie in nature. They enter the main hallway where they see a group of zombies. Between the two of them they kill all the undead. Not sure what they are looking for, they head for the exit, but the exit is blocked by debris.
“Another dead end! Shit looks like we have to explore this hell hole.” Angel says angrily.
“Well, knowing our luck we’ll bump into some secret Hybrid facility.” Leslie says in her calming tone. For such an extreme situation she’s taking it in stride.
The two of them head deeper into the gallery. It’s filled with renaissance-era paintings, statues and even art dating back to ancient times. The hall is filled with many locked doors as they try to find any sense of direction. Eventually they find a maintenance room with a key leading to the second floor galleries. It looks like it’s upstairs for the survivors.
They head upstairs to unlock the first room which is a room full of paintings of famous ancient leaders. They include Ramesses II, Julius Caesar, Hammurabi, and Cleopatra. A message in the middle says, “Four of the greatest leaders of the ancient times will open the gateway to hell, assuming that they are placed in perfect chronological order.” The message has a button below it.
“Chronological order? Not much of a history bluff.” Leslie asks.
“Well I did well in history, so I might have an idea what to do here. Looks like we have to take these pictures and arrange them in the proper order. Gotta be careful though before we press that button, I seen these puzzles before. Knowing Hybrid they probably got this puzzled rigged with their deadly experiments if we get the puzzle wrong.” Angel warns Leslie to be careful.
The two begin to take the paintings down and attempt to put them in order. Angel figures that message means the birth date of each leader. Both of them agree that Hammurabi is the oldest so he goes first, after him Ramesses the second goes after. The problem lies between Cleopatra and Caesar since they were alive when they met each other in history.
“I’m guessing Cleopatra was born before Caesar.” Angel thinks out loud.
“Well you know more than I do to be honest.” Leslie replies calmly.
“Get your gun ready just in case.”
Angel puts Cleopatra in the third slot and Caesar in the final slot. He presses the button and hopes for the best. However, instead what he gets are the walls to the side turning around revealing fleshers.
“Oh boy this isn’t good!” Angel screams.
“I guess you were wrong.”
“No time for that Leslie, just shoot at them!”
Angel is able to kill one of the fleshers easily with his shotgun. The other flesher though jumps towards Leslie. He’s able to grab and pull her away from the attack. The flesher gets onto him and attempts to cut him up with its claw. He holds the claw of the flesher for as long as he can. Leslie aims her pistol for the flesher’s brain and takes a shot that hits the brain on the money killing the creature.
“Angel, are you ok?” Leslie asks loudly.
“Yes, thanks to you. I owe you another one.”
“I think you should switch the Caesar and Cleopatra pictures and that should do i
t.”
“Agreed!” Angel replies.
Angel moves the pictures and tries again. This time the wall of pictures opens up in half revealing a wall with the devil’s pitchfork and flames as wallpaper. In the opening there is a mask, he takes it and reads the back. It reads, “This mask cannot smell death, one of the four masks of death needed to open the gates of hell.”
“Great another crazy scavenger hunt, this time for some devilish masks. Can this get anymore fun?” He asks in disgust.
“Well no use complaining, let’s find those masks.” She replies once again in her same calm tone.
The two head back to the hallway where a horde of zombies pop out of the windows into the hallway. Leslie and Angel empty bullets to the zombies killing several of them, but many still remain. He comes up with the ingenious idea using the live wire hanging above him and dropping into a pool of water by the zombies. He drops the wire into the water and the zombies become cooked meat in a matter of seconds. The circuit breaker for that circuit eventually trips and the water becomes safe to walk through again.
After that jump scare the two enter the next room through a red cherry wood door. When the two enter they see a statue of a Roman statue holding another death mask. Also they see a gray statue and terracotta statue facing opposite each other on opposite sides of the solider statue. Leslie takes a look at the message and it reads, “When the gods of the sun and of the moon face directly each other, then and only then will I release my curse on this mask.”
“Another one of these puzzles?” Leslie asks in disgust.
“I’m afraid so, looks like this is gonna be a labyrinth we have to get through before we get out of here.” Angel says disappointed.
“It looks like we have to get these statues to look at each other.” She comes up with her thoughts.
“I see the red tiles that are different in color where the statues belong, should be a quick one to solve.” He figures out the rest of the puzzle.
Angel pushes the terracotta statue while Leslie pushes the gray statue. They push their respective statutes to the red tiles where they belong until the statues are looking at each other. After that happens the mask falls out of the hand of the statue that was holding it.
Angel slowly heads to the mask and grabs it. According to the imprint on the mask it’s incapable of seeing evil. That leaves only two masks left to be obtained. However, all of a sudden he floor under Leslie begins to fall apart and in a matter of seconds she falls down to the floor below.
“Leslie! Are you ok?” Angel screams.
“Yeah I’m ok, this room scares the living daylights out of me. This room is full of statues of saints, skull heads and candles just like if this is a secret room where santeria is practiced. Not to mention that the door is locked, I’m stuck in here.” Leslie screams up.
Angel finds a rope nearby and drops it down to her. She tries to climb up the rope, but the rope breaks in the middle of her climbing and she falls back down.
“Damn the rope broke!” Leslie yells.
“Ah… hang tight down there I’m going to have to open the door some how. There’s gotta be a key to that door. I just hope I don’t run into my old friend.” He replies.
Getting out of the room, he heads into the hallway where it’s way too quiet for his own good. All of a sudden Mr. Z pops out from the ceiling in front of Angel. The creature attempts to smash him with its right fist, but he is able to sidestep the attack. He pulls out the Desert Eagle and aims for the creature’s head. After a couple of shots, Mr. Z goes down while Angel nearly falls due to the heavy recoil of the gun.
After that jump scare he heads for a blue suede door and leads him to yet another strange room with most likely another puzzle. It contains three statues all holding their hand out for something. As he studies the statues and message, he reads the message. It reads, “The statue of Fortuna wishes for a ball made out of something that once can see their reflection. The statue of Athena wishes for a ball that is of pure love. Finally Venus wishes for a ball that comes from the deep core of the Earth.”
Angel finds one of the balls, which is made out of Amber and a memo along with it. The memo reads, “One of the balls has been relocated to the sculpture room on the third room and the key for the third floor room is located in the Roman exhibit room on the first floor.”
Angel heads downstairs to the Roman exhibit where he finds plenty of Roman memorabilia and sees an obsidian ball on a picture of a Roman plebeian. He tries to take it out, but it is stuck and he’s unable to remove it.
“Shit this bastard is stuck. Looks like another puzzle indeed; well I should have expected that.”
He heads to the back where he sees a fireplace burning and three torches. Each torch has a number under it. He finds the key to the key for the sculpture room, it has a rather 19h century look to it.
“Wow this place must really be this old, so why I haven’t heard of it besides it being an abandoned factory?” Angel is perplexed when he sees the style of the key he just picked up.
He assumes that each torch has to be lit in numerical order. So he tries it, but no success as all the torches turn off. He heads back to the picture and reads the message under the saying that the Queen, Prince and Emperor must be lit in order to release the price.
He returns to the torches and thinks about the puzzle more carefully. The number 12 is considered the Queen in a standard deck of playing cards. The prince would be the jack and the number 11 in a deck of cards. That leaves the Emperor as number 13 representing the king.
After figuring out the puzzle, he goes to light up the torches in the same order as in his head. This time the torches stay lit and the obsidian ball falls from the picture. He heads to the picture to get the ball, but Mr. Z pops through the wall and chases Angel. He wants no business with Mr. Z and runs out sprinting upstairs to the 3rd floor.
Running up to the third floor avoiding Mr. Z, Angel heads to a stairway that is five times older than he is. He sees paintings thrown around and other art pieces collecting around 50 years worth of dust. Heading into the only room on the third floor he quickly closes the door making sure that Mr. Z doesn’t catch up to him.
All of a sudden he finds himself in a room full of mirrors and another puzzle. He sees a message that reads “Guide the light to me the almighty Apollo and I shall release a ball of pure crystal.”
He sees a prism in the middle of the room and figures out that the puzzle is asking him to move the light in a way that it will reflect off the mirrors to the statue of Apollo. He turns the prism so that it can hit the mirror, but that’s only part of the puzzle. He has to move the mirrors properly in order for the light to reflect to each mirror properly and hit Apollo.
Angel turns the first mirror northeast, the second facing west, the third one due east and the final one in a strange angle that just hits the statue of Apollo. The crystal ball drops down to the floor and he goes to pick it up. As he’s leaving though the ceiling collapses and to his surprise, it’s Mr. Z.
“Man do you ever take a break?” Angel says in shock, concerned about the persistence of the creature.
Mr. Z takes a hack at Angel and misses breaking a few mirrors instead. Angel pumps a few rounds to the creature, but the creature doesn’t budge. Mr. Z breaks through everything in the room like a bull in a china room.
Mr. Z deals out a hard punch right to Angel and he lands on some old paintings. After that, he grabs his shotgun and shoots the creature until it gets on his knees. Once he sees the creature gets on its knees he makes his way down the stairs. Then he hides in a small enclosure on the 2nd floor hall where he keeps still as a board until Mr. Z passes him by heading back up to the 3rd floor.
He takes a deep breath and goes back to the room of goddesses. He takes the three balls and puts them in their respective spots. After that the painting of the goddesses falls and a couple of things can be seen. He finds a mask without a mouth and a key to the room where Leslie is stuck in.
Angel heads down to the 1st floor and unlocks the door where Leslie is stuck in. When he opens the door he sees she is on the wall surrounded by fleshers. She tries to keep quiet to avoid catching attention with the deadly fleshers. Angel comes into clean house and is able to kill all the fleshers, after that he comforts Leslie.
“Thank you, Angel, that’s another one I owe you.” She says graciously.
“Don’t sweat it, like I said it’s my job to look out for you.” He replies.
“I found this in the room.” Leslie hands him the last death mask he needed.
As the two look ahead they see four spots where the masks go. Each hole has its own indention, so each of them fit into their own holes. Once the two of them figure out the placement of the masks, the bookcase to the right opens revealing a secret passage. Hearing the screams of Mr. Z the duo decides that it’s better to take their chances seeing where the passage will lead them.
Heading through the passageway they find themselves in an industrial styled hallway. Angel and Leslie are starting to find out why this particular building and street was always closed off to the public, even the police themselves. They head further down the hallway only to run into a group of zombies, which they kill rather easily. They have a choice of two paths and they choose the left path first only to find it is a dead end. However there’s a corpse with something useful for Angel.
He finds the corpse is holding shotgun parts used to improve his shotgun. Now his shotgun is able to do double damage and the impact is spread out more. The two of them head towards the other path and Angel clears out the hall full of zombies with one shotgun blast. They see a metal door and continue down the path to see yet more zombies.
Clearing the path they eventually find a ladder leading up to a storage area. Angel decides his next move and then comes up with his plan.
“Listen Leslie I’m going in alone, you stay here and make sure no more zombies get up here. I’m going to see what Hybrid is trying to hide in this facility. I think it’s more than meets the eye.” He tells her his plan.
Angel heads through the only door and ends outside of what is a long-lost abandoned facility. He heads deeper into the area and sees a big hole along with a small elevator. What does this facility have to offer and is the art gallery a front for a secret project that Hybrid is hiding?