by Angel Ramon
Chapter 10
Angel heads for the small elevator and heads down to the platform. He sees an electronic door and heads into the motor room for the elevator. The path is linear. Once he gets to the end he sees the control switch area. He also sees a key with a yellow tag marked “UP”, must be to bring the platform up. There’s also a monitor as well, Angel turns on the monitor and to his horror it’s Mr. Z again.
Mr. Z walks slowly and smashes the camera to pieces cutting off the feed to the monitor. He quickly hops onto the pipes above him to avoid being spotted, but the pipes crack under his weight. All of a sudden Mr. Z is in front of him. The creature does a double-axe handle towards him and Angel rolls out of the way with Mr. Z smashing only the cement floor. He is unable to get a clear shot of Mr. Z with the Desert Eagle.
Mr. Z does a haymaker towards him and Angel gets under the legs of the creature. The creature busts the camera system up along with the machinery for the elevator motor. Eventually Angel is able to get a good shot and hits Mr. Z with three head shots with the Desert Eagle. The trench-coat wearing freak finally goes down to his relief.
Angel heads back to Leslie and finds the control to bring the platform up to their level. Leslie hands Angel a couple of Desert Eagle clips to his surprise. He is grateful for the rounds of ammo and he inserts the key, then he turns it bringing the platform up.
“Well let’s get moving.” Angel says with Leslie nodding her head in agreement.
When the two get out of the room they see the platform has risen up with a train like car. This is probably the transport the Hybrid employees use to get up and down from whatever their secret facility is down below. Angel heads for the control panel to start the descending process, the two of them get into the car. A loud noise of the engines revving up can be heard and the platform heads down.
Halfway through the ride though a loud noise is heard and a hard bang can be felt on the car. Out of nowhere a claw comes crashing into the car hitting Leslie. The impact incapacitates her while Angel tries to snap her out of her pain. He heads out of the car. Before he heads out though the emergency signal is heard indicating the door will be locked until the danger has been taken care of. It also indicates that the door can be opened one time before it locked.
He heads out of the car and the door clicks locked. Meanwhile the platform is still moving down and a loud roar can be heard. He investigates the platform and all of a sudden the mutated Anthony is seen. Anthony begins to mutate even further with his human head buried in the mutated body. Meanwhile a head of a lizard pops out and his claws begin to grow even bigger.
“Shit it looks like the second mutation of Anthony is taking place right now. This should be interesting.” Angel says nervously.
Angel right away shoots three Desert Eagle rounds to the creature before he runs out of bullets and has to reload. Anthony Clark gets close and tries to slash him. He barely gets out of the way. Anthony brings out his claws and attempts to crush him. He ducks under with one of the blades barely missing his head. He uses the little time to reload his Desert Eagle and shoots the eye on the shoulder.
Anthony backs away for a few seconds enabling Angel to get up and get room. However, the shot isn’t enough to defeat Anthony.
“I didn’t expect him to survive that, looks like the second mutation like his wife was saying is indeed stronger.” Angel says in shock.
He keeps shooting until Anthony jumps up to the top of the car and hops back down trying to get a sneak attack on him. He backflips out of the claw attack and continues to aim for the eye. Anthony tries to jump on the car again and again Angel is able to avoid the sneak attack. Finally he’s able to shoot four more magnum bullets losing the clip of ammo into the eye of Anthony. This time though Anthony jumps out of the platform and hangs on to wall, retreating for now.
The door is unlocked and Angel enters the car to attend to Leslie, she is still down. He puts her on the seat. However, before he could get comfortable though, the platform makes a hard stop. The yellow light by the door lights up indicating that the car has stopped due to engine overheating. Angel tries to cheer Leslie up and back into consciousness.
“Come on Leslie, don’t die on me. Come on, snap out of it, come on!” Angel screams.
“Urgghhh…” Leslie begins to open her eyes, but she’s in pain.
“Welcome back.” He says while Leslie is still in pain.
“Take it easy, it looks like we’re in Hybrid’s secret laboratory. I’ll try to find something to treat that wound. Stay here in the meantime.”
“Just go… go save yourself. I’ll just slow you down… with my injuries… Look you’re be in danger if you stay with me. Just go, leave me to rot.” She replies.
“We’re leaving this place together! Just stay here and relax in the meantime.”
“I’ll only slow you down. I know I’m not capable of caring about anyone. However, I don’t want to lose you. Also there’s something you have to know, I’m looking for someone as well in my family.”
“Who? Maybe we can find that person together.”
“That’s the problem, the one I’m looking for. We haven’t been in good terms for a while now, it’s my younger sister. She claims that the family disowned her and I never had her back.”
“Sister? I’m sure you can’t be that bad, after all you saved my butt a few times already.”
“It’s true though. I haven’t been a good sister to my younger sibling. I just hope I find her and I can make up for lost time. However, I’ve failed so far.”
“No you haven’t, we’re getting out of here. Just wait here and I’ll be back with something to treat that wound, it can’t be too bad.” Angel says while Leslie falls back to sleep.
“Could it be? Could Leslie be the older sister of Maria, can I possibly fix this family after all? Too bad I never got the name. I’m sure when she’s up she’ll tell me.” He says in his head.
He gets out of the car and finds himself in the upper levels of the laboratory. Walking around the platform, he finds a vent and enters it dropping down to a hallway. When he lands though, the platform can be heard restarting and finishing going down.
“Shit! I gotta get down before anything happens to her!” Angel screams while slamming on the wall.
His first instinct is to take the elevator to go down, but to no surprise it’s down. So he turns around and heads for the double doors instead. He finds himself in the engine room with all the smoke and machinery doing their magic. He takes a small elevator down to the lower level and sees a corpse eaten alive ahead of him holding a couple of things.
As he heads closer he sees what looks like a fuse and a document. The document reads that to activate the elevator the switch in the sub-power room must be activate to activate the door for the transformer room. Then the fuse must be inserted into the circuit for the elevator to power the elevator.
Angel sees an elevator taking him down to the sub-power room and heads downstairs. When he reaches the downstairs level he sees three fleshers that are black with yellow spots. These fleshers have gone through their second mutation and as a result their attack abilities are beefed up even more. He takes his beefed up shotgun and takes out two of the fleshers. The recoil of the shotgun is so powerful that he falls to the floor and the third flesher gets extremely close.
The flesher attacks him with its claw and it cuts his arm. The silver lining is that the attack only grazed him. After that the creature jumps towards him, but Angel takes the shotgun and blasts the flesher killing it. His left arm is cut and begins to bleed pretty quickly. Angel takes his part of his shirt and rips it to use it as cloth to cover the wound. He heads to the switch to activate the power to the transformer room.
He heads back up from where he came from and sees the light above the transformer has turned green to indicate it’s open. He makes his way into the transformer room where the room is full of high-voltage. The noises of fleshers can be heard in the distance and the fact any little touc
h to the transformers can be deadly will make this a dangerous expedition.
Walking slowly to avoid giving attention, Angel walks past a few fleshers hanging out above him. Getting closer to the elevator circuit, he remains careful. Approaching the circuit for the elevator, a flesher appears out of nowhere and latches onto him. He doesn’t panic and flips the creature to the top of the transformer where the creature gets its goose cooked.
He grabs the fuse he got and inserts it into the fuse box. He hears the motor running and hopes that the elevator is operational now. Making his way back to the elevator, Angel calls the elevator and to his relief it’s working. When he gets into the elevator he has it go to the lowest level, which is B4. Upon getting out of the elevator, he is met with a gang of zombies that are naked. These zombies were probably test subjects gone wrong for the Hybrid Corporation.
Angel makes quick work of the zombies with his upgraded shotgun. After dealing with the zombies he heads for the car to recover Leslie. When he gets to the car though she is nowhere to be found and only a strange looking key is found by where she was located before.
“Leslie… Leslie! Where could she have gone?” Angel asks himself.
When he gets out of the car he is approached by Annette.
“Annette?” He asks.
“Yes, it’s me. I know you met my husband already, look if we don’t do something quickly he will continue to mutate into something we might not be able to defeat. These anti-virus bullets might be able to slow him down, but…”
“But what?”
“I fear the worse.”
“Listen have you seen a woman named Leslie or my girlfriend named Maria?”
“You mean your spy friend, I saw her in the sewers. Normally I don’t take kindly to spies, but my husband has caused too much damage. Your friend is in great danger, not to mention the man in the red trench coat who can’t be killed. As for your girlfriend, I pray she’s not in here playing around. This is no playground, as much as I like to help you out there is some unfinished business I have to attend to with Anthony.” Annette says explaining the situation.
“You gotta be kidding me! You expect to stop that creature by yourself? Listen, let me help!” He screams, but she runs deeper into the lab. Could it be Annette has a death wish to die beside her dear husband?
Angel follows her path and is led to a huge hallway where there are two possible paths, an east side and a west side. He chooses the east side where he enters a hallway only to find a locked shaft and a locked door. So he heads to the door at the end of the hall. It turns out to be the storage room for keeping experimental bodies that were used for experimenting.
Angel is unable to stand the brutal look of the mutilated bodies that were being used as test subjects. The bodies were mostly those of elders and middle aged people, but a few younger people were also made subjects.
“The thought of everything taking place under closed doors and nobody was around to survey the area. Makes me wonder how long this has been happening and how long were people were in the dark with all this.” He says in his mind.
Exploring the room further, he finds nothing of interest except for a keycard for the west side. He heads to the west side of the lab, losing Annette in the process. What concerns him though is the condition of Leslie, Bill and more importantly his girlfriend Maria. He also wants to know if there is a relationship between Maria and Leslie, if so he might be able to fix it. At the end of the day though, his hometown of East New York and probably all of NYC are nothing more than just mere shells of themselves. Right now it’s all about survival.
Chapter 11
Angel enters the West side of the laboratory and uses the keycard on a panel to open the shutter. When the shutter opens, he’s greeted by a couple of plant monsters that are able to move.
The plant monsters are known as “Ivies”, however these particular ones have gone through a second mutation. The anti-BOW spray that was activated actually made the ivies stronger and their spit becomes poisonous. This upgraded mutant is known as “Poison Ivy” and its vines are also much longer.
The creatures slap Angel down to the ground with their long-reaching vines. After that they attempt to spit their poison towards him. However, he’s able to get up on his knees and roll backwards. Knowing that conventional weapons probably won’t work on these creatures he heads towards the room on the other side of the hall. Entering the room he searches for anything useful and then he bumps into a closet.
He finds a few incendiary grenades, exactly what’s needed to kill the plant varmints. Heading back to the hallway arrogantly, he grabs one of the grenades and throws it to one of ivies burning it to a crisp. Before he could tackle the other one, it grabs him with its vines and prepares to bite his head off. Angel is tied up unable to get out of the clutches of the ivy. He prepares for impact, until an unknown person shoots the ivy grabbing its attention.
It’s Annette to Angel’s rescue. After escaping the ivies grasps, he throws the other grenade burning the other ivy. After that he thanks Annette.
“Annette… why thank you? I owe you one.”
“No problem, I realize we have to work together. This lab is huge though, I say you go downstairs and check down there while I stay up here. Your friends have to be here or…”
“Let’s not even think of that. You sure you’ll be ok by yourself?”
“Yes, besides I have to be the one who deals with my husband…” She says and then heads back to the main hall. He becomes concerned as she continues to repeat that she has to be the one to deal with Anthony.
He goes down the stairs and ends up on the B5 level of the lab. Approaching the hallway he can hear the sounds of fleshers, so he walks slowly through the hall until he sees two of them up ahead. However as he walks through the hall another flesher pops through the vent in the ceiling.
Angel quickly pulls out his improved shotgun is able to kill the first flesher. He’s unable to get a good shot on the other two fleshers. He decides to just run and dive to the end of the hall. While diving he shoots the fleshers with his shotgun in mid-air. The hall is clear and he keeps moving until he enters through a door. Entering through the door he enters the monitor room where parts of the laboratory can be seen through the use of cameras.
He sees nothing of use through the cameras. He keeps going until he reaches the A-2 laboratory where a horde of zombies can be seen. However, what catches his attention is the weapon box behind him that he opens using the key he found in the basement of the gallery. Opening the box he finds magnum parts and bullets. The parts inside the locker are for improving the magnum firepower and lowering the recoil after shooting the weapon.
Heading deeper into the laboratory he sees the horde of zombies and throws his last grenade to the horde. All of the zombies end up burning alive. As he heads deeper into the lab, he finds a key. The key is a rather bulky and it has a power symbol indicating it’s the key to the power room. Perhaps there is another section to be powered in the lab?
Angel heads back where he came from until he finds himself back in the hall where he was attacked by the ivies. He finds there are two ivies that weren’t there before. One of them spits poison at him which barely misses him. The other ivy prepares to slap him down to the floor. However, he sidesteps it and makes a run for the door to the main hall. After dodging the ivies he makes a bee-line for the power area. After heading up the elevator he hears a scream.
Running to the scream he sees Annette trying to back step from Mr. Z.
“Annette get to the elevator, I’ll take care of trenchy here.” He screams while Annette runs to the elevator going down.
He tests out his new improved magnum and to his surprise he’s able to take down Mr. Z in only two shots. Even he was impressed by the power of his new weapon.
After entering the motor room he heads down the small elevator and he spots a few metal boxes that build up to the power room door. He uses the key to enter the power room, upon entering he sees a h
uge power core and continues carefully. When he reaches the end of the hall Mr. Z drops from the ceiling and traps Angel in a corner unarmed. Mr. Z prepares a haymaker until its shot from behind, it’s Leslie.
“Run!” Leslie says while she empties her bullets towards the creature until she runs out of bullets.
She tries to reload her pistol, but Mr. Z grabs her. However, she’s able to shoot Mr. Z in the head causing it to be blinded. However, the creature throws Leslie right into the power core causing it to malfunction. At the same time Mr. Z drops into the pit of fire below the power room.
Leslie is seriously injured holding her body weakly. Angel runs to her trying to attend to her.
“Agghhh… Angel please escape.” She says weakly.
“No I won’t, we’re a team! I can’t just leave you behind…”
“Please I’m going to die anyway, tell Maria when you find her that her sister always loved her and I never meant to hurt her…” She says then screams in pain and then continues. “I know you love her, go find her and make her a happy girl. I know you’ll protect her and nurture her…” Her voice becomes weaker.
“Ah… so that explains it, you were looking for your sister. Why didn’t you tell me Maria was your sister?”
“I’m sorry… I’m just a woman who fell in love with you, Angel I love you. I just wanted to give you something before I go. Please do me a favor and don’t tell my sister.” Leslie says as she wants to kiss Angel before she goes.
“Oh man I know I shouldn’t do this, but she’s going to die anyway might as well make her last wish come true.” He says in his head as he wants to respect Leslie’s last wishes. The two kiss passionately for about 30 seconds, in fact Angel actually feels a little bit of passion. For that short amount of time the two forget they’re in the middle of a collapsing lab.