I catch up to Cade in time to see him hunker down in my original hidey-spot behind the boxes. He’s slipping his bulletproof vest over top of a black long-sleeved shirt, causing the hem to ride up and give me the briefest glimpse of his sculpted abs and drool-worthy Adonis belt.
Holy hell.
I almost stumble as I take the last few steps to him but manage to keep from embarrassing myself too badly. Being this discombobulated before breaking into an unknown experimental base of operations isn’t wise.
Thankfully, I’m already in an outfit Cade deemed worthy for our mission, the only thing missing is the vest to match his. Which apparently I have, but again, don’t ask me how. Cade didn’t come here knowing I’d become his ally in this adventure, so how he has a vest that fits me near-to perfect is a mystery. One that I’m not going to solve at the moment, while we need to be focusing on another.
Gaze locked behind me, Cade doesn’t relax from his stiff stance until I’m safely ensconced in the little cubby with him. “All set?” He whispers.
I offer him a nod, too nervous to risk speaking.
He helps me into my protective gear, then reaches down to adjust the strap of my thigh holster. It’s supporting one of the handguns he’d produced earlier, sans the silencer. He’d insisted, and I’m not one to argue extra weapons. His hands skim a sensitive area on the inside of my leg and my whole body tenses, causing him to look up at me from where he’s crouched on the floor.
The view of him kneeling there, staring up at me so trustingly, is breathtaking; I almost reach out to run my fingers through his short hair just to see what it feels like.
Nope. NO! Not gonna do this now. Totally not the time. Focus!
Clearing my throat, I break eye contact, and he stands back up, slightly hunched over to keep out of sight.
He sets about the task of loading up his own weapons — a handgun tucked into his rib holster, a knife in each boot and another slightly larger handgun is stashed at the small of his back. How his thick arms can maneuver around to reach it, I have no clue.
Looking sufficiently badass, Cade glances up at me, raising one eyebrow in question. I give him a thumbs up, and he motions for me to duck down and follow him.
Seeing no one in the hallway, we make our way over to the door’s keypad on silent feet. I pull the code-catcher from one of the many pockets in my black cargo pants and hand it over to Cade so he can place it on the reader.
Holding my breath, I watch as each number scrolls on the screen, turning green as the little device moves on to the next. On the seventh digit, all the numbers lock into place, flashing brightly as a little lock appears off to the side and pops open.
At the same time, Cade and I brace ourselves as the tumblers to the gargantuan door begin to disengage from the inside. As the sounds come to a halt Cade reaches out and pulls on the innocuous looking handle, the door easily giving way under his strength as it swings out towards us.
Trading satisfied grins with Cade in the dimly lit hall, a new emotion rolls through me: Excitement.
We’re in.
CHAPTER 18
Pausing at the pitch-black darkness that surrounds us as the door closes at our backs, we wait, listening for any sounds of movement. When none come, the silence is so thick I can hear ringing in my ears.
It’s like we’ve entered a black hole.
Not one to be afraid of the dark, under normal circumstances anyway, I find myself taking calming breaths to soothe the sudden fear coursing through me. I can’t even see my hand when I lift it to touch my nose.
A light would be great right about now!
Unfortunately, Cade only has one headlamp, and knowing he’s better at the whole ‘sleuthing’ thing, we agreed it was best for him to wear it, not me.
As always, he proves to have a keen sense for my thoughts. The swish of fabric, overly loud in the silence, sounds and Cade’s headlamp clicks on, illuminating the platform we’re currently at the edge of.
I gasp, taking a step back as Cade’s arm instantly darts out in front of me to bar my steps moving forward. Lifting a finger to his lips, he reminds me to be quiet.
Not like I could forget. The gasp was involuntary, dammit.
Satisfied I won’t fall, he drops his arm, turning to scan the area. The beam of the headlamp glances off a metal stairway, spiraling down off to our right. It has no railing, and though I’m not usually afraid of heights, a rush of vertigo shoots through me at the sight. Today is a day for all my non-fears to actualize, apparently. Cade’s headlamp can’t penetrate far enough into the darkness below to reveal the bottom.
How deep underground does this shit go?
I guess it would have to be far to keep whatever sounds that emerge from the depths from reaching the outside world.
The platform we’re standing on is only a few feet across, the boundary mere inches from where we’d stopped. The drop won’t be far to the next set of stairs, I’m sure, but the ruckus our potential fall could’ve made would likely have been deafening in the quiet. Enough to alert anyone at the bottom to our presence, that’s for certain.
Double checking I’m good to go, Cade takes slow, measured steps down the stairs. I keep a hand on his shoulder so he knows I’m with him and not getting left behind in our descent.
It feels like we travel down for hours, but by the time we finally step off the last stair and onto yet another metal platform, it’s only been twenty minutes or so. Still, for it to take that long, we have to be at least five or six stories underground.
The platform we’ve stopped at leads to another door, with yet another keypad.
Fuck!
Hopefully they don’t require a separate code for each door. If they do, we’re screwed.
We wait with baited breath as the catcher inputs the same digits as before, only breathing again when it flashes the green unlocked symbol.
Thank you, Kenji!
Cade motions me to wait as he cracks the door a few inches, peering into the space beyond.
I do, somewhat patiently… but he’s taking a long damn time to gauge the room. I’m just beginning to wonder if he fell asleep standing up or something, when he quietly closes the door and turns to me. Reaching up, he shifts the headlamp closer to his temple so I’m not being blinded.
“We’re okay to talk for a moment,” he says in hushed whispers. “This entry leads to a hallway with three other doors, two on the left, one on the right. At the end of the hall is an observation deck of some kind. It has windows that are lit from the other side, but I can’t see that far.”
His expression tells me there’s something he’s hesitant to share, but now isn’t the time for holding back. We’re here. We need to get this done. “What?”
I find myself wishing I could see his eyes more clearly as I feel them roam my face — they’re always so expressive, and I want a glimpse into his mind.
“There are gurneys with bodies lining both sides of the hallway. Much like how you described their incinerator walkway to me.” He pauses, taking stock of my reaction before pressing on. “They’re naked. Look to be tortured. I want you to be prepared.”
I take a minute to absorb the news, then meet his gaze head on. “I can handle it, Cade. I have to.”
That’s all it takes — he trusts me to know my own limitations. It makes me appreciate his confidence in me all the more.
“The hallway is lit with emergency lights, so stay close. I didn’t spot any cameras, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t there. They could know we’re here the minute we pass through this door.”
“Gotcha.”
Switching off his headlamp, there’s a brief bout of darkness before we both slip out into the hall. My stomach instantly rolls, but I steel my resolve as the stench of rotting flesh smacks me full force in the face.
Damn, that’s disgusting.
There are several mutilated corpses lining the sides of the hall, just like Cade warned, creating a narrow passage for us to walk through. A cou
ple of them have the same odd deformities as Gladys, while the rest look normal. Or as normal as the bodies of tortured people can look anyway.
Cade tries the handle of the door to our right - locked - then moves on down the hall to the first one on the left. It’s tightly secured, making him grunt quietly. He knows I’m capable of lock-picking, but now likely isn’t the time. We need to scan the area before making the effort to gain entry.
The last door on the left is unlocked, and Cade gestures for me to keep watch as he slips inside the room. It only takes a moment before he reemerges, shaking his head. Nothing.
That leaves the windows at the end of the hall. They’re frosted around the edges, leaving only the center transparent to peer through. My gut clenches and threatens to revolt at the scene unfolding on the other side.
Cages, many of them occupied by humanoid figures in different levels of dishevelment, line the perimeter of the vast room. Clear plexiglass cubicles take up the center space in a three-by-two grid. Their contents have me forcing down another dry heave, trying to maintain my composure.
Each clear cube has a single exam table inside, with restraints rigged to their top and bottom — much like what would be used in an asylum back in the day. Unlike the cages, only three of the testing rooms are in use. The first, closest to the viewing platform, has a man inside who doesn’t appear too worse for wear — yet.
He’s dressed in a medical gown, wrists and ankles bound to the bed he’s prostrate on. Tubes and wires trail off his body like the tendrils of a spider’s web. I can’t quite tell from this distance what they all lead to, but I can see at least one that’s pumping a viscous black liquid into his bloodstream.
It creeps slowly down the tubing, like it’s too thick for the small encasement, leaching into his body in timed waves. The substance is too dark to be blood, that much I can see. I’m positive it’s not any kind of medicine that could help him, in any case… every time a new spurt of it courses into him, he thrashes and bucks against the restraints. His face is blotted red, muscles corded against the strain. I can’t hear his screams from where we stand, but I can imagine them.
Farther back in the room, another victim is hooked up much the same way, only he looks so much worse. His body is infused with the black substance — it maps out his veins like rivers throughout his skin, festering just under the surface. This man is barely twitching at each new injection of the stuff, and I can tell he’s close to giving up… or giving in. Or whatever they’re trying to gain from these people. He looks beaten.
The final test subject is the worst of them all.
I can’t tell her age, but what is visible of her features is horrendous. She doesn’t even look human any longer. Her face is deformed, brow-bone protruding forward on her head, her jaw lined with large, bubbling, masses under the skin. Her flesh is a mottled crimson, much like the first man’s. Only hers is shredded and bloody, like at some point her hands were free and she tried to claw her own skin off. The whole affect makes her look as though she’s been dipped in an acid bath repeatedly, then left to rot.
Holy fucking hell.
Most sickening of all… there are similarities in her appearance that my mind is forcing me to recognize, despite how distorted they are. She looks like someone who’s been infected. Only, somehow her suffering has been worse than even the mindless husks we call Zerks. She’s been left to rot with no hope for a cure. Deliberately.
Usually Zerks are harder to tell apart from Pures — in theory. The most telling features are their black veins, sunken cheeks and hollow eyes. Eyes that say there’s nothing sentient left inside the emaciated shell of the former human being.
In the outside world these things can be hidden by clothing, sunglasses and such. Not intentionally, but Zerks stay in what they’re wearing when they turn. It’s not like they’re going to go clothes shopping and swap outfits — their priority, first and foremost, is to feed. Gluttonously. As a whole, their gate is slower than the average human, like an out of shape person’s, but they don’t hobble or shuffle unless injured.
To see someone who I know can’t be a Zerk, but is exhibiting even more advanced deformations… It’s choking the hope from my fragile belief that one day things can go back to normal in the world.
If this is Nyler’s plan - making more advanced Zerks - we’re all screwed. But that wouldn’t make sense, honestly. It doesn’t feel right.
Nyler wants stronger humans. Zerks are no longer that. They can’t think, can’t communicate. They can’t function other than to follow the drive to feast on living flesh. There’s no way Nyler wants a world full of mindless zombie-adjacents.
But then…
Cade seems to come to the realization at the same time I do, if his widening eyes and tensed jaw are anything to go by.
“He’s infecting humans with Zerk DNA to try and create a super-human race from the melding.” The words are strangled as they push past my lips. It’s a concentrated effort to keep from shouting them.
Fucking twisted, mental, gods-damn bastard!
Cade grunts in agreement, green gaze still glued to the scene, scrutinizing.
There don’t appear to be any people wandering about outside of the cages, and the ones in the exam rooms definitely aren’t going anywhere. We must have timed things right to not have anyone here to contend with.
“It’s time to move.” Cade intones, gravel and anger leaking out as he steps around me to a connected hallway we hadn’t been able to see from the entrance. It leads to a single metal and glass door with a staircase beyond, dropping down into the experiment room below.
“Right behind you.”
◆◆◆
The latest door isn’t locked, nor does it require a code. I guess once Atlas member’s get to this point, there’s no need for added security measures. You’d think they’d at least secure it somehow though, considering what they keep on the other side.
Their folly, not mine. Though it does cause a nagging thought to surface in the back of my mind, too far out of range for me to grasp, the frustrating bitch.
As we reach the bottom of the entry steps, I note another room directly below where we’d been standing. It looks like the lab proper, with its closest wall made completely of glass to allow viewing into the subject zone. The lights inside are blindingly bright, easily illuminating various stainless-steel worktables covered in lab equipment of all types — a shit ton of them I didn’t even think existed anymore. Fridges with glass fronts, against the back wall of the laboratory, house beakers and vials full of all kinds of substances.
We’ve found the mother lode. This is exactly what we need. If I can get in there and steal some of the samples, we could send them to Cade’s government buddies to analyze. A while back he disclosed they have a small lab of their own, kept under wraps, a few hundred miles away.
But first…. Turning to face the cavernous room, I do my best to ignore the chill in my bones. It’s fucking cold down here. I guess they need it to be to keep their work from corrupting — most labs were temperature controlled Before.
It surprises me they managed to have all of this here and functioning, when aboveground so many things just… didn’t work.
It pisses me off.
At the sound of our boots shuffling across the concrete floor, several of the cage inhabitants begin to stir. The edges of the room where they’re being kept are darker than everything else, so I can’t see defined features or anything recognizable to indicate they may be people I once knew.
As we step farther into the room, the subjects on the right side start making grunting noises — fingers poke out to curl around the bars, their cages rattling in protest.
“You’re new.” The scratchy voice comes from our left, on the other side of the plexiglass cubicles. Cade had his gun out and aimed within seconds.
“Who spoke?” He demands with authority. He angles to where he can see the whole room in front of him, the lab at his back.
“I did.” T
he person responds, humor in their tone. A small hand peaks out of the bars of a cage about two yards away.
We slowly venture across the room, all the while keeping an eye on the noisy peeps to my right. I wish they’d say something so I could know how to help them. I’d scanned the room for a set of keys as soon as we were on the lower level but wasn’t able to spot any.
I fucking hate Nyler.
Cade and I stop a few feet from the enclosure of the talkative individual, wary. The person lets out a small chuckle and leans forward, revealing the face of an older gentleman. “I know you!” He says, pointing at me in glee.
“You do?”
“You’re the nurse girl that hands out the meds to the old folk, no?”
I’m disconcerted at being recognized, but not able to say the same for the person that speaks, so I offer him a small nod instead. “That’s me.”
“Used to see you going into Old Man Wilson’s place every other day. Names Paul.” He introduces. “I’m gonna go out on a limb and say you ain’t with Nyler’s bunch. If I’m right, I ought ‘ta tell you, steer clear of them cages over yonder.” He gestures to the other side of the room. “Filled with Zerks who haven’t eaten in days. They’re likely to rip you’re arm off, you’re not careful.”
I blanch and Cade whirls, readjusting the aim of his weapon.
A few other prisoners shift forward at his movement, though none of them speak. I wonder if they’re trying to gauge if we’re here to help.
It fucking wrecks me that they can look at another human being and not immediately know we’re not here to hurt them.
They’ve witnessed the worst of our race, and I hope I can find a way to free them and let them see we haven’t all devolved into cavemen.
“What’re they doing to the subjects in the cubes?” Cade asks Paul.
Paul leans back, his face falling into shadows once more. His tone is haunted as he replies, “Shootin’ em up with Zerk gunk. Fillin’ up their bodies with it, hoping to make them better.”
Atlas (Apocalyptic Cries Book 1) Page 16