Something long and pointed flashed in front of the light. We flinched when we heard two gunshots from outside the door. Somebody screamed, the blinding light instantly cut out and we heard the sound of breaking glass tinkling to the floor.
Smith swung his flashlight around to the door window. Spider web like cracks surrounded a circular chip on the opposite side of the glass.
“Ha ha, stupid bastards tried to shoot out the window,” Smith mocked. “That glass is obviously bullet proof. The idiot who fired the shots got a ricochet right back in the face and it took out his flashlight too. We’re safe for a moment.”
He swung his flashlight around and we saw we were in a small kitchen type area, with several sinks embedded into a pale blue countertop with closets beneath. The walls were the same dull whitewash but numerous jars and bottles stood on the countertop in separate bunches.
“This looks like a lab of some kind,” I said.
Batfish tutted and shook her head in disapproval when Smith took a piss in one of the sinks.
“You still got that first aid kit on you, Milner?” Smith asked, after rinsing his hands.
Milner nodded and painstakingly removed the small green box from his inside jacket pocket. Smith took the first aid kit and removed a tube of antiseptic cream and a bandage. He patched up Milner’s shoulder then wiped the blood away from Batfish’s nose with an antiseptic cloth. I was last to receive medical attention and my head wound stung like a bastard when Smith wiped away the half congealed blood. He stuck a huge wad of padding onto my cut that must have made me look like I was sporting an off center Mohawk haircut.
The banging, crashing and muffled shouts of abuse continued from the opposite side of the door. Cordoba kept the entrance covered to be on the safe side. Smith ripped an old calendar from the wall and used the tape from the first aid kit to stick it over the small window.
“Don’t those fuckers ever give up?” Milner sighed.
“Whatever we do, we can’t stay here,” Smith muttered. “That whole bunch of zombies is going to come riding through that damn corridor any time soon and I don’t want to be around when they do. If we don’t get out of here soon, we’ll be stuck in this damn room forever.”
Chapter Sixty-Three
“What? Are we going to shoot our way out of here, Smith?” I asked. “We’re all pretty much injured. I don’t rate our chances of success too highly.” Fatigue, shock and pain were getting the better of me.
“Those guys ‘aint nothing,” Smith sighed. “They can hardly walk and their aim is totally shit. We can take them in a fire fight.”
I knew he was trying to rouse us but an extensive gun battle was the last thing I needed right now. Batfish wasn’t in any fit state to try and recreate the ‘Gunfight at the O.K. Corral’ and Milner had been hit, albeit a flesh wound but the injury would still have a negative impact on his combat skills.
Knowing his luck, Smith would make it out of here alive but the rest of us would perish at the hands of the crazy guys or the onrushing crowd of zombies. But I knew he was right. If we stayed put the zombies would eventually catch up and they’d never leave the doorway until we starved to death in this cramped little room.
Smith handed Batfish the flashlight, pulled out his pack of smokes and offered them around. Batfish and I took one each, Milner shook his head but I was surprised when Cordoba took one. She saw me watching her in the flashlight gloom and gave me a little shrug.
“I’d quit for ages but in the circumstances, what the hell?” She flashed me the briefest hint of a smile that almost made me sigh.
The warmth of the flame on Smith’s Zippo lighter made me turn my head. I lit my cigarette and noticed an angry red mark on Smith’s hand where the guy had hit him with the metal bar.
“Does that hurt?” I asked.
“Stings like a bastard but the pain gets me motivated,” he growled and lit his own cigarette.
I noticed a narrow passageway behind Smith amidst the faint glow of his lighter flame.
“Where does that doorway lead to?” I asked, nodding in the direction of the passageway.
Smith spun around, still with the lit flame in his hand. He held the lighter in the direction of the passageway. The orange flame illuminated another stainless steel door, standing in the shadows of a recess in the wall opposite. A yellow warning sign on the door read – “Warning! Enter with Caution,” in black lettering.
“Hand me the flashlight,” Smith said to Batfish.
She complied and Smith snapped his lighter shut. He shone the light beam into the passageway and across the shiny, silver door.
“Let’s take a look,” he muttered and approached the recess.
“Wait a minute, Smith,” Batfish squawked. “It might be dangerous in there. What if there’s some kind of poison gas on the other side of that door. Look what this place did to those poor bastards outside this room. I don’t want to end up like them.”
I heard Smith sigh. “There ‘aint a whole lot of options here, kid. We’re running out of time before that army of zombies reaches us.”
“I agree,” Cordoba added. “You open the door, Smith and I’ll keep you covered.” She moved towards the passageway behind Smith, holding the M-16 at the ready. “Go for it.”
Smith reached for the handle, which was latch operated, like an old fashioned fridge from the 1950’s. He slowly released the catch and yanked open the door, shining the flashlight beam into the room beyond.
We heard a crescendo of what sounded like animal noises emitting from the room. A combination of whooping, barking and squealing sounds flooded the small lab we huddled inside.
“What the fuck?” Smith gasped above the din and moved inside the room.
Cordoba followed, still with the rifle held in a firing position. I couldn’t see inside the new room but wanted to take a closer look at what the hell lay beyond our confined space.
Batfish grabbed my arm as I pushed myself away from leaning against the countertop. “Be careful, Brett,” she whispered.
I flashed her an admonishing glance that she probably didn’t see in the diminishing flashlight beam. “Of course,” I muttered. Batfish treated me like a dumb kid sometimes.
Milner followed me to the doorway inside the recess. His interest in what lay inside the room beyond probably matched my own. We crowded in front of the entryway, peering around the corner. An almost overpowering strong, musty stench wafted through the doorway. Smith held the flashlight out in front of him with Cordoba at his shoulder. He shone the beam around the second room, illuminating several metal cages. The enclosures held assortments of emaciated animals, snarling, howling or squawking behind the bars. The creatures all seemed to be going wild and showed aggression at our presence. One of the larger cages held four big baboons that rattled the cage bars and made a cross between a screeching and barking sound.
Smith shone the light beam at the primates and we saw their eyes possessed the same milky white film, similar to those of the undead. They leapt around the cage in jerky, frantic movements that didn’t seem natural for members of the ape family.
A German Shepherd growled from within its cage, next to the baboons. The dog too, had those cataract like eyes. The noise from its throat was a combination of a growl and a howl but again the noise sounded odd and not like any canine I’d ever heard.
“What the hell have they done to these damn animals?” Milner yelled above the racket.
Batfish crowded behind me for a closer look at the bizarre scene. Smith flashed the light around the room. The lab must have been the antechamber for the larger area containing the caged animals. The room was large and rectangular shaped with the cages evenly spaced along each side on a gray tiled floor. Pigs, chickens, cats and rats were amongst the animal species enclosed in the cages. All of them looked in poor health and seemed as though they had something ungodly wrong about them.
I stepped into the room and felt an evil presence. Batfish and Milner followed close behind me and
I suddenly went cold and violently shivered. Something had happened in this room. Something I didn’t want to dwell on.
Smith shone the flashlight over some gurney tables between the cages.
“Hey, look at this,” he called out.
I slowly moved to where Smith stood, not sure if I wanted to know what he was looking at. Several syringes containing what looked like brown liquid lay on the gurney table, alongside some blood stained scalpels and clamps.
“Remind you of anything?” Smith asked me.
I shrugged and shook my head. “It looks like these sick fuckers have been experimenting on these animals,” I sighed.
“Remember when we got lifted at Newark Airport by that Podolski dude and that crazy doctor guy?”
The memories of that particular horror returned to my mind. “Yeah, I remember,” I groaned. Doctor Doom was about to inject me with zombie blood until you burst in and saved my ass.”
“This kind of looks like the same sort of set up,” Smith said, waving the beam around the room.
The flashlight picked out the carcass of a gray and white haired dog on top of a gurney table between two cages. The poor creature had been cut open and half its guts spilled out across the flat, stainless steel surface.
“Oh my God,” Batfish wailed and averted her gaze by ducking her face behind my shoulder.
“What the hell have they been doing in here?” Cordoba shrieked above the animal noises.
“I dread to even imagine,” I groaned. I glanced around the room, expecting to see more horrific sights but I noticed a loose panel in a wall recess between two cages. I moved across the floor for a closer inspection of the panel.
“Whatever they were doing in here, it wasn’t good,” Milner said, shaking his head in disgust.
“I’ll bet a penny to a pinch of shit they were injecting these animals with infected blood,” Smith said. “These dumb asses were probably trying to cure themselves and ended up poisoning each other.”
The panel was nothing more than a thin board loosely put in place. I removed the panel and stared into the void beyond the wall.
“Do you think it’s affected their minds, as well?” Batfish asked. “All those injections probably made those people go a little crazy.”
“You think those guys have been injecting themselves?” Cordoba asked. “With what, exactly?”
“Rogers said this place was used for chemical warfare research,” Milner chipped in. “They could be injecting themselves with anything. Maybe some chemicals we don’t even know about. The Brits loved all their cloak and dagger stuff.”
“Well, we can stand here from now until eternity speculating whether those jerks have been shooting up shit or not,” Smith butted in. “But the cold hard reality of the situation is this, people – we have to figure out some way out of here.”
“I think I might have just found our escape route,” I said, pointing to the dark space the panel had covered.
Chapter Sixty-Four
“What are you talking about, Brett?” Batfish asked me.
“This thing looks like some kind of service elevator,” I said, pointing to the dark recess. “They possibly used it to transport the animals up and down the levels.”
A small, rectangular box, around four feet long and three feet high, sat inside the recess behind where the panel sat. A control switch on the wall pointed either up or down to guide the service elevator. I tried the switch but the box didn’t budge.
“There’s the flaw in your plan, Einstein,” Smith mocked. “No frigging power.”
“Hang on a minute,” Milner said, approaching the elevator. “Does that thing move?”
I pushed down on the inside of the box- come-elevator and it moved in the chute slightly. Milner moved alongside me and pushed the elevator further down the chute.
“We don’t need the power to operate this thing,” he said. “We can haul it up and down by the pulley wire.”
Milner reached behind the top of the box and grabbed the wire at the back of the chute. He winced in pain as he pulled the wire around the box to the front of the elevator.
“Shit, that stings,” he croaked.
“Need a hand?” I asked him.
Milner nodded. “Grab that cable and see if we can move that elevator.”
I did as he ordered. By threading the wire through my hands, I could move the small elevator up and down the chute. Smith, Cordoba and Batfish came nearer for a closer look.
“One question,” Batfish said. “Where the hell does that elevator lead to?”
I shrugged. “How the hell do I know?”
“Wherever it leads, it’s got to be better than here,” Smith said. “We can only fit inside that elevator one at a time, so who wants to go first?”
Nobody spoke or volunteered for the first ride in the elevator. It was time for me to step up to the plate.
“I’ll go first,” I said. “Smith’s right, we can’t just wait around in here and besides the stench up here is making me want to hurl.”
“Shout up when you get to the bottom of the chute,” Milner instructed. “Can you use your weapon?”
I nodded and drew the Beretta.
“Keep it at the ready, just in case,” Milner said.
“Okay, let’s go for it.” I tried to sound enthusiastic.
Smith tugged the cable and positioned the elevator so I could crawl inside. The box felt more cramped and claustrophobic than I thought it would. I had difficulty turning around inside and reaching the cable.
“We’ll try hauling the cable from up here.” Smith grabbed hold of the wire.
“Good luck,” Milner said.
Smith handed me the flashlight and gave me a nod. I struggled with the cable but eventually managed to thread it through my hands and start winching the elevator downwards. The animal noises receded and an eerie silence engulfed me inside that little box. I felt hot and nauseous all of a sudden and sweat trickled from my forehead. The flashlight beam reflected off the stainless steel surfaces all around me and I considered turning the damn thing off.
My shoulder ached and I had to stop pulling on the cable but the elevator still descended. Smith and Milner must have carried on winching the box downward. For the first time in a long while, I felt utterly alone. I wondered what would happen if the cable snagged and I couldn’t move up or down, ending my days stuck starving to death inside the cramped, stuffy little silver box.
I felt as though I’d been cooped inside the elevator for hours before I felt a bump then a jolt and I descended no further. I shone the flashlight to the front of the elevator and saw a sliding door blocking the exit route. I placed my hand against the stainless steel surface and slid the panel to my left.
Before I had time to view my surroundings, I felt two pairs of hands seize hold of my jacket and drag me from the elevator. The flashlight fell from my grasp and rolled across the floor. My feet slipped on the hard floor surface and a hand clamped around my wrist, directing the M-9 wide to my right.
I heard muffled grunts and heavy breathing. “I told you they’d try and get out this way,” one of my assailants muttered. “Hold him steady so I can stick him.”
Stick me with what? It sure wasn’t going to be a stick of celery. Whatever they had in store for me, it wasn’t going to be pleasant.
I quickly glanced to the flashlight beam shining across the floor and counted two pairs of legs around me. Two opponents I had to take care of or they’d kill me. No other options. Smith, Milner or Cordoba couldn’t save my ass this time. I had to do this all on my own.
Me and the guy danced around the floor space in a grapple. The other hunched, dark figure lurched left and right, obviously trying to get in position to stab me with whatever sharp implement he held. I maneuvered the guy I wrestled with between us, swinging him around in a scuffling motion.
He shook my hand, trying to make me drop the handgun. I gripped onto the M-9 for all I was worth. If I dropped it I had no offensive options.
“Grab that torch, Mick and shine it in his eyes,” the guy I wrestled croaked.
The guy with the shank complied and scooped up the flashlight. He swung the beam around and I saw my attackers more clearly. They both wore hessian sack hoods like the others and tatty, green army combats. The one I grappled with wore a light brown colored great coat over the top of his fatigues. The other guy held what looked like a long, sharp bayonet, waving it around and slashing the air. These guys had obviously been soldiers once upon a time. Fit, tough guys who would have easily overpowered me when they were in their prime. Now, they were diseased and weaker than they had been over six months ago.
The longer the situation carried on, the more likely I was to get run through with the bayonet. I had to end it, preferably with a favorable outcome.
Chapter Sixty-Five
I couldn’t remember having any kind of fight or altercation in my adult life before the apocalypse. It seemed amazing what feats a human was capable of when faced with life or death situations. I was damned if that guy was going to stab me or shine the flashlight in my eyes.
An overwhelming rage and will to survive pulsed through my body. I roared a type of war cry and head butted the guy in front of me. I briefly felt something squash and heard an audible crack from behind the sack hood. He howled in pain but I wasn’t done yet. I sharply lifted my left knee that connected with the guy’s groin. He huffed and exhaled, bending forwards. His grip on my wrist loosened and I was able to free up my gun hand. I shoved him as hard as I could towards the guy with the shank. They bumped into each other and one of them might have been accidently stabbed with the bayonet but I didn’t wait to find out. I raised the M-9 and let fly with six or seven shots in quick succession.
I never really enjoyed killing, not even the zombies but as those two guys jerked with the impact of the bullets slamming home, I felt a tremendous sensation of satisfaction. Both of them wailed and fell backwards into the darkness. I heard the bayonet clatter onto the tiled floor and the flashlight rolled into the corner of the room.
The Left Series (Book 3): Left On The Brink Page 29