Severed Ties

by Jo Schneider

“The Shrimp is in trouble,” Kev said, adjusting his light.

  Sven snorted.

  Wendy suddenly missed Cal’s laughter. She hadn’t seen enough of him lately.

  “Put this on too,” Matt said. He handed everyone a mask. “They have all sorts of diseases down in the labs. Trust me, no one wants to catch one.”

  No one joked about that.

  “Take it slow,” Jeff told Kev. “We don’t know what we’re going to find.”

  “Got it, boss. Everyone ready?”

  They all nodded.

  Kev entered the dark first. His lamp lit the way ahead, and left his head a dark silhouette to follow. Jeff went next, his lithe frame treading softly. Matt followed, then Wendy. She could hear Sven’s light breathing behind her.

  The combination of lights bobbing around in the stairwell gave the scene a surreal quality, like six lightning storms all going at once. Light swept over the walls, which were the same gray as the hallway. Rubber edges lined the stairs with little indentations that were full of grime. The rail was a flat, thick, steel thing that had served to gather the dust of the past almost twenty years.

  Wendy expected to see more bodies as they descended, but they didn’t find any. She noticed that there weren’t even many spider webs or curled up insects in the corners or around the air ducts that sat in the top corner of each landing. Light mesh, mostly covered in dust and dirt, obscured the openings.

  “No one has been down here in a long time,” Sven said. “No footprints.”

  Even through the mask, the air tasted strange, stale. Wendy licked her lips and tried not to breathe too deep. The dry, stagnant air was nothing like the tunnels in the Den, but the same eerie feeling of being alone seeped into her bones.

  They descended to the second landing, then the third. Each held a door that stood alone and stalwartly locked. Kev checked each one as they went by.

  “Just in case,” he said. There were keypads next to each one, but Kev didn’t bother with that.

  The spiral of people and lights almost seemed whimsical. The urge Wendy had to grab her knives and be ready for an attack did not.

  A clang sounded far away, followed by a low rumble. Kev stopped. He didn’t have to hold up his hand; the others stopped as well. Wendy strained to hear. The sound of her heartbeat as well as her wheezing breathing filled her ears. Nothing else.

  They stood stone still for a good thirty seconds. Waiting.

  “Must be an automated system,” Matt said. “Maybe the air.”

  Jeff gave Kev a nod, and they kept going down the remaining stairs. When he got to the bottom, he stopped. The others stayed on the stairs. Wendy gave them plenty of room, in case there were people inside. Just because this entrance hadn’t been used recently didn’t mean that the whole place was deserted.

  Kev dusted off a keypad and squinted at the numbers. After a second he said, “5967 or 5697?”

  “5697,” Jeff said.

  “Thanks.” He hurriedly typed them in and pressed the dingy green button.

  For a moment nothing happened, then the keypad started to blink red.

  “Maybe I put the wrong one in,” Kev said. His fingers moved to start again.

  “No!” Matt said. “If you type the wrong code in twice, it might activate the security system. Plus, I think that’s a retina scanner.”

  “A what?” Kev asked.

  “It scans your eyeball.”

  Kev grinned. “That’s easy, anyone see a corpse with enough eyeball left to scan?”

  For a second nothing happened, then Matt snorted. Jeff let out a barking laugh, and Sven shook his head.

  “You guys are sick,” Wendy said.

  Matt shook his head. “Let Sven blow it.”

  “So the security system doesn’t care about explosions?” Kev asked.

  “The wrong code could set off a destruct sequence in the lab, frying all of the meds.”

  “Oh, great,” Kev said.

  Sven slipped past Wendy to the landing. He fished the explosives out of his pack. “Back up,” he told everyone.

  The Den had rarely had explosives to work with, and when they did, Wendy’s dad had made sure his daughters stayed away from them. Especially Kenzie, who seemed to be more interested than their dad was comfortable with.

  Wendy moved all the way to the landing above, where she made room for the others. They waited for thirty seconds before Sven’s footsteps sounded. He ran up the stairs and onto the landing, keeping his back to the landing below. “Face the walls. Cover your ears.”

  Jeff ended up right next to her, their arms touching. She thought it was an odd place for her stomach to get that butterfly feeling in it.

  Ten seconds later, a boom reverberated through the stairwell. A fast and heated wave of air rushed up the middle of the stairs. The blast of light blazed through her closed eyes. As quickly as it had happened, it was gone.

  Sven ran back down and shouted up, “Clear. It’s open.”

  They filed back down. Wendy expected the door to be blasted clear out of the frame, but it still hung by one valiant hinge. The doorway was clear.

  “I’m in,” Kev said as he moved through.

  Another dark room. Wendy grit her teeth and followed the boys.

  The bobbing lights showed Wendy an office. Much like those at the top of Shelter. Desks, half walls, chairs and cabinets—all covered in a thick, dark layer of dust—sat in little clusters throughout the room.

  Matt pulled off his mask and pointed. “That way.”

  The others tugged the masks off.

  Wendy’s gaze followed his gesture and found a wall of glass lining the far side of the room. Grime made it impossible to see through it clearly. Kev, who got there first, used his sleeve to wipe a clean spot.

  “Looks like a lab.”

  Matt moved forward and looked through. “We need to get in.”

  Kev pointed at a keypad. “Anyone have a code?”

  “No,” Jeff said.

  “Okay then, Sven, did you bring the diamond cutter?”

  “Yeah.”

  “We’re going to need it.”

  Sven and Kev set to work cutting through the glass. Wendy turned away and glanced around at the desks. A maze of short walls snaked through the room. She started through, treading carefully on the thin carpet.

  There were plenty of places for someone to hide, but the dust indicated that no one had been here in a long, long time. If any place should have people, it would be the medical ward.

  But this wasn’t like medical in Shelter. There was no place for patients. So why the office?

  “Testing,” Jeff said through the radio. “Cal, can you hear me? We’re in the lab.”

  No answer.

  “Looks like we’re too deep for them to work.”

  Wendy’s eyes swept over the desktops and under chairs as she crept through the room. One desk held a few picture frames. Wendy picked one up and dusted it off on her pants.

  The smiling faces of a dark skinned man, a blonde woman and two little kids who had to be theirs greeted her.

  A family.

  A pang of jealousy tugged at her. Wendy’s mind turned to Kenzie. She’d died because Wendy hadn’t seen the signs with Pelton. Her dad had died for the same reason. And she’d helped her mother take her own life.

  Had this family survived the Starvation? Or had they lived to see the hell the world had become? Were their bodies stacked on the floor upstairs?

  The thought of dead kids sent a tremor through Wendy’s hand. She dropped the picture on the desk and walked back toward where the boys had gotten through the first set of glass walls. There was another door in the far corner, back so far her light barely got to it.

  “That’s the vault,” Matt said, pointing at a steel and glass structure behind yet another wall of glass.

  “Can you get us in?” Sven asked.

  “I doubt the code will work, can you just blow the lock?”

  Sven pulled another charge out of h
is pack. “Sure.”

  Wendy and the others moved back to give Sven space.

  “Just the lock,” Matt said again. “If we blow too much it might lock itself down.”

  “Which means what?” Sven asked.

  “It means that everything in there will either sink into another vault or it will be destroyed. Scrubbed clean probably by a fire.”

  “Right, just the lock.”

  Kev, who had been looking around, came back to Wendy. “This place is creepy.”

  “I agree.”

  They watched for fifteen minutes before Sven said they were ready to blow it.

  “Get back,” Matt said. “And put your masks back on.”

  “Why?” Kev said.

  “There are a lot of deadly diseases in there, some of them airborne.”

  Kev slipped the mask back over his nose and mouth. “This just keeps getting better and better.”

  Wendy put her mask on and pulled it snug around her nose and cheeks. Matt joined them on the far side of the room. They put a couple of desks between them and the vault.

  “Fire in the hole,” Sven said.

  Wendy crouched down and covered her head.

  Unlike in the stairwell, this blast sounded like a small pop. No wave of heat rolled over them.

  Jeff, who crouched beside her, uncurled and stuck his head up.

  Wendy did the same, and found a hand-sized hole where the lock on the door had been. Light streamed out of it.

  Matt went to the door. He reached through the hole, pushed something that caused a loud click, then pulled the door open.

  As one, they all moved to see inside the vault.

  Six little refrigerators with clear doors housed more glass vials then Wendy could count. Each row was labeled. A counter sat above the refrigerators, and on it sat more vials. More labels. Only a three-foot section of floor stood clear of anything.

  “There’s still power for those?” Kev asked.

  “I’m sure they have a separate battery. One that lasts a hundred years.” Matt pulled a case out of his pack and opened it. There was room for two dozen vials. He started searching the labels.

  “Need help?” Kev asked.

  “No, I got it.” Matt’s voice held a clip of command to it.

  Wendy and the others waited, shifting their weight and watching Matt. After a few minutes of looking, Matt sighed, and his shoulders sagged.

  “They don’t have it?” Wendy asked.

  Matt shook his head. “Not exactly what we need, but I think we can make something that should work from what’s here.” He started loading vials into the case.

  “What does that mean?” Kev asked.

  “It means that it will take us longer to make a cure. We might lose more people than we had hoped.”

  Everyone understood that.

  Matt was about half way through loading the case when a clatter sounded from the door at the other end of the room.

  Wendy and Kev were the closest. Without thinking, she ripped the mask off, drew her knives, ran to the door and checked the handle. Locked.

  Kev stood opposite her. He pressed his ear up to the wall.

  “Stay with Matt,” Jeff said to Sven. He joined Wendy.

  “Hear anything?” he asked Kev.

  “No. It could have been a vent falling out because of the explosion.”

  “Maybe.”

  Wendy’s palms began to sweat. She gripped her knives and waited.

  Matt had just finished loading the vials when a knock came at the door. The three metallic thunks caused Wendy to step back.

  “Was that a knock?” Kev asked. “Someone is seriously knocking?” He looked at Jeff. “Do we have a secret knock?”

  “Actually, yes.” Jeff reached out and knocked twice.

  The person on the other side did four.

  Jeff did one.

  Wendy watched. “A secret knock?”

  Jeff frowned. “They come in handy, and that’s one of ours.” He glanced at Kev. “You get ready to shoot if this isn’t one of our guys.”

  “Got it.”

  “Wendy, you stay here. Slice anyone we don’t know.”

  “We don’t have to open the door, “Wendy said.

  “Yes, we do.”

  Without further ado, Jeff unlocked the door and twisted the handle.

  A little screech sounded, then a hiss of air escaped. The old hinges screamed at being forced to bend.

  Wendy stayed pressed up against the doorframe. Jeff was on the other side. Kev had ducked behind some desks.

  Wendy watched Kev as he watched the door. His eyes remained emotionless as he aimed; then recognition dawned, and he put his gun down.

  “Hound.”

  Jeff gave Wendy a nod. She would stay. He jumped into the opening, his gun out and his light in the guy’s face.

  “Whoa, it’s just me,” Hound said.

  Jeff kept his weapon up. “What happened?”

  Wendy stayed in place until Jeff led Hound into the room. Blood ran down the side of his face, and he walked with a limp.

  “Where is everyone else?” Kev asked.

  Hound looked up and around. He searched until he turned around and saw Wendy. He shook his head. “It’s Pelton, he’s here. He grabbed the others.”

  Chapter 17

  Wendy felt the world fall out from beneath her feet. Pelton. Here? Just a few floors away? Blood pumped through her ears, building into a roar. Her fingers tightened around the hilts of her knives.

  “How many are there?” Jeff asked.

  Hound wiped blood from the cut on his forehead before it reached his eye. “I didn’t get a good look. I’d left Cal in the control room to go check out a smaller computer terminal room. I heard running and assumed it was you guys, but when I tried the radio, it was dead.”

  Matt moved to Hound and wiped the blood off. He drew a patch from his small medical kit and placed it on the cut. Hound hissed as the patch let out an antiseptic and then knit the cut together, binding it with glue.

  “What happened next?” Sven asked.

  Hound poked at the patch as if the extra pressure would make it feel better. “I shut down the computers and crept back out into the hall. I was on my way back to the repair bay when I got jumped by three Skinnies.”

  “Did you kill them?” Jeff asked.

  “Yes, but it was noisy. Others were coming, so I tried a detour. By the time I got around to the repair bay I saw our guys all gathered in a group, surrounded by at least twenty Skinnies. One of them called the leader Pelton.” Hound’s eyes moved to Wendy’s.

  She did her best to keep her face from twitching. The killer energy rose from her stomach and engulfed her mind, causing her fingers to constrict and her lips to press together tightly.

  “Does he know you’re here?” Jeff asked.

  “He knows there are more of us. He already sent the Skinnies out looking. I didn’t see a quick way to get the others out, so I came here.” He glanced at Matt who was carefully moving meds to the packs. “Did you find them?”

  Matt shook his head. “It’s not perfect, but Doc and I should be able to make what we need from this.”

  Hound looked at Jeff. “We need to get those meds out of here.”

  Jeff nodded. “Did you find the shield part?”

  “Dennis says we can’t get to the one they have installed, but their system says they have a backup here somewhere.”

  Jeff scratched his chin.

  Wendy took a series of steadying breaths. She focused on Matt as he wrapped the plastic case in his extra shirt and tucked the bundle into the center of his pack.

  “Do you have enough meds to split up?” Hound asked.

  “What are you thinking?” Jeff asked.

  “If we can separate the meds into two or three bundles, then we can divide up and try to get out.” He turned to Matt. “If we have enough.”

  Matt nodded. “There’s enough to give everyone a set.”

  “So we’re assumi
ng some of us aren’t going to make it?” Kev asked.

  Jeff answered. “It’s a good plan. We need to get these back to Shelter. Riggs would say the same thing.”

  “So we just leave the others?” Sven asked.

  Wendy digested the plan. Could she get away from her partner and go kill Pelton? It should be easy to lose the other person in the maze upstairs.

  Matt went on. “Without the shield, the meds won’t matter much.”

  “But without the meds, the shield won’t matter much,” Jeff said. “I don’t like it, but Riggs is smart, and can take care of himself and the others. If we want to help Shelter, then we need to get these meds to the transport.”

  “He’ll have guards outside,” Wendy said. “Someone is going to need to distract them.”

  Jeff turned to Hound. “Is there anything we can do with the computers?”

  “What did you have in mind?”

  “Turn on some of the security grid, if you can.”

  Hound grinned. “That would be distracting.”

  “We just need to buy time for at least two of us to get out.”

  “I can probably think of something, as long as they haven’t found the other computer room I was in.”

  Jeff took a moment to look around. “Sven, go with Hound. Take a set of the meds just in case things get really crazy. Kev is with me. Wendy, you’re in charge of getting Matt out.”

  Wendy’s mind had been going through just how she would kill Pelton, but the fantasy came to a screeching halt when Jeff spoke. “What?”

  “You and Matt can fight your way out if you need to. I’m betting on the two of you to get to the transport.”

  The blood lust in Wendy’s mind screamed at her to tell him no. She didn’t have time to get Matt out. She had to go and kill Pelton. If she killed him, maybe the voices in her head and the flashes in her mind would stop. Maybe she could release the monster on Pelton and then it would go away for good.

  “Can I trust you with that?” Jeff asked. His dark eyes studied hers, and the worry in them told Wendy that he knew exactly what she was thinking. He held her gaze as her mind raged.

  “Wendy?” he asked again. She could feel the others staring.

  She searched for the right words. The thing she should say. Her lips moved, and she said, “Yes.” The hollow voice barely sounded like her.