“I agree,” Mason admitted. “I lack any knowledge of what could cause this.”
Randall seemed smug and Joe felt like punching him.
“But so would any other person in my field,” Mason added. “This defies explanation. I don’t know of any virus or biological condition that would present in this way. Even rabies would not present on such a wide scale.”
Bill sighed heavily. “I think what caused this is irrelevant now. What we need to think about is how to defend ourselves. What do we know about this thing, so far?”
The group thought for a few moments. Then Victor said, “We know that they’re after us. Those wee monkeys downstairs were single-minded in taking chunks out of my ass. Nay else mattered to them. Like they were possessed or something.”
“Yes,” said Mason. “It’s quite clear from what we are seeing in this very room that the animal’s instincts are being entirely over-ridden by the desire to attack us; even at the expense of their own well-being. Whether or not they are ‘possessed’ is a different conversation however. What else do we know?”
“They’re working together,” said Randall. “I saw them from the window in the seminar room. They were moving in groups, searching for people. Even animals that would usually attack each other like wolves and those brown, spotty cats were working together.”
Mason rubbed both hands against his pale face. “Lynx. The zoo has eight Canadian Lynxes. They would have been the cats you saw. That is…most disturbing. It appears that all the laws of nature no longer exist. The animal kingdom has lost its natural instincts and replaced them with one prime directive: extinguish all human life. We are now at the bottom of the food chain, hunted by all other species.”
“Not quite.” Bill was standing over by the cages. “Look.”
Joe and the others moved closer to the cages and saw what Bill was pointing at.
Mason leaned forward and examined closer. “The birds!”
Joe nodded. “The birds aren’t affected.”
The two plump, brightly-coloured specimens were extremely agitated, but it was clear that they were not suffering from the same malady as the other animals. They were just normal, frightened animals.
Victor spoke up. “So, whatever’s happening isn’t affecting the birds? Grand! That makes my day a whole lot better.”
“Sarcasm aside,” said Mason, “this bodes well for us. If this phenomena had affected avian species then we would surely have been doomed. There are hundreds of thousands of birds in the UK alone and there would be no way to defend against them. This is very good news.”
Joe agreed. He didn’t like the thought of being in a real life version of The Birds. “I wonder if any other species are unaffected?”
“I suppose time will tell,” said Mason. “For now, we should close this room off. Just in case the animals get free.”
“Fuck that,” Victor said. “Let’s euthanize the bastards.”
“We will do no such thing! Many of these animals are endangered species.”
“So what! They’ve gone feral.”
“I will not allow it!”
Victor pushed Mason aside and pulled out Martha, shocking those that had not yet seen her.
“Victor!” Randall was speaking.
Victor turned around. “What?”
Randall went and placed a hand on the man’s shoulder. “We are all going to have to work together now, so if our good friend, Mason, wants to leave these animals…intact, then I believe it would be best to do so. In the interest of cooperation. We should not be brandishing knives.”
That’s weird, Joe thought. Maybe Randall’s not a complete asshole after all.
Victor’s face scrunched up as he scrutinised the suggestion. “If these things spring loose,” he said, “you’ll wish different.”
“Perhaps,” said Randall, “but for now the animals here seem secure enough not to concern us, despite their racket. Put the knife away, my friend.”
After a hesitation of several seconds, Victor finally returned Martha to her hidden sheath behind his back. He glared at Mason. “These things get free it’ll be on your head.”
Mason nodded and Victor stomped away, joined by everyone else, except Joe who waited behind. “We should go too,” he said to Mason, eying up the creatures rampaging inside their cages. “Maybe they’ll calm down if they can’t see us.”
“I hope so. They only started acting up once I entered the room. They were silent prior to that.” Mason clicked his fingers. “I almost forgot again. I need to get you a first aid kit.”
Joe laughed. “My arm will be hanging off by the time I get a bandage.”
Mason allowed himself to smile and walked across the room towards the far wall. Sitting atop a filing cabinet was a bright green box. Mason reached out for it.
Then recoiled in pain.
Joe rushed towards him. “What is it? What happened?”
Mason was clutching his hand. “Something bit me!”
Joe skidded to a halt on the floor tiles. “Shit! What was it? What bit you?”
Mason’s hand had started to bleed from two round puncture wounds. Red globules dripped onto the ground. “I don’t know. Be careful.”
Being careful was not advice Joe needed. He trod carefully towards the filing cabinet, ready to bolt at the first sign of danger. As he got closer, he could make out a delicate scratching sound from behind the green-boxed first aid kit. Something was definitely there.
He looked around for a weapon – something that would put some distance between him and whatever hidden creature had bitten Mason.
“Over there.” Mason pointed. “There’s a set of steel tongs for holding hot materials.”
Joe saw the implement and grabbed it off the nearby table. The long metal rod felt good in his hands, empowering him enough that some of his nerves faded away. He crept towards the filing cabinet. Positive that the scratching sound was becoming louder.
“What should I do?”
Mason came up beside Joe, still clutching his wounded hand against his chest. “I don’t know. Just be ready. Whatever it is was small and quick. You may only get one chance.”
“What happened to your views about euthanasia?”
“The bugger bit me.”
“Fair enough.” Joe prepared to attack. He held out the tongs in front of him and aimed them towards the first aid kit. “Ready?”
Mason nodded. “Ready.”
Joe prodded the first aid kit and knocked it onto the floor. There, amongst a stack of papers and a pencil pot, was a snarling brown rat, the size of an over-fed housecat.
Joe swung for the bleachers.
“Damn it!” The rodent leapt towards Joe, claws outstretched and ready to draw blood. Joe spun and managed to sidestep. Mason ran in the other direction. Joe readied himself for another swing. “A bloody rat? Seriously?”
“They were going to add them to the petting zoo,” said Mason. “They had one up here to assess its temperament.”
Joe swung the metal tongs again. Missed. Struck the hard tile of the floor and sent a tingling from his wrist to his elbow. “I think its temperament is bad.”
The bulbous rat lunged again at Joe and this time managed to get a bite-hold on his lower leg, thick incisors burying deep into the fatty flesh of his calf. He hollered in pain, poked at it with the tongs, tried to grip and twist the animal’s fat body away from him. “Jesus, this thing won’t give in.” Joe felt knife-like fangs burrowing into his skin deeper, scraping against bone. He screamed louder.
Mason rushed forward and tried to kick the rat away. But the man’s lack of athletic prowess was evident, and he missed completely, stumbling onto his knees in a tangle of his own cumbersome limbs.
With the thrashing creature continuing to take chunks out of his calf, Joe looked for an urgent solution. If he ripped it off it would take away his flesh in the process; he needed to make it let go. Attached to one of the desks was a gas valve that led to a Bunson Burner. He hobbled o
ver to it, trying to stay focused despite the pain rushing up his white-hot calf muscle.
The burner turned on easily enough. Joe’s memories of high school physics helping him through. The flame licked about two-inches into the air until he turned the inlet valve and sent it another inch higher. Without hesitation, Joe pushed the tongs into the flame, heating the tips. The rat continued to rip and tear at his flesh, but he had to hold on a little longer. If this was going to work, he needed to wait.
The acrid smell of burning dust filled the air and the tongs began to turn red.
Then orange
Then white.
Joe waited a few seconds more until he could take the dizzying pain no longer. He pulled the tongs away and carefully lined up the molten pincers on either side of the rat’s thrashing head.
He clamped the tongs shut.
The animal immediately released its grip on Joe’s leg and screeched, the pitch so hellish that it hurt his ears. The noise sharpened as the tongs tightened, squeezing and melting the animal’s face and head. Eventually, the rat’s squeals weakened into breathless whimpers, finally fading away to silence. The furry body went limp and Joe pulled open the tongs, letting it fall to the floor.
“It’s dead,” said Mason.
Joe was panting and struggled to get his words out as his vision dimmed. “One crispy fried mother-fucker. Now…can I please…get that first aid kit?”
Joe’s vision spiralled into darkness as a switch went off in his head. His vacant body collapsed onto the floor, spilling fresh blood onto the tiles.
Chapter Ten
“It’s time to start planning, my friends.” Randall had perched himself down on the edge of a desk as he addressed those present in the room. “It took me a little time, I’ll admit it now, but I’ve finally come to understand the situation we are in. It will take organisation and planning to survive. We all need to be moving in the same direction. Writing on the same page.”
“What do you suggest?” asked the man he thought of as ‘Cosby.’
“That we act now rather than later. We need to find food, blankets, water. The building needs to be secured – at least our part of it. A strategy has to be in place if we are to get through this together.”
“Where do we start?” The brunette girl, Grace, asked him. She was young and attractive, if a little plain. Randall noticed that her fingernails were chipped and thought it made her look cheap. That and the many faint scars that lined her arms.
One of those self-harming wackos by the looks of things. Goddamn nutcases.
“In order of priority, my dear,” he answered her. “We need to secure this floor as much as possible, windows as well as doors. Then we need to find food and water. Once we’ve got those we can concentrate on settling in and working out where everyone is going to sleep. I think we should split into two teams.” Everyone seemed to be in agreement, so he continued. “Victor, you take Bill and Shirley. I’ll take Grace and Mr. Mason. That is, whenever he returns from whatever it is that he’s doing.”
“What about Joe?” Grace asked.
Randall thought about it for a moment. “I was assuming that he could actually look after his son for once. I know he seems to prefer that you look after him, my dear, but right now the group needs you.”
Grace looked down at the little boy, asleep in her arms. “I’ll just look after him until his dad gets back.”
“Where is he anyway?” Victor asked.
“He stayed behind in the lab with Mason,” said Bill. “I think they’re bandaging his wounds up.”
Randall sighed. “Let’s hope he hurries up and makes some use of himself.”
Bill tutted. “I think Joe has shown himself to be more than useful on a number of occasions.”
Victor sniggered. “Sounds like you wanna butt fuck the guy? Big dumb blonds your type?”
“Screw you!”
“You wish, gayboy.”
Randall put a stop to things before they could go any further. Childishness was anti-beneficial right now. “Gentlemen, please remember that you will be working together. Try to behave like adults.”
Victor put his hands up, a wide grin upon his broad, cat-like face. “I’m just fooling around. He knows I don’t mean it.”
“Yeah right,” said Bill.
Randall waved a hand dismissively. “Okay, you two take Shirley and begin checking for any areas that need securing. It wouldn’t hurt to seek out weapons too. See what you can find.”
Victor nodded and took off immediately. After a short while, Shirley and Bill followed after him. That left Randall and Grace alone.
Along with the brat, of course. Where the hell has his deadbeat father gotten to anyway, for heaven’s sake? Maybe those animals have escaped their cages and torn him apart. One can only hope...
Randall scolded himself for such an ill-natured thought. Such a harsh attitude was not the way to proceed in the current situation. A certain amount of tact would be needed. He sat down next to Grace and smiled. “I guess we should get started then, sweetheart?”
Grace frowned at him and Randall made a mental note: She doesn’t like ‘sweetheart’. Don’t use it again. He smiled. “I thought we could check each room for a water cooler. Office buildings always have them, do you agree?”
Grace nodded. “Okay. Should I bring Danny with us or find Joe first?”
Randall thought about it. Guess it couldn’t hurt to come across as child-friendly. “Yes,” he said. “We can take the little chap along. Perhaps we’ll bump into his father along the way.”
Grace seemed confused. “Your attitude has changed.”
“I think the stress of this situation affected me worse than I first realised. I’m prone to making harsh judgements. A defence mechanism, I guess.”
Grace’s demeanour softened. She nodded. “Okay. Let’s get going then.”
“Great!” Randall stood up and offered a hand. “Wake the young man and we’ll make a start.”
Grace rubbed Danny’s shoulders above his Undertaker backpack. “Time to wake up, honey.”
The boy stirred slowly. Too slowly, and Randall became impatient. “Come on now, lad. We’re going to go and find your father.”
The boy opened his eyes and looked around in a daze. “Where’s Dad?”
“We’re going to find him now,” Grace answered.
The boy nodded and finally woke up fully. Randall forced himself to smile. “That’s a good lad. You hold on to Grace’s hand now, you hear?”
The three of them headed for the door and stepped out into the corridor. Randall couldn’t be certain, but he thought he could still hear the riotous shrieking of the monkeys downstairs. Not to mention the rattling cages in the lab ahead. He wondered if Joe and Mason were still in there.
“We should check the lab,” said Grace, obviously wondering the same thing. “They’re probably still in there.”
Randall nodded. He put a hand out in front of Grace and the boy to stop them. “I’ll go, but you stay here, just in case there’s any danger.”
The boy whimpered and Grace stroked his head. “Daddy is okay, honey. We just need to check that there’s nothing a little boy like you shouldn’t see.”
“I’m not little. I’m big and strong like the British Bulldog.”
Randall didn’t have time for this. “Wait here. I’ll be right back.”
He padded along the blue carpet and headed for the door. When he got there, Randall placed a hand around the long silver handle. Thoughts filled his mind about what he might find inside. His earlier notion of the animals escaping their cages now seemed quite plausible. The image of Joe and Mason ripped to shreds and lying in a pool of their own blood filled his mind, and he almost turned back. But he had to do this or else he’d lose face in front of the girl. Slowly, Randall pushed down the handle.
When the door opened, the hinges squeaked. Randall hoped it wouldn’t alert anything dangerous to his presence. There was chaos inside the room. Randall immediately sa
w trails of blood – and what seemed to be a dead rat. Amongst it all was Mason, kneeling over the body of Joe.
Is he dead? What the hell happened in here?
Randall was just about to burst into the room and offer his help, but reconsidered. Instead he closed the door quietly and turned back into the corridor. There, Grace waited for him, expectantly.
“Well?” she asked him.
Randall shook his head. “No one in there. They must have gone somewhere else.”
Grace bit at her lower lip nervously. The gesture spoke of vulnerability and made her more attractive. “Why would they do that?”
Randall shrugged. “I guess we’ll know when we find them.”
Grace still seemed unsettled. “Okay. We should probably keep on then.”
“Yes,” said Randall. “Let’s go see what else we can find.”
Chapter Eleven
The pinprick of light gradually widened until Joe’s vision fully returned. He found himself staring at the ceiling. His head throbbed like a drum beat, but the worst pain was in his leg. It felt like it was being held over a flame.
“Are you okay?” asked a voice from somewhere in the room.
Joe didn’t reply for a few moments, and at first didn’t even know who the other person was. Then, as he continued staring at the blank white ceiling and listening to the chaotic sound of rattling cages in the room, everything came flooding back.
He tried to sit up, but Mason held him down. “Wait a few minutes. Catch your breath.”
Joe complied, but was still panicking on the inside. “The animals, they’ve gone mad. I need to find Danny.”
Mason shushed him. “Danny is fine. He’s with Grace. You’ve been out for almost ten minutes.”
Joe remembered passing out because of the pain. “My leg?”
“I think you’ll be okay. You’ve got a pretty deep gash, but I stopped the bleeding. I bandaged it while you were out. Your arm too.”
Joe examined himself and allowed himself a small laugh at the absurdity of what he looked like. A mummy in training. “I feel like a train hit me.”
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