by RWK Clark
When the man turned to her she saw nothing but madness in his eyes. He looked at her, but it was obvious he didn’t see her or hear her at all. He quickly jerked his arm away from her and began running once more. Right then she saw the nurse at the station slam the phone down, and she sped over to the woman.
“What’s happening, nurse? Where is Kyle Hilliard?”
The nurse’s face was wet with tears, and she had a panicky look in her eyes. “He took the Casperson girl’s sister to a safe room.”
“What?” Diana asked. “What do you mean, a ‘safe room’?”
“The sick Casperson girl… she attacked her mother,” the woman stammered. “The mother had undone her restraints, and the girl suddenly… attacked her! The sister, the older one, she came running out, and they were chasing her, both of them! He took her away to keep her safe!”
The woman broke down in sobs, but Moss paid her no mind. Everyone on the floor was out of their minds, and from what she had just learned she knew that she had no time to waste trying to comfort the hysterical nurse. She darted in the direction of the elevators once again, but just as she reached them the nurse in the corner went crazy, kicking and clawing, and when Moss turned in the direction of the commotion she saw the woman had a bloody grip on another attendant with her teeth.
“Oh, my,” Moss muttered.
The elevator came open and she rushed inside, followed immediately by three more nurses and a janitor, all of whom were trying to escape the madness on the fifth floor. It was right then she also saw Julie Yates, the nurse who had checked the Casperson girl in. She was loping toward the elevator, spit stringing from her mouth, her skin yellowed and papery. Flesh was ripped away from one side of her face, and she was emitting a grunting scream unlike anything Diana had ever heard.
“No!” the janitor yelled. “Shut the door! Shut the door now!”
He reached out and began to punch the button to close the elevator door over and over. It began to finally close in slow motion, with Yates getting closer and closer. It finally closed just as the woman lurched for it, sealing at the very last second.
It seemed that everyone in the elevator began to sob in relief all at once. Diana Moss was panting, and her heart was pounding violently against her rib cage. All heck had broken loose at Suburban Medical Center.
She suddenly reached out and hit the emergency stop button. The elevator gave a violent jolt before screeching to a stop. All of the passengers began to scream at Diana.
She calmly held up her hands. “If we are in here, we are safe! I need you all to calm down, now!”
She was forced to repeat her statements another time before they all began to be still once more. “Listen: I know we have a major issue going on, and a terribly dangerous one at that.” Dr. Moss made it a point to make eye contact with everyone on the elevator as she spoke. “I think I know what the problem is, what has caused this… this outbreak. But I must know if any of you know where Dr. Kyle Hilliard is. He took the older Casperson sister off the floor for her safety.”
“I do!”
It was the janitor, a man with ‘Reese’ on his identification badge.
“I’m Harold, doctor, Harold Reese” he replied. “When everything started to go crazy Dr. Hilliard came up to me and asked me where my work quarters was located. He asked me if there was a lock on my office, and when I told him yes he left with the little girl in his arms. A little blond girl, right?”
“Yes, Harold said. A little blond girl.”
“Where did you tell them to go?”
He smiled slightly, but his eyes were still wild with fear. “Why, to my office, of course. It’s in the basement, on the opposite side of the floor from the lab, where the boilers are. The entire maintenance area can be locked. It is where to go in case of a shooting or anything.”
Diana took a deep breath and smiled back at him. She punched the button, and after a violent jerk the elevator started up once again. Diana pressed the ‘B’, and they were off.
“That is where we are going, then,” she said. “It will be the safest place for all of us. Is there a phone in your office, Harold?”
“Of course there is.”
“Then it’s decided,” Diana concluded.
∞
The fifth floor intensive care unit at Suburban was in far worse shape than either Dr. Hilliard or Dr. Moss even comprehended.
For one thing, many more people had been bitten and attacked than just Michelle Casperson, Julie Yates, and the nurse in the corner. Something of a chain reaction had been set off as soon as little Melanie Casperson’s mother had set her free of her restraints, and now, each and every patient on the floor was looking an awful lot like the rats looked at Aspen, and if Randy Carstens had been present he would vouch for that fact.
Kyle Hilliard had, indeed, taken Megan to the maintenance area. He had put her in Harold Reese’s office, fished a can of soda out of his mini-refrigerator for the child, and then locked her safely inside. Next, he had called the hospital administrator from a corridor phone and told him what was happening. The entire hospital was being put on lockdown just when Diana Moss was pressing the elevator button to the basement. The administrator then locked himself in his office and proceeded to call police, who were telling him of the situations breaking out all over the state of Colorado.
It was nothing short of a catastrophe.
∞
Now, Kyle was back in Reese’s office with little Megan. She was curled up in the corner, covered with Hilliard’s doctor coat and sipping pop. He was sitting in Reese’s chair trying to figure out what to do next. Where had Dr. Moss disappeared to? He could only assume that one of the monsters had managed to get its hands on her somehow, which told him they had spread even further than he initially believed.
Suddenly he could hear a key being inserted into the office door.
Hilliard jumped up from where he sat and practically threw his body into a protective shield in front of Megan Casperson, who had begun to cringe immediately with fear. The knob turned and the door opened, and the head janitor Harold Reese and Dr. Diane Moss nearly tumbled into the door. They were followed by a small group of emotional nurses, patients, and other hospital staff.
Hilliard nearly collapsed. “Dr. Moss, Finally! I’ve been looking for you! The fifth floor is completely out of control, and I have no idea what the heck could be going on in the rest of the facility!”
“It’s on complete lockdown,” she gasped as she made her way, in surprise, to Dr. Hilliard and her patient, Megan. “I’ve only gotten bits and pieces. I’ve been to the fifth floor; what can you fill me in on, Doctor?”
Kyle turned himself over, his motions slow and exhausted. As he pushed himself against the wall for support he began, “I was talking to a nurse at the desk on five. The alarm started to go off in Melanie Casperson’s room, signifying that her restraints had been compromised. Just as I prepared to run to the room Megan here came out, and she wasn’t moving too slowly. Michelle had loosened Melanie’s restraints, and the girl had attacked her. Megan barely made it out. After that, everything went sort of haywire.”
Diana sat cross-legged on the floor by both of them while Harold locked the office up tightly. He then picked up the receiver of the phone on his desk and began to punch out numbers while they continued to talk. She wanted to know everything she had missed during her trip to purchase the Lumiosa pen and while taking it to the lab.
“I got one of the pen’s at the pharmacy, just like you said,” she told Megan. “When I got back here I took it to the lab to a man named Roy.” She glanced at Kyle. “You know, Roy Fitch. He did some tests, and he said that the ink is likely the problem. It destroys all cells it comes into contact with while simultaneously… mutating them and keeping them alive, but they become volatile.”
“Are you serious?” Kyle asked her.
Diana could do nothing but nod. She paused for a long moment, then continued. “I tried to contact Aspen to initiate a compla
int for recall, but the entire factory has been shut down and quarantined, and there is some kind of… outbreak, in the town where the company is located in: Monte Vista.”
“So, what now?”
“Well,” Diana said as she shot a brief look at Megan, than back to Kyle.
Wasting no time, Kyle rose to his feet and walked over to Harold Reese, who was just hanging up the phone. “Was that administration?”
The older man looked at him with tired eyes and nodded his head.
“Well, what did they say?”
Without changing his expression at all the janitor said, “It was the administrator’s secretary. The entire hospital is on red alert lockdown. Everyone is to stay where they are until they are notified otherwise, and if possible, we are to remain under lock and key.”
“I can’t believe this is happening!” Kyle Hilliard felt as if he were losing his mind. He looked at Diana, but her eyes were empty of the answers. They were all tired, hungry, and scared. They all needed some time to think about the situation they were in.
“Well,” he said, turning to Harold, “what do you think?”
Harold released a ragged breath and sat on top of a box marked ‘Bleach’. “I’m not sure what the heck to think, to be honest with you.” He looked at Diana Moss. “How about you?”
“I think we need to stay right where we are for now,” she replied.
The room fell silent except for the sobs coming from a few of the nurses. Even Megan Casperson was doing better than they were. She sat in the corner, wide-eyed, clinging to her soda can with one hand and stroking Hilliard’s doctor coat with the other.
After a moment the young girl spoke up. “What about my mom?”
All eyes went to her immediately. Hilliard’s mouth opened slightly as if to respond, but he remained still, obviously at a bit of a loss for words. Instead, Diana, who had been the girl’s pediatrician since birth, reached out and took Megan’s free hand. As she stroked it with her thumb she offered up a slight smile.
“She is upstairs, Megan, and she is pretty sick too, just like Melanie.”
Megan nodded. She put the can on the floor and pulled the doctor coat over her head. It was a reply that everyone in the room understood clearly. One of the nurses broke out into a fresh batch of tears.
It looked like it was going to be a long stay for the group in the basement at Suburban.
CHAPTER 15
The police station was in a state of madness, or at least that was how it seemed to Randy. He sat in a chair watching people rush to and fro like they were mad. People had been pouring in, attempting to get information on what had taken place at Aspen, and the phones were ringing off their hooks, but the police were trying to keep it tight-lipped. They didn’t want to breed panic, but someone on the inside had obviously already ran their mouth, and word of the horrible incident was spreading like wildfire.
The incident at Aspen Stationers’ had managed to take the lives of both Roger McGinley and Officer Gibbons, but it was apparent that the situation was not confined to Monte Vista. Just since he had been sitting there his smart phone had alerted him to another outbreak incident in the town of Thornton, and from the way it sounded things there were looking mighty bleak. People were actually holing up for safety in the local high school! Randy’s blood was running cold, and his mind would not stop its thinking and wondering; how many people all over were actually being affected.
Randy knew that as far as Monte Vista went, the only known infected beings were the rats, and they were caged up. All of them but the one cage that fell. He remembered that three of them attacked Roger McGinley, but only one was there when they re-entered the lab, and that one had eventually been shot to death. He had made the police aware of that fact, but it didn’t make a difference. Aspen and all of the property that was part of the company were shut down immediately and quarantined until such a time as things could be figured out and the problem solved.
But Randy knew that wouldn’t matter to an infected rat.
The doors to the station flew open once again and a woman came in screaming. She was one of many who appeared to be panicking, or at least that was how it seemed initially. Randy stared at her; most of his view was obstructed by the massive desk which sat directly in front of the main entrance, so all he could see was her face. She was crying, and he could make out the words ‘help me’ when she spoke, but that was all.
He stood and made his way closer to the main desk.
“All I want is for someone to look at him,” she was sobbing. “I just want to know if he is infected with this… this thing! I know something is going on; everybody knows!”
The officer at the desk was trying to calm her with soothing words, but she was having no part of it.
“Listen to me!” she continued, her eyes becoming wilder. “He was fine! He was just playing, and then that animal bit him, and it’s like he passed right out! He’s cold! Someone just look at him, please! He’s out in the car!”
That managed to really get Randy’s attention. He walked straight up to the desk and began to talk to her without even thinking about whether or not he should. He wanted to know the details right away.
“Excuse me, ma’am,” he said as he touched her arm. “What bit him?”
She turned to him immediately, a look of relief coming over her face. “Finally, someone is going to listen! I don’t know what it was. It came into our yard where my Timmy was playing; I saw it coming toward him up the sidewalk. I thought it was a small cat or something.”
She took Randy by the arm and began to lead him to the main entrance. “Just look at him, please! The thing bit him, and he passed out almost right away, then it began to… to… try and eat him!”
Randy followed her, but he already knew; it was the rat he was just wondering about that had bitten this boy. Behind him he could hear the officer at the desk yelling at him to come back, an officer would handle it, but Randy ignored the man and went out the door with the woman.
She continued to talk as they walked, her words pouring out of her mouth at high speed. I just ran outside and tried to shoo it off, but it tried to come at me, so I picked up a large rock and smashed it! I smashed it and grabbed my boy and put him in the car.”
They were nearing a blue car. At first the car looked empty and peaceful. When they got about ten feet from it a small, blond-haired boy sat straight up and began to pound on the glass of the window. He had what looked to be red, bloody bite marks on his forearms and face, and his eyes were insane. He immediately began to scream and growl at them both.
“Timmy?” The woman jumped back, startled at first, then completely overcome with fear. “Timmy?”
Randy reached out and grabbed her by the upper arm, pulling her backward. “You can’t go near it,” he said. “Yes, he is sick. He has the sickness.”
She looked at him with wide-eyed dismay. “No! How do you know?”
“Is the car locked?”
She nodded. “And the window lock is on, as well as the child safety locks.”
“We have to keep him in there,” he told her. “We need to get an officer right now.”
He still had a firm grip on her arm. “I can’t leave him! He needs me!”
She tried to put up a fight, but Randy wasn’t about to let go of her. “You don’t understand! He is not himself, and he will hurt you! Didn’t you say you heard about the sick man at Aspen?”
“Yes, but…”
Randy stopped and looked her dead in the eye, his face stony and serious. “We have to get a cop, okay? I know it is your son; I have kids too. But he is sick, and it is very dangerous, okay?”
After a second she nodded mutely, looking as if she was dazed and very confused. Randy began to walk back into the police station briskly, pulling her along behind him. She stumbled over her own feet as she tried to keep up.
Back in the station there was still a small group of people around the main desk, all of them trying to talk to the officer seated t
here. In their efforts each of their voices fought for power, and the result was nothing short of chaotic. Randy cut through the crowd, keeping a firm grip on the woman the entire time.
“Officer,” he said, leaning down into the cop’s face. “This woman, the one with the boy…” he turned to her briefly.
She understood immediately, and said, “Linda Abbott.”
“This is Linda Abbott,” Randy continued. “She is the one with the boy who got bit. He is in the car, and officer, he is very sick.”
Randy was trying his best to keep his voice down but still audible, but that was much easier to do in theory. “What?” the cop asked as he turned his ear to Randy.
At that point Randy’s frustration was bordering on explosive. He grabbed the officer by the shoulders and practically pressed his lips against the guy’s ear. “Her boy is very, very sick! He has been infected!”
The cop looked at him, all of the color draining from his face. He may not have been one of the cops on scene at the Aspen Company, but word had already gotten around the entire department about Gibbons and the rats, and it came from the captain himself. He believed his boss.
The man wasted no more time. Instead, he jumped up from his seat at the desk and grabbed another officer. “What vehicle is it?” he asked Randy as the four of them headed for the door.
“It’s a blue car parked on the curb out front,” he replied. “It is locked, and the child safety locks are engaged, his mother said.
Linda Abbott followed numbly behind them, and the group that had been at the desk began to follow as well. They got halfway down the main walk when the desk officer, whose chest tag read ‘D. Mason’, stopped and held up his hands. “Listen folks, I’m going to have to ask you to return to the station. This is nothing more than a professional police matter, and has nothing to do with your own inquiries. Please re-enter the building; another officer will be with you shortly.”
The crowd began to mumble and complain, but they all started back for the building. Right then Randy saw three more cops coming from the side of the building, and they were headed in their direction. Officer Mason didn’t take notice; he simply started for the blue car once more, the other cop close by his side.