She glanced around the floor and grabbed a rifle. At the next break in the gunfire, she burst up from the floor, aimed it out the shattered front window.
She squeezed the trigger and let off a volley of shots. The mechanics had taken cover behind two pickup trucks in front of her, and she peppered the vehicles with bullets.
When she had finished unloading, she discarded the rifle, grabbed another, and moved for the rear of the van.
If I stay here much longer, they’ll kill me for sure.
She grabbed the door handle, opened the doors, and jumped out into the garage. As she did, a spray of gunfire hit the other side of the van.
In front of her, she saw that the cargo bay doors were closed. She was effectively trapped in the garage.
She ducked behind the vehicle next to her—a pickup truck—and hoped she could buy enough time until Sam returned.
Before Sam had time to think, he had already fired a bullet into the agent in front of him, striking the man in the leg. The man screamed out in pain.
The noise echoed into the corridor, and Sam dove forward through the door, taking the agent to the floor with him. The door clicked shut behind them.
He was now in a hallway filled with jail cells, and he heard the occupants screaming for help. Underneath him, the agent writhed and yelled, and he did his best to pin him down.
“Be quiet or I’ll shoot you again!” Sam warned, raising his rifle and pointing it at the man’s face.
The man reached for his pants, but Sam knocked his hands away with the muzzle of his rifle. When the man had stopped struggling, he patted him down and removed a pistol, then tucked it into his own waistband.
Sam stood, still aiming the weapon at the agent on the ground. The man’s face was contorted in agony, and his leg was spilling blood onto the floor.
“Who the fuck are you?” the man spat.
“Never mind. I need you to open these jail cells.”
“Why in the world would I do that?”
“Because if you don’t, I’ll put a hole in your other leg.”
The agent tried to stand, but collapsed in pain. He reached for his belt, and Sam noticed a ring of keys.
“Give me those,” he said.
The agent tossed them across the floor and Sam bent down to pick them up. When he had them in hand, he surveyed the room he was in.
Along the thin walkway were about ten jail cells, each containing several prisoners. Among them were men, women, and children; their faces were stained with dirt, their clothes ripped and disheveled. As he rifled through the keys, keeping an eye on the downed agent, the captives began to shout at him through the bars of their cells.
Sam felt a swell of anger. What had been done to these people, and what horrors had they seen since getting here?
“Which key unlocks them?” he barked at the agent.
He held up each of the keys until the man nodded. After finding the correct one, Sam unlocked the doors one at a time, working his way down the room.
“You’ll never get out of here alive!” the agent shouted at him.
Sam ignored him, instead ushering the prisoners out of their former cells. As they emerged, they ran toward the exit, tripping over each other as they tried to reach it.
“We don’t have much time!” he said to them. “Everybody line up by the door so we can get out of here.”
When Sam reached the last cell, he noticed a young girl inside. She looked to be about eleven years old. Her long, shoulder-length hair was matted and tangled, and her blue eyes were wet with tears.
“What’s your name?” Sam asked her.
“M-Margaret. Margaret Brown.”
“Come with me, Margaret. Everything’s going to be OK.”
He gave her a hug, and then watched her scramble toward the others.
When he was done gathering the prisoners—about twenty in total—Sam ordered the wounded agent into one of the cells and locked the door behind him.
“You can’t leave me here!” the man yelled, grasping his leg.
Sam stared at the prisoners, who were watching him intently. Then he turned back to the agent.
“Watch me,” he said.
Sam opened the door just enough to admit the tip of his gun. As he did, he heard shouts erupting from down the corridor. Several agents were running in the direction of the jail cells. When they saw Sam, they began to shoot.
He opened fire with his rifle, sending the agents tumbling to the floor, pistols skittering in front of them. When the corridor was clear, he motioned for the prisoners to follow him.
“Stay behind me, single file!” he shouted.
He made his way down the hall in a half-crouch, holding his rifle at the ready and keeping a sharp eye on the closed doors around them. The prisoners followed behind him, quiet except for their nervous breathing and the shuffle of feet.
Gunfire sounded from somewhere below them, and he began to worry about Delta. Had she been discovered, as well? A lump formed in his throat, and he swallowed it, continued.
A few doors down from the jail cells, he halted. He signaled for the people behind him to stay put, and then he hit the keypad. The door buzzed, and he whipped it open. Inside was a small lab with beakers, Bunsen burners, counters, and test tubes lining the counters. A few men in lab coats jumped as he entered, one of them dropping a vial onto the floor. The glass shattered. Surprisingly, the men pulled out pistols from beneath their outfits, aiming at Sam. He fired before they could get off a shot, spraying the room and equipment, and then ducked out of the doorway and back out into the hall.
He turned a corner, the prisoners back in tow, and made his way down the hallway with the elevator. As he did, he heard the familiar whir of the motor, and then someone barking orders from inside. He ran past the elevators and continued to the door with the stairs.
“Come on! Follow me!” he hissed at the people behind him.
The prisoners kept the pace, though a few had started to cry. Sam poked his head through the door, verifying that no one was on their way up the stairs, and then let his companions go ahead of him. Once the last one had made her way through, he heard the ding of the elevator, and he slipped into the stairwell and gently closed the door behind him.
Through the glass, he saw four agents running in the opposite direction.
Heart thundering, he motioned for the prisoners to start making their way down, running past them so that he could take the lead once again.
One of them—a young boy in his teens—stopped next to Sam.
“Can’t we have any weapons? We’re defenseless,” the boy said.
“Do you know how to shoot?”
The boy nodded.
Sam reached into his pants, handed him one of the pistols he had tucked there.
“Follow me to the front,” he said.
The boy took the gun and then clambered down the stairs behind him.
When they reached the ground level, Sam peered through the glass window looking out onto the first floor. Before he could assess the situation, he saw that an agent’s face was pressed against the other side of the glass. Sam cried out in surprise, jumping back several feet.
Without hesitating, he flung the door open, preparing for a fight, and was surprised to hear a gunshot from behind him. The agent doubled over and collapsed onto the floor. Sam swiveled and saw the boy lowering his pistol. The boy gave him a nervous smile.
Sam nodded, and then waved the prisoners out of the stairwell.
Once in the hall, he recognized the same doors he had passed on the way up. He ran to the head of the group, leading the way, and then stopped at a door about halfway down the corridor.
“Stay put,” he said.
Like the others, this door had a keypad, and Sam punched in the same series of numbers Hopper had given him previously. He kicked open the door, aimed his rifle inside. The room was empty, save for several rows of monitors and screens.
On them, Sam saw images flashing from various lo
cations—the infected wandering empty streets, buildings that were dilapidated and destroyed, and feeds from outside the desert compound.
Sam opened fire, spraying the room with bullets. Computers exploded, sending fragments of glass and debris throughout the room, and smoke billowed from the equipment. When he was satisfied, he slammed the door shut and beckoned for the prisoners to follow.
Down the next hallway, Sam recognized the door leading to the cargo area. From the other side, he could hear the unmistakable sound of gunfire. He reached into his pants, retrieved the other pistol he had stored there, and then whipped open the door.
The garage smelled like fire. Thick, black smoke hovered in the air, filling the cargo bay with the smell, and Sam noticed that one of the vehicles was aflame. After a frantic scan of the area, he located Delta behind a pickup truck. It appeared she was trading gunfire with one of the mechanics across the room.
Sam followed her gaze, finding the man behind a cargo van several cars ahead of the one she was hiding behind. He raised his rifle and fired off several shots in the man’s direction, then watched the man duck out of sight.
“Let’s go!” he shouted to the prisoners behind him.
All twenty of them poured into the garage, their footsteps echoing against the floor. In front of them, Delta had her pistol trained on the remaining mechanic’s location, and when he appeared several seconds later, she squeezed off a shot, sending him sprawling to the floor.
“We’ll need another ride!” she yelled to Sam.
He nodded. Aside from the van they had driven earlier, there were several other cargo vans parked next to the garage door. He ran to the first and whipped open the door. The key was still in the ignition. Encouraged, he checked the one next to it, and was surprised to find the same thing.
“In here!” he shouted, waving to the prisoners.
They began to pile into the two vehicles, with Sam and Delta coordinating the effort. Once they were inside, Sam heard a bang from across the garage.
The building’s entrance had burst open, revealing about ten of the agent soldiers.
“Let’s go!” he shouted to Delta.
The two jumped into the vehicles—Delta in one van and Sam in the other—and then started the engines and began to reverse toward the door. When they were a few feet away from the garage, it began to open, gliding up the track to reveal the desert beyond.
In the meantime, the agents had opened fire, bullets slamming into the side of the vans.
“Come on!” Sam shouted at the doors behind them.
He ducked low in the seat just as the windshield shattered, raining shards of glass and debris onto his lap. He transitioned his foot from the brake to the gas.
“Here!” someone yelled from behind him.
He turned in his seat. One of the female prisoners was holding something up for him. Apparently she had found it the back of the vehicle. He reached back to grab hold of the object, and then looked down to inspect it.
In his hands was a grenade.
Outside, the shooting continued. He waited for a lull in the gunfire, and when he heard one, he stuck his head out the window.
Sam pushed down the striker cap, pulled the pin, and lobbed the grenade across the garage. He then slammed his foot on the gas pedal, peeled out of the cargo bay, and careened out into the desert.
The explosion was deafening.
In the driver’s side mirror, he saw flames licking at the inside the garage, the vehicles enveloped in a wall of fire. In front of them Delta had taken the lead, and he fell in line behind her vehicle as she navigated the narrow road.
Sam kept his foot on the gas and his hands on the wheel, increasing the van’s speed until the compound was no more than a speck behind him.
For the first few miles, Sam let Delta lead the way. He kept his eyes glued to the rearview mirror, waiting for the agents to follow, but the desert roads had remained clear.
Was it possible they had actually escaped?
Overhead, the sky was a magnificent blue, the passing clouds doing little to inhibit the beams of the sun.
He let out a cautious smile. For the first time in days, he began to wonder if things were actually starting to turn around.
The prisoners had begun to chat in the backseat, their words starting at a low volume and then increasing in fervor as the van took them farther away from the compound. Surprisingly, they spoke mainly not of their time in captivity, but about their families, and the prospect of seeing them again.
Sam kept quiet, knowing that at the moment their hope might be the only thing getting them through.
After about half an hour of driving, he saw taillights on the van in front of him, and noticed that Delta was pulling off the road. She navigated around the back of a vacant building, and Sam followed suit. When they had stopped, he got out of the vehicle and began walking toward the other van.
Delta met him halfway. He noticed she had tears in her eyes.
Before Sam could speak, she threw her arms around him, embracing him in a tight squeeze.
“You did it,” she whispered.
“We both did.”
He held on to her for several minutes, two bodies swaying back and forth in the desert.
When Sam finally leaned back, he looked into her eyes. Gone was the fear he had seen for the last few days. In its place was a look of strength and hope.
She looked him up and down and smirked. “You look like shit.”
He laughed. “It must be the jacket. White’s not my color.”
“Do you think they’ll come after us?”
“I’m sure this is far from over,” he said. “But right now, at this moment, we’re safe. Let’s enjoy it while we can.”
She studied him for a minute, and he let his gaze drift to the horizon.
“They’d be proud of you, you know,” Delta said.
“Who?”
“Your wife and daughter.”
Sam wiped a tear from his eye and smiled. “You know what? I think you’re right.”
They walked back to the vans, where the prisoners had started to file out the back, taking in the warm rays of the desert sun. One of them—the one who had said her name was Margaret Brown—approached Sam.
“Mister, would you mind if we had something to eat? None of us have eaten in a few days.”
“Of course not. Let’s go see what we have. I’m sure you all must be starving.”
Sam studied her face for a minute. At some point he would have to tell her about her brother, but perhaps now wasn’t the time. She had been through enough already.
As he walked back to the van, he noticed the group staring at him, awaiting direction. Until now, he hadn’t gotten a good look at them; amid the chaos at the compound, he hadn’t had time. He was surprised to find that the prisoners were comprised of a mix of ages and sexes: several teenage boys and girls, a handful of middle-aged men and women in their thirties and forties, and an elderly couple.
Among them was the boy who had helped him earlier. He noticed the kid was still clutching the pistol in his hands.
“Hey,” Sam called over to him. “Can you help me with something?”
The kid nodded and moved to join him. The two began pulling out the boxes of food that had been stored in the back of the cargo van. Sam pulled his knife and tore open the red packages, sorting through a mixture of dried fruits, grains, water bottles, and cereal. After he had laid it all out in the back of the van, he placed a few of the empty boxes upside-down in the dirt.
He motioned to the elderly couple. “Here, have a seat.”
The two made their way over, giving him a cautious smile, and then took the water and food he had offered them. A few of the other prisoners trickled over beside them, taking seats on the remaining boxes or sitting in the dirt.
When everyone had been provided with food, Sam took a seat on the back of the van. Delta sat beside him. She handed him a box of cereal. He took it with a smile.
“W
here to now?” she asked him.
“We’ll have to discuss with the group once everything settles down a bit.”
“I mean after that. Suppose you could go anywhere you wanted, Sam. Where would it be?”
He shrugged. “I’ve always wanted to go out to the West Coast. I’ve heard California is nice.”
Delta grinned at him, shaking her head in disbelief.
“You mean you’ve never been there?” she asked.
“Nope.” He smiled back.
“And I thought I didn’t get out much.”
She punched him lightly on the leg, and Sam felt a surge of warmth pass over him.
Just a few short days ago, Sam had been content with working in his White Mist store, surrounded by memories of his family; content to live out the rest of his days in solitude until he could join them again.
Because of what had happened to him, he had learned that there were no certainties, no absolutes. In the blink of an eye, everything could be taken away.
But now, sitting here with Delta, he could sense that a new future was waiting.
And for the first time in two years, Sam was looking forward to it.
AFTERWORD
Hello!
If you’re reading this, I’ll assume that you have finished reading the Contamination boxed set. If so, I’d like to take a moment to thank you for your interest and support. Each of these books has been a pleasure to write, and I hope you have enjoyed reading them as much as I have enjoyed writing them.
Although the main story arc has been concluded, there is still more story to be told. Contamination 4: Escape, due out Fall 2013, will pick up where we left off with Dan and Quinn in the salvage yard of St. Matthews.
For a preview of that book, simply flip the page!
Again, please accept my eternal thanks for reading this far. I have a lot of other stories planned (both zombie-related and otherwise), and hopefully we will meet again at some point in the future!
If you would like me to keep you posted on what I’m working on, please sign up for my mailing list at: http://eepurl.com/qy_SH and I’ll be sure and let you know when something new comes out.
Contamination (Books 0-3) Page 39