“Something escaped,” he said.
Emma nodded, her mouth was dry. She’d heard rumours about Level-C and things that she didn’t want to believe could be true. But the open cage, the trail of blood and bodies that they had passed to reach it, all suggested that they were.
“What were they doing down here?” Billing said.
“Experiments,” Emma said.
He turned to look at her and then quickly went back to looking at the cage. She wondered if he now thought she was in on it too. How much had Miller known and why had he been prepared to come down here despite it?
“There were rumours,” she said.
He nodded without turning around. She didn’t want to know what he was thinking. “What sort of rumours?”
“You know about Dale?” she said.
“Sure,” he said. Because everyone knew about Dale. For weeks it was all anyone in the compound had been talking about, even if they hadn’t known about it before. He had been the key to a cure, or if not a cure then a vaccination that would make it a lot easier to fight the undead. He’d been a soldier, but he hadn’t been prepared to do his duty, and now he was dead, and so was their hope of defeating the zombies.
“I heard they weren’t just looking for a cure,” she said.
He turned around again and frowned at her. She was uncomfortably aware of how exposed they were down there. Zombies couldn’t see particularly well, but they could hear. They might be listening to her now and getting closer with every word that she said.
“They were doing experiments,” she said. “Taking the best bits of the zombies—”
“Like what?” he said.
She shrugged. “I don’t know, like how they can’t be killed unless you destroy the head.”
“Fine.”
“They were trying to build soldiers,” she said. “At least, that’s what I heard.”
“So what happened?” he said. “One of them escaped, and now there’s some kind of super zombie soldier running around down here?”
“Maybe.”
She thought about the bodies that they had climbed over to get to the cage. The blood. There was something down there with them, and the open cage suggested that, whatever it was, it was big.
“What are we going to do?” Billing said.
Emma looked around. An unfamiliar part of her felt like jumping Billing and fucking him until whatever was down there found them and killed them both. But she shook that thought away.
“We need to get out of here,” she said.
“Leave?” Billing said. He turned around now so that he was facing her dead on.
“Whatever this thing is,” she said. “Its already killed a few hundred people. People who were trained and prepared to deal with it. We don’t have a clue. If we go back, we can get help.”
Billing shook his head. “No one else is coming.”
“Well, we can’t kill it by ourselves.”
“Why not?” he said.
The question hung in the air like a bad smell. She knew the answer, but she couldn’t explain it, it was a feeling rather than a rational explanation, but she knew that if they stayed down there, then they would be killed.
“We’re soldiers,” he said. “We were trained for this.”
“Not for this,” she said.
“Fine, not for this specific situation, but something like it. These people…” he waved his arms around to indicate the bodies on the ground. “They weren’t soldiers. You know Miller was a builder before all of this started?”
It made her feel a little better to think that they had kept the real soldiers above ground, where they would be able to do their jobs and protect the base. If they hadn’t wanted to risk the lives of the trained killers by having them protect their experiments then maybe they did value the lives of the people who lived in the compound.
“If we don’t find it and kill it,” Billing said. “Then you know it’s going to get out.”
Emma listened to him and fought the urge to lean forward and kiss him. She knew it was just the excitement of combat, the increased adrenalin and awareness.
“We have to stop it getting out and killing anyone else,” Billing said.
“Okay,” she said.
She hadn’t really needed much convincing. If he had ordered her to do it then she would, even without the (admittedly very reasonable) explanation for why they needed to. She was a soldier above all other things, and that meant that she was prepared to do her job.
“Fine,” she said.
He smiled, and she turned away, it was the only way to prevent herself doing something they would both regret. If they were going to fuck, she didn’t want it to be on the bloody floor with the corpse of their former friend just a few metres away.
* * * * *
Billing led the way and Emma followed. They both had their guns raised, looking around and covering themselves as completely as they could. They walked slowly and as quietly as they could, but every movement made a noise and, if there really was a super soldier zombie down there, then she was afraid that it would be able to tell they were coming just by the sound of their hearts beating.
It didn’t occur to her to wonder why the army might want to build a super zombie soldier. She had been in plenty of combat situations and had learned that the best thing to do was to shut off the inquisitive part of her mind that thought about such things. It was difficult to follow orders when you were questioning and asking ‘why’ all the time.
They followed the trail of dead bodies that led away from the cage. There were more of them here, and she frequently found it impossible to walk on the floor. Instead, she had to stand on moldering bodies and, once, in the cavity of someone’s chest. She was glad that none of them moved.
Billing stopped at the end of the next corridor, and she stopped behind him. They stood back to back so that she could continue to cover them both.
“What is it?” she said, not turning to look at him, but feeling his strong back against hers. “Did you see something?”
“Through here,” he said. “It came this way, and it’s a dead end.”
“Can you see it?” she said.
He shook his head, she could feel it against hers and wondered what it would feel like to kiss him. “No, but it’s got to be in here. This place isn’t that big.”
She nodded. It made sense. “It’s trapped?”
“We can take it, and it won’t be able to run away.”
She felt an extra kick of adrenalin and knew that there would soon be a hot gun in her hands, firing at the creature that had caused all of this death. They hadn’t been told not to kill it, so the people in charge must have been really concerned about the threat.
“On three,” Billing said.
“On three,” she agreed.
They counted down in voices that were barely a whisper. When they reached three she turned so that she was standing beside him, her gun raised, together they started to fire blindly into the darkness.
The magazine in her Koch had been full when they’d entered the basement, and she squeezed the trigger until she had emptied it. When it clicked empty, she reached for another and quickly swapped them over.
The corridor in front of them was filled with smoke so that she couldn’t see what was there, whether they had hit it or not.
Billing raised his hand and indicated that she should follow him. She nodded and together they walked into the room.
They reached the end of the corridor without coming across the zombie and stopped.
“Shit,” Billing said.
Emma stopped beside him and saw what he had already seen. The wall at the end of the corridor was in pieces. It seemed as if every single shot they had fired had hit the brick work. There was no sign of a super zombie soldier.
They stood for a moment, and she let a little part of her questioning mind come back into play. A moment later she wished that she hadn’t.
“Oh damn!” she said.
&nbs
p; “What?” Billing said.
“Oh fuck, fuck, fuck!”
“What is it?” he said again.
Before she could answer him the light at the end of the corridor was blocked off. They both looked up, but they didn’t have time to ask whether the other could see it there.
The creature was huge. As tall as two men and as wide as three. Its head was tiny, out of proportion. Its body was naked and covered in mould. The creature didn’t move for a moment, and Emma found that she couldn’t move either. She looked at it, and it looked back.
Billing raised his gun first. Sensing him move beside her she was able to break her paralysis and do the same. There was no way she was taking a step towards the creature, but she could shoot it from where she stood.
They opened fire, but she couldn’t tell whether any of the shots hit. Once she had emptied her magazine for a second time she stopped and peered through the smoke. The creature was still there, still standing and looking at her.
For a moment, she was startled by the humanness of its eyes. They seemed to shine through the darkness, like two blue beacons. There was an understanding in them that she had never encountered in a zombie before.
Emma raised her gun again but, before she could reach back for another magazine, the creature began to move.
It didn’t have the jerky uncoordinated gate of a typical zombie. Its movements were smooth and controlled, and its eyes never left her.
“Em!”
She realised that Billing was calling her and that he had been for some time. With great difficulty, she turned away from the creature and looked at him.
“Time to go,” he said.
Emma nodded.
He raised his gun, and she did the same. The only way out of the room was the way they had come in, which meant going towards the creature. They fired as they walked but, now that she was closer, Emma could see that her shots weren’t having any effect on the zombie.
She stopped to reload, ignoring the growing pang of certainty that this was all a waste of time. Their weapons weren’t having any impact on the creature, it didn’t even seem to realise it was being shot.
Then it started to move towards them again, and she saw that it wasn’t looking at Billing at all. Its eyes were locked on her as if nothing else in the world existed. As far as it knew maybe it didn’t: if it had been created (she couldn’t bear to think of it as being born) down here then it might never have seen the sky, might not know that there was a whole world up there.
She realised then that she had to stop it. No matter what it cost her, she had to make sure it never got out.
Emma turned to Billing, surprised by how quickly she had made peace with what she was going to do. She had lived longer than anyone else in her platoon, but everyone had to die eventually.
“You need to run,” she said.
“What? No way! I’m not leaving you here.”
“Listen to me Sam,” she said. “There’s no time to discuss this. When it comes for me, you have to run. Get upstairs and tell them what happened. Tell them they need to burn everything. If you have to then burn the place down yourself. Okay?”
He didn’t say anything.
“Okay?” she said.
He nodded slowly. She didn’t know if he would actually do it or not, but she had to believe he would try.
She turned back to the creature. It had stopped momentarily, almost as if it was giving them a chance to say goodbye. But of course that was ridiculous. No matter how it appeared, the creature wasn’t sentient. It started moving towards her again.
Sam said something, but she was no longer listening to him. As if hypnotised she walked towards the creature, stepping over a zombie on the ground. It waited for her and all at once she knew what it wanted.
The monster wouldn’t kill her, it would turn her into one of them. The thought sickened her, but she pushed the it away. What difference would it make now? If it turned her then, soon, the fire would come to release them both.
Emma felt unreasonably calm. She was aware enough of her surroundings to see Sam run past. For a moment she thought he was going to attack the creature. It would have been a waste of time and probably gotten them both killed, but she would still have been grateful. Then he was gone, the monster let him pass without so much as a glance.
It was just the two of them left then, Emma and the monster. She stopped walking and allowed it to come towards her. Resisting may have taken more time, and given Sam a better chance of getting away, but she didn’t have the heart for it now. She was resolved to her fate and had little desire to string it out any longer.
The monster stopped in front of her. The fact that she didn’t scream was a final thing to be proud of. What purpose would it have served? The creature bowed its head towards her, and the last thing she felt was blinding agony. And then there was nothing.
When she opened her eyes again, she was no longer Emma Harris. Every thought and feeling that she had experienced had been reset. There was nothing now except the smell of flesh and the hunger (oh the hunger) burning inside of her. It was time to feed.
CHAPTER SEVEN
After the first hour, the cave became restrictive. It seemed like everywhere she looked there were people looking back at her, their wide eyes silently asking her what they were supposed to do now. She couldn’t turn away because every time she did she saw more of them.
She could hear the zombies outside. They had arrived less than ten minutes after they’d entered the cave and hadn’t gone anywhere since. The entrance was small and covered with greenery that she had pulled down to disguise it. She knew that the zombies didn’t know where they were, but they must have realised they were close.
“Are you okay?” Noel whispered.
Beth looked up. She hadn’t realised that she’d walked over to him. It must have seemed like a purposeful decision, but it was just a coincidence. She forced a smile, said nothing, and then carried on walking.
Around the cave she went, doing her best not to look at any of the other survivors while also ignoring the fact that they were looking at her. She wanted to scream at them, but that would have been a bad idea for several reasons. Instead, she kept walking, around and around, wondering how long they could survive in the cave before they starved.
Noel, using Dawn to help, had gotten everyone to pile up their water and food in the middle. Beth tried not to look at that either, it was depressing to see how little they had. Half a day, maybe less, after that they were going to have to think of something else.
They should have left when they’d had the chance, she thought. If she had only been able to make that decision, then they would at least have had a fighting chance of getting away. Now they were trapped and when starvation set in they would either hand themselves over to the zombies or turn on each other.
Dale wouldn’t have made this mistake.
When she found herself by the entrance to the cave again, she stopped. They were out there, just a few metres away. She could imagine them walking around with their arms stretched out and their skin hanging off. They were monsters without intelligence, but they would still kill them all. Maybe some of them would be turned. She no longer knew who the lucky ones were.
The moans were the things of nightmares. Toneless and constant. It sounded as if there were hundreds of them.
As an experiment, she considered that this might be the end. She, all of them really, had been lucky to make it this far. By rights, they should have been killed back in Harmony, or on the journey from it. Plenty of other, more deserving people, wouldn’t have made it as far. If this was the end then maybe she should just accept it gracefully? She could pull back the green curtain and walk out with her head held high.
But no. She didn’t want to do that.
The sense of self-preservation wasn’t so much for herself, and it had even less to do with the other people from Harmony who had tagged along. If it had just been them, then she might have handed herself over gladly.
It was Dawn. If Beth died, then there would be no one to look after her sister and, even supposing Dawn was able to escape, how long could she last by herself in the wilderness?
She turned away from the entrance. There had to be a solution to the problem. She simply refused to believe that there was no way out. There had to be something, she just had to figure out what it was.
Another walk around the cave did little to improve her disposition and absolutely nothing to help her work out what to do. Maybe this really was it.
She slumped down against the cave wall and stared at the green plants covering the door. The afternoon light came through, making it seem to glow green and yellow.
* * * * *
At some point, she fell asleep with her head resting on hard rock. Nobody had tried to wake her. When she opened her eyes and looked around, she saw that the rest of the group had settled down, and most of them were sitting.
She stretched and stood up. The sound of the zombies outside had become white noise and, for a moment, she didn’t hear them at all. She heard an engine rumble to a standstill, and that allowed her to hear the zombie moans again.
Beth froze.
It seemed impossible but she listened again, through the thick soup of zombie noises, and heard another engine.
Her heart was beating more quickly than it had done when the zombies had been the only threat. She considered her options and then hurried across the cave to Noel.
He was sitting on the floor beside Dawn, who had her head on his arm and her eyes closed. She looked peaceful and, for a moment, Beth considered finding someone else to share the burden with her. Then Noel opened his eyes, and she saw that he wasn’t asleep.
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