A World Reborn: The First Outbreak

by Chris Thompson

  “Damn it!” Roy roared suddenly, making Donna jump. “You’ve got to get into the computer system, Donna, you’ve got to find a way to help us get this door open or we’re both screwed.”

  Donna shook her head in response. “I can try Chief, but if we get caught by the malware then we’ll undo all the progress we’ve made so far. I’m just a little scared of messing up.” She confessed.

  “You’ve got to. I believe in you. I’ll be honest, I’ve no idea what you’re talking about or even what you’re doing, but you’re the best computer tech I’ve ever met, and I’ve got absolute faith in you. You can do this, Donna!” Roy enthused, and this seemed to be the push the woman needed. She immediately began typing on the keyboard, and passively, Roy watched her work.

  Chapter Six

  Melissa had crossed over and taken the south stairs down to the ground floor. She didn’t want to contact Roy yet, to find out if he’d made any headway on her actually getting down to him, as she wanted to get into position first. The biggest obstacle, at least from her perspective, were the thousands of infected in the casino, but she had to get through them; Roy and the hostages were depending on her and she couldn’t afford to fail.

  “One problem at a time.” Melissa whispered to herself as she thought this over. She cracked the door to the ground floor open a few inches and peeked out, but it proved useless. All she could see was the other side of the corridor housing the elevators, which was of no more help than looking at a blank wall. So, exercising extreme caution, Melissa opened the door enough for her to peer around the edge of it. She saw that the immediate area was empty, enabling her to quietly proceed. She exited the stairwell and pressed herself up against the wall on her right, before moving past the bank of elevators. When she reached the corner, she could see out along the edge of the huge casino area, the hallway opposite and the cafes, stores and bars to its left. The Reborn had completely sealed off the casino, ransacking the stores for materials to build their barricade around the wide, arched entrances as well as metallic barricades in front of some sections similar to the ones she’d seen up in front of the elevators on the executive suite floor. Some sections however, were barricaded entirely with furniture. There was no sign of the infected outside the casino area, and there were no signs of the Reborn either. Melissa ducked down and peeked around the corner she was pressed up against. She saw the turn of the avenue she knew led to both the theatre and the sports bar, but one of the Grand Staircases was directly in her way, which meant she would have to move around it to check on where the Reborn where in that direction. As there were no Reborn that she could see, she hunkered down and slipped silently out and around the corner. She hugged the wall, only stepping away to get around the staircase blocking her path, then hurrying back to the wall once more. As she moved towards the theatre, she idly glanced across at the confined infected who were baying at her, pressing against the barricade as they caught scent and sight of a new victim. Shuddering, Melissa warily continued onwards, ignoring them as best she could. Eventually, she could see the first edge of the theatre, where she stopped.

  Across the way, she could see the ‘Staff Only’ door, with a key card lock beside it. Edging closer to the corner on her side of the avenue, Melissa was able to see the Reborn, about six of them, hard at work stacking what furniture they could find to make a defensive position around the perimeter of the theatre. Risking one quick glance fully around the corner of the wall she’d been following enabled her to see the sports bar directly across from the theatre, and while it was impossible to see it clearly, a brief glimpse through the windows was enough to reveal quite a few of the infected inside. The doors were shut and it seemed this isolation meant they were no longer under the calming influence of the collars, because they were pressing themselves up against the glass desperately trying to get to the soldiers and the hostages in the theatre beyond.

  Melissa pulled back around the corner and saw a fire alarm just by her shoulder. The plan crystallised in Melissa’s mind. She remembered how noise aggravated the infected; even the screaming of just one woman was enough to drive the nearest infected to her rabid with ravenous hunger. Noise seemed to cut through the collar’s effect, as they had snapped at the Reborn during the massacre at the Money Pit, who had then been forced to physically fight them off. She followed this line of thought through, and figured if she was able to set off the fire alarm, and then unleash the infected from the sports bar and casino, it would keep Reborn soldiers busy trying to control them and then, perhaps, she could slip past them without being seen. The only problem was there were bound to be more guards inside the theatre. However, if there was enough of a ruckus outside then the soldiers guarding the prisoners would be forced to leave and help or at least, some of them would. If that happened, then maybe, and it was a slim chance at best, she could go in through the back of the theatre and quietly dispatch the soldiers within. But where would she and the hostages go? Logically, she mused, it seemed they would have to go down to the security room and hold up there until the police made it inside, assuming she was able to get down there initially to enlist Roy’s assistance.

  “As easy as that.” Melissa said to herself once she had concluded her line of thought. She had retreated to underneath the grand staircase where she looked across at the Money Pit, first seeing the used cameras for the broadcast discarded in a pile, and then seeing the half-eaten remains of those who hadn’t been infected and turned. The sight of all that blood made Melissa’s stomach churn, so she forced herself to tear her gaze away from the scene of slaughter and her mind to the task in hand. Slipping the collar out of her pocket, she put it around her neck and clicked it together. She awkwardly craned her neck to see if the light was green, which it was, so she concluded it was working as well as it had on the rooftop with the remains of the soldier who had fallen.

  Melissa holstered the gun in her belt and gripped the bat tightly in her hands, holding it across herself as she cautiously hunkered down to move towards the casino in a kind of crouched walk. She knew down to the right soldiers were guarding the theatre, but she hoped they were far enough away that they wouldn’t notice her. Checking in the direction of lobby, she saw it was clear of the infected and Reborn alike, seeing only the lowered, heavy security gate on the outside of the hotel doors. Melissa quickly moved in line with the Money Pit. She felt revulsion at stepping into the blood, which had sprayed out onto the floor and spread in a pool towards the staircases; a sight which turned her stomach violently again. A brief look inside showed the blood and human remains had seeped down onto the fans which would normally spin coupons into the air for happy holidaymakers, and the acrylic walls were also painted with blood and gore. Once again she forced herself to look away, and focused on the barricaded entrance to the casino instead. Away from the suppression effect of the collars, the infected were incredibly agitated, likely caused by the bloody remnants lingering in the Money Pit. With a final, awkward look to see if the light was still green on the collar, Melissa approached a section of the barricade consisting of a large table with a pair of heavy duty waste bins on top to discourage the infected from climbing over. There was a smaller table underneath, its top facing the casino, with a couple of bins pressed tightly behind to prevent them from crawling under.

  Melissa looked over the barricade and saw that the line of infected grunting and growling at the forefront seemed to calm down once she got a little closer, and despite her growing feelings of fear, Melissa raised her hand up near the face of one of the infected. He looked at her hand curiously, like a child regarding some new stimulant for the first time, and then looked away. Melissa looked him in the eyes. They were pale, as were the other infected, and his skin was pallid. She looked behind him at the throng of infected, the closest of whom were falling into the same kind of idle stupor that the ones nearest to her were in. With a quick glance to ensure that her point of entry to the casino was obscured from the Reborn establishing the defensive perimeter outside
the theatre, she carefully mounted the table that was directly in front of her. She got one foot up into a space just big enough for her boot, and crossed over the waste bin that stood in her path. She intended to put her foot on the other side of the bin on top of the table, but as she transitioned, the table wobbled slightly from the infected piled against it and she fell into the casino. She squeaked in fright, but managed to prevent herself from giving a full throated yelp. As she fell, she knocked down a pair of the infected, landing awkwardly on top of them, while others were simply knocked back and away. In what could almost be considered comical, the infected looked up at her, wondering why this person was on them and why they were lying down, as though they could barely comprehend what had just happened. However, Melissa wasn’t in the mood to find it comical. She was terrified that at any moment they’d see her for what she was: prey.

  Melissa shook off the fall and got back to her feet. She checked the collar, saw its light was still green, and breathed a sigh of relief; a sigh which quickly turned to a gasp as she looked up and around. She had known this was where the majority of the infected where, but to actually be amongst them was an entirely different thing. It was impossible to see through the vast crowd of what was presumably thousands of the infected. If the collar stopped working she wouldn’t stand a chance - a negative thought she firmly pushed aside. It would do her no good at all to be gripped by fear now.

  She had dropped her bat in the fall and needed to find it. She knelt down and looked between the legs of the infected and luckily saw it off to the right. Melissa stood back up, took a deep breath and slowly began pushing them out of the way. She handled them with caution, keeping her hands away from their mouths and any open looking wounds, of which there were many, with great chunks of flesh missing from their torsos, faces and necks. Gentle shoving was enough to get them to move from her path, and, on rare occasions, she was able to simply move her body through a gap presented by them.

  Melissa, despite moving calmly and purposefully, was truly terrified. She saw more than one of the infected turn to look at her as she passed, or more precisely she thought, turned to look at the wound on her arm. It had stopped bleeding, but blood was soaked into the fabric of her jacket and it seemed that even though the collar was stopping them from attacking her, it wasn’t stopping them from noticing the relatively fresh blood on offer. She reached the position where the bat had rolled and knelt down to pick it up. Despite how many she had shoved and moved there were still a lot of the infected around her, so Melissa forced herself to stand slowly and carefully after she had retrieved it, hoping not to make too much of an impact on them. Melissa knew she needed to get a good look around the casino and figure out which direction to go in, because as she’d never set foot on the casino floor before, she needed to get the lay of the land. She pushed her way through and eventually reached a craps table. Putting her bat on it to one side, she clambered up onto it and gazed around. The situation didn’t improve with altitude. The sea of the infected spanned some considerable distance. The enclosed space was loaded with them, as close to capacity as possible, which was impressive considering the size of the casino floor. In the distance, there were hundreds of slot machines, black jack tables, the cashier’s desk, and every type of game imaginable, and wherever she looked, there were the infected, shuffling, groaning and looking for their next meal. The ones further away from her seemed to be regarding her hungrily, no doubt at the edge or even beyond the limit of the collar’s effect. Worse still, the ones that were near the slot machines were futilely attacking them every time the machines made a noise; the jingling, the music, the flashing lights, it all angered the infected. When the machines fell silent, the infected moved away, only to be attracted by something else making a sound and returning to seek it out. The ones nearest to Melissa, and indeed, the ones milling around the other parts of the casino weren’t attracted to the sounds of the machines, and she wondered if this meant they had some kind of range to their hearing. However, now wasn’t the time for such musings; Melissa needed to focus on the task in hand.

  After a glance in the direction of the theatre to ensure she had not been seen, Melissa looked for some sign that would tell her which way to go. She knew she needed to find her way to the private rooms, but where they were in this maze of gambling venues was difficult to determine. An unsettlingly long way away on the right side of the floor, Melissa saw a sign hanging from the ceiling, and could barely make out the word ‘Private’. Hoping it meant private gambling rooms, Melissa resolved to head in that direction as carefully as she could. It was slotted away in the far corner, and there were hundreds of the infected to get through in order to reach it. Looking around once more, she observed there was a buffet and eating area close by on her right, beyond a section of blackjack tables, but the door leading to its back section was barricaded, and she didn’t want to mess with it. Seeing no better options, Melissa carefully climbed down from the table, pushing aside a few curious infected, and began moving amongst them in the direction of the private area. She thought briefly of contacting Roy to confirm she was heading in the right direction, but she feared the sound of her voice and his response would aggravate the infected. Holding her bat tightly around the handle, Melissa pressed onward.

  It was difficult to see how much progress she was making at her current level, with all the infected blocking her line of vision, but Melissa slowly made her way towards what she hoped were the private rooms. The number of infected thankfully grew fewer the further from the barricade she got, making it easier to navigate. However, she couldn’t help but notice that the ones at what she presumed were at the edge of the suppression effect of the collar were moving to follow her, jostling through their docile companions in an attempt to find the fresh meat. The thought of an attack chilled Melissa. If anything went wrong she could quite possibly become one of them; just another of the infected amongst the horde, to eventually be studied or put down. The very concept that no one would know she cared enough to risk her life to try to save people was abhorrent to Melissa. A far worse thought crept uninvited into her mind; instead of being infected she could quite possibly be consumed alive, screaming and pleading, until nothing but a bloody mess of her remained. That thought filled her with abject horror. Being infected would condemn her to a soul-destroying existence for a time, but at least, in a way, it was quick. Being eaten alive, however...

  “Stop it!” She hissed at herself, drawing the attention of those infected in her immediate vicinity. Determinedly, she pushed past the frightening thoughts lurking in her mind and refocused on her self-imposed mission, jostling around and between the infected.

  Several, tortuously slow minutes passed, and then she was at the edge of the private rooms. At her feet, there were a few posts holding a rope barrier that had been knocked over and further along, a couple that remained standing. Clearly, this was normally used to stop the uninvited from wandering into the rooms where the big gamblers were winning or, as was more likely to be the case, losing. Melissa stepped over the fallen rope barrier and approached the first of the private rooms; the door to it was open, and from a quick glance within, it appeared there had been a last stand of sorts, with the poker table used as a kind of barricade. The bloody skeletal remains and high arcs of arterial blood sprayed across the walls however, highlighted the fact that it had proved ineffective, and they had been unsuccessful in their attempts to keep the infected at bay. The avenue of private rooms, six on one side six on the other, led to an emergency door at the end with a glowing green exit sign above it. Perhaps, Melissa thought, she was going to get through this after all.

  Melissa, now clear of the infected, risked one look over her shoulder, and saw the horde behind her standing impassively, at least for the most part. One or two were looking intently at her, their lips curling like an animal would before it growled a threat. A single infected turned its body to face her and took an uncertain step in her direction. Melissa heard an almost imperceptible sound,
a kind of mechanical click that she heard only due to her heightened sensitivity to all stimuli. She was certain the infected wouldn’t have heard it over their moaning and grunting, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that the sound had attracted them to her. Half a dozen were now turning towards her, and the one who had moved in her direction was now taking a second step, albeit with as much uncertainty as he had taken the first. Melissa heard the click again, and was certain it was close to her. The first thought she had was that there was something in one of the private rooms she was passing, but it seemed closer than that. A third click was followed by a fourth and Melissa was now certain the infected were following her. Seven of them were advancing slowly down the corridor, their pale eyes focused on her, their slack jaws opening and shutting as though anticipating good eating.

  Fear began to overwhelm Melissa. She was near the door, about a dozen more paces, and wondering exactly why the infected were pursuing her now. She risked a quick look down towards the collar and her heart sank. The green light had turned to red. When she heard the mechanical sound, the light flickered back to green, only for another click to turn it red. It must’ve been damaged in the fall, some internal mechanism that kept the suppression effect active was slipping between an on and off state, and this was why the infected were now following her. She was, she imagined, appearing and disappearing before their eyes. The collar clicked one final time, and the light went out completely.