Cryonic (14 page)

As intimidating as the building was, it was dwarfed by the grassy acreage. The grounds were peppered with mature trees, and among them, we could make out shadowy figures stumbling around in the distance. We pulled the van up front. From what we could tell, the facility was deserted. It was getting darker by the minute, yet not a single light shone through the hundreds of barred windows that dotted the front of the building.

“This place gives me the creeps,” Celeste offered.

“Me, too,” I said. The mysterious figures were getting closer. Zombies in bloodied hospital gowns made their way toward us through the mist. “Look at that. Place has probably been overrun, but at least we know there's a hospital. Let's go take a look.”

I grabbed a gun and jumped down from the van. Celeste followed.

“You coming, Alex?” she asked.

“No, I better wait here to keep an eye on Mike,” he said.

“Dude, no way. You stay in there you're going to be bait for all those freaks over there,” I said.

“But what about Mike? Won't they smell him?” Alex asked.

“Maybe, but he also might become one of them by the time we get back.”

The thought of being trapped in the van with Mike was all the motivation Alex needed to grab a gun and join us.

I put my hand on Alex's shoulder. “Look, pal, you were really brave back there at the storage depot. You saved my life
again
when you pulled me out of that mess. You got this, man. Fire up that laser, and let's go torch some freaks.”

“All right,” Alex said with a sheepish grin. He stepped back and activated his weapon. The laser shot out a good ten feet right between Celeste and me.

“Be careful, Alex,” Celeste said, stepping away from the beam. “We better keep our lasers short. We don't want to hurt each other.”

We tiptoed into the building, expecting to find ghouls at every turn. Instead, we found ourselves exploring the annals of an abandoned insane asylum. The rooms were mostly empty save for an occasional antediluvian restraint table bolted to the floor, which was littered with brittle plaster that had broken free from the crumbling walls. At first, we moved slowly through the pitch-black rooms, with only the warm glow of the lasers to guide our path. After failing to run into a zombie for a good ten minutes, we started moving faster and faster until we reached the end of the western wing.

“This is weird,” I said.

“I know. They couldn't have just packed everything up and left,” Celeste said.

“Even if they did, the building wouldn't be in shambles.”

“Perhaps the hospital is located in the other wing,” Alex suggested.

“I hope so. We better go find out,” I said.

We worked our way back toward the other wing. As we walked through the lobby at the center of the building, the clock struck the hour. The thundering bell rattled our bones. We all took a combative stance as if we were under attack, then stood and laughed at the absurdity of the moment. When the clock stopped chiming, the reverberating echo was replaced by howling emanating from somewhere beneath us.

“You hear that?” Celeste asked.

“I do,” I said. “Where's it coming from?”

“I don't know.”

We stood in place, listening carefully before we moved toward the source of the sound. The wailing led us to towering white drapes that appeared to be covering a very large window. I grabbed the cloth and yanked it back, unveiling a door that was slightly ajar.

“A secret passage,” Alex whispered.

“Come on . . . follow me,” I said, putting my hand on the door.

“Why?” Alex cried. “We know what's in there.”

“We're here to find the hospital, right?”

“Yes, but—”

“If they're trying to stop the outbreak, then what's the one thing they need to have in the hospital?”

“Patients.”

“Bingo. Let's go.”

I pulled the door back and leapt into the doorway, ready for anything. Instead of zombies, I found a dimly lit stairwell.

“Okay, let's go down. Careful with those lasers behind me, okay?” They nodded.

There weren't more than twenty stairs. At the bottom, they met a concrete hallway that ran to the left. I stood at the corner, my back to the wall, and waited for my companions to catch up. Once they did, I spun around into the hallway. A crowd of zombies at the other end of the hall had their backs to us. They were gathered around a large steel door, screaming and scratching at it in agony. Most wore gowns, but some were soldiers, and others wore the uniforms of medical personnel. Alex opened fire abruptly with his machine gun, which immediately got the ghouls' attention
and sent them running toward us. Alex turned and ran back up the stairs, and Celeste and I followed. I looked behind as I rounded the corner and saw what I thought was a face peering through the viewing window on the other side of the door. When I got to the top of the stairs, I slammed the door shut, and then stood panting with my back against it.

“What was that, Alex?” I inquired.

“I don't know. Fighting?”

“Like the enthusiasm, buddy, but you can't be going all Rambo on us. We need to work together.”

“What's Rambo?”

“
Of course
. It means wild . . . commando, you know? We need to work as a team.”

“Got it.”

“There are a lot of them down there,” Celeste said.

“I know, and we're going to have to take care of them because there's somebody on the other side of that door.”

“How do you know?” Alex asked.

“I saw someone looking through the window.”

“I didn't see anyone. How do you know it wasn't one of them?”

“Because, I just know. Besides, why would they all be jonesing to get in there if all there was, was a freak on the other side?”

“He has a point, Alex.”

The zombies had followed us up the stairs, and now they were going to work on our door.

“All right, Al, you get the door, and Celeste and I will do the honors,” I said.

We readied our lasers, and as soon as Alex pulled the handle, we made quick work of the zombies on the other side. Blood, brains, and entrails saturated the carpeted steps.
We walked gingerly among the carnage careful to avoid still-moving torsos and heads.

When we reached the bottom of the stairs, several zombies were still clawing at the other door. A man behind the window waved at us. We returned the gesture and then pulled back around the corner.

“I guess they weren't ready to give up on him,” Celeste whispered.

“I think we should sneak up behind them and take them out,” I said, “but we have to use our bayonets cause we don't want the lasers hurting that guy on the other side.”

“They won't cut through that steel,” she said.

“I know, but what about the glass?”

She nodded.

“No shooting either, Al. Look, there aren't many more of them than there are of us, so we should be fine. Let's move quickly before they know we're here.”

We raced down the hallway with our weapons at the ready. Only one zombie heard us coming so I charged in his direction and thrust my bayonet into his eye. Celeste stabbed her target in the back of the head and then hit another attacker with the butt of her rifle and finished him off once he fell to the ground. Alex made an instant kill to the back of the head as well, but he was too overcome by the experience to react quickly to the creature next to his target. It turned and grabbed him by the shoulders, but I thrust my bayonet up underneath its chin before it had a chance to bite him.

With our enemies vanquished, we had a moment to pause. Alex was as white as a ghost.

“You did great, buddy,” I said. He nodded slightly. “Looks like I still owe you one.”

As I patted him on the shoulder, Celeste noticed the dried blood on my sleeve.

“Royce, are you injured?” she asked.

“Where? Oh, that? Nooo, that's just from when I was helping Mike.”

“Oh, good.”

Dodging that bullet made me anxious and self-aware. I noticed that I was sweating profusely. I told myself that it was just adrenaline from the fight, but I couldn't be sure.

The man on the other side of the door struggled to force it open against the bodies lying on the ground. We dragged them out of the way and were greeted by a tall, gaunt man in an ill-fitting lab coat that hung loosely on his wiry frame. His hair was dark and curly, and he wore thin-rimmed glasses that he pushed tightly against the top of his nose.

“Am I glad to see you!” He beamed. “Here, come in. Shut the door in case there are more of them out there.”

We walked down a flight of stairs and entered a lab eerily similar to the one in New York. The white room was the size of a high school gymnasium with advanced machinery dotting the floor and five large metal gurneys positioned evenly across the center of the room. Three doors ran along one wall, and a massive metal pole stretched from floor to ceiling on the other side of the room.

“I surmise that you weren't sent by the government,” the man said.

“Definitely not,” I replied.

“How did you even know about this place?”

“We have a friend. He worked in a communication center, and he picked up on things. He's injured; we're hoping you can help him.”

“How bad is it?”

“Pretty bad.”

“Has he been bitten?”

“Yes.”

“Well, as you can see, I can't do anything for that.”

“Please, just do whatever you can. Can we bring him down?”

“Certainly. Where is he?”

“He's out front. In the van.”

“Okay, here's what I need you to do. Drive your vehicle around the back of the building until you find a cement patio without any furniture on it. Park the van on the patio and honk your horn.”

“Um, okay . . .”

“Now get going. If your friend has been bitten, we don't have much time.”

The zombies must have smelled Mike, because several were pounding on the door at the back of the van.

“You think that means he's still alive?” Alex asked.

“Let's hope so. If we gotta take him out, just be careful with the food,” I said. “Shall I do the honors?”

“Why certainly,” Celeste replied, curtsying.

I extended my laser as far as it would go and then snuck around the side of the van. Once I was alongside the zombies, I held the laser above my head and swung straight down like I was chopping wood. This stroke prevented any damage to the van, and it chopped the majority of them right in half.

“Did you guys see that?”

“I like your handiwork,” Celeste said, placing her hand on my arm and running it gently across my back as she walked around me to strike a zombie.

My laser had missed the zombie's head and it was trying to get up on one arm and leg. Celeste fired a round into its head, and Alex used his bayonet to finish off another crawling in a circle on the other side of the van.

“You're starting to get the hang of this, aren't you?” I asked Alex.

“It's scary, but it's kind of fun,” he said.

“When in Rome, right? Let's see how Mike is doing,” I said and swung open the back door of the van.

Mike was lying right where we had left him.

“Okay, let's get him in there,” Celeste said.

She climbed into the center of the cab, and Alex sat next to her in the passenger seat. I drove around the building searching for the patio.

“I don't think he's breathing,” Celeste said.

“Get your gun ready and keep a close eye on him,” I said. “We don't want him sneaking up on us like Carson.”

“I don't see what the point of this is,” Alex said. “You heard him yourself, he can't cure him.”

“He can't if he doesn't try. Medicine is amazing these days, right? What if healing the wounds before he turns stops the virus?”

“I suppose, but I'd be surprised if he hasn't tried that before.”

“Well, let's find out,” I said as I pulled up onto the patio. I put the van in park and honked the horn.

“Why do you think he has us out here anyway?” Celeste asked.

“Beats me.”

As I spoke, the ground shifted. The patio moved slowly downward. When it stopped moving, we were inside the lab. The man in the lab coat waved us forward, and I drove the van off the patio onto the floor. Behind us, the piston returned the patio to the surface.

“Where is he?” the man asked.

“He's in the back,” I said.