High Pressure System: First Season Underground (15 page)

My class and I ran to the classroom. “You younger ones, you need to stay on this floor near the door to protect the moms and the smaller kids. Do not go into the stairway. What did I say?”

“Don’t go into the stairway,” they said in disappointed unison.

“Anyone fifteen or older that wants to come, grab your boots and let’s see what we can find to crush the spiders. Why spiders?” I sighed as I searched the hall and other classrooms for anything that we could swing.

I had my entire class by the stairway door. “All right. That big one had a stinger that put Bossy Pants on the medical floor. We don’t even know if he survived. I’m assuming the little ones will probably have one too.”

“You call him Bossy Pants?” Daniel asked.

“I don’t know his name and he’s bossy. But that doesn’t mean I want something bad to happen to him.” I pointed at the thirteen-year-old’s nose.

There was nervous giggling from the younger ones.

“So, this is serious. We aren’t in lockdown this time. It is up to all of us to make sure everyone is safe,” I said as I looked in each pair of eyes. I had to blink so I didn’t cry over what I was asking all the kids to do. However, they were ready and so was I. Opening the door, I could hear the adults still climbing the stairs high above. I made sure only the older kids entered the stairwell.

“Guard this door. Don’t let any of them in. Stomp on them, smash them. Make sure you keep the little ones safe.” They nodded and I closed the door behind me. The battle up above was under way and I had no idea what we were all in for.

We climbed several flights of stairs before we met up with the ones at the bottom of the trail of people that extended all the way up to the landing closest to the lobby. All I had to do was look up and instantly wished I was someplace else. Little things moved all over the walls, rails, and stairs. If people were fighting them all the way from the lobby, there had to be thousands of them. Their bodies were the size of a quarter and their legs moved in unison with the others. A spider army scurried towards us. There was much stomping and smashing with whatever was in their hands.

“You all spread out down there and stop what you can.” Was shouted to us from someone above.

I pulled my hood over my head and cinched it tight and followed orders. That’s what we all did.

Aaron bounded up the stairs. He must have taken care of the bigger robot in a hurry.

“Aaron, you and the older ones spread out here. The younger ones, down lower,” I ordered.

“We’re all pretty close to the same age. Remember, you left the younger ones down below.” Aaron smashed bots on the wall.

I stomped on a few. Bots were crawling up my boots. I held the rail to keep my balance trying to stomp them off and that was a mistake. Several spiders crawled up my glove. I flung them off my hand and might have sent them tumbling through the stairs to fall on the kids below.

“Fling them against the walls, Rach.” Aaron looked like he was doing an Irish dance routine as he stomped and smashed at the same time. That was what everyone was doing. Smashing, stomping, and whacking. I would flick one off someone’s back and they would return the favor flicking them off my shoulder.

“Oww.” One of the adults closest to us yelled. “I think one got me.”

There were more yelps of pain from others higher than us. Small robot parts rained down on my head with intact, still mobile spiders and it was a horrific ordeal. I kept an eye on the person that complained a few stairs above me and was worried they would fall ill right away just like Bossy Pants did after he was poked but nothing happened. They kept going until they were stung again.

I panicked when a cluster of bots fell on my shoulder. Someone batted them off and the bots shattered into pieces when they hit the wall.

The stairwell echoed with screams and more yelps of pain as we battled on. I couldn’t help it, I screamed a few times as well. Even though the walls still crawled with the mini robot spiders, I tried to console myself that it was probably much worse farther up near the lobby.

“The drones are leaving.” Jim’s voice on the intercom drowned out the noise for a moment.

“Does that mean this is all there is?” the woman near me asked.

“What do you mean is this all there is? The walls are still crawling with them,” the man closest to her said as he smashed every little moving thing.

“There are still so many getting past us,” I said, stomping to remove more from my legs.

“As hard as we try to eliminate them, they are still getting away going under the doors,” someone said a few stairs up.

Robot legs and parts piled up on the edges of the stairs. All of us were brushing pieces off as the onslaught slowed. I knew it wasn’t necessarily slowing because we were destroying them all. Many of the teenagers descended the stairs to chase the ones that got away. I followed even though I thought about going up to my floor to make sure my dogs were safe. It was too difficult to navigate past people smashing everything that moved. Going up sure didn’t appeal to me. Some of the adults left the stairs to battle bots down the halls. The longer we fought the invasion, and the more I realized how many were still mobile, the more I worried. I was starting to itch and swell where the blasted things had poked me where they passed by my sweatshirt on my neck.

Someone grabbed my shoulder. “Did you get stung too?” Micah turned me around to face him. “You did.” He opened my hood and pushed my hair over my shoulder so he could see my neck.

I only had a couple there.

“I think everyone has been stung.” I could see swelling on his hands, on his cheek, and neck.

“I’m not looking forward to whatever it is those bots shared with us.”

One landed on my head. I cowered trying to knock it away. Micah took care of it for me.

“I’m tired of this, come with me. We can work on this floor.” He pulled me though the doorway. We stomped and smashed robots. They were moving in organized chaos down the hall and up the walls to the vents.

I stopped. “This just became as bad as a roach infestation. We will never get rid of all of them now.”

Micah paused and turned. “I know it doesn’t feel like we are stopping enough of them, but the less there are that get in the vents, the better off we’ll be. They can’t breed.”

Adrenaline had to be what was keeping us going. It felt like forever and they didn’t stop coming. When I was stomping on bots before they crawled under the door to the janitor closet, I got an idea. “Is this unlocked?” It wasn’t my floor and I knew each floor had different methods to accessing the shared cleaning supplies. Before Micah could answer, I opened the door. Grabbing the backpack vacuum, I ran over to the plug and had the thing running, sucking up as many moving bots as I could. Luckily that floor had two and Micah followed my lead. We sucked up bots and their bits and pieces. We even cleared a few out of the vents. I stayed near the door sucking up any the ventured through the cracks once we had a majority of the invasion on our floor under control.

“I’m scared to turn these off,” I yelled over the vacuum’s whine.

“We’ll find a way to plug it up. This was a brilliant idea,” he shouted.

One of the people in the stairwell opened the door and saw what we were doing. Their eyes widened and they gave us a thumbs up before they left and the door closed. I only hoped they were going to share our discovery and do the same thing on the other floors. There was no going into the stairwell just yet. The cord wasn’t long enough and finding a plug in there wasn’t possible until the worst was over.

The incoming spiders slowed to next to nothing. Even though we couldn’t go into the stairwell completely, we could stand in the doorway and vacuum parts off the landing. I didn’t like standing where spiders could fall on us in the stairwell. Micah’s reach was longer than mine so I happily stayed just out of the fall zone.

It wasn’t much longer before there was little left for us to do. Micah plugged up the vacuum holes in our vacuums. Other people were vacuuming on the other floors as we passed each landing. Everyone covered in welts were ordered to go to the Medical floor, which had to be everyone.

We all lined up in the hall as we waited to be examined. Micah had gone down with Aaron and some of the other people with vacuums to make sure no bots escaped the canisters.

Marjie found me. “You were lucky you weren’t up higher. Everyone looks awful.”

“I guess I’m lucky I was wearing my sweatshirt too.” I pulled a robot leg off the cuff of my sleeve.

Marjie made me turn and she plucked a still moving bot out of my hood, threw it on the floor, and stomped on it.

“Check it for more, please,” I begged trying hard not to wiggle in distress over what else might be hiding in it. While she looked for stray bots, I spotted Brandon. He entered the Medical floor with sagging shoulders. He had welts covering his arms, neck, and face. Swaying as he walked, he tripped over his own feet.

I rushed to his side to catch him right when Marjie was pulling another off my head. I winced as she ripped out some of my hair. It wasn’t worth the pain. A few men much closer to him caught him before he hit the floor.

He shrugged them off once he righted himself and he made eye contact with each person giving them a sympathetic nod as he passed.

“You don’t look as bad as everyone else,” Brandon said when he saw me. He examined the biggest welt on his arm. “I’m sure a plague of some sort is about to his us all.” Beads of sweat formed on his forehead. I caught his arm as he went weak in the knees.

The doctor was by his side right away. “This is going to be a long night,” the doctor said as he led Brandon into the clinic. “Come with me.” He motioned with his head for me to follow.

I looked around to make sure he was speaking to me. Suddenly I was aggravated with myself for stepping out of line and drawing attention to myself. I was hoping that once I was given a quick look over, I could leave to check on the dogs and Rocky to make sure none of the bot spiders made it in my apartment.

I grudgingly followed the doctor. “Why do you need me?”

“Because you are the only one not covered in welts.”

I pulled off my sweatshirt as I followed him and Brandon into an exam room so I could prove him wrong. Looking my arms over, he was right. I felt them poke my arms through the sweatshirt material. They weren’t bad at all, though. “I still have some.”

He handed me a surgical mask and waved at me dismissively. “That’s nothing compared to the others. Wear this mask when you are around anyone until whatever this is blows over. And wash your hands. All the time” He handed me a box of latex gloves. “or wear these.”

I pulled my heavy-duty rubber gloves out of my sweatshirt pockets and waved them at the doctor.

“Those will work if you don’t mind bulky.”

I set the box down to put my sweatshirt back on.

Brandon’s face was flushed as he rolled onto the bed. He grabbed a washcloth from the bedside table. “Scrub it off.” He rubbed it all over his arm.

The doctor took it from Brandon. “We will help you clean the welts. However, it is already too late to stop whatever you are infected with.”

“Can I go?” If they thought I would be spared the worst of what was about to hit everyone, I really wanted out of there.

“Rachel.” Brandon rolled over and waved me over.

I only took two steps closer as I covered my face with the mask. “This is as close as I get.”

“Will you check on Jim?”

I sighed. “Of course.” My dogs will have to wait. I wasn’t sure how helpful I’d be to Jim. I had no clue how to run anything in the control room if he needed help. I pulled my rubber gloves on before I opened the door.

“Young lady,” the doctor followed me to the door. “Come back here if you feel you’re coming down with anything. I don’t think you’re going to get hit as fast as the others.”

“I hope not.” I tucked my chin down so I wouldn’t meet anyone’s gaze, as if that would somehow make me sick, and went down the hall nearly running to the doors. Once I was in the stairwell, I remembered why it was still an undesirable place to be. Even more so by myself and I froze. Looking up, that was the last place I wanted to go. I went up a couple steps and stopped again. Maybe if I waited long enough I would hear Micah returning to the upper floors or maybe he was already checking on Jim up above. Waiting on the stairs wasn’t going to accomplish anything and it just left my dogs alone even longer so I pulled my hood over my head, cinched the strings tight and took the stairs two or three at a time until my thighs and butt burned. That was a mistake, I was completely winded and going slower just made me jump when anything moved. There were still a few straggler bots. With the protection of the gloves, I batted them off the walls with as much force as I could to destroy them.

I was so close to the lobby when I reached the floor where the control room was. Bot parts completely covered the stairs. Some of them were still twitching. I stomped on them in case there were intact ones underneath but I almost slipped off the stairs since there was so much slope on the stair treads from all the acid water.

I tripped through the doorway and slammed the door. When I turned, I really wished I waited for Micah. Bots were crawling everywhere. Most of them were concentrated on the door to the control room. The ones that weren’t changed direction coming right for me. Somehow I was no longer exhausted as I ran for the utility closet flailing my arms as I ran so they wouldn’t be able to fall on me easily. I slapped the light switch and shut the door until I could get the vacuum plugged in. They crawled under the door. I stomped them off my feet. The boots were great protection. I turned on the vacuum. They turned around and were fleeing before I had a chance to suck them up. But I was faster. I took a deep breath before opening the door. All of a sudden, I had all the power as they scurried for the vents and the doors as fast as they could and I chased them down. I might have cackled some with great satisfaction as they disappeared inside the tube. I vacuumed the door to the control room until the bots were gone. With great relief, I knocked on the door. That door was the most sealed and secure one in the building. I sucked a rag up in the vacuum from the janitorial closet before I turned it off.