January 31, 2012 by Mark Lidstone

Zombies II – Chapter 8

DOOR NUMBER THREE

VOTING FOR THIS CHAPTER IS NOW CLOSED. A NEW CHAPTER IS POSTED EVERY TUESDAY

“I have no idea,” says Victoria. She stares at the unlabelled room on the map. “It’s big, whatever it is.”

She turns to face Elizabeth but she isn’t there. Victoria catches sight of her several feet away, heading down the hallway.

“Where are you going?” she shouts.

“Duh, it’s a mystery room,” Elizabeth answers. She glances back at Victoria with a grin. “We have to check it out.”

“But we have no idea what’s in there.”

“That’s what makes it a mystery.” Elizabeth winks and turns her back. “Besides,” she says playfully. “I’m already dead.”

“You are not!” screams Victoria. She huffs in frustration. She isn’t letting Elizabeth go off alone and she definitely doesn’t want to be alone. She hurries to catch up to her friend.

The hallway isn’t as long as they had initially assumed when looking at the map. The office doors are close together – giving the impression that the offices themselves are actually quite small. The two keep quiet during the walk but Elizabeth seems to get increasingly nervous as they get closer to the unknown room. Victoria watches her fiddle with her clothes until she eventually shoves her hands into the pockets of her jeans.

“You OK?” Victoria asks.

“Yeah.” Elizabeth glances at her briefly. “Just a little hungry, I guess.”

Victoria keeps a wary eye on Elizabeth.

“Right,” she says.

As much as she likes Elizabeth, Victoria realizes she has to keep reminding herself what Elizabeth has become. What she’s capable of. They continue the walk in silence. The only sound comes from their shoes, tapping against the floor.

After a short while, a hunched figure comes into view. It’s sitting on the floor a few doors away from the exit with its back against the wall. Its head hangs and it doesn’t move. The women slow their pace as they get closer.

“Do you hear anything?” Victoria asks.

“No.”

“So it’s dead dead?”

Elizabeth shrugs.

They step next to the figure. It’s a man in a military uniform. He sits in a pool of dark blood that appears to have come from the gaping wound in the back of his head. Splattered against the cement wall above him is a mixture of blood, hair and tiny pieces of bone.

Elizabeth stretches her leg out and nudges the man’s with her toe.

“Hey,” she says. “You dead?”

He doesn’t react.

“Looks like it,” Victoria says.

To the right of the dead man is a door with a small black sign. Written on it, in white letters, is the word “ARMORY.”

“We definitely go there next,” Victoria says.

She eyes the blood splatter on the wall again. She turns around and sees a similar splatter of blood on the opposite wall. This one is a little lower and streaks across the wall towards the exit door.

She follows the trail until she comes to a door. This one also has a small sign but the words have been blacked out. Under it is a piece of lined paper. The words “Project Gerra: Observation Room 3” are written on it in black marker ink. She quickly loses interest in the blood trail.

“Elizabeth,” Victoria says. “Come look at this.”

Elizabeth doesn’t respond. Victoria turns to face her friend. She stands motionless in the hallway, staring intently at the dead man.

“Elizabeth?”

She appears to snap out of her daze and quickly turns to face Victoria. She reads the sign on the door.

“Project Gerra?” she asks.

“Come on,” Victoria says. She grabs the handle on the door and opens it a crack.

“I’ll join you in a second,” Elizabeth says. “I’m just going to take care of something.”

She turns her attention back to the corpse.

“Don’t be long,” Victoria says.

“Just a nibble.”

Victoria turns away just as Elizabeth crouches over the man. She can hear Elizabeth’s heavy breathing behind her. She’s tempted to turn her attention back to her and watch – to see what it was like. Disgusted with herself, she forces the thought out of her head and pushes the door open.

The room is dark. Victoria’s hand blindly searches the wall until it comes in contact with a switch. She flips it and the room fills with bright, fluorescent light.

At the far side of the room, there’s a small desk with with an ancient computer monitor sitting on it. Above it, mounted to the wall, is a large TV screen. Both screens appear to be off. The rest of the room is completely empty.

Victoria moves to the computer and notices the small line of white text in the upper left corner of the screen. The text simply says “PASSWORD:” and a small, white cursor blinks next to it.

“Another password?” Victoria mutters. “Goddammit!”

She searches the desk for something that could hold a password but it’s completely bare. She looks around the room but there isn’t even a scrap of paper.

“Maybe this will help,” Elizabeth says from the doorway. She holds up what appears to be an ID card. “Our delicious friend in the hallway isn’t going to need it anymore.”

Elizabeth joins Victoria and hands her the card. On the front is the picture of a smiling man that resembles the corpse in the hallway. Under the picture is the name “James Elston.” On the back is a black barcode and a small label that says “PW: HQTJ11.”

“You’re a star, Elie,” Victoria says.

She looks over Elizabeth. There are a few new drops of blood on her shirt but, other than that, she appears to be completely clean.

“You know, you are much cleaner than the others,” Victoria says with a smile.

“Hey,” Elizabeth says. “I may be a flesh-eating zombie but I’m still a lady.” She smiles brightly, exposing a small piece of red meat caught in between her teeth.

“You’ve got a little…” Victoria says. She mimes picking her teeth.

Elizabeth covers her mouth in embarrassment and turns away. When she turns back, her teeth are clean.

“Still a lady,” she says.

Victoria turns to the computer and uses the ancient keyboard to type in the password written on the back of the card. The thick keys click loudly as she does.

After hitting the ENTER key, the large TV screen on the wall flashes to life. A series of green lines, in the shape of a map, come into view. In the middle of the map is a small X with the words “impact area” written next to it in green font.

“That’s the dormitory,” Elizabeth says. She points to a series of lines next to the X. “That’s the creek.”

Victoria briefly recalls spending days at the creek with her family while the guards kept watch. They didn’t have the freedom to leave the area so most families would spend their afternoons there. It was the only place left that felt normal.

There’s a large circle drawn around the entire area on the map. It doesn’t have a label. Near the edge of the circle is another X.

“What’s that?” Victoria asks.

Elizabeth’s fingers dance along a few of the keys on the keyboard. The screen zooms in to the map. She presses a few more keys and the map moves around until the X comes into view. A small label appears next to it. “Extraction point.”

“Hey,” Victoria says. “Do you still have the map you took from David’s office?”

Elizabeth nods. She pulls it out of her pocket, and struggles to unfold it for Victoria.

Victoria holds the map up in front of the screen. After a brief moment, she lowers it and presses her finger against the TV a little above the extraction point.

“We’re here,” she says. She points to the large circle that surrounds the area. “I think this might be the impact radius of Project Gerra.”

“I really wish you hadn’t said that,” Elizabeth says.

She steps aside and reveals the old computer screen. Green numbers stretch across it: “00:00:21:14.” Under the numbers are the words “UNTIL IMPACT.” The numbers are counting down.

“We have twenty minutes before this thing comes down right on top of us,” she says.

Victoria’s heart sinks and she struggles to speak. She looks back at the map on the screen.

“We can make it to the extraction point, right?” she says. “It looks like it’s maybe a kilometre away. We can get there.”

“That’s not our only problem,” Elizabeth says. Her eyes darken and she stares off as if she’s listening to something. “We aren’t alone.”

Victoria quickly turns to the door and steps backwards towards Elizabeth. “How many?” she asks.

“A lot,” Elizabeth says. “Most of them are further away but they are quickly closing in on us.”

“Quickly?” Victoria turns to face Elizabeth again.

“Runners, I think. But there’s another one. Its thoughts are loud and aggressive. It’s really close,”

“Savage,” Victoria says. “We need to get to the armory.”

“We don’t have time,” Elizabeth says. She grabs Victoria’s arm before she can run off. “It’s right outside. We have to run.”

Victoria shrieks as a loud bang echoes through the hallway outside of the room.

VOTING FOR THIS CHAPTER IS NOW CLOSED. A NEW CHAPTER IS POSTED EVERY TUESDAY

What do they do?
A: Rush to the Armory
B: Get the hell out