Fast (15 page)

            Forest summed it up eloquently. ‘You’re saying we just got chased one step down the food chain?’

            Vanessa nodded. ‘It seems your weapons inspectors were coming with very good reason.’

            She had basically already answered Coleman’s next question, but it still needed to be asked. ‘You think these have been designed just to kill people? You think they’ve been intentionally designed as a biological weapon?’

            ‘It’s more than that,’ she confirmed. ‘The strength of my bio-survive system lies is its adaptability to the local environment. These creatures suit this Complex perfectly. I can’t think of anywhere in this facility that the creatures couldn’t reach. I think Gould has designed these creatures just to hunt down and kill every person in this Complex.’

#

Four hundred meters south-east of Third Unit, in the Evacuation Center’s sealed antechamber, Corporal Harrison struggled to deal with the chaos of terrified evacuees.

            Harrison
smashed
his palms down on the table.

            At six foot four, he towered over every person in the room. With his broad shoulders and rangy features, he knew he cut an imposing figure. Especially when he scowled. Right now he sported a scowl that creased his heavy brow and drew his lips tightly over his teeth. He was no oil painting at the best of times, and especially not when he felt like smashing one of these smart-mouthed scientists’ teeth down the back of their throats. They didn’t seem to realize that
everyone
had lost friends today.
Everyone
wanted answers.

            The guilt of leaving Third Unit behind still burned like concentrated battery acid in his chest.

            How could I have just left them in there?

            He couldn’t shake the image of Third Unit trapped within a closing circle of hostiles.

            Abandoning the four Marines were the ugliest orders he’d ever carried out. The evacuees in front of Harrison didn’t seem to appreciate that the Marines had been every bit as shocked by the creatures as themselves.

           
It’s not their fault. They don’t seem to know any more than you do. Just calm down and get some control of the situation.

            ‘Listen!’ he yelled over their riotous demands for information. ‘For the last time! We don’t know what the creatures are. We don’t know how they got into the Complex, and we don’t know where they came from!’

            The small group of disheveled scientists who had cornered Harrison in the antechamber looked stunned and outraged. Two of them had bandaged leg wounds. One had a dressing on his head and a badly bloodshot left eye. The other four had been faster on their feet, or just plain lucky.

            Harrison took a deep breath and tried to sound calmer. ‘Now, please just get back to the tasks you’ve been assigned.’

            The group stared to protest, but Harrison raised his finger steadily towards the open doorway. He articulated every word precisely. ‘Get…to…work.’

            Protest cut short, the frustrated group filed reluctantly down the corridor back to the communal hall.

           
Harrison watched them go.
They were only trying to get some answers.

            But he had no answers. He was only now getting a handle on their current predicament.

            The blueprints spread over the table showed the Evacuation Center operated completely self-contained. The Center was its own little complex. Recessed into the desert, the single-level, octagonal-shaped structure proved just large enough to accommodate the two hundred or so evacuees. Surrounding the central common area, segments of the octagon were dedicated to dormitories, a medical clinic, quarantine services, communications and stores.

            They were ready for anything, it seems.

            Two exits led from the communal area. East from the communal area led up a close-walled cement stairwell to the top-deck. The top-deck was a small cement landing with a set of mechanically-operated steel doors. The doors opened to a helicopter pad on the roof. West from the communal hall led to Harrison’s antechamber, and then down the evacuation tunnel to the containment door.

            The antechamber was the first room Harrison and Sullivan encountered when they followed the evacuees down the tunnel. The front wall of the antechamber, separating the room from the tunnel, was floor-to-ceiling plexiglass. Inside the chamber, a round table stood surrounded by banks of wall-recessed computer systems monitoring the conditions within the main facility.

            Harrison had remained in the antechamber to watch the containment door and listen for more survivors, either evacuees or Marines. From where he stood, he could see down the short corridor into the communal area in one direction, and down the tunnel towards the heavy containment door in the other.

            It felt like working in a giant fish tank.

            After Captain Coleman ordered Harrison and Sullivan behind the fleeing evacuees, they slid under the containment door and joined the mass of evacuees streaming into the Evacuation Center.

            Reaching the antechamber, both Marines were dragging two wounded civilians apiece and delivering first aid on the move.

            Bloody shoe prints still covered the white antechamber floor.

            They found the Evacuation Center in absolute human mayhem.

            The fifty-meter-wide octagonal communal hall contained a disorganized nightmare of wounded and hysterical people. Some tried to fight their way back towards the evacuation tunnel for family and friends. Watching these frantic struggles with huge eyes, a group of six unattended children huddled in one corner. Scattered everywhere, the badly wounded appeared as equally at risk of being trampled as of dying from their wounds. A dozen different languages shouted through the din. Any voice calling for order was ignored.

            Harrison knew he didn’t have a moment to spare. He drew his pistol and fired twice into the ceiling.

            The chaos paused and turned his way.

            He removed his helmet so everyone could see his face. He raised his voice so it carried with clear authority across the communal hall.

            ‘I want the five most senior staff members in the antechamber in one minute! I want all the wounded stabilized and moved to the medical clinic. I want hardcopy blueprints of the Evacuation Center, and every structural and mechanical engineer to start sealing off any points the creatures could access, including the top-deck doors. I want a communication system update and a list of all the missing and injured.’

            Harrison raised his voice even further, almost hollering, leaving no doubt that until
he
said otherwise,
he
was in charge.

            ‘My name is Corporal David Harrison, United States Marine Corps Fleet Anti-terrorism Security Team. I’ll expect status reports in five minutes.’

            And with that, after a moment’s stunned silence, people started moving with purpose.

            Fortunately, Harrison had every kind of professional available at his disposal. Private Sullivan coordinated the sealing-off of places the creatures might try to gain access.

            As the most senior staff member still alive, Dana Lantry proved the biggest help. A linguist fluent in four languages, the British communications officer worked through the task-teams, getting status reports and ensuring the right people worked on Harrison’s orders. Dana’s had been one of the voices calling for order during the earlier chaos, but now people listened. She quickly provided Harrison the facility’s blueprints and allocated a team to attempt a remote shut down of the C-Guard jamming transmitters.

            Group hysteria had passed, but it wasn’t far away. Crying and screaming from the medical clinic lessened as drugs kicked in.

            Harrison was double-checking the blueprints to make sure he hadn’t missed anything. He couldn’t afford to overlook even a single access point. If the creatures found a way inside the Evacuation Center, the evacuees would be slaughtered.

            He keyed his radio. ‘Sullivan, how’s the top-deck coming?’

            Sullivan’s reply sounded breathless from exertion. ‘Nearly done, but I don’t know how we can seal off the ventilation shaft and still expect to breathe.’

            Harrison knew what he meant. Without any information on the outside situation, they were in a difficult position to be making decisions. Were the creatures waiting up on the helicopter pad for the evacuees to emerge, or was the top-deck a viable escape route if the creatures compromised the Center elsewhere? If they completely sealed off the ventilation shaft, would help arrive before they needed to reopen the shaft to breathe? Harrison had to keep making decisions, even without the information.

            ‘Shut it down,’ he decided firmly. ‘I don’t want any surprises. Get an engineering team over there and do whatever you can to seal it.’

            ‘Copy that.’ Sullivan spoke quickly to someone in the background. ‘We’re finishing up here now. En route to the ventilation shaft.’

            Harrison removed his radio headset as he heard a strange scraping noise from the evacuation tunnel.

            He lifted his rifle from where it rested close-to-hand on the table.

            Moving to the antechamber’s sliding plexiglass wall, he peered down the tunnel and listened. The tunnel looked like a two-lane underground traffic channel. A single row of fluorescent ceiling lights stretched from the antechamber to the containment door. A small section down the far end of the tunnel was dark. Harrison couldn’t remember that section being dark earlier. The tunnel’s light switches were in his antechamber. The main Complex had no control of any of the Center’s facilities.

            At a glance, he could see that the light switch was on, so it had to be a faulty pair of fluorescent bulbs. At the far end of the tunnel, a spinning orange emergency light set above the containment door illuminated the darkened section every few seconds.

            Harrison watched the hypnotizing light sweep over the dark slab of the containment door.

            Behind that door, God only knew what was happening. He wasn’t receiving any responses to his radio messages. No one answered the Complex’s internal telephones or intercoms.

            Harrison had to assume he and Sullivan were alone.

            A large red button was recessed into the table where Harrison stood. The button controlled the plexiglass wall. If he hit that button, the entire wall would slide away and expose the antechamber to the tunnel. Harrison flipped up the protective lid, but hesitated.

            After a moment’s indecision he thumped the button. He reasoned that anything that could breach the steel containment door could also easily breach the plexiglass.

            As the barrier slid away, he heard the noise again. A scraping sound, and definitely coming from the tunnel.

            He stepped cautiously into the tunnel, turning his head to pinpoint the source.

            SCREEEEEECH!

            There it is again.

            Harrison directed his flashlight beam down the tunnel. It looked all-clear, but was he overlooking something? Some access hatch or maintenance conduit that led into the tunnel?

            Something moved in his peripheral vision.

            He almost whipped his weapon around to fire before he realized it was just a child. The boy stared silently down the evacuation tunnel. Harrison hadn’t heard the kid cross the antechamber. He must have slipped away from the communal hall.