Undead by Ryan W Aslesen

Author:Ryan W Aslesen [Aslesen, Ryan W]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781543945409
Publisher: BookBaby
Published: 2018-09-30T06:00:00+00:00

13

Zuckerberg stood in the doorway as the elevator came to a halt. No one spoke, though Max heard some nervous breathing, probably from Koontz. A mixed bag of body odor—half sweat, half adrenaline—befouled the air in the cramped elevator. Delorn, packed in next to Max, smelled particularly noisome. Like a wet retriever after a duck hunt.

The doors slid open. Zuckerberg swept the SAW’s barrel quickly left and right. “Clear,” she said, sounding bored as she moved from the elevator.

Max followed her out. The corridor looked as though it had been conceived by Satan’s interior decorator. Colors exerted an undeniable influence on human emotions, and the designers of this facility utilized them to great effect. Vermillion walls with three parallel scarlet stripes ran into the distance, while harsh lights, recessed into the mustard-yellow ceiling, glared down every ten feet to reflect from a floor of the same color. The bright lighting and garish, irritating colors instantly annoyed Max, who donned polarized combat goggles and stowed his NVGs when he knew the hallway was clear. He normally didn’t like to wear goggles but decided it was worth the precaution due to the pathogenic way the virus could spread.

“Stay on point, Trish,” Juno said. “We’re right behind.”

Koontz isn’t the only nervous one. Juno had been twitchy since finding her father’s research paraphernalia upstairs. Max dreaded having to remind her that rescuing Dr. Park was only a secondary objective. He hoped she could keep it together, whether they located him or not. His assistant is the leak behind this trap. Chances are they’re both dead already. That harsh reality didn’t require utterance. By this point she surely realized her father’s probable fate. Besides, we are probably next.

“Shit, who turned up the heat?” Delorn asked. The kid had a point; Max had already started sweating in his heavy undergarments.

“Radio silence,” Max ordered, halting all other verbal observations of the disquieting logistics and personnel level.

They first came to a vacant mess hall, the large room with its orderly rows of tables and chairs bolted to the floor visible through floor-to-ceiling Plexiglas windows. Juno motioned them past the glass double doors. Max would have preferred to enter and clear the kitchen—it would be spacious enough to hold many troops—but continued to march beside Juno as Zuckerberg stalked forward with the SAW. West took the rear again as they moved through this innocuous-seeming area.

They passed other closed doors, Juno translating the labels affixed to them: maintenance, janitorial, commissary department. “Pick it up, Trisha,” she said. “We need to find stairs or another elevator.”

Zuckerberg negotiated several turns and intersections as they moved on, always taking a cautious glance around the corners before proceeding. Juno called a halt just as Zuckerberg prepared to peer around a left turn in the hallway about ten feet ahead. “Barracks Area 1,” she whispered, glancing toward a closed pair of steel double doors on the right wall. “Get back here, Trish.”

Zuckerberg joined them and posted directly before the doors. Max flanked her on the right, Juno on the left.

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