Contaminated: A Zombie Survival Novel (4 page)

“
Identification please
.”

“Um, Alpha, Tango, One.” Arthur smiled when the lock audibly clicked and the door opened. He took a quick glance inside. A single bed with sheets folded neatly on top, and a set of towels and robe were on top of a small dresser. Drawers built into the wall waited to be filled. With a smile, Arthur turned toward the man. “Can I see the lab now?”

“Yes, of course, but just in case you forget, the showers are directly across from your room.”

Arthur tossed his bag of clothes into the room and shut the door. He didn’t plan to spend much time in this room. He jogged to catch up with his tour guide and slid into the elevator just as it was about to shut.

Thirty seconds later, a pristine corridor of white walls hurt his eyes, but they adjusted after a few seconds.

He walked behind the man all the way to the end of the hallway. A door with the name Dr. Covington stood in front of him.

“Open it, your lab awaits.”

Arthur examined the wall and found a small button. He pushed and once again gave a drop of blood and his eyeball to the security system. When he heard the hiss of the door and saw what waited, he felt like a kid who just got all his favorite toys for Christmas.

Every piece of equipment he’d asked for and a few he didn’t recognize waited to help him unlock the secrets of the universe. He stumbled in, looks of awe and shock fought for control of his face.

“You’ll have three lab assistants and two guards in here at all times. The window over there is the observation room. Be in it when you run your tests. On one of the upper floors, we have another team working on more minor things, but should you need help with something, feel free to ask them to send someone down.”

“This is amazing,” Arthur said in a timid voice.

“Pay attention, Doctor, I don’t have all day. Your room is on the dormitory floor along with the showers, so please make use of them. We don’t want you falling over from exhaustion. The cafeteria serves three meals a day, try not to miss them.” The man adjusted his tie as he frowned at what Arthur knew was a rumpled and scraggly appearance. “This is a highly secured facility and each room requires a certain type of clearance. Do not try to enter a room or level where you are not allowed. In case of an emergency of any kind, security measures will lock down each floor. A signal will be sent to the main office and a rescue team will be sent.”

“What could happen? We’re just going to examine rock samples?”

“I like to prepare for every possible scenario.” The man walked toward the exit as he spoke, “The team might take a while to break through the security protocols on each level to access the stairs. The elevators will be shut down as will all other power except emergency lighting.”

“Nothing like that will happen, will it? I mean, this is a safe place right?” Arthur asked in a worried tone.

“For your sake, I hope not. Goodbye, Dr. Covington.”

Arthur watched the man leave and felt a weight lift off his shoulders. He walked over to the computer and turned it on. Three hours later, he’d created his username and password, downloaded his data to a tablet, and read the operation manuals of all the devices at his disposal.

He inspected every square inch to make sure he was well acquainted with his home for the next few years. The one thing missing, and he kicked himself for not thinking about it earlier, were the samples.

A black phone sat in a cradle on his desk, but it lacked numbers, all he saw were names. Upon closer examination, he realized it was to other places throughout what he viewed as an underground compound.

Pressing the number one for storage, he waited until a female voice answered. “Storage, what can I do for you, Dr. Covington?”

Spooked for a moment that she knew who he was, he realized there was a small screen that displayed incoming numbers.

“Um, yes, I was wondering where the samples are I’m going to be working with.”

“Go to the back of your lab. Press the button marked ‘Samples’, then take your pick of one,” she said in a tone one would use with a child.

Arthur felt like an idiot. “Thanks,” he mumbled as he hung up.

So much for knowing every inch of the place, then again, the button was hidden behind a loose piece of paper warning about the use of stairs in case of fire. He jabbed the small circle and grinned at the four sets of drawers as they rolled out of the wall in staggered levels. Scanning them with a careful eye, he selected two, both of which he remembered pointing out for the rover years ago. They still held their odd color and something inside of him knew they were the ones.

A moment later, the specimen drawers were back in their safe place and the two rocks he chose were in separate trays. Shedding his ragged blazer, he pulled on a pristine lab coat with his name embroidered on it.

First things first, he needed to weigh the samples and determine their density. Weights were entered into the computer as well as the volume when placed in water.

The computer beeped letting Arthur know the results were ready.

“.5 g/cm³ for a rock that weighs 14 grams and has a volume of 12 cubed cm? This has to be wrong,” Arthur said as he stared at the computer screen.

He ran the tests again and used a diamond tipped saw to cut a sliver from the other sample as he waited. He placed the wedged shaped piece on one of the examination tables and turned on the light from below. The internal computer took several readings, but what could not be put into data bytes was the array of colors on the ceiling, some of which Arthur never saw before.

“Dr. Covington, what do you think you’re doing?” a feminine voice demanded.

Arthur couldn’t tear his eyes away from the display. “My job, what does it look like?”

“Mr. Monroe made it clear you were to have three lab assistants at all times, as well as two guards, and most importantly, be behind the damn observation window when running tests.”

The voice trailed off and Arthur assumed they were sucked into the amazing display of color above him the way he had. A click and it disappeared. One of the guards, armed with what looked like a Sig P232 stormed into the room and picked Arthur up by the lapels.

“You will do as told or I will kick your ass out of here, understand?”

Arthur nodded. The man put him down and the assistants went to work putting on their suits.

“What are you doing?” Arthur asked.

“Did you read any of the protocols about running this lab? Are you even competent to do the job?” a young female asked him. The nametag on her white suit read Williams.

“I’m more than capable; now just tell me why you’re putting those damn things on. I haven’t even run any tests yet for your information, so you can stop yelling at me.”

“The suits are for safety, because some of the samples gave off peculiar readings. Whenever we’re in the labs with specimens, we wear these.”

Arthur caught the suit tossed to him by the less scary looking guard and examined it, lightweight, durable, and easy to move in. The Tyvek name gave him some consolation so he slipped into it. The breathing apparatus felt constricting and the goggles over his eyes fogged up. The helmet top made him feel like an idiot, but he did as told. He sighed, if this was the only concession, he would find a way to live with it.

He picked up the paper-thin bit of rock and put it in the machine that he liked to think of as the pulveriser. In seconds, nothing but dust remained. He pulled out the small vial and examined the contents. Tiny particles caught stray bits of light, but there were other things floating to the top.

Arthur poured the powder into the mass spectrometer and pressed start out of habit.

“Behind the observation window, remember?”

Arthur felt himself pushed aside two seconds before the machine blew up with enough force to launch one of the assistants across the room through the Plexiglas of the observation room.

Noises echoed around Arthur and his ears rang from being so close to the source of the explosion. The lights flickered then went off, as did the computers, and everything else. Arthur felt a wave of dizziness take hold and his last thought was how pissed off “the man” was going to be.

Arthur managed to blow the lab up on his first day of work, which had to be a record of some sort.

Chapter 4 –

John Hooks took a sip of coffee, which caused him to make a face at the bitterness. Operation Covington went into effect a few hours ago and he bet the poor bastard still hadn’t figured out he was a prisoner. Then again, his obsession with those rocks would keep him busy and hopefully not asking questions any time soon.

He read over the data once more, wondering what the unidentifiable compound had the potential to be. If his company could corner the market on a new source of fuel, Sunset Inc. would control the world. If there was a potential vaccine for cancer, he could charge people whatever he wanted, because of the limited supply.

Of course, there was always the possibility of it being nothing more than a neat new flavor of gum, or bacteria that ravaged the Earth of all its resources. He forced a chuckle to ward off the dark thoughts.

Lately, his mind wandered to the edgier side of things. Dora, his wife said it was because of his close call with death a few months ago. Out of the blue, his heart had seized while he was playing a round of golf with friends.

Today was his first official full day back at work, and though his doctor told him to take it easy, the fatigue taking him over let him know he’d pushed too hard. He shut down his computer, and picked up the phone to call Dora, when a red light on his desk went off.

Crap,
he thought, that light was never supposed to go off.

John felt the blood drain from his face and flow to his overworked heart. Why the hell was that light on?  Project Covington hadn’t been active for a full twenty-four hours yet, well at least part of it. He started running his own tests a week ago when the rocks first arrived, but his people were doing something different. His assistant, James Barrow, burst into the room, his ashen face a match to John’s.

“Sir, we have a problem.”

“Thanks for stating the obvious. Do you have anything else to add or should I hire a trained seal to do your job?”

“Sorry, the last few moments of footage we received showed an explosion in Dr. Covington’s lab. It seems he took a sample of rock, ground it up then placed it in one of the machines. Seconds later, the machine exploded. We lost contact ten seconds later.”

John took a deep breath and reached into his pocket to pull out the small container of nitroglycerin his doctor gave him for situations like this. He placed the small pill underneath his tongue and forced his breathing to even out.

“I take it, normal security procedures have been enacted?” he asked James.

“Yes, sir, the entire facility has been locked down. What do you want to do?”

“How long until emergency power kicks in?”

James looked uncomfortable. “Not sure, the electricians are looking into it.”

“Motivate them to look harder,” John yelled.

He needed to think. A small lab explosion was nothing to get too worried over. It could’ve been caused by anything; faulty equipment, a crossed wire, misuse of the machine, and lastly, what was placed inside to be analyzed.

He never thought these rocks could contain something that he could weaponize. With tensions rising around the world over oil shortages, this was the perfect time to come out with a brand new “I can kill you more” weapon.

The samples were now priority one.

“Get a strike team ready. I want Monroe to head it up.”

James stuttered as he spoke, “Monroe won’t like that.”

“I don’t care what he likes. He does what I tell him to do, or I find someone who will.”

James left the room to make the necessary arrangements, while John picked up the phone to let Dora know he was going to be late for dinner.

He could tell she was mad. After thirty years of marriage, he knew this was an expensive weekend away somewhat upset. He forced the thought out of his head and pushed the power switch on his tablet. He’d had the electronics division connect him directly into their feed so he could monitor everything in the facility.

No one could sneeze without him knowing about it. He called up fifteen minutes of footage before the accident. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary, except two things. On Level 14, he saw an unfamiliar face meddling with some vials, dropping a few on the floor. The second thing was on Level 8, a technician wandering around the room and stopping in odd places.

John tried to zoom in, but he couldn’t see anything. A minute later, the screen went blank. Dr. Covington’s mishap triggered their security protocols. Each floor would be locked down, no going up or down. The elevators would be shut down, as would communications.

Certain floors would now be “armed” in case anyone was trying to steal from him. Monroe was the only one familiar enough to send in, and if he was lucky, come out alive. John glanced at the time. A full three minutes had passed and he still had no visual. The one thing he wanted maintained under any circumstances was visual.

“James, why don’t I have visual, dammit?”

The empty room didn’t respond, but something about this didn’t seem right. He would take notes on what he saw and get James to investigate.

***

Frank eased his feet up on the seats next to him. A glass of 100-year-old Scotch swished in the glass on his stomach as the limo moved at a steady pace to the airport. His phone vibrated and he ignored it. The third time he glanced at the caller ID and almost fell off the seat when he saw the corporate number.

He cleared his throat and answered, “Monroe, what can I do for you, Mr. Hooks?”

Frank swallowed the amber fluid in one swig and grabbed the bottle to prepare for the bad news he felt coming. That idiot Covington did something; he just knew it.

“
I need you to turn around. A strike team will be landing at the airstrip in four hours. You need to have a plan ready to take them into the silo and protect the samples. The damage appears to be minimal, but I want eyes in there and the place up and running in seventy-two hours
.”