It did not matter if you were deep in the Red Lab section, or one inch inside the bulkhead. If the containment alarm went off, those doors shut. If you were standing one foot in and one foot out, you were split like Solomon’s baby. They left no room for error … or mercy.
Gant had seen enough examples of what could go wrong; how one scientist's "whoops" could lead to a dozen deaths in the name of scientific security.
At that moment, the CONTAINMENT sign above the entrance went out.
Gant tensed, expecting an attack, and scanned the area with his tactical light while Twiste held his glow stick high like a torch, but it provided only a tiny radius of illumination.
Ahead of them from inside the Red Lab section came a new source of light as several beacons sprang to life, spinning and flashing yellow and red. Emergency lights, turned on — it seemed — for their benefit.
"How come I don't like the look of that?"
Gant answered, "For the same reason I don't."
As much as he did not like the idea, Major Gant realized that they had no choice. Apparently all their slinking about had come to naught; they were expected. Guided, in fact.
Together they crossed the threshold. The red stripes that had led them to the entranceway bled until they engulfed the concrete walls entirely.
Steel doors marked secondary laboratories. Most were hidden behind the concrete, but one offered a stretch of thick, laminated glass, allowing the research in one workshop to be viewed from the passage.
It was dark in there, but one of those spinning yellow siren lights provided enough flashing light for the intruders to see inside: test tubes, ancient computers, and a tall metal cylinder that Gant believed was a transmission electron microscope. However, the two bodies sitting at chairs among the equipment grabbed his attention more than the equipment itself.
With each yellow flash he discerned more features and realized he saw the mummified remains of two researchers sitting with their heads slung back, staring at the ceiling through black holes with decaying jaws locked open in an eternal scream.
The image made Gant think of a display at a museum: come see the dead scientists in their natural habitat!
His view inside the lab as well as everything behind went dark as the flashing siren lights clicked off, leaving them in total blackness yet again.
As had happened the last time, the dark did not last long. Soft track lighting — only half the bulbs worked — fixed in the upper corner of a hallway switched on, lighting the way, joined a few paces later by about half the bulbs in a couple of fluorescent lights.
Gant wondered if they should follow the prescribed path. Perhaps a brief retreat to regroup and find a new approach might be best. Yet he could not shake the feeling that their choices were limited, and he had grown tired of the mystery. He wanted to know his enemy.
They reached a four-way intersection where the lights ended, leaving the other passages shrouded in shadows. Ahead waited two large doors shut tight. Gant saw a sign posted there, and while it was too dark to read the fine print, he knew that sign marked their final destination: ground zero of the Briggs experiment.
Something moved to their left, just around a corner. Gant shined his tactical light in that direction and it fell — briefly — on a ghastly white face with big black eyes. That face retreated, so he did not fire, but he knew it had not gone far.
Another sound, this time to the right. That passage led to a large door displaying the word "disposal" below a biohazard icon. That door stood open, just a little. The major's tactical light illuminated several pairs of pale hands sporting spindly fingers.
At that point, he knew what was coming before he heard the sounds from behind. He did not bother swiveling his rifle around to see the creatures shadowing them.
The track lights and fluorescents switched off. Lines of red — like fiber-optic wires — turned on and ran the length of the hall, leading to the double doors.
Twiste glanced about nervously and said, "What the hell are those things? Is that what you saw outside the storage room?"
"Yes, I think so. For the most part."
"What do we do now?"
"We have two choices," Major Gant replied. "We could start firing and hope to fight our way out, but I don't think that worked very well for the rest of the team. Or we could accept the invitation and see where it leads. After all," he nodded at the bag Twiste carried, "that’s where we want to be, anyhow."
"I don't like those choices, Thom. Not at all."
"Me neither."
Side by side, they started toward the double doors. As they moved, Gant heard the scampering of feet, the snarls, the snapping of the creatures behind them moving to block that avenue of egress.
Before they reached the doors, Twiste touched Gant's shoulder and said, "Hey, um, Thom, I'm sorry about pushing you back there. You know, in the storage room. I just, well, you're a friend and I think sometimes you need a push."
"You might be right, Doctor. I hope we make it through this and you can push me some more. But for now, let's find out what this is all about."
Gant and Twiste reached the double doors and went inside.
22
Lieutenant Colonel Liz Thunder imagined the nicotine sliding down her windpipe. Then that feeling of calm, of satisfaction, of everything right in the world could move in and take over, chasing away the doubts and second-guessing. By the time she finished what remained of the pack, she felt sure she would not give a damn about the Red Rock Mountain Research Facility and all the problems therein.
Yet she hesitated. Why?
She stood outside in the sunshine for the first time all day. In fact, it felt like several days since she had seen the sun with all the clouds and rain that had blown through.
Still, she did not like the woods, so she remained close to the main entrance, sucking down big gulps of fresh air with the half-pack of Virginia Slims in her hand.
A cadre of unseen birds chirped while the sporadic movement of small animals — probably squirrels or woodchuck — disturbed a branch here, a leaf there.
It had been nearly four hours since the Archangel unit disappeared beyond the great vault door. Four hours since General Borman’s blow torches sealed that door shut, entombing them.
Oh, what's the difference, Liz? You've entombed plenty of people in the past, sealing them away behind a vault door of drugs and "'therapy.” It's all part of this nasty business. Just relax and have a cigarette. You'll feel better in a jiff.
As she wandered along the concrete slab that stretched around the perimeter of the building, she realized how much she had missed the sun. She realized that the fake light from the buzzing fluorescents of the sublevels could never match the real thing.
What are you doing here, Liz?
Now there was one of those questions she tried to avoid. It was right there along with “why did you do that?” and “is this really what you want?” Those were not good questions because she rarely liked the answers.
She gazed at the pack and imagined glowing embers devouring the paper inch by delicious inch, leaving ashes in their wake.
Movement from behind distracted her from the cigarettes' attraction. The main door to the facility opened and Corporal Sanchez emerged without seeing her. He stood and looked toward the sky, closing his eyes and craning his neck as if bathing in the afternoon air. Then he stretched his arms and let slip a quick groan as his tired muscles released.