to wait for an answer, he took off after the soldier, leaving me swaying unsteadily in the hallway.
I wanted to lie down, and really should have gone back to my room. But I’ve never been much for following orders, especially with so many questions left unanswered. So I waited a moment, and then followed him into the makeshift medical ward.
CHAPTER EIGHT
----
The screams I’d heard from the hallway hit me like a wave of sound the instant I slipped into the ward. Eerie moans echoed above the screaming, a real life chorus of the damned. The smell in the room was thick, coppery, and rancid. I did not want to know what the source was.
There were a dozen or so cots, all occupied by thrashing people. None of them looked good. Sallow, greenish-yellow skin tone, like jaundice with a bad case of mold. Blood and other fluids leaking from their mouths, noses, and ears. Some had raw wounds on their arms or legs while others had bandages seeping through with blood—or in some cases, nasty, foul-smelling blackish ooze. Most of them had restraints strapped across their arms, waists, and legs, along with metal collars around their necks. The straps were totally disturbing, and the collars were strangely decorated with a bunch of rings. It was just plain creepy.
There was a commotion at the far end of the room, lots of shouting and guys brandishing guns. Most of the hazmat brigade were down there, along with Gabriel. Like me, he wasn’t wearing protective gear.
I briefly wondered why, but then the woman in the cot nearest me started convulsing. Dark blood poured from her mouth and nose in scary quantities. Her eyes snapped open and for an instant we locked gazes. Thewhites of her eyes looked like bloody egg yolks; sickly yellow streaked with red veins. Thick red tears oozed out from under her lashes and trickled down her face. She opened her mouth and croaked out something.
I think it was “Help me.”
Then a fresh flow of blood caused the words to rattle and distort in her throat.
“I... I’m sorry...”
I backed away from her, wanting only to escape from the horror of the moment. My legs hit cold metal and I nearly toppled back onto another cot, this one holding a skinny African-American kid covered in red-soaked sheets. His eyes and mouth gaped open, blood oozing thickly from the corners. I would have thought he was dead, except for the occasional tremor wracking his body.
Pressing a hand to my mouth to force back the bile rising in my throat, I stumbled to the middle of the room, trying not to look any more as my ears filled with the grotesque sounds of throats closing up, then vomiting out foul-smelling liquids.
Why isn’t anyone doing something for these people?
Someone at the far end of the room growled, and it was a guttural, feral sound. My attention snapped back there in time to see one of the hazmat guys raise his gun, tugging back on a lever that made a nasty ch-chak , like the noise a shotgun makes in the movies when they rack a shell into it.
“Hold your fire.” Gabriel barked the order in a tone that cut through the chaos. “Don’t shoot it. We need to contain as many of these specimens as possible.”
Specimens?
“Use the poles. Just keep away from its teeth.”
I slowly approached the cluster of soldiers and medics, and saw that one of the creatures was loose. He... it was wearing one of the collars. The soldiers had poles, about six feet in length with spring-loaded clasps on the ends. No one noticed me as two or three of them tried tohook their clasps into one of the metal rings on the collar. The thing’s head was snapping from side to side, but I could see that he had once been a good-looking guy in his twenties. He wore the torn, bloody remnants of jeans and a white cotton, button-down shirt.
Wounds were visible through the shredded fabric, deep gouges in gangrenous sallow-green flesh.
“Matt...?”
My voice came out as barely a croak.
Matt’s head stopped moving as if my voice
I wanted to lie down, and really should have gone back to my room. But I’ve never been much for following orders, especially with so many questions left unanswered. So I waited a moment, and then followed him into the makeshift medical ward.
CHAPTER EIGHT
----
The screams I’d heard from the hallway hit me like a wave of sound the instant I slipped into the ward. Eerie moans echoed above the screaming, a real life chorus of the damned. The smell in the room was thick, coppery, and rancid. I did not want to know what the source was.
There were a dozen or so cots, all occupied by thrashing people. None of them looked good. Sallow, greenish-yellow skin tone, like jaundice with a bad case of mold. Blood and other fluids leaking from their mouths, noses, and ears. Some had raw wounds on their arms or legs while others had bandages seeping through with blood—or in some cases, nasty, foul-smelling blackish ooze. Most of them had restraints strapped across their arms, waists, and legs, along with metal collars around their necks. The straps were totally disturbing, and the collars were strangely decorated with a bunch of rings. It was just plain creepy.
There was a commotion at the far end of the room, lots of shouting and guys brandishing guns. Most of the hazmat brigade were down there, along with Gabriel. Like me, he wasn’t wearing protective gear.
I briefly wondered why, but then the woman in the cot nearest me started convulsing. Dark blood poured from her mouth and nose in scary quantities. Her eyes snapped open and for an instant we locked gazes. Thewhites of her eyes looked like bloody egg yolks; sickly yellow streaked with red veins. Thick red tears oozed out from under her lashes and trickled down her face. She opened her mouth and croaked out something.
I think it was “Help me.”
Then a fresh flow of blood caused the words to rattle and distort in her throat.
“I... I’m sorry...”
I backed away from her, wanting only to escape from the horror of the moment. My legs hit cold metal and I nearly toppled back onto another cot, this one holding a skinny African-American kid covered in red-soaked sheets. His eyes and mouth gaped open, blood oozing thickly from the corners. I would have thought he was dead, except for the occasional tremor wracking his body.
Pressing a hand to my mouth to force back the bile rising in my throat, I stumbled to the middle of the room, trying not to look any more as my ears filled with the grotesque sounds of throats closing up, then vomiting out foul-smelling liquids.
Why isn’t anyone doing something for these people?
Someone at the far end of the room growled, and it was a guttural, feral sound. My attention snapped back there in time to see one of the hazmat guys raise his gun, tugging back on a lever that made a nasty ch-chak , like the noise a shotgun makes in the movies when they rack a shell into it.
“Hold your fire.” Gabriel barked the order in a tone that cut through the chaos. “Don’t shoot it. We need to contain as many of these specimens as possible.”
Specimens?
“Use the poles. Just keep away from its teeth.”
I slowly approached the cluster of soldiers and medics, and saw that one of the creatures was loose. He... it was wearing one of the collars. The soldiers had poles, about six feet in length with spring-loaded clasps on the ends. No one noticed me as two or three of them tried tohook their clasps into one of the metal rings on the collar. The thing’s head was snapping from side to side, but I could see that he had once been a good-looking guy in his twenties. He wore the torn, bloody remnants of jeans and a white cotton, button-down shirt.
Wounds were visible through the shredded fabric, deep gouges in gangrenous sallow-green flesh.
“Matt...?”
My voice came out as barely a croak.
Matt’s head stopped moving as if my voice
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