Prologue
"We've got orders from Maryland. ZEUS has been spotted multiple times in this area, one of the reports has something interesting to say."
"He's carrying a girl in his arms."
"Within the span of time he retrieved her from the Central Core Hive. Considering our… sudden cut of communication from our regular watch, we assume our small-time doctor has decided to play side. Your task is to retrieve Dr. Bradley Ragland and Dana A. Mercer from St. Paul's Hospital. Secure any work of the doctor's as well. Understand, soldier?"
"What about ZEUS, captain?"
"As far as I know, nothing can survive a nuke."
The deafening roar of the helicopter's rotors droned as four Blackhawks soared over the water of East River. Upper East Side Manhattan wasn't the glimmers of glasses of high rise buildings, but it was nonetheless marred by the hellscape of trailing smokes of fires from further south and in the west. It was strange to see the rubbles of warzone amidst the townhouses that stood side by side – all the more made it easier for the infection to grow from one building to another.
Thousands of lives were housed within those walls throughout the decades. Now a whole street was gone, reduced to nothing but ruins in the purging.
It was a despairing scene they could see in every part of Manhattan. What was there to save if this was the remains?
"NYC looks fucked," a man radioed at the sight before them. "They say Hudson's river filled with barges of just skinheads."
"Shit's still on fire too," commented a veteran, voice scratching into their headset.
"Thank fucking God we're on retrieval," said another.
"You guys spoke too soon."
"Jesus, Mary, and Joseph…"
They hovered by the harbor, overlooking the remains of a white aged square building. At the very center, a square tall tower sat right on top, standing out like a sore thumb. Attached to the side, a small semi-modern addition was placed as part of its grand entrance… or should be. A whole chunk of the south side of the building was missing, smashed through right under by something big enough to make a section of the building collapse into the ground. The streets surrounding the hole was crawling with Walkers, and already red meat moss was growing from the corpses of New York's citizens.
Hell had decided to open its mouth.
"Red Crown, Red Crown. This is Thunder Two-Fifteen. We've got a situation here. Infected have breached St Paul's Hospital. I repeat, infected have breached St Paul's Hospital. They have dug… a giant hole right at the location. Standing by for order. Over."
"I thought they're headless…"
"Secure the area," the clipped voice of Red Crown ordered shortly. "Commence Operation Ark."
"That was quick."
"We're going in there? Like in there? In that hellhole? Hellhole filled with skinheads and fuck-knows-what."
"You heard Red Crown, Commence Operation Ark. Thunder Two-Fifteen, clear the area for landing."
"Copy that, Lieutenant."
The screams were instantly heard the moment the red smokes of BloodTox spilled from the canisters deployed, the slow pace of Walkers turned into a frenzied fury. It spoke of their lack of minds when they didn't run away, but towards the BloodTox tanks instead. Their mountain of bodies trying to extinguish the red viricides from seeping into the streets. Something was commanding them. Something was still there.
Nothing says calm before the storm like the thunderous fury of 30mm bullets puncturing the flesh of infected coming out of the woodwork with an orchestra of M4 and M16 rifles firing. As cheerful as the tune was, it didn't stop the pessimistic thoughts lurking in the back of their minds. If Dana Mercer and Dr. Bradley Ragland were not amongst the casualty, that meant one thing. They would have to venture down into that hole beyond the reach of convenient air support and easy cavalry – no thanks to the cowardice of Col. Taggart and Zeus leaving Blackwatch's command a goddamn mess.
With the state of the building, a missing morgue, and a giant hole in place of it, that situation was becoming more likely.
"Hydras at three o'clock."
The Blackhawk tilted and swerved as a piece of 740 pounds of pure asphalt was thrown straight through hundreds of feet of air towards the space they've occupied. With a few paces, it would have hit them and sent them spiraling down into New York's cold water. In retaliation, Thunder Two-Fifteen sent two rockets down accompanied by two Blackhawks raining metals onto the streets of Manhattan, the deep booms thundering even through their gears.
The bloodcurdling roar of a Leader Hunter came expectantly, and in reply, the sound of a pack followed.
No commands needed to be made, all four Blackhawks simultaneous changed their priorities. They retreated further away from the harbor, beyond the reaches of the perches on buildings with the cold river water below as their moat.
It didn't discourage the one Hunter when it jumped, leaping towards them from a building, only to fall few feet off its mark and down into the water. It actually wriggled in panic, water splashing and surged into a wave at its pathetic flapping, a clear obvious runt of the family.
The veteran laughed, "Look at it go."
"Seen my cat do better."
The Blackhawks paid no mind to the spectacles, instead they focus-fired on the leaping creature that was clearly aggravated by the preys being beyond its reach.
A Hunter threw a car, only for the makeshift missile stopped short by the cheerful whistle of a rocket blasting it off its course. Another one followed its siblings, throwing a grey truck right after and a Blackhawk was quick to stop it. It was like watching a pack of apes at a zoo throwing sticks only to have the sticks uselessly bounced back against the glass wall that separated animals from humans. The persistence though was what made them dangerous, as they kept throwing something, Blackwatch had to quickly change its focus from Hunter to hazards.
A pattern the Leader Hunter took advantage when all the Hunters focused-fire. The sound of Thunder Two-Twenty exploded when an asphalt smashed into the cockpit followed by another two flying hazards sending the helicopter careening down with screaming men tumbling down into the water.
Thunder Two-Fifteen and Two-Eleven rained fire and metal at the brief opening with Two-Twelve making short work of the stunned Leader with a blast of a Thermobaric missile.
"Dumb thing in the end."
"But it's smart and learning, trying to mimic what we just did."
"Well… it's a smoldering corpse now."
The street sweeping season continued until nothing more remains but piles of punctured corpses waiting to be burn. In the stifling peace, two Blackhawks landed in the empty streets. The men of Blackwatch spilled out from the Blackhawks and onto the ground – soldiers in black nuclear-biohazard-chemical gear, wearing a dark blue full body skin-suit beneath the standard military webbing, their black tactical helmet equipped with vision goggles and gas mask. They spread out across the field, rifles raised and ready to shoot on any remains of Infected.
Their executive officer glanced with distaste at the living fluid crawling out from the corpses. Even when brains were blown to mush, and its hosts dead, the infections always find a way to persist.
"Burchfield!" he called out.
A D-Code snapped and turned. "Sir!"
One of the many super soldiers from Project D-Code, he was a tall hulking giant of muscles that put bodybuilders to shame, easily stood out a head higher than the other men. An experiment made possible from a dose of the mother virus and the surgery they undergo that implanted the metal spinal supports all could see protruding on his back. His body suit was grey instead of the typical navy blue, and he wore a rectangular box, a black camera device of a sort pressed up against the top part of his gas mask. It was a built-in mobile viral detector meant to spot out the skin-shifter amongst the men of Blackwatch.
"Lead your team to the hospital. There's probably some fresh-brewed Walkers in there," he ordered the giant.
"With pleasure," the hulking soldier grunted and stomped off.
"And get me some Sandhogs here," he ordered the rest of his men.
His gaze turned towards the hole gaping before them. It was at most within the span of a hundred feet diameter, narrowing down into a crack that sharply descent. It widened further, encompassing into a chasm that swallowed the morgue down under. Uncanny in design, like it was purposely made to make it easier for… Walkers to climb out.
From the infrared sensor of his vision goggles, he could see dim glows stirring within the abyss. Heat, which meant more living things.
He pulled out his radio. "Red Crown, this is First Lieutenant Thompson here. I'm going to need a team of HUSAR to clear up some rubbles here ASAP. Over."
"Copy that," she said. "A team would be on the way within an hour."
He looked up from the hole then at the remains of the platoon. One Blackhawk was gone, one gunner, one pilot down, eleven men waiting for confirmation. Thunder Two-Fifteen could be heard hovering near, searchlight on and scanning for survivors from the crash in the water.
"Secure the area, rendezvous at fifteen, and prepare for descent," he ordered the rest.
"…fuuuuuuck."
"Stow it, soldier!" Their sergeant barked.
It was under the subtle glaring gaze of aggravated Sandhogs that had been herded into some pen during the Outbreak, miraculously given back tools of trade despite the massive lack of infrastructure Manhattan needed to coordinate resources, that two squads of Blackwatch prepared in front of the descent.
Red smokes of BloodTox rose from down below, covering the backs of a team of Marines' Heavy Urban Search and Rescue looking through the wreckage. Sounds of loud construction and clanging of equipment securing rubbles in place echoed loudly. The blinding construction lights were set up in front of the entrance. They shone down the hole, revealing more rubbles and broken leaking pipes sticking out of the ground. Some of the men hoped they weren't going to deal with New York's sewage system, because dealing a hive on top of whatever shit waiting for them down there was what they just needed.
"Lieutenant!" A voice called down below. "We've located a body. It's the doctor."
"Dead?" He radioed the team.
"Nah. He's one lucky sonofabitch. Trapped beneath the rubbles," the radio reported. "He's still conscious… barely."
"The Infected didn't bother digging him up?"
"Looks like it. Wait, he's got something to say."
He raised an eyebrow from beneath his gear. "What is he saying?"
"Talking about some anti-viral drugs. Slows down the infection. She needs it."
She? Dana Mercer?
"He's not making much sense. I think he's delirious."
He made a disgruntled sound before he said, "I'll be sending the extraction team down there." He turned around, gaze resting on the squad standing around the D-Code. "Once the HUSAR given all clear, extract Dr. Bradley Ragland," he ordered.
"Burchfield, you're in command. If we don't hear us back by…" He pulled out his radio then glanced at the afternoon sky that had the gall of Fall's sun shining brightly through the grey clouds. "Twenty-four hours from now on, blow the tunnel into smithereens."
"Copy that, sir," the D-Code drawled. "You're taking the experimental weapon?"
"Got to test the peashooter out," he said with a grimace.
"And I'm stuck with them," muttered a soured Blackwatch with said peashooter equipped across his chest instead of the standard issue M16 rifle.
It was an inauspicious black tranq rifle with ammo capacity attached to it. A glorified non-lethal air gun made lethal in the field of monsters capable of soaking bullets. Tranq shouldn't even work on infected considering human beings themselves had varied results when it comes to drugs in their system. Some took more, some took less to affect, and that same amount could easily kill the next person. With the resilience of the infected stack on top, he doubted the tranquilizer was a reliable weapon to dish out the damages they needed.
This was the next best thing their weapon's department came up with? Apparently, the darts within were filled with some strong bio-chem, strong enough that they were told to handle them with care. If it broke from its casing, it will kill the person within a second of contact.
It clearly wasn't BloodTox they were handling. BloodTox starts to have an effect if it was saturated at an environmental level, not within 100ml of liquid.
"Ready men!" He barked at the restless soldiers geared up with light and heavy weaponry at his side.
"Sir!"
The click of climbing gears and kicks at some loose debris at the edge, they started to rappel down the hole. One of them made one last sign of the cross before he followed his team down. The glaring lights above slowly became distant, the sharp slant rectifying into a solid foothold they could stand on. Amidst the red vapors of BloodTox, their platoon leader waited in front of the HUSAR's team leader. In comparison to the typical tri or double lens of Blackwatch's NBC gear, the Marine wore a gas mask with a clear visor.
"This was what the doctor was asking to give you. Says it's urgent for you to administer it," he said, passing what looked like two cases of insulin shots into the Lieutenant's hand. "Right now, my team is trying to secure the wreckage around him before we bring him out." He gestured at the cleft of rubbles.
"How did he manage to survive all of this?"
"We found him in what's left of the hospital's cold chamber. Probably caught off guard while he was in there. We'll continue the search-"
"Let me remind you that you are standing on a quarantine area that was overrun by the infected. If you found any survivors, let my men handle them," he said briskly. "Do you understand, Marine?"
"Yes… sir."
He turned away from him, joining the rest of his troop waiting ahead.
Without another word, the troop began moving. They entered the stifling darkness, climbing even further down beyond the grasp of the red vapor of BloodTox and the glaring lights. Asphalt, concretes and debris slowly gave away to the hard rocks hundreds of feet below Manhattan. The sounds of construction became echoes that thumped in the distant.
The blue lens of their helmet gleamed in the dark, night vision and lights turned on to light their way ahead. The air slowly grew thicker and warmer, the skin beneath body suits began sweating uncomfortably in their march, the stench of rotten meat growing stronger even through the mask.
The ground and walls were soon met with familiar pulsating veins rooted in the rocks.
"You think it's a good idea to bring the big guns down here, sir?" A Blackwatch spoke. "You know… close quarters, explosions, unstable underground…" He gestured the anti-tank missile launcher on his shoulder.
"Must you?" Another spoke out with an annoyed voice.
"If you have any other idea that could do the same job effectively against the stronger Infected, do so and tell me, soldier," their lieutenant called out drily. "Besides, I don't think you have to worry about narrow space down here." He looked around at the cavernous arch around them, hundreds of feet wide and tall, carved meticulously but jagged as if chewed through by something with sharp teeth and spat out of the other end.
"I have a feeling this tunnel had handled something worse in them," he told his troop.
"You think it's that big thing that attacked Time Square, sir?"
MOTHER has been said to be tunneling an underground hive, giving the Infected unrestricted movement and growth with no means for air support and artillery to stop them. It was a method they assumed the Infected were using to get out of the island, digging through the Red Line right beneath their nose and under the rivers. The plan to use BloodTox pumps at Time Square was to stop this from happening.
To be honest, he wasn't sure how extensive these tunnels system was and how far MOTHER had managed.
They were literally in the blind.
"That's the worst outcome," he told them.
They were silent. It didn't need to be spelled out, meeting one of the worst Infected variants hundreds of feet underground without the help of proper fire support and in close quarters says everything about their prospect down here.
Black heavy boots continued to march, thick soles stepping on a layer of a web made of soft flesh that throbbed and pulsated in a slow breathing pattern. Nothing was said, only the subtle breathing behind masks was their company down here. Their nerve tightening when they encountered nothing after what seemed an hour meandering down here.
The ground subtly shook, and the troop paused.
Hands slightly shifted their position and weapons were hefted up in ready. The shaking grew stronger, not just under them but all around, a tremor they could feel in their bone.
"Move NOW!" their lieutenant barked.
Rocks around them crumbled and burst. Something long and pointy slammed out of the walls, pinning down two of the men suddenly. Their screaming cut short when they were punctured and slid through by the long slender beak that gave away to a slithering flesh.
Worm-like. Split jaws. Up close, he had forgotten how huge a Hydra was – long enough to count as a building, wide enough to crush a car underneath them. They were so unassuming from high above but deadly in their unpredictably to appear anywhere underneath. Down here, it was everywhere.
The ceiling and floor shook, more came out all around them above and below, front and back, from all sides. The tunnel suddenly growing teeth of them.
"Deploy the canisters of BloodTox!"
The clang of metal cans and hiss of viricides vapor being released, someone launched a missile. One Hydra dismembered from its beaks in the deafening explosion, the bones and jaws shattering into bits. It quickly retracted back into the hole from where it came, but more kept coming in its place. They surged out of the ground between his soldiers, separating his men from others as pillars of flesh that were enclosing them in.
The tunnel shutting its jaws down onto them.
Then someone shot the peashooter dart multiple times amidst the useless gun firing.
The moment the dart met the flesh, the moment the Hydra eerily screamed. Its flesh seemed to grow a large pimple instantly from where the dart was before the parasitic growth burst and melted into fluids, bleeding the Hydra continuously than it could heal as something within ate its inside up and spit it out. Its flesh oozed and slid away from its bones as it violently thrashed, crushing more of his men in its wild swiping. Someone shot three more into it, the agonizingly slow and deadly effects sped up and grew stronger, paralyzing it when it feebly twitched in mid-motion.
It was being bled dry. It was melting. The hot blood and fluid seeped up to their ankles when it slammed down to the ground. All done within minutes but still too slow to his liking when he remembered the men it crushed before its inevitable end.
"Shoot it, shoot everything with it, fucking shoot it!" someone shouted.
That someone did as three more Hydra had followed suit by some darts hitting their flesh, the ground shaking when they roared shortly just before their large tendril body collapsed, hot thick fluid splattering onto some of the men when they crashed. The result was instant.
They ran away, retracting and retreating into the ground. Something scared them so much, hurt them so much, they rather ran away, and it was inside those darts.
Everyone stood in silence, the thick air still hissed of BloodTox vapors escaping from their canisters punctuated by the sound of someone hyperventilating loudly from the ground. That someone was the one holding the peashooter up. Everyone looked at him expectedly, and he clutched the tranq rifle possessively to his chest in answer.
"Sir, why didn't we have something like this earlier on?"
"It's a recent development they've just discovered," he spilled this out. "There wasn't any need to weaponize it before until… now."
There was no Hydra, no Hunter, heck… no fucking ZEUS in all the previous outbreaks Blackwatch has dealt with. No previous outbreaks were a catastrophe, unlike Manhattan. Bullets and the firepower they had were enough to shut down all previous ones for the last forty years and were also less dangerous to handle unlike whatever in that lethal air-gun.
"Samples," their lieutenant suddenly said. "Gather samples. That's one of the conditions of using that," he ordered his men.
"What the hell is in that gun?"
"I'm not supposed to know so you should shut up too. Go and help your squad mate instead," he snapped and looked around at some of the soldiers pulling up one of them off the ground.
They were a shaking mess, he inhaled sharply then he looked down and stared at his own gloved hands smeared by something then at his boots in the thick puddle of infected fluid. He could feel the uncomfortable heat of the Hydra's blood on him.
He crouched and dipped his gloved hand into the puddle before he brought it back out. It didn't feel alive but looks could be deceiving. When human and animal bleeds, it was just tissue, but Infected fluid was alive, every little part of it an individual thing with the instinctual sense to spread, grow and protect its own life. A troublesome trait that resulted to meat moss, crawling tendrils, and hives built from the remains of Infected bodies. ZEUS was said to slurp these fluids with his feet if it wasn't sucking the Infected dry with its consuming.
Hence the burning of corpses, cut off the infection's food supplies.
He stood up and sauntered over towards a cannister on the ground, his hand hovered over the BloodTox vapors hissing from it. Through the green night vision of his lens, he saw the fluid just dribbled and dripped down his hand like liquid, not defying the rules of gravity. Dead matter. The lab was going to need to examine this.
The fact the tunnel wasn't reduced to holes of Swiss cheese from the Hydras' digging said something about the structure itself. A carpet of meat had sealed up those worms' entrances. The ground a landmine of craters and holes already covered with throbbing roots crawling over it. They weren't standing on a pile of dirt and rocks, they were standing on a web.
They knew where they were down here.
This flesh could feel them with each step, could count how many preys had entered their domain and like a spider's web, the sensation would travel up and be felt by the heart of this giant fucking hive – while his men down here wander in the blind.
"Anyone of you who can stand, stand now!" he said and gave them a minute before he asked, "How many of us left?"
A quick glance at those capable, his Corporal said, "Twelve."
He came here with twenty-one men, and instantly nine of them were down.
"The injured?" His voice hardened.
"Will be dealt with, sir."
"If you can't do it," he said loudly. "Bring me to them. Salvage their gear before you do."
"Sir." The grunt nodded.
He heard three shots fired. One in the head, two in the chest. It wasn't unheard for someone to survive a shot in the skull. The shots in both lungs were to ensure they don't. If they really want to be sure, they would check to see if the eyes dilate.
Another three shots were fired.
"Sir, should we retreat?"
It would be the smart thing to do. They didn't have the resource nor the firepower to deal with whatever was down here.
"We still have the demolition equipment with us?" he asked and turned towards them.
"Yeah."
"We'll go a bit deeper, set up the explosions, just to give them something for the hell they caused," he said to his group of soldiers. "The rest of you who wants to retreat, retreat. You have my permission."
Their blue lens gleamed in the darkness. None of them moved, they stood as one, as Blackwatch.
"Fuck that," someone said. "When we hunt. We kill. I didn't come here to run."
He smirked. "No turning back now."
Onward they went, deeper into the heart of these tunnels, passing the oozing corpses of the Hydra on the ground. The sounds of their heavy boots marching muffled by the layer of flesh squelching from each step they made. From the distant, they could see shambling silhouettes of human beings. Walkers. They gurgled and croaked like their lungs were thick with some fluids in their shuffling to some direction ahead. In an instant, one of them screeched with all suddenly turning around, rushing towards them.
"Save those darts for the bigger ones!" He quickly commanded. "The rest of you, open fire!"
They tore into the numbers of Infected easily, thinning out the crowds with the occasional grenade launcher fired to stop them overwhelming.
A furious roar of a Hunter echoed and shook the ground they stood on. Even out of its element, in a tightly enclosed space, it was quick to leap from spot to spot, clinging to walls and ceiling with its claws to avoid the missile shot at it, and it was heading straight towards them.
A dart stabbed into its shoulder, it squealed, collapsing onto the floor and stumbling in confusion at its sudden useless limb attached to it. A missile made short work of its head, the impact of the explosion shattering the bones of its skull with the burst of fire swallowing the rest of its body.
They continued their march, clearing out the tunnel of occasional Walkers, the thundering of guns echoing throughout the tunnel until they were back to walking in silence again.
An eerie moment of respite that made them stood more on edge.
"Feels like we're being watched," one of them said.
Then they found it, an intersection. From the large pimples and bulbous growths on the walls and ground, that squirmed and twitched of something growing inside, to the thick unbearable heat and stench of rotten meat, the air roiling alive as the tunnel breathed. They stood on the inside of a hive with the tunnels splitting off to different directions.
In the center of it all, a pale white body laid curled up on the pulsating ground of flesh, as if put there carelessly.
"Scout the area, and set up the explosions," their lieutenant ordered before he marched over with three others accompanying him.
She wore a long hospital gown that covered up to her knees, the sleeve short and ended up just above her elbows. She laid out on her front, her arm sprawled out and resting by the side of her head, her short-cropped hair matted and clump, a droplet of sweat slid down from her head. She was peacefully asleep despite the side her face pressed against a pulsating source of infection, her mouth just a breath away from the throbbing rotten meat.
Twenty-year-old college girl out of place amongst the wrongness that surrounds her.
None of them wanted to make a move towards her. Their lieutenant subtly glared at one of his subordinates until one of them reluctantly moved. He kneeled down and turned her body over, examining her face.
"It's her, lieutenant," he reported.
"Give her this." He pulled out the insulin shot from one of the pockets of his military webbing and tossed it to him.
"You think it would help after she's been down here for hours?"
"Better than nothing," he replied.
The case popped when the soldier quickly opened it before he inserted the needle randomly into her arm, injecting the antiviral drug with a press. He pulled the needle out once done and started to position her, ready to pick her up and hauled her over across his shoulders.
"Wait."
The trooper turned towards him.
"Your boots." They all pointed, flashlight landing on the ground at his feet.
Tiny tendrils crawled up from the ground, attaching themselves onto his boots and creeping up to his legs like clinging vines. He quickly jerked his foot up and tugged, pulling hard and snapping strands of the tendrils when he did.
He wasn't alone in this dilemma as others noted their own legs getting caught up with this entanglement and did the same. Someone twisted open a canister of BloodTox and dropped it onto the ground, red fumes carpeting the floor. In an instant, the flesh darkened and wilted into dead matter, easily torn off with a sharp pull. The tendrils were quick to learn and crept away to avoid the fumes.
There was a shuddering exhale, a tiny whine and a sob escaped, everyone turned to the body hyperventilating on the ground.
"Uh… sir!"
The creep-flesh had quickly amassed over her, weaving into a blanket of flickering tendrils that was trying to cover and swallow her into a cocoon.
It was trying to shield her from the BloodTox.
"Get her out of there now!"
Someone was quick to grab Dana Mercer's arm and tried to pull her out of that thing that was swallowing her, but the growing cocoon stubbornly held on. Not one budge even when he put his foot down on it and pushed against as he pulled. His leg just ended up sinking into its flesh instead, and now he was trying to wrestle himself out of the thing as tendrils quickly climbed up the leg of its new prize.
"Get me out of this thing!" he shouted.
"The dart! Shoot the dart into it," their lieutenant ordered.
"What if it hurts her?"
He couldn't answer, the soldier pressed the trigger and shot the dart into the thing. The flesh of the cocoon around the plastic needle quick to melt, it spewed the thick fluid out, but the sudden burst of dead matter soon became a slow dribble.
It was fighting off the sickness.
The ground beneath them shook violently and exploded under, sending them all flying. Pointy beak snatched the soldier with the tranq rifle in mid-air, its jaw snapping the screaming man in half before throwing the body and the gun further away from reach.
They were fucked.
Gunshots fired at the Hydra from further off, it simply just soaked in the bullets when it rose even further out of its hole. The men on the ground struggled to get up, the tendrils on the floor snatching onto their arms and body into place, pulling them in towards the cocoon.
"Lieutenant!"
He struggled and tried to pull away, he felt his boot sinking down into the thing as he struggled to fight off the tendrils pinning his arms to his body. Every ounce, every drop of strength in his muscles screamed when he forced his body to push. The infected flesh on the floor ripped out of the ground in his grasp for a foothold. He breathed heavily as he felt himself sink further into the flesh of the cocoon, his eyes glancing at the other two men being pulled alongside, one was even panicking in his screaming to get away. He then rested his eyes on the rest of his soldiers further off in the tunnel, shooting at the Hydra.
The tendrils crept up his chest and on his neck from beneath his military webbing, the weight of their presence hot and heavy even through his body skin. His lungs heaved, and he swallowed deeply to clear his throat.
"BLOW THIS FUCKING PLACE DOWN UNDER!" he screamed his last order.
He couldn't hear the rest, he couldn't see the rest, the back of his head locked and pressed against the hot flesh of the cocoon as tendrils crept up his face and around his gas mask, the creep-flesh covering the lens of his goggles.
Then it swallowed him.
'Help me.'
Spread.
'Alex?'
Home.
'Please. Help me.'
Light.
'Where are you?'
Hope.
'I don't want to be here. Please…'
Red.
'I'm scared.'
Mother.
It was wet, everywhere around him, on him, in him, in the back of his throat, in the back of his eyes, in the pit of his stomach, in his lungs that fought and heave.
It was hot, scalding hot even.
The taste in his mouth bitter and salty, metallic. Sweet.
The heartbeat in his ears roared.
There was nothing but darkness. A darkness that steadily pulsed, almost lulling.
He shouldn't be here.
Gregory Thompson twitched.
Why was he here?
What was he doing here?
He stared at the depth of darkness stirring around him. A part of him was aware there was someone behind him.
A comforting presence that made him calm. He burrowed his face and nestled in, the taste in his mouth salty and sweeter.
Ark. He twitched again. The Ark. They lost the Ark. Got to get it back.
They fucked it up. They took it away. Let the animals escape.
Got to get it back.
Had to clean up after them. Had to deal with this bullshit.
He needed to do something.
He shouldn't be here.
His hands moved and tightened, he could feel the tip of his fingers pressed into his palms.
He shouldn't be here.
Gregory jerked and kicked. His feet met something soft but thick, a flimsy stretchy material when he pressed his legs against it.
Got to get out. Got to get it back. Got to get her out.
He kicked again, punching right through and his foot met the slippery ground. He frantically kicked and pushed again, forcing his way through, digging himself out. His head was first to emerge from the cocoon and he was immediately greeted with cooler and dry air. With a firm grasp on the outer layer of the shell, he tugged his arm out repeatedly then pulled himself out with a shove, stumbling into freedom and landing onto the still beating scorched-ground, a thick puddle of warm fluid spilling out with him.
Charred flesh and meat marred with cracks met his hands. His chest heavy with tendrils clinging onto him, and he quickly tore the flesh off his suit in his brief crouching before he remembered.
Turning around, he dug back into the cocoon, blindly searching in the dark until he firmly felt the body. Then he pulled, and he pulled hard.
There wasn't any struggle this time. She easily came out from the cocoon that he slid his footings from the fluid and landed on his back with her in tow. On his back again, in the hive, surrounded with pulsating infected flesh filled with the virus, covered in a mess of fluid, he laid there drowsily staring at the woman asleep by his side and all he could think, sleep would feel good about now.
Got to move. His body jerked and lifted itself up. Got to get back. He crouched down by her head then pulled her up to a stand, took her arm and tucked his head under her armpit, her arm going over the back of his neck then down his other shoulder. He bent down, hooking his arm over the back of her knee then lifted her up, her stomach pressed against the back of his shoulder.
Got to get back. Got to move. He stumbled when he walked towards the tunnel, passing by the remains of his men and the burnt body of the Hydra, its fluid feeding the hive as it slowly repaired the damages done to the nursery.
Got to get out. He walked with the weight resting heavily on his shoulders. Got to move.
Sleep would be good, his eyes drooping as his feet stumbled beneath him. He quickly caught himself and keep moving.
He's done worse, had trekked worse, had carried worse. This wasn't bad. This wasn't fucking fifty-four hours of boot camp. There weren't forty miles of bullshit.
This was Manhattan. This was the Red Zone. This was a fucking underground hive that had killed all his men.
He stumbled and collapsed to the ground, landing on all four. The girl's body slid off his back and onto the ground. His chest heave, throat threatened to choke, and he realized he has been holding his breath in. His hand jerked towards his helmet and tore the gas mask off, the cooler air met the face of his skin.
He immediately moved to the side and vomited the content of his lungs, the infected fluid escaping from his body.
Oh God, he wanted to lie down so much.
He collapsed back to the ground then turned his eyes towards her. She slept peacefully like a baby, a part of him felt like prodding her. Got to get her out. Got to get out. He crawled over and reached out with his gloved hand. He shook her.
She didn't stir. He stared. Sleep would be good, he thought and slowly laid down right beside her.
Sleep would be good.
Fingers brushed the corner of his bottom lip. He briefly opened his eyes to stare back at hers. Her eyes gleamed in the dark like yellow cat eyes. Her breath hot when he felt her exhale on his face. Her nose a mere inch away as she laid right across him.
Why wasn't he wearing his mask again?
She continued brushing his lips in a repetitive rhythm then slipped her finger in. He was suddenly aware the coppery sweet taste in his mouth and he felt some bit of it escape from his lips. He sucked his breath in and swallowed, a small part of him realizing he had just lapped up and tasted the tip of her finger.
She smiled.
'They listen to you. Will you listen to me?'
Gregory jerked awake, he was met with the sight of a sleeping woman across him. He quickly pulled himself up and sat there on the ground, gazing at the surrounding around them.
It wasn't pitch dark down here. He blinked. He could see the shapes of the rocks, the jagged and smoothly carved formation of the tunnel.
He could see in the dark. He turned and rested his eyes back on the girl. Her eyes shut, deeply asleep as she should be, but still too close to his liking.
He exhaled. He was fucked either way.
But at least, at least he could give one last fuck you to the Infected. He got up and walked back into the hive, or the remnants of it if the marks of chemical burn and black scorch mark were a clue. He searched the ground, found only cold brass of carbine bullets but didn't give up.
His eyes finally landed on the familiar shape of a rifle and he reached down to the dismembered body on the ground. He unclasped the tranq gun and put it over his neck before pausing at the military webbing. A quick search of the content, he found the samples within. Unbuckling his own, he switched gears.
He got back up, quick to check the darts left in the tranq gun then he made his way back to the tunnel where she waited.
He lifted her up over his shoulder and simply just marched towards his exit without further ado.
A morbid thought wondered if he was even going the right way, was this even the tunnel that they got in?
He really didn't care. He wasn't going to last anyway, so wandering endlessly down here wouldn't be the worst of it.
He marched in silence, aware the missing footsteps that had walked alongside him in the beginning, his breathing was his only company.
He walked for a long time, an hour or two, or even more until he felt the slight incline up. He began his climb. From the distant, he saw the light at the end of the tunnel. He could also hear the loud pumps of the familiar BloodTox blowers and he hesitated at that.
What did it matter? He was going to get shot anyway, put out of his agony. He sniggered and continued his climb before he started to cough violently. Mild allergy, shitty flu, whooping cough, he thought to himself. She slightly slid down his back and he hefted her up, only to frown when he found a thin film of translucent membrane starting to coat her body.
He wasn't alone with his mild allergy. He laughed.
Up he went, the distant glow growing brighter and brighter. He was finally bathed under the glow of glaring lights, back to hard concrete, back to the clean ass-paprika of BloodTox, back under Blackwatch's gaze. The air alive with the sound of helicopter's rotors in the distant. What he would give to be in one of them right now.
He heard a thundering slam and he slightly flinched when the D-Code landed in front of him.
"Hey Burchfield," he said quite calmly and couldn't help grinning.
He was losing it. He had a sudden urge to laugh loudly.
"Lieutenant Gregson," the D-Code drawled.
"It's Thompson, you fucker," he replied testily.
The giant just stared at him from behind his black rectangular device.
"You're infected," he said.
"No shit."
"You're still alive and still you."
He looked up and stared, squinting at the glaring lights that shone down from behind the D-Code. "How long have I been down there?" he asked.
"Sixteen hours."
It felt a lot more than that.
"Pass me your radio," he ordered.
Sergeant Bryan Burchfield gave a pause before he pulled it out and handed it to him.
With a click of a button, he exhaled, mentally preparing to say one simple line. "Red Crown, this is Lieutenant Thompson. Mission accomplished."
"Status report," she said coldly.
"Twenty… twenty-two down. I lost them all. Down there."
She said nothing but what to expect from the goddess of Death, Warfare, and Victory. You pray to her for reinforcement and for the rain of fire, not a pat back for a job well done. He passed the radio back. "Well, do your job, soldier," he told the D-Code. "With a bullet, please. Not your fists," he added quickly.
He wasn't sure if the super solder had grinned or not when he stared at him from behind that rectangular box. "You haven't let go of the care package." Burchfield pointed.
Strangely, he barely felt her presence at all. He paused and glanced at the weight on his shoulder. Slowly, he knelt and laid her on the ground, made a quick mental decision right there to place the rest of his gears down too. It was during that moment, Burchfield had taken his pistol out and was now pointing at him.
"It's been good working with you, Lieutenant," he said courteously.
The shot came expectantly, a puncture through the left lung, then the right.
The head came next.
The third bang and the bullet whizzed past his ear.
He had just dodged a point-blank shot to the head.