'Rick, there is no one there!' Shane said
'I saw the camera move, I swear!' Rick said, as he stared into the camera.
'It's just automated movent, there is no one there, it's abandoned!' Shane said, as he tried to pull Rick away from the camera.
Rick pushed him back, and walked even further to the camera.
'I know you're in their, please help us, we're nearly out of food, water is running low, and we need shelter please.' Rick said, desperately.
But no response came, the doors of the center for disease control remained closed.
T-dog grabbed Ricks left arm, and pulled him back.
'Please! We have women and children!' Rick screamed.
'Look! I saw it move again!' Rick said as he pointed to the camera.
'Rick, look at me' Dale said.
'There is no one inside, everyone is dead' Daryl said.
The next moment the door opened.
The white light coming out of the door almost blinded them, it was that bright.
'Oh god' T-dog said.
'Who are you?' Rick said.
The bright white light started to fade.
A woman in a white coat looked at them.
She was aiming an assault rifle at them.
'Who are you?' she asked, while aiming the weapon at Rick's head.
'We're searching for hope' Rick said.
'That's asking an awfull lot these days' the woman said.
'I know' Rick
'You still didn't answer my question' the woman said.
'I'm Rick Grimes, former police officer' Rick said.
'I see' the woman said.
'I can provide shelter, but you first have to do a blood test' she said.
'All of you'
'And remember, once the front door closes, it won't open again, got it?' the woman asked.
The group shook their heads in agreement.
'Now come in, if it stays over for much longer, the biters will come' the woman said.
The group quickly folowed Rick and the woman.
Once they were all inside, the door immediately closed.
'Welcome to the cdc' the woman said with a dark smile on her face.
'Don't touch anything unless I give permission' she said.
'I will bring you to your quarters' she said.
'Where is everyone else?' Dale asked.
'Who?' the woman asked.
'All other docters?' Dale asked.
'Gone, there is only one person left' she said.
'Who are you' Rick asked as he looked at her.
'I'm docter Candace Jenner, head scientist of the cdc, specialized in disease cures and vaccines' Candace Jenner said.
Docter Jenner led the group down a narrow staircase just left of the main entrance.
As they walked further, they began to see research rooms, all behind thick glas.
Rick could feel cold air against his body, was this, air conditioning? he asked himself.
That was a feeling he never tought he would feel again.
'When it all started, things went down very fast' Jenner said.
'Before we knew, the army came to protect us'
'It all happened seventy-six days ago, operation Wildfire was started sixty-seven days ago' Jenner said before she stopped.
'This is it, the rooms are for four persons each, all have showers and baths, but go easy on the hot water please' Candace said, and she walked away.
'Did he just say hot water?' shane asked.
'That's what she said!' T-dog said laughing.
It was Rick's first warm shower for what seemed like an eternity.
The dirt from the months on the road fell from him, and when he was done, he felt like he was reborn.
To his suprise, the bathroom was even supplied with shaving knifes.
'How's going?' a voice behind him said.
When Lori touched him from behind, he could feel his heartrate rize like it was their first time.
'Want to test the bed?' she asked.
Two hours later the group sat in the CDC's cantine, which looked really empty without the personel.
'Take what you can, there is more than enough for everybody' Candace said smiling.
'Air normal, nothing to report, slight increase in carbon dioxide' a voice said loudly.
'Oh, that's the cdc's VI, she is almost completely self aware, and talks as you can hear' Candace said.
'Oh and VI, tell them welcome' Candace said.
'Hello guests, welcome' the computer responded.
'How long have you been here by yourself?' Dale asked, as he began eating.
'It has been at least eight weeks since I've seen a living soul other then my own' she said.
'Now eat, i've got work to do.
Candace Jenner grabbed one sausage, and was gone.
Carl looked at her leaving, and decided to follow her.
He took one last bite from his crossaint, and left the room as well.
Jenner walked fast like she was in a hurry.
It took al his effort not to be seen, he was afraid that the docter would hurt him when she found out that he followed her.
Carl followed her up a staircase, which ended in a small room that overlooked another enormous room.
Carl slowly climbed the staircase, extremely careful that he didn't cause any cracking sounds.
He slowly raised his head above the finale step, and he could see the docter sit in a chair, seemingly exhausted.
He decided to wait before he went on to his business.
He was so close, that he could even hear her talk.
Jenner picked one photo from the desk, and held it in her hand.
'I did the best I could in the time that I had' she said, fighting the tears.
'I hope you'd be proud of that' One tear rolled down her left cheek, and she put the photo back on the desk.
She slowly walked toward the edge of the office, which looked directly over the other, much larger room.
'We always think there is going to be more time, then it runs out.' Jenner said.
Before Jenner could see him, Carl was already gone.
The first night in the cdc, everyone slept like logs.
How long was it since they had a proper good night's sleep?
Three months? four?
Nobody knew.
The next morning came quickly.
The group had their breakfast in the same room as yesterday.
'Man, don't ever let me drink again.' Glenn said, while banging his head on the table.
'Hungover boy?' Daryl asked, laughing.
'Agghh' Glenn said, his head felt like it was on fire.
After half an hour, Jenner joined the group.
'Actually we didn't went here just to find a shelter, we came here for a cure' Rick said, while he looked at Jenner's eyes deeply?
'A cure?' Jenner said, almost like she didn't know what he was asking.
'I will show you guys something, all of you, follow me' Jenner said, and she left the room.
The group hurried to follow her.
'When this all started, we were hopefull that we could develop something to counter this in a few months time' Jenner said.
'What happened?' Rick asked.
'Complications, it proved extremely hard to even detect, before the cdc fell, we only succeded in isololating the virus' Jenner said.
'Vi, power up the workstations and the main projection screen' Jenner said.
'Powering up the workstations and main projection screen' VI responded.
The group gathered around Jenner in the middle of the room, right in front of the big projection screen.
'If anyone can't handle violence, please stand back now' Jenner said.
No one stepped back.
'VI, show testsubject 19' Jenner said.
'Showing testsubject 19' VI responded.
The big screen showed a MRI brainscan of a person lying on a table.
'Test subject 19 was someone who got bit, and donated his body to me, in an effort to find a cure' Jenner said.
The group all looked like they had never seen a MRI scan before.
'Scanning to first event' Jenner said.
'Scanning to first event' the computer responded.
'What is that?' Glenn asked as, he pointed to the screen, following dark dots that traveled towards the brain.
'The virus invades the brain like menigitis' Jenner said.
'Is that what happened to Jim?' Sophia asked her mother.
'Yes' Carol said.
Andrea began to sob.
'She lost somebody, two days ago, her... sister' Lori said.
'I lost somebody too, i know how devastating it is' Jenner said.
'Scanning to second event' Jenner said.
'Scanning to second event' VI responded.
'The brain goes into shutdown, then the major organs start to fail' Jenner stopped for a moment.
'Then death' she said.
Andrea continued to sob, her loss was still new.
'Scanning to final event' Jenner said after she swallowed once.
'Time of resurrection varries wildly, we have reports of it happening in as little as three minutes, the longest we heard of was eight hours' Jenner said.
'In the case of this patient, it was two hours, four minutes, seven seconds' Jenner said soflty.
The brain scan of the person on the table showed slight activity in the brain stem, long after the person had died.
'It restarts the brain?' Lori asked.
'No, just the brainstem, the frontal lobe, the neo-cortex, that doesn't come back, the you part' Jenner said.
'It's nothing like before, most of that brain is dark and dead' Rick said.
'You tell me if it's alive' Jenner said as she pointed to the screen.
'Just a shell driven by mindless instict' Jenner said.
The next moment, a gun appeared above the test subjects skull, and it was fired, destroying the reanimating brain.
'God' Carol responded.
'He killed his patient' Andrea said.
'I ended his suffering' Jenner said.
'VI, power down the workstations and main projection screens' Jenner said.
'Powering down the workstations and main projection screens' VI responded.
'Docter Jenner?' Dale asked.
'Yes?' Jenner responded.
'To what is the clock in the corner of the room counting down to?' Dale.
'That's the moment the station runs out of fuel' Jenner said quickly.
'Out fuel?' Rick asked.
'The basement power generators, they run out of fuel' Jenner said.
'And what happens when the clock reaches zero?' Lori asked.
'Then the station decontamination system takes over.' Jenner responded.
Rick, t-dog and Shane went down to the basement to check.
When they arrived they only found empty barrels of oil, Jenner was right.
Wherever they looked, they couldn't find a single drop of oil.
The last barrel they checked, in the corner by the generator, was also almost empty, next to nothing was left in the barrel.
'Looks like Jenner was right' Shane said.
An awful feeling began to creep onto Rick's shoulders.
They all ran back to the room where Jenner showed them test-subject 19 on the screen.
They found Jenner sitting in the middle of the room, her face hooked to the screen of her computer.
'What is happening?' Lori asked.
'Just like I said half an hour ago' Jenner said.
'Full decontamination of the entire station'
Suddenly the group began to realise what Jenner meant.
'No' Andrea said.
'Jenner please' and Daryl began to run for the door.
But Jenner was faster, and she closed the door immediately with a quick press of the button.
'Full decontamination commencing in 28 minutes' VI said.
'You looked us in!' Daryl said loudly, as he began to attack the door with an axe, soon joined by t-dog.
'That door was designed to withstand a direct hit from a rocket launcher' Jenner said.
'But your head ain't!' Daryl screamed, as he tried to attack Jenner with the axe.
The group barely managed to hold Daryl off.
'Jenner open that door now!' Rick demanded as he walked towards Jenner, who was still sitting on her chair.
'There is no point, everything topside is locked down, the emergency exits are sealed' she said.
'Well open the damn things!' Dale said.
'That's not something I control, the computers do' Jenner responded.
'I told you, once that front door closes, it wouldn't open again!' she said, reminding the group about what she said.
'It's better this way' Jenner said, and she returned to the computer screen.
'What is?' Dale asked.
'What happens in 28 minutes?!' Rick said demandingly as he looked at the clock, which was still counting down.
'Come on!' Daryl shouted.
Jenner jumped from her chair, and began to shout:
'You know what this place is!?'
'We protected the public from very, nasty, stuff!'
'Weaponized smallpox!'
'Ebola strains that can wipe out half the country, stuff you don't want getting out ever!'
Jenner regained her calmness, and she returned to her chair.
'In the event of a catastrophic power failure in a terrorist attack for example, H. are deployed to prevent any organism from getting out' Jenner said calmly.
'H. ?' Rick asked.
'VI define' Jenner said, her face in a sad expression.
'H. are high-impulse thermobaric fuel-air explosives that consist of a two-stage aerosol ignition. They release a blast wave of significantly greater power or duration that any other explosive except nuclear. The vacuum-pressure effect ignites the oxygen between five thousand and six thousand degrees and is useful when the greatest loss of life, or damage to structure is desired.' VI responded.
'It sets the air on fire' Jenner said.
Some in the group began to cry.
'No pain' Jenner said, her voice increasingly soft.
'An end to sorrow, grief, regret'
'Everything.'
The group was so shocked that no one could move for minutes.
The clock reached 15 minutes.
'My daughter doesn't deserve to die like this!' Carol said, crying with Sophia in her arms.
'A short moment, a millisecond, no pain' Jenner said.
But Carol continued to cry.
'Jenner, I think you lied' Rick said, with tears in his eyes.
'About what?' Jenner asked.
'About no hope, if it was so, you would have bolted with the rest, you didn't why?' Rick asked.
'It doesn't matter' she said.
'It does matter, it always matters, you stayed while others ran, why?' Rick asked.
'Not because I wanted to!' Jenner said, and got up from her chair.
'I made a promise, to him, my husband' She said, as she pointed to screen where the video's about test-subject 19 where played.
'Test-subject 19 was you husband?' Lori asked.
'He begged me to keep going as long as I could, how could I say no, he was dying' Jenner said.
'And now I will finally join him'.
'What about your research?' Dale asked.
'It all doesn't matter anymore, there is nowhere to produce a cure, it's impossible with one person' Jenner said.
'This is what takes us down, this is, our extinction event' she said and she returned to her chair.
'Your husband didn't have a choice, we do, that's all we want, a choice' Rick said desperately.
'Let us keep trying as long as we can' Lori said with tears in her eyes.
Jenner stared at Rick for a minute before she responded.
'I told you top-side is locked, I can't open those' She said, as she entered a code on a keypad.
The door opened.
The group immediately started to run.
'Here's your chance take it' Jenner said.
'I'm grateful'
'The day will come when you won't be' Jenner responded.
'Come on!' T-dog shouted.
Jenner looked at the group as they left the building running, somewhat pleased with herself.
When the group reached top-level, they found that it was indeed locked, there was no way out.
'Out my way!' T-dog said, as he attacked the window's glass with a table leg.
But nothing happened, the glass didn't even show a single scratch.
'The glass won't break?' Sophia asked.
'Come on!' Shane approached the window with his shotgun, and fired a shot at the window.
The shell ricocheted.
'Rick, the first day in camp..' Carol said before she was interrupted by Shane:
'Carol, I don't think a nail file is gonna do it'
'When I washed you suit, I found this in your pocket!' Carol said, and she pulled out a handgranade from her bag, and gave it to Rick
'All behind cover!' Rick shouted as he took the pin from the grenade.
'Ohhh shiiittt' Rick said as he laid the grenade close to the window, and he started to run.
With a loud bang, the grenade exploded, throwing Rick of his feet.
And the glass broke.
'Everyone, quickly!' Shane said as he stepped outside.
'They got out' Jenner said, still sitting in her chair and following the group by cameras
She looked at the clock, only three minutes remained until the H. where deployed.
She started to stare into the screen where the ts-19 video's where portrayed.
'I promised, for you, for our son' she said.
'Everyone down, down!' Rick said, as he watched his watch.
'Thirty seconds until detonation!' Shane said.
Suddenly they could see her.
Docter Jenner was going through to the same breech in the wall as they did.
She had changed her mind.
'Jenner down!' Rick shouted.
Jenner started to run.
'Down!'
'DOWN!' the group screamed.
Jenner jumped behind a pile of sandbags.
The next moment, the H. where deployed.
The explosion ripped through the air, and destroyed the entire CDC building in one, extremely powerful fireball.