Chapter 2:
When I woke in the morning I was alone. Daryl wasn't on the couch. I got up and changed into a pair of jeans and a light t-shirt. I grabbed my sweat jacket out of my bag and slipped it on, zipping it up quickly. It was hot outside because of the Georgian heat, but in the CDC building it was chilly. I wasn't going to take advantage of that. I might have been cold, but I'd rather be cold than hot and sweaty. I walked out of the bedroom and into the dining area where we all had dinner the night before. When I got out there, everyone was there besides a few of the others.
"Good morning, everyone." I said cheerily. Offering a smile to everyone and sitting at the table next to Lori. Rick walked into the room sitting in the seat next to me.
"Mornin'."
"Are you hung over," Carl asked his father with a smirk. I smirked along with him, remembering everyone drinking last night at dinner. "Mom said you'd be."
"Mom is right." I let out a chuckle.
"Mom has that annoying habit." My sister mumbled with a smirk.
"Eggs! Powdered…but I make 'em good!" T-Dog walked away from the stove carrying a skillet full of said eggs and putting some on Glenn's plate. "Protein…helps a hangover." Glenn grumbled.
"Don't ever, ever, ever let me drink again." I laughed at Glenn's obvious discomfort and no doubt headache from the amount of alcohol he consumed last night.
Shane walked into the dining area. As soon as he walked in I could feel tension. It was quiet until T-Dog broke it.
"What the hell happened to you," Shane sat down across the table from me. "Your neck…?"
"Musta done it in my sleep." I raised my eyebrows while looking at his neck and the scratch marks. I didn't know Shane like that but I was pretty sure he didn't do that in his sleep.
"Never seen you do that before." Rick said.
"Me either…not like me at all." I watched as Shane's eyes shifted towards my sister. She looked up at him but quickly looked back down at her plate a few seconds later. What the hell was that? I decided I didn't want to know. It probably wouldn't be something I approved of or even wanted to hear come out of my older sister's mouth.
Lori was never the…brightest. She always got involved in things she shouldn't have. Rick was a great man and a great father. If anything was going on with her and Shane, She better stop it. I told myself I'd speak to her about it later. I continued to eat my breakfast but every few seconds I'd look towards Lori. Every time her head was still down and trained on her food. Soon Jenner appeared.
"Hey, Doc, I don't mean to slam you with questions first thing—" Dale started.
"But you will anyway." I thought he reply was a little rude. He must not be that much of a morning person. Then again, not many were as happy as me in the morning.
"We didn't come here for the eggs." Andrea told him. Jenner lead us to the main floor, where the computers were.
"Give me play back of TS-19." Jenner said while typing a few things in on his computer. The animated voice of Vi brought up the big screen in front of us. On the screen in front of us were four small frames of a brain some zoomed in farther then others and a bigger version showing a face and a brain. "Few people ever got a chance to see this, very few."
"Is that a brain?" Carl asked him.
"An extraordinary one…not that it matters in the end. Take us in for an EIV." Vi expanded stating what an EIV was—an enhanced Internal View—and the bigger frame of the face was zoomed in. The brain had flashing lights in it.
"What are those lights?" Shane asked. I knew what those lights were. I took a course on the brain while I was in college. Who knew it would have come in handy. While everyone looked confused I knew what those lights meant.
"It's a person's life—experiences, memories, it's everything. Somewhere in all that organic wiring, all those ripples of light, is you, the thing that makes you unique—and human."
"You don't make sense, ever?" Daryl accused Jenner.
"Those are synapses—electric impulses in the brain that carry all the messages. They determine everything a person says, does, or thinks from the moment of birth to the moment of death." I explained. Jenner looked at me and nodded.
"Death," Rick questioned Jenner. "That's what this is? A visual?"
"Yes or rather the playback of the visual."
"This person died," Andrea asked, moving closer to the screen. "Who?"
"Test Subject – 19. Someone who was bitten and infected and volunteered for us to record the process. Vi, Scan forward to the first event." I looked up to the screen again, watching as the lights that were flickering so much before grew lesser and lesser. The brain started to get darker.
"What is that?" I asked.
"It invades the brain like Meningitis." The entire brain grew dark, pitch black, as Jenner spoke. I watched as Andrea took deep shallow breathes as Jenner explained what this virus did to the body. He eyes became watery and it looked like at any moment she would start to cry. I bit my lip, something I always did when I felt sadness fall over me.
"She lost somebody two days ago," Lori spoke up. "Her sister." Lori looked at me, her eyes turning sad. I looked away from her. Yesterday I didn't know if my family was alive and two days ago Andrea had lost her sister. I didn't know Andrea at all but I felt sorry for her. Nobody deserves to have to suffer from a dead of a loved one but in this world it was a given. I don't know what I would do if I lost my sister, or Carl, or even Rick. I bit my lip even harder thinking of it.
"I lost somebody too. I know how devastating it is." Jenner spoke to her. "Scan to the second event." I looked away from the group to the screen again. "The resurrection times vary widely. We have reports of it happening in as little as three minutes. The longest we heard of was eight hours. In the case of this patient it was two hours, one minute, seven seconds." Jenner knew the time by heart. I realized that this person, TS-19, was someone very important to Jenner. I felt my chest constrict as the realization dawned on me. This world was just full of sadness and death. Even the living were like death with the amount of it they—we—had to see.
Before, the brain was all dark. Now there were small lights flickering in the brain again. It looked as if the brain was being restarted. "It restarts the brain?" I asked, voicing my thoughts.
"No, just the brain stem." Jenner explained. "Basically it gets them up and moving."
"But they're not alive." Rick stated.
"You tell me." Jenner motioned to the screen. Jenner explained more, "The frontal lobe, the neocortex—the human part, that doesn't come back. The 'you' part. Just a shell driven by mindless instinct." Suddenly a bright light flashed and a streak went through the brain.
"My God, what was that?" Carol asked. I looked at her slightly before answering.
"He shot his patient in the head. Didn't you?" I looked to Jenner. He didn't look at me or answer me. He walked away a little ways before speaking again, only it wasn't to me.
"Vi power down the main screen and the work stations." The screen that held the visual of the brain turned black and the computers turned off.
"You have no idea what it is, do you?" Andrea asked him.
"I could be microbial, viral, parasitic, fungal."
"Or the wrath of God." Jacqui put in.
"There is that." Jenner replied. I wasn't very religious before the world went to hell. I sure as hell wasn't going to become religious in times like this. Maybe God was punishing us. Maybe we're punishing ourselves. I didn't know.
"Somebody must know something. Somebody, somewhere!" Andrea spoke.
"There are others, right? Other facilities?" Carol added.
"There may be some…people like me." Jenner started but was cut off by Rick.
"You don't know? How can you not know?!"
"Everything went down…Communications, directives, all of it. I've been in the dark for almost a month."
"So it's not just here? There's nothing left anywhere? Nothing? That's what you're really saying, right?" I pried. He didn't reply as we all just stared at him, waiting for an answer.
"Man, Imma get shitfaced drunk…again." Daryl said, walking away a little bit, putting his head in his hands, rubbing at his face.
"Doctor Jenner, I know this has been taxing for you and I'd hate one more question but, that clock," Dale pointed to a clock on the wall. "It's counting down. What happens at zero?" I looked at the clock. It changed from one hour to fifty-nine minutes. I bit my lips again, this time out of anxiety. I seemed to be doing that a lot lately.
"The basement generators…they run out of fuel." Jenner said quickly. He was obviously hiding something.
"And then…?" Rick asked. Jenner only walked away. "Vi, what happens when the power runs out?" Vi's voice sounded.
"When the power runs out Facility wide decontamination will occur." That was my breaking point. Rick, Shane, T-Dog and Glenn all started to go find the generators but I spoke out.
"Why are you going to go check on the generators? There's less than an hour of fuel left! Jenner! What does facility wide decontamination mean?! Jenner!" The four guys stopped and stared at me, as well as the rest of the group. The lights above flickered before finally turning off. "Jenner what the hell is happening?!" I yelled.
"Zone five is shutting itself down." Was all he said.
"Hey! What tha' hells that mean?!" Daryl called out to Jenner. Jenner ignored him. "Hey, man, I'm talkin' to you! What you mean it's shuttin' itself down? How can a buildin' do anythin'?"
"You'd be surprised." Jenner simply replied. "It was the French." Jenner looked at me.
"What?" I snapped, confused. What did the French have to do with this place shutting itself down?!
"They were the last to hold out as far as I know. While our people were people were bolting out the doors and committing suicide in the hallways, they stayed in the labs until the end. They thought they were close to a solution."
"What happened?" Jacqui asked.
"The same thing that's happening here. No power grid, ran out of juice. The world runs on fossil fuels. How stupid is that?!" Shane jumped up to Jenner speaking something. I was too focused on Rick telling us to get our things. I quickly turned around, heading for the room I had shared with Daryl. I was the first one to get into the hallway leading to all of our rooms when I heard the sound of heavy metal closing behind me. I turned quick to see a heavy door closing, separating me from the rest of the group.
"Shit." I started banging on the door. "Open the door! Open it! Open the damned door!" I banged on the door continuously until my hands hurt. "Shit!" I swore. I turned quick and ran to my room. I grabbed my bag quickly before leaving the room. I stopped in the threshold of the door before grumbling and going back in to throw Daryl's bag over my shoulder along with mine. I quickly looked around the room before seeing a crossbow sitting on the couch. I grabbed it taking it with me.
I headed back the way I came before dropping the bags and Daryl's crossbow on the ground. I heard banging coming from the other side. I started to bang on the door again after hearing the muffled voices from the group behind the door. I couldn't make out what they were saying. I could tell they were screaming though. This door was made out of a heavy metal. If they were just speaking to each other I wouldn't have heard them, not even their muffled voices.
I started to panic. Panicking wasn't a good thing to be doing right now but I couldn't help it. I just got back my family after thinking they were gone for so long. I couldn't bear losing them. Whatever was going on in there, whatever reason Jenner decided to close this door, wasn't a good thing. I didn't want to know what decontamination meant. I knew that I was going to be dying alone though. I didn't know how to get out of here. There was obviously a stairwell somewhere, but I didn't have time to look for it. I wasn't goo with direction and I'd get myself lost. I stopped banging on the door walking over to the wall and slid down it, putting my knees up and my head on them. I wrapped my arms around them taking a deep breath. I started to think of all the good times I had before the apocalypse.
I thought of my college graduation. I remember my parents' faces, the happiness and pride was in their eyes as I walked up to get my diploma. I remember Lori's face too. She was already married to Rick at the time and I looked up to her. I hoped to have someone like my sister did. Rick always loved my sister. I don't think anything could stop that man from loving my sister. I wanted that unconditional love she had from Rick. Now that the dead rose up, I wasn't going to be experiencing that.
I thought of the day Carl was born. I was only fifteen when Lori had Carl. There were complications during birth but they both made it out alive, obviously. He was such a cute little boy and he's grown into a handsome young boy. My sister was so lucky to have two amazing boys by her side.
I shook my head and stood up. I had to find a way to get back into that room. I walked to the door to see if there was any way I could get it to open. Just as I walked up to the door, it opened. Daryl was at the door and almost ran into me on his way to get in the hall. I backed up quickly, bending down to get the bags and crossbow. I threw him his stuff and followed him down the hall. The rest of the group got their bags while Daryl, Rick, Shane and T-Dog ran to a stairwell and started running up it. I followed them. We got to the main lobby, glass windows were in front of us. We all took turns trying to break it. Daryl used an axe, T-Dog used a chair, I used the butt of my pistol, and Shane shot at it with a shotgun. It didn't break. There were only scratches left on the window.
"Rick! I have something that might help." Carol came running up to us, a hand in her purse.
"Carol, I don't think a nail file's gonna do it." Shane snapped. I gave him a dirty look. Carol pulled her hand out of her purse, he hand shaking. I gaped at her hand in disbelief.
"You're first morning at camp, when I washed you're uniform…I found this in your pocket." In her hand was a grenade. A grenade! Rick grabbed it and ran to the window. We all ran away from the window, me running to Lori and Carl covering them with my body as Rick pulled the clip on the grenade and dripped it, running towards us. A few seconds later a loud bang sounded along with the sound of glass breaking. We all got up and ran for the window. Daryl was the first out, me second with the help of Daryl. Daryl turned around and started to kill off walkers that were starting to come our way. I helped Carl and Lori out before turning and heading towards where Daryl was going. Ahead, there was a line of cars: an RV, a couple trucks, one with a motorcycle in the back and a jeep.
I let Carl and Lori run ahead of me, following them into the RV, Rick and Glenn behind us. I heard Lori, over the loud beating of my heart and the pounding of my head. I looked to where she was pointing to see Dale and Andrea coming out of the broken window. Rick started to hit the horn while Lori screamed out of the RV's window telling them to get down. I was confused as they all got down covering their heads. Rick pushed my head down right as soon as a heat wave hit us. Right as soon as I felt the immense heat I heard a loud bang. I waited a few seconds before I looked up. The CDC was no longer. IT was a pile of concrete and flames. My jaw dropped. What was that? Rick looked up, started the RV and started to drive off. The rest of the cars, I'm assuming, followed.
I didn't know where we were going now. I didn't know where they were before the CDC but I felt as if it was their last hope of safety. The CDC made me realize something...maybe my idea of a safe haven wasn't realistic. In this world, safe didn't exist anymore.
Here's chapter two! Tell me how you like it! I forgot to put a disclaimer on the first chapter so here it is:
I, BLArensman, do not own the characters of The Walking Dead. I don't own anything affiliated with TWD. I only own Lenni and the plot of Glory & Gore, nothing more, nothing less.
-BLArensman xx