Left 4 Dead: Gemini Strain.
Chapter XXXIV: Cognitive Development – Adam
The rain had stopped.
The only problem now with the weather was the cloud coverage that
left no light to escape the dark sky. We had managed to find what
appeared to be a museum and raced into its hold. We had done all
we could to block the doors we had entered in with various furniture
and hefty artwork we could find. Initially we were all too unsure
what the museum held but soon found that it was composed mostly of an
exhibit on Viking history and artifacts. None of this really held our
interest so much as a way to keep the Infected at bay.
"We
are getting close to the university..." Latvia said to me,
trailing off as she perused the routes that would lead us there.
Fortune smiled upon us with the convenience of the visitors booth
located in the main (if not almost utterly destroyed) lobby. There
were bodies littering the floor in various states or disarray, blood
in pools and scattered amongst the few exhibits in the main lobby.
What caught our interest was how a Viking warship managed to be
pushed in front of a rather large hole in the wall. Whatever the
reason was it allowed water from the storm to pool alongside the
blood and bodies and an eerie draft to breeze in and make us shiver
in spite of ourselves.
I wanted to make a joke about how
even Infected could not bear to go to a museum but considered how ill
humored that would be. Instead I took point near her and made sure
that I kept any Infected if they did manage to pop up away from her.
"If we make it to the university and the others are
not there...are we going to go on without them?" Latvia asked me
as she took her pen in hand and made sure to put our travel route in
bold enough script.
I was taken aback by her question and
pivoted on my feet to look at her with a shocked face. I opened my
mouth to say something but quickly closed it. Latvia was not looking
at me; her focus was on the map. The thought of abandoning my friends
if I alone had a way to escape the city had not crossed my mind at
this point. I was absorbed in my thoughts on moral and
ethical decisions to act swiftly enough to what happened next.
Maybe if I looked more closely I would have seen her grab her
neck uncomfortably Regardless it happened and she fell to the floor
in a heap.
"Latvia...!?" I exclaimed as I
ran over to her, bending down and examining her for some reason for a
sudden collapse. Her neck caught my eyes and then the dart soon
followed. It seemed lethal just by the look of the cold steel
appearance. Before I could manage to bring my handguns at attention a
sudden kick to my shoulders made me launch to the floor. Again I
tried to ready myself but a foot reached my throat first. I struggled
to breathe, my energy focused on removing the foot from my throat. I
glared with angry eyes at the one above me.
"Adam, I'm
kind of enjoying how I always seem to catch you off guard like this."
Cassius said to me in his usual way. The pressure from his foot was
enough to make me gasp for air but not enough to make me pass out.
His face changed from a smirk to one that was all too serious. He
looked at me with those cold blue eyes and addressed me. "Adam,
we need to talk."