It was almost like civilization.
True, the Keeley Center was old and abandoned, but it remained mostly untouched by the undead. For all practical purposes, all of the employees were just coincidentally on holiday at the same time. Five found herself more unnerved by the vapid emptiness and relative stability of the place compared to the dark laboratory hallways of the facility she had explored the day before.
Five peered around quietly, and, for the hell of it, pressed a round little button in the wall. To her complete surprise, it lit up and she heard a shuffling from in the wall.
"The elevator works here!" she cried to Sam and Dr. Myers.
"What—an elevator?" Sam replied incredulously. "Ride it, ride it! It'll be fantastic, just like a roller coaster—well, not exactly, but compared to what we have now—"
"Focus, Five," Dr. Myers interrupted. "Don't go in that elevator. We'll lose signal with your radio, and if it breaks or gets stuck, that'll be a whole mess of problems we don't want to deal with."
The elevator doors clanked open invitingly, but Five turned away from them with a wistful sigh.
"All right, Dr. Myers. Taking the stairs then, the old-fashioned way."
When she reached the third floor, Five began searching for the proper room once more.
"Okay, Runner Five, you're on the third floor now," Dr. Myers said. "Do you see— just in front of you is an office labeled Dr. Samuka. He was Paula's liaison with the government here at the Keeley center." The door was right in front of Five and she entered, looking around the room. It was like a miniature library, filled with books and papers and maps. "I need you to check through his files. we're looking for anything labeled VS-72. Or Pandora Haze. It might take a while."
"No, we haven't got a while!" Sam gasped. "Look!"
"What?" Five said urgently, freezing in the middle of checking through some folders.
"It's a…"
"That is a man moving by the trees!" Sam said. "He's signaling to that helicopter! Something's coming. Whatever you're gonna find, Runner Five, find it fast, and get moving!"
A thrill of panic shot icily down into Five's stomach, and the papers fluttered to the ground as she scanned through them feverishly. They had to be here. Somewhere. Anywhere.
The pattering of the oncoming helicopter began resounding in Five's ears, and she worked faster, accidentally knocking over a vase with dead flowers to the floor, shattering it and spreading the moldy water all over the carpet. Then, she saw it. A small, nondescript manila folder labeled VS-72. With a quick flick, Five opened it and saw the exact label she had wanted: Patient 29—Arthur Gherkin.
"It's landing. It's… it's not from the military, look at it. It's painted with the Pandora Haze logos. How are those guys even still alive?"
"They had a lot of money. That's what it takes to survive. Have you found anything, Five?"
"Yes!" she replied, tucking the folder into her backpack and speeding out of the room back down the stairs. "Patient 29!"
"Good," Dr. Myers said. "Bring it back, Five; we'll see what we can work out."
"Better head out the back," Sam instructed. "There are three people from that chopper coming in the way you entered the building."
Almost tripping over herself, Five twirled in the other direction and ran down the opposite hallway.
Dr. Myers gasped. "Is that—"
"Runner Five, two people are heading towards the back of the building! You need to get out of there, now. Run!"
"I only met him a couple of times at Christmas parties, but…"
Five could hear voices and the door breaking down at the main entrance; she sped out the back doors and into the sunlight.
Sam finally saw her. "Runner Five, good, just—just keep going. They won't spot you if you go now. Now! Now, now, now! Out into the woods—run!"
With a burst of speed, Five skidded behind a large concrete side-building labeled Hazardous Materials—Do Not Enter. The forest was still a good fifty feet away from where she hid in pure daylight, her only cover this tiny building. The stench of forgotten waste reached her nostrils as she panted.
"I'm sure that's him," Dr. Myers's voice trailed through the radio, horrified. "That's his face! That's Professor Van Ark!"
"You—you're joking!" Sam gasped. "N—I thought he was—"
"Five, you have to get out of there! The place is swarming with his men."
"I can't," Five whispered, daring to peek around the side building. The helicopter had landed on top of the Keeley Center. People in uniform crowded it almost like the undead. They crashed down doors and Five could hear windows shatter sporadically. "They'll see me. There are too many."
She watched as the men filled the building, rushing around and calling out to one another. The hazardous materials shack Five hid behind was far too close for comfort; the men only needed to come about three meters away from the main building to see her hiding there. She could even hear snippets of their conversations.
"Check the third fl—"
"—Samuka's studies, right over—"
"What the hell happen—"
"They're gone!"
"Oh my God!" Five whispered. "They know the documents are gone! They just broke in!"
"Oh, no," Sam moaned. "Five, you—"
"Shh!" she interrupted, straining her ears.
"Send out a search!" a stern voice commanded. "They can't have gone far. Look at this spill—the robber was just here."
Five squinted and looked up to the third floor windows. A tall, permanently-frowning man stared out of the window. He was clean-shaven—clean at all, for that matter—and wore a pristine white laboratory coat.
Without having Dr. Myers point him out, Five knew exactly who he was.
"They're sending out a search!" Five squeaked, her eyes locked on Professor Van Ark. "Oh God, they'll find me!"
"Five, run this second," Dr. Myers said. "Head straight behind you into the woods. If you run fast enough, the men at the top of the building won't know who you were until you're gone. You don't have time to wait. Stay in the building's shadow as long as possible. Go!"
Without even thinking, Five sprinted across the shadow, her eyes on the woods. They would see her. They would definitely see her. There was no way they wouldn't see her.
…They didn't see her.
Before she knew it, Five was safe in the shadows of the trees, heading back the way she came.
"Five! Oh wow, that was fantastic," Sam said. "Look at them, they're crawling around the place now. Just checked that shack you were hiding behind."
Five didn't answer—didn't speak until she had made it back into Abel. She stumbled in, exhausted, but she had done it. She had found the files.
There was no celebration that evening, however. No one could shake the fact that fellow humans were out for blood. That they knew the files had been stolen.
There was nothing Abel could do about that, Dr. Myers insisted. They just had to buckle down and continue testing. The files were in the right hands.
For once, Five could relax.