"We have to warn Coulson," Elizabeth whispered.
Edwards nodded. Elizabeth opened a communication console and launched the complicated procedure necessary to open one of the official radio conversations where she and Coulson discussed the real, serious matters, instead of bantering about fairytales on an illegal, secret phone. It generally took half an hour before the request was accepted, so Elizabeth just leaned back in her chair.
"I am never leaving this room again," she joked. Edwards just stared at her, so she felt the necessity to add, "I am kidding. But you have to admit, it is tempting."
"Actually," he said, and there was a pause. Elizabeth did not dislike it, the way Edwards thought before he talked. One of Elizabeth's colleagues before the evac, Duy, was a "verbal processor", his terms. Meaning he had to talk aloud before arriving at a conclusion. Elizabeth had wanted to throttle him so many times, but she didn't, because Duy was a sweetie, an efficient employee, and also, five billion deaths were quite enough.
"Actually," Edwards repeated, "your idea of hunkering here is an excellent one. We should prepare—if the situation degenerates. We could stock water and food in this room, and…hygiene supplies. Medicine. Mattresses, covers, coats. In case it gets cold."
"Good idea," Elizabeth answered, and then, because she was kind of a verbal processor too, "but maybe… A room with several exits would be safer. When the Witch comes for us—when they send a chopper to evacuate, we will need a way to get to the roof. And we won't be able to do that with an army of undead blocking the only door."
"You are perfectly right."
New silence. They were both thinking. "Do you have schematics of the Center?" Edwards asked. "Real ones, with everything, not the redacted version?"
"I suppose I could get them with your codes. I would have to—"
"Sit Rep." Coulson's voice. No image, just a radio conversation. It had not even been five minutes. Maybe he had been waiting for her to call since her last, vaguely ominous text.
"Mr. Coulson, hello," Edwards began. As the one with the superior bracelet, it was natural for him to take the lead. "Ms. Moore and myself here in the room. We had several security issues—so we asked for an in-depth diagnostic…"
He explained the situation while Elizabeth remained on her keyboard, sending information. The diagnostic results. Some secondary files. A few pictures of door CV-17 she had taken a few hours ago, under daylight and at night. Not that they were particularly useful, but—admin brain, it made her feel thorough. It felt strange, hearing Coulson's voice and not interacting with him, but these radio conversations were not private. At least one security team must be listening and everything was recorded.
"Thus, we make an official request for an early extraction," Edwards concluded. The exchange between him and Coulson had been short. The Very Important People working for the Witch up there in the capital hated when the radio contacts lasted too long.
"Thank you," Coulson concluded. "We will study the diagnostic results and come back to you. In the meantime, define a safe zone for yourself and for Ms. Moore, and do not leave it. Do not take any unnecessary risks. Am I clear?"
"Very."
"Ms. Moore, am I clear?"
"Crystal."
End of communication.
-XX-
Two years ago.
Karima's birthday in Cafeteria Two. In attendance: Elizabeth, Coulson, Churchill, Mary, Duy, and obviously, Karima. Karima had said once that she loved flowers. She did not have botanist clearance; she was not allowed to go outside so Elizabeth had gathered a huge bouquet for the occasion. Then she cooked a chestnut cake with flowers essences in the recipe, baked donuts in flowers' shapes and sculpted flavored elaborate sugar flowers to decorate the whole. They put a candle on the cake, they sang "happy birthday, Karima," people in the cafeteria mostly ignored them, a few sang along.
Some of the IT guys began to snicker, so Coulson made a paper missile from one of the HR leaflets and got one of them right on the nose. Perfect aim. Coulson was in Special Forces before, rumor said. He was Head of Security now, so you did not want to mess with him.
The asshole stopped laughing. The asshole's friends began laughing at him though.
"Thank you so much, Elizabeth. This is all wonderful, so thoughtful," Karima said formally, but they could all tell how moved she was. Karima was one of the rare survivors of the Thursday attacks. You remember the stories, right? The shelters. Those guys looking for food, medicine, and women. Karima was still young; her whole family had been there.
"Only doing my job!" Elizabeth countered with a smile. "This is not a cake, but a…professional experiment. The walnuts are local, so you are all helping me test the flora of the affected area. Official Center business, you see."
"This is not a cake?" Coulson said. "Is it a Matisse?"
Elizabeth smirked. "You think you're so clever."
"You're confusing opinions with facts."
"Pseudo-intellectual jokes. Aren't they the best?" Churchill commented—yep, he and Coulson, no love lost here, fortunately, no one but Elizabeth noticed the tension.
"The flora is perfectly safe," Mary began, before launching a detailed explanation of the Event's influence on the ecosystem, all of which Elizabeth knew because it was her job, not Mary's. But Mary worked in the labs and had a red range bracelet—magenta, to be exact. She really was a good egg, despite her tendency to Marysplain everything to the plebs. At least she never asked them to call her "madam".
Anyway, they all ate cake, Coulson opened a bottle of some bubbly concoction with less than 0,18% alcohol because you were not supposed to get drunk at lunch. The conversation took many twists and turns to finally land on zombies' teeth, of all subjects, like, how did the teeth stay tough enough to eat people when the rest of the corpse was decaying? Believe it or not, there was an actual explanation. In non-scientific terms, The Event had turned dead humans into killing machines. The teeth were essential to the task and some of the resources of the body were diverted to the jaw.
"We always have such heart-warming conversations", was Coulson's comment. Duy asked Mary what happened when the teeth were already gone. Like, people with dentures, did the teeth grow again?
Short answer: no.
-XX-
Now.
Getting the complete, unredacted blueprints of the Center with Edwards's codes was easy. They printed everything, taped the docs together, spread the resulting map on the system room table and studied it, red marker in hand. Circling all the doors that were compromised, according to the diagnostic.
"This zone is safe," Edwards declared, after he and Elizabeth had just circled more and more doors, including CV-17, obviously. "All this area here, including the system room. Most of Building Three is fine, really."
Which was good news, considering they both slept there. The red door with the possible shuffling was system-locked, which they already knew—the lights were blinking. On the other side of the door lay a series of apparently mundane offices, nothing strange there, in theory. The safe zone included Cafeteria Three, the one with the dry cereals, the one where Elizabeth cooked. Good news again. Except: "The problem is," Elizabeth stated, "those doors are locked for now. If the system is failing, the electronics can stop working anytime. We can't trust anything," she continued, while Edwards just watched her silently.
"Low-tech solutions," he said after some thought. "Barricading."
"What, the doors? All of them?"
"The ones that lead to our safe zones, yes."
"How?"
"Blocking them. Physically. With, hum, furniture, I suppose."
Wonderful.
-XX-
The rest of the day? Barricading. Using whatever was on hand. Tables, shelves, even chairs. Using tools from the deserted janitors' closets. Now, you know the maxim, "everything always takes longer than expected?" True even in zombies-related matters.
Blocking seventy-four doors with nails, hammers, and office-related material is a very lengthy process. Especially in a huge administrative building with corridors stretching for miles. Two elevators were also out of order; the info did not appear on the in-depth system diagnostic, make of that what you will. Edwards and Elizabeth both felt it was safer to tag team; it was in the orientation rules, "in case of doubt, never go alone, use the buddy system."
Felt like common sense.
Around six they were already exhausted. Thirty-one doors blocked, forty-three to go. And this was just Building Three. When they finally decided to call it a day, they collapsed in the chairs of one of the more recent, huge accounting offices, and stayed there, unmoving.
"Schrodinger Zombies," Elizabeth whispered.
She wondered if Edwards was going to ask for clarification, but of course, scientists knew about Schrodinger. He seemed vaguely amused, maybe even ready to banter back, except this was the moment they heard a noise behind a door on their left, one of the doors that of course—of course!—they had not barricaded yet.
They both froze. A reflex, but also the smart thing to do, because if the creature had not sensed them yet, better not attract its attention. Elizabeth silently turned her head toward the door, calculating the d. Edwards was doing the same, certainly.
More than twenty feet. Maybe. Their eyes met. Neither of them moved.
Silence. The noise subsided, started again, before vanishing completely. When it seemed clear that no angry monster was going to burst through the door, Edwards made a silent gesture and they both retreated out of the room.
Two doors between them and the possible creature. Elizabeth found another chair, stuck it behind the doorknob.
"Let's nail it shut."
Edwards hesitated. He looked at Elizabeth.
He looked at the door again.
"Or," he said. "We could go in and kill them."
-XX-
Edwards's proposition was to go in there, get rid of the zombie, "and find the way through which it came." Impeccable grammar in times of crisis, such was Elizabeth's new partner in crime.
"The security system is failing, sure, but why… Zombies are not spontaneously generated in empty buildings," he stated. "Why are they here to begin with? The presence of even one creature means there is a way into the Center. Maybe a busted door. Maybe an open one. And if one creature found it, others will. One of them will sense us, they will Call… and then we won't have to deal with a building in which a few zombies may have peacefully wandered in by mistake. We will have a building filled with creatures actively trying to get us."
"I see your point. Sir."
Edwards glared at her, but Elizabeth was not trying to be provocative. "We would be doing exactly the opposite of what we have been taught though," she protested. "Remember all those safety meetings? 'Do not go hunting!' 'Do not take any unnecessary risks!' 'You are civilians, not soldiers!' 'Wait for the professionals!'"
"And where, exactly," Edwards asked, "are the professionals?"
Another good point.
"I do applaud the fact that for once, you want to play by the rules, Ms. Moore. But these are extraordinary circumstances, and if we don't act, the situation could degenerate quickly."
Sadly, this made a lot of sense.
-XX-
"Body armor?"
"Check."
"Medical kit?"
"Check."
"Z-Knife?"
"Check."
Patting each other's bodies for tears in their BUAs—Body Undead-Armor, which had quickly been renamed the ZAs—Zombies Armors. This was second-hand, cheap security material—all the good stuff had been snatched up during the evac. Mercifully, it was not like biohazard suits, ZAs did not have to be perfect, just with no major holes where zombies could sink their teeth.
"Helmets?"
"Check."
Time to go.
Through the first door, back to the accounting offices. The two chairs they had just left were still there, slightly askew. Only one hour ago, and it seemed like an eternity. The sunset was gorgeous and inaccessible on the other side of the large glass bays. Nearly eight, not night yet, not at this latitude.
No nightmarish creatures. Just the crimson radiance of the evening.
Through the second door.
On the other side, it was dark. No windows. They had checked the map before going in. Elizabeth had an excellent visual memory, so she knew there were two other doors to consider, one on the right, leading to a hallway and another series of offices, and the second one opening inside a VIP office, with a series of archives closets. The room was large; you could hardly discern the cubicles. Elizabeth tried the switches—the lights didn't work. She brushed a desk; a computer woke up, showing its welcome screen, a picture of the moon with a gloomy, beige glow.
Two prudent steps forward. And here: a shuffling sound. Inside the VIP office, the one with the archives. The door was open.
"We could just barricade it in," Elizabeth whispered.
"That would not solve anything. Let's keep to the plan."
Yes, yes, the plan, the plan was wise, the plan made sense, but the idea of willingly confronting a bloodthirsty creature was much less palatable in the dark. Elizabeth felt Edwards turn to her in the obscurity. "I am not pulling rank, Ms. Moore. You have to be totally onboard. We are risking our lives here."
"I am onboard. Unenthusiastic, but onboard."
"Let's go then," he whispered—not that he sounded enthusiastic either.
They decided on a strategy. Part one, step into the d to lead the zombie near the VIP office door. Part two, Edwards would violently kick that same door in, trying to trap the creature between it and the wall. Part three, Elizabeth would hold the aforementioned door with all her strength while Edwards stabbed the trapped monster in between its eyes.
An excellent plan, except none of it went completely right. As soon as they stepped into the d the creature leaped in their direction so fast it was not exactly in the right spot when Edwards banged the door in. The zombie's head and its left arm remained free; it grabbed Edwards's shoulder when he tried to stab it. Edwards unmanly yelped before kicking the creature; it tried to bite again, its teeth clacking dangerously close to Edwards's face—that was when Elizabeth decided that to hell with the plan, instead of holding the door she stepped away quickly, the door flung open; the monster was projected forward and fell; Edwards was taken by surprise but he reacted quickly enough, jumping down and SLACK, Z-Knife, the blade stabbing the zombie right in the back of its head, an impressive move, actually, a faultless strike, killing the creature on the spot.
Edwards and Elizabeth retreated a few steps from the motionless body.
"You got him," Elizabeth whispered, nonsensically. "I mean. It."
Edwards was watching the corpse, speechless—he was overwhelmed—so was she.
"We have to, hum. Continue. Find their way in," he began, looking around. "The other door, it, it leads to—" and this was, of course, when the second zombie bit him. Elizabeth let out a strangled cry, then fumbled to get her Z-Knife; Edwards pushed the creature away, the zombie fell down, dragging with it the separation shelf that had hidden it from their view. Archives boxes noisily scattered around; Edwards tried to stab his assailant but this time the creature was too quick. It was (it had been) a woman, she rolled on the side, snarling, tried to nip at Edwards's ankle; Elizabeth grabbed her by the arm and half dragged her away, then she tried to stab her, but only got the creature in the neck—have you recently tried to stab someone in the head? Not as easy as it looks! The zombie tried to sink its teeth into Elizabeth's wrist, but the armor was too thick; Edwards struck again, his Z-knife already stained with blood, he got the woman in the jaw, which split open, teeth and green spit spilling out—not enough, not yet, she was still writhing, Elizabeth stabbed and stabbed again, Edwards did too, gore everywhere—and then at last, at long last, the creature stopped still, her skull crushed, her eyes open and very blue.
Elizabeth did not think. She opened her emergency kit. Took the hypodermic needle out. Grabbed Edwards's shoulder, where the zombie had bitten. "It did not break the skin," Edwards protested.
"Shut up," was Elizabeth's answer; she stabbed the needle in and pushed.
Edwards froze, taking a long breath—the big ass super powerful antibiotics burned like hell, they said.
"There's blood," Elizabeth finally explained. Looking at Edwards's shoulder. "Your blood."
"No, it… The armor…" Edwards raised his hand and brushed the place of the bite. The armor was torn where the creature had struck, and yes, there was blood. The teeth had gone in—just a little bit. A tiny little bit. Edwards was staring at the minuscule wound.
"Oh," he said. And then, "I see." And then, "Thank you."
"Don't mention it," Elizabeth said in a low voice. Politeness in the weirdest situations, that's how she had been raised. Her parents, diplomatic, formal, strict in some ways. Good family, middle class, very keen on education. Till they refused to be sent to a displacement camp, and…life took quite a different turn.
Edwards closed his eyes. "That was close."
"Much, much too close."