Degeneration (59 page)

He knew that he could access each housing unit’s emergency exit by following the path.

             
U
nfortunately
, he also knew that meant taking the long way. He would have to walk past the rear emergency exits of blocks ‘A’, ‘B’, and ‘C’. Then, he would have to follow the corridor through the education and recreation departments before looping around to the opposite side of the institution in order to reach blocks ‘D’, ‘E’, and finally ‘F’.

             
His brother would be waiting in ‘F Block’, cell 22.

             
“I’m coming,” Richard muttered.

             
Richard made his way down the desolate concrete corridor, walking slowly, limping. The corridor lights overhead flickered and a few were out completely. The scene was so very surreal, the backdrop of nightmares.

             
He passed the ‘A Block’ housing unit emergency exit sallyport. The door had been cut open and spray painted with the same type of cryptic message he saw earlier:

             
He had no reason to go inside. His brother was in ‘F Block’, so he continued onward past the ‘B Block’ housing unit emergency exit. Like the other unit, the doors had been cut open.

The spray-painted message on the door read:

             
Terror gripped him as he started to understand what the cryptic messages meant, what they were tallying. The realization of what they could possibly mean for his brother consumed him.

             
Ignoring his burns and his aching body, he ran to the next housing unit, ‘C Block’, to confirm his suspicions. Like the others, the door locks had been burnt off and the door was slid halfway open. On the door it read:

             
Richard slid the sallyport doors open and walked into the housing unit and immediately gagged on the stench of decay. The buzz of flies was almost deafening.

             
The housing unit consisted of two tiers that wrapped around the expanse of the unit, each lined with cell doors. There was a staircase leading up to the upper tier on each side of the unit. An officer’s control station sat in the center of the unit, situated on a raised cement platform. The housing unit was running on emergency generator power and only a few of the overhead gymnasium-style
halide bulbs
were still on.

             
The bullet-riddled corpses of a soldier wearing a white-suit and a prison guard wearing an ineffective N-95 paper mask lay in the middle of the housing unit.

The pistol used to kill the soldier lay next to the guard.

             
All of the cells were locked and the cell door’s narrow windows were peppered with bullet holes. An orange ‘X’ was spray-painted on each cell door.

             
The prisoners, locked in their cells, had been systematically executed.

             
Terror seized Richard as he realized that he may already be too late to save Andy.

             
He ran towards the 9mm pistol and snatched it off of the ground.

             
With fumbling hands, he checked the gun’s clip.

             
It had ten rounds left.

             
Working quickly, he patted the guard’s corpse down for additional clips but found nothing. Under normal circumstances, he knew the guards would never be issued guns inside the secure confines of an institution since, obviously, it caught the soldier by surprise. However, Richard knew that things stopped being ‘normal’ right about the time the dead started to walk and the military executed people with impunity.

             
If Andy was still alive, he would have to hurry.

             
Richard ran back into the corridor and froze, listening.

             
He heard his shambling entourage as they made their way towards him from the far end of the corridor, following him, nearing ‘B Block’. They were persistent hunters; he had to give them that.

Richard ran onward, darted through another breached security grille, turned the corner, and entered the education department annex.

             
Doors leading to classrooms and workshops lined the right side of the annex. Each of the doors had an orange ‘X’ spray-painted on them. Bullet holes peppered the concrete walls and some of the overhead lights had been blown-out by gunfire. Brass shell casings littered the floor.

             
The bullet-riddled corpses of two guards wearing heavy black tactical armor lay face down in the middle of the floor. The back of the armor read ‘S.O.R.T.’ in bold white lettering.

             
Richard ran to the two corpses, sliding his pistol underneath his belt. He bent down and searched the corpses for extra ammo.

             
Behind him, one of the classroom doors opened.

             
Richard quickly spun around and drew his pistol, pointing it towards the opened door.

             
A
German shepherd
limped out of the classroom. The dog’s coat was matted with dried blood and he held his left hind leg up close against his body; its injured leg was covered with bite marks. The dog wore a harness that read ‘S.O.R.T.’ and had a tattered leather leash attached to it. The dog stared at Richard, ears perked up.

             
Richard sighted-in on the dog, finger on the trigger…

             
The dog’s ears lowered as it whimpered and limped away in the direction that Richard had just came from, barely able to walk.

             
Richard slowly lowered his pistol and relaxed.

             
The dog let out a series of excoriating yelps and cries of pain as soon as it retreated around the corner. The dog’s cries were quickly drowned out by the loud moans of the infected.

             
Richard hastily raised the pistol and backed away…

             
One of the S.O.R.T. officers on the ground became aware of Richard’s presence and slowly stood up. He turned towards Richard and stared at him with dead eyes.

             
The S.O.R.T. officer lunged at Richard, groaning, arms extended.

             
Rather than wasting ammunition, he jumped back a few feet.

             
The S.O.R.T. officer fell down on his face and his helmet rolled off of his head. He slowly started to rise again, moaning…

             
Infected started to emerge from around the corner and shamble towards Richard. They had fresh blood and dog hair smeared across their faces.

             
Richard turned and ran.

             
He bolted past the vacant classrooms and entered the recreation annex.

The windows on the right side of the wall looked into the weight rooms, craft rooms, and the indoor basketball court; every window was shattered and the gym doors were chained shut.

             
Corpses bound in clear plastic and wrapped in masking tape were stacked high in the middle of the gymnasium. Some of the wrapped bodies were moving, trying to wriggle free from the plastic. The amateurish scene was evidence that the prison staff was trying to contain things their own way before the military intervened.

             
He turned the corner and ran through yet another set of security doors that had been defeated by a cutting torch and forced open.

             
He was now on the opposite side of the prison.

             
“I’m almost there, Andy,” Richard said.

He ran past ‘D Block’ and threw a passing glance; the sallyport doors were forced open and another tally was spray-painted on the doors:

             
As he approached ‘E Block’, he noticed that the polished concrete floors of the corridor were splotched with large pools of blood. The gory scene was not at all reminiscent of the almost surgical precision strike he saw on the opposite side of the institution.

Something went wrong for the marauders.

             
He reached ‘E Block’ and was forced to stop.

The security grille was still intact and the lock hadn’t been torched off.

             
He looked at ‘E Block’s sallyport and saw, like the other units, it had been cut open, but the spray-painted message was different: