The Containment Team (3 page)

If the fool had waited, I’d have loaned him one of my other rifles or pistols. Ducking underneath the smoke and gasping for air, I pulled out a box from underneath my bed, undid my belt, and slid on a holstered SigSauer P250 that shot .40. After closing the blade, I pushed my pocketknife into my pants. Shortly after that, I found myself charging out into the hall after him, hoping to keep him from getting killed.

Or even worse. Turned into one of these monsters with purple sludge running through their veins.  

THE HALL OUTSIDE our dorm room was long and the screams came from down on the other side. Pete ran in that direction, his big lumbering frame reminding me of a football linebacker. I couldn’t tell for sure at this distance, but it sounded like the screams were coming from the women’s bathroom.

No wonder why Pete was in such a hurry to get there. He considered himself something of a ladies’ man. Not many ladies agreed.

As I left our room, I Iooked back at the burning blob and was surprised to note that what little remained was still moving. I would have expected it to be dead but it was still writhing around, even while engulfed in flames. The sprinkler in our room hadn’t gone off yet and I wondered if it would, for the first time I noticed that it looked rusty. Perhaps my fear had been unnecessary. 

I had sat under that sprinkler almost every day for over a year and I have never once thought to see if it looked operational. It is funny how a situation changes your perspective on something. If I would have known an hour ago that the sprinkler wasn’t working, I might have been alarmed, now I was just relieved.

The desk I’d pulled over to cover the flames didn’t look like it was in danger of catching. The ball of flame below should be burned out long before anything like that could happen.

The movement stopped, hopefully, it wouldn’t come back. I glanced back down the hallway, Pete was almost to the women’s bathroom where the screaming had increased in volume and frequency.

The person’s terror tugged at my heartstrings but I hesitated to leave the burning blob alone and lowered my shotgun, wanting again to blast it apart regardless of what Pete had said.

Wasn’t it better just to leave it burning and to hope that it completely died? I released a breath that I hadn’t known I was holding and slowly let it out.

My momentary trigger-happy instincts suppressed, I moved back into the room and opened Pete’s philosophy book and set it over the burning mass like a teepee. It seemed as though the creature—and not just the kerosene—was burning, but just in case I was wrong, I figured it was best to add fuel to the flames. Pete wasn’t likely to fail his class anyway and I was still feeling a little spiteful.

Shattered wood flew from the closet as the two creatures burst out. The wounds had sealed off, the purple sludge had stopped seeping out, and a purple bulge had formed on the top of the neck of the headless one. It looked as though it was trying to grow a new head.

The other monster made a high-pitched sound. Was it my imagination or was there the force of air behind it? I remembered how it had been unable to roar once I’d shot it in the chest and shredded its lungs.

I let out a string of swear words as I stepped backward, knocking the desk, but avoiding the burning glob. I was glad my mother wasn’t around to hear it. She’d never liked that I’d picked up the habit from my father.

Even as an adult, she still shot me a glare whenever I forgot where I was and let my mouth run. My father usually smiled broadly, as if he was winning some sort of long fought battle.

I shot the closest one in the chest again—the one with a head—and sprinted towards the door. I had initially doubted Pete’s claim that it was Jen and Veronica, but I no longer did.

Even through the mucus-covered face, I’d been able to make out Jen’s features as I’d pulled the trigger.

While I ran, I felt a wave of guilt that was swept away when the Jen creature let out a roar and chased after me. I glanced back in time to see the headless one run into the wall outside the door. It was both sickening and heartening. I noticed the tattoo on the creature's ankle that I recognized as belonging to Veronica, but I was also glad to see that creature had some limitations without a head.

Cursing again in a fit to make my mother red in the face, I increased my speed until my heart throbbed and my knees felt as though they were going to rip apart. My bare feet slapped on the tile floor and I wished that I had stopped to put on shoes instead of move a desk. Up ahead, I saw Pete run from the women’s bathroom with another of the creatures hot on his heels.

A hand snaked out and grabbed my leg from behind, sending me into the wall. The creature slammed into me, floundering to grab my head, its mouth open. The gray mottled skin was slimy and the creature’s breath rancid. I caught the barest whiff of garlic as I pushed off the wall, grabbed the monster by the head, and yanked, hurling the creature headfirst into the cinder blocks. The resulting sound was a satisfying thwack.

Jen had had blue eyes, I remembered thinking that they were pretty. These were dark orange with a red pupil, slitted like a cat.

Snatching up my shotgun from where it had fallen to the floor, I fired a shot into the creature that used to be Veronica. It had been coming on all fours, like an animal, and I aimed for the front arm. As I did, I prayed that Veronica really was dead, as Pete had claimed. It was irrational to think she was still alive as her head was gone, but it was difficult to think some part of her wasn’t still in there as her body moved towards me. 

The other creature was getting up by that time but it still had its back turned towards me. It shook its head as if trying to get its bearings. I put the barrel of my shotgun inches away from one knee and fired. The creature screamed, flung out its arms on the wall to steady itself but slipped and fell.

I ran, trying doors as I did, hoping I could fling the creatures in and shut the door, they seemed to have trouble with doorknobs. The monsters on the other side had only tried to get through with the use of brute force.

Unsurprisingly, every door I tried was locked. There are some people that will run towards the screaming, but most turn a deaf ear to it, figuring that somebody else will take care of it. I knew that the floor wasn’t empty. My guess was that everybody had locked their doors when the trouble had started.

I’d always thought of myself as a man that would move to help during a time of emergency, but as I galloped down the hall, I couldn’t help but think there was something to the other approach. I couldn't deny the cold hard logic of putting your head down and waiting for the danger to pass.

Based on all the commotion heading towards me from behind, both monsters were in pursuit, so I sped up, giving up on any of the others doors and headed instead towards the one I’d seen Pete duck into.

A weak scream of fury from behind was joined by a roar from the front as a creature was thrown out into the hallway right before I got to the place where I’d seen Pete disappear.

It landed on all fours, looked up at me and hissed just as I blew off its head. By the size and shape, this one had been a man. I thought that the face on the other side of the red goo looked familiar as I squeezed the trigger, but in the next moment it was obliterated and the feeling was gone.

“Perfect timing.” Pete stood in the doorway, his sides heaving as sweat trickled down his neck.

“I should have figured it was you when I heard all the shooting.” The voice came from behind so I turned back to the bathroom door to see the blue eye of a blonde haired woman peeking out at me. She fully opened the door as she spoke. “What is it with men and their guns?”

“Madelyn?” I stepped into the bathroom as Pete followed and slammed the door shut. Moments later the creatures were outside beating on it. I repressed a sigh. Not only were we in the same position we had been when this had all started, I was now trapped with my ex-girlfriend and there were now
three
of the monsters on the other side.

“What are you doing here?” I asked.

She only wore a robe and the look on her face had gone from scared to red. After a pause, she took control of her emotions and managed to plaster a calm look on her face. 

“It’s not what you think.” She paused. “Besides, should it matter to you if it was?” The challenging look was enough to make other men shirk, but not me.

I was too familiar with her ways.

After I’d called her out on it, Madelyn had admitted she spent hours in the mirror practicing various types of looks. From infectious smiles to seductive poses. After the admission, I’d reviewed our relationship and recognized the amount of influence she’d been able to exercise over me just by the way she would smile or raise an eyebrow.

Some of us men are suckers for a pretty face, especially for that of a woman who knows the right configurations to draw attention. After her admission, I’d made an effort to remain vigilant to her tactics. Don’t get me wrong, she could still get stuck in my head. It irked me she had that kind of influence over me.

Ever since our break up, anytime I’d noticed a woman eyeing me, I couldn’t help but wonder what it was that she wanted. The thought she may have been flirting was usually the furthest thing from my mind. Madelyn hadn’t turned me off to women, she’d just made me wary.

That was usually a good approach with Madelyn too.

The pounding increased and I snorted when I remembered that the remnants of Veronica were on the other side. Wary indeed. Talk about my love life coming back to haunt me.

“Not even a month later,” I said. A shard of glass poked the bottom of my foot as I took another step into the bathroom. I bit off a yelp of pain and looking down, glad to see that it hadn’t drawn any blood. I was paranoid now that I knew the goo needed a fresh wound to shift into.

Whatever that meant.

Pete must have noticed the startled look on my face because he bent over to examine my foot.

“You got lucky, Buckshot. No blood.”

I looked around. The bathroom was a mess. A mirror by one of the sinks had shattered and was the source of the glass that had nearly cut into my foot. I looked at Madelyn. “Where is he?”

“Not that it matters, he’s back in his—” She pointed at my shoulder while keeping one hand around her robe. “What the frick is that?” 

I glanced towards an unbroken mirror. Balls of purple blood were moving towards my neck. Without thinking, I tried using my hand to brush them off but they clung to my skin. When I saw where they were now, I panicked and flicked my hand. They went flying off and stuck to the tile wall where they splattered like gelatin and quivered. My heart thundered in my chest as I looked down at my hand, carefully inspecting for any residue of the parasite. It looked clean, but just to be sure, I scooted carefully around the broken glass and washed my hands.

“Is that their blood?” Madelyn approached the wall and stopped inches away, careful to keep the robe covering her as she did. “Is it alive?”

I opened my mouth to answer but something slamming into the door stole all of our attention. The creatures were no longer just beating at it with whatever appendages they had left, they were full on throwing their bodies into the door. 

Pete continued to brace it with his shoulder, but it was three on one.

“We need to find a way out of here,” he said.

Madelyn, looked back at the goo, not seeming to be the slightest bit worried about the creatures trying to get at us from the other side of the door. “What is this?”

“I don’t know. Ask Slammer. Maybe you’ll get more of an answer from him than I could.” Was it just her curiosity overcoming her fear or was she actively fighting down the terror? Wasn’t it her who had been screaming until Pete had come to her rescue?

She spun around. “What’s he talking about?”

Pete looked away uncomfortably as one of the creatures on the other side slammed against the door. The hinges were about the same quality as those that had been on our bedroom door, luckily, it looked as though Pete was doing a better job at keeping them from taking the door down.

Despite the gravity of our situation, I couldn’t help smiling. It was unusual to see Pete so disconcerted and there was a sick part of me that relished the moment.

“That’s right Slammer. What
am
I talking about?” I really can be twisted at times. I shook my head to try and dislodge the feeling, knowing that I was not helping the situation. All of our focus needed to be on surviving. 

“We thought at first that it was an ancient virus but as you can see it’s much more than that.” He shook his head. “Truth is, we have no idea what it is. We only know some of what it can do.”

I ground my teeth. I didn’t buy his story. “This is what you’ve been spending all your time researching, right? Look man, you gotta let go of this whole attitude. You are past the point of keeping this thing contained.”

“We
were
limited as to what kinds of experiments we could perform.”

“So these ‘limited’ activities were keeping you busy for a full year?” I asked.

“I signed papers on penalty of treason!”

The door bulged.

“The time for discretion has passed.”

Pete took a step towards me and the door jounced with vibration as several bodies hit it at once. Were they coordinating their attack? I counted five heartbeats before the next one came. The three distinct sounds were almost in unison. How was that even possible? Two of the creatures didn’t have brains. How were they able to think, much less plan an attack or communicate? 

“Where did this come from?” Madelyn asked, a look of excitement on her face, oblivious to the tension between Pete and me. “How was it found?”