Return to the Facility

I had to go back to the government facility again to see if I could learn anything more about what's happening. I prepped my gear and headed out with the sunrise. I wanted all the time I could get. It was an easy trek through the city. I ran into three draggers but was able to dispatch them handily with the .22 semi-auto from the daycare. It works surprisingly well for the head shots on slow ones and I can carry ten times the ammo without adding weight. As I neared the facility I drew my pick-hatchet so I could remain quiet should I run into another zombie.

I rounded the last corner before the facility and took up a concealed position behind a burned out car. I could hear a vehicle approaching. As I crouched behind the wreckage I saw a prison bus pull into view. It was full of inmates! They were still in orange county uniforms and chained. A soldier sat behind the wheel and another couple stood guard at the front gate of the bus. They were followed by a military Humvee. The two vehicles entered the parking structure under the facility.

I crept through the alley along the facility trying to find a place where I could observe without having to get in again and where I would not be seen. As I looked it dawned on me that it made perfect sense for inmates to be alive. They were in a modern day fortress under armed guard and most of the prisons had ways to maintain electricity and services of their own so that the inmates would not escape or riot if a disaster hit. If you could find an emptied prison and had a crew of survivors together you could probably live there quite comfortably.

Then I spotted something that pulled me out of my daydreaming. There was a row of basement windows along the back of the building. I wasn't sure but I thought from my time inside that it was probably where the lab coats had taken us for the "demonstration". I began to cautiously approach the first window. As I got closer it became apparent that I wasn't going to see in. It had been spray painted from the inside. I worked my way along to the next one. It was the same. As was the next and the next. As I turned to walk away from the fourth window a glimmer of something caught my eye. I turned back to the window and studied it carefully. There was a tiny oblong spot that the painter had missed. It wasn't much but it was enough that I could get my face close and see what was happening. I crawled down into the window well and peered through the opening.

They had some of the inmates in the lab already. They were being restrained one at a time by several soldiers while the others where chained and held at gunpoint. In spite of the guns the inmates where still protesting very adamantly. The soldiers tied them down to stainless steel tables with restraints like the ones you see in movie hospitals or psychiatric wards. Once tied down one of the lab coats would inject them with something and they would be unconscious within minutes. During this process one of the inmates tried to break free. He took a swing at one of the soldiers and the armed guard shot him dead. This seemed to quiet all the other inmates quite well. The inmates body was quickly taken to another part of the lab out of my view. The soldiers and lab coats resumed their work without so much as a blink.

Once they had all the inmates restrained and sedated the lab coats began wheeling in zombies on restraint tables. The zombies were gagged in addition to being tied down. They placed one next to each of the inmates. A lab coat was stationed with each patient (or more appropriately victim). One by one I watched as a lab coat would un-gag a zombie and offer it a part of the sedated inmates body to bite. One did a foot, one a hand, upper arm, lower leg, head, neck. Each inmate was bitten only once in one major part of the body then the lab coat would grab his clip board and a stop watch and wait. The inmates one by one started to come too. The one that had been bitten in the neck started to convulse. I don't know how long it took for him to die but it wasn't long. He was bleeding profusely. The bite must have gotten into his jugular. He lay still but only for a matter of minutes. His eyes opened and he began wildly trying to bite the lab coat. The lab coat just calmly wrote down some notes on his clip board and made a note of the time.

The other inmates that had awakened began to scream in fear. They all began to realize what was being done to them. They tried to break free but it was useless. They were so afraid. The terror in their eyes was unimaginable. No matter what their crime they didn't deserve this.

The soldiers came around and gagged them all to quiet the room somewhat. I stayed at my perch the rest of the day watching in horror. A few more of the inmates died and came back as I watched. It seemed if they were injured closer to a major artery the infection would spread much more quickly. As I watched they brought in more inmates. They injected some with blood drawn from freshly reanimated zombies. This didn't seem to have much effect in the time I was there. But when they injected them with saliva the inmates began to show signs of the infection as rapidly as the men bitten.

One inmate they took to a table right in front of my window perch. He was sedated. They had him bitten on the hand by a zombie. They then proceeded to amputate his arm at the elbow! I turned from the window and vomited. I couldn't watch any longer. These were people. They were just using them like laboratory machines. They wronged society but what they did was nothing compared to what these lab coats and soldiers were doing to them. It was wrong -

Something moved in the alley. I pulled myself out of the window well. I didn't realize how long I had been down there. My whole body ached. It was starting to get dark. I was still looking down the alley where I had seen the movement. My eyes were not adjusting to the light right because I had been peering through that hole so long. I began to back toward the nearest cross street. I stepped back onto a bottle. It flung out from under my foot and I went down. As I raised my head I saw what had been moving in the alley. A thorpe stepped out from behind a dumpster with the remnants of an animal hanging from it's mouth. It charged. Without thinking I raised my rifle and fired. I shoot four rounds before one connected with it's head. It dropped at my feet. Then I heard a thundering of boots inside the facility. I had to move fast. I got to my feet and ran. I could hear a team of soldiers burst from the building just as I jumped a fence into a yard a block away. I ran as fast and as long as I could. I finally slowed about a block from Jan's. I thought my heart and lungs were going to burst but I didn't hear any soldiers following. As I approached Jan's door I realized I had dropped my pick-hatchet when the thorpe attacked me.

I stepped inside Jan's and was greeted with concern and hot soup. As I write this I have compiled a small list of things to ponder.
1. I need more cardio.
2. Tethering your weapons to yourself is probably a good idea.
3. If you can find others that are friendly stay with them.
4. Those bastards at the facility will have to answer for what they're doing.