Necropolis 2

by S. A. Lusher

  Greg positioned his hands over the keypad, and then hesitated, glancing around. The door behind him remained closed.

  “Okay,” he murmured. “I'm ready.”

  Thomas slowly, methodically, began to read off a list of keystrokes. Greg followed them, his mind clear, his thoughts quicksilver, his fingers fluid. There were around thirty separate keystrokes. Time seemed to disappear.

  He punched the last one in.

  All the lights in the strange device went suddenly dead, the room plunged into darkness, and Greg felt a bolt of terror shoot straight through him. A few seconds later, the lights in the room came back on, though more dimly.

  “Thomas? Did it work?”

  Nothing. The radio was dead silent.

  “Thomas?”

  Behind him, the door snapped open. Graves' massive form filled the open doorway and his crimson eyes blazed with intensity. He marched across the room, a grim reaper or perhaps an archangel, coming to collect Greg's soul.

  Greg stood paralyzed with fear, frozen, his mind reeling from this abrupt development. Graves' hands were outstretched, his mouth a flat, angry line, eyes wide. As the gap between the two narrowed, all the lights on the device flared to life.

  They were red.

  “Oh, you bastard,” Graves whispered, staring up at it. “You stupid bastard, what have you done?”

  Greg tried to move then, to run, to get around and away from the titanic hulk known only as Graves, but he wasn't quick enough.

  A massive fist blotted out his vision, and then the whole world went dark. Greg smashed to the floor.

  Somewhere distant, he thought he heard laughter.

  Chapter 04

  –Ataxia–

  When Greg came to, he was muttering to himself. Whatever he said seemed important, crucial, even. His eyes flickered open and his muttering stopped. Greg worked his mouth, as though trying to jump-start it.

  “No,” he mumbled.

  Blood coated his mouth and tongue. What was he saying? After a moment, he decided it was lost. Pushing himself up slowly, Greg worked his mouth and spat a thick wad of coagulated blood and saliva onto the floor. It looked out of place on the smooth, pristine tiling he lay sprawled on. Somewhere distant, an alarm wailed.

  “Thomas?” His voice was thick with grogginess.

  No answer. Greg massaged his temples as he fully sat up. He surveyed the room. Hanging over him like a monolithic sentinel was what Thomas had called the security network databanks. It pulsed a steady crimson in time with the distant alarm. A confused jumble of memories crowded him as Greg rose unsteadily to his feet.

  “Making a habit of this,” he mumbled, then had an odd memory of saying something similar not too long ago.

  How many times had he been knocked unconscious in the past two weeks? Greg suspected it was too many for medical comfort. He finished massaging his temples, deciding the headache wasn't going to go away without the help of a few pills, and continued studying the piece of equipment before him.

  It still stood in stark contrast to the room around it, though now everything had a crimson gloss applied to it. Where was Thomas? Had the plan worked? A jolt of fear ran through him as his memories reached their conclusion, punctuated by Graves' massive fist that had left him in his current predicament. He checked the room, making sure he was truly alone, and then stared at the floor where he'd landed when Graves had punched the fuck out of him. Working his jaw, he was surprised to find it was merely bruised and not broken.

  There was more blood on the floor, from where it had leaked out of his mouth, or perhaps from his lip. Greg stared at his own distorted reflection in one of the blank screens, and saw his lower lip had split and was now swollen. He registered the pain in his mouth as having bitten his cheek. Greg coughed, hawked, and spat once more, clearing his mouth of blood. He touched his lip, then winced in pain.

  As the pain in his skull slid into something more manageable, Greg felt control reasserting itself, slaying his confusion. Whatever had happened with Thomas didn't matter right now. For the moment, Greg's primary goal was getting a gun, some gear, and making his way back to the cells to free his friends.

  What was the ship like? Hopefully, everything had been thrown into disarray, allowing him to slip by. He remembered the part where the Undead specimens were to be released and felt a shudder of fear ripple down his spine, pooling coldly in his guts. The idea of facing them again wasn't one he relished, especially without proper back up or a weapon of some kind. Greg steeled himself, and began to move for the door.

  Right as he reached it, he stopped, turned and stared up at the elongated black diamond of intricate, expensive equipment. What was it? It was obviously important, and at least partially tied into the plan he and Thomas had concocted. Greg felt there was more to it, much more, in fact, but what? He supposed it didn't matter anymore.

  As Greg slipped out the door after making sure the coast was clear, he found his thoughts turning to Graves. The titan of muscle and digital eyes had promised him death if he somehow managed to escape, which he had. So why was Greg still drawing breath? A few possibilities presented themselves.

  The first being that perhaps Graves had felt like giving him a second chance, that perhaps it wasn't a fair fight. Greg thought it might be possible...but a second, uncomfortable possibility kept presenting itself. That Graves had something even more pressing to attend to, something important enough to leave Greg passed out on the floor and not send anyone to retrieve him. What could that be? The Undead? It was certainly possible, but Greg wasn't sure. Was there something else at play here that he didn't know about?

  From somewhere up ahead, a scream echoed down to him. Greg forced himself to focus. He was alone and weaponless on a ship overrun with assholes in black armor and undead monsters. He stood in a lengthy white corridor, the walls occasionally broken by doorways and rings of gray steel that Greg realized hid welded seams. It was empty, Greg the only soul traveling down it. He felt horribly exposed.

  Unsure of where to go, he slipped into the nearest doorway, finding himself in, of all things, an office. It was empty, though it looked like someone had just been there. The padded swivel chair was slightly ajar, a black mug of coffee sat on the desk, not steaming, but still warm to the touch. The terminal was powered down, screen dead and blank. Greg booted it up, righted the chair and took a seat.

  Thomas was supposed to help with this part, feeding him instructions, the layout of the ship, key areas where he could find guns, ammo, medical supplies...but the little radio tucked into his ear gave him nothing but silence. Had Graves broken it? Even so, wouldn't Thomas try contacting him via the camera network? He'd said knocking out the security wouldn't disrupt their ability to communicate...

  So what happened?

  Greg sighed, pushing it aside for now. It didn't matter. He booted up the terminal, stared at it for a while and then grunted as he spied a password slot. He wasn't getting in, at least not here. A general access terminal might not be password protected. Standing, Greg looked around, considering his situation.

  Where to go? He let his gaze slide across the office until it settled on another ventilation grate. Greg smiled. Standing, he crossed the room and slapped the open button. The grate opened and Greg grabbed the edge of the vent, pulling himself up. He peered cautiously into the opening, seeing nothing but a lengthy stretch of metal. When nothing moved, nothing hissed at him, Greg finished pulling himself up and into the steel tunnel.

  “This is familiar,” he muttered as he started crawling along the passageway.

  He decided to stop repeating himself.

  As he progressed through the vents, sounds came to Greg: gunshots, explosions, the screams of the dying, and the inhuman howls of the already dead. Far off, little more than a rumble, an explosion erupted. Greg wondered about hull breaches and decompression. He kept crawling, pausing only to look out a vent grate, not sure what he was looking for, but felt positive he'd know it when he saw it. He crawled on
.

  Every vent was a different scene.

  Here was a corridor, splashed with blood, red and black, punctuated by the occasional corpse slumped on the ground.

  Here was a small storage bay, empty of life, crates piled high.

  Here was a security center housing a bank of monitors that registered nothing but a gray wash of static, gun lockers open and empty.

  Greg almost slipped out for that one, but something told him not to, so he kept going, ever hunting. He finally found what he was looking for a few moments later in what looked to be a break or rec room. He stared down at the sleek black pistol lying on the table as if it had been tossed there without care. It looked tempting.

  After waiting for several minutes, listening intently, straining his ears against the silence, Greg opened the grate and lowered himself onto the floor, dropping the last few feet. Greg looked around, apprehension making his skin crawl in wretched anticipation, but he was alone in the room. He grabbed the pistol, checked the magazine, and found it full.

  Whoever wielded it hadn't managed to get even one shot off. Greg spent a few moments hunting through the rec room, through the collection of end tables, chairs, couches, a few soda machines, and arcade cabinets. He was struck by the insane urge to stick around and play a few video games, they looked fun. He settled for prying open the soda machine and grabbing a chilled can of Vex. Popping the top, he drank it all in one go.

  It was like drinking liquid gold after all the shit they'd been feeding him lately. He belched loudly, felt it rattle his throat, and considered grabbing another soda, but no, not a good idea, he was on something of a schedule. While he considered heading outside, maybe trying the corridors again now that he had a pistol, a steady stream of gunfire just beyond the door changed his mind. He shoved the sturdiest looking table beneath the vent, listening to shouted commands, more gunfire, and the roar of what sounded like a Berserker.

  With some effort, Greg pulled himself back up into the vent, keeping the pistol in hand. He kept going, trying to keep his mind clear, but it refused. Like storm clouds rolling in on an otherwise clear sky, his thoughts crowded around him. Graves, Thomas, the security databanks, his friends...they all came and went like cards shuffled through a deck. Oddly enough, beneath it all, Greg found himself missing the rain of Dis.

  Was that crazy? Greg thought so. He remembered obsessing over Kyra at the beginning of this whole thing and thinking he was crazy. Was that insanity? He knew there was a technical term for insanity and that wasn't it, but then there were a lot of ways to be crazy, weren't there? So maybe it was stupidity. Greg didn't like thinking he was stupid, but then, he supposed, no one liked to think that, whether or not they were.

  He continued thinking of the rain, its calming effect, the way it smelled before, during, and after its fall. In his mind's eye, he saw blackened storm clouds building on a twilit horizon, titanium-white lightning forking in sprays, splitting the sky open in phosphorescent freeze frames. The bass rumble of thunder, in the distance. He crawled around in ventilation shafts on a ship of the damned and thought of rain.

  After a while, Greg paused and pulled the radio out of his ear. He studied the small, round piece of compact technology. It didn't seem damaged in any way, and the little light to indicate power was still a comfortable, steady green. He slipped it back into his ear and hit the activation button one more time.

  “Thomas, can you hear me? I could really use some fucking help right about now.” Greg's agitation crept into his voice.

  Nothing. Silence. He sighed and pressed on. As he kept going, Greg was stricken with the notion that he was no longer alone in the vents. Visions of crimson eyes and Stalkers filled his head and he glanced behind briefly him. Nothing there, but...he held his breath, listening intently, hearing nothing but the hum of power, the soft respiration of the oxygen filtration systems, and the distant sounds of battle.

  He kept going, deciding that he was imaging things.

  That's when it happened.

  There was a sound behind him, a soft hiss, and Greg whipped back around. A Stalker crawled directly towards him, eyes blood red and wide, pallid flesh stretching taught as the muscles worked. It was coming for him, murder on its mind. Greg let out a small scream, flipped over on his back and, pointing his pistol down the length of his body, opened fired, barely remembering to put his feet as flat as he could to avoid shooting them.

  The Stalker let out a shriek as two bullets punched through its face, spraying the inside of the vent with black gore and nearly deafening Greg in the process. He fired a third time and this bullet went into its mouth, exploding out the back in an obsidian plume. That shut the thing up. It slumped forward, no longer moving. Greg let out the breath he'd held and decided that the vents weren't for him anymore.

  He slapped the open button at the next vent grate that didn't show any immediate danger. He dropped into a storage room atop a pile of crates, that were, thankfully, steadier than they appeared. Greg made sure to shut the vent behind him and then made his way carefully down the pyramid of metal crates.

  The room was empty, at least. Greg found what appeared to be a general access terminal by the door, one meant for a crew member to stop by and check something quickly. It wouldn't give him access to key systems or databanks, but it should at least have a map of the ship. That would be enough for now. He booted up the terminal, stared at the main screen for a few moments and frowned at his options.

  Why did shit always have to be so complicated? Greg spent some time attempting to navigate the database, hunting for just a simple map. Most of the things he tried to access did require a password and what he could access showed him nothing worthwhile. Eventually, he decided the map was either somewhere he couldn't get to or in a place he wasn't thinking of. He felt the pressure of time and his calm began to crack.

  He slammed the side of the console.

  “Just give me a fucking map, goddammit!”

  The screen cleared, and then a map of the ship popped into existence. Greg blinked in confusion, staring at the map for several seconds before finally coming back to himself. He tried to speak and coughed.

  “Thomas?”

  Nothing. Was Thomas watching him, still trying to help him, but just unable to communicate? He supposed it was possible. Greg made himself focus, staring hard at the map. He saw the detention block right away, but where was he? He looked around, finally locating the stamp above the door showing which storage room he was in. The letters and numbers scrawled across the metal in neat, thick, black alphanumerics.

  He found himself on the map, began to plan a route across the ship to the detention center. It wasn't far, well...okay, maybe it was. Greg stared at his lonely pistol, not even a spare magazine of ammo for company. Pulling the magazine again, he saw that he still had a dozen bullets to play with after his run in with the Stalker. As he ran that memory through his head, it caught uncomfortably and Greg frowned.

  Something had been different about the Stalker. Something...disturbing, but what? He stood there for nearly five minutes before finally figuring it out, playing the memory over and over again in his head. The Stalker had been very difficult to see. It wasn't just a matter of bad lighting, as the vents came with their own lights, no...it was because the thing was damn near blending in with its environment.

  What did that mean? The Stalkers were an obvious stealth offshoot of the zombies, meant for quicksilver speed and invisibility until they dropped down on your ass from the vents. Did it make sense that they would continue to get deadlier? He supposed it would, sure, why not? Things were shitty enough as it was.

  Greg sighed and memorized the route he had to take, again. He thought about it for a moment, and then decided it would take about twenty minutes, including a few detours if he ran into bad guys, whoever they might be. Finally, he decided he'd gotten all he could from the storage room and terminal. He opened the door.

  Poking his head cautiously out after listening and hearing nothing, Greg
surveyed his surroundings. Another corridor, this one shorter, no blood. He slipped out and hurried down it, keeping the map firmly in his head. He turned a corner, spied a corpse up ahead, a Dark Ops soldier. Greg's hope sparked.

  He knelt by the body to investigate. The man's weapon and sidearm were both absent, but he had a few magazines to spare for the pistol. Greg grabbed them, finding only two, and slipped them into his pocket. As he stared at the body, Greg thought of the infection. He was a walking cure...and they still appeared to need him. Why? The most important question, (at least to him), could he get infected? Was it possible?

  Again, he ultimately concluded that he didn't want to run the only real test that would tell him. Luck was a thing that seemed to stick to him, he realized. Two weeks on Dis, longer, actually, before his memory went, and after all the encounters he'd had with the Undead in their varied forms, he hadn't been cut, bit, or touched even once, neither had Kyra or Cage, Billings or Powell. As he kept going, he thought of the dead.

  Baker, the poor kid who couldn't get the Zombie Apocalypse out of his head and looked at the whole thing on Dis like a movie. Then Greg thought of the Berserker, the hulk of raw muscle and killing power, crushing Baker's head like a grape, and stopped that line of thought. Instead, he shifted his focus to Kauffman. Taken down by a bullet, by Dark Ops. Where was his body now? When he'd last seen the pale thing, it had been on the floor of a jump ship. Greg didn't like that train of thought either, so he derailed it.

  Just in time, too. Something groaned up ahead: a deep, unpleasant sound. Adrenaline came at him, making him faster, stronger, more focused. Greg came to a corner, put his back to the wall, and edged up to it. He peered around the corner and spied a trio of zombies moving away from him. For a second, he was struck by how smooth their gaits were. In fact, if it wasn't for the rotted flesh and the inhuman groans, he'd have mistaken them for humans.