Necrocide

Chapter 47

*This chapter is extra long and extra violent...*

TWO YEARS BEFORE THE OUTBREAK...

Schaefer and Bennington walked back to the lab. Before Bennington could wipe the blood off his knife, Schaefer stopped him. "Do you mind if I borrow that for a moment?"

"What for, sir?" Bennington asked.

"I want to see if I can make a few changes to the Ambrosia's behavior. Just a little something to prove we didn't entirely fail."

"Sure, but who are you gonna test it on?"

"Well given the fact we killed all of the test subjects, I'll just try it on myself. And if it doesn't go well, I have a gun and a box of grenades to make sure I pass on."

"If you say so, mate."

Simon ran up from behind them. "Gentlemen! We have a situation down in the sub-levels."

"Can't talk right now, Simon," Schaefer replied. "I've gotta make some last second improvements to the Ambrosia before we head back to London." And he walked away, leaving Simon behind with Bennington.

"You can talk to me, lad," Bennington said. "What's wrong?"

Almost as if on cue, animalistic screeches echoed from the stairwell along with the sounds of gunfire and human screams. Simon ran to the door leading into the stairs and locked it, now panting heavily.

"What the bloody hell was that?" Bennington asked.

"Follow me, sir!" Simon replied, and he grabbed Bennington's arm and pulled him along as the two of them made their way down the hall.

They jumped into the first open room they came across, which coincidentally was right next to the room Schaefer locked himself in. They shut the door and turned around to find many other scientists in there. Hera, Artemis, Hypnos, and Helios were present, all four of them gathered around computers displaying the surveillance footage. Bennington noticed more gauze wrapped around Hypnos's neck, the color red seeping through. This slightly amused him since he also had a previous wound on his other arm from an incident with one of the corpses, but a crude scar replaced that injury since then.

"Could someone please explain what's going on?" Bennington asked.

"The test subjects' corpses," Artemis said in awe. "They're coming back to life."

"One of the ugly bastards bit me in the neck," Hypnos grumbled. "I'm not feeling too well, sir."

"I thought we sent the guards down to incinerate them!"

"We did," Hera replied. "They were ripped limb from limb as soon as they opened the doors."

Bennington and Simon approached the screens with hesitation. The only sights present on each screen were hordes of greenish-pale corpses running around like panicking citizens, all of them attacking the closest living humans they could find. They were shocked at how easy it was for these dead men walking to rip apart human flesh like if it were plasticine. They were also disturbed at the fact the corpses began consuming the mutilated flesh of their victims, like predators ripping apart their prey. And no matter how much gunfire penetrated their bodies, they didn't seem to be stopping anytime soon.

"Who let them out?" Bennington asked.

"The same wankers who were supposed to get rid of the bodies," Helios replied. "Now they're dong like Zeus hypothesized, attacking anyone who doesn't have Ambrosia running through their veins."

Bennington felt like a lightbulb clicked on in his head. "That's why Schaefer was gonna test it out on himself!" he exclaimed.

"He's gonna become one of them?" Simon asked.