Aidan was the first to wake up. He had dreamed of something bad, but couldn't remember what. He had a screaming pain in his neck and even without looking he knew his arm was in an awkward position. He must have used it to unconsciously support himself at some point in the night in an attempt to gain comfort, and now was regretting it.
He pulled his arm away and moved his legs. He looked at his cell phone clock and realized that they had slept six hours… But he still felt that a truck, ten buses and at least three bicycles had passed over him.
On the other side, Rachel was asleep and there didn't seem to be any new bleeding. She looked so peaceful, very different from the girl he saw last night as the two of them practically tortured that imposter.
He would never admit it, but at first the girl scared him. It was a wild card full of unforeseen events and, in a way, it still is. But it was different now. He felt like he'd known her for years. Perhaps almost dying several times in the company of someone else had brought them closer together. He now considered her a friend, for sure.
Rachel was so calm and relaxed, Aidan didn't want to wake her. He forced himself to nudge her gently and slowly she opened her eyes. Blinked a few times, but soon focused her vision on him.
Rachel gave him a genuine smile, followed by a grunt as she tried to move. Automatically, Aidan threw his body forward and placed a hand on her shoulder.
Rachel could feel his touch burning against her skin and he was just applying the lightest of pressures.
- Hi, good day. Let me take a look at your wound, please.
Without even answering because it would hurt so much at that moment, she just nodded. Then with a great deal of care, Aidan pulled her body forward, using his knee to hold her, and peeled the dirty tank off her skin for a look.
The wound looked better. It wasn't healed, of course. But it didn't bleed either. He didn't have to change the bandage yet. Which was a good thing, considering the need to pick up some supplies as soon as possible.
- It looks much better now, but you definitely can't go with me.
- You can't leave me here. – She looked angry, broken and surprised.
- Of course not. Relax. We are a team, remember? I'll go alone to the control room, find where the guy is, what happened to him and the cure, and come back to find you. I promise.
- I'm not comfortable with the idea of you going alone.
She was worried and, as much as she thought it was a sign of weakness, it was stamped on her face. He could read her now and it made her feel vulnerable. Aidan reached out and placed his hand over hers. – I promise that as soon as I can, I'll be back.
Rachel was entering an emotional state she had never felt before. She wasn't exactly good. – All right, but be careful.
Aidan released her hand and got to his feet. He had to follow the rest alone, at least for a while.
- Hey. – She said, drawing his attention. - Is there any chance I can convince you to take a gun?
The look he gave her said a lot, but he understood where it was coming from. So far he's had either Rachel or Ronnie giving a little extra protection. He needed this if he was even going to have a chance to go back to both of them and help his mother.
Aidan looked at the gun on the floor and following his plan of vision, Rachel picked it up and held it out to him. After a long pause and a deep breath, he withdrew it from her hand. The gun practically shook. It looked toxic. The image of his father flashed through his mind and Aidan tried as hard as he could to push it away.
- I don't know how to shoot. - Aidan said with embarrassment as he clumsily tucked the gun into his waistband like he had seen Ronnie do so many times.
- Do not worry about it. Just raise your hand and pull the trigger. The gun does the rest.
- ...Okay.
Aidan checked the knife in his pocket and pulled out his phone. There it was the information about the disease and maybe it was necessary for him to download something else.
- I won't be long, okay? Just stay supported and relax. Try to get some sleep.
He grabbed his backpack after Rachel insisted it might be necessary and gave her one last look before starting down the steps.
Fear consumed him. But, if those two girls were strong enough to get through all of this without complaining, he couldn't let them down. After all, he was sure the only reason he was still alive was because they hadn't given up on him.
- Still alive?!
He heard her scream as he passed the first floor and it made him smile. - Still here!
Aidan arrived at the basement door. It took him a few seconds to take a deep breath and focus all his willpower to push it open. The door opened fully and what he saw was not surprising. The floor was dead, to use the best possible word. Everything that was there was gone. It had been lost.
Still, Aidan was careful. He kept one hand on the knife and the other near the gun strapped to his waist. It was burning against his skin and he was convinced it would leave a mark. Even if it's a psychological one. It was heavy, but maybe he was unconsciously exaggerating. His mind was working to focus on something different, but it always came back to the gun. He only had it there to satisfy Rachel and soothe her.
He walked through the corridors slowly, noting the names on the doors. He was looking for a control center, but he would be just as happy if he found a....supply closet!
Aidan entered quickly and although there were some overturned bookshelves, he managed to find several bandages, alcohol and other useful things. There were also bottles of water and canned food.
When satisfied, Aidan slung his backpack back and returned to his search for the control center. The corridors down there were different in many ways, such as: they were much more muggy than the others; they had no windows, which was giving him a new sense of claustrophobia; they were poorly lit, which could only be because some lights were burned out; they were more depressing; and probably the dirtiest corridors ever.
"Finally!" He found the control room. Entered the room and searched the most apparent computer in the room for recordings from the moment of the incident.
When he turned on the computer, he noticed that the ventilation control page was open. Tomás must have slowed down when he and Ronnie were there. "Ok, maybe a little less...". When he put his hand on the button to decrease the air capacity, something came to him: "Wait! With this loud noise, the chance of any monsters hearing them is low, right? Arg!" He left it as it was and searched for the security videos for the past two days.
Unfortunately, there are no safety videos inside the emergency stairs. So, he will need to look for the path that Tomás supposedly took.
"Well, let's go. He said it all started when he stole the virus. This one was on the tenth floor, so . . ." Rolling through the cameras and the moments he remembered being the time of the epidemic, Aidan sat up and leaned back, hoping for the best of the shoddy quality. Seriously, for such a fancy place even the equipment should be better.
"Here it is!" Aidan thought when he finally saw the guy running down the halls. It was Thomas. The man was holding something in his hands and was angry. Aidan could see the moment he threw the vial against the air duct. There were several security guards around, and even though the camera was black and white, the emergency lights flashed.
Soon after that, Tomás runs out of the camera area and disappears down the emergency stairway. Seconds later someone goes after the man. Since all the cameras were passing in sync, Aidan could see the surge he gave. People fell to the ground in pain. They seemed to scream, but the cameras had no audio. Still, the pain and suffering were clear.
"Wait... Come back, I think…" On one of the cameras, Aidan noticed a sudden, familiar movement off the stairs. That's what Thomas had said. That had to be the real Harold Smithens! The man was older than Tomás, wore a white apron and had a strange beard.
Harold was thrown out and surrounded by various monsters. Well, at least the guy hadn't lied. Harold struggled with them for a few seconds until something strange happened. All the monsters stopped attacking him and practically dropped to his knees giving the man a few seconds. So he managed to escape and ran away.
Aidan had to rewind the video to see it better. Something was wrong. Still unconvinced, he came back a third time and paying an awful lot of attention, Aidan could see a remote control, almost like a whistle, not Harold's hand. "Was he…was he controlling them? But…"
Returning to his original plan, Aidan tried to follow him on camera, but it wasn't an easy task. Several people were infected or were running and recognizing a person in black and white through shoddy small cameras wasn't exactly fun. It required a lot of attention, concentration and vision. None of these were at a high level at the time.
With great luck, Aidan managed to see him reach the other stairs and after that Harold disappeared. He ran through the entire footage from the front of the lab and at no time did Harold get in there. Unless there's a door they don't know about, the only other people who got in were them. Strange... This is not Harold. Then it was clear as water. It was his mother who had entered the lab.
Aidan froze when he saw her. Part of him was heavy with longing, wanting to see her, hug her and tell her how much he loved her. But another part, an important part, wanted to know why she had entered there. He fast-forwarded the video for a few seconds and it was her. She came out of the laboratory and held the vial that had to contain the cure.
"But why? How is mother the one who got the cure? And more importantly, why had she done this on Harold's behalf?" Following his mother through the camera, Aidan saw her run to a spot and then disappeared. He checked all the cameras, she was nowhere. As if she knew a way through the blind spots and she'd slipped out unnoticed.
Aidan took the map that was crumpled in his pocket and tried to use her location to recognize from the cameras exactly where that spot would be. It was kind of bad to read, quite dirty and had already lost some of its color, but he saw that it appeared to be not far from the lab. By the path Ronnie and Tomás had taken to get there. On the map there was a supply room there. It must be where they keep the medicines and bandages.
Fast forwarding the video, she remains inside for a long time. And when the floor is flooded with monsters and everything is relatively calmer, the video shows her leaving. It was her mother still. She was normal and didn't look contaminated. And that gave him hope. She might be fine somewhere in this building and he would find her.
From eight to eighty Aidan's heart fell. Her mother was passing through the monsters until she stopped in the center. He couldn't hear her, but she screamed. It must have been loud because everything moved quickly and several of those infected were heading towards her. The vision that followed would haunt him for the rest of his life. It was his mother being attacked by several of those beings. Breathe. They were drowning her. The tears come down quickly and flood the keyboard. And his eyes couldn't leave that image. They were glued to the screen.
"She went through all this... But why? What was he missing? She seemed to have gotten past the monsters well and then purposefully submitted to it. Why? What was the missing piece in the story? There is something wrong about this."
He replayed the video. And using one hand to cover the camera that showed his mother, he searched for anything that bounced during the case. That's when he saw it. Harold was heading towards the emergency stairway, in the opposite direction of the monsters, during all this. Had she done this for him?
"How could she have been able to do this to them? She certainly must have remembered that she had two children she needed to take care of. Arg!" He couldn't stress about it. Even because everything that came now would be just speculation. He continued to watch the emergency stairway exits. Harold was never seen again. had to check the stairs then, there was no other way. He could only be there.
With a bit of curiosity and needing to calm himself, Aidan sought out the recording of moments before they entered the lab. He saw her then…it was Ronnie. And Tomás, but who cares?
She still looked fine. It must have been before the incident. One of them, at least. But then it happened and he saw it. It was the moment her mother, her own blood, attacked Ronnie. That tasted bitter in her mouth. After all, her mom was the main reason Ronnie had put herself in that position in the first place, how could she do that? True that she was a monster now and theoretically could not be held responsible for her actions, but still ...
He had already wasted too much time. He had to get back to Rachel, check on her and on the stairs. If they find the guy's body there, then they're screwed. Taking everything he'd brought, Aidan took one last look at the cameras and walked out the door. The way back to the stairs was quick because he already had confirmation that nothing would attack him.
The moment Rachel heard the door open softly downstairs, she managed to breathe easily. He was still alive. She could hear his footsteps quicken as if he were running upstairs. His breathing was clearly panting and in just a minute, Aidan's body appeared in her field of vision putting an involuntary smile on her face. She tried to hide it, but she couldn't contain it and he noticed. He reciprocated.
- I see you're doing a lot better… - The double meaning sounded innocent and unintentional as it left Aidan's mouth, but not when it reached Rachel's ears.
- Of course, having you as a doctor… - He chuckled. - There's also the fact that I haven't gotten up since you left, but…
- Speaking of which, let me see how your back is doing. - He took his backpack off his back and fetched the bandages and medication he'd taken downstairs.
Rachel realized he was weird.
- Did you find Harold? - She asked as she straightened up.
- No, several things happened that I can't explain everything to you now. But the last thing I saw was him entering the stairs and there's no document of him coming out on any of the fourteen floors. Including the basement. He bent down to be at her level and check her bandage. – Which means he's on these stairs and probably dead.
Rachel was annoyed because she ached when he pulled on her tank top.
- But Aidan… - She held her breath when he put the tank back on her skin. He pulled her body back to face her. - This building does not have fourteen floors. It has fifteen.