AGE OF INSANITY

Chapter 18: The shelter 2

The newcomers made their fallen comrade look like Santa Claus. They were all huge men that looked like they had seen their fair share of fights. One if them had a huge scar that ran across his face. The last guy to arrive was argueably the scariest one with his tatoo, blacked out face and slit eye lids. Thier features were not the most terrifying thing about them. The uniforms they wore were. Unlike their dead comrade, they still wore their Kissiani maximum security uniforms. My limited interaction with the members of Kissiani had been jaring and morbidly disturbing. It housed the very worst society had to offer. It did not house criminals, it contained criminally insane men whose crimes were simply too morbid to describe. Judging from thier anticipating glares and the walls of horror surrounding me the men in front of me were no different.

I backed up an inch and was rewarded by teeth snapping so close to my ankles I could feel their heated breath. Who ever had made the chains the infected to the wall had ensured the chains were not long enough to intersect making a path in between them. I had enough bullets to put all of them down. However from where I was standing I could only get to two before the rest were on me. Even if I could take them, the infected would not make it easy for me. So I carefully backed up hoping against all hope that the chains that held the infected would not break.

The men watched me retreat with wild amusement. These men did not need a virus to make them inhuman they simply were and that was a lot more dangerous. I made it to the opposite end of the shed before whipping out my silencer. They took in the withdrawn gun and charged at me. I fired in three rapid succession taking three of them down leaving Scar behind. Scar had picked up the body of one one his mates and used it as a shield.

The man was huge and the body he carried was not exactly a feather. I shot at the charging criminal three more times before ducking as he threw the body at me. Throwing the body threw him off balance. I took advantage of the few extra seconds he needed recover to time to slide in between his legs shooting his thigh in the process.

I did not pause, choosing instead to get out of the shed before turning around. The man was kneeling on his bad leg while he shot daggers at me. With nothing to shield him from my bullets, i emptied my clip into him and the remaining infected pausing after everything became motionless. I surveyed the damage hating the fact that I had to get rid of the bodies before any of the twins came looking for me. It would do no one any good to raise alarms before we got in the shelter.

It was safe to assume that the criminals had not yet discovered the underground shelter and even if they had they could not have bypassed the lock. Given the presence of the criminals in the shed, there had to be more of them around considering the close proximity of the prison to the forest. Even if the rest had not come across the shed more of them were bound to show up. The canisters had been positioned in public areas where they were likely to cause the most damage. The shed however was not close to any other settlement.  Any infected person in this area was either brought here or had driven here before the symptoms had gotten out of hand.

The lack of infected meant that the criminals, if they had not turned on each other, were very much alive and well rested. Any increase in activity in this area as there was bound to be during the relocation would attract unwanted attention. It took well over an hour to drag all the bodies including the infected into the pit. I tried hosing the shed down but nothing happened. The  was water, hopefully it was not the case for the shelter.

I made my way to the now deserted pond and washed the blood off my body. I surveyed the rest of the compound ensuring there was no one around. Satisfied with things I made my way to the shelter securing each door behind me.

The entrance to the shelter was wide open, the twins nowhere in sight. Inside the shelter was pitch black. The torch, probably with the twins, was not visible. I felt blindly along the wall hoping whoever had had been uncharged of planning had put a switch conveniently near the entrance. A bruising exploration later, my searching hands met with the switch.

A row of  came on instantly lighting the entrance and what appeared to be a tunnel. The short tunnel led to a slidding glass door that was secured by an electronic lock but was luckily open. I walked through the glass doors and found myself on a narrow landing that overlooked the entire shelter. What I saw could only be described as an alternate universe. The shelter could easily house a thousand families with no problem. An entire civilization could be created here with no one on the surface being the wiser.

It was basically an underground city complete with houses and infrastructure. I finally spotted the twins, not far from where I was taking pictures. I quelled the need to beat them senseless with their phones and instead called out to them. Patrick threw his arms around my shoulder jumping excitedly.

"Do you see this. This is big enough for everyone and then some. I mean we could have kids and grandkids and still have enough space for everyone. This is the ultimate apocalyptic refuge. Too bad the coach and his daughter didn't make it."

"I know we could help other people . I mean the more the merrier right. Can you imagine we could start a new society here!" Eric joined in.

I went back to the hatch securing each door and changed the password to ensure no one else made the same discovery. After briefing Marcus on all my findings including the criminals, we spent the reminder of the day exploring. The houses were fully furnished and had electricity and water. This was a great find as long as we were the only ones who knew about it.