“Can’t you?” She narrowed her eyes.
“There’s a weapon in there that will key to your biometrics. You need to open it so it will key to you. I don’t need it. I have my own weapons.” He clicked his teeth together to accentuate his meaning.
He stood precariously close to the entrance, and there was something about the situation that felt wrong, but against her better judgement, she opened the panel.
Instead of the weapon he’d promised, a hidden door opened revealing a secret room, and from what she could see of it from the outside, it looked to be a panic room.
Polidori was abandoning her.
“I’m sorry, Elizabeth. If you’ll recall, I tried to talk you out of coming in today.” Polidori gave her a smile that was more pity than anything.
“So you’re part of this? Part of X?” She refused to acknowledge the panic rising in her chest.
“No, not at all. I’m part of Team John. See, your monster is coming. I can’t be here when he arrives. It would probably be better for all involved if you never met him.” He shrugged. “This way, the rest of us have a fighting chance.”
“What are you talking about?”
“No time to chat, Elizabeth. I’ll miss you.” He slammed his palm down on the door to the containment unit and the snarling, slavering creature was free.
It charged toward her just as the safe room door closed and left her alone with the revenant.
“I’ll kill you, Polidori. I don’t know how, but I will kill you,” she cried. Jesus, she didn’t know what had possessed her to say that. She wasn’t a killing kind of person.
Of course, being cornered by a flesh-eating zombie could change one’s constitution.
There was an ax encased in glass on the wall—goddamn it, why hadn’t she seen that sooner? Polidori with his—oh shit!
She slammed back into the wall and put her elbow through the glass. Elizabeth was suddenly grateful for the self-defense class all employees of Bureau 7 had to take. She grabbed the ax just in time to put it between them.
He was strong, so incredibly strong, and his breath and body were fetid. He smelled as if he’d been dead for days, not hours.
Elizabeth wasn’t sure how long she could fight him off, and if he was infectious…
A horrible flash played out in her mind’s eye. There was no way out of this. He was stronger than she was, faster than she was…
And she was alone.
Alarms blared and a calm, recorded voice came over the comm. “This is a Code Black. Prepare for containment and cleaning protocol. Please secure your stations and proceed to the nearest safety pod. This is a Code Black—”
She shuddered to think what was going down outside their lab. Even if she defeated this one, how many more were there?
“Safeeeeeety pod…” he hissed in her face.
Suddenly, he was ripped from her by Barton Smith, head of security on Kythnos. He was just as strong as the revenant, fighting him with his bare hands. When Barton wrestled him down, Elizabeth didn’t hesitate.
She swung the ax in a mighty arc and brought it down on the creature’s neck, severing the head. It rolled from the body, those razor teeth still clacking together as if still searching for meat.
The body jerked and twitched, but finally stopped—even as the teeth continued snap and chatter, the head chewing on its own lips and tongue now as it died.
She shuddered with revulsion.
“You okay, Dr. Wollstonecraft? Did it bite you?” Barton checked her over, turning her this way and that with his big hands.
“I don’t think so.”
“Let’s hope not. We lost Sector 4.”
“Sector 4?” That was the housing unit. “All of Sector 4? How the hell does that happen?” Her voice hit a higher pitch than she meant. She was trying like hell not to freak out, but she was losing ground rather quickly as the world around her went to shit.
Yeah, that was the scientific term: going to shit.
“This infection spreads quickly. I need to get you to a safety pod. Where’s Dr. Polidori?” Barton asked, rubbing his arm.
“Polidori took the pod and locked me out.”
“Bastard. Just for that, when I get back to the central command center, I’m popping his door.”
Elizabeth wouldn’t deny the idea held appeal, but she was more concerned about what was going on with Barton and all the scratching. He seemed to be working something pretty awful on his bicep.
“What’s that? Were you bitten?”
“Just a scratch. Itches like a motherfucker, though.” He hadn’t stopped scratching and his uniform shirt was bore a dark stain that grew as she watched.
“Let me see it.”
“Doc,” he began.
“Barton, let me help you.”
“I guess you are pretty handy with that ax.” He unbuttoned his shirt and peeled it off. “Fuck,” he said, when he saw it.
It was obviously so much more than a scratch. The flesh around the wound had putrefied, and it was spreading.