Chapter 16 #2
“The old world’s economy used to rely on places like these,” Timothy says. “We were rapidly progressing into a more digital-focused economy, but every physical product needed factories and production lines, making places like this crucial.”
“It’s hard to imagine how many people used to be alive to work here,” I say.
“True, and this city is small. You should have seen New York!”
“My village doesn’t need factories to be successful,” River says. He suddenly stops walking, and the rest of us do as well.
“What is it?” Josh asks, already moving his rifle in front of him.
“Something’s coming… many somethings.” He turns around to look at where we came from. I follow his gaze but see nothing out of the ordinary, yet I still reach for my rifle.
A few seconds of silence go by before River shouts, “Run!”
Anything that can scare him is bound to terrify me. We break into a run. Through the sound of our footsteps hitting the pavement, I notice a growing screeching sound from behind. I turn my head around, almost stumbling at the sight of what is chasing us.
Lizard men.
They’re green and pale, as tall as Buck, though much leaner. Even from this distance, I notice their sharp claws. And they’re so freaking fast. Maybe River could easily outrun them, but the rest of us can’t run as fast.
Buck sharply stops and turns around. He opens fire, and the rest of us join.
It takes a lot more than a single bullet to bring down one of the lizard men, even when hitting their skulls.
I hope the rest will stop chasing once they see we’re not defenseless, but they only run faster, with more of them joining like a wild herd.
I’m beginning to realize this whole thing was a trap. That glowing thing must have tricked River into making us come here.
“Keep running!” Buck shouts, because shooting them isn’t working.
We don’t get far before a window shatters to our right when a lizard man jumps through it. River crashes into him before he can reach us. The powerful impact sends the creature flying against a nearby wall, then Josh quickly shoots him down.
More lizard men rush toward us from both sides, jumping through windows and running through open gates.
River and Buck punch whoever we’re not fast enough to shoot, but it’s slowing us down, and Josh is already out of bullets.
I switch rifles with him since he’s the better shooter.
I have barely any air left in my lungs, making me fear I’m about to stumble.
“Up ahead!” Timothy calls, and I focus my eyes until I see the large structure we saw from the air. The glowing yellow light still pulses like a heartbeat.
“It can be a trap!” I shout, my breath coming out as whistles.
“It’s not!” River shouts back. A second later, a lizard man almost rips his head off, but he ducks in time for Josh to shoot him through the eye.
Even if the glowing light ends up being a trap, it’s not like the alternative is any better.
We’re seconds away from reaching the structure when the lizard men collectively screech, the deafening sound piercing through my skull. I look back to see that they’ve stopped, as if blocked by a transparent barrier. They wave their claws angrily, snapping their jaws.
“Is everyone okay?” Timothy asks.
I lean with my hands on my knees to catch my breath, beads of sweat dripping from my forehead. “Shit, that was close. Why… why aren’t they attacking?”
“They’re afraid,” River says and hands me a bottle of water from his backpack.
My hand shakes as I drink, my shirt clinging to my skin. There are so many of those lizard men out here, and I can’t imagine how they got here in the first place. “Do you think they are here to fight the glowing light?” I ask.
“I think they’re meant to keep people away from it,” Buck says.
“Hector must’ve sent them.” Josh takes the remaining water from me. “It means we’re where we should be.”
I turn around to face the entrance of the massive structure. The yellow light pulses more dimly, and I feel a strange urge to step inside.
“We’d best enter before the lizards decide they are no longer afraid,” Timothy says.
With nothing behind us but certain death, we step into the light.
*
I stop hearing the screeching of the lizard men the moment we enter the structure and find ourselves in a dusty reception area.
Faded posters on the walls promote the Fuel of Tomorrow!
They all show a yellowish liquid inside glass tubes, with some of them including smiling people driving in the background.
“It seems like a new type of energy,” Timothy says as he walks from poster to poster. “Oil prices skyrocketed in the years before the war, and there was a lot of pressure to find alternatives, but nothing was good enough to be a true replacement.”
We follow the pulsing light through a long hallway. There’s a weird scent in the air that I can’t quite define, and the lack of breeze makes the place feel stuffy. We walk past abandoned offices, where people’s belongings are still waiting untouched after so many years.
We follow the light from hallway to hallway, and I realize how strong it must be to be seen from the sky.
“In there,” River says, pointing at the large open door in front of us.
The faded sign says it’s the cafeteria. We step inside, holding tightly to our weapons.
I stop in my tracks the second I’m past the door, my eyes darting from side to side.
A glowing yellowish liquid substance covers the walls, most of the floor, and some of the dining tables.
It seems to be shifting rather than staying still.
“Fascinating,” Timothy says. “It reminds me of an old lava lamp. Best not to touch anything.”
I wasn’t going to, and I’ve no idea what a lava lamp is. I wonder if standing so close to this substance is enough to endanger us.
“Did you see that?” Josh points to our right.
Something dark seems to be shifting inside the yellow substance on the wall. We walk carefully toward it, keeping close to each other. The thing inside the liquid shifts again until it turns into the silhouette of a man.
“Shit,” Buck says. “Look.”
I turn my head and gasp. Across the entire cafeteria, dark human shapes appear inside the substance.
“Are they trapped in there?” I ask.
“Not exactly.”
I jolt at the nearby sound. “Did you speak?” I ask the figure closest to us.
“We did.” It sounds like one man speaking, though his voice comes from multiple directions.
“You wanted us to come here,” River says.
“It was you who wanted to come here, and we assumed you had a reason. Things used to happen for a reason.”
“They still do,” Buck says. “What’s the reason for what happened here?”
“The end of the world, of course. We feared it for months, and when it finally happened on a Tuesday morning, we quickly lost all contact with the outside world. Some of us stayed here because of the underground bunker, but some chose to return to their homes.”
“A bomb fell not far from here,” Timothy says.
“It did. Some of the bombs were biological weapons that were meant to spread and kill whoever survived the impact. The one that hit south of here was one of those.”
“Did it get mixed with whatever you were developing here?” Timothy asks.
“Eventually, yes. We developed a new type of bacteria—a single-celled organism that could reproduce on its own, resulting in the creation of pure energy. When the bomb fell, the bacteria had just enough intelligence to sense the danger. It reproduced faster than we ever imagined possible. Within minutes, it flowed throughout the facility and engulfed everyone in its path.”
“To protect you,” Timothy says.
“Yes. To protect its makers.”
“Everyone who was here is now inside this thing?” Josh asks.
“No. In time, some of us chose to leave, though we can’t survive long on our own.
We nourish each other, a self-sufficient organism.
And there were the children. Five of them were here during that day.
The bacteria consumed them as well, but we protested, and they were allowed to exit before they could become one with the bacteria.
We didn’t know whether they were affected in any way, but we later learned that they were, though the radiation outside must have also played a role in their condition.
The children chose to leave in search of a new home.
Four died on the journey, but one remains. ”
“Was that child named Hector?” I ask.
“No. His name was Paul. His father brought him here on that day because of the bunker. Paul’s mother died when he was a baby. Years after he left us with the rest of the children, his father left as well to search for him, but he did not survive the journey. Please, stay back.”
The shape of the man becomes clearer, as if he’s coming closer to the surface of the substance. I almost fall back when he emerges, still covered in the yellow liquid. He doesn’t have clear features, but he’s no longer connected to the rest, at least not physically.
He walks toward the entrance, and we follow him at a safe distance. His walk is clumsy, as if he’s slowly remembering how to move his legs.
“We loved having the children here,” he says, his voice now coming from a single source.
“We had a playroom for them while their parents were working. Paul was their unofficial leader, even though he was younger than the rest. He had a temper, but he was also charming and intelligent. Is it impolite to call a child cunning?”
“If he grows up to be a murderous psychopath, it’s fine,” Josh says.