Chapter 9: Missing persons
as samantha and michael first approach the base, there is no sign of the armed guards; with the loud siren still blaring, they drive past the line of cars that were waiting to enter the base. They notice that the cars are now wrecked; and in a panic, it looks like they have smashed into one another. With dead bodies hanging out the cars windows, showing signs of massive trauma. They look closer to see that the gate blocking the entrance, completely smashed through by a deceased civilian, who is now sitting in a suv, perched atop the gate, blocking the path, so that no one can drive through. With that samantha begins regretting leaving alyssa here, and begins breaking down. Michael tries to reassure samantha, by telling her, “that we found her once” ”, and not to worry we will find her again”. Finding them selves in another horrible situation, samantha and michael jump from the vehicle. While samantha grabs her oversized bag, that is full of supplies out of the trunk; out of no where, michael begins to feel weary, and begins staggering against the car; starting to feel the effects of this long sadistic night beginning to weigh heavily on him. With samantha trying to hurry, and michael lagging behind, they make their way into the base, by climbing over the hood of the suv; past the corpse of a passenger, with the flesh ripped from his face. Samantha and michael then notice a decent sized medical tent, set up outside of the main building. It has a light inside; that is shining through, casting the shadows of four figures; who looks too be operating on a small body, which is lying on a table. With samantha fearing the worst she rushes in, and finds that she is partly right. Samantha finds four mangled infected civilians, tearing out the organs, of a middle aged woman’s upper torso, that has been severed from its lower half. Catching the infected civilians attention, samantha and michael enter the tent; the blood drenched organs begin hitting the floor, as the infected civilians, see something more enticing. They begin charging at sam and mike, with one of them knocking samantha to the floor pinning her to the ground, as sam struggles to get the gun from her waist. Michael musters up his strength fighting off the beasts; he delivers a swift kick to the head of the creature, knocking it off samantha. As samantha's life has just flashed before her eyes, she jumps to her feet. They both fire multiple shots that echo throughout the surrounding area, dropping the rowdy infected vessels, to the ground. Sam and mike scavenge through the tent trying to ignore the smell of the dismembered body on the table, swatting flies away as they go; they both begin gathering multiple medical supplies, that are spread throughout the tent, just incase they get injured, or they run into anyone along the way. They exit the tent, and start toward the building. Samantha and michael run into the building, glancing above the door as they enter, they notice a security camera panning back and forth, realizing that the place is heavily monitored, and that there has to be a surveillance room, showing most of the facility. Michael mentions to samantha, we have to get to that room, and check those monitors immediately. That has to be our best bet at finding alyssa; it would also give us the upper hand on whatever else is roaming the rooms and the halls. With that, samantha and michael begin heading down the hall, working their way through dead civilians and dead military men. Out of nowhere, an older gentleman in military fatigues comes running from an adjacent hall, and rushes into a room, ahead of them slamming the door behind him. Not sure, what he was running from, sam and mike, glance around the corner, noticing nothing is there, thinking that it is strange, sam and mike approach the room, and open the door. Opening the door, samantha and michael are greeted with a gun pointed at them, by a man sitting behind a desk with a name plate on it saying, colonel henry myers, he must be the officer in charge of the base, colonel myers quickly withdraws his weapon saying, “sorry you two” ”, thought you might of been one of them”. Samantha immediately asks the colonel about alyssa, and if he has seen her; the colonel lets samantha know, that he has not, and he is sorry. Samantha then asks, what happened here, how did you guys lose control; the colonel lets them know that little under an hour ago, the base was over run by hundreds of blood thirsty crazed civilians. The guards tried holding them off, but there was way too many; most of the guards retreated into the building some stayed and fought, with most of them dying. The colonel barricaded himself, in a room just down the hall, waiting for it to die down. After it did, the colonel then came in here to get the phone number, of his superior so he can find out what exactly is the next step that he needs to take. As michael begins pointing to a camera, in the corner of the room; he asks the colonel“, is there is a surveillance room in the building” ”, that has monitors” ”, so we can view the building” “, and try too find alyssa”. The colonel replies, “yes” “, it is right down the hall, which i just came from” “, it is the very last room, on the left”. With that, colonel myers calmly asks, sam and mike too leave the room, and tells them that he is about to make an important call, and that it is private. The colonel, then kindly asks sam and mike, if they would please shut the door, on their way out. With that, samantha and michael slowly closes the door, exiting the colonels office. They make their way down the hall, and enter the surveillance room, locking the door behind them. They notice a few chairs, and about 20 monitors in the room. Samantha and michael, then quickly begin scanning through the monitors, noticing multiple packs, of infected civilians throughout the building. Samantha notices colonel myers, on one of the monitors on the phone, slamming his fist on the desk, as he is talking to somebody. Samantha begins growing curious as to what he is saying, since there is no sound on the screens. Michael notices there is a room, that looks kind of like a cafeteria, on one of the screens that is heavily barricaded, and filled with healthy civilians and soldiers, all grouped up together; but there is no sign of alyssa. Continuing to search the screens, samantha notices the colonel has finished with his phone conversation, and is now writing something down, on a piece of paper that is on his desk. All of a sudden the camera in the cafeteria begins to pan; and michael finally sees alyssa cuddled in a corner, with a soldier and her doll; thank god! She is ok. Out of nowhere, samantha gasps, followed by a loud bang, as samantha and michael hear a gunshot from down the hall, which echoes throughout the building. With samantha, covering her mouth with her hand, michael glances at the screen to see colonel myers, slumped on his desk bleeding from his head. “oh my god” “, he just shot himself”, samantha says; “why would he do that”? Michael then shows samantha the other screen and she immediately forgets the scene she just saw; seeing her daughter and the soldier that she is with, being jimmy. Samantha is overcome with excitement at the sight of her daughter. With samantha and michael, just having to find the cafeteria, they exit the room. As sam and mike pass the colonels office, curious as to what he was writing down, just before he shot himself; samantha enters the room and grabs the note from his desk. It reads (suicide note) i just got off the phone with the commander and chief; he has let me now that the situation, has gotten to far out of hand, and that he is extremely relieved, that we have not initiated the solution anywhere else, in the country. He let me know that they will be terminating the program as we speak. He also informed me that to prevent the situation from getting any worse, and the information of what happened here from leaking. They have dispatched two stealth bombers, equipped with the latest underground nuclear device, which will penetrate the surface of the ground detonating, and will cause the city, and the surrounding area to collapse in on itself, causing a crater that will look like a meteor impact. They are going to say that a meteor hit the city, in order to cover up, exactly what happened here. He informed me the strike will be here within the next hour. I also, really need to get this off my chest, and if any of my guys find this, i want you to know, i am extremely sorry. They ordered me to feed you guys the drug contaminated food, at chow this afternoon that we gave to the lower class citizens in the city. So very shortly, you will more then likely become one of them; i am so sorry you guys, and they also ordered me to serve it to the evacuated civilians when they arrived, but i was unable to do so, before the attack. They changed their minds this afternoon, and did not want anyone who knew about what we were doing, to be allowed to leave the city, or survive through the cleansing, except for a select few. I never imagined my career ending this way, but we all have to go sometime, goodbye (end letter). After reading the note, samantha becomes white as a ghost, fearing for alyssa again, who is now trapped in a room with a bunch of soldiers, which can turn violent, and become infected at anytime. Samantha also feels bad for jimmy, because he has no idea, of what is about to happen to him. With that, mike and sam begin making their way to the cafeteria.