Flip This Zombie - Jesse Petersen [21]
“Please, come in,” Dr. Barnes insisted as he passed through the door his key card had unlocked. “I’ll try to explain everything to you.”
We followed him. I guess we were too numb and curious to do anything else. Inside we found a tidy office, sort of like what you used to find at a clinic before you went into an exam room. There was a big desk near the back wall with a computer on it. A computer that was on and working! Instantly all my little geek-centricities kicked in and I longed to check e-mail and see what was up with I Can Has Cheezburger.
Of course, those things didn’t exist anymore, computer or not.
In the back of the room and along the left wall were banks of windows, but built-in blinds were lowered between the panes of glass to keep us from seeing what was on the other side.
The room was cool, probably half from being underground and half from the air conditioning pumping through vents hidden somewhere in the room. Air conditioning! We hadn’t felt that in months (again, old vans have their advantages and disadvantages).
Soft light glowed from a desk lamp beside the desk and some kind of instrumental music drifted out of the computer speakers.
It was all like a weird oasis from what was just above us.
Dr. Barnes took a place at his desk and motioned us to sit across from him. As we sank into the seats and stared, both of us too stunned to do much else, he smiled.
“You must have a few questions.”
Dave snorted as a response, but Barnes ignored his interruption.
“Let me begin at the beginning. You see, this warehouse was once owned by a government facility for which I worked.”
Dave shifted in his chair as we shot each other a look. Governmental lab. Sort of like the one at the University of Washington where all this shit started.
“Making zombies, were we, Doc?” I asked softly.
Barnes’s face paled at least three shades and I thought he might pass out right then and there. He was filled with righteous indignation when he sputtered, “Of course not!”
“Then what were you doing way out in the desert in a warehouse obviously designed to look like a nothing hole?” Dave asked, his brow arching.
“We—well, it was classified,” the other man stammered as his eyes darted away from us. “And it really doesn’t matter now, does it?”
“Doesn’t it?” I asked as I folded my arms. “Damn, I don’t want to find out there’s something worse out there waiting to be unleashed on us.”
Barnes hesitated. “Well, if there is, it wasn’t something I was involved in before the infection. And whatever I did before, there’s no longer a government to work for, at least not out here. I’m no different than you two now.”
Dave opened his mouth to argue, but I jumped in instead. “So how did you survive the outbreak?”
The doctor’s frown deepened. “When the infection began, a few of my assistants and I were downstairs in this lab. An emergency lockdown procedure was triggered at the first whiff of those things hitting the city and we were trapped with only satellite television to tell us the story of what was going on just twenty feet above us.”
I flinched. As bad as it had been to be a part of the outbreak, I could hardly imagine being physically trapped somewhere, only able to watch on monitors while all the horror unfolded just above you. It must have been like a bad movie… except you couldn’t change the channel.
“But after a couple of days, the television stations from around the world slowly broke out and then died. Even the military links failed, which is when we all recognized just how bad it had gotten.” He sighed.
I tilted my head to look at him. If this was an act, he was very fucking good at it. Like “I’d like to thank the Academy” good.
“So how’d you get out, Doc?” Dave asked, seemingly less impressed than I was. His arms were folded tightly in front of him and his eyes were narrowed.
“After about a week, the power went