British Zombie Breakout: Part Three (2 page)

Karen shrugged.
She lifted Janet's napkin out of the soup and returned to her paté
on toast.

Janet found
Sarah standing outside the TV lounge looking back and forth down
the corridor. The room was in a state of disorder, not the way her
son would have left it, or the responsible Alex.

Taking in the
scene with a practised eye, the guard spoke through his
walkie-talkie to his men. 'Full alert!' Turning to Janet he said,
'Looks like we've had an incident, here.'

'Incident?'
Janet's voice was shrill.

'Yes, ma'am.
I'm sorry ma'am, it looks that way.'

Dinner having
been at least temporarily abandoned, Sarah and Janet joined Fred,
Maisie, Rachel, Bill, Karen and Graham in the bar area next to the
dining room.

'Found them?'
Graham said, walking towards the two women.

Janet's body
language said it all. Her only words were, 'Not yet.'

'Why'd they go
off like that with no warning?'

'The sergeant
says he thinks there was a fight of some sort in the TV
lounge.'

'Steve and Alex
were, like, fighting and ran off?' Maisie said.

'No, if they'd
gone anywhere by themselves, they'd have at least let us know. The
worrying part is the TV room being all messed up, it's making me
think someone got in and took them.'

'Got in past
the soldiers?'

'Kidnapped? No
way!'

'Who would do
that?'

'The press?
Some paper trying for an exclusive story?'

'No chance,'
Bill said, 'Not since the hacking scandal in twenty-eleven.'

The waitress
appeared behind the counter where drinks were served. 'Is there
anything we can do?' she said, referring to herself and the
chef.

'A small
brandy, I think, dear,' Janet said, using the bar for support. 'Our
apologies to the chef, by the way.'

'Don't worry,
Mrs Reynolds, he's staying on in case any of you want something
later. The most important thing is they find your boy and the
girl.'

The soldiers
initiated a room by room search. Steve and Alex were still missing
when a sentry was found tasered next to an entrance onto the
courtyard garden, the other side of which were tall steel gates
that opened onto the street. The gates were found to be ajar, the
chains sliced through with bolt-cutters, and there was no sign of
either Steve or Alex, anywhere.

The sergeant
entered the bar with an update. 'Mrs. Reynolds?' he said, his eyes
searching the dimly lit seating area.

'Yes?'

'I've called it
in, ma'am, Commander Hodgeson himself has been informed.'

'What now?
You're going to find Alex and my Steven?'

'Another unit
is on its way. We've checked the surrounding area for a block in
each direction.'

'And?'

'Nothing. We're
going to sweep the building again, roof to basement with the second
unit. You will be closely guarded at all times.'

'That's not
good enough, sergeant, someone has taken my son. There's been time
for anything to happen to them.'

The sergeant's
radio bleeped indicating an encrypted transmission. He held up his
hand to Janet and strode out of the bar. A moment later, he
returned. 'They've broken into the Breathdeep Facility.'

'My son?
Ridiculous, he hasn't had time to get there!'

'No, of course
not. We assume other members of the same group which took him and
the girl.'

'Why the same
group?' Graham said.

'Timing,
sir.'

Chapter
3: Hold Up

At Breathdeep
Biological Research Facility, the professor and his chief assistant
had the place to themselves, having put the lab in good order after
the previous few days' stream of emergencies. The zombies were all
either dead or cured, and the security staff all inoculated and
sent home. It had taken days to ensure that the zombie pens were
fully cleaned and disinfected, and that the automated vaccine
preparation sequence was running smoothly. At the end of a long day
checking data and making adjustments in the main lab, they were
about to log out and lock up when all the alarms went off.

The two
scientists exchanged worried glances and each rushed to a
monitoring station to check the cause. Curiously, the wailing siren
silenced again within seconds. Neither Albert Mason nor the
assistant had time to establish what was happening, before running
footsteps sounded in the corridor. The professor was about to open
the door when three armed men burst in.

'What do you
want?' Mason said, taking note of the automatic weapons on show and
backing away until he bumped into a bench covered in an array of
complex glassware. 'Why are you here?'

'Zombie
Virus.'

A ski mask and
black flight suit concealed all but the leader's heavy accent. He
chambered a round into his automatic, pointing the muzzle at the
assistant and repeating the demand.

'Albert, these
guys are serious.'

'But this stuff
is lethal!' The professor glanced nervously at the safe but didn't
move. 'It wiped out half of England,' he said in an imploring tone.
'In the wrong hands, it…'

The leader
pushed his gun so hard under the assistant's chin, his head was
thrown right back. At the same time one of the other men fired a
single shot into the ceiling. For an instant, Mason expected to see
his assistant's face explode.

He sagged
against the bench, knocking against some of the fragile equipment
in the prototype vaccine production line. His jaw fell open but he
was unable to speak as, with a shaking hand, he entered the code to
unlock the safe.

'Douglas?'
Professor Mason's voice was not altogether level.

'Albert, what's
up?'

'We've had
visitors.'

'They came for
the virus?'

'Doug, I feel
such a coward, I more or less just let them take it.' His whole
body shook at the thought of what had happened. 'If we didn't
already have the vaccine in production, I'd have let them kill us
rather than hand over the virus.'

'Albert, you
did the right thing. We're going to need you to sort this one
out.'

'Listen, how
did you know they'd been here?'

'The fugitives
we've got at the hotel had visitors, too.'

'Don't tell me
something's happened to them?'

'Taken two of
the kids.'

'No! Why'd they
do that?'

'Fallback
position. If you hadn't given up the virus at Breathdeep, it would
have been a hostage situation.'

'Would
have?'

'I hate to say
it but your giving up the virus probably stopped a very ugly result
over here.'

'Where are we
at now?'

'A stolen
helicopter took off from a rooftop six blocks from the hotel, then
dropped under the London radar. As you've just told me they got
what they were after, I can't imagine they'd be keen to take a
couple of teenagers with them.'

'But you don't
know that for sure!'

'You're
correct.' The commander sighed. 'Albert, can you give me a quick
summary of what happened?'

'I'm going back
through the surveillance camera records now. Chopper dropped on the
roof of the holding pens. They hacked the main computer somehow,
then popped all the doors on the bunker. I was on my own in the lab
with my assistant.'

'You're not
hurt?'

'No. I can't
tell if they expected to find us here but they were armed. They
fired a shot and I thought they'd killed my assistant.'

'See them?'

'No, they all
wore black masks and flight suits. Scared us witless with the guns
and barely said a word.'

'They must have
said something.'

'Oh, yes,
"Zombie virus", several times. Heavy accent but I couldn't say from
where.'

'Well a
chopper's not going to take them far. They've probably met up with
a plane between London and your lab. There are a couple of old
airfields near the coast.'

'I expect
that's how they got in undetected.'

'They took the
only phial there was?'

'Doug, they
have no idea what they've done. This… this is going to end very
badly.'

'More than just
for them, I suspect,' Hodgeson said in a grave tone.

'And you've got
to find those kids before that ends badly.'

Having lifted
off from Breathdeep in the helicopter, the intruders flew the phial
of zombie virus thirty miles northeast. It was confirmed later that
the helicopter had made a rendez-vous with another helicopter
shortly arrived from London. At an abandoned airfield, the agents
boarded a long range cargo plane. While all the men in the
helicopters had been completing their tasks, two stayed behind to
replenish the plane's fuel from stolen stocks. With all the men and
the virus aboard, the plane then flew below radar height, heading
out beyond the Atlantic coast. Needless to say, they succeeded in
concealing the plane's eventual destination.

Chapter 4: Baggage

In the hotel
bar, Janet and the others tried to piece together what had
happened.

'Sergeant, how
did they get into Breathdeep?'

'Another
helicopter, apparently.'

'So, these
people wanted the virus?'

'That's what
they took. If they'd had trouble at Breathdeep, Steve and Alex
would have been in reserve.'

Janet dropped
into a chair, her hands were shaking and her voice cracked when she
replied, 'They got all they wanted?'

'They only took
the virus, not the vaccine or a ZDT. They probably didn't even know
about those because they're so new. They hacked the electronic
systems, knew exactly what they were doing.'

'Wait, wait,'
Janet said confronting the sergeant directly, 'how do you know they
haven't taken my son with them?'

'Excess
baggage.'

'How dare you
call my son…'

'I'm sorry,
ma'am. I mean it was a very slick operation. Fast in and out, no
hanging around, no unnecessary cargo.'

'You mean they
might not have taken Steven and Alex with them?'

'We hope to
recover the kids soon.'

There was a
moment of tense silence. Rachel and Maisie were huddled together,
looking very pale.

Bill had been
sitting on a corner sofa, holding his wife's hand. 'What about the
tasered guy?' he said.

'The medics are
with him now,' the sergeant said. 'We hope to have some answers
shortly.'

Janet
accompanied the sergeant to debrief the sentry who'd been found by
the door to the courtyard. A young soldier was resting on a
stretcher, his tunic and shirt were unbuttoned and there were a
pair of angry-looking red wounds on his chest. As soon as the
sergeant stood beside him, the soldier pushed himself up onto one
elbow.

'It was all so
quick, sarge,' he blurted out, half-heartedly attempting a
salute.

'At ease,
private. Start at the beginning.'

'There was only
one of them at first. Outside the windows, there.' He nodded
towards a pair of French doors leading to a courtyard. 'Had on a
uniform, see, same as us. Done up like brass he was.'

The sergeant
answered Janet's quizzical look. 'A senior officer.'

'Senior my ar…'
The soldier stopped at a sharp look from Janet. 'Sorry miss,'

'It's Mrs,
thankyou.'

'Continue,' the
sergeant said.

'He held up
some ID. Looked genuine enough. Couldn't really see through the
glass, and I let 'im in. Then two or three more jumps out from
behind the bushes, like. Stuck us with the taser before I could ask
what was up. Must have blacked out.'

'High power
contact taser, by the look of it,' one of the medics said.

'You didn't see
them leave, son?'

'Nah, if I had,
I'd of shot the ba… blighters. Sorry, Mrs. I'm feeling a bit
rough.'

'That's
alright, private, I appreciate the sentiment. Shouldn't he be in
hospital, sergeant?'

The sergeant
nodded at the military medics, who then lifted the stretcher and
took the young soldier away.

'I'm going to
have all the unnecessary exits boarded up.'

'But what about
my son?'

'We're going to
start between here and the roof used by the helicopter.'

'No-one heard
or saw anything?'

'We chose a
deserted part of London to conceal you until you were out of
quarantine and we were certain the Minister and all his 'employees'
were rounded up.'

Janet and the
sergeant returned to the bar, to find the others in earnest
discussion.

'Why pick on
us, though?' Graham said.

'Yes, do you
think they knew there was any connection between us and the
virus?'

'How could
anyone know that? Our borders are sealed.'

'Wait a minute,
I can only think of one person who knew about us and would pass on
information.'

'That commander
chap?'

'Of course not,
he and Mason worked together when the zombies attacked
Stannicvale.'

'The
Minister?'

'Exactly. I
take it they haven't caught him, yet, sergeant?'

'I can't say
and while someone is dealing with that, I've got to find those two
missing kids.'

'Can I help?'
Fred said.

'You only,
like, want to go around with the guys with the guns, Fred.'

'Maisie!'

'But it's true.
Don't let him, Mrs Reynolds.'

'We need to
stay put,' Janet said. 'And that includes you Fred.'

Chapter
5: Where's
Steve?

Alex was within
a couple of steps of the TV room when she saw a soldier she didn't
recognise come out of there. He looked quite senior, having more
insignia than the ones she'd seen around the hotel earlier.

'Is Steve in
there?' she asked.

The soldier
nodded but as soon as Alex passed him and turned into the doorway,
he grabbed her from behind and placed his hand hard over her mouth.
Besides Steve, there were three men in the room, all wearing ski
masks. One of them immediately taped Alex's mouth and tightened a
heavy cable tie around her wrists. She saw that Steve was also
taped and bound. Seconds later, they were bundled out of the room,
down the corridor towards the side of the hotel. They were shoved
along, past a soldier who was lying unconscious on the floor, then
out through the garden into a van waiting with its engine running
by the gate onto the road.