Two Alive, стр. 45
“No, we probably did, but we just never named them like you guys. They were all just freaks to us. Infected people. Or people who needed help.”
“They’re not people. Not anymore. Once you get infected you just become one of those.” Antonio pointed over his shoulder at the monitor where Nadine was sitting. “Those ain’t people. Those are monsters. And if you fuck around they’ll kill you.”
“Kill or be killed.” Miles jumped back into the conversation the instant Martyn was done with him. “That’s what the old man would say.”
Antonio snapped his head around to his brother with a grimace on his face. He looked around the room quickly and saw the adults had reacted to what was said.
“Old man?” Carver started to move closer to the table.
Julia put up a hand low in her lap that she hoped the major would see and back off.
“What the fuck Miles?!” Antonio lowered his voice and grabbed his brother by the sleeve, pulling him close and started to whisper to him.
“Who’s the old man? Did he help you guys survive?” Julia leaned forward just enough, but not to invade the hushed words exchanged between the boys.
Carver wasn’t as courteous, still moving closer with each heavy boot fall. “Is he waiting for you out in the woods? Is he watching this place? How many more are with him?”
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” Miles kept repeating the words and started rocking.
Julia stood up from her seat. “It’s ok, it’s ok Miles. I just want to--”
Carver grabbed Miles by the arm and ripped him from his seat, “Who is this old man?”
“Get your fuckin’ hands off my brother!” Antonio jumped up, knocking over his seat and grabbed the major’s arm.
Before things could escalate any further, a shrieking wail came from the dock area. Everyone in the monitor room whipped their heads around to look in the general direction of the docks while Nadine was glued to the display in front of her; the blood in her face starting to drain and her expression a look of paralyzed fear.
“Uh… major. I don’t want to use the cliché but… you better come look at this.” Nadine was trembling, her voice was shaky.
The major let go of Miles and saw the frightened look on Nadine’s face. When Miles was free, he went rushing to the display screen and saw an infected creature, that may have once been an elderly man, was tweaking with its mouth agape as it screamed.
“It’s a siren. One of the strikers is turning. It’s turning like before! It’s turning like before!” Miles was nearly leaping out of his skin, though the expression on his face was one of childhood joy rather than fear like the others. To see another infected person, go from one type to another, like he saw two days ago, was exciting to Miles. This was something new he and his brother hadn’t encountered.
“Into the office now Miles!” Antonio was running to the office door and grabbed his folding chair with him. He looked back at Julia and Dr. Martyn, both of them stunned and confused, but Antonio didn’t have any words to assure them. “I don’t know how many people y’all got, but y’all better tell them to barricade somewhere while y’all deal wit that madhouse! Miles, c’mon!”
Miles glanced at his brother and ran past Carver to meet Antonio at the door to the office.
“Madhouse?” Carver said the word like it was foreign to him. Like he had never heard the expression. But it was more likely he wasn’t sure what Antonio meant when he was using the term.
“What is that screaming? It’s insane!” Chakrabarti looked to the ceiling, wondering how the cry could be heard so loudly from outside. Through the thick walls, down a hallway and through a steel shutter door, the wailing from the infected siren sounded like it was no more than ten feet away behind a screen door.
“You said a siren, Miles?” Julia called to the boy before they closed the office door. “What’s going on boys, what is it? What’s a madhouse? What’s the siren doing?” She did a double take and saw Carver now standing at the monitors with Nadine and his eyes were glued on the screen in front of him. Finally Julia made her way to the display to have a look herself; Chakrabarti followed.
“It’s a siren. A siren’s out there. It’s just gonna scream and scream and bring more infected and drive the other ones crazy. They turn into a madhouse. They go crazy like a madhouse. The hive is just gonna go crazy and then they’ll break in here. They’ll find a way in. They’ll get in. You have to leave and go somewhere safe before the madhouse gets in here!”
The outside camera display was exactly how the boy described. It was carnage. Infected people were blitzing the outside dock like a stampede of mindless bodies. They attacked everything. Launching their bodies against the wall and the shutter door and exploding like a riot of angry hornets as they encircled the howling siren. The frenzy was so intense many of the infected were killing each other with flailing arms and fists in all directions or trampling those that fell to the ground. Others turned cannibal and eaters were biting and chewing and gorging ravenously on anything they could sink their teeth into.
A thick dark ooze was beginning to pool beneath the bodies and covered most of the ground around the hive. Many of the monsters were slipping and falling in their own black fluids while they continued rampaging. But that didn’t stop them from ganging up on the shutter door and