The Facility

She ran in the rain through the bushes. She dashed blindly, one hand clutching the nylon-wrapped hard drive to her chest, the other held out in front of her, ignoring the branches and plants tearing at her face and clothes. She cried softly as she ran, chanting mindlessly, "the world has to know" as if in a trance.

She went on, looking to put as much distance between herself and the facility as possible. She needed to get as far away as possible because she knew what was coming.

She had always had that foresight. It was the same every time! The rush of blood to her head, the tingle in her spine, the way all the little minor events seem to fall into place like dominoes...

She had warned them this would happen, but Professor Adeola and the rest of the team wouldn't listen. She had shown them her research, showing them how the virus reanimated and reinvented itself even after a patient had been cured. She'd shown them her hastily assembled graphs of the re-infected, but they'd laughed and put it all down to a very resilient virus, not her "overactive imagination."

Why couldn't they see how the virus kept eating everything in its path relentlessly? They were only concerned about the fame and glamour of a vaccine, maybe a cure, and with it, probably a Nobel Prize.

She was sure that was the least of their problems back at the facility now as she ran on in the heavy rain. Despite the downpour, she could still hear the staccato of gunfire and willed her legs to run faster. She had to get the information out before it was too late. The first of the deceased reanimated that evening.

She had heard some commotion from the morgue as she hurried through the light drizzle that promised more rain to the living quarters and reacted in disgust. The attendants and soldiers had a nasty habit of aiming an endless stream of jokes at the cadavers that made her skin crawl. She didn't like going there...

Then she heard the first gunshot! It didn't register at first, she didn't break stride, probably some vehicle backfire. And then the shots came again, this time in rapid succession, and she froze! That familiar surge went up her head and ran down her spine.

First Sergeant Nweke ran out the doors, followed closely by Private Habib, and then she saw them!

The reanimated ones, all bloodied, swarmed out of the morgue, chasing after the military pair. She reacted immediately, turning on her heels and running back towards the lab. The gunshots must have attracted other facility staff because all of a sudden there were people everywhere and the air rang with screams... out of panic, death cries, and the pain of being eaten alive.

She saw Private Habib fall over, and the swarm enveloped him.

The two soldiers from the gate stood in front of the lab, shooting at the reanimated ones.

Esther, one of the other researchers, ran out of storage into the path of the things.

As she ran by, she saw something that looked like intestines fly up in the air...

She didn't wait to find out, she made it to the lab, got to her work station, fumbled for the key and with shaky hands attempted to unlock the second drawer

She gets it open after several tries and grabs the hard drive, then reaches into the bin to grab the nylon bag her pastries had come in earlier in the day and heads for the exit.

As she pushed through the heavy doors of the lab, there were bits of human parts in army uniform strewn all over the place. She saw one of the reanimated ones coming straight for her. Hands stretched out as if welcoming her into it's embrace, eyes glazed over, mouth frothing.

She froze, her limbs suddenly weighing a ton, her mind resigned to its fate of being turned to sherds. Then the head of the thing exploded! It had been shot!

She heard someone yell at her and glanced to the right.

Sergeant Nweke, still holding his gun up, yells, "Wetin you dey do for there? RUN!!!"

And then he is tackled by two of the things, and the swarm consumes him.

She turned and ran!

The downpour was heavier now. The rain and the tears clouded her vision, the roar all but deafening. Her body was running instinctively, her mind numb with shock.

Suddenly, the bushes disappear and she plunges forward, her momentum carrying her into the road on a collision course with a speeding truck.

She tried to stop, but she even then, she knew it was futile.

She heard the tyres squeal.

The impact flung her back onto the side of the road

As she lay there in a crumpled heap, the life flowing out of her broken body, her lips move as if to speak, but she coughs up blood instead.

Her vision blurs in and out of focus, she notices the nylon-wrapped package several feet away. She wills her hand to reach for it, but her broken body fails to respond.

She hears the truck accelerate rapidly into the night, as the panicking driver flees the scene without a backward glance...

As her consciousness starts to fade away, her mind chants on...

"the world has to know"