Forget her treachery and her lies for now. Standing across the room is the same thing pressed against the windows ahead, but now there isn't twelve inches of glass between us.
It croaks and shuffles forward a foot, my eyes dart around the space it occupies. There's no way our guns could have an effect on that thing, but as I find nothing I lament. They had to keep a weapon in here of some kind to suppress their experiments in the control room. Laboratories are equipped with supplies in order to contain whatever they're testing if it breaks out. If this is what they were creating in this particular lab, words can't explain how dumbfounded I'll be if there's nothing to subdue it. That is, until the true panic begins.
Spinning around, I nearly miss the large glass panel concealed in the dark, on the wall beside the door. Inside the glass case is something large. I shine my light, my heart stuttering at what appears to be a flamethrower from the build and a large canister tucked in front of where the trigger is behind a large muzzle.
"Leon!" Madeleine shouts, firing a shot at its knee to stagger it as I dart to grab a stool from a bench. The thing takes only a second to recuperate and stumble our way again as I smash into the case.
Picking the heavy flamethrower up as glass clinks to the ground. "Get down!" I shout at her, mind torn over foolishly worrying for her safety in the frenzy. She ducks behind the counter, kneeling and shielding her face in her arms as I aim the flamethrower. My left hand grasps just in front of the fuel tank for a firm grip.
Praying there's no safety and the scientist's set this thing up so that all I have to do is pull the trigger...
Flames spray from the nozzle, engulfing over five feet in distance where I aim with a loud fwush. The plant instantly catches fire. Screaming and gurgling, writhing and taking a step back as if to escape the flames desperately. Unable to, as if whatever pain its feeling overcomes the need to run. The limbs and green vines contorting through its body produce an acrid smoke, turning a crisp black.
With a feeble cry, it falls back onto the floor and I break in my firing. Watching as it thrashes wildly before its limbs slouch and it stops moving.
Gasping, the air in here feeling thin now. Others continuously bang on the glass and the door, uncaring, like every other creature as they watch one of their own be burned to nothing.
Left hand releasing the muzzle, my right swings heavily to the floor at its weight. "Fucking hell," I pant, eyes catching Madeleine slowly lifting her face from her arms to mine. Swallowing the acidity forming in my throat at the way her green eyes seem to glow in the light of the map to the side of us. I step to her, reaching a hand out to help her stand. Hide your mistrust, Kennedy. Pretend you know nothing and it's all still the same.
If she's as big a threat her own words make her out to be, then I could've been in danger this whole time with one wrong move. One wrong question. "You alright?" I ask, my internal voice screaming obscenities at her.
Her hand fits into mine, fingers small and delicate. "I grabbed that door..."
Madeleine stands with my help and as soon as she has her footing, I pull my hand away. A bit too sharply. Her brows come together, puzzled at me acting like she'd scalded me. As soon as they do, they relax. "I'm fine. I wasn't expecting one of them to get in through there is all," she explains, head looking over her shoulder at the line of five others outside. "Claire and I were split up when they started dropping from the ceiling," she faces them now. A step closer to the window, "Maybe with that thing we can kill them all and get to the lab," she whispers and I stare down at the flamethrower.
YOU ARE READING
The 0714 Files: File #1 Inferno (Remake 2)
Horror"I think you're going to learn a lot of things about this city and the people that you won't want to." Madeleine Sówka has spent the last twelve years of her life believing she knows what monsters look like. They are the people who hide in the backg...
