Trials of Survival

Chapter 1: Brutality

Goddamn it.

I dropped the can and reached to my belt, feeling around for a moment before pulling my flashlight free from its strap. It was heavy and cumbersome in my hand, but it got the job done. Hell, I prefer the old stuff more than the modern gadgets. And the thing DEFINITELY lit up a room better. But I wasn't wasting any battery yet, the others could all they wanted.

"Oi, I'm going to check in on what happened. Hell, for all I know, could be an attack. You idiots coming?" I asked, glancing over at the dulled outline of the two other guards. By then, Jake was already up and about, Dave was stuffing away the bat, and had flung out his flashlight too.

"Sure. Don't have nothin' else to do." Dave replied, waving the flashlight about in his hands, getting a good feel for the thing. I squinted my eyes, shying away from the bright light. 

Jake only grunted. I never really heard the big guy talk, but his voice was rather deep. Held a good strong rumble beneath it too. If I hadn't caught a glimpse of the man without all the thick gear on, I'd assume he'd have a physique that made him look like he curled trees for a pump.

Dave nodded to me, and I returned the gesture. He walked on out towards the doorway, light raised to shine down the hall, while Jack and I were soon to follow. A small shuffling and clicking noise rang out, as we all unclipped our truncheons from our utility belt, holding them taut in case we got  ambushed... ah, to hell with that idea, we were definitely looking to smash in some skulls.

I heard the quiet muttering of the desk lady, as well as the clanging and crashing of her bumping about in the dark. I chuckled softly under my breath, she'd be fine though. No use in coddling any confused sap. 

I wondered what all the researchers were doing... hell, I'd only ever spotted a few of em' while patrolling the cafeteria, the rest were hired muscle for moving shit. If anything, they were most definitely stumbling about that weird ass cave, tripping over their own feet... yeah, I could definitely imagine that...

We slowly made our way through the halls, Dave probably knew the layout the most, seeing how he loved inspecting every little odd detail of every single room, I couldn't blame the kid, since there was a whole ton of nothing to do down here... But, I was surprised the higher ups hadn't fired him yet, under suspicion of being a spy or whatever, but hey, who was I to judge? If anyone were to know were that electrical grid was, it was him.

We continued walking along, though it was eerily quiet, the only thing we could hear was the sounds of our own footsteps, echoing through the relatively empty halls... Not like it wasn't always like this though. 

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8:45 AM

We had made a good few loops through the facility, obviously keeping away from the big giant cave... Yeah, none of us were brave enough to go down there... even if we were incredibly violent, and a little crazy, but still...

We hadn't seen much... but every time we circled, something seemed more and more off. Firstly, the desk ladies were gone, some of the workers had disappeared also. Things started seeming more and more disheveled as we wandered, random items strewn about. Worst of all, as expected, the pipes in the server room had burst open violently. Spewing gusts of water into that portion of the facility.

We couldn't be bothered to work with that, so we just ignored it. No one was looking to get electrocuted to death anyways. As of now, we were taking a small break in Storage Bay 1, sat upon some discarded crates and a sturdy metal desk. Though, as we relaxed... we noticed something odd... or rather, heard something off. Not the curses of a clumsy researcher, or the shouts of a disoriented grunt worker... in fact, we hadn't heard anything human throughout our rounds through the place...

It was the clanging of hollow metal, followed by the violent sizzling of something corrosive and the burbled cries of someone probably melting... or maybe the bubbling of toxic liquid, who was I to guess?

"... Someone probably knocked over one of the waste bins in the Support Cave..." Jack noted with a grunt. As expected, deep, gravely voice. 

Without a second thought, we'd all got up from our 'seats' and made our way towards the noise. Dave led our little group, the light from his heavy-duty piercing shallow into the thick darkness... it was like there was a thick, black fog hugging us from all sides, we couldn't see shit!