Infection - Part I

Chapter 11.

With light shining in front of them, Valerie and Lisa made their way down to the bottom of the stairs. Valerie was met with a layer of water on the floor, a mere centimetre in depth. "What happened here?".

"I think a pipe burst..." Lisa responded before moving a step ahead and looking left and right.

"Where's the generator room?".

"Follow me..." Lisa spoke out. "I don't know if any of these monsters managed to get down here... So be careful.".

"Will do..." Valerie responded as she turned the other way, so the two women were back to back as they slowly progressed through the basement.

The water between their feet splashed gently with each step they made, causing slight ripples of small waves to spread throughout the narrow hallways.

"It's way too quiet..." Lisa commented as she felt her back slightly tingle with unease.

"How much more until we're there?..." Valerie asked seconds later.

"Just around the corner and the third door to our right," Lisa responded.

Seconds later, they reached the door of the generator room. Entering it, they were met by shelves upon shelves of what seemed like bottles of oil on other canisters consisting of different liquids.

To their left was what they were looking for, the main generator. With The two women pointing their flashlights at the generator box, they approached it, noting a red light glowing on the display that was beside the red button, which had 'Start' written on it.

Seconds later, Monica's voice was heard through the walkie-talkie. "Lisa?... Valerie?".

"We've arrived in the generator room," Lisa responded. "What do we do now?".

"Press the button that says start, given that all the lamps on the display are off," Monica responded.

"There... there's one red lamp that's glowing on the display," Valerie spoke up as she shone the night onto it. 'No Power'.

"What lamp?" Monica inquired seconds later.

"It says the generator has no power, Monica," Lisa replied. "Is there a way we can... I don't know... tap into the power?".

"Shit... I think there are a few backup generators down there... some 3 or 4, I am not too sure. You'll have to turn those on, so they can feed into the generator and allow it to turn on," Monica explained. "Because it seems to me that Artull is off the power grid now...".

Just as the women were about to continue with their newly given tasks, Monica let out a dire warning. "But be careful... the backup generators can only work for so long. Once they are gone... we're fucked.".

"Alright..." Lisa answered back as she looked at Valerie. "Let's go and find these generators...".

With that, they both headed back out into the hallway. "Where do we go on from here?" Valerie asked.

"I think there should be a map here somewhere..." Lisa replied.

"There must be something labelled on the walls to tell us where we are going too... no?" Valerie inquired seconds later.

"Most of those are run down," Lisa responded.

With the two women regaining the same postures as when they were going toward the main generator room, they continued venturing through more of the hallways of the big basement. 

It wasn't long before Lisa let out a small gasp as she ran toward something. Ripping off what looked like a poster, it took a moment for Valerie to realise it was the map Lisa was looking for.