The Road to Nowhere

Chapter 22: Lab

Chapter 22

The door opens up to a stairway that's littered with the same pale white fluorescent lights the rest of the compound has had. Except, these are flickering. About every couple of seconds, the stairway becomes completely dark. But, only for a moment. It really looks like something out of a horror movie. The stairs go on forever. The darkness of the room hides the base of them, and I can't help but wonder what's at the bottom.

I try to keep myself calm by taking slow deep breaths. It doesn't seem to work. All I can think about is what happened before Layke and them found me. I have no idea how the walls started bleeding, and then it was just gone. Was it another nightmare like I had while I was taking a nap in the van? There's no way it was a dream. I was awake. Was I hallucinating? I couldn't have been. It felt so real. What is wrong with me? Am I going crazy? I have no idea what everyone thinks of me, but I can guess it's not a good thing. 

I feel like I'm being watched. I can't help but look over my shoulder to see if anything is following us down the steps. I have a gut feeling that whatever grabbed my foot, isn't too far behind us. I grip the railing tight as I descend the stairs behind Layke.

Once we got to the bottom of the stairs, we walk up to another door. It has two little windows at the top of it just like every other door in this compound. Robbie and Scooter look through and I stay behind and watch from the bottom of the staircase. Once Robbie and Scooter say that it is clear, we crack open the door and slip inside. We stand on a platform that's about twenty feet above the rest of the room. It overlooks an entire laboratory. Many computers line the walls. The monitors are enormous. Some of them are as big as doors. The biggest screen has a video playing on it. It shows a petri dish from a microscope with many small living things swimming around it. It reminds me of my biology class in high school. The smaller screens looked like they had heart rate monitors displayed on them. They are all going at different rates and speeds. Some of them are even flatlined. 

In the middle of the room is a large table with a glass dome surrounding it. The dome is caked in many different shades of red. There are chunks of what looks like flesh sticking to the glass.

Before we proceed down the stairs, we make sure our guns are drawn. We all carefully walk down the stairs and enter the massive room. It's empty. Those soldiers that came down here before us are nowhere to be seen. 

But, something catches my eye. There's a metal computer desk at the far end of the room. A fancy computer sits on top of it, and I can see the top of a head peeking out from above the monitor. With Robbie's cue, we all tip-toe across the room and over to the computer desk. The guy is facing away from us so I cannot see what he looks like. I can only see the sporadic gray hair on top of his head and the white lab coat he's wearing. I notice something shinning on the floor next to his foot. There's a chain wrapped around his ankle. The chain looks like it could be at least thirty feet long. The man sat elevated in his chair quietly mumbling to himself. 

"Where did you take them?" Robbie said in a deep commanding voice.

The man stops typing and slowly turns his chair around. He has circular glasses that sit low on his nose. His face is wrinkled, making him look around sixty years old. He has a small mustache above his lip. His eyes match his hair, dull and gray. His lips are flat while he stares at us with no emotion.

"How may I help you?" He says in a monotoned voice. He turns his head toward me and sees that I'm not wearing a uniform. His eyebrows arched in confusion and a small look of worry fills his face.