The Vordox

Chapter 5

I walked for about 7 miles now, now that walking had become easy. Hover boots which had made it simple going distances, because of their huge energy storage and speeds reaching 20 miles an hour. I was exhausted, till now I had encountered none of the infected. I guess there were not many Afterall. The dense forest had finally ended to a broken city. There was almost one to no building standing. The infected wrecked the cities so severely that it seemed as if the damage was caused by something else but not by humans. I sat down to have my lunch, sitting in the lip of the forest that met the city. After I was over with the meal, I was about to get up as I heard a crumble of leaves. The crushing of dry plain leaves which once used to sound heartwarming for once sounds scary. I suddenly took out my gun and pointed it straight at a bush. I saw the bush shake a little. I loaded the gun, "come out whoever you are" and I started moving towards the bush. I heard another footstep from behind me, I swiftly turned around. Someone took me down from the back It was a girl, I recognized the grunt. I slowly got off the ground, raised my hands. She told me to drop the weapon. I did so and turned around slowly saw a girl the same age as mine. She was holding an Ak-47 while pointed it at me I said, "no wait I'm one of you" "how do I trust you" "I see the way you're holding the weapon, it's the correct way. If you were infected I know you would've been holding it like a bat. Also I know how to speak" she lowered the weapon gave me a hand. I got up she asked me ,"who are you and where did you come from" I said, "I'm Harison a species specialist from the Italian WWO's base" she was acting a little odd she kept looking behind me. She didn't seem mentally stable. She said, "oh no I need to leave I don't want to go to mars with the others. Your squadrons will be here in some time?" she stumbled backwards I replied, "no, wait I'm alone. yesterday the base was destroyed. Nothing's left. I'm all alone and headed to the Chinese base. You can come along with me" "no thanks. I don't want to go to mars its better down here on Earth" "why do you say so .... Where's your family" "they are up on mars" "do you have a way to communicate to them?" "No... they think I'm dead. I faked my death only not to go to mars, anyway its nicer down here" "ohh.... Do you live somewhere around here" she replied with a smile, "yeah let me show you around" I followed her for about 10 minutes going left and right into the broken city. She was also wearing the same hover boots. She led me to a voice automated entrance lock. She looked at me just to make sure I kept my weapon away and said "unlock" the big rock structure started moving. I asked her if she lived alone. She replied "not quite." The big rock opened I saw a dark passage. There were stairs heading downwards. We started going down the stairs. She suddenly turned the lights on I gasped, "WOAHH... the underground subway system from the twenty eighteens. they are still there and in a good condition too" she said, "yep It just needed a little maintenance which was quite easy and now I have a whole underground lab, zoo, home and surveillance area" as soon as I heard the word zoo I asked, "what all kinds of animals do you have" she replied, "ohh you name it" I looked at her impressed. My mouth almost flew open, "so where are the other people you work with" she simply said, "they don't quite help me. They just enjoy themselves" "and they might be....?" "in the zoo" "what? I don't understand" "well you asked if I lived alone, I said "not quite". I live with other animals. At least I'm not alone" she said giving me "that" look. She even started the subways. Yes, I know they move very slowly about 50 miles an hour. Now that we have speeds reaching 155 miles/hour which is about 250 kmph we find subways very slow. I said, "wait I still don't know your name" "I'm Isabel"

Isabel was the most perfect name for a girl with brown hair lots of twists and a sweet voice.

As we reached to the bottom of the stairs, she led me to her house at first. It was an ordinary house; it even had a swimming pool. Her house was a nice lemon-yellow color. It was big and with a few cables going in it. She led me In, I followed her as she opened the door, we went to the guest room, where I kept all my stuff and took a nice warm shower. As I was about to come out of the shower, she called on me and said that she had prepared something to eat. I dressed up and went to the kitchen, she was standing there in front of the stove, she turned the gas off grabbed a bottle of wine and offered some to me. I took a little saying I can't drink too much because I'll have to leave early, she said "you can leave tomorrow, anyways you're safe here." Innocence shone in her eyes as I looked at the clock it was 5pm. I thought it won't be bad if I stayed one night and left tomorrow morning. She had made oats. She told me to eat properly because it will be good for me. I had the warm oats and asked her if she could take me to the zoo, she built. I really wanted to see all the animals she had. She said "why not" we left the house towards a path that split into 2, she took the left path. I was following her when I asked "what's to the right?" she said "don't mind its nothing important". I didn't think about it much but it rose suspicion. We first entered a room full of desktops. She called it the surveillance room. I was quite confused, it looked as a command center rather than a surveillance room. We kept going forward and then entered the lab. It was full of the latest technology it had robotic hands that perform your experiment as you speak to it. Which was one of the greatest inventions I felt personally.

She then guided me into a room, which was dark she put her finger on her lips and said, "shh... follow me" I followed her she gave me a pair of night vision goggles which I put on. She went ahead and opened a big steel chamber. I stepped Inside it. She closed the chamber behind me so that light doesn't enter. I turned the goggles on. She waved at me and pointed at her goggles to ask whether I'm able to see properly or not. I gave a thumbs up as a reply to her question. She then wore rubber boots and gave me a pair. They were warm as they were kept in a sterile chamber. She stepped in a puddle and told me to step in it too. I asked, "what is...." She suddenly placed her hand over my mouth "shhh.... You need to whisper" she said whispering I asked, "why stepping in this? Where are we? Why is it dark? Why do we need to whisper?" I was soo confused the next thing she could do is answer my questions rather than skipping them. She said, "were in the zoo this is the alcohol puddle which kills all the bacteria so that you don't spread bacteria inside or take some outside and you'll know why it's dark" she opened the next huge steel gate and closed it after us. I couldn't believe what I saw with the night vision goggles. I saw cages and a lot of animals. I saw sections divided based on the weather condition. I saw penguins, giraffes, bats, hyenas and many other animals. We kept walking further. I was soo impressed there were soo many animals. She led me to a secluded area and opened the blackout curtains which was covering a big cage but this time in this cage I saw humans and not just any humans, infected humans. There were over 50 humans I asked her "how do y..." she grabbed my mouth again every human in the cage suddenly stopped moving as they heard my voice and suddenly looked at us. I panicked and hid behind her scared, she held my hand and told me it's alright don't worry she pointed to a sign that said "nanofiber irticium" attached to the wall which is a man-made fiber which could not be broken with force. We got out really quickly from the back entrance. I asked her, "WHAT? HOW? WHY? DO YOU HAVE THEM?" she replied "for only experimental purposes. I needed to find a cure for Vordox for myself or I wouldn't have survived. I release my own antivirus vaccine every 4 months. Lucky for you, I had an extra batch per paired" "oh that's great besides WWO's was about to send the vaccine today but I think that won't be possible" I shrugged with a smile. We took off the goggles. She took it from me and through a suction pipe it went back to where we got them from. We kept the rubber boots to a side. She then boarded the subway and said, "come on we're going back" I said, "I've never ridden the subway before" she said, "okay we'll take it slow this time as it's your first time" I grabbed on to her hand and climbed on the subway. I saw the speedometer and said, "hey... did you crank this thing up?" She replied, "yes now it moves 150 miles an hour instead of only 50. It even includes safety features which I installed" she started the subway and in moments we reached back to the house. It was getting late at night almost around 9 she asked, "what would you prefer to have for dinner" I said, "let's see what we have" we got off the subway into the house through the subway-house backdoor entrance and I went into my toon, took out some cans of food from my bag and asked whether she had the imploding microwave (the imploding microwave was an invention of the late 2060 where canned food turned into plates and ready to serve hot meals) she said, "yes." I put 3 cans in it at once. She activated the robotic arms and set the table. When, the food was ready the microwave gave out hot steaming food in plates to us. We sat on the table Isabel poured us something to drink. She asked me why did I have imploding microwave canned food if I knew I wasn't going to have the microwave. I told her that they work the same with fire. You throw them in fire next moment the fire is gone and there you have your delicious meal ready. After eating well. We were both exhausted, so we went off to our beds. I didn't sleep for a while I was up writing in my journal describing Isabel and her zoo, I even wrote about the weird surveillance room which seemed more like a control center. After describing the day, I tried sleeping I tossed and turned but couldn't sleep.