043. Lazaretto, 3

(Luka)

We picked up whatever we could still use or eat before nightfall.

The longer we waited, and the darker night got, the worse the mood devolved into around us.

Smoke seemed to rise from the earth around. Some dark mist was rising in fumes in the obscurity. The animals growling and lurking around, they grew louder and seemingly closer, while still unclear or cautious.

Shura tried to climb the wall to no avail. This side is a thick but chalky and soft layer, built with compressed powders made to spread and scatter under pressures, and meant to kill anything through poisoning afterward. It's not made to be climbed easily, on the contrary.

The dents he made to carve a kind of ladder didn't hold his weight and only exposed him to falling mottles of toxic dust. I heard it's made of lead compounds mostly. It wouldn't work this way and the nearby trees were a good few metres away, precisely because the ground near the wall has been killed by this dust.

Maybe if we had a chainsaw we could have built something, but now we're just really stuck.

Our phones get signal from outside intermittently. The network of our city appear to be in continuous cycle of rebooting, connecting for half a second and shutting down. We didn't get yet what happened outside the dead zone where we camped.

We got that we were in deep shit and that we best should regroup back at the old Krikfalgorod hospital.

I loaded my handgun. I was still shaky, but our only other weapon was with the other down there.

Shura picked up the light, and we started heading back, more scared than before.

He felt even worse, realizing the way outside the lazaretto had been destroyed.

We didn't know yet what to do to get out. But first, we agreed to regroup our chances of survival...

~

Our walk through the woods was less physical as it headed downside toward the city, but more mentally exhausting as we felt surrounded from the start.

Shady things were clearly lurking, peeking, and considering whether to attack us now or later. Growls and rustling could be heard, while avoiding always to get into our sight or light as we strolled forward.

The horror movie had turned too real for us, and we weren't looking proud or amused anymore. Sweaty, jolting, looking around nervously and unsteadily. The light beam making weird shapes vanish and hide away everywhere we pointed it at.

We got closer to the streets. We also got closer to some of the beasts now with less shrubs and trees to hide.

One of them jumped out in front of us and in the light. Shura jolted, startled. I screamed in panic and fired a shot at it.

The monkey-looking beast was hit, falling back in great splatters of its blood. It screamed while we barely held ourselves standing together.

That amorphous thing died. A very tall monkey, scorched looking, already putrefied in places. Its flesh melting where it died into a growing puddle of stench.

Yura's tool beeped again, keeping us at a safe distance from this...

But we were shaking, unable to move right away, shocked like we've never quite been.

Shura pulled me away, and we continued walking through the now darker streets of Krikfalgorod.

Mom had told me the more insane stories about her father...

About his investigation back then, and hers afterward. After he disappeared in the erection of the lazaretto.

Mom spent her childhood in Cordov with so many others, trying to piece out together the puzzle of what had happened.

She told me too many times how they were evacuated, how the wall was built to bury their secrets, and the folktales of some monsters invading the city.

She showed me the bleached and blurry pictures that poorly aged, taken by my grandfather allegedly during his investigation under Forodlystiev.

Faceless monsters, with dripping flesh and rot all over. He had not found the names of the people involved however.

Seeing poor pictures for years, and hearing second-hand stories filled with fantasies, that didn't prepare me...

Now my hands are shaking like something's wrong with my nerves. As I've shot down one of these weird animals. Something transformed, into weird bloody savagery.

We get closer to the hospital.

We hear a shot. Orel fired at one of them too, in the middle of the dark street. We see him.

We run to them, panicking, hearing more and more monsters regrouping toward us. Orel urges us to run.

We rush.

We head inside and lock the door. We barricade it again. A second later, the sounds of claws or bones rattling against the doors begin. Between moans and growls, sounding like tortured souls at best.

We're catching our breath, regrouping back in the upper rooms where we set camp before. We're all feeling weird. We're all lost and confused about what is happening.

Morgan finally got a full message on her phone though.

Y - What is it?

M - It's an evacuation notice...

We all looked at each other, first in confusion, then in dread.

We all know the cities of this dead zone were evacuated in a sudden outbreak hurry.

We've played around this dead city for a long time. All of us. Then some headed back, or died along the way. And now... The city we got here from, our hometown of Cordov, it sent its citizen an emergency evacuation notice as if history is repeating itself.

We're looking pale. Did we fuck up that badly? Did our friends carry the worst contamination out of here and back home?

Y - Wait...

We check all of our phones again. We mostly got corrupted data, but the timestamps don't match. The evacuation notice from Cordov predates when the others left. It's more around when we all fell sick.

O - What should we do anyway?

Y - Move during the day first... And find another way out.

They all look at me. Because they know I'm like the historian expert for this place and cities. I know them better than anyone else. Their maps were in my living room since I was born. Mom studied the lazaretto like an angry ghost and I grew in her shadow. I know all there is to know about them.

M - Any idea how to get out?

L - I'm thinking... The wall really surrounds the area well, so I doubt we'll find a hole anywhere...

Y - That leaves the rivers, right?

L - They've been locked pretty well too... I think the lake's level is higher than in the past, meaning downstream is likely flooded too... Maybe upstream. Or...

I've got an idea, but it's quite an ordeal.

L - Maybe... We can find a way to blow it or break it. A hole in the wall.

Y - You've got jackhammers or explosives somewhere?

O - You mean these locked supply crates scattered here and there?

Orel refers to some heavy duty crates we've seen at crossroads here and there. They are locked shipping containers, using good locks for keys or codes we've never come around. I think they were supplies airdropped during evacuation time or wall building and containment time. So they're likely to hold either old relief supplies, or military equipment. But I don't know where their keys are and we couldn't crack them open.

L - No. I'm thinking it's a long shot but... Back when the cities were evacuated, the Forodlystiev old city had begun some extensive demolition work of unsafe city blocks.

My grandfather disappeared in Forodlystiev's schools district, leaving behind a daughter obsessed with too many questions, and odd rumours about diseases and monsters.

The government back then had just begun demolishing the oldest and most decrepit buildings of the ageing city. And then all went to hell too fast. People were evacuate to Cordov orderly from Krikfalgorod, but in a hurry from Forodlystiev.

L - If we find a way across the lake... There might be some demolition explosives left in demolition sites in the north of Forodlystiev...

~