Craig Dilouie - Tooth And Nail

Ignoring Cohen’s questioning, she clicks to the image of Sims lying in the doorway to the Men’s Room.

“Oh,” she says quietly.

Behind Sims, in the mirror on the bathroom wall, she can see Jackson looking at himself, far enough from the camera so that the resolution is not very good, but close enough for her to see what he is doing.

He is poking very gingerly at his right eye. Or rather, his left eye, which only looks like his right eye in the mirror. Yes, he is poking at his eye.

Or rather, what is left of his eye.

Jackson, the retired, overweight, out-of-shape cop, beat Baird. But Baird bit his face and ruined his left eye.

Jackson’s clearly in shock. And almost certainly infected.

He has not yet turned, but it is only a matter of time.

Trust me

There are now four infected people in their section of the building, and two, possibly three uninfected survivors trapped inside with them.

“Sandy, listen to me,” she says into the phone. “I am looking at the security camera feeds and they are showing me the corridor outside Dr. Saunders’ office.”

“Can you see if Dr. Baird is still around?”

“It is not Dr. Baird anymore, Sandy,” Petrova says. “In any case, he is dead.”

“Oh my God.”

Petrova grips the phone, her hand and ear slick with sweat.

“Drs. Lucas and Saunders are now infected and have become Mad Dogs themselves,” she says. “And Marsha Fuentes.”

“There’s three of them now?”

“I am afraid so. Actually, four. Stringer Jackson has been bitten. He has not yet become a Mad Dog, but I believe he will transform soon, which is why it is essential you try to get to me now, where it is safe.”

“That’s not supposed to happen. You can’t become a Mad Dog if you get bitten. You only get it if the virus enters the brain. And no virus has an incubation period that short—”

Petrova sighs loudly. “I cannot get into the details, but what I am telling you is true.”

“Well, I can’t stay here forever with those things around, Dr. Petrova,” Cohen says, her voice edged with hysteria. “You have to help me. You have to make them leave.”

“I cannot do that, Sandy.”

“Make them leave. Please. Please.”

“Listen to me. I cannot make them leave, but I can see where they are by using the security cameras. That means I can tell you when it is generally safe to come to my location.”

“You want me to leave here and go out there? Are you freaking nuts?”

“Right now, Dr. Lucas and Marsha Fuentes are in the auditorium and heading towards the elevator lobby,” Petrova says, rapidly scanning the flipping images on the screens. She blinks, surprised at how fast the Mad Dogs move. “And Dr. Saunders, um, is now in Dr. Hardy’s office.”

“Saunders is too close!” Cohen hisses.

“If you go now, you can make it.”

“What if there’s another one of these Mad Dogs in one of the offices?”

Petrova admits the possibility to herself, but there is no other way to get Cohen to the safety of the Security Command Center without her eventually abandoning the relative security of her hiding place. There is no sure thing here. She has to take a chance or stay where she is, cut off from food and water and help.

“I know for a fact that there are no other Mad Dogs,” she lies. “Trust me. Do you know the way to the Command Center?”

“But after I hang up, I won’t know where they are.”

“This is a good time for you to leave Dr. Sims’ office and come here.”

She can hear Cohen taking deep breaths, getting up her nerve.

“No!” she hisses. “I can’t.”

Petrova thinks for a moment, then says, “Do you have a cell phone? If you do, then we could stay on the line together, and I can walk you here safely.”

“Yes, I have one. But all the lines are jammed, aren’t they?”

“It is possible to get through. So try. Please.” She reads Cohen the direct dial number of the phone in the Security Command Center. “Call now. Try a few times. If it doesn’t work, then call me again using the interoffice line, which we know so far is reliable.”

Before Cohen can respond, she hangs up.

The silence is startling.

Panicking, she flips through the images until she sees Baird lying on the floor. He is no longer twitching. He is dead. Really and truly dead. Thank God.

Aaa-aah-aaaahhhh

She bites her lip hard to prevent these little shrieks from sliding into uncontrollable hysteria. Wrapping her arms around her ribs, she rocks back and forth.

The phone rings, sending an electric wave of adrenaline through her body. She snatches up the phone, bathed in the glow of the screens.

“Yes?”

“I got through! I can’t believe it.”

“Keep your voice down,” Petrova hisses.

“I’m on my cell.”

“That is good. I will guide you, Sandy.”

Petrova scans the images until she confirms the positions of the Mad Dogs and Jackson, who is still at the mirror, staring dumbly at himself and probing his ruined eye.

“This is a good time,” she says. “You can go. But hurry.”

“All right, I’m up,” Cohen tells her.

Sandy Cohen appears on the left screen, dancing from foot to foot to restore her circulation. She is still wearing the white gown she had on in the lab, which flaps around her legs.

“Can you see me?” she asks.

“Go now. Keep going. Keep going. Keep going. Stop. Stop! Go into the office on your right. Now!”

Cohen disappears from the screen. Seconds later, Saunders appears, his hands balled into fists clasped against his chest and his head jerking like a bird’s. He stops outside the office Cohen entered, appearing to sniff the air.

“Do not move even slightly, Sandy,” Petrova whispers into the phone.

Saunders turns, runs down the hall and enters East Lab.

“Now. Go. Now.”

The lab technician darts out into the hall on tip toes, looking both ways, holding the phone against her ear.

“Turn right at the end of the hall,” Petrova tells her.

Cohen turns the corner and abruptly freezes in her tracks, putting her hand over her mouth.

Petrova curses herself. The horrors that she has already begun to digest are new to Cohen. She should have warned the woman about what she was going to see.

“That is Dr. Baird,” she says. “He is dead. He is no threat to you.”

“Oh my God,” Cohen says.

“Be quiet,” Petrova says. “Dr. Lucas and Fuentes are heading in your direction. You can make it, but you must go now.”

She sees Cohen nod vigorously, dance around Baird’s corpse, and begin walking rapidly towards the Security Center, looking over her shoulder every few steps to make sure nobody is coming up behind her.

Petrova says, “You are doing just fine. You are very close now.”

“Almost there,” Cohen huffs, already out of breath.

“You can do it,” Petrova tells her.

The digital projector blinks out, the lights shut off and Petrova is plunged into darkness and silence so total she wonders if she’s dead.

She sits in the dark, her heart pounding against her ribcage and her blood crashing in her ears.

The power has gone out.

The phone in her hand is dead.

She can hear Cohen shouting, “Hello? Hello?” out in the hall, the sound muffled and distant.

“Be quiet,” Petrova hisses at the dark. “Be quiet or they will find you.”

The woman is not far away. She’s about thirty feet down the hall, in fact.

“The power’s out, Dr. Petrova!” Cohen wails. “Help me!”

Petrova hears thuds against the wall.

“Oh, no,” she says.

“Help me, please!”

Cohen is not being attacked. She is banging against the wall with her fists, which Petrova can hear in the Command Center.