Chapter 274: Chapter 273 - Open the Doors
Her mouth barely moved.
Frankenstein saw it anyway.
His eyes narrowed, but the soldier by the door pressed one hand harder against his earpiece before he could speak. His face changed first. The nurse saw it and froze with one hand near Iyisha’s IV line.
"Sir," the soldier said. "Control post is silent."
The words reached Iyisha late. Her eyes stayed on the ceiling as the lights stretched and blurred at the edges, then sharpened until they hurt. She tried to turn her head, but her neck only gave one weak pull against the pillow.
Frankenstein stepped away from the bed. "Again."
The soldier pressed the radio closer. "Control post, respond."
Static answered.
The alarm kept beating through the walls. The doctors stopped around Iyisha in broken pieces, one hand over a tray, one hand near her arm, one hand still holding the strap across her thigh. The nurse at the IV line looked at Frankenstein, waiting for him to stop the procedure.
He did not.
"Control post," the soldier said again. "Respond."
Nothing came back.
The monitor beside her began to beat faster.
Frankenstein looked at the screen, then at her.
The soldier listened to his earpiece. "Gunfire outside control."
Frankenstein turned toward the screen. His face changed. Anger cut through the calm, sharp and personal, like someone had touched his work with dirty hands.
"No," he said. "We’ll proceed with the procedure."
The older doctor looked toward him. "If control is compromised—"
"This is an impenetrable location. Continue."
The speaker cracked overhead.
"Unauthorized ward release command detected."
The younger doctor stepped back from the bed.
The soldier looked at the screen. "They got in."
"Override denied."
For one second, nobody moved.
Frankenstein grabbed the tablet from the table and struck the screen with his finger. "Someone is inside my system."
"The security is trying to regain control," the soldier said.
"Bullshit." Frankenstein looked at him. "He got inside the control, there’s nothing they can do. Let’s move."
The speaker repeated.
"Override denied."
The older doctor lowered his voice. "We should wait. It’s just one man isn’t it?"
Frankenstein turned on him. "1 man who got inside the control room."
Frankenstein pointed at the bed. "Disconnect her."
The young doctor looked at Iyisha. "The procedure—"
"Sector 4."
"We have no sterile room ready in Sector Four."
"I need her alive. I need the cells. I need the eggs." Frankenstein stepped closer to him. "After that, I don’t care."
The nurse’s hand shook over the IV line.
The speaker cracked again.
"Unauthorized ward release command detected."
The soldier swallowed.
"Override denied."
Hands came down on Iyisha. Wires were pulled from the pads on her chest. The cuff loosened from her arm. The IV stand rattled beside the bed. Someone pulled the sheet higher over her body and locked another strap across her thighs.
The speaker cracked again.
"Override denied."
Frankenstein gripped the rail. "Move."
They pushed her out of the room.
The corridor outside already looked wrong. Soldiers ran past with rifles up. Staff pressed themselves against the walls with trays clutched to their chests. Red light flashed over the glass cells ahead.
The bed rolled faster.
Iyisha’s head moved against the pillow. Ceiling lights passed above her in broken strips. Red. White. Red again. The drug dragged at every second until she could not tell how long they had been moving. She heard pieces. Boots. Wheels. Static. Frankenstein’s voice. The same warning coming back again and again.
"Unauthorized ward release command detected."
A pause.
"Override denied."
The doctors kept running.
"Override denied."
The soldiers cursed into radios full of static.
"Override denied."
Frankenstein’s hand stayed tight around the rail. He looked angrier with every denial. Each failed attempt meant another one was coming. Each denial meant someone had hands on the system and enough time to keep trying.
They stopped twice.
She heard the young doctor breathing too fast beside her.
She heard someone say ten minutes.
Then later, twenty.
Time moved wrong after that. Her body stayed heavy. Her mind floated up only when the alarm changed or when the bed hit a seam in the floor.
At the next junction, the wall screen blinked.
Yellow spread across the lock icons.
The soldier nearest the bed stopped walking.
The speaker cracked one last time.
"Override accepted."
Frankenstein stopped.
The corridor answered before anyone else could.
A lock clicked.
Then another.
Then the whole ward began to open.
The sound ran through the walls and into Iyisha’s bones, one long chain of metal releasing from metal. Soldiers turned toward the glass cells. Staff backed into the walls. A nurse whispered something that sounded like a prayer.
Frankenstein’s face went still.
Then fury came back.
"Faster."
The first glass door lifted.
A man in a hospital gown stumbled out and fell to his knees with both hands clamped over his ears. A soldier aimed at him and shouted for him to stay down. Another door opened, and a woman crawled into the hall with one leg dragging behind her. Her mouth moved fast, but the alarm swallowed every word.
Then something came out of the third room.
Iyisha’s eyes tried to follow it through the drug haze.
Thin body. Bare feet. Hospital gown. Head snapping left, then right. Shoulders jerking like something inside it pulled too hard.
Then it launched.
It hit the nearest soldier in the chest and drove him into the wall. The rifle fired into the ceiling. The soldier screamed when teeth tore into his throat.
The corridor broke.
People ran in every direction. Some crawled under carts. Some pressed against walls with their hands over their heads. Some grabbed at doctors and begged to be taken with them. The soldiers shouted over the alarm, but the twitchers cut through the crowd in fast, broken bursts.
Iyisha tried to turn toward the screams.
The restraints held.
The bed slammed forward.
A man grabbed the rail near her hip as they passed. His face was wet with tears. "Please. Please, don’t leave me."
A soldier struck him with the rifle butt. The man fell under the edge of the wheels, and another patient tripped over him. One of the twitchers hit them both before they could crawl clear.
Iyisha made a sound.
A nurse slipped beside the bed. Her tray hit the floor, and vials shattered under the wheels. She reached for the rail with both hands.
"Help me!"
A twitcher slammed into her from the side and bit into her shoulder.
The nurse screamed.
The young doctor stopped.
Frankenstein grabbed his sleeve. "Leave her."
The young doctor stared at the nurse. He looked too young then, too pale, too human for the room he had chosen to stand in.
"She is bitten," Frankenstein said. "Move."
A rifle slid across the floor and struck the wheel near Iyisha’s hip.
The young doctor looked down at it.
Then he bent and grabbed it.
His hands shook so badly the barrel dipped before he could raise it. A twitcher came at him from the left, body jerking, mouth open. He fired once and hit the wall. He stumbled back, breath breaking, then fired again as it lunged.
The bullet struck its shoulder and spun it into the glass.
It pushed upright at once.
The young doctor screamed and fired a third time.
The twitcher’s head snapped back.
It dropped.
He turned the rifle toward the one on the nurse and fired twice. The body jerked off her shoulder and hit the floor. The nurse crawled away, sobbing, blood spreading down her sleeve.
Frankenstein’s face twisted. "Move her."
"Shut the fuck up," the young doctor shouted.
Tears ran down his face. His hands trembled around the rifle, but he kept it raised.
Frankenstein stared at him for one cold second.
Then he said, "Move."
Two soldiers grabbed the front of the bed and pulled. The young doctor backed beside them, shaking through every step, rifle aimed at the chaos behind them. Iyisha stared at him through the drug haze.
He was terrified.
He stayed anyway.
The hallway bent toward a heavier door marked SECTOR FOUR. The letters flashed red under the emergency lights.
Behind them, more doors released. People came out first, crying, limping, crawling. Then the fast ones came through them.
Five twitchers hit the hall in broken bursts. One ran upright, dropped to all fours, and sprang into a guard’s legs. Another slammed into the glass, rebounded, and sprinted toward Iyisha’s bed. A third stopped in the middle of the hall with its head twitching toward every scream before choosing one.
Two came straight for her.
Her stomach tightened under the strap.
The baby.
Her fingers curled weakly against the cuffs.
The young doctor fired and missed. A soldier stepped in front of the bed and emptied half a magazine into the first twitcher’s chest. It hit him anyway, and they crashed into the wall together. The second twitcher leapt over them, fingers scraping the side rail of Iyisha’s bed.
Iyisha jerked back as far as the restraints allowed.
The young doctor fired again. The shot tore through the twitcher’s neck and knocked it sideways. It hit the floor, twitched hard, then dragged itself toward them with both hands.
The doctor fired until the rifle clicked empty.
His face went dead with fear.
"Inside," Frankenstein ordered.
The soldiers dragged Iyisha’s bed through. The young doctor backed after them, swinging the empty rifle like a club when the crawling twitcher reached for the bed again.
Another twitcher sprang from the side corridor.
A soldier caught the back of the young doctor’s coat and yanked him through the doorway.
The door slammed shut.
The twitcher hit the glass panel from the other side. Once. Twice. Then it pressed its face to the window, twitching so fast its eyes seemed to shake.
Inside Sector Four, the hall went cold and quiet for one breath.
Then the locks deeper inside began to open.
One after another.
Iyisha turned her head toward Frankenstein.
Her mouth moved before sound came.
"Should’ve..." Her voice scraped out thin and broken. "Killed them."
The door opened.
