Chapter 8 – Underground Bunker of Horrors – Part 2
The first room he came too pretty much summed up most of his fears. No, it wasn't a meat locker full of dead bodies or parts of them hanging on hooks, yet as he entered and looked around, he couldn't resist the feelings of horror. Instead, clear glass storage bins similar to stand-up glass refrigerators filled with thousands if not tens of thousands of vials of blood lined the walls. Now he wasn't wholly horrified at first despite the mass quantities of blood, as he remembered records of scientists doing countless experiments on beast blood trying to figure out how they evolved. This could be beast blood right? As he looked closer, he was in fact relieved when he started to read the text written on the labels of each vial. The first few rows had been the name of beasts and their suspected 'evolved' powers or other attributes that they possessed. Of course, his relieved expression faded quickly as his eyes moved along the rows of blood. The beast names started to be replaced by names of people along with their known 'evolved' powers. Most of these people's names were written on hundreds of small vials. He also saw much larger glass containers filled with blood on the bottom shelves that matched many of the names on the smaller bottles.
"No way someone could lose that much blood and live!" Kip screamed to himself as he quickly skipped to the end of the row, to a half full refrigerated case. To his horror…there was a row for his father. Legibly written on hundreds of vials of blood as well as a few much larger containers, was the name of his father. Tears streaked down his face as he backed away from the site in horror. "What are these monsters doing?" he couldn't help but ask out loud. He then noticed a log book on a table to the side, flipping it open Kip saw that it was a catalog of all of the vials of blood collected. He threw it into his pack for later. He also opened up the refrigerated storage and grabbed some of his fathers and a few other random vials of blood and added them to his bag. Evidence maybe for later? He was acting on instinct at the moment and not a hundred percent present.
He hadn't seen his mother or sisters name yet, so he still had time to act hopefully. Rushing out of the room with an increased sense of urgency, he only briefly glanced in the direction of a medical area with nothing of significance. He then passed another area that was full of people, some he recognized some he didn't. None of them were from his parent's scavenger team. These must be the guards and those who had attacked his parent's group. He wanted to enact as much violence as possible on them and yet his rational mind yelled at him to find his sister and mother first. He did take time to notice the door to the room, had a bar on the outside and not the inside which was rather strange. Although he didn't know why exactly its design was like that, it was currently unimportant as the door stood wide open. Just a detail to note for later.
Moving quickly down the hall he passed a few other medical looking rooms as well as an office finally coming to a halt when he heard a voice he recognized. It was Banner Rawle! He followed the sound of the voice around a bend and found himself looking at Banner who was busy giving an evil villain monologue to Skyla. Another man was present as well who appeared to be in the process of withdrawing blood from the unconscious form of his Mother.
"She won't last much longer," Banner continued. "She has already lost too much blood. She won't die if we stop now. If instead, we proceed, the same thing that happened to your father will happen to her. Either way, you will serve me. However, if you serve me willingly, your mother may yet live. In our experiments with evolution, we have found some success in stealing other's abilities through the infusion of their blood into "essence" and then injecting ourselves with it. However, the best way is still to inject unborn fetuses. So, our best hope for evolution is still a mixture of the old-fashioned way, combined with a few much more recent additions. It's a shame your mother is too old to reliable conceive now if not…well let's say we'd be threatening her differently to get you to bend."
Meanwhile, Kip had inched closer never taking his eyes off his sister. He knew that she couldn't see him, so when Banner looked away, he had tossed the pendant into her lap. Realization struck her suddenly, and even though her arms and legs were chained, she seemed to have a sudden spark of hope. Then, of course, she opened her mouth and started lying.
"Okay, fine, I agree. Let my mother go! In fact, how about we start right now? Unchain me and take me to your room and I'll try and make a man out of you!" She said adding a sultry tone to her voice.
Banner looked very surprised at first, then grinned wickedly motioning for the other man to stop what he was doing — then reached for the shackles binding her to the chair to unfasten them. "Finally, you have come to your senses. I knew you would. We can rule humanity together and make many strong 'evolved' babies!"
Kip thought that this guy was apparently an idiot. He had heard stories of him being a womanizer on base, which is partially why his sister had rejected him in the first place. However, to blindly believe his sister that fast, how dense was this guy? Or maybe he was just super confident in his powers?
"Yep, your manliness just won me over in the end, how can I possibly resist?" She continued in a solemn tone then rolled her eyes when he wasn't looking. Once free she staggered towards her mother away from Banner as if losing her balance, where Kip also happened to be waiting.
Kip slowly extended his field to include just enough of his sister so that she could hear and see him. This level of control was very challenging to Kip, but fortunately, he had practiced it enough to pull it off. Wasting no time, he explained. "I will get Mom out. I already rescued another girl, and there is nobody else alive that I can find. Do you need help with Banner? We have a ride back to the base already, so we just need to get out."
Facing away from Banner and the other minion, she whispered. "No I can handle him, you get out with Mom, I will be along shortly. I have been drugged up until now mostly or had the threat of Dad or Mom's death on my head if I resisted earlier."
"Okay, if you aren't out in a few minutes I am coming back in. After I secure Mom, I'll head back in regardless to help delay any pursuit," Kip responded.
"Love you, little brother," she added before winking and turning back to Banner whom she led hand in hand out of the room.
Kip followed them for a few seconds to determine what room they entered before heading back his mother. The minion there looked like he was about to start draining more of her blood as if they only stopped to get his sister to agree.
"Oh, hell no you don't!" Kip yelled… well to himself as he grabbed the large needle that had been sitting next to his sister. He wasn't sure but guessed it was some type of sedative and figured it couldn't hurt…Well hurt to try that is, it could very well hurt his target. He stepped forward keeping the cloaking field only against himself and plunged the needle into the man's neck pressing the plunger in all the way. At the same time, he extended his cloaking field to cover the asshole vampire as well! It turns out it was a good idea, as the man cried out as he collapsed to the floor and started to spasm making all kinds of racket. Hmm, maybe too much of whatever I just used. Dah well, he was an asshole that probably drained my father dry and many other people as well!
He took the time to quickly unchain his mother and remove the IV-like needle from her arm. On a whim, he chose to keep it, and the rather large number of vials he found nearby full of her blood. Maybe they could put it back? He was no medical doctor, but his sister would know. He threw all of this into a tote he found on a shelf, and then put the entire contents into his pack. The lackey had finally stopped twitching, so he shrunk his field to only include his mother as he picked her up and headed for the door. Miraculously no alarm rang out and nobody jumped in front of him as he made it out without incident. He remembered at the last moment to pause outside the exit door to ensure his cloaking field still stopped the bells from making noise and alerting the others inside. He then proceeded up the stairs and down the path with his mother in his arms. Almost immediately he spotted the girl and Yogi. The former of which was furiously scratching the latter's neck, and he could have sworn he was purring.
"I am in there risking my life, and you are out here getting a spa treatment? I swear!" he scolded. The girl jumped at his words, and Yogi somehow looked chagrined. "Everybody else is dead, here is my Mom, my sister will be out soon. Can we load everybody up on your back in preparation in case we have to run?"
Yogi sent a mental Confirmation and laid down on the ground allowing the girl to climb up onto his back.
Kip handed his mother to her. "Please hold on to her, I will be back in a minute," Kip said as he headed back down the path without waiting for an answer. Just as he opened the door to head back in, his sister burst out nearly plowing over him.
"Um you may want to run," She said as she slammed the door behind her, grabbing his hand and tugging him along up the stairs and out of the passageway. She halted for a moment when she saw Yogi, then proceeded on when she noticed her Mom and the girl on his back. "I was only gone for a few weeks, and you can't help but replace me with the biggest bear in the valley, what am I going to do with you?" She scolded in a joking manner as she climbed up onto Yogi's back.
Kip climbed up between his sister and the girl temporarily ignoring his sister's question saying, "let's go, Yogi!"
Yogi responded by climbing to his feet and lumbering eastward back down the road we had arrived from. Of course, even the bear was cheeky sending an image of his sister, then a sense of Fondness as if a kindred spirit.
"Well Yogi likes you too," he said to his sister as they raced off into the night.
"Of course, everybody loves me after all. Unfortunately, that includes crazy psychopaths bent on world domination," her voice growing more somber towards the end.
"Well it kept you alive," Kip said seriously, "he could have just drained you from the start."
She was about to answer when a massive explosion ripped through the night.