"...Who’s there?"
The weak female voice echoed faintly through the intercom beside the reinforced blast door.
For a brief mont, nobody answered.
The operators kept rifles raised toward the dark corridors behind them while the ergency lights flickered weakly overhead.
Ryan slowly stepped closer toward the intercom panel.
"We’re friendlies," he answered first. "Hopefully."
Adrian imdiately gave him a look.
Ryan shrugged slightly.
"What? I’m trying to sound approachable."
The intercom remained silent for several seconds afterward.
Then finally.
"...Identify yourselves."
The woman’s voice sounded exhausted.
Adrian stepped toward the speaker.
"My na is Adrian. We are a private military force operating out of the Philippines."
Silence again.
Then.
"...Philippines?"
"Yes."
Another long pause followed afterward.
The operators continued scanning the corridor while distant sounds echoed faintly sowhere deeper underground.
tal scraping.
Movent.
The infected were still nearby.
Watching.
The woman finally spoke again.
"...How did you even get here?"
Adrian answered calmly.
"We made contact with surviving Chinese naval personnel in the Philippine Sea. Captain Liu told us about you."
That imdiately changed the atmosphere behind the intercom.
"...Liu is alive?"
"Yes."
The woman exhaled shakily afterward.
For the first ti, emotion slipped into her voice.
"...I thought everyone was dead."
Ryan quietly muttered—
"Honestly, most people are."
One operator beside him elbowed him lightly.
"What?"
The intercom clicked softly again afterward.
Then a deep tallic sound echoed from inside the reinforced blast door.
LOCKS DISENGAGING.
The operators imdiately raised weapons higher.
Hydraulic systems groaned loudly.
The blast door slowly began opening inward.
Cold air rushed outward from the containnt sector beyond.
The team imdiately aid into the darkness inside.
But instead of infected. They saw light.
Actual stable lighting.
The containnt sector beyond looked far cleaner than the corridors outside. Ergency backup systems still powered portions of the underground laboratory while reinforced walls and sealed bulkhead doors lined the inner sector.
And standing roughly ten ters inside—
Was a woman.
Doctor Lin i.
She looked sowhere in her mid-thirties. She was also tall and beautiful.
Even exhausted, she still carried an almost elegant appearance beneath the harsh white laboratory lights.
Her dark hair was tied loosely behind her head while several strands fell near her face from exhaustion. She wore a fitted white laboratory coat over black thermal clothing, though parts of the coat were stained with blood, dirt, and grease from months underground.
Despite the situation. Ryan’s first thought was imdiate.
"...Damn."
One operator quietly muttered.
"Bro."
Ryan cleared his throat instantly.
"What? I was just surprised she’s alive."
Doctor Lin looked pale and tired, but her eyes remained sharp.
The kind of eyes Adrian imdiately recognized from scientists and military analysts who had spent too long surviving under pressure.
She studied the ard team cautiously.
Then her eyes stopped briefly on the Chinese flag patch attached to one operator’s gear.
"You really ca..."
Adrian slowly lowered his rifle afterward.
"Doctor Lin i?"
"Yes."
Adrian nodded once.
"We’re here to extract you."
The woman looked toward the operators behind him.
Then toward the corridor beyond the blast door where distant screams still occasionally echoed faintly underground.
"...You crossed all of that just for ?"
Adrian answered honestly.
"No."
That caught her slightly off guard.
"We ca because we believe you know sothing about the outbreak."
Doctor Lin slowly stared at him for several monts.
Then quietly.
"I do."
The atmosphere inside the containnt entrance imdiately beca heavier afterward.
Even Ryan stopped joking.
Because everyone there understood the importance of those three words.
I do.
Doctor Lin stepped slightly farther back inside the containnt sector afterward.
"Get inside first. We cannot leave the blast door open."
Adrian imdiately nodded.
"Move."
The operators entered quickly while maintaining security formation.
The mont the last man crossed the threshold, the blast door began sealing shut behind them.
CLANG.
Massive locking bolts engaged instantly.
The sounds from the outer corridors beca muffled almost imdiately afterward.
The containnt sector felt different from the rest of the underground facility.
Portable generators humd softly deeper inside the laboratory while stacks of ration packs, water containers, dical supplies, and scientific equipnt lined portions of the walls.
Several sealed body bags rested quietly near one corner beneath white sheets.
Ryan noticed them imdiately.
"...Not everybody made it?"
Doctor Lin looked toward the covered bodies briefly.
"No."
Her voice remained calm.
Too calm.
Like sobody already exhausted from grieving months earlier.
Adrian removed his respirator mask slowly afterward.
The air inside the containnt sector felt cleaner.
Filtered.
Doctor Lin watched him carefully.
"You’re not military."
"No."
"But you operate like military."
Ryan answered for him.
"We’re basically military with less paperwork."
Again, one operator elbowed him lightly.
Doctor Lin actually smiled faintly at that.
Very faintly.
But it was there.
Then her expression beca serious again.
"You said Captain Liu contacted you."
"Yes."
"He told you about Beijing?"
Adrian nodded once.
"He told us enough."
Doctor Lin slowly looked downward briefly.
"No. He didn’t."
Silence followed afterward.
Then suddenly—
A deep distant rumble echoed faintly through the underground structure.
Everyone imdiately looked upward.
The vibration felt subtle.
But real.
Ryan frowned slightly.
"What was that?"
Doctor Lin’s eyes widened slightly afterward.
"They’re gathering again."
Adrian imdiately focused.
"The infected?"
"Yes."
She pointed vaguely upward toward the surface.
"They’ve been becoming more aggressive over the past several days."
Ryan slowly looked toward Adrian.
"...That’s not suspicious timing at all."
Adrian already understood the problem.
The infected above were concentrating around this sector.
And if enough gathered—
Eventually even reinforced containnt sectors would fail.
Doctor Lin noticed Adrian’s expression imdiately.
"You understand now why I could not simply wait forever."
Adrian nodded once.
Then without hesitation—
He activated the encrypted radio mounted onto his vest.
"Adrian to Changzheng-418."
Static crackled briefly.
Then Captain Liu’s voice answered.
"Changzheng-418 receiving."
Adrian looked toward the ceiling above them.
"We reached Doctor Lin."
A brief silence followed.
Then Captain Liu answered quietly.
"Understood."
Adrian’s expression hardened slightly afterward.
"Prepare missile strike package on Beijing surface sectors surrounding our extraction route."
Even Doctor Lin looked toward him sharply hearing that.
Ryan slowly grinned beneath the tension.
"Oh..."
He looked toward the operators.
"...This is gonna get loud."
Captain Liu answered imdiately.
"Confird. Type-094 launch systems already standing by."
The Chinese ballistic missile submarine.
Changzheng-418.
Even subrged far from Beijing.
It still carried enough firepower to devastate entire districts.
Adrian continued calmly.
"Target infected concentrations around western containnt sectors. Prioritize surface swarm reduction."
Captain Liu’s voice remained steady through the radio.
"Understood."
Then more formally.
"Preparing JL-2 ballistic missile strike package."
Doctor Lin blinked slightly.
"You’re launching submarine ballistic missiles into Beijing?"
Ryan answered first.
"Well technically Beijing already got nuked before."
"That’s not helping," one operator muttered.
Far beneath the Philippine Sea, inside the Changzheng-418, warning alarms began illuminating quietly across the missile control compartnt.
Chinese naval personnel moved imdiately between launch consoles while targeting data stread across tactical displays.
"JL-2 targeting packages uploaded."
"Launch vectors confird."
"Surface swarm coordinates locked."
The JL-2 submarine-launched ballistic missiles were originally designed for strategic nuclear deploynt.
But now. Their conventional warheads would beco anti-horde weapons.
Captain Liu stood silently behind the launch officers while watching the targeting grids populate across the screen.
Ruined Beijing.
Surface infected concentrations.
Extraction corridors.
Then finally. the launch officer looked upward.
"Missiles ready."
Captain Liu nodded slowly.
"Fire."
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