Hannah continued pacing the medium sized room, moving in and out of the shelving units. Cheryl had Jewel wrapped in her arms, comforting the sobbing young woman, while they sat on the floor in the corner, farthest away from both doors. Darius was searching the room for things they could use as weapons and looking for an alternate way out at the same time.

"Have you been working here long, Darius?" Hannah asked.

"Three years."

She walked over to the door, and pressed her ear against it, listening for a moment before turning back to him. "How well do you know the station?"

"Well, I don't generally go anywhere else but the truckbay and the warehouse. My card doesn't have access to the engineering floor or the lab level, so sadly, not much."

She nodded at him, then turned to Jewel. "What about you."

"I'm the same as him, sorry."

"Damn, okay."

Back to the drawing board. None of them knew the station well enough to get somewhere safe. All she knew were the living quarters, the lab level and the main floor. And she didn't know the main floor that well, just enough to get to the conference room and back to the elevator.

A zombie pounded on the service tunnel door, making it rattle, and Hannah jumped, breaking her train of thought.

"They're going to get in here," Jewel cried.

Cheryl slapped a hand over her mouth, shushing her. "They will if you keep screaming."

The woman shook in her Cheryl's arms but went silent. Fear rampant in her eyes, as it was spreading like a wave through Hannah. She could hear the music of every horror movie in her mind. Taking a deep breath, she tried to reign in her senses, losing it now wouldn't do anyone any good.

Why wasn't Xavier coming for them? Why hadn't he tried contacting them? She clicked the button on her vocera and tried to call Xavier, but it just said he wasn't available. Was the system down? The station still had power, so it shouldn't be down.

"Try Kevin," Darius suggested.

She did, but received the same response. "Looks like we're on our own. Where's the emergency satellite phone?"

"There is one in engineering, one in the Director's office, and the last is in the Security room."

Hannah threw her hands up in the air. "Great, all areas we don't have access to."

"We're doomed," Jewel said, her chin wobbling.

"Not if I have anything to say about it. We need to find a practical place to hunker down until the security crew sorts this mess out," Darius said, his shoulders squaring.

"The cafeteria is the inside muster station. We're supposed to go there if we can't leave," Jewel said with a shaky voice. "That's where everyone will go."

"Our cards aren't working," Cheryl said. "And the elevators are down."

"Shit," Darius said as he punched the wall, making Jewel flinch. Little by little, the woman was withdrawing from them.

Hannah walked over to her and leaned down. "I know you're scared, but we're going to get through this, but we all need to work together, okay?"

Jewel nodded.

"Since we can't get off the floor, we need food and water. There's none in here."

"The lunchroom isn't going to work because it just has an arch and no actual door," Darius commented, then he jumped with fists raised when a cracking sound filled the room. "If we don't leave now, we'll be trapped in here on both sides."

"Ya, that sound is going to draw them all."

The trickle of anxiety rushing through Hannah moments ago hit with the force of a flood. "Grab anything you can find as a weapon and some bags. We have to go."

"Where?" cried Jewel, getting to her feet.

"We need a room that doesn't have a window into the hallway," Hannah said.

"The morgue is the only one I can think of," Cheryl said, swallowing hard.

Jewel viciously shook her head, almost making Hannah dizzy. "Nu uh, no way. I'm not going there."

"It's either that or my lab with the big bay window," Hannah countered. "Where all the dead guys can see us."

"Okay, morgue it is," Jewel said, a look of defeat on her face.

Hannah pulled Darius to the side, away from the women.. "When we get to the Morgue, I need to get you to keep the girls there."

"What are you going to do?"

"I need to go back to my lab and try to end this." If she didn't do it, no one would. Chances were the other doctors were already gone for being stupid. But if she went back, did that make her stupid too? However, better to do that than sit down waiting for death. She at least had to try.

"I can't let you go alone."

"Look, I lost one friend already. I can't lose her too. Our families will never forgive me. If I can solve this, then maybe I can die without anything else on my conscience."

"What can I do to help?" he asked.

"Just promise me you'll keep them in there. I'm going to follow behind you, and once we get to the morgue, close the door after yourself and I'm going to keep going."

"She'll kill me you know. I can see it in her eyes."

Cheryl was watching them closely, her eyes curious about what they were talking about. "You guys might want to include us in your conversation."

Hannah turned to face her, wiping her hands on her pants. "Our first stop is the pantry in the lunchroom kitchen. We need to stock up and either move to the morgue or come back here, but I don't think that door is going to continue to hold," she said, hiking her finger towards the service tunnel door, which was already splintered. "Come on, we have to go."

Darius went over to Jewel and handed her a broken broom handle. "Stay close to me."

Hannah tightened her grip on her own weapon and went to the inner door, pressing her ear against it. It sounded quiet. "I'm going to open it slowly to check."

Taking a deep breath, she stood behind the door and opened it a crack, it creaked slightly, making her freeze, expecting at any moment for one to pounce against it. But it remained silent. She could hear pounding farther down the hall and around the corner.

"It's clear," she said, waving for them to come. "Let's go."

Slowly and quietly, they filled out of the room one after the other, holding their weapons in front of them. "How far?" Jewel whispered.

Not wanting to answer, she just pointed ahead. The lunchroom was also adjacent to the service tunnel because the pantry had access to it. But she wasn't going to risk speaking and the monsters hearing her. All they had to walk was another hundred feet. But they had to pass a middle hallway and she had no idea what was awaiting them there. It was about thirty feet ahead.

They needed to move quickly and quietly before anything came around any of the corners behind them. Her body vibrated viciously, like every nerve in her body was convulsing and every sense awakened. She could smell the sweat gathering under her arms, could hear the raspy breaths of her comrades.

Safely reaching the middle hallway, she motioned for them to stop and slowly peeked one eye around the corner. In the middle of the hallway were two zombies banging against the door of her co-workers lab, but they weren't looking their way.

Hannah turned back to her team and put her fingers to her lips and held up two fingers, pointing down the middle hallway. "One at a time," she mouthed. Cheryl went first and then Hannah checked to make sure the movement hadn't alerted the dead crew members, but all seemed well, so she had Jewel go next.

When it was her turn, she held her breath and didn't take another until they were all safely on the other side, her heart racing.

Thank god.

***

"He's dead. They're all dead," Clara sobbed into Xavier's arms.

They had managed to get the door closed in time, but the incessant pounding against it meant that it wouldn't hold up for long. If he wouldn't have opened it, then the things wouldn't know they were in here, but now they did. But he couldn't let her die.

"It was eating him. Oh god, it was eating him," she cried hysterically.

"Shhhh, hun. I need you to keep it down, otherwise, they'll keep trying to get in."

She shook her head, grabbing his shirt with her hands in a death grip. "They don't stop. They don't stop."

"Kevin, can you break out the whiskey and give the lady some."

"But we don't have any—"

"Bottom draw under the false bottom."

"How did you—"

"Doesn't matter, just give her some will ya. If she doesn't stop, we'll never get out of this."

He knew the guys always kept a bottle in the office, and they never thought he knew, and he never had the heart to take it away. They needed something to numb the boredom. Ya, it was taboo, but heck, they were in the middle of nowhere with very little time off. Kevin unscrewed the top and filled up a small water cup, handing it to her.

"Drink."

Clara took it with her left hand and downed it one gulp, favoring her right arm where blood was seeping through the sleeve.

"Kevin, grab the first aid kit."

Xavier knew that treating the wound wouldn't stop the infection but he could at least try to make her comfortable before they had to decide what to do next. She was going to die like the others, and he honestly had no idea what he was going to do with her. He knew that once they figured out a plan, then they'd have to segregate the healthy from the bitten to keep everyone safe.

As Xavier treated her wound, the woman jumped every time a zombie hit the door, "You're okay. You're safe here."

"No. No, we're not," she cried, her entire body shaking. "We have to get out of here. We have to leave."

"Just breathe, hun."

"Uh, Boss," Kevin said. "She's right. Look."

Xavier finished wrapping her wound and turned to look at the monitors. More of the dead were wandering towards the commotion. He knew that their door could withhold the weight from a few of them. There was no way they could all pile against the door because the hallway wasn't wide enough, but they still couldn't get out and do what needed to be done with them out there.

If it wasn't one thing it was another. He took the chance to help her, and it got them in this mess, so now he had to find a way out of it. A heavy feeling shrouded his chest, making it hurt to breathe. He was beginning to think that he'd have no choice but to pull out the guns.

"You said someone died. Who?" Xavier asked her.

"Director Adams," she said. "They were...they were all over him. I barely got away."

Wrangle them up and keep them somewhere until help arrives. That was his last order to him. Now he had a choice since the station was in his hands with both directors dead. Honor his bosses decision and do what he can first, or shoot his comrades. Could there possibly be help for them somewhere along the line or was it a lost cause?

Xavier raked a hand through his hair, getting more irritated by the minute at the incessant pounding on the door. Weren't they ever going to get tired and move the hell on? They couldn't see them, so why were they sticking around? It probably didn't help that they were talking, so he lifted his hands to his lips and rested his hand on Clara's shoulder to help calm her, bringing a finger of his free hand to his lips..

Quietly, he walked over to Kevin and grabbed a pad of sticky notes. "Ventilation schematics," he wrote. They didn't have those on the wall, as it was more classified than the main station schematics. And since they had people pop by on occasion, he knew that the maps had to stay on their harddrive or locked in the safe in the Director's office.

"Here, that's our office." Xavier pointed to a certain box. "That means..." He stopped talking a moment and looked around, then leaned down to scope out under the desk and saw the vent there. That was his ticket out of the office.

Standing back up, he put his hands on his hips and said, "Okay, here's the plan."