Slowly, the three women made their way to the top of the steps, with Valerie keeping an eye around them to ensure no zombies were after them.
With the lights on and the beacon-like strobes from the fire alarm lights swirling around, the red hue painted the 3 women's faces.
Monica let out a sigh of relief along with Lisa as they reached the top of the stairs. With Monica leaning against a wall, it gave Lisa a moment of rest as she looked Valerie's way, she was still scanning the stairs for a second more before joining the two women.
"Everything seems clear," Valerie spoke out. "Where is the telecommunications room?".
"It's not too far from here," Monica responded, however, she gritted her teeth as she retook hold of her injured shoulder. "But if you can give me a moment to just recover...".
Valerie nodded, looking at Lisa who stood up from leaving against the wooden wall.
"Alright..." Monica muttered seconds later as she propped herself up properly onto her feet, still leaning against the wall for support.
"Can I help you some more?" Lisa offered.
"No, no. I'll be fine..." Monica responded. "You've done more than enough... Thank you.". With that, Monica tried to lead the way. Her steps became that bit more firm, confident, the more she walked.
A couple more meters and a bend later, they arrived in front of a closed, metal door. Reaching into her pocket, Monica retrieved her bloodied card which she used to scan into the card scanner, unlocking the door. Opening the door for herself and the two women who followed her, the door closed behind them all as they ventured deeper into the darkened room.
"We need to activate all the equipment... that might take a few minutes," Monica spoke out as she reached her work desk. Turning on the computer, she looked at Valerie before saying, "Can you get the big computer, please, Valerie?".
At first, she looked to which one she implied, but finally eyeing it seconds later, she made her way to it before powering it up.
"Alright... now all we do is wait..." Monica commented as she pulled out a chair for her to sit on. With a grunt and a groan of pain, she managed to get herself down onto the chair, releasing a sigh of relief in her doing so.
The projector showed the big computer turning on as a big, clue rectangle was shown on a wall, with a small, spinning circle in the middle showing that the program was loading up. A minute later, the blue was to be switched out with a black screen as a bunch of sentences appeared on the screen. It was all code.
"We'll just let it do its thing..." Monica kept both Valerie and Lisa up to date. "It should be ready in just a minute now...".
Lines and lines of code were rapidly shown by the system before a percentage sign appeared at the bottom of the screen, seconds later, numbers took their place beside it. Racing up to 100.
Once that loading was completed, the screen went dark again, as if the projector turned off, only for the blue screen to come back a second later, with the text, 'Welcome' reading across it. And then it requested a login.
Monica let out a sigh before gathering all the strength she had to stand up on her feet again. Slowly, with the help of both Valerie and Lisa, she made her way to the computer, where she inputted her credentials. Pressing enter, the screen loaded again before giving them access to the home page.
There lay several boxes, some empty, others containing text but they were darkened. "Fuck..." Monica let out.
"What is it?... What is all of this?" Lisa asked.
"I don't see any officers active now..." Monica responded.
"Could the power outage in the town have anything to do with it?".
Hearing another question of hers, Monica looked back toward Lisa. "That shouldn't be an issue. It's not like those cars are powered through the electricity supplied to the town," Monica explained.
"So what do we do now?" Valerie asked, her eyes gazing at all the boxes on the screen.
"We wait... there has to be at least someone out there...".
"Can't we just get a car from out there and get the fuck out of here?" Lisa asked.
"With blockages throughout the whole town and the walking dead everywhere, our chances are pretty slim..." Monca responded. However, she paused at Lisa's words. She thought through them again before letting out a gasp as she pushed herself back onto her feet.
Making her way toward a shelf filled with books, she has Valerie and Lisa follow closely behind her. "Where are you going, Monica?" Lisa asked.
"We might have a chance after all..." Monica responded, looking at Lisa. Switching her gaze to Valerie, Monica noted that the two women had no clue what she was on about. So instead, Monica let out a mere sigh before beginning to dig through the books that were on the shelf. "Let me find it first and then, when I show you what I mean, everything will make more sense...".
"What are you looking for though?" Lisa asked.
"A map... there should be a map of the police station somewhere here..." Monica responded, still rummaging through the shelf.
"Would this map do?..." Lisa responded, holding up the map she found in the basement.
Slowly, Monica turned before looking at what it was Lisa offered her. Taking it into her hands and looking at the folded page, she looked back at Lisa. "Where did you find this?".
"The basement, when Valerie and I were looking for the generators," Lisa responded.
Monica licked her bottom lip and just as she was about to speak up, the sound of 'ping' caught her attention. Immediately, she looked toward the boxes shown on the wall by the projector. One of the names which was darkened, was now glowing in white and green. She couldn't believe her eyes.
"What does that mean, Monica?" Lisa asked.
"Someone is active..." Monca replied. "Valerie, you're faster than me, can you go and check it out for me please?".
"Sure.". Immediately, Valerie made her way to the big keyboard of the computer, looking at all the labels on the screen. "Erm... Monica? What do I do now?".
"Try to initiate contact with them... You'll need to put on the headset. Set the external audio to on, so we can hear if they contact us back," Monica responded, keeping an eye on the screen as she slowly moved toward Valerie, with the help of Lisa.
"And... how exactly do I initiate contact?" Valerie asked, moving the cursor around the screen.
"Click on the glowing name tag. In the box on the left, you'll have an option to tune in. Do that and call out. See if they can get to us," Monica further elaborated.
With Valerie doing just that, she saw a sentence above the box she just interacted with. At first, it was an amber text. 'Attempting connection.'.
Seconds, later, the lettered turned green. 'Connection Successful.'. Valerie caught a breath.
"H-hello?... Hello? Do you copy?..." Valerie began. No reply. "This is Artull police station, my name is Valerie Simmons. Do you copy?". Still no response.
"No response?" Monica asked, keeping her voice down.
Valerie shook her head. "Nothing yet...".
They all waited a few seconds more, however, nothing. No response.
Valerie looked up at Monica, who had her eyes on the monitor ahead. "What do we do?" Valerie inquired next.
"Let's wait a bit more..." Monica replied, biting her lower lip again.
Seconds later, the name that glowed green-white disappeared. It returned to the darker shade of blue, just like it was several minutes ago as the connection status showed red letters. 'Connection Lost.'.
"Shit..." Monica voiced.
"What now?..." Lisa inquired next.
"We better get into contact with someone before the generators run out of fuel," Monica responded.
"Do you know how much time we've left?" Valerie asked.
"Depends on how full the generators are.".
"They are all about halfway full," Lisa replied.
"In that case... We've time. Certainly until the sunrise...".
"You were going to show us something, Monica... Something on the map, was it?" Valerie spoke up, breaking the silence that spread between the women for a mere second.
"Ah yes..." Monica began, laying the map ahead of all three women. "This only shows the basement though... But do you see this door here?...". Monica showed toward a door that led to somewhere off the map. However, upon a closer look, Valerie saw that the door was located close to the backup generator 4. The metal door both she and Lisa stumbled upon.
"What's behind that door?..." Valerie asked right away.
"I don't know all too much... however, Gemma told me that there's a passage to the underground car park of the station, which is about a 500-meter walk from this door.". Monica kept her finger pointed to the door on the map.
"So you're saying there could be a car there?" Lisa questioned.
"Well..." Monica began. "There's only one way to find out... However, I want this to be our last resort. Just before the sun rises over the horizon, if we get no response, that'll be our way out.".
"But what about the town blockages?" Valerie asked next.
"I think we should be alright there..." Monica responded.
Just as the quiet settled within the room once more, another 'ping' sounded in the room. Looking back at the displayed projection on the wall, the same name came back online.
Valerie gasped as she pressed the blinking name and initiated contact once more. Once the connection showed to be successful, all that was here was static.
"Hello?... Is anyone there?... Can you hear me?" Valerie voiced again.
But still, no response. The group began to feel unsettled once more, Valerie's heart pounded against her chest. That was until a static "Hello?" came through.
The women all looked at each other before Valerie turned toward the monitor once more. "H-hello? Hello... Can you hear me?". Valerie paused. "This is the Artull police station, I am Detective Valerie Simmons... Can you hear me?".
The voice remained static. "Loud and clear, Ma'am. Can you hear me?".
"Yes, yes we can.". With that, Valerie, Monica and Lisa all breathed out a sigh of relief, each woman smiling ever so slightly.
"We tried contacting you earlier, however, we couldn't get through," The static voice went on. "What are you doing in Artull? Shouldn't everyone be evacuated from the town?".
"Our town got ravaged before a proper evacuation could take place," Valerie responded, swallowing down the slight lump that grew in her throat.
"That's unfortunate. I am sorry to hear...". The voice paused for a moment. "Do you need me to make a pitstop in Artull to pick you up?... I am on my way to the airport myself.". Valerie couldn't believe what she heard.
"P-please! Please, we'll pay you how much ever you ask for... Just please, get us out of here..." Valerie let her vulnerability show, however, she didn't care. All she wanted, at that moment, was to be as far away from the police station, from Artull as she possibly could.
The voice laughed. "No need for that... However, I do ask for you to be speedy. I'll be in Artull in about 20 minutes. I can't wait for long, there are zombies everywhere. Armull is swarmed with them.".
Valerie's heart dropped ever so slightly. "Are you from Armull?".
"Yes, Ma'am...".
Valerie felt her chest pain at what was happening. Just like what Artull meant to Valerie, the same was true with the man behind the static voice. "I'm sorry..." was all Valerie managed to say. "We'll get going now... Where should you wait for us?".
"I suppose that I should be the one asking you that," the voice responded.
"I'll give you my phone number..." Valerie responded as Lisa and Monica furrowed their brows. "Call me when you're close by, so I can tell you where we are...".
"Alright... how many people are there with you?".
"Three, myself included. Will there be enough room for us all?" Valerie inquired next.
"We'll find a way to make yous fit..." the voice responded, a slight satirical tone present in his voice. "Tell me your phone number and then get going. You won't have much time left...".
"Alright...". With Valerie telling the man her number, she proceeded to say one, last thing. "Thank you...".
"No worries... we'll see you three very soon.".
And at that, their call came to an end.
"Why give him his number?... Aren't the networks down?" Monica asked.
"Last time I checked, yes... but that was right after I left the house..." Valerie began. She checked her phone only to see that still nothing changed. "I hope that the signal will be back up, even for just a minute, for long enough so that he can call me to say he has arrived...".