Zone Zero (Book 1 of 3)

Chapter 11

I spend so many hours alone in the red room looking for a way out. I pace from wall to wall and try to push against every surface, but everything in this room is locked tight like a vault. I even move the bed and check the bathroom for some sign of an exit or a vent, something big enough for me to squeeze through but besides the small air vent in the bathroom that I would be lucky to fit my hand through, there is nothing.

Finally I give up and lie on the bed, gazing at the ceiling. I miss the outside world so much as the darkness of the underground shelter begins to close around me. This place is so cold all the time that it has begun to feel like a mortuary to me.

I long for rays of sunlight to burst through and shine down on me so that I can soak in the vitamins and finally feel human again. Being down here is beginning to make me lose grip of time which I can only imagine will eventually grow to losing a complete grip on reality. I have barely eaten and am beginning to feel weaker by the hour.

I have to stay focused.

I search through the bedside tables next to the bed once more hoping that I missed something or that a book may be inside. I pull the drawers out completely and notice that a book has in fact fallen behind the empty draw somehow. I pull free the red leather hardcover and notice as a single word is scratched into the front casing; Bible.

Is this some sort of sick joke? Why would a vampire have a copy of the Bible?

I put the Bible back in the draw and lie back down closing my eyes to my situation.

I try to picture my brothers and how it all used to be when I was younger but the face of my brother Declyn is slowly beginning to fade from my memory. I try to harder to remember his smile and his laugh but the sound is lost. I am forgetting my brother.

Tears begin to stream down my face as I curl into a ball with the sheets pulled tightly up toward my neck and let them escape.

What's the use of holding back my tears anymore? It is the only thing I know for certain that the vampires can't take from me.

...

"I'm not sure what she knows, probably nothing." A muffled voice on the other side of the door and what sounds like footsteps, lingers throughout the room and I feel my curiosity peak.

I slide off the bed and creep closer to the door in hopes to hear what is being said more clearly.

I press the side of my face to the door and feel the cool chill of the wood against my skin but it doesn't do much in the way of hearing any better. The only thing I know for certain is that it is Alex and he is pacing between the main room and one of the other rooms I have yet to explore.

I look around the bedroom and find the empty glass from earlier on when Alex brought me some water. I crawl over to the bedside table and grab it deciding to use it against the door to hopefully amplify his conversation.

I make sure not to make a sound and press my ear to the other end of the glass and to my luck, it works.

"He stays with the other leaders. Our problem is with him not the others, they don't mean anything to me."

It is definitely Alex but no one is responding to him. He must be on the phone.

"I told you already, nothing. They aren't even that close from what I gather."

Who is he talking about?

"Soft? That's rich. May I remind you of Bulgaria or of Cambodia or even Spain? I, my dear brother, am far from soft."

Wow he definitely has seen the world.

"I need more time. A few days at least. She is more valuable than you think."