The Becoming: Revelations by Jessica Meigs Read Free Book Online Page B

mechanical, as he shot one after another, trying to shut down the part of his brain that screamed at his actions. It could have easily been him. The horror of the idea was too terrible to comprehend. Ethan buried it and set about his disgusting work.
    It was only after Ethan fired the last bullet into the last of the infected before him that he realized he was out of ammunition again. He lowered the weapon, his eyes locked onto the man spread-eagled on the concrete at his feet, and waved a hand at Alicia as the woman approached. “Give me a new magazine,” he demanded.
    A last sporadic burst of gunfire punctuated the silence after Ethan’s words. “We’re done, Ethan. There aren’t any more. We got them all,” Alicia said. She stood silent for a moment and then lashed out, punching Ethan’s shoulder. Ethan flinched and sidestepped away from her. “What the fuck were you thinking, running into the fuckers like that? Huh? You could have gotten yourself killed!”
    Ethan jammed the gun back into his jeans’ waistband, striding across the garage to the door leading into the hotel proper. He skirted a few people emerging through the door as Alicia said something to Dominic. Then she hurried after him, still berating him as he shoved the door open.
    “You’re fucking insane, you know that? Absolutely crazy. You’re going to get one of us killed, and—”
    “Shut the fuck up, Alicia,” Ethan snapped. He pulled the Glock from his jeans and turned on her. Her cheek twitched as she tried to not flinch at his sudden movement. He shoved the sidearm toward her chest. “Here, take the fucking thing.”
    Alicia took it and ran her fingers along the slide before ejecting the magazine, reloading it with bullets from her pocket as methodically as she’d shot the infected in the parking garage. Then she slapped the magazine back into the gun, chambered a round, and handed it back to Ethan grip first, much to his surprise.
    “I think you’ve earned the right to carry this,” Alicia said solemnly. She pushed past him and stalked down the hall, quickly disappearing into the darkness.

Chapter 7
     
    Brandt was torn from sleep by the sound of the fire alarm blaring through his room. Thankfully, his reaction was only to open his eyes and look around in bewilderment; it wasn’t like the movies, where people suddenly sat up, gasping and panting, when they were woken by something unexpected.
    That was how the end of Brandt’s world began: with him simply opening his eyes.
    Brandt pushed himself to a sitting position. He scrunched his eyes in the bright lights that flickered on, covering his ears as the screeching alarm echoed in his skull, rattling his brain. His head swam with the movement, and his stomach churned with nausea as he tried to figure out what was going on.
    The fluorescent lights flickered as the power surged. Their brightness was further aided by the pulsing light from the fire alarm system mounted above the door. Brandt grimaced and slid out of bed to search for pants. He didn’t smell smoke, but he wanted to be prepared in case something had happened that required the evacuation of the CDC. He dragged a pair of sweatpants from the dresser by the bed and pulled them on as he glanced at the door. It was likely a false alarm. If that was the case, he was going to be pissed .
    The shriek of the fire alarm’s siren shut off. The silence was oddly loud to his ears, and he shook his head as if he could shake the lack of sound loose. The alarm’s strobe lights continued to flash against the white walls of the “guest” room he’d called home for the past month; the effect was dampened only by the lights that accompanied their awakening. Brandt glanced at the door once more before stumbling to the bathroom and fumbling for the watch he’d left on the sink the night before. His fingers closed around it, and he squinted at the digital numbers. 5:58 a.m.
    “ Well, ain’t that some shit?” Brandt said out loud.