Free Endemic Rise of the Plague by Jeannie Rae

time limit here, Junior. Go get the goddamn wheel chair, before I put you in one,” Rhino growled in a low voice, trying not to draw any attention.
    “ Can I help you?” A woman's voice chirped from behind.
    Startled, both men turned to see the woman standing just inside the curtained area. Her hands moved to her hips with a look of distrust upon her worn face. Instead of wearing hospital garb, she wore long black skirt and a pink floral top.
    “ Yes, are you Mrs. Swick? And is this your husband Kyle?” Junior asked.
    “ Yes, I’m Norma. What could you possibly need from my husband?” She narrowed her eyes at them.
    “ We are from Angora Laboratories, we heard of your husband's condition from your son. We came to collect him. He must come with us immediately,” Junior said.
    “You don’t look like you are from a classy place like that. You look like a couple of dirt bags. What are you doing over there?” She fixated on Rhino at Kyle’s bedside, sheets in his hands.
    “Ma’am, I promise that we are here to help get your husband safely to Angora. We were called in off duty, to help him. I assure you that there is a whole team of specialists, just waiting for him to arrive. We need to go now, time is of the essence. Here, take a look at this,” Junior yanked out his security badge from his pocket, allowing her to examine it.
    A look of relief came over her face as she read the badge, “What about our daughter Jenna? She’s here too. Will your specialists be able to help her?”
    “I’m sorry, but we can only take Kyle at this time. Jenna is in good hands here. Once we get Kyle to Angora, we can see about having your daughter transported,” Junior negotiated.
    “Well Jenna is in much better shape than Kyle. I just don’t want them separated. Oh golly, I don’t know what to do,” she said.
    “Why don’t you come with us, to see to it that Kyle will be treated by our team? You said that Jenna is doing better than your husband, so let the doctors here help her. Why is she here?” Junior asked.
    “She was bitten by—”
    “Oh yes,” Junior interrupted. “With that type of injury, the doctors here will take excellent care of her. There is no need to worry. We can even call and check up on her.”
    “ Specialists are waiting for him, really? What the heck then, let's go. We were out in that darn waiting room for ages. No telling how low long it’ll be before they get a doctor in to see him. And look at him, he needs a doctor right now. He has a fragile heart, you know. I'll go tell the nurse that we're leaving.”
    “ Ma'am, we'll take care of that. You just stay with your husband for now,” Rhino interjected. “Junior, the chair.”
    Junior nodded and exited the curtained area.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN
    In a guarded stance, Randy and Shotgun clinched their guns within the Bishop home. A man and a woman lie on the kitchen floor, soaked in blood—so much blood that determining the original color of their clothes may prove impossible. The shirts were torn on both of them, their bodies limp. Another man and woman, splattered in blood, were crouching over the two on the floor. They appeared to be devouring raw meat over the ones on the floor, slurping and chewing, their heads down. The man leaned in and sunk his teeth into the neck of the man on the floor, while the woman lowered herself, biting and tearing a hunk of skin from the face of the victim beneath her.
    Randy had never thought of himself as squeamish, but the grotesque scene unfolding before him was testing that theory. He felt instantly transported back to his time in a government facility, to a dark and treacherous place, a place he had hoped to forget.
    “Hey!” Randy called out, surprised that he and Shotgun hadn’t been noticed by the cannibals yet.
    The man looked up with his face caked in blood, and seemed to almost hiss. Clenching his teeth together, he slowly began to rise to his feet, the woman imitating him. Her right arm dangled from