James Axler – Cold Asylum

Doc had strolled away from the others, to a section in one corner, where the intrusive damage was less marked. He called out to his friends.

“Come and see.”

He’d opened one of the drawers, finding how easy it was with the greased runners. Inside, as they gathered around, he revealed a most beautiful young woman.

Her hair was as fine as silk spun from threads of pure gold, and her naked damask skin was flawless. It seemed as though she were a fairy-tale princess, not dead but simply sleeping. At a word, or a kiss, she might waken and smile, and stretch and tell them of the wonderful riverbank dream of a white rabbit that she had been enjoying.

“Her name” Doc coughed, clearing his throat. “Her name, from the card, was Emilythe same as my dear, dead wife. She I am sorry, my dear friends, but I cannot cope with this horror. It is not right that those ghastly and blasphemous entities should be able to feast upon such sweetness.” There were tears brimming in his eyes. “It has no grace. No dignity. It is as though life and death are both suspended here, like some Stygian limbo. Mr. Poe and his nightmare vision of the facts about Monsieur Valdemar were as nothing compared with this.”

He turned and walked away, vanishing around the corner of the row of body units, the sound of his heels diminishing into the distance.

“I don’t know what that Valdemar was,” Krysty said, “but Doc’s right. It’s gross. There must be something we can do to sort this out, Ryan.”

“What?”

“Find how those sickies broke in here and seal it off. At least we can leave the dead with somewhat was Doc’s word?”

“Dignity?”

“Yeah.”

“Let’s take a look around first,” J.B. suggested. “Might be something else in the redoubt, except for thousands of snow-white bodies.”

“WHERE DID DOC GO?” Michael asked, when they came out of the wintry depths of the morgue. “He ran by me a few minutes ago, stared at the map, muttering, then went off like he had a devil on his shoulder.”

“Got upset,” the Armorer said. “Which way?”

“There.” He pointed to the widest passage that gaped ahead of them.

“Main control area and the entrance.” J.B. sniffed. “Might as well follow him. It’ll take us through two more of those big rooms.”

“Terrific.” The teenager was still paper-pale, beads of sweat frosting his forehead, despite the intense cold that seeped out of the morgue.

“SOMETHING” Krysty stopped dead, looking around, her eyes showing her puzzlement.

They were halfway across the second of the vaulted mausoleums, the scattered corpses seeming more numerous.

“What is it?” Ryan glanced around. He couldn’t remember ever being in a creepier place than this dreadful redoubt of frozen death. There was no sign of Doc, and Ryan was beginning to worry that the disturbed old man had fallen victim to a gang of marauding muties.

If he’d been taken, then his fate was too appallingly certain to be thinkable.

“It’s getting warmer.” Mildred stood with her mouth slightly open. “You can feel it.”

Dean touched the door of one of the cabinets at his side, showing them his finger. “Wet.”

“Listen.” Krysty held up her hand. “Can you hear it? The deep sound of the main nuke gen.”

“I can’t hear it,” Michael said.

Ryan nodded. “Right. You can’t hear it now, but you could hear it up to a few minutes ago. It stopped, but it was such a far-off, background noise that none of us even noticed.” The penny dropped. “Of course. Doc!”

“What?” Mildred asked. “You mean the troublesome old fart turned off the switch?”

The temperature seemed to be rising faster. The mist across the roof had vanished, and worms of moisture wriggled down the walls.

Ryan sniffed the air. “Fireblast! You can already smell it. They can’t be rotting that fast, can they? It’s not possible. Mildred?”

“Been frozen a hundred years or so, Ryan. You only have to push the temperature up a couple of degrees above zero and corruption sets in.”

“Then the sooner we’re out of here the better. Let’s move it, people.”