Bulldog: Too Many Monsters - Chapter 1
Bulldog 1: Too Many Monsters
Chapter 1: First Wave
“Do you think they will make it?” a stranger’s voice called out to anyone listening.
Nobody answered, and the silence gave him the answer he dreaded. I judged from the look across his whitening face that he had known someone unlucky enough to have been thrown out into whatever waits beyond the gates in an earlier round of survivor torment. He quietly sobbed as the reality of his comrade’s fate sank into his chest like fire through dry wool. The screen overhead switched itself back on, my eyes still swollen with welts and swollen raw stung at the light interrupting the darkness that soothed them. The white static made everyone jump in the darkness. Sealed at both ends for the moment, possibly our last moments. The screams outside momentarily became drowned out by the musical theme playing out that accompanied the announcements.
Mockingly upbeat, the tune sang for a while before the screen went blinding white for a second time, just a blank white screen. This was the image we saw before the numbers of the next batch would flash up and inform us we were next to have our turn. Our chance to run this apparent gauntlet that had taken many before I even regained consciousness. I only ever heard rumours of what existed beyond the gates while we slept in the dorm, quiet chatter, whispers of the night. Sometimes from faces that no longer existed amongst the survivors. Some back in the camps would claim it was just people with guns or various other means of murdering that awaited us once we left the camps proper, gladiators slaughtering the animals that we existed as now. Others spoke of monsters and dark things that crawled on all fours and tore limbs from bones to survive themselves. That last one came courtesy of a mouthy, English speaking, guard that got loose with his alcohol and lips one night after raping a survivor in the concentration camps that held us before this.
“Stop thinking about it. It won’t help,” I told myself softly.
Interrupting my anxiety inducing thoughts, the screen became alive with numbers. One by one, they slotted into place and filled a grid with digits assigned to individuals stood by in the tunnels, here and across the country. I glanced down at my wrist. The implant sat neatly inside, the blood now dry and clotted. It had run enough while I was passed out to leave a haunting reminder of the implant process down my forearm, it had gone deep enough just beneath the veins that now protected it from tampering. Could I be next? I saw the pattern, but it could always be changed if they had got bored.
“Fuck, my face kills” I thought suddenly feeling my likely fractured eye socket throbbing.
Outside of some conspiracy gossip, none of us knew what they had planned for the populace since they took charge. The numbers continued filling the screen. It was now obvious this next wave consisted of numbers thirty-one to sixty. Tears and wails sounded out around the tunnels, some immediately at my shoulder and others singing through the vents that carried voices from miles away. Others waiting just as we did for their turn to go off into this unknown trial imposed by our new heavy-handed masters.
“What number are you?”
I turned to see the face of the person still composed enough to chat as others fell into misery and despair. It was a young man, couldn’t have been older than twenty years. Fluff attached to his chin, that seemed to be a goatee attempt, defined his outline.
“91, I think they said I was 91” I replied softly without giving him too much attention. I could see the shock in his eyes when my beaten face caught the light, he likely wasn’t expecting this deformed man to be still surviving.
“I am 100, nice round number, right?” he joked back at me with a forced sniffle of his nose.
“Looks like we are going together then,” I said, looking up at the screen, watching the timer count down from one hundred that taunting the souls destined for the exit.
“Do you know what’s out there?” he asked, the innocence in his voice caused it to crack.
“Nope”
“Me neither; someone back in the Suffolk camp told me it was wild animals they had mutated in a lab.
But I think it’s just a firing squad. Target practice, you know,” he explained his theories while slumping to a rest beside me, just propped up enough to avoid the wet beneath us.
That same wet had already soaked through my clothes, I felt inhuman. The alarm roared into life. Screams could be heard louder than last time as those numbered on the screen realised their time was up in the imprisoned safety of our tunnel home. I gazed across from the screen to the young lad who took up safety at my side, unsure if it was his attempt to seek some ally for whatever comes beyond those gates or just to ease his nerves. His innocent face made me dream of my little brother Sammy; he would have been thirteen soon. I think. It was hard to keep track of the days since the occupation. Sammys face, laying cold, grey, and muddy still haunts me. I close my eyes, and his little eyes are rocks of agony staring back at me. Wide and weepy with flecks of his blood splattered across his brow. Those animals came and slaughtered him. Now I wait for my turn to face the ruling overlords’ iron fist. I hope they choke on what’s left of me.
With a large hissing creak, the utility hole shaped gate swung open, lifting itself to the skies. The light outside was blinding, and the air was cold. Warmer inside, but the season was harsh when they came, and it made life in the camps more arduous. Enough food, if you could call it that, to keep us alive, but not enough to ever feel full or satisfied with the offering. It was pretty common knowledge that almost all the produce and crops we once made were now being sent back to their home country. Gossip as usual, but still completely likely. Somewhere filling the bellies of the heartless, soulless creatures that orchestrated this coup. I watched emotionlessly through my aching eyes as the wave of chosen numbers ran through the gate. Some walked slowly, and others fell as they attempted to stay in the relative safety of the tunnel. We had been aware of the consequences for refusing our place. It was not worth trying to hide in the tunnels. Everyone knew what they did with problem captives.
“You think they will make it?” he asked with almost hope loitering in his words.
The door slammed closed, and the room felt all the emptier as the darkness settled around us.
“No,” I whispered across to my new lurking friend.
“Yeah…me neither”
“Whatever is out there waiting for us is likely going to be our end,” I said, letting my inner monologue through and likely further crushing his hopes of survival.
I saw his face drop into his chest; this is what they have reduced us down to. Self-fulfilling lambs to the slaughter, destroying any unity or humanity, still be breathing somewhere inside.
“Sorry,” I offered to him.
“No trouble. I think I know how this ends for me.”
I hated to ask, but it felt rude to leave him dangling after the way I spoke to him previously.
“How does this end for you?” I asked, hesitant to hear the answer.
“Well, like it did for my Dad…and my brother… and my sister” he wiped a tear that was falling down his face with the ball of his palm.
“The first wave?” I asked, knowing exactly the answer.
“Yeah. When they first landed, we were having a day out at the coast. Just a silly little trip to play some two-p machines and buy some donuts by the beach,” he continued, wiping away the tears as he spoke. I didn’t know what to say to comfort him, so I let him continue.
“We tried to make it back to the car when the bullets started firing, but Dad got hit. Mum was lost in the stampede. Mark and Suzy got crushed right before my eyes. I crawled under a car and hid until the bullets stopped. Might have been hours.”
This broken kid was now doing all he could to hold back a sobbing episode.
“They picked me up when I tried to get Dad’s keys out of his pocket. I was riffling through his jacket as he lay there bleeding out. I was taken to Suffolk. The camp there was already full by the time I arrived, and the bodies appeared in stacked mountains. Smoke surrounding me the entire journey.”
It was enough. I didn’t need to hear anymore.
“I am sorry. We all lost people. We need to keep our heads clear for the next part. I don’t know what the fuck is waiting behind that gate. But I am not letting these monsters take me as easy as they think, they haven’t killed us yet right?” the fire was bubbling up and my speech seemed to rouse the attention of some others around me.
The alarm blared once again. So soon after the last wave and drowning the gasping effort to breathe some replenishment into the listening masses around me.
“Fuck! It must have been a slaughter,” the kid declared, causing a panic to spread amongst the others.
The screen flashed white once more, blinding everyone who sat in almost pitch-black darkness. This time, a voice accompanied the light.
“This is new,” someone said aloud to the group left.
“Attention! Attention! Important message will follow,” the voice called out through the screens speakers, blaring into echo through the tunnels and likely through the vents.
“Because of the efforts of the last subjects ranking thirty to sixty. We are proceeding with a larger pool of subjects for the next round of participation.”
Screams and angry yells burst out from the listening masses.
“You are tasked with completion of the exercise. Signs will be available once entering the live zone. These signs will give further instruction. Please proceed as instructed. Resistance will be met with lethal measures,” the voice stopped.
The screen now simply read “ALL” in place of the numbered grid. Yet more screams and chaos erupted from some groups now, realising their time was likely up.
“Well, that’s that then,” I whispered to myself, but loud enough for the kid to hear as I got to my feet and stretched out my limbs to see what was damaged. Nothing major it seemed.
“When we get out there, can I stick with you?” he asked gingerly.
“Sure. Just keep up if we need to move fast. I can’t help you if it means I might die.”
His face was solemn but nodding in approval. At the sound of the next alarm, it was my turn to run this gauntlet. This exercise as they labelled it into the active zone. I knew in the pit of my stomach, as the intestines twisted into knots, that I would likely not be making it through. At least I wasn’t dying alone.
