Ezra hadn't slept well since returning to the base—wherever the base was. If she'd thought her sleep had been bad before, it was nothing compared to the insomnia she developed since Antarctica. She barely slept, days piling into weeks. Dark circles ringed her eyes, caused by nightmare upon nightmare, of diseases and deaths, thanks to her creation. Not to mention the fact that her dad had sounded completely heartbroken on the phone—not that she'd told him everything that's happened in the past few months, but she told him the gist of it. She was fine, but the men that took her want her help with something terrifying...

Every time she closed her eyes, she could still recall his sobs and pleas of, "Please come home, beta. Do whatever they ask of you. Just make sure you're safe... and come home."

It was these, and the lack of sleep, that had her on the brink of abyss one morning; awake but not; asleep but not. She barely registered the thunder of footsteps clomping down the hallway then. Soldiers rushed past her room at an alarming rate. Nor did she register the urgent squeal of the siren. She was far, far away, in some dreamless, foggy land to care.

Heavy army boots that thumped the ground and faintly shook the floor even, thinned, yet Ezra was semi-dead to the world. Until someone banged on her door like they meant to force it down—thump, thump, THUMP—that she finally dragged her heavy eyelids open. "What?"

"Practice fire drill, Doc! Better hustle before they lock the base down and the system vacuums out the air!"

Ezra didn't know who it was that had almost blown her door down, but she pushed herself up on weak arms, grabbed her jacket—much like a zombie. Who's going to vacuum the air? Is it dirty?—and slipped on her slippers. She ambled equally heavy footed to her door. By the time she came out into the corridor, it was empty and eerily so, with only a distant, rhythmic thump, thump, thump of synchronised footsteps rushing away from her.

"Wait!" she called out, "I don't know the way..." her voice was husky and cracked from little use this past week. She had isolated herself in the hermetically sealed section of the lab, oxygen supply tethering her to her level four biohazard suit. For days she heard nothing but the sound of her own breathing and the rickety clump of her heart, replaying Dad's shaky, desperate words like a survival mantra: Please, Ezzie. Do whatever they ask of you. Just make sure you're safe and... come home...

For days she'd seen nothing but pathogens she never thought she'd study up close or that the sight of her shaky hands almost always made her swallow her tongue in fear. I can do this. I can. I'll make this and a cure... and no one has to die because of me... Just have to play along and get home with the antibodies or a vaccine... then I can save the world...the thoughts of a delirious, sleep deprived woman obsessed with getting out alive.

And today, it was the first she'd appeared even remotely interested in others, but now no one was around.

"Hello," she called out again, rather useless. "Wait for me!" Why vacuum seal the base? But the empty floor only echoed her own voice.

Ezra tried her best to navigate to the bunker entrance as best she could. Weeks ago, she'd taken that very route with Captain Rai. But that was weeks ago, and this was a maze. Soon, Ezra heard nothing but the shuffle of her own slippers as she climbed stairs after never ending stairs. And soon, with each passing step, the air felt thinner and thinner till her lungs burned for air.

"Why suck air out...?" She followed her poor sense of direction up, mumbling to herself.

To choke the fires! No air, no oxygen!

Suddenly, panic gripped her throat and her burning lungs. She wasn't that out of shape. One positive thing to come out of living at an army base was that exercise wasn't an option. The men, especially Millen, dragged her to his sessions almost every day—except these past few weeks, since Antarctica. She couldn't have gotten so out of shape in just two weeks.

She clawed at her throat. Had they already starting vacuum-sealing the base as a drill? Without checking if everyone was out?

But what if this is how they plan to get rid of me? Her delirious mind didn't help as she found herself lost, staring at another endless corridor. Where was she? How many flights of stairs had she climbed?

The air got thinner still. Her lungs screamed in agony. And her vision got patchy. Was it her or the lights had dimmed?

"Wait!" she tried calling again, though how loud she was or whether anyone heard was as good a guess. "Wait..." Exhaustion overtook her limbs, and she leaned against a cold wall, forehead to the concrete. She closed her eyes. Just a moment. I just need to catch my breath...

"Why the hell are you still in here, Ezra?" A voice floated into her dreamless interior. "Why didn't you follow my man out? I asked him to take you with him."

Ezra shook her head. It took a lot of energy. Who is that? "I..." Can we not talk? It's a lot of effort right now...

"Ezra!" He shook her shoulder roughly. "Come on, don't you fall asleep on me!"

Then the world floated. Am I asleep? Is this a dream?

"Hold on! This should help." The voice said again. Something hard embraced the edges of her face and then her lungs no longer burned.

"What..." Am I even speaking?

The man no longer spoke to her again, not until light hit her eyelids, but she wished to stay where she was. It was warm and safe; the faint rhythmic sound of something thumping, soothing.

But she was denied her wishes. She felt the hardness of a floor—or a lumpy ground—then he said, rather breathlessly, "Take a minute, then go join everyone. Say you got lost and finally found an exit. Don't mention me. You never saw me. Are we clear?"

Ezra nodded, coaxing her eyelids to open. Sure, but who are you?

By the time she opened her eyes and discovered she was resting by an unmarked exit, the man was gone.

Who was that? She wondered, following the voices of men to the main entrance of the base, the giant garage. She scanned the line, trying to catch a sign of someone who just joined it. A slight movement, a strange stare.

But they are all staring! She noticed. As soon as she came into view, all eyes were on her. Three hundred, four hundred men? Did they really all live here on that base? How come she'd never seen more than a dozen or two at any one time?

"Dr Mayur, we were wondering what happened to you." A man in a captain's uniform addressed her as she came closer. She'd been there long enough to recognise how the marking on Rai's uniform differed from other soldiers. This was an identical uniform. "How did you find your way out?"

"Someone"—Ezra bit her tongue. 'You never saw me. Are we clear?' "I... thought I heard someone... Where's Captain Rai?" she asked, clumsily joining the line wearing her pyjamas and her silly slippers next to the well-groomed, well-dressed men.

This new captain laughed. "There's more to this camp than just Captain Rai, Doctor. There are more of us... Not that you noticed."

The men roared with laughter along the front line.

Do they think I only see him? Like I like him or something? Ezra watched the men, wide awake for once. Embarrassment coloured her cheeks red when a handful of soldiers exited the building wearing oxygen masks.

Trailing them was Rai. "Base is clear!"

When he passed her, their gaze met briefly, and he seemed to ask her, 'What? Why are you looking at me like that?'

If it wasn't him... then who?

She pushed the drill to the back of her mind as much as possible, trying to puzzle out the mystery. Who saved me? That hard thing on her face she'd felt—it had to have been a mask, surely. And the man had stopped talking. Had he given her his mask and brought her outdoors before taking what was his and plunging back into the airless base?

But who?

With her eyes shielded, she studied the men—dismissed to sit where they liked while they waited. From her perch on some trolley that was cooking in the mid-morning Aussie sun, the men carried on talking, though none of it interested her. Until...

"...did you hear? We're getting some fresh meat?"

"New recruits?"

"That's what I heard my captain say... he's leading the pickup this time, not Rai..."

"What, he got demoted or something?" Someone chortled.

He shut up the moment he caught Ezra staring.

"... it'll be good to see fresh faces instead of your ugly mugs every day, that's for sure!" Another one said, wiping the sweat off his brow, unaware of Ezra's eavesdropping.

The soldier broke eye contact first, returning to his friend. "Heard it's for the lab, now that it's up and running again..."

Ezra narrowed her eyes. New recruits for the lab? Made no sense. What were fresh recruits going to do in a sophisticated genetics lab? Play footy?

At least it's not my friends. It's not Tehreem. Ezra stood, aiming to go wait by some shade if she could find any. How long would it take to pump air back into the bunker? Everyone I know is safe, back home. Good. Maybe Rai listened to me when I said I can do it alone...

That night, she slept like a baby, that anaconda of guilt had finally let go of her chest.

She shouldn't have. The anaconda was still around, and this was going to be the last peaceful sleep she ever got. Period.

The next morning, her nightmare unfolded and there was nothing she could do to make it stop.

(Chapter 13, continued...)

A/N: I'm far from home, in an entirely different country, and I'm writing the rest of this story on my phone, hoping I stay under the word limit.

And what do I get? A rogue chapter! This was not how I planned it to go. 😂😂 but I hope the next half listens to me!
Anyway, who do you think saved Ezra?
And what do you think her nightmare come true is?
I hope you enjoyed either way. And wish me luck, that I may finish this thing within time and limit. 😃🙏🏼❤️