28 Reunion

Claire and Katherine come to a halt as a corpse walks by, letting out a low moan. It walks out. The two wait a second before proceeding down the stairs. As they go down the steps, Claire steps on some blood, causing her foot to slip. She starts to fall forward, but catches herself on the next step, making a loud thud that echoes.

Claire draws her gun in anticipation. The first zombie they had scene comes walking towards the stair, it's decomposing face turning up towards them with a limp neck. With three clean shots, it falls to the floor. Another zombie appears, this one a fat construction worker still wearing a bright orange vest. This one only takes two shots. She reloads her gun, leaving ten left in her bag and the special bullets.

"Thank god these guys seem to get easier to take down," Claire mutters as they reach the bottom of the stairs. The place has more open than the rest of the sewers and well lit by lights on the wall. On the other side of the room it sinks back down into the river of sewage. They're on the other side of the gate that was blocking one of the paths when they first entered the sewers.

A lever sits on the wall to the side of it up out of the river luckily. Claire walks over and places her hand on the lever. As she pulls it down, gunshots ring out through the tunnels. It's coming from a smaller tunnel right of the stairs. They hurry over, coming across a heavy metal door with a blue hydrant in front of it. Claire pulls out the T-Handle and sticks it into the socket at the top. It's very worn from lots of use and takes a lot of effort to turn.

Within a minute the door is lifted up. She pulls the handle out and they hurry on through. The tunnel is really short, quickly leading into a much larger and open tunnel. The path quickly makes a left, cutting across the width of the room. The iron bridge shakes with every step as they run across it. As they reach the other side, more gunshots go off. The path turns left once it runs into the wall, and continues for several feet before turning into a long staircase that goes up.

The two hurry up the stairs as another gunshot goes off.

"I know I'm not the best shot, but I'm at least in better condition to fight than you right now," A familiar voice states irritably.

"Ben? Ben!" Katherine calls out as they reach the top of the stairs. Another heavy-metal door blocks their path, but the hydrant on their side is broken. To the left are bars allowing them to see the other side. It's full of sewage, with a waterfall going far down below.

"Katherine? Katherine! Where are you!" He replies.

"We're over here!"

The sound of sloshing sewage echoes from the other side of the bars. Soon, Ben and Leon come into view.

"Is there a blue hydrant on your side?" Claire asks as Ben and Leon pull themselves out of the sewage and onto dry land.

"Yeah, it has a funny looking hole thingy at the top," Ben replies. Claire pulls out the T-Handle and holds it up through some bars in the door.

"Use this to open the door,"

"Okay,"

Some dirt falls off the door as it slowly shifts up with each turn of the handle. The door lifts up to reveal Ben and Leon covered in shit. Leon's right shoulder and bicep are also covered in bandages. Luckily, they're much cleaner than the rest of his clothes. He looks completely exhausted.

"Are you guys okay? What happened to you?" Katherine asks.

"Ada...we got shot at…" Leon mutters, trying to fight off his drowsiness.

"What?!" Claire and Katherine exclaim.

"We ran into Anette. She's-"

"Sherry's mother," Claire interrupts, "Katherine, can you take them back to the control room? I'm gonna go get those plugs,"

"Wait, hold on," Ben objects, "This place is crawling with monsters that you clearly don't seem to know about. You haven't spotted any, giant mutant alligators have you?"

"N-No," Claire replies.

"Lucky you. Katherine, sweety," He places a gentle hand on her face, "Could you take Leon to that place? I'll stick with Claire and help her find whatever she's looking for,"

"...Alright," Katherine hesitantly replies, "Just stay safe, both of you, alright?"

"I've killed one giant alligator, I can kill another if I have to," He leans in for a kiss, but Katherine blocks his lips with her hand.

"I love you, but you're covered in sewage," She replies, "And time isn't on our side right now,"

"She's right," Claire adds, "Come on Ben, we need to get the plugs asap to get to Sherry," Before Ben has any time to talk, Claire walks past him into the tunnel him and Leon had just been in. Ben quickly follows her as Katherine and Leon head down towards the control room. Claire and Ben have to trudge through the sewage once more as they walk down the murky tunnel. The path splits into two just like the one down below.

"This way," Claire states as she charges right-ward. As they walk toward an elevated platform, they hear the familiar and dreading stomps of Tyrant. Walking down a staircase, the Tyrant steps down into the tunnel, and turns to them.

"Oh shit…" Claire mutters.

"How many of these fucking things are there?!" Ben exclaims as the two of them turn around, moving as fast they can through the sewage. As they try to run, all the sewage latches onto them, slowing them down as much as possible. There's a loud splash as the Tyrant drops down into the sewage and starts walking towards them, tearing through the water with ease.

The distance between them quickly closes as Claire and Ben reach the stairs leading down. They rush down them, getting some distance between them and the Tyrant. As they reach the bottom of the stairs, they spot a ladder to their right going down into the bottom of the tunnel. Without thinking, they quickly slide down it. It's not until they are sitting at the bottom the fowl-odor attacks their noise.

It smells like raw-meat and corpses, the smell is almost enough to make them puke as it crawls through their nostrils and mouth. The source of the smell is coming from a massive mound of, raw meat and bones. Most of the path is blocked off by it, forcing them to move to the left side of the tunnel. They can hear the Tyrant's footsteps getting closer. As they reach the other side, the mound comes to an end. The path made by the large mound of meat curves to the left. Several feet in front of them stands a high wall of meat and bone. To the left, the mound has been flattened and lowered just enough for them to be able to pull themselves up onto.

A corpse sits behind them against the wall up on meat. They freeze as the Tyrant enters the tunnel. They hide behind the large mound as it scans the room. They're relieved when it starts to walk away, but suddenly the corpse behind them starts to move slightly. Claire and Ben turn around, only to have the corpse's chest pop open and something fly out towards them.

"Aw shit!" Ben exclaims as they both jump out of the way as something goes flying into the water. They quickly pull themselves up onto the raw meat, only to look up and see the Tyrant staring down at them.