Mutagen

Day 25 – 2:45 PM – Philippine General Hospital, Ermita, Metro Manila

"Fall back! Fall back!"

Frantic yells from the soldiers could be heard all around the compound could be heard under loud noises produced by the huge tentacles as they demolished everything in their paths. The remains of the main hospital building, the trees, the vehicles, the other buildings, the people and even the infected were swept away. Many who witnessed the scene lost their will to fight and ran away with their tails behind their legs.

There were those that managed to get away but there were those who were unlucky. Those who received the full force of the whip like strike of the tentacles flew with their mangled bodies. Their arms, feet, legs or even their necks were bent and turned in the wrong angles while different parts of their bodies were heavily lacerated splashing blood in the places where their dead bodies landed. Aside from those that where killed that way, there were also those that were caught after some of the tentacles coiled inwards, trapping them.

Those that were caught tried to pry themselves away both in fear and panic. Even though they were caught, they should still be able to help themselves out of the entrapment since the tentacles did not coil on them tightly. However, they found themselves being grabbed by something in different parts of their bodies and were unable to move. Looking at their bodies, they saw dozens of hands grabbing different parts of their bodies like in some horror movies. All of those hands and arms grabbing them were all rooted from the huge tentacle around them.

They were finally able to look at it closely. The tentacles were made of flesh and that was exactly right. However, both the huge mound and the tentacles were made of thousands of infected bodies fused into one. The tentacle that trapped the poor Mutators and Evolvers was a tentacle made of torsos and arms while the tentacles that whipped everything away was a tentacle made of waists and lower limbs. One of the tentacles even clad a black color and looking at it closely, that black color was because the majority of the tentacles were made of decapitated heads.

One tentacle went straight into the front of the hospital coiling around the dead body of the huge infected earlier. It could be seen that the tentacle coiled on it gently and lifted the lifeless body up bringing it closer to the female infected in front of the mound of flesh.

With the huge body of the killed infected suspended beside the woman, she looked too little as her body was of normal size of a person. She reached out for the bloody and destroyed face of the huge infected. In her pale colored eyes, there was an expression of both sadness and anger. She sharply turned her head and she stared at the building in front of the hospital compound.

To be exact, the female infected was staring at Mei who was doing the same. The two women clashed with stares, one infected and one human. Mei was expressionless but the female infected was brimming with rage.

CRYAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!

The female infected bellowed in rage. The screeching sound was too loud compared to a person of her size should be able to emit.

Strangely, all the people in the hospital compound felt sluggish and their movements slowed down a lot.

BAM! BAM! BAM! BAM!

The tentacles trashed even more killing more people while those that were caught were brought into the mound of flesh. The mound of flesh opened and the caught people were thrown inside. Only their screams of fear, helplessness and despair were the only things heard before the opening closed.

BANG! BANG! BANG!

Loud gunshots from the snipers echoed with their shots aiming for the woman.

However, several smaller tentacles emerged from the mound and protected her even before the shots were made. Each of the arm sized tentacles were protected with hard skin and fleshy armor disabling the bullets from punching through.

The shots stopped as the snipers were all dumbfounded.

BANG!

Another shot echoed and it was from Mei who aimed between the gaps of the tentacles. The shot through the woman's forehead or it should have been. At the last moment, the woman sharply leaned her head to the right which made the bullet only scrape her ear.

"The hospital is a lost cause. Switch to Plan B."

Major Lopez's serene voice echoed in everyone's radio.

Plan B. It was the plan to decimate the whole compound using explosives and flames. This plan was only the alternate one due to the fact that the military did not want to destroy a place that should contain a lot of medical supplies, equipment and apparatus. If they managed to clear the infected here while keeping the hospital intact, they would be free to collect the mentioned things.

Now however, the main hospital building was decimated while the other buildings were severely damaged to the point of collapse. It would be very unlikely for them to find usable equipment and items in that huge pile of rubble. Not to mention that there was a monstrous infected that could not be dealt with in a direct combat rendering all of them helpless.

With the Plan B in effect, everyone would need to retreat away from the vicinity of the hospital. All this time while everyone was fighting the infected, several soldiers of the assault units had planted dozens of very strong improvised explosives that could only be detonated by the designated wireless remote. This was in case that they were not able to eliminate the threat in the hospital in time or there was no way for them to leave the hospital intact. Some of the explosives were even attached to the tentacles by skilled soldiers.

Since Plan B was announced, everyone ran away to vacate the area but it also happened in chaos. The private groups that participated were not trained soldiers and were not trained to retreat calmly in unfavorable situations. There were those that managed to remain calm but most did not.

***

"Infected woman know that we are here."

Mei said with a frown.

"Mama, that infected is a psychic."

Iola tugged the hem of Mei's clothes and said while her purple colored eye shone with faint light.

"A psychic infected?"

Odelina was also surprised because of two reasons. One was because the existence of an infected that was also a psychic but also surprised that Iola could tell.

"Yes, Auntie. That scream is some sort of psychic attack."

The other people around them also heard the conversation of the three but hearing the word "psychic" made them feel that it was inconceivable.

"Everyone, let's go! Plan B is initiated. We need to leave this place!"

Irene yelled taking the attention of everyone.

However at that moment, the private radio not issued by the military that Odelina brought with her and distributed to Jason and Nikky's group suddenly sounded.

"Miss Odel! Miss Odel!" It was Nikky's voice. "We are trapped within that building in Sector 2-2! We are going to the rooftop now, we don't know if we can find any way to get out from there."

Odelina hurriedly looked at the building in Sector 2-2. It was a four floor building. At this moment, the building was shaking with the first and second floor being coiled with one of the tentacles. If this continued, the building would likely collapse.

At this time, Mei spoke as she stared the infected woman who was also staring at her.

"Odel, go with Laelaps and retrieve them. I'll go with Fein to distract the infected woman."

"But…"

"Go. I'll be fine. Take Gale and Iola with you when you go down and make them wait at the vehicle."

"Alright. Young Miss, be careful. Master will be angry at me if something happen to you."

Mei nodded and made Fein climb up her back. It was a little heavy but it was not something she could not carry. Fein clutched the leather parts of Mei's clothes which was made for this kind of move.

At that moment, Mei's whole group jumped down the building which gave everyone a huge heart attack. All of them hurriedly ran to the edge of the roof to look down.

Below, they could see Odelina and the two girls that landed safely and was riding an inconceivably large golden dog and was now running back to the camp. Mei on the other hand flew with the buzz of Fein's wings. They were not worried about the remaining people in the rooftop. The camp was just a vehicle away from the camp and the building had already been emptied of the infected before the operation started.

Mei flew towards the compound with Fein's help. Her appearance in the air attracted the attention of a lot of people. She was then followed by Odelina riding of Laelaps' full three meter form.

The two pairs of human and non-human creatures went different ways. Odelina and Laeplaps went to the north-eastern side while Mei flew directly forward the flesh mound.

Seeing Mei approach in the air, the infected woman on the mound tried to scream once more. However, since Mei was already warned by Iola that the woman's scream was a psychic attack, Mei would not let her.

BANG!

Mei, suspended in the air shot her sniper rifle with great precision. The bullet was blocked by the armored tentacles but it prevented the woman from her attempt to attack. As Mei flew around gathering the infected woman's attention, it tried several times to scream but it failed due to the gunshots. When Mei reloaded her gun, the woman found an opening and managed to scream but Mei had already flown out of her attack range. She only came back after she reloaded her gun and repeated the same actions.

Pissed, the infected woman retracted the tentacles she was using to attack the ground troops and concentrated them on Mei. Unfortunately, Fein was too good at dodging as a creature who was too afraid of getting caught. That action of the infected woman however freed the ground troops from danger and they retreated while watching Mei in the air with gratefulness.

Not everyone was saved however, there was still another group where only one managed to escape and was caught by the tentacles with hundreds of hands. As that tentacle tried to attack Mei, rhe several people caught by it were screaming for help.

Mei saw the group that was caught since she was too close to the tentacle and those people also saw her and called out to her. However, looking at their miserable condition, Mei's eyes squinted with glee and she let out a smile.

She then made Fein fly down to the ground which caused that tentacle to smash down to the ground as hard as it could. When the tentacle that held the group smashed down, Mei flew away and started to escape.

The group captured screamed with fear and despair but they could only see the ground come closer until they all turned into meat paste. Mei saw everything that happened and could not help but smile as she flew away.

"Young Miss. We already retrieved them."

Odelina's voice echoed from the radio.

"I know, I saw it. Let's leave."

Mei replied with happiness in her tone.

When she returned, everyone from their group had already prepared to leave while the soldiers and the other groups that managed to escape were the same. Even the support groups managed to return already. Luckily, it seemed that the huge tentacles could only move within the hospital compound, no, to be exact, they could only move at the areas blanketed by the red webs within the compound.

Seeing many people managed to escape from her attacks, the infected woman screamed repeatedly in rage especially when Mei left intact.

"Young Miss?" Odelina could not help but call with askance as she saw Mei's pleasant smile. "Did something good happen?"

"Yeah, I saw some annoying flies die just now."

She giggled before entering the vehicle.

Some people, especially from the sharp eyed monitoring groups, witnessed what happened and some of them heard Mei and Odelina's conversation. They could not help but shudder. It was no secret to the leaders of the groups and it spread to their members. That group that turned into meat paste was the group under Senator Dela Vega and the ones that ridiculed the group of women during the meeting.

'Never offend this group of women.' They all promised themselves in their hearts.

Everyone packed up and left immediately even before the allotted time to leave. The next thing they saw was the large display of explosion which caused tremors, smoke and rained disgusting flesh and blood around the area. The roof of their vehicles were painted with blood and flesh but it became more of a sight with that blood as their convoy left with the huge ball explosion from the background.

They lost many but it could not be helped. What they needed was to move forward. After all, the world was getting more and more dangerous as time flew by.