THE DEATH KNELL-Chapter 38: DESCENT INTO THE UNKNOWN

The passage to the lower level stretched before them, dim and unwelcoming. Slade Wilson led the way, navigating the corridor with practiced ease. Along the way, they encountered minor obstacles—collapsed sections of the ceiling, rusted security barriers, and the occasional mutated vermin skittering in the shadows. None of it slowed them down.

After a few more turns, Slade finally found what he was looking for: a stairwell leading deeper underground. Beside it, an old industrial elevator stood dormant, its rusted doors sealed shut. Even if it had been operational, using it would have been a mistake. Not only was it unreliable after years of neglect, but it would make any kind of emergency response nearly impossible. They had no choice but to take the stairs.

The group descended cautiously, their footsteps echoing against the concrete walls. When they reached the negative second floor, the staircase ended abruptly—there was no further descent. This was it.

Slade immediately scanned the area, noting the still-functioning distribution box embedded in the wall. Without hesitation, he flipped the main switch. A series of overhead lights flickered to life, illuminating the underground space as if it were daytime. The sudden brightness forced some of the others to shield their eyes, but once they adjusted, their expressions shifted—from discomfort to pure astonishment.

What lay before them was something out of a nightmare.

A massive experimental facility stretched out beyond the stairwell, its structure encased in reinforced glass. Rows upon rows of enclosures lined the space, forming a grotesque maze of surgical stations, steel operating tables, and medical equipment eerily well-preserved despite years of abandonment.

Cindy exhaled sharply, her gaze sweeping over the bloodstained tools left behind. "This... doesn't feel like a lab. Feels like a slaughterhouse."

Slade said nothing. He had seen worse.

This content is taken from freeweɓnovel.cѳm.

Dark chitinous creatures scuttled across the floor behind them, drawn to the movement. Without missing a beat, Slade lifted his rifle and fired, his shots ringing out in quick succession. Each bullet struck with unerring accuracy, reducing the insects to twitching husks.

He turned to Cindy, giving her a nod. "Move out. This is our only path forward."

The team advanced through the eerie glass corridors, their reflections distorted against the transparent walls. It felt like walking through a twisted museum—one filled with horrors from an era of unethical science.

Most of the operating tables were empty, but some still held remnants of their victims. Twisted, shriveled husks lay abandoned, their features frozen in expressions of pain. The evacuation of this facility had been sudden—too sudden for the scientists to erase their crimes. The reason for their hasty departure was unknown.

Not that Slade cared.

At the end of the corridor, they encountered a massive reinforced door. It loomed before them like an unmovable sentinel, coated in layers of dust. Its surface bore faded symbols and markings, their meaning lost to time.

Slade narrowed his eye. Something had come through here before them. The little creatures they encountered earlier—how had they passed through this sealed door? The possibilities ran through his mind. Ventilation shafts? Maintenance tunnels? Or worse... something had forced its way inside.

To the side of the door, an outdated ID card slot and keypad system remained intact. It was a relic from another time, its presence strangely out of place in a world that had long since abandoned such security measures.

Slade turned to Barbara and pushed her wheelchair forward. "You're up. Open it."

She didn't hesitate. With practiced efficiency, she dismantled the card reader, exposing a tangled mess of colored wires. From her laptop bag, she retrieved a connector, aligning each thread carefully before linking it to her own device.

Barbara 's expertise in technology extended far beyond simple hacking—she had a deep understanding of the systems themselves, both in theory and application.

She muttered under her breath as she worked. "This is ancient. Did the government even use these before the '90s? I need to simulate an ID card signal before we can bypass the lock..."

Her fingers moved rapidly over the keyboard, inputting a sequence of commands. Within moments, the screen displayed the decrypted passcode.

She entered it.

With a low mechanical groan, the heavy door began to lift, releasing a cascade of dust into the air.

Beyond the threshold, an even more unsettling sight awaited them.

The room had once been a storage facility, but its current occupants were far from ordinary cargo. Towering glass tanks lined the chamber, each filled with an unnatural blue liquid. Suspended within were hybrid creatures—genetic experiments preserved in stasis. Some bore disturbingly human features, while others were monstrous amalgamations of various species. Bubbles occasionally rose from the tanks, as if their inhabitants were still... alive.

Barbara recoiled, instinctively raising a hand to shield her eyes. "Are they... still breathing?"

Slade reached out and lowered her hand. "You tell me. Look at the readings on the consoles. What do the numbers say?"

Gritting her teeth, she stepped forward, focusing on the data rather than the grotesque figure floating before her. The nearest tank held a misshapen mass of flesh, its limbs fused unnaturally into its torso. Suppressing her nausea, she accessed the corresponding console.

"Human-armadillo hybrid... designed for close-quarters infiltration," she read aloud. "Three hundred and twenty trials... Experiment ID... Status: Deceased. Recommended for reproduction."

Cindy let out a dry laugh, tapping the hilt of her knife against her armored shoulder. "An armadillo? What, were they planning to send these things into battle to roll into the enemy's legs?"

Slade remained impassive. "The military funds whatever has the potential to work."

"Heh." Cindy shook her head, unsurprised by the lack of ethical boundaries.

Barbara continued her search, uncovering even more horrific fusions—dragonfly-human mutations with grotesquely elongated limbs, grotesque insectoids with compound eyes, reptilian hybrids with scales replacing their flesh. The more she saw, the less human she felt.

Slade had brought her here for a reason. He wanted her to see firsthand the depths of human depravity. These weren't the acts of some rogue scientist—this was sanctioned research, carried out in secret under the orders of the so-called "elite."

Compared to them, Cindy—known for her ruthless reputation—was practically a saint.

Perhaps, after this, Barbara wouldn't be so quick to dismiss Slade Wilson as just another killer. Perhaps she would even provide him with intelligence in the future. After all, information wasn't free. And Gordon, whether he admitted it or not, would appreciate any help that secured his daughter's safety.

Slade's attention shifted back to the storage room. Not all the tanks remained intact. Some had shattered. The blue liquid had long since dried, leaving behind faint stains on the cold steel floor.

Barbara resumed decrypting the remaining consoles.

"Human-bat hybrid... echolocation-based navigation... designed for night combat... Primary function: Infiltration and radar disruption... Status: Containment failure. Security breach reported."

Cindy twirled one of her knives. "So, what—some distant cousin of Batman?"

Slade didn't answer. Instead, he tilted his head upward.

Something massive stirred in the darkness above them.

A figure hung from the ceiling, its brown-furred body blending into the shadows.

Cindy groaned. "Ugh, a bat's still just a bat."

She drew her pistols and fired.

The bullets cracked through the air, striking home.

The creature shrieked.

Then, it spread its wings.

And dove.