18 Floors Above the Apocalypse

Chapter 489

Jasper and Cooper took off like a shot.

As they bolted, the distant red dots started closing in faster, like they had rockets strapped to them.

Inside the house, Snowflake sensed something was off and bared her teeth, ready to charge out the door. Stella and Rosie instinctively grabbed their guns.

The two women and the wolf reached the door just as Jasper and Cooper came barreling back in.

"What's going on?" Stella asked.

Jasper quickly deadbolted the door, securing all three locks. "A pack of gators."

No sooner had he spoken than a series of thuds hit the door.

Bang! Bang! Bang! The impacts were rapid and fierce, shaking the entire shipping container like a tin can in a storm.

Stella was baffled. The gators hadn't bothered them last night when they came ashore to lay eggs. Why were they attacking now?

The banging didn't let up; it only got more intense.

Front, sides...

Even through the container and layers of ice, Stella could imagine the swarming chaos outside.

She approached the lookout point with her gun, trying to get a glimpse.

In the gloomy watchpoint, a pair of red eyes suddenly appeared.

Cold and bloodthirsty.

Holy smokes, red-eyed gators.

If it weren't for the lookout point being just 20cm wide, trapping the gator's head, they'd be flooding in.

Even so, the trapped gator kept wriggling, trying to get inside and devour them.

Could it be because she threw their eggs into the sea?

After a whole day, any traces or scents should have been scattered by the wind and snow by now.

Stella was puzzled, but the eerie red eyes made her quickly close the lookout.

She put on night-vision goggles and peered through a higher watchpoint, spotting a mass of gators outside, easily a few hundred.

If they broke through the container, the three humans and five dogs wouldn't even be enough to pick their teeth with.

the door, Cooper and Snowflake squared

"Bark! Bark! Bark!"

"Howl... Woo..."

only intensified

was exasperated; these two were

inciting the gators' ferocity, and

can't beat

retracted the entire shipping

tonight, see who could last longer, and deal with

the Arcadia,

a shower and lights out, Stella and Jasper discussed how to handle

snow made them hard to target, a much tougher fight than

fed by 8 AM, they armed themselves to the teeth. Even

they stepped out of the Arcadia, weapons loaded and even flamethrowers at the ready, it

or lose, this was the round

outside, it was eerily

lookout, but saw

to

finding nothing, she finally opened

was littered with

They resembled pig dung.

damn creatures, unable to catch their prey, had vented their frustration with

up the gator droppings around the

"Should we dry it out

the idea repulsive. "No

plenty of fuel stored in the Arcadia, with no need to burn

the level of the gators' vengeance, it couldn't just be a

in the sea with ease, so why bother coming

figure it out, she checked around the

were buried in the

tell it was

it was no wonder the red-eyed gators

nose, scolding, "Don't

family, you

keep stashing all sorts of rubbish, see how I deal

she said it, it went in one ear and out the

turning the area around the

his mate,

No scolding, no hitting.

grabbed Cooper by the ear. "And you, you

had stashed away. This time, instead of tossing them into the ice hole, she

gators weren't afraid of heat, and a simple