“My fellow Americans,” Grace said, mindful of the fact that millions would hear his words over the radio. “Darkness continues to gather all around us, but here in the heartland of our country the sun is shining, and we have reason to rejoice!”
It was an applause line, and thanks to the twenty shills Dentweiler had positioned in the audience there was applause, which Grace acknowledged with a nod as he waited for the noise to die down.
What followed was a stirring list of victories, accomplishments, and positive trends all strung together to lift the cloud of gloom that hovered above so much of the nation. As Hale listened, even he began to feel better, in spite of the fact that he’d been to Chicago and seen firsthand what life was like in that city.
But Hale wasn’t there to listen. He was there to help provide security, which was why he kept his head on a swivel, his eyes scanning for any sign of a threat. There was nothing to see, however, not until he turned his gaze to the Ridley Hotel, and the dozens of windows that stared out onto the capitol grounds.
One of them was open, and that in spite of air so cold he could see his breath, and feel his fingers starting to grow numb. A guest perhaps? Determined to get a better view of the speech? Or something more sinister?
As Grace gave the crowd a somewhat embellished account of Operation Iron Fist, Hale brought his binoculars up to examine the front of the hotel. Try as he might Hale couldn’t see into the room. But as he continued to stare Hale saw a momentary flash of light which served to backlight both the person at the window and the familiar shape that was angled his way.
A Fareye! But then the image was gone, leaving Hale to wonder.
He blinked, hoping to somehow restore what he’d seen, but the room remained dark. Assuming he was correct, and not hallucinating, it was as if a light had been turned on behind the rifleman. Or a door had been opened into a well-lit space.
But what to do? Evacuate the President from the platform? That would be prudent, perhaps… But if the marksman was a Secret Service agent, or a photographer with a long lens, or a maid with a mop, a lot of people were going to be very angry.
But he couldn’t just let it drop.
Hale glanced around for Stoly, and saw him on the far side of the platform. The handheld radio he’d been given was for emergencies only, and therefore silent, as he brought it up to his lips.
“Hale to Stoly… Front of the hotel, third floor, open window… At least one person inside. Yours?”
There was a brief pause, followed by an emphatic reply.
“Hell no!”
Hale felt a sudden surge of adrenaline as he took three steps forward to the point where one of his soldiers was stationed. “Give me your rifle,” he ordered harshly, as he took the Fareye out of the man’s hands. “And stand perfectly still. I’m going to use you as a rest.”
As Hale laid the rifle across the Sentinel’s shoulder, and put his eye to the scope, Stoly hit Grace from the side. And when the President went down a projectile hit the Governor of Colorado—who had the painful misfortune to be standing directly behind Grace when the projectile was fired. The Governor made a grab for his shoulder as he fell, and the rest of the dignitaries scattered in every direction as the sound of the shot echoed between the surrounding buildings.
People began to scream.
Hale had the window centered under his crosshairs by that time, and even though he couldn’t see a clean target, he fired repeatedly. Hale figured that if he hit the would-be assassin, then that would be good, but even if he didn’t, the counterfire would probably be enough to ruin the bastard’s aim. And that would be sufficient. Because within minutes, five at most, Secret Service agents and policemen would storm the room. To his credit the Sentinel whose gun he had taken stood perfectly still as Hale continued to fire, brass casings arcing through the air, and people continued to scream.
The window was open, the dresser had been moved into position in front of it, and the rifle was resting on a carefully arranged sandbag. Susan swore as someone knocked Grace down and her bullet hit one of the men behind him. Then, as she worked another round into the Fareye’s chamber, some quick-thinking bastard fired at her.
Except that he missed, and Susan heard Puzo make a horrible gargling sound as the incoming bullet tore through his throat, and he brought both hands up in a futile attempt to stop the sudden spray of blood. Then he was falling, as another bullet whispered past her ear, and smashed into the mirror behind her.
Susan spent a fraction of a second analyzing the possibility of a follow-up shot on the President, saw that Grace was unreachable under a pile of protective bodies, and adjusted her aim. Secret Service agents would burst through her door within minutes, she knew that. But if she was going to die, why not take the man with the rifle with her? Because if anyone deserved to die, it was the army of assholes who supported Grace and kept him in office. Susan found her target, and prepared to squeeze the trigger. Then she saw the left side of the man’s face. “Nathan!” That was when a sledgehammer hit Su san’s head, and the long fall into darkness began.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Yankee Doodle Dandy
Near Madison, Wisconsin
Thursday, December 20, 1951
It was one-day down in the stink hole, which meant that another group of doomed prisoners had been led away, and the survivors were going to live for another forty-eight hours. Well, most of the survivors anyway, because Henry Walker was determined to kill the son of a bitch responsible for his wife’s death.
Walker couldn’t prove that Marcus Tolly had engineered Myra’s death. And he was fully cognizant of the fact that all of the prisoners were going to die, the only question being when. But logical arguments didn’t matter, because Walker had to kill Tolly, or lose his mind. So having named himself judge, jury, and executioner, Walker had made a study of the one-eyed committee-man’s habits, and created a plan. And, as darkness fell over the pit, that plan was about to be implemented.
Tolly had finished his boil by then, and having returned his empty hubcap to the outdoor kitchen, he began to make his way over to the tent he had appropriated from a family of three. Tolly stopped every now and then to schmooze with his cronies, but Walker knew it was only a matter of time, and was content to wait within a recently abandoned lean-to located only yards from his quarry’s tent.
But as he sat there, peering out through a hole in the wall and waiting for his prey to arrive, Walker knew it was the last thing Myra would want him to do. In fact he could almost hear her talking into his ear.
Killing Tolly won’t bring me back, Henry… There’s been enough killing. We’ll be together soon enough.
And Myra was right. Walker knew that. But watching Tolly swagger around the pit, pushing people around, and taking whatever he wanted, was more than Walker could bear. That’s what he told himself anyway, although deep down he knew it was about revenge, and a desire to strike back at the man he felt sure was responsible for Myra’s death.
Finally, having completed the long circuitous walk to his tent, Tolly paused to look around. Then, having satisfied himself that it was safe to do so, he bent over to enter his shelter. A shadow appeared as Tolly lit the lantern within and began to prepare his bedroll. That was the moment Walker had been waiting for. The key was knowing exactly where the big man was within the tent.
Walker had been a Marine, and he had killed before, but never like this. His heart beat wildly and his hands shook as he rose, and emerged from concealment. Three careful steps carried him over to Tolly’s tent. The homemade dagger was one of dozens of such implements that had been manufactured in the stink hole and passed down to the living from the recently dead. The weapon was in Walker’s right hand, and it made a ripping sound as it sliced through the patchwork quilt collection of fabrics that had been painstakingly sewn together to form a serviceable tent.
“What the hell?” Tolly swore as a hole appeared above him. “God damn it!”
Walker poured the better pa
rt of a gallon of gasoline onto the committeeman’s head and shoulders. The fuel had been siphoned out of one of the mining trucks and stored in a rubber bladder made from an inner tube. It gave off its characteristic odor as Walker opened a Zippo lighter. He flicked the wheel and sparks appeared, immediately followed by a blue flame.
Tolly looked up, saw the flame, and screamed, “No!” He was kneeling as if in prayer, and a thin trickle of pus flowed out from under his leather eye patch as he stared upward. But the pitiful sight wasn’t enough to stay Walker’s hand as he dropped the lighter into the hole and was rewarded with a loud whump!
Walker took a full step backward as Tolly was enveloped by flames and a wave of heat hit his face. The air around them was extremely cold, so it felt natural to bring both hands up, and enjoy the sudden warmth.
The committeeman was on his feet by then, having stuck his head up through the hole Walker had made, and he began to scream as he beat at the flames. People came on the run, but when they saw Walker standing there, warming his hands over the fire, they knew what had taken place. None of them chose to intervene. And that was a wise decision, because Burl had arrived on the scene, by that time along with other members of the Fair and Square Squad, all of whom were ready to deal with Tolly’s fellow committeemen, should that become necessary. So as Tolly flailed about, and his tent caught on fire, there was no one to help him.
The Hybrids stationed around the rim stared down into the pit and watched impassively.
Finally, having lost consciousness, Tolly collapsed in a smoking heap. Walker spit on the badly burned corpse and heard the liquid sizzle before he turned away. He felt sick to his stomach, and his knees were weak, but for the first time in days he knew he’d be able to sleep.
* * *
“Tunnel I is ready!”
Those were the words that flew mouth to mouth at roughly noon that day. And, as Walker knew from personal experience, it was true. Because he’d been in the shaft, working as a donkey, when the long-hoped-for breakthrough occurred. He hadn’t been there himself, up at the top of the steeply slanting tunnel where the patch of gray sky suddenly appeared, but he was among the first to hear about it as word of the accomplishment rippled down the line.
It was joyous news, but troubling as well, because with the next three-day only hours away everyone would want to scramble through the tunnel, even though they knew that most if not all of the escapees would be caught and probably executed. So it was all Walker and the other members of the Fair and Square Squad could do to try and impose some sort of order on the situation.
The key was to present not only the perception of fairness, but the reality of it, which was why all 278 prisoners were given an opportunity to pull a number out of Burl’s hat. A process that had to be carried out surreptitiously lest the collaborator, Collins, or one of the Hybrids take notice.
There had been talk of more complicated systems designed to give tunnelers, medics, and kitchen workers some sort of priority in recognition of their service to the rest of the prisoners. But such schemes were deemed too difficult to manage in the amount of time available. Besides, as Burl pointed out, “The only reason Tunnel I exists is because people who knew they wouldn’t get the opportunity to use it were willing to dig it anyway. We’re going to die. Get used to it.”
As luck would have it Walker drew the number 131, which wasn’t very good, since it was generally assumed that at least some of the earliest escapees would be caught. That would draw attention to the rest, which would bring the entire exercise grinding to a halt and a predictably bloody end.
Still Walker couldn’t help but feel excited as he went to retrieve the tape recorder and the evidence that would surely bring the Grace administration to its knees. Then, mindful of how demanding an escape from Chimera-held territory would be, Walker went to his tent to sort through the few possessions he had and load his pockets with those that were likely to be the most important.
Once that chore was complete, the only thing he could do was lie down and wait for darkness to come. At 10:00 P.M., the first person would leave the tunnel. Walker tried to sleep, but couldn’t, and was still wide awake when the time came to crawl out of the lean-to and make his way through pitch blackness to the point where the line had already started to form. Then, having located numbers 130 and 132, all Walker could do was wait.
Harley Burl had drawn number 23.
A very low number—and one that gave him a good chance of actually clearing the hole. What happened after that would be primarily a function of luck, although those who were smart and in good physical shape would have a definite edge. And Burl, who thought he was reasonably smart, had a plan. A crazy, audacious plan that was so counterintuitive it just might work. Especially against a bunch of stinks.
So when the appointed hour finally arrived, and a chiropractor named Larthy crawled out of the tunnel onto the snow-covered ground beyond the rim, Burl was tensed up and ready to go. And as the line began to jerk forward, and giant shadows oozed across the walls, Burl felt his heart bang against his chest.
Would one of the people in front of him make a stupid mistake?
Would someone get caught within a matter of minutes, leaving him trapped in the tunnel? All he could do was hope.
Time seemed to slow as the line crept forward—each passing second bringing additional risk of discovery—as those at the head of the tunnel forced themselves to count to thirty before leaving the relative safety of their burrow. The gap was supposed to space the escapees out in hopes that the thirty-second intervals would prevent the prisoners from bumping into one another in the dark. But each pause felt like an eternity.
Finally, as fresh air began to seep down into the tunnel, Burl was only one person away from freedom. Then number 22’s bloblike body was gone, it was his turn to count, and a light speared down out of the sky a quarter-mile in the distance. One of the escapees had been spotted. There was only one thing Burl could do, and that was to run.
Walker was about halfway up the tunnel when all the people who were still inside Tunnel I had no choice but to turn around and return to the pit. What ensued was a desperate scramble in which people swore at one another, a support beam was knocked out of place, and dirt rained down from above.
There were voices of reason however, including Walker’s, as he called on the people within earshot to slow down, and to be careful lest the entire tunnel cave in on them.
But most of the support beams held, which meant that it wasn’t long before people began to leave the tunnel and exit through the four-holer set up to hide it. And as they arrived, one after another, about two dozen Hybrids were on hand to receive them.
One of the stinks gave Walker a shove, and another growled at him as he was sent to join the others. All of the prisoners were huddled under the glare produced by three Patrol Drones. They hummed menacingly as they circled the crowd. “Do you think they’ll shoot us?” a woman wondered, her teeth chattering from both fear and the cold.
“Naw,” the man next to her replied dismissively. “We should be so lucky! It’s kinda like when some of my father’s chickens would find a way out of the coop. Pa didn’t kill ′em, not right away. That came later. When Ma had a hankering for fried chicken.”
Walker wasn’t so sure about that, but eventually the chicken analogy was proven to be correct, as the stinks left the prisoners unharmed but tore all of the four-holers apart looking for more tunnels. There were two additional shafts, both located on the other side of the pit, but went undiscovered because the Chimera couldn’t generalize beyond the example in front of them. Tunnels went with shitters, and vice versa, that was the extent of their reasoning.
The escape attempt did not go entirely unpunished, however. Once all the prisoners were out of the tunnel, and explosives had been used to seal it off, Walker heard a now familiar thrumming sound as a Chimeran shuttle drifted over the pit from the north. The wind generated by its flaring repellers blew snow, flimsy shelters, and bits of tra
sh in every direction as the ship put down next to the poisonous-looking lake. Multicolored running lights strobed the entire area as the shuttle settled onto its skids.
That was when servos whined, a ramp came down, and roughly fifty prisoners were marched down onto the ground. They were newbies, all having been captured over the last few days, and completely unaware of the drama that was playing itself out around them. That wasn’t unusual, because newbies arrived every couple of days, though usually on foot. What caught Walker’s attention was the fact that rather than be allowed to take charge of the newcomers the way she usually did, Collins was being held in check, and judging from the expression on her normally impassive face she was terrified.
Then, once all the newbies were off the shuttle, two Hybrids took hold of the collaborator’s arms and dragged her up the ramp, where they forced her to turn around and face the crowd. And there she was, still standing on the ramp, as the shuttle lifted off.
The aircraft rose to a height of approximately one hundred feet, and all eyes were still on the ship as it began to hover.
That was when the Hybrids pushed Collins off.
The schoolteacher was expecting it by then, and screamed all the way down. The noise stopped when her body landed on top of a piece of rusty mining equipment, and blood splattered the ground all around it. The stinks were sending a message—and everyone understood it. Even if they didn’t feel any sorrow.
“Rot in hell, bitch,” someone said. It wasn’t much of an epitaph—but the only one that Collins was going to get.
Resistance: The Gathering Storm r-1 Page 27
