“It’s the only way.”
“What?” Naia asks, “what is it?”
“We’ve got to go down through the freight elevator shaft.”
She shakes her head and then summons a weak smile.
“This keeps getting better and better.”
We pivot and throw ourselves into the turmoil, heading in the opposite direction, fighting against the flow of refugees.
We pass by windows and I can see outside that some of Roger Parker’s people have extended ladders and crude rigging platforms from the other buildings.
They’re urging the refugees from VC1 to cross to safety.
I watch Big Sam and Teddy and even Jason Sullivan scamper across to safety and then I put my head down and plow forward. There’s a faraway hall door that leads to a set of short mechanical stairs that connect our floor with the freight elevator.
If we can make it there, we might have a chance.
Brixton swings his arm and we surge forward when there are shouts on the other side of the door, then a keening whine.
Before Brixton can scream for us to duck and cover the door explodes and out strides Matthais.
22
Mad Meg starts to shout a warning but is silenced by a bullet from Matthais that hits below her chin. Something ruptures under the soft skin of her neck wattle and a gusher of red that appears almost black under the blinking red back-up lights, issues.
Her legs give out and she falls back into Donkey’s arms and the fact that her body doesn’t buck once means she’s already crossed over.
Brixton sprays his gun like a garden hose as Matthais, who looks like a demon with his battle mask on, grabs a male refugee, using the man as a human shield.
One of Brixton’s bullets strikes the human shield in the chest, killing him. Matthais continues to fire, joined by six of his men who appear behind him.
A dozen refugees fall in the cross-fire.
“Pull back!” Naia says, grabbing my arm, “pull back!”
We do, forced to leave Mad Meg behind as we juke left, an explosion taking down part of the roof and walls behind us.
We dart forward, moving through panicked residents like hunters, seeking cover and a way out. Peripherally I see some of the residents, now armed, confronting Odin’s guards and I wonder whether a rebellion has occurred.
A hallway leads away before us and we run through a door and down over a causeway with a long, glass partition.
I can hear the shrieks of the Dubs in the distance and then there’s a flare of light and a puff of smoke and an explosive projectile is fired at us. What I believe is a missile curls over open space and detonates nearby.
The heat from the backblast is like an oven door being opened.
A smell like rubber being cooked over a fire overwhelms me as the concussive explosion tosses me sideways. A wall breaks my fall and then folds under me like wet cardboard.
I’m dizzy and disoriented, clouded in smoke. Howls of agony and automatic weapons fire rip the air, red lights pulsing overhead.
I push myself up and turn to eye my surroundings, searching for the others when a gun barrel slices through the smoke-laced air.
Matthais trails the barrel, lifting up his battle mask to squint at me.
His face is so screwed up in anger, so drained of color and fissured and cratered that it looks like a hunk of eroded rock.
He doesn’t say a thing, just silently leans the barrel of his gun against my already bloody cheek.
A surge of pain bites through me, the metal hot enough that I can smell my skin smoldering.
Matthais works the barrel into my cheek, pressing into the pocket between my upper and lower jaws.
All the while my eyes remain on him, taking in his terrible visage, the veins pulsing in his neck, his urine-colored eyes, the ammo skull on his hip, the festering scalps tied to his waist, covered, even at this time of year, in fat-bellied flies.
I struggle, turning away, but he rams the metal so hard into my mouth that I’m worried he’s going to dislodge what few teeth I have left. The pain forces my eyes closed, but then I realize I can’t go out like this. If this is how I cross over I won’t go on Matthais’s terms. I’ll look him in the eye when he pulls the trigger.
My eyes rocket open and Matthais grins and then—
WHAM!
A dark form looms out of the murk and rolls right over him.
The figure slams into Matthais who lets off a burst from his gun that stars the ceiling.
What comes next is a blur of motion.
A swipe of a hand.
Ragged fingers make the air sing.
The figure that bodyslammed Matthais flicks his hand to remove a nugget of flesh from the area around Matthais’s Adam’s apple.
Matthais clutches his neck as a thin line of blood spurts.
He forces himself up, gagging, managing to kick the figure off and now the two are grappling, throwing punches, marinated in blood and spit.
Staggering to my feet, I spot Matthais’s rifle and lunge for it.
I grab the weapon and pull it around, aiming at Matthais and—
Gus.
For God’s sake there he is, looking very much like he did back down on the street: clothes torn and bloody, a halo of dried blood on his skull from where he was scalped.
Matthais makes a stab for the rifle and Gus throws out a hand and blocks him and then he turns to face his killer.
Matthais doesn’t retreat, instead pulling a fist back and punching Gus who absorbs the blow and then does two things almost at once: he rips his scalp away from Matthais’s waist-belt and bites off a good portion of Matthais’s hand.
A cord of blood leaps from the wound and I see real fear in Matthais’s eyes for the first time.
He recoils like a beaten dog.
Then he slugs Gus again and runs off through the smoke, clutching his injured hand and neck.
I stand there, watching him go and then aim at Gus as he steps to me.
His head cants and he spits out Matthais’s flesh.
My gun never leaves Gus who holds his own scalp up like a trophy.
“What did they do to you, Gus?”
He looks at me again, cockeyed, and whether it’s the play off light off his eyes or the way his mouth seems to curl into a tight smile, I can tell his humanity hasn’t been entirely extinguished.
He wipes a finger in his own blood and reaches over and makes two markings on my cheek.
And then he steps back as if admiring his handiwork and yowls as a contingent of Dubs appear from out of the smoke.
I could probably cut them all down if I wanted to, but for some reason I just stand there, watching them tramp by me like rush hour office-dwellers on their way to work.
I begin to tell myself to stay cool, to not panic, but then the realization comes over me.
I’m no longer afraid of them.
I have no idea why, but after blinking to clear my vision I nod at the Dubs gathered before me and they seem to nod back.
A few spot the markings on my cheek which appear to have some sort of significance to them because they scent me, but don’t attack.
Gus clucks his tongue and they respond and peer at the ground which is speckled red. Gus always said the old fierce pull of blood was strong and he was right. The Dubs follow the faint blood-trail, tracking after Matthais, vanishing into the din.
And then it’s just me and Gus again.
“I came back for you,” I say to him. “I want you to know – they tried to kill me, but I came back for you.”
His eyes blink and he mouths something that I can’t understand.
“I let the dogs go and I think they made it out. I’ve got Zeus down the hall,” I say, pointing, “he’s with Brixton and Del Frisco and Naia and … you can come … I’ll talk to the others and you – if you want you can come with us.”
A tear rolls down Gus’s cheek and he stares at his blood-smeared scalp and I know it’s impossible.
As much as I wish it were otherwise, there’s no way Gus will ever leave this building again.
In the distance I can hear Naia shouting for me.
“He’s still up there, Gus,” I say, ignoring her voice, angling a thumb at the ceiling. “Odin is directing things and trying to hold onto power. He wanted to bring the building down.”
Gus’s jaw tightens, his black-painted teeth rubbing together.
I can hear his joints crack as he grips his scalp.
Something passes between us and I know that Gus is exactly where he needs to be.
He’s been blamed, mocked, cast out, and murdered.
And now, newly resurrected, the lamb has returned as a lion to set things right.
His hand finds mine and the flesh is surprisingly warm.
He squeezes my fingers and I nod and then there’s a soft patter as Zeus emerges out of the smoke.
The dog is covered in dust and stops, looking between me and Gus.
And then Zeus trots up and sniffs Gus and I kid you not, his tail starts wagging.
I can’t be sure, but I think I see what might be a smile tug back the corners of Gus’s mouth.
He holds a trembling hand up to me and nods and then he lumbers off, looking somehow battle-hardened as he melts into the smoke, following his new comrades to the upper floors.
I want to shout and run after him, but I know Gus is on a mission.
He’s going up to meet Odin and I don’t think things are going to end well for the dictator.
Turning from this, I look at the ground and notice Dad’s old flip-style cellphone on the ground.
It must have fallen there when Gus ripped Matthais’s hip belt off.
I grab the phone and walk with Zeus at my side, the two of us picking our way through the debris and dust and after several moments, the barrel of a gun held by Brixton points at me. The fact that I’m bleeding in several places causes Brixton to eye me warily.
“You get punctured?”
I shake my head.
“Where’d you get the boom-stick from?” he says, gesturing to the gun in my right hand.
“I took it from Matthais.”
Brixton smiles. “In your dreams, Jumper.”
He lowers his gun and I follow around several corners and through an alcove to see Naia, Del Frisco, and the others. They’re fronting the open doors on the rear freight elevator.
“Hope you brought your climbing shoes, Wy,” Del Frisco says.
The back-up lights provide just enough illumination for me to see the thick cable running down the middle of the elevator shaft—the only one that wasn’t pried out to make a tendril for The Dream Catcher.
I look into the hoistway and balk because it’s so far down, but there’s no other way. I jump and grab hold of the cable which is thankfully knurled every eight inches or so which allows me to maintain my grip while planting my feet.
“Will it hold?” Brixton asks.
“It better,” I reply, before looking at Del Frisco and Naia. “You guys okay?”
They both nod.
“Just keep your arms pressed to your sides and you’ll be good to go,” Del Frisco says.
I feel for solid ground with my feet and sensing nothing, keep hold of the metal rope and start the slow process of climbing down over the drive system.
My lat muscles burn, but I manage to take the pressure off by resting my feet on the metal knurls and then the rails, the metal tracks that would normally be guiding the “car,” the elevator box that people used to ride up and down in.
The farther down we go, the colder the cable grows. It’s icy and frayed so that the jagged metal slices and dices my hands, blood mixing with the cable’s oil to form a greasy residue that I warn the others about. I gape up to see them, eerily silhouetted above me against the red light. Brixton’s holding onto the cable while simultaneously clutching Zeus who’s whining and panting.
We can hear the sounds of the battle raging through the walls.
Screams, mostly from the Dubs, followed by errant gunshots and explosions.
“Do you think they got Odin?” I ask.
“Don’t ever count that bastard out,” Brixton replies.
At that moment, Odin’s voice rings out of some unseen speaker. There’s desolation in his words as he rambles and shouts nonsensical things about empowering people and thinking outside of boxes and finding core competencies.
“All civilization is centralization!” he says. “All centralization is economy!”
I peer through a section of grating on the far wall, looking over stretch of hallway that is littered with trash and mummified Dub bodies. I instantly recognize it as a corridor in the old building, one of the floors below the Keep down on ten.
“We’re close,” I say.
I swing out and kick the grating in and then worm my way in through the opening, hopping over the bodies of the long-dead Dubs.
I lean against a stairwell door and ease it open and read the neon lettering spray-painted on a bare wall. We’re on the sixth floor.
“We’ve got to go down one more floor,” I whisper, the others tensing.
We slip down the stairwell, covering our mouths, the air a stomach-churning combination of mold and decaying flesh from the dead Dubs who lie where they fell on the cement steps.
I’m a few feet from the door at the bottom landing when Del Frisco calls out:
“Hey, Wyatt?”
“Yeah?”
“Who’s got the keys, man?” he says.
Everyone stops on a dime and I slowly look back.
“Come again?”
“It’s a motor vehicle of some kind we’re after, right?”
I nod.
“So I’m guessing it probably needs keys to run.”
“Yeah. Probably.”
“So … who’s got ‘em?”
I shake my head and cast a glance at Brixton who sports the same look as me. Neither of us thought about this.
“I’ve got the keys right here, boys,” Naia says, holding up her hands. “Just get me in the thing and I’ll get it started.”
We share a smile and then I pivot back and push open the door and—
—A hail of gunfire nearly rips my head off!
I drop to the ground as the door is punctured by a flurry of well-placed shots. Brixton snake-crawls past the others and then fights to peer around the corner before more gunfire rings out.
“Two, maybe three shooters,” he says.
“Can we take them?”
“Lots of open ground out there,” he says.
Someone whistles and our eyes pan over to see Asian Phil holding one of the dead Dubs up. The thing’s head flops to one side and its blue and black-bloated belly sags like a deflated balloon, oozing through a tear in the pants it was wearing when it crossed over.
“What the hell are you doing?” Brixton says.
Asian Phil studies the Dub and smirks. “Repurposing,” he says.
Brixton and Donkey examine the Dub bodies and grab two of the biggest, widest specimens as I’m handed a machine-pistol.
“You’re overwatch now,” Asian Phil says.
The three move forward and crouch near the open door. We can hear the muted voices of the men down the hall, waiting patiently for us to make a move.
Brixton closes his eyes and soundlessly counts to three and then—
He’s out into the hall, twirling around, the Dub held up like a shield as the corridor rattles with automatic weapons fire.
Bullets blow ragged holes in the Dub flesh, most rounds miraculously deadened by bone and dried tissue, a few exiting to thwack off the nearby walls.
The three men advance as I lean out and catch sight of the two men crouching at the other end of the hallway, shooting at us.
“Give us some cover, Wyatt, yeah?” Brixton says as I rise up and spray the hallway, moving my weapon side-to-side, the recoil stronger than I anticipated.
I don’t hit a single thing, but my s
hots cause enough confusion that the men turn and run.
Brixton shoots one of the fleeing men in the hamstring and down he goes. The rest of us roll up to the door with the biometric scanner as Brixton grabs the wounded man and drags him over.
“Put your hand up there,” he says to the wounded man, “put it on that pad before I hack it off and do the deed myself.”
The wounded man complies, his hand pressed to the pad on the door. A red light flashes green and a buzzer sounds and Donkey kicks the door down.
On the other side of the door lies the oversized bay and the immense machine that’s still positioned at the top of a ramp, facing the roll-up door.
“Look at that mother,” Del Frisco says, whistling, grinning as the wounded man gimps off.
We move as one down the ramp and then do a circuit of the mighty machine, admiring its bells and whistles.
It’s locked which is why Brixton points at his machine-pistol (which I still hold) and says:
“Hand me my key.”
I toss the gun to him and he bashes a hole in the driver’s side window, reaches in and unlocks the door.
The interior looks industrial, lots of stainless steel and ruggedized, hand-formed plastic. The windshield appears to be at least an inch thick, the dashboard a long piece of chrome, five-point harnesses around each seat, and several gun-ports on either side through which weapons can be fired.
“That is one bad-ass, piece of vehicular divinity,” Del Frisco whispers.
Naia slithers across the driver’s seat and leans down and begins stripping wire and portions of the metal and plastic column that supports the metal wheel that is used to steer the machine.
Her hands move like someone dealing out cards, her fingers able to twirl certain colored-coded wires together, pinch small electrical boards apart.
She finishes by twisting two strands of copper wire together and then she taps a black floor pedal as the engine rumbles and races to life.
“How many little horses you think we got in this puppy?” Asian Phil asks.
“Enough to piss out us out of this fuckin’ city and more,” Brixton replies.
He motions to Naia.
“Step aside please.”
“Why is it that a man always feels the need to be behind the wheel? Is it a control thing?” Naia asks.
Vertical City Box Set [Books 1-4] Page 37
