Creepers

by David Morrell

Suddenly, the stairs wavered. Bolts popped from the wall, the staircase pulling loose from its moorings. Balenger swayed. As the bolts clanged onto the lower stairs, he grabbed the unsteady railing. The stairs were a huge bobbing coil anchored at the top but not at the sides, banging against the walls.

  Vinnie’s legs hit the railing. He screamed. Amplified by the stairwell, the noise seemed to fill the hotel. Ronnie couldn’t fail to hear it. Balenger pulled the crowbar from his belt, turned, and swung toward the razor wire. He hit it with all his strength, the wire so taut that it snapped from the impact.

  “Upstairs!” he shouted to Amanda. “Now!”

  Pellets blasted through the wall. More bolts popped, the staircase wobbling. Sweat dripping from his face, Balenger groped for the trapdoor’s opening. Grateful to touch something that was solidly anchored, he scurried up and yanked Vinnie through, trying to ignore his screams. He stopped in the kitchen, hoping for safety against the outside wall. The trapdoor banged shut, and Amanda was suddenly next to him.

  “We’ll try another stairwell,” Amanda said, hoping.

  “Hardly any left.”

  Amanda sank wearily, her hips on the floor, her back against the wall. “He has a good chance of finding us.”

  Balenger slid down next to her, sounding as exhausted as she did. “Probably has traps in them.”

  “Yes,” Amanda said. “Probably.” She looked down at Vinnie, whose pain had caused him to pass out. “Any other ideas?”

  “Not at the moment.”

  “Me, neither.”

  In the surveillance room, smoke drifted past the wet towels that sealed the edges of the trapdoor.

  “But there must be something,” Amanda said. “I won’t give up.”

  Yes, just like Diane, Balenger thought. “That’s right. We won’t give up.”

  Static from the walkie-talkie.

  “Still alive?” the voice asked.

  Balenger pressed the transmit button and squeezed his elbow against his holstered pistol, trying to draw reassurance from it. “Waiting for you.”

  “Waiting for the fire,” the voice said.

  Waiting will get us killed, Balenger thought. We need to do something. We’re not going to let ourselves die here. He was conscious of the rain lashing against the metal shutter above him.

  Something. There’s got to be something.

  Amanda stared up toward the shutter. With a chill of hope, Balenger realized the thought that came to her. Slowly, they stood and examined the shutter. Like the others in the hotel, it had rollers that rested on a horizontal bar above the window. In theory, a sideways sliding motion was the only thing necessary to open it. At the bottom, a lock secured it.

  But unlike the shutters downstairs, the rollers on this one were rust-free. As with everything else in the penthouse, Ronnie kept the shutters scrupulously clean.

  Balenger shoved the end of the crowbar under the lock. He started to apply leverage, then worried that Ronnie might hear.

  “I’ll distract him,” he whispered to Amanda, putting her hands on the crowbar.

  He eased into the dining room and pressed the transmit button on the walkie-talkie. “Walter Harrigan. Ronald Whitaker. Ronnie. Did your mother call you ‘Ronnie’? Is that why you want your girlfriends to call you that? So they’ll be like your mother?”

  “You’re guaranteeing more pain for yourself.”

  Balenger looked into the kitchen, where Amanda tugged furiously at the crowbar.

  “Walter Harrigan. You’re Ronald Whitaker, and yet you’re…Of course.” Balenger felt a thrill of understanding. “When you left the juvenile facility, did you change your name? Is that what happened? With a new name, you wouldn’t be stalked by your past. No one would connect you with that Fourth of July. No one would know you killed your father. No one would know he abused you.”

  Balenger watched Amanda. The lock’s plate seemed about to separate from the wall.

  “Was that it, Ronnie? Was it Carlisle’s idea to change your name? Was that another way he helped you?”

  “Oh, he helped, all right,” the voice said. “He couldn’t stop helping.”

  “Or making excuses? Even when he suspected what you were doing, he still made excuses for you, didn’t he? He didn’t really believe what you were capable of. Why would—”

  Amanda strained against the crowbar. As the lock’s plate pulled from the wall, Balenger returned to the kitchen and grabbed the plate before it could strike the floor.

  “Why would he make excuses for you, Ronnie?” Balenger felt sick as the answer occurred to him. “He watched through the wall. He saw your father…He saw the pervert your father took money from come in and…After a lifetime of watching, Carlisle finally got disgusted with being a watcher. He could have done something to stop it, but…He was a god who observed without intervening in this hell he created. But when he saw you bash in your father’s brains, he finally felt more than curiosity. Maybe because he was alone so much as a child, he identified with you. He felt guilty. He wished he could have stopped what happened. The only thing left was to try to make amends. He spoiled you, and then one night, he discovered the consequences.”

  “Tonight, you’ll discover consequences. I see smoke down here,” the voice said.

  Balenger put the walkie-talkie into his knapsack. He and Amanda pushed at the shutter. He was surprised how smoothly the rollers shifted along their rail.

  The window gaped. Like the others in the hotel, it was broken, part of the hotel’s disguise to make it appear oppressively deserted. Out of the howling darkness, wind and rain struck Balenger’s face. He and Amanda took urgent breaths, filling their nostrils, throats, and lungs. Lightning flashed, illuminating the beach seven levels below.

  Balenger raised the window frame to avoid being cut by the shards in it. “I’ll find a spot to anchor the rope,” he told Amanda. “Close the shutter as soon as I’m out. If Ronnie smells the fresh air, he’ll know what we’re doing.”

  He climbed through the window. Rain lashed him. In green-tinted darkness, he eased down to the roof. The wind gusted at him, imaginary hands shoving. Moisture pelted his face, entering his mouth. It tasted bitter, a mixture of sweat, dirt, and blood from his cheeks.

  The rain on his goggles made it difficult to see. He wiped their lenses, flinched from a nearby lightning strike, and moved cautiously forward.

  The roof felt spongy. He shifted to the right, breathing slightly easier when the area under him became solid again. At the roof’s edge, he crouched to prevent the wind from pushing him over.

  For a moment, he allowed himself to hope, but then he peered down, and despair swept through him. The center of the roof below him was collapsed, water streaming into it. Lightning revealed the lower levels. They were damaged from years of punishing weather and lack of maintenance. Surfaces were peeled back, flapping in the wind. Holes were evident, even from a distance.

  Balenger opened his mouth to breathe. Wind filled his throat. No, he thought. No! Lightning struck the beach. The rain strengthened, intensifying the chill of his drenched clothes, but that was nothing compared to the chill that invaded his spirit. He looked for a place to secure the rope that was in his knapsack.

  A ventilation pipe. He approached it, his goggles revealing rust. When he pushed a shoe against it, the pipe held. He pushed with greater force. The pipe continued to hold. Wiping rain from his goggles, he headed back to the shutter. Another spongy section of roof threatened to collapse. He skirted it, took three steps, and abruptly, his left shoe broke the surface. He froze, supporting his weight on his other foot. Slowly, he pulled the shoe free. Testing, he continued across the roof.

  When he reached to slide the shutter open, it startled him, seeming to move on its own. Amanda’s arms came into view, helping him through the window.

  Dripping, shivering, he squirmed into the kitchen and closed the shutter. After the fresh air, the penthouse’s atmosphere of smoke, pain, and death was overwhelming.

 
His goggles couldn’t hide how depressed he felt.

  “What’s wrong?” Amanda asked.

  “The three of us can’t do it.”

  “Can’t?”

  “Two of us lifting Vinnie—the roof won’t hold our weight. If you go separately, you might make it. But if I carry Vinnie, I’ll…he and I will go through the roof. We might never stop dropping till we reach the ground floor.”

  “But…”

  “Leave,” Vinnie whispered in pain.

  Balenger was surprised that Vinnie was conscious.

  “Holding you back.” Vinnie’s murmur was distorted with agony. “Leave me. Get help.”

  “No, I won’t leave you.” Balenger took off the knapsack and removed the rope. “Amanda, you weigh the least. There’s a ventilation pipe. I tested it. It’ll hold you. Loop the rope around it. Slide down the wall. Pull the rope down to you. Find another anchor and keep climbing down.”

  Amanda’s face tensed in concentration. “How far to the ground?”

  “Seven levels.”

  “Slide down the rope? It’s called ‘rappeling,’ right?”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s not as easy as you make it sound. Even if I manage to reach the bottom, what happens next? Where do I find help?”

  “There’s nobody in this area. You’ll need to go to the police station. I’ll give you directions.”

  “How far?”

  “A couple of miles.”

  The smoke made Amanda cough. “In this storm? As weak as I am from being in that vault? With my legs protected only by this nightgown? I’ll collapse from hypothermia before I get there. You go.”

  “But—”

  “You’re the strongest. I’ll stay with Vinnie.”

  He studied her. Blond hair. Determined, lovely features. So much like Diane.

  The idea abruptly seemed futile. “By the time I bring help, it might be too late,” he said.

  “Then what are we going to do?”

  Balenger listened to the rain against the shutter. “Maybe there’s only one chance.”

  She watched him, trying to control her desperation.

  “I need to go after him,” Balenger said.

  “Yes.” The cold made Amanda’s lips pale.

  An apron hung next to the sink. He wrapped it around her unprotected legs.

  Something made her frown toward a corner. When he looked in that direction, he saw a rat. Other rats stated in from the dining room.

  “They’re attracted to the smell of Vinnie’s legs,” Amanda said.

  More rats appeared at the door to the library. One had a single eye.

  Balenger went to the bedroom and took an object from Cora’s jacket. When he returned, he showed Amanda what it was.

  The water pistol.

  “Vinegar.” He squirted a rat. It darted away.

  She took the pistol.

  Static came from the walkie-talkie. “The smoke’s thicker down here,” Ronnie’s voice said.

  “Then maybe you should leave the building,” Balenger replied.

  He turned off the walkie-talkie and put it into his knapsack. He shoved the crowbar in also. Facing Amanda, he promised, “I’ll come back as soon as I can.”

  But he didn’t move, couldn’t turn away from her. Each felt the same impulse. They put their arms around each other.

  Balenger tried to draw strength from her, possibly the last friendly person he would ever see. His chest swelling with emotion, he slid the shutter open. The rain pelted him. Just before he eased onto the roof, he peered back into the kitchen and saw Amanda sink to the floor, where she cradled Vinnie’s head on her lap. The green-tinted rats formed a semi-circle at the edge of the room. She aimed the water pistol. He settled his weight on the roof and closed the shutter.

  The wind threatened to suck air from his lungs as he worked his way toward the ventilation pipe. With each step, he feared that his foot would again break the surface. Drenched, he studied rain-swept puddles, deciding that the roof would be weakest where water collected. But the next spongy section he encountered was in a raised area that turned out to be a blister. He stepped back and veered around it.

  A crack of lightning struck the tip of the pyramid. It reminded him of an artillery shell exploding. Despite his urge to run, he forced himself to be cautious. Rain obscured the pipe. He looped the rope over it and pulled, again testing. Designed for mountain climbing, the rope had a standard length of 150 feet, reduced now to 75 because it was doubled. Although thin and lightweight, it was exceptionally strong, its polyester sheath protecting a core of silk fibers.

  Earlier, Rick had questioned him about his familiarity with heights and rope. Needing an innocent explanation, Balenger had responded that he was a rock climber. In truth, he knew about heights and rope because of his Ranger training. He knotted the rope about four feet from its tips. The knot would warn him when he was almost at the end. He dropped the doubled rope off the roof. Straddling it, he pulled it up behind him, over his right hip. He looped it across his chest, over his left shoulder, and down his back, making sure the rope was cushioned by his jacket and wouldn’t cut into his neck. He used his left hand to grip the forward part of the rope while his right gripped the section behind and below him. The arrangement allowed his body to act as a brake.

  Somewhere, somehow, he’d lost his gloves. As a consequence, he risked rope burns on his hands. Straining to be optimistic, he told himself that the gloves would have been slippery in the rain, that under the circumstances exposed skin was safer.

  Right. Be positive. Look on the bright side.

  In green-tinted darkness.

  It keeps getting worse, he thought. Yet his emotions puzzled him. The Gulf War syndrome from his tour of duty in Desert Storm was suddenly so distant a memory that it seemed not to have happened. The post-traumatic stress disorder from his near-beheading no longer weighed on him. After the hell of the previous six hours, after so many deaths, after discovering the corpse of his beloved wife, a grim rage overtook him. It was so expansive and powerful that it left no room for fear. Vinnie depended on him. The woman who resembled his wife depended on him. They mattered. Punishing Ronnie. That mattered.

  He tested the rope one final time, then stepped backward off the roof. Swaying in chaos, he eased the rope through his right hand behind him while his left hand gripped the forward section. The rope slid around his body. With his shoes pushing against the wall, he walked horizontally backward and downward, approaching the crater in the patio below.

  The rope jerked. Had the pipe bent? Friction burning his cold fingers, he eased more rope through his right hand. The rope jerked again. Don’t think about it. Keep going. Keep thinking about Amanda and Vinnie. Through rain-streaked goggles, he saw that the surviving edge of the patio was just below him. A moment later, he set down on it, holding the rope around him so he wouldn’t drop if the remainder of the patio gave way.

  He was braced against a closed, rusted shutter on the sixth level. There was no way inside. To re-enter the hotel, to get to Ronnie, he needed to descend farther. Into the crater of a room on the fifth level. His soaked clothes weighing on him, he walked to the edge of the crater and leaned back, settling into it. Without a wall to brace his feet against, he grimaced from the strain of lowering himself, the rope biting into his hip, chest, and shoulder. Now the moisture falling around him was thicker, not only rain but also water accumulating on the roof. It poured over him. Below, he saw a canopied bed, a bureau, a Victorian table, the basic arrangement he’d found in most of the other rooms. The middle of the floor was another crater, water crashing farther down.

  He kicked his legs. The motion started a pendulum effect that he increased by kicking several more times. Swinging, he neared the remainder of the floor across from him, kicked again, and suddenly his breath was taken away as he dropped. The pipe’s breaking, he thought. He jerked to a stop.

  The rope constricted his chest. Still breathless, he exhaled through his mouth and i
nhaled through his nostrils, trying for a calming rhythm. Staring up, he saw that the reason the rope had dropped was that it had dug into the crater’s edge and broken away a portion of the roof. Six feet of ceiling had crumbled. That was how far he had fallen. Now he hung below the hole, dangling into a fourth-level room. He tried to pull himself up, to lift his legs over the edge.

  But the rim of this crater now began to disintegrate. As the floor gave way, he sank lower, dangling farther into the fourth-level room. Water fell past him. Then a chair. It brushed past his jacket sleeve.

  Jesus, the whole ceiling’s collapsing. The furniture’s going to—

  The table plummeted past him. The bureau tilted toward the widening hole. The bed slid in his direction.

  Staring down, he saw that the door to the fourth-level room was open. Nearly all the floor was gone, the entire contents having cascaded, hitting subsequent floors and crashing through. At once, Balenger understood that this was the room from which he’d rescued Vinnie after Vinnie dropped.

  More of the crater’s rim collapsed. The rope dropped him another two feet. With a woosh, the bureau hurtled past. The bed slid nearer. He worked down along the rope. At the same time, he swung his body. His right hand touched the knot that warned him he was near the rope’s end. As he swung again, the pressure of the rope made that section of the ceiling give way. The bed plunged toward him. His pendulum’s arc sped him toward the open door. His fingers clawed, snagging the jamb. He tightened his grip on the door frame. The bed swooped past him.

  The rope held him prisoner, tugging him backward into the chasm while he fought to pull himself around the doorjamb. The bed crashed far below. His right hand released the rope and joined his left hand clinging to the side of the open door. He pulled himself farther through. Although soft, the balcony’s floor held. He took another step. Another.

  Unwrapping the rope from his hip and shoulder, he freed the knot and tugged one end, trying to pull it down. It snagged on something. Worried that his effort would stress the weak floor, he took a step farther back, then tugged again. The rope refused to budge.