“We have some jailers in the apartments,” Mike’s man said into the general com link. “Go cautiously. One is down and won’t be breathing anytime soon, but no telling how many more of these creeps are down here.”
“Copy that,” Mike said. “Be alert, people. Don’t get sloppy and in too much of a hurry.”
Sarge stepped over the pile of garbage they had just shot as the other bedroom doors opened and more victims looked out.
Sarge knew he had to be in a hurry, otherwise a lot of people were going to die.
And they had no idea how many.
One more thing he didn’t want to think about at the moment.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
October 20th, 2016
Las Vegas, Nevada
PICKETT HEARD THE shots like a distant pop echoing through the corridors. She was relieved when she heard that Sarge and one of Mike’s men had dropped a jailer. She just wished she could have put a bullet or two into the scum as well.
She and her partner had just pulled six more from another suite and were headed back down the hall toward the main room when Detective Sanders and a former Special Forces man either from Mike or Robin’s people met them.
Detective Diana Sanders was tall, dark-haired, and as hard a cop as they came. But Sanders’ eyes were round and Pickett could see she was breathing hard, more than likely from the run here and from this horror show she had found herself in.
“Just leave the door open after you have cleared a suite of rooms,” Pickett said to her. “We won’t duplicate that way. But make sure everyone is out in case someone is too afraid to move.”
Sanders nodded, staring at the six people in their pajamas and bathrobes heading down the hall past her.
“Be careful,” Pickett said to her as she followed the six survivors out toward the main living room and the tunnel door.
Less than a half minute later, she and Mike’s man were headed back into the tunnel just as Sanders and her partner went through a suite door shouting Las Vegas Police.”
She and her partner went to the next door in the seemingly endless hallway and had it open and through in less than thirty seconds.
And less than a minute later they were following Sander’s group down the hall and toward safety.
Pickett and her partner had rescued 18 survivors of all this so far. They had less than 65 minutes left. There was no way they were going to get everyone before those bombs went off and brought all this down.
“Mike,” Pickett said into her com link.
“Go ahead,” Mike’s calm voice came back.
“We’re going to need to change up this plan a little to pick up speed. How about we clear a room and let the survivors just evacuate themselves back to the main room. We should be able to triple our speed.”
Pickett noticed her partner nodding, but saying nothing.
Silence for a moment, then Mike said, “Seems like we have no choice.”
There was a faint click.
“Listen up, people,” Mike said. “Just clear the room, tell the survivors how to evacuate and then go to the next room. Jennings, I need you and Stevens in that big main room directing traffic out into the drainage tunnel. Carlson, you are in the tunnel pointing the way to the exit.”
Pickett heard a couple of clicks as she and her partner headed at a run back up the tunnel. That might just get a bunch more out. But it was clearly more dangerous.
But after seeing all this, she was hoping against hope they would find a jailer so she could give him what he deserved: A bullet where his heart should be.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
October 20th, 2016
Las Vegas, Nevada
IT WAS ON the eighth suite Sarge and his partner had cleared that things turned worse, if that was possible. Until they went into that suite, Sarge would not have thought it could be worse.
And by that point they were under fifty minutes left.
They blew the lock and pushed it open and instantly Sarge knew something was wrong. The smell of death smacked him in the face like a hammer.
Mike’s man ducked inside to the left, Sarge went in low to the right shouting “Las Vegas Police!”
Two people, one man, one woman came out of the dark at them. Both looked like they hadn’t eaten in months and were nothing more than skin and bones. They were both naked from the waist up.
As they advanced, Sarge could see the knives in their hands. And both had a look of anger and hatred.
And insanity.
“Las Vegas police!” Sarge shouted.
Both of the people just growled and kept coming, knives held high.
“Stop! Now!” Sarge shouted.
Made no difference.
Sarge took the man coming at him with the knife raised and shot him twice.
Mike’s man took down the woman the same way.
“We need to check the bedrooms and bathroom,” the guy said.
Sarge only nodded and stepped around the insane couple and headed for the bedrooms.
Every room was a horror show. Blood everywhere, signs of fighting. Two bodies in their beds, clearly dead. Two more in the bathroom.
Sarge just felt himself go numb. He wasn’t really seeing this. This wasn’t possible.
He followed Mike’s man out into the hallway and pulled the door closed.
Mike’s man nodded and took out a marker and marked the door with a bright “x” that glowed in the dark. Then he wrote “Keep out!”
Sarge glanced at a couple of survivors going past him in the hallway. They looked fine.
“Mike,” Sarge said. “You need to warn everyone that sometimes the survivors are dangerous as well.”
“What happened?” Mike asked.
“We ran into a suite that two residents had clearly gone a little crazy and killed the others. We put them down when they attacked us. We closed the door and marked it.”
Silence.
Then Mike said softly, “Jesus, sorry I asked.”
Then he clicked on the com link to everyone and warned them of problems with survivors. “Stay alert, people.”
Sarge took a deep breath, then nodded to his partner. “We got more to get out of here.”
Thirty seconds later they were going through yet another door in this endless hallway of nightmares.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
October 20th, 2016
Las Vegas, Nevada
“CLEAR THE AREA!” Mike ordered.
“Shit, shit, shit,” Pickett said to herself. They had just gone into a new suite and had two unable to walk.
“We have five minutes,” Mike went on over the com link. “Get everyone out of that area and into the big tunnel. We’re going to bring up the power in three minutes and try to defuse the bombs in four. Move it now, people. Now!”
Pickett swore again, then turned to two men who had been waiting for her orders and who had told her about the two women who couldn’t walk. They were standing in one of the woman’s bedroom.
“You two,” Pickett said, “Pick her up between you and get going. We don’t have time to wait for medical.”
“Why?” one of them asked as they headed for the woman across her bedroom. She had wide brown eyes and looked scared out of her mind.
“The sick bastards who did this to you planted explosives. We’re going to try to defuse them in a few minutes.”
Both men nodded and then, as gently as they could, picked up the woman. They clearly liked her and more than likely had lived with her for a very long time.
Back in the suite hallway Mike’s man had the other woman over his shoulder like carrying a light backpack. The other two women in the suite were already headed for the doorway into the hall as others streamed past, all in pajamas and bathrobes.
“We got anyone sweeping up behind us?” Pickett asked.
Her partner nodded. “Mike’s got it covered.”
She nodded.
But she didn’t want to think about all the doors they hadn’t ma
de it to. The hallways past them just seemed to go on and on and branched.
If these hallways blew, this would turn into the most extensive rescue operation in history. Since the suites didn’t have bombs set in them, the people in the suites would last for a short time. But not that long. Especially in the dark.
She just hoped Mike and Will and their computer experts had found the right way to stop this.
There were so many people in the hallway headed back toward the main room that it felt like a busy subway corridor at rush hour. Six teams had been opening doors along this hallway and then just pointing the survivors in the right direction. So some of the people were crying as they walked, others just sort of staggering along.
A few were helping others who didn’t seem to be able to walk.
“Four minutes,” Mike’s voice came in strong.
Pickett flat couldn’t remember how far down the hall they had gone. But she knew it was a distance and the one door into the drainage tunnel would be a jamming point as well.
She glanced back at her partner, who was carrying the woman over his shoulder like it was a normal day. Behind him she could see a couple dozen more people and then one of Mike’s people bringing up the back.
This just seemed impossible, that such a horrible nightmare could be allowed to go on for so long. And right under the streets of Las Vegas.
She hoped that the Chief had arrested everyone responsible for this tragedy. And if lucky, they would all get small cells that never saw the light of day for the rest of their lives.
And even more sadly, every one of these people now moving down this corridor in their bathrobes and pajamas had once come to Las Vegas for the happiest day of their lives, only to find themselves down here like this.
Pickett had no doubt that some of these people had been in here for years and years, just holding on, living under the knowledge that every single moment of their day was being watched.
Pickett shook her head and then helped a man in a gray robe who had slowed down and was shaking. Clearly he was about ready to collapse.
“We need to get out of here,” she said to him, giving him a shoulder to lean on even though he was considerably taller than she was.
He nodded. “Getting out of here is all I have been thinking about for three years.”
“It’s happening now, finally,” Pickett said. “Just keep moving.”
He nodded, clearly looking around and seeing everyone around him for the first time.
“They did this to this many people besides the six of us?” he asked, standing up and shaking himself slightly, seeming to come back into his mind.
“Far, far more than the ones you can see,” Pickett said. “Far more.”
“Oh, shit,” the guy said.
Then he moved to help another man who was starting to slow.
“Three minutes,” Mike said in Pickett’s ear.
Three very short minutes.
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
October 20th, 2016
Las Vegas, Nevada
SARGE SAW PICKETT come out of a hallway one over from his. They had only two minutes and the lights should be coming up shortly.
The big living room was jammed with people as the tunnels came down trying to get through one doorway. Mike’s men were helping people along as fast as they could, but it was going to be close.
Very close.
Behind him the last people they had gotten to made it out of the tunnel. Sarge had no idea how many they had rescued, but he knew it was far from everyone. The tunnel went on past the last door they had opened.
And he was sure that none of the other tunnels had reached the last people either.
Robin came out of a tunnel two over and moved to join Pickett.
“Lights coming up,” Mike said.
There were so many lights in the big room from all of the police and Mike’s men that when the lights did come up, it didn’t seem that different.
But the lights down the hallways came on as well. Sarge didn’t let himself look back. He didn’t really want to think about how many people they had not gotten to.
The room was emptying quickly. Sarge moved over to Pickett and Robin. “You two all right?”
“I will be if we get a chance to get back down those tunnels for the rest of the survivors,” Pickett said.
“I just want to wake up from this nightmare,” Robin said.
Sarge nodded.
The people in the large living room were now down to the detectives and Mike’s people.
“Let’s get into the tunnel and away from this door,” one of Mike’s men said at the doorway.
They all moved quickly, and Sarge let Pickett and Robin go through ahead of him just as Mike said, “We’re going to try to disarm the explosives in fifteen seconds. Get clear, people.”
Sarge and Pickett and Robin headed to the right along the old drainage tunnel at a full run along with six or seven other detectives.
The last of Mike’s men slammed the big metal door closed and followed them.
After about ten seconds, Sarge took Pickett’s hand and the three of them crouched down, backs to the walls as Mike counted it down.
At one, Sarge knew he was holding his breath. He had no idea that, if that many explosives went off, the drainage tunnel they were in would even hold up.
The silence in the old drainage tunnel was intense as Las Vegas detectives and former Special Forces soldiers just waited.
Slowest few seconds Sarge could ever remember.
No explosion.
After a couple seconds, Pickett squeezed Sarge’s hand.
He still didn’t let himself take a breath. It wasn’t over yet and they all knew it.
“We think we got it,” Mike said, “but hold safe positions until we get past the full two hours. Another twenty seconds.”
Sarge could only imagine how much stress there was up there with Mike and Will and all the computer people trying to disarm these explosives. Especially since Will’s wife was down here.
Mike again counted it down.
Sarge again held his breath. He just couldn’t help it.
After a few seconds past the final count, Mike said, “We’re clear. Get the rest of those poor people out of there. Follow the procedure we have been doing and stay on guard.”
Robin and Pickett and Sarge stood as their former Special Forces team members joined them, seeming to just appear out of the faint light in the tunnel.
Sarge nodded to them and all six of them turned and started back toward the big metal door that led to the cavern of horrors. Around them dozens of other teams were doing the same, this time walking instead of double-timing it.
The ticking clock was shut off.
They had survivors to rescue.
PART EIGHT
The Aftermath
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
October 25th, 2016
Las Vegas, Nevada
FIVE OF THE longest days that Pickett could remember followed that long night in the underground hell. It had been almost ten in the morning before the teams started at the far end of the tunnels and checked every room and every closet for anyone remaining.
They had covered the body of the one jailer they had shot as they went past that suite and found no one else alive.
They also marked where they had found bodies in suites. Clearly people who couldn’t hang on long enough and had killed themselves or died just days or hours before rescue was to arrive.
Sarge and two others found survivors hiding in closets too afraid to show themselves. And medical had to come for a few others.
Pickett and Robin and Sarge had finally climbed the stairs all the survivors had climbed to get up to the parking garage. There was no chance they were going to get Pickett’s car out of the mass of tents and emergency vehicles set up there now, so Robin called Will and had him send someone to pick them up.
Pickett was fine with that. She wasn’t sure she could have driven anyway. At that point
all she really wanted was a long, hot shower and some breakfast and a bed.
As they had walked into the daylight to meet their ride, the warm morning air felt fantastic.
“I think I had forgotten what daylight felt like,” Robin had said.
Pickett nodded.
Sarge said nothing.
“Imagine how all those poor souls held down there felt coming into the light,” Robin had said, softly.
“We got them out,” Sarge had said. “That’s what matters at the moment.”
Picket could only agree with that.
The long shower, a light breakfast, and a few hours sleep came four hours later after they reported in to the Chief.
About five in the evening, she and Sarge met and went to the Golden Nugget buffet for dinner, then they had headed to the large warehouse set up for survivors just a few blocks away.
The entire Cold Poker Gang had volunteered to help, talk with survivors, and get information. An entire computer center was set up to find relatives of the survivors. Mike’s people and Will’s people were all working full time to help the police on this.
And the FBI and Nevada State Police had been called in and were starting to bring in help as well.
Two of the women that Pickett had talked to had been in the same apartment for over six years. Sadly, both of their fiancés had found someone else and married during those six years.
Neither woman blamed the men, but Pickett had no doubt this was going to be difficult going home, if that was even going to be possible for many of the survivors.
On the third day they had learned that they had rescued over nine hundred missing persons from that hell in the ground.
Nine hundred people got to be reunited with the families. The largest missing persons case in history as far as they knew.
And the place where the dead had been buried had been found as well and was being worked on slowly to put closure on even more missing persons’ cases.
Dead Hand: A Cold Poker Gang Mystery Page 13
