“What the Sam-Fucking-Hell is that noise?” Markham rises and the cot seems to let out a squeaky exhalation of relief at the purging of his massive weight. The man stands at least six foot six in his bare feet. His huge pectorals look as though they could maybe use a Playtex Cross Your Heart Bra. He takes a step toward the window, his enormous feet making thunderous vibrations.
“I got it.” Daniels waves him back. He tosses the spent EpiPen. “Probably one of them rats-with-wings we get in the gutters around here time to time.”
Daniels goes over to the window, grabs the cord, and raises the blinds.
At first, the figure in the window does not compute: a slender woman with brown hair holding an assault rifle like a spear.
Daniels lets out a little impish giggle. The woman thrusts the barrel at the glass as hard as she can but the window holds. Daniels jerks back with a start. The window is made of safety glass and right now it merely cracks, doesn’t break. Daniels giggles and giggles. He doesn’t get the joke but still finds this whole thing hilarious. Who the hell is this chick, the fucking window washer?
“Who the fuck is that?” Markham’s deep, phlegmy voice gets Daniels’s attention.
Daniels turns and starts to say something when the second blow from the AR-15’s muzzle breaks the window. Broken glass erupts. Diamond shards spray in all directions and a gust of noxious wind swirls into the room. Daniels rears back, nearly falling on his ass as the woman lurches into the barracks.
Markham turns and starts to go for his pistol when things begin to unfold very quickly.
The woman vaults across the room and simultaneously rams the butt of her rifle into the groin of the big man. Markham staggers, letting out a garbled cry as he slams back against the far wall, rattling the foundation and knocking a Barely Legal nude calendar off its nail. Daniels turns and fumbles for his HK, which lies just out of his reach on the end of his cot. The woman drops her assault rifle and lunges toward the Glock. At the same time, Markham dives for the pistol. Across the room, Daniels claws for the HK. Meanwhile, Markham and the woman get both their hands on the 9mm pistol at the exact same moment. By that point, Daniels has gotten his hands around the machine pistol, but it’s too late. The woman has already managed to force the muzzle of the silencer up as she wrestles with the big man over domination of the pistol’s trigger. Both their fingers are on the trigger pad now as they slam against the wall and struggle for the gun. The woman manages to squeeze off several wild shots in the general direction of the man across the room. The silencer pops, spitting sparks a half dozen times before the seventh and eighth blasts strike Daniels directly in the chest between his nipples, plowing through his heart.
The skinny soldier staggers backward, gasping wetly, dropping the machine pistol, struggling to breathe as he hemorrhages. He slides to the floor by the cot, letting out a death rattle, pink foam bubbling from his mouth, the off switch pinning his eyes open.
In the meantime, Markham has finally overpowered the ferocious chick. He wrenches the pistol away from her and throws her to the floor with the force of an overgrown child tossing aside a rag doll. The woman bangs the back of her skull on the tile, the impact knocking her silly. She tries to roll away but the big man has flopped down on her, sitting on her midsection. It feels to the woman like a Winnebago has landed on her.
She gasps for breath as Markham aims the pistol between her eyes, the muzzle inches away from her nose. He squeezes off a shot at point-blank range.
The gun clicks impotently, out of ammo. The big man angrily tosses the weapon aside. Lilly tries to wriggle free but he wraps his gigantic hands around her puny neck and starts to strangle her.
Lilly gasps for breath as the big guy tightens his grip and breathes his noxious breath into her face, which changes color as she starts to lose consciousness.
THIRTEEN
A ball of fire builds in Lilly’s lungs as she struggles to breathe. Her vision blurs. The dim ambient light of oil lamps in the reeking barracks begins to fade, the darkness of oblivion closing in on her. All she can see now is the colossal head of her strangler—a monolithic planet orbiting Lilly’s world—glowering down at her in all its cruel crystalline detail. She can see the man’s acne scars on his livid cheeks, the nose hairs in his flaring nostrils, the green decay in between his yellow teeth, his liver-colored lips peeling back with psychotic rage. The final observation that Lilly makes before sinking into the void is the man jerking his head back suddenly and without warning. His eyes widen, and his mouth goes slack, and a stringer of drool loops down off his flaccid lower lip.
All at once Lilly can see the handle of the screwdriver that was given to Tommy Dupree now sticking out of the top of the man’s skull, and she feels the man’s huge hands suddenly loosen their hold on her neck.
Lilly gasps and coughs convulsively as the giant collapses to the floor next to her, revealing a smaller figure standing behind him.
“Oh fuck … shit … shit.” Tommy Dupree stands dead still with his skinny arms at his sides, his fingers curled into claws, his eyes wide and bright with terror. He keeps murmuring to himself, “shit … shit … shit,” while glancing down at the delicate little droplets of blood on his right wrist. Blowback from the impaling has spattered his entire sleeve.
Lilly tries to say something but is still too busy laboring to get air into her lungs. She pulls one leg from under the fallen behemoth. She rubs her neck, the tendons and cords panging with agony. She heaves for air. Wheezing and hacking, she manages to say, “Okay … Tommy … calm down.”
“What did he think he was…?” Tommy swallows hard, looking at the massive lump of a man on the floor, the screwdriver like a vestigial horn protruding from his head. “What did he…?” Tommy stares at his hands with the expression of a person not completely awakened from a nightmare, the terror still clinging to him. He wipes the blood on his pants. “I had to do it … I had to because he would have—”
He pauses abruptly, a shudder passing through him, his tears welling up.
“It’s okay, Tommy.” Lilly gets her bearings, then rises on her unsteady legs. She goes to the boy and pulls him into her arms. She hugs him to her chest, feeling the shaking deep within him like a motor running. “You did the right thing, Tommy.”
“I had to because he … he would have … he was going to kill you.”
“I know … it’s okay.” She strokes the back of his head. It’s dawning on her that perhaps the boy has never killed the living at such close range before, which is quite different from taking someone down through the distant perspective of a scope on a rifle. “Listen to me. You did well.”
“He would have killed you.” Tommy tries to stave off the tears by burying his face in the nape of Lilly’s neck. “He would have done it.”
“I know.”
“He would have killed you.”
“I know … believe me … that’s about as close as I want to come.” She gives him one last squeeze, tenderly stroking his hair. “Look at me now, Tommy.” She holds him by the arms and speaks very clearly to him. “I need you to hear me. Look at me. I need you to listen closely. Are you listening, Tommy? Look at me.”
He looks up at her through wet eyes. “I just wanted you to know I would never let anybody kill you.”
“I understand that, I do, but right now I need you to listen to what I am saying.”
His breath hitches with a sob. He’s trying, bless his heart. He’s trying so hard to be grown-up, to be dispassionate and cold and unemotional. “I just wanted you to know—”
Lilly slaps him. Not hard but brisk enough to cut through his tears. “That’s enough now. Listen to me. I’m going to need you to stop talking. I’m going to need you to shake it off.”
He nods. He wipes his face and nods again. “I’m good. I’m good.”
“Shake it off.”
He gives her another nod. “I’m good. I’m okay.” Deep breath. “I’m good, Lilly.”
“Okay, here’s the de
al. We don’t have much time now. They’re going to find these guys—it’s just a matter of when. So I’m going to need you to help me get their bodies up in their bunks. It’ll buy us a little time maybe. Who knows? Come on—first the big guy.”
They lift the massive remains of Private First Class Glenn Markham onto the corner cot, covering him up to his neck in blankets. The screwdriver comes out of his head on a rivulet of blood. Lilly quickly wipes the excess with the end of the blanket.
It takes them another minute or two to drag Daniels across the floor and position him in the other bunk. They wipe the blood trail. Then Lilly looks around the room. “Look for any spare ammo, check that locker. See if there’s another magazine for the Glock.” She picks up the HK and shucks out the magazine, replenishing it with one from the Glock. It’s a high-capacity version—thirty rounds when full—and now Lilly sees that it’s a little over half-empty. She’s about to say something when Tommy’s voice interrupts her thoughts.
“Okay!”
Lilly whirls and sees that Tommy has found a bandolier with what looks like several dozen high-powered cartridges tucked into its loops. He looks up at her. His eyes have hardened, his jaw clenched as if he’s ready now to do whatever it’ll take to get his brother and sister back. “Does this help?” he asks.
* * *
The third-floor corridor stretches a hundred feet in either direction, deserted, dark, a few gurneys pushed up against the walls, the parquet tile floor old and overscrubbed. In some places, the beige tiles have been cleaned so many times they’ve turned gray. The air hangs heavy with disinfectant, ammonia, and something stale and food-like, maybe canned cream corn or dehydrated milk. Most of the numbered doors are shut. Muffled voices come from behind some of the distant ones, probably other soldiers medicating themselves with Nightshade.
Weighed down with heavy artillery, Lilly and Tommy move down the hallway without making a sound, staying close to the wall. Lilly has the AR-15 strapped against her back, the HK in her right hand. She also has a twelve-inch tactical knife that she found on Daniels now tucked into the shaft of her boot. Tommy has the Glock gripped tightly in both hands, the bandolier tight across his narrow chest, digging into his armpit. He awkwardly walks with the gun’s muzzle forward, ready to rock, shaking slightly. Neither says a word as they approach the intersection of corridors at the end of the hall.
With a quick hand gesture, Lilly stops for a second and listens to muffled voices and footsteps coming from the floor above them. The sounds echo down a stairwell to their left. Another quick hand gesture, and they slip through a metal door and into the stairwell.
They climb the steps single file, guns at the ready. Lilly’s heart thumps as they reach the top of the stairs and pause before going through the unmarked metal door. Lilly whispers in a hoarse voice, her traumatized vocal cords still sore and creaky, “Stay close, and follow my lead.” She waits for a nod. “If bullets start to fly, stay behind me and stay low and look for a way out. Don’t wait for me. Just get the hell out. If we get separated, we’ll meet back at that rooftop. You got that?”
Tommy nods briskly, nervously. “What do we do when we find Bethany and them?”
“You follow my lead, and let me do the talking. I promise you I’ll get you and the kids out of here alive. But you have to do exactly what I say. And if you have to draw down on anybody, don’t hurry your shots. Take time to aim. I promise you, they’ll take time to aim at you. You do the same. Put that front sight in the middle of that back sight. Squeeze the trigger in one fluid motion just like I taught you. Understand?”
He nods.
“Say it.”
“I understand.”
* * *
The first thing she notices about the fourth-floor corridor is the odor—a disturbing mélange of pine-scented death-reek and acrid chemicals. Then she notices hundreds—maybe even thousands—of little Renuzit bottles. They line the scabrous floor, one every few inches along the baseboards, some of them brand new with cheerful little pictures of pinecones and evergreen boughs, apples and cinnamon sticks. Lilly blinks, her eyes burning. She pauses and surveys the far end of the corridor. At the moment, the hallway is unoccupied—a long, wide expanse of ancient tile, flickering fluorescent tubes, and stainless-steel tables—but the sounds of voices and shuffling footsteps and generators hum inside many of the rooms.
Lilly slowly creeps toward the first open doorway, her back pressed against the plaster wall, Tommy right on her heels. She sees a sign hanging above the lintel that says RADIOLOGY. Gooseflesh pours down the backs of her arms and legs as she registers the garbled sound of walkers snarling and spitting, a human voice crackling out of a two-way radio, and the rattle of equipment. She motions at Tommy, and the two of them pause just outside the doorway.
Carefully peering around the doorjamb, Lilly gets her first glimpse of what seems to be a makeshift lab set up inside the cavernous radiology department. In the sputtering light of old fluorescents, amidst a labyrinth of shelves brimming with beakers and flasks and petri dishes and test tubes spinning on centrifuges, she sees the upper torsos and heads of the reanimated dead. They hang from stainless-steel hooks, their arms amputated, their heads lolling. Someone has sewn their mouths shut with thick surgical sutures. The severed heads continue to work their jaws like cows chewing cud despite their stitched and impeded lips. Their jugulars are connected to ports sprouting IV lines, which curl and twine down to large conical flasks and condensers and cannulas on the floor beneath them. The air vibrates with the whir of laboratory equipment and generators, as well as the smell of deodorized rot.
“Lilly—?”
The whispered breath of Tommy’s voice sounds far away in Lilly’s ears. For a moment, she’s paralyzed, rapt, awed by the diabolical evidence of some sort of reorganization going on in the radiology room. She can see whiteboards along the back wall scrawled with feverish hieroglyph, hastily sketched formulas, chemical compounds filling every square inch of white space. She can see headless bodies lying on gurneys, their ragged neck openings vomiting spaghetti-like tangles of wires and tubes glistening with fluids in the fluorescent light. She can see far tables jammed with test tube racks and glass slides swathed with innumerable samples of tissue and blood and DNA from God only knows what source.
“LILLY!”
She finally tears her gaze from the room, pivots around, and looks at the boy. “What? What is it?”
“Listen.” He nods toward the opposite end of the corridor, his eyes widening with alarm.
Lilly cocks her head and listens to a strange sound that seems to be warbling and emanating from some distant warren of corridors, mingling with the faint sound of footsteps, all of it coming this way. At first, it sounds like an exotic bird shrilling and squawking. And these are no ordinary footsteps. Hasty, rubbery, squeaky, they approach with the purpose and speed of a person on a mission.
“C’mon, this way!” Lilly grabs the boy by the collar and gently ushers him into the radiology department.
* * *
They choose a shadowy area behind the hanging specimens in which to hunker and wait. Crouching down in the fetid shadows, they hide behind an equipment locker—their fingers on triggers, poised to fire at a moment’s notice—while they listen to the footsteps and the bird noises closing in.
Above them, the dripping upper torsos of the dead shudder and react to the introduction of humans to their personal space. Some of the heads twist around and search the darkness for the source of the human smells, their shoe-button eyes seeking fresh living meat, their jaws still hungrily clenching and working, their sutured lips straining to break free of the haphazard stitching. They make muffled moaning noises, their flesh filling the room with the reek of festering meat, and for some reason, it all strikes Lilly at that moment as more heartbreaking than horrifying.
Maybe the ghastly quality of dismembered pieces of the dead continuing to move and twitch—feeding off the nothingness—has lost its shock value. Now, in a way
, it’s more prophetic than terrifying. Like a burning bush. It’s where everyone is headed. And Lilly finds it agonizing to watch but also mesmerizing … right up until the point she hears the footsteps and bird sounds approaching outside in the corridor.
A nurse swishes into the room with the casual briskness of a stock clerk searching for a part. A middle-aged woman with iron-gray hair done up in a haphazard bun, and a face as weathered and lined as parchment, she wears a white uniform that’s shiny and pilled with age, and she carries a caterwauling baby in her arms. The infant looks to be only a few months old, its cherubic little face soiled and chapped, its body swaddled in an old blanket.
Crossing the room, the nurse absently bounces the baby on her hip in a futile effort to get it to quiet down. The baby runs out of air for a moment, then shrieks some more as the nurse casually walks up to a stainless-steel refrigerator. She elbows it open, reaches in, and pulls out a laboratory jar filled with unidentified pink fluid.
Then, just as abruptly as she entered, she turns and whisks back across the room and swishes out into the corridor, the baby squalling and ululating as they depart.
Lilly gives Tommy a nod. He nods back at her. Then Lilly rises to her feet and crosses the room with her HK in both hands, her gaze locked onto the corridor, her boots making very little noise on the parquet floor. Tommy stays close on her heels. Lilly reaches the door and hears the sobbing cries of the baby receding down the hall. Lilly takes a deep breath and peers around the jamb.
The nurse has reached the end of the corridor, and now she carries the infant through a glass door and up another narrow staircase. Lilly indicates to Tommy that he should follow her and do it quietly.
They slip out the door and start down the hallway, Lilly holding the machine pistol’s muzzle out in front of her as steady as a ship’s prow. Tommy does the same, both his hands keeping a sweaty grip on the Glock. They move silently, hastily, keeping close to the wall.
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