The List - A Thriller

by Konrath, J. A.

  “Where?”

  “The next room. There’s a hidden door.”

  It was a trophy room, deer heads and trout mounted on oak plaques and hanging on all four walls. A fireplace was in one corner, a matching sofa and chair arranged around it on the wooden floor. Tom checked the room out, top to bottom, and couldn’t find any evidence of a hidden door.

  “That’s because it’s hidden,” Stang snapped. “Go to that bookcase and take out the volume of Moby Dick.”

  Tom found the book and pulled on it, half-expecting a secret passage to open. None did. He flipped through the book and it appeared normal.

  “What’s the deal?”

  “Hold the book against the wall, just above the light switch. It’s a magnetic lock. Then flip the switch up.”

  Tom did as instructed, and there was a clicking noise. Several wood panels in the center of the floor had risen up about an inch. Tom knelt down and realized it was a trap door, the seams hidden by the natural cut of the wood. He pulled open the hatch and flashed his penlight into the hole. A staircase.

  “At the bottom there’s a keypad. The code is 61694. Punch it in and the door will open. There’s a short hallway, and at the end of the hall there’s another door with another lock, same code. That’s my safe. The papers are in there.”

  Tom sniffed the air. It was stale, and something else. Musky.

  “Want me to go?”

  Tom shook his head at Joan. “Stay here. If anything happens to me, tell my partner to snap Stang’s neck.”

  He took the stairs slowly. When he reached the bottom he figured he was about twenty feet underground. A large aluminum door blocked his path. Tom found the keypad to his left and punched in the numbers. There was a clang and a hiss, and the door clicked open.

  Tom was hit by a wave of cool, damp air. The musky smell was stronger, more acrid. He pushed the door inward and aimed the penlight down the dark hall.

  “There’s a light switch,” Stang called to him, “on the wall to the right.”

  Tom located the switch. He flipped it up, bathing the narrow hallway with pale yellow light. Looking ahead about fifteen feet, he saw another metal door. This one appeared larger, stronger. It also had a big metal slat in the center, with a slide bar. Tom had seen a similar contraption on a door in the solitary confinement wing at Joliet State Penitentiary. It had been the food slot. Violent inmates could receive their meals without the risk of opening the door.

  “Hey Stang, what’s this thing in the middle of the door?”

  “I can put valuables into the safe without opening it up.”

  Tom didn’t know if he bought that. His back hurt, his ribs hurt, and he now felt a sharp stab of paranoia. He approached cautiously, gun in hand. Being careful, he pulled back the slat on the door and tried to peer inside. It was dark, and his penlight didn’t penetrate very far. An awful stench came through the slot—the smell of death. Tom thought it over. What if this wasn’t a safe at all? What if it was some kind of private graveyard?

  Actually, that would be a good thing. If Stang was burying dead bodies under his house, they wouldn’t need all the cloning evidence to put him away. Local law enforcement would take care of him, and the media would take care of his son.

  Tom punched in the code and the door unlocked. This one opened outward rather than inward. He peered inside the room, awash in the awful smell, trying to see in the darkness.

  He called to Stang. “Is there a light?”

  “On the far wall. It’s only a few feet inside.”

  “What’s that awful smell?”

  “A, uh, an animal burrowed under the house and died. We haven’t been able to find it.”

  That sounded like a big grandaddy lie. Tom took a step into the room, trying to steel himself against any possible shock.

  He didn’t see it, but he immediately sensed something directly in front of him. The hairs on his neck stood up, and he aimed his gun forward. By then there was movement on both sides of him as well.

  Tom managed to fire twice before he got knocked off his feet. He landed on his back, hard. Something was on top of him, moaning and snarling. Tom felt rancid breath, hair, teeth. Mad dog?

  No. Worse. Much worse.

  He managed to push the attacker at arm’s length and got a look. It was a man, with wild eyes, long hair, and a ragged beard. Black and jagged teeth. On his forehead, beneath the grime, Tom could make out a long scar. Deep, and old. And if the shock couldn’t get any greater, Tom was stunned to recognize the face.

  It was Stang.

  The man tore at Tom with filthy fingernails. Another man stood over them both. He was also Stang, with a similar scar on his forehead. But this one was cleaner looking. Tom saw that he was holding something at his side. A white bandage, stained with some blood. Right in the spot where a kidney would be.

  No wonder Stang was able to get so many organ transplants. He had his own personal supply, locked away down here. And always a perfect tissue match. Stang must have kept all of Harold’s early cloning experiments, and then raised them to be spare parts. The thought horrified Tom. Have they been locked up here their whole lives?

  The clone on top of him continued to growl and attack, and Tom noted that three more scrambled out of the darkness of their cell and ran down the hall.

  “Jo—” Tom tried to call out but a grimy hand forced its way into his mouth, cutting off his voice. His gun arm was pinned. Tom grunted, and with all of his effort managed to roll his attacker over and get on top of him. He brought up his gun and aimed at the clone’s chest, firing two shots.

  Almost immediately he was hit from behind by another clone. His gun was knocked from his fist, skittering across the floor. The man on his back began to pound on him with both hands, each blow bringing stars to Tom’s eyes. Then he was suddenly dead weight on Tom, mashing him onto the corpse below him. The weight doubled as another clone tried to climb over them, and another, and another.

  Tom was being crushed by the pile of bodies, and very close to blacking out. He tried to fight it, tried to hold on, but he couldn’t draw a breath and the pain and claustrophobia were so intense he felt he might go insane. Tom tried one last time to scream out Joan’s name, to try to warn her.

  All that came out was a weak moan.

  “So you’re a clone of your father?”

  Phil Jr. nodded under the towel. Bert had finally tired of the complaining and was wiping his face.

  “I’m going to be President and—”

  They were interrupted by a sharp report, muffled but obvious. A gunshot.

  Roy went to the door, taser in hand. “Stay here.”

  Bert shook his head. “If Tom’s in trouble, we both go.”

  Roy nodded. He hadn’t even taken one step out of the door when Bert saw the blade flash.

  Roy fell into the hall, his taser clattering to the floor where he stood. And then the man came into the room. Bert mouthed his name.

  “Attila.”

  His samurai sword was held in both hands. Bert noticed the blood dripping from the tip.

  Roy’s blood.

  “Attila!” Phil’s voice was cracking with emotion. “What took you so damn long?”

  The small man grinned, exposing a single gold tooth in a field of rotten ones. “Needed eye gear.”

  On Attila’s head were a set of swimming goggles, held on by an elastic band. He pointed his sword at Bert and slashed an X in the air.

  Goggles or not, Bert let him have it with the pepper spray. He squirted Attila in the chest and face, a powerful eight second blast. When the fog lifted, the man was still standing there. His face was bright red, puffy, and the goggles appeared tighter on his eyes. His breath came in rasps, and his lips were swollen to double their size. But he could still apparently see, because he lunged straight at Bert with the sword.

  Bert tripped backwards over Jerome and fell onto his ass, narrowly dodging the blow. But the pain from his gluteus maximus was like getting impaled all over
again.

  “Kill him!” Phil yelled.

  Still gripping the can, Bert sent another stream of pepper at Attila, wondering what could possibly be keeping this man on his feet. It was bear repellent, for God’s sake.

  Attila continued to advance, slashing at the spray with his sword. He’d begun to howl, his face so swollen he looked like a Cabbage Patch doll. The sword came, closer, closer, and Bert felt that he was going to drop dead from fright before Attila even touched him.

  Another lunge. Bert rolled away. The pepper fog in the room was now so bad that Bert was having trouble keeping his eyes open. It hurt like crazy. He blinked away the tears and tried not to breathe too deeply.

  Attila planted both his feet and slashed, swinging at Bert’s head like a baseball player. Bert ducked, and the sword neatly cut off a lock of his hair. He dove onto Stang’s bed and tried to crawl across the mattress. A quick look over his shoulder found that Attila was standing directly behind him, puffy face grinning, ready to bring down the blade.

  Someone yelled, “Hey!”

  Attila paused, turning at the doorway, his swollen eyes squinting through the goggles.

  Roy shot Attila with the taser. The probes hit him squarely in the chest, and Bert watched in awe as the first arc of blue electricity ignited the alcohol-based pepper spray soaking Attila’s clothing.

  It was like throwing a match on a gas grill.

  Attila dropped the sword and screamed, trying to beat out the flames that had exploded all over his body. He just made it worse. Soon the bed canopy was also on fire, and the drapes, and some of the carpet.

  Phil Jr. backed away from him, his face pure panic. “Help me!”

  Bert watched in horrific fascination as Attila took two, three, four steps towards the Speaker of the House. Phil Jr. had run out of room and was cowering next to the railing, hands raised in supplication.

  “Stay away!”

  Attila collapsed on top of him, tangling his limbs in Phil’s, setting his benefactor on fire.

  Their screams mingled into a high pitched cry that seemed to go on and on. Bert turned away from the horror, focusing on Roy. The cop shuffled into the room, holding his left shoulder. Blood dripped down from his fingertips. Across his chest was a twelve inch slash in the Kelvar vest.

  “Time to go.”

  Bert hurried to him, took a quick look at the wound on his arm. It was deep and ugly, possibly an artery.

  “We have to get out of here.”

  They made it into the hallway, just in time to see two people running at them. Tom and Joan?

  When the figures came into view Bert almost yelped.

  They looked like cave men, dirty and hairy and loping in a strange gait. Bert didn’t stop to think about who they were or what they wanted. He still held the bear repellent and he fired straight at them. They rolled onto the floor, wailing and pawing at their faces.

  Roy mumbled. “Jesus. They look like Stang.”

  Bert pulled Roy’s arm over his shoulder and tried to bear his friend’s weight. They half-walked, half-stumbled to the staircase. Another one of the crazy people was lumbering up the stairs, covered in blood. Bert brought up the spray and pressed the trigger. Empty.

  He threw the can, bouncing it off the lunatic’s head. The man kept coming, flailing his arms, eyes crazy. Bert tried to brace himself for the impact, but it was all he could do to hold up the sagging Roy. The man jumped on them, pulling and kicking. Bert reached for the railing, trying to keep his balance, and then all three of them were tumbling feet over head down the long grand staircase.

  Joan heard the gunshot at the same moment she saw the man running up the stairs. He was followed by two more. Joan took two steps back and widened her stance. She kept the baton in front of her in a defensive position.

  The first man emerged, hairy, bewildered. Joan did a double-take. It looked like a bearded, dirty Phil Jr. Another clone? She tightened her grip, ready to attack.

  But instead of running at her, the man launched himself at Stang. The old man whimpered, bringing up both frail arms to protect himself. He was quickly yanked out of his wheelchair and thrown to the floor. The other two men came up the stairs and joined in the fray, scratching and slobbering and pulling him to pieces.

  Joan didn’t stick around to watch. She took the stairs two at a time, moving as fast as she could. Barely one step into the lower hallway a man reached for her, pulling at her hair. Joan brought the baton down onto his collarbone and he crumbled to the ground.

  Ahead of her was a human pile of unwashed, hysterical Stang clones. Joan spotted a hand protruding from the giant mound of bodies. Tom’s. She sprinted to his aid.

  Her first impulse was to grab the gun, start shooting, but that would leave him buried in dead weight. Instead she pulled, and pushed, and smacked arms and legs and noses to get the clones to move. Gradually she uncovered Tom’s head, bright red from pressure and oxygen deprivation. She grabbed him by the vest and yanked, her feet pushing against the body beneath him. Once his upper body came free he made a sound like a vacuum cleaner. Joan put an ear to his mouth, listening for breath. It was fast and steady.

  The clones had given her a wide berth, nursing sore arms and heads. There were at least six of them in the hall, and God knew how many more in that dark room.

  “Thanks.”

  Tom had opened his eyes, and was staring at her.

  “What the hell is going on, Tom?”

  Tom coughed. “Stang’s personal organ bank. You can guess the Catch-22. If kidney disease is genetic, he keeps replacing his bad kidneys with other bad kidneys.”

  “What’s wrong with them? Are they crazy?”

  “Those scars on their heads are from lobotomies. To keep them from knowing what’s going on.”

  Joan helped him to his feet. But instead of going back down the hall, Tom limped into the dark room where the clones had been kept.

  “What are you doing?”

  Tom coughed. “I think Stang was telling the truth. I think the papers are in here. Could you come up with a safer place to keep them?”

  “Maybe there are no papers. Maybe they were destroyed.”

  “Stang’s ego is too big. He’d never destroy evidence of his scientific triumph.”

  Tom picked up his penlight, groaning at the exertion of bending down. He flashed it into the room. Joan assumed a defensive posture, unsure of what horrors may await, and followed him in. The smell was overwhelming—stale body odor and rotten food. Tom played the small beam of light over three rows of stained cots, maybe twenty in all. In the corner was a toilet and sink, cracked and filthy. Along the near wall was a pile of tin dishes, seemingly out of place because they were neatly stacked.

  Tom flashed the light on the far wall. There was another metal door, complete with keypad.

  “What was that number?”

  Joan approached the panel and tapped in 61694. The door clicked open and they peered inside. Two file cabinets, dusty and old. Tom opened the top drawer. Manila folders.

  “We found them.” He tried to tilt the file cabinet up onto its side. “Heavy. Maybe we can find some suitcases or—oh shit…”

  Tom directed his flashlight beam behind them. Joan gasped. Twelve of the clones had returned, and they were coming closer.

  “I only have five bullets left.”

  “Maybe they won’t attack.”

  The clones attacked.

  Joan lashed out with the baton, cracking the nearest clone in the head. He fell backwards, howling. Tom’s gun boomed in her eardrums, and another clone went down.

  “Get to the door!”

  Tom tried to grab her wrist but she held him back. It was a bad move, defensively. Better to keep their backs to the wall, so they couldn’t be surrounded.

  She spun and hit another clone with a reverse kick. Someone grabbed her leg and she bounced the baton off his face. Another shot, and a moan. Joan rabbit punched the clone in front of her, driving the aluminum club into his stomach. A
second clone tugged at her arm and brought it up to his mouth to bite. She tried to pull away, but another slipped behind her, getting her in a choke hold. Joan watched, horrified, as the biter grinned. His mouth was a sewer of black and rot, and saliva dripped down his chin as he prepared to take a hunk out of Joan’s wrist.

  Joan pivoted, flipping the choker over her hip, dislodging the biter before he had a chance to break the skin. She glanced to her right and watched Tom fire two more shots, then get tackled. Swinging her baton like a sword, she slashed her way past several clones and reached Tom, cracking the man on top of him across the temple. He crumpled, and Tom pushed him off. She helped him to his feet, and they faced the horde.