by Jaspre Bark
"Forty-two to be exact."
Cortez placed a hand on Greaves shoulder to stop him interrupting again. "If we're going to have to shoot our way out we're going to need as many men as we can get." Cortez turned to Colt. He was a powerful looking man, Colt would give him that. "I need to know that if I freed you and your men you'd fight alongside us, not go off on your own or try and attack us while we're in here."
"I'm not going to let you free these men," said Hiamovi. "I thought I already made that clear."
"With respect Great Chief," said Cortez. "I may not control an army but we're holding the keys to the cells, no-one else here knows how to get around the place and we're the only people who know how to get the Doomsday Virus out of here. We're the ones who set the terms of this escape."
"How do I know you're not planning to double cross us once you get the virus?" said Hiamovi.
"Of course we're planning to double cross you," said Greaves. "Just as you're already thinking of ways to double cross both Colt and us, and Colt here is dreaming up ways to get one over the rest of us. That doesn't matter. What's important is that none of those plans will come to anything unless we all agree to work together right now to get out of here."
"He's got a point Hiamovi," said Colt. "I don't like him anymore than you do, but you can't argue with the little runt."
Cortez looked Hiamovi in the eye. "Agreed?"
Hiamovi nodded.
Cortez met Colt's gaze.
"I got no argument," said Colt. "I want to get out of here and get some payback."
His anger had fused with his compassion turning it into a fierce protectiveness. He felt protective of the men in his command and of his faith. He was ready to kill to see they came to no harm.
Cortez unlocked Colt's pen and offered Colt his hand to help him up. The two sized each other up as Colt got to his feet. Be careful of this man, Colt thought. Better to have him on your side when it counted.
As Cortez freed Colt's men they squared off against Hiamovi and his braves. Neither side took their eye off the other for a second. Hiamovi and Colt had been bitter enemies since each began their rise to power. This was the first time they'd met face to face. Not as opponents, but allies in a desperate bid for freedom. Fighting side by side to escape and go back to their war.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Fitch still had a stinking headache when he reached the bottom of the stairs. The little faggot with the glasses was seriously pissing him off and as soon as Fitch got a gun, that little fucker better not turn his back on him.
He'd led them all over the complex, hiding round corners waiting for cameras to go off. Then they doubled back on themselves and headed for a stairwell they'd already passed. And the faggot Greaves comes on all superior like that's what he'd planned the whole time. Acting like his college education meant the rest of them ought to kneel and kiss his heiny. Fitch was going to put his fist up it in a minute.
He was still groggy from that pollen shit that had knocked him out. His head throbbed and his guts wanted to puke, only he wasn't going to let them. Fitch hoped they'd get into this armoury soon, because someone had to die for the way he was feeling.
At the top of the stairs Greaves started whining about the door to the armoury being an exit only door with the lock on the inside. "I didn't anticipate this from the blueprints," he said. "What we need to do is punch a hole…"
Fitch stepped up to the door and pushed him aside. "One side Einstein," he said, then he caught a whiff of the runt. "Jesus you stink!"
When the big, bearded wetback started to get up in his face, Fitch knew he was outclassed. He held his hands up. "Listen. I got no beef with you. But while Joe College here was getting his ass kicked by frat boys, I was getting my education in jacking Seven-Elevens. This is my area of speciality."
Fitch took in the door. It was heavy and there were no locks, or handles showing. "We need to jimmy it," he said. He looked around and saw the metal spindles on the stairwell. One good kick and they'd come free. He nodded to Golding to join him and they tore three loose.
"You wanna give us a hand Tom?" Fitch said, then realised his mistake. "I mean Ahiga. This is a three man operation you know that?"
Tom looked over at his Chief, who nodded and them helped them ram the spindles into the door jamb between the hinges. They leant on the spindles and popped the hinges out of the jamb.
The three of them busting a back door to jack some stuff was just like back in the day with 57th Street bangers. Everyone in Boulder knew about them. They ran Lomont. Tom joined them straight out of reform school where he'd met Golding. Golding and Fitch grew up on the same block. The three of them were the meanest mother-fuckers their age and they were on their way up in the gang.
At one point Tom had looked to take over as leader. Fitch and Golding had put a stop to that after they'd discovered Tom's little secret. He'd have been dead if word got out. But instead of slipping a noose round his neck they put a leash on him. Turned him into their bitch. The Cull came down pretty soon after that and Tom had drifted back to his own folks and became Ahiga. Fitch and Golding went into the Neo-Clergy.
Cortez was first through the door. Fitch and Golding followed. They entered a side room filled with metal shelves and boxes. There were pegs all over the walls with stuff like flak jackets, gas masks and bullet proof vests hanging from them.
Fitch walked past a shelf and saw a guard with a clipboard. He had earphones in so he wouldn't have heard them come in, but he looked up and saw Fitch. Before either of them reacted Cortez was right behind the man, grabbing his head and wrenching it round. Fitch heard the man's spinal column snap with a crunch of vertebrae. He was blown away. Cortez was quick and lethal.
Greaves bent down and picked up the clipboard. "It's an inventory. The guns are in the next room."
Cortez was careful to make no sound as he stepped into the room. A huge cache of firearms were on display. He heard the sound of voices coming from behind one of the racks.
Cortez signalled to Fitch and Golding to be quiet and get out of sight.
"So Burns tells him if he's late again he'll be on permanent latrine duty," said a guard, stepping into sight.
"He's such a jerk off," said the guard next to him. "They should clean the latrines with his face. Have we done grenades yet?"
"I don't think so."
Cortez found a row of belts, each with a knife and a sheath on it. He took one knife and tossed it to Fitch then removed another for himself. He signalled to Fitch and Golding to go down to the far end of the racks and to come up on the left hand guard from behind.
Cortez went the opposite way and came around the other end of the racks. As he glanced into the aisle where the guards were he heard a clatter from the other end of the room. Fitch or Golding must have knocked something over. The two guards turned to see and Cortez took advantage of their distraction.
He came up on the second guard from behind, placing a hand over the man's mouth Then he brought the knife round and rammed it into his heart. Blood gushed out in warm spurts, spilling down Cortez's hand as he gripped the knife.
The first guard dropped his clipboard and backed away down the aisle, fumbling for his weapon. Golding grabbed him from behind and held his arms while Fitch stuck his knife into the man's guts. He pulled it out and stabbed him twice more.
The guard broke free from Golding screaming in pain as blood poured from his wounds. Catching hold of the guard again Golding put a hand over the man's mouth as Fitch stuck him repeatedly with his knife.
Cortez heard footsteps approaching on the opposite side of the room and, as another guard entered, he brought the knife down on the top of the man's head, ramming it through his skull.
The guard stepped back staring at Cortez with anger and shock. His eyes rolled back into his skull and a thin trickle of blood ran down his face.
Cortez was about to step over the body when a bullet whistled past his ear and clipped the wall next to him. He dived out of sigh
t and dragged the body of the guard towards him. Cortez pulled the man's pistol out of his holster. He leaned round the doorway and let off a shot into the office beyond.
Several more shots tore through the doorway hitting the walls and the floor and, from what Cortez could see, there were two more guards in what looked like a front office.
Cortez turned to see Fitch and Golding loading three pump-action shotguns. Colt and Hiamovi were coming up the centre aisle. Cortez raised a hand to caution them and they stopped.
Fitch threw Cortez a shotgun. Cortez lifted the dead guard's body into the doorway to use as cover and draw the other guards' fire. Four or five bullets thudded into the corpse. Cortez could see that one guard was using a desk as cover. He got a bead on the man's position and squeezed the trigger.
The round blew a huge hole in the desk. There was a scream of pain. Fitch, Golding and Cortez counted silently down from three before entering the room and letting off a barrage of gunfire.
The desk was blown apart along with the body of the guard behind it. The last guard made a bolt for the exit. Fitch caught him with a blast to the shoulder that threw him against the door. Cortez and Golding opened up, tearing chunks out of him.
Cortez checked the front office. There were no more guards, but the gun shots would surely have alerted the others. He needed Greaves and his smarts to lock the place the down and get them a way out.
Greaves was out in the main armoury watching the escapees drool over the weaponry on display. They were helping themselves to whatever they could carry, discarding one weapon as soon as they saw a better one.
His heart sank as soon as shots were traded. The noise was deafening. It would bring half the guards in the complex down on them. They had to secure the armoury, then find a way out.
Greaves moved to the exit at the other end of the room. It was electronically activated and it opened onto stairs leading to the officer's quarters. The keypad was on the other side of the door. There was no way Greaves could disable it.
He turned and called to one of the Native Americans who was helping himself to ammunition. "Quick. You've got to shoot at this wall. Right there where I'm pointing." The brave did nothing but stare at him suspiciously.
"There's an electronic lock on the other side of this wall. This leads to the officer's quarters. Any minute now guards are going to be swarming out of it. We have to take out the lock."
The brave turned to look at Hiamovi who nodded and the brave fired three shots into the wall.
Greaves jumped out of the way as chunks of plaster and dust flew. The third shot hit its target and sparks leapt out of the hole.
Cortez put a hand on Greaves' shoulder. "We need to secure the entrance to the front office."
Once in the office Greaves found the control console and activated the security shutters. Reinforced steel slammed down over the doors.
There were shots from the stairwell outside. When they got there they saw that Colt and his henchman, Simon Peter, were at the door. "They tried to get in by the stairs," Colt said. "We put a stop to that."
"Is there another exit out of here?" Cortez asked Greaves.
"Yes. There's another door on the opposite side that leads to a different stairwell, but they'll be trying that one as well now. We've got to barricade both doors."
"No shit," said Colt. "But that won't hold 'em long. I thought you were the one that who had everything planned out. Least ways that's how you act. Now it's all falling apart, where's this brilliant plan of yours?"
Greaves didn't have an answer. He always had an answer. Something always came to him. But nothing came now. He felt himself start to buckle under the pressure. He was close to physical collapse from illness and infection. He hadn't eaten or slept properly in weeks. He was starting to get palpitations. It was just like his breakdown. He felt events spiralling out of his control. They were looming over and threatening to crush him. No, he was stronger than last time, older and wiser. He thought of Cortez who overcame everything that was put in his way. Be like that, Greaves told himself. Be like Cortez.
It was all Sinnot's fault that he was feeling this way. He was the one who had dragged up Greaves' past. There had been so much pressure on him from such an early age, so many expectations and so many great things he was supposed to have done by now. As Sinnot had said, so much wasted potential.
Greaves could have been anything but he ended up a lab assistant. And Sinnot had cheated him out of his last chance to be something worthwhile, to live up to all that incredible early potential. To redeem himself.
That's what he was in search of when he found Anna – redemption. To make up for all that lost promise he would rescue the remnants of humanity from their own stupidity.
Sinnot and his idiot colleagues had no idea what they actually had in the Doomsday Virus. They hadn't the foresight or the imagination to see. All they wanted was to hand it over to their paymasters so they could go on running the world in the same stupid and brutal way they always had.
Greaves was so close, but it was all getting too difficult. Too many things kept going wrong. He started to hyperventilate. He reached into one of his pockets for a paper bag to breath into. He could see the men around him smirk. They were no better than the jocks from high school who laughed at the prepubescent maths whiz who had to do gym with them along with his other lessons.
As they moved one of the shelves in front of the doorway, a box of night-vision goggles fell off it.
"I've got it," Greaves said. "We kill the lights and use these goggles. They won't see us but we'll be able to see them."
"How are we going to do that?" Colt said.
"We'll take out the fuse box on this floor to begin with."
"That's no good," said Fitch. "They'll just wait till we go up to the next floor where there is light."
"That's just to buy us enough time to get out of here before the explosion," Greaves said.
"What explosion?" Colt said.
"Here's the clever bit. In the far room is where they keep all the high explosive. This room and the main one are right over the generator in the sub-basement. If we set enough explosive in these two rooms, we'll take out the floors above and below. We'll also destroy the generator and kill the power to the whole complex, while taking out the guards in the barracks above us at the same time. Those that are left won't be able to see and they won't be able to re-arm themselves because we'll have totalled the armoury. What's more, once power is down all the freezing equipment that's keeping the biological weaponry safe won't work. We'll have just enough time to get out before the place becomes infected. Everyone else will be too busy evacuating to avoid infection, to stop us taking the Doomsday Virus."
The looks on all the men's faces changed. They couldn't see a flaw in the plan. They stopped sneering at Greaves and in spite of themselves they all looked impressed.
"Now you see why I keep him around," said Cortez.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Anna had given them every kind of bodily fluid. They'd taken her blood, urine, saliva and they'd even done something called a smear test. The man called Sinnot and his scientists buzzed around her with so much excitement they reminded her of the clients at the Pleasuredrome. Only they seemed more cowardly than those men and a lot more dangerous.
Now they were subjecting her to something they called a CAT scan. She was strapped to a padded metal table that moved in and out of a revolving tunnel. In the next room she heard them discussing the images of her brain that appeared on a computer screen.
"She's too old," Anna heard Sinnot say. "She's got too many defined neural pathways, we couldn't counteract them all. Besides the micro-circuitry is to small to fit an adult brain."
"We can shut down any part of her brain that resists processing," said the man called Bennet. "Any vital functions that effects can be controlled by our CPU. We've already proven that."
"Besides," said another man who she thought was called Roth. "We don't need to rebuild the micro-c
ircuitry, just the bio-connector, which is the easiest part of the apparatus to replicate."
"But we've never done this with a subject of her age," said Sinnot. "She's not pliable enough for our requirements."
"She's the only hope we've got." Bennet said. "Our masters aren't taking our failure well, and we've got nothing else to bargain with."
Anna could feel the Doomsday Virus elsewhere in the complex. It was writhing inside the super-cooled containers. It already felt like another part of her body. When she was back at the community Anna had once heard a woman who had lost two babies talking. She had said she could still feel both of them at her nipple a month after they'd gone.
And there was Old Eli, a farm worker who lost a hand in a shooting accident. He told Anna once that the back of his hand still itched from time to time even though he couldn't scratch it.
That's what the Doomsday Virus felt like to Anna. Like some kind of phantom limb that had been cut off at birth and kept in jar. Now she was here in the complex it had come to life. She could feel its excitement, its hunger to be joined with her again.
Anna heard the doors to the lab hiss open and she craned her neck to see four guards burst in. "Sir," Anna heard a guard say. "You've to come with us straight away."
"What the hell are you doing in here?" Sinnot said. "You've absolutely no clearance. We're conducting important work."
"Sir we have orders to get you and your team to safety."
"Safety? What on earth are you talking about? You're about to place our whole work in jeopardy!"
"It's you and the other doctors who are in jeopardy. The prisoners have escaped and they're armed."
"Armed?" said Bennet. "How did that happen? "
"I can't tell you that now sir."
"One minute," said Sinnot. "I'll get the girl and we'll leave. "
"Sir, our orders said nothing about the girl. Only you three doctors."
"Don't be ridiculous man," said Sinnot. "Don't you know how important she is to our whole work here?"
