by Ray Garton
It was Corcoran’s voice coming from the rear entrance. His footsteps sounded as he jogged toward them.
“Two of the test subjects are out there attacking someone in a car,” he said.
“Who the hell went out and got in their car?” Ollie barked.
“No, no,” Corcoran said, shaking his head hard. He stood rigid, fists clenched at his sides. “It’s someone who’s driving here, to the hospital. A police car. They’re outside the gate, but the gates are open, for some reason. Crashed open. From inside. And somebody stole my goddamned Jeep!” As he shouted the last sentence, his whole body quaked.
“Did you get that coat out of my closet?” Fara asked absently. It sounded more like a thought inadvertently spoken aloud than a question in search of an answer.
“I bet Ivan called the sheriff,” Emilio said.
“The sheriff,” Ollie said. “Fuck.” He turned to his men and shouted, “Did any of you hear that? While we’re standing here contemplating our fuckin’ navels, those people are gettin’ out of the fuckin’ building!” He called out, “McCoy! Baker! Axelrod! Come with me!”
They followed Ollie down the corridor, the light from their headlamps bouncing and swaying through the dark ahead of them.
“What were you doing out there, Dr. Corcoran?” Fara said, shining her small Maglite directly in his face. “Trying to leave?”
Corcoran squinted and turned his head away. He made a sound of disgust as he held up a hand to shield his eyes from the light. “I . . . I wanted to get something from my car.”
Fara nodded. “Uh-huh. A new location. I so admire a man who stands behind his work.”
Corcoran looked down at her right hand, which hung at her side, then at her, with disbelief. “Is that a gun in your hand, Dr. McManus?”
“It is. And I know how to use it. Remember that the next time you think about trying to ditch us. You’re going down with this ship, captain. Vendon Labs may be able to step in and save your ass, but I’m going to make it as difficult for them as possible.”
Corcoran fidgeted and tried to dodge Fara’s light, but like a mean child holding a magnifying glass over an ant on a sunny day, she wouldn’t let him. Finally, he straightened his back and looked directly at her with squinting eyes.
“You seem to be forgetting who’s in charge here, Dr. McManus,” he said.
“It’s certainly not you, Dr. Corcoran. Not anymore.”
Watching Fara stand up to Corcoran, listening to her talk to him like that—Emilio thought it was sexy as hell. He was glad it was dark because he’d been watching her with an admiring smile and a growing erection.
Then Emilio noticed that Dr. Corcoran was looking at him. Staring at him. As if he expected him to say something. It quickly made Emilio uncomfortable.
“What?” he said, shrugging. “She’s right. Looks like Ollie’s the alpha male in here now. And outside, the hurricane’s in charge. Right here, though, in this corridor?” He nodded his head toward Fara. “She’s in charge. And she’s got a gun. I’d listen to her.”
Corcoran lifted the back of his hand to his eyes against the light. “Put that fucking light down. You’ve made your point.”
Fara lowered the light and Corcoran dropped his hand. He looked back and forth between them with a contemptuous smirk that oozed into a smile.
He chuckled that annoying chuckle of his, then said, “You’re in for such an unpleasant surprise.”
“What does that mean?” Fara said.
He kept smiling, but didn’t say anything.
“What does that mean, Dr. Corcoran? What surprise?”
Another chuckle, then he said, “You’ve got the light. Let’s go.”
Corcoran stepped around Emilio and headed for the office.
“What the hell do you think he means?” Emilio whispered.
“I have no idea, but it worries me.”
“Are you coming?” Corcoran said.
They followed him down the drafty, cold corridor.
Emilio’s stomach growled with hunger, which would soon be followed by acidic burning. He had some Gaviscon tablets in the utility closet they’d just passed, but he didn’t stop to get them. He’d do that later. The heartburn and reflux were always worse when he was seriously worried about something, and if Fara was worried, then Emilio was damned sure worried, because she knew this guy a lot better than he did. When Emilio had come to work there, he’d decided pretty quickly that he didn’t like Corcoran simply based on his behavior. Fara had much better and far more solid reasons for not liking him, and though he didn’t know what all of them were, Emilio trusted them.
The sound of a door gently closing with a couple of clicks was just loud enough to catch Fara’s attention. She stopped walking and turned toward the sound with her light—to her left, the beam sweeping along the wall to stop on the door marked STAIRS, and beneath that, EMPLOYEES ONLY.
“Did you hear that?” she said.
“Yeah,” Emilio said. “Ollie sent a guy down to the basement earlier.”
She aimed the light down the middle of the corridor, swept it back and forth to see if there was anyone behind them. There was no one, nothing. She turned the light back to the door—
—as it finished swinging shut and made that same clicking sound again.
“Hey,” she said, “what was—”
“Fucking cunt!” a thick female voice growled as a fist swung out of the darkness and struck Fara in the left side of her jaw.
“Shit,” Emilio said, quickly stepping forward to catch her before she fell. The gun and flashlight clattered to the floor. Her body was limp, she was unconscious, and the woman who had punched her babbled furiously as she began pummeling Fara with her fists while Emilio held her.
Occasionally, something coherent emerged from the woman’s angry, senseless babbling and ranting.
“You hateful bastard, you never loved me, you son of a bitch, eighteen years, eighteen fucking years!”
Her face remained obscured by darkness, but the shape of her head told him she was mostly bald.
He backed away from the woman, tried kicking her but couldn’t connect, then backed away some more. He bent down and swept Fara’s legs up, then swung his leg up again. This time, his foot connected solidly with her left knee and she stumbled and fell as Emilio turned and ran to the office door. He heard her getting up, though, ranting, coming after him.
“Run away! Run away! That’s all you ever do, you useless prick, you liar, you thief, you fucking asshole! I’m finally gonna kill you!” Then she became incoherent again, making more sounds than words.
The office door stood open, with the soft glow of candlelight coming from inside.
Hands grabbed the back of Emilio’s shirt and the woman’s angry, incoherent babbling was suddenly in his right ear as she latched on to his shoulders and wrapped her skinny legs around his waist.
“Goddammit, lady!” Emilio croaked, panting as he turned around and slammed her against the wall, throwing all his weight into her, trying to crush her.
She grunted and wheezed as her lungs emptied and he felt something crack against his back—a rib? Her hold on his shoulders and waist weakened until her legs slipped off of him and her arms dropped down to her sides.
Emilio stepped forward and the woman dropped to the floor with a whimpering sound. He sidled through the door, pushing Fara’s feet through first, then kicked it shut behind him. He spun around and turned the lock on the doorknob, then carried Fara into the office and gently placed her on the couch.
“What the hell was that?” Corcoran said. He was already seated at her desk again, smoking a cigarette. “What’s wrong with her?” He pulled his feet off the desk and stood, went to the couch and stood behind Emilio.
Emilio ignored him and knelt on the floor beside Fara. A bruise was beginning to darken on her cheek as it became puffy with swelling.
She coughed and sniffled and opened her eyes only slightly.
“That’s twice you�
��ve been punched in the face in one night,” Emilio said.
She closed her eyes again. “Yeah, but I don’t think it’s the kind of thing you get better at with practice.”
“The door’s locked and she’s in the hall not feeling very well, I think. We’re safe for now.”
“Who clocked you?” Corcoran said, peering over Emilio’s shoulder with a smile that he was managing to hold down to a smirk.
“I think it was one of the survivors,” Fara said without opening her eyes. She sat up and put her feet on the floor.
Emilio stood and said, “I’ll get some cold water for that—”
“No, not yet,” she said. “I don’t want to touch it yet. Half my face is throbbing and my headache’s back.”
Emilio sat beside her on the couch.
Corcoran paced while he smoked.
The storm continued to assault the building with a howling rage.
43
Ollie felt as if he were moving through a dream because the simple act of walking in the storm was like trying to walk through water against a strong current. He saw the car’s lights as soon as he stepped outside.
He did not want any trouble with the police, but at this point, it was inevitable. Ollie could not remember ever making a bigger mistake than he’d made by bringing his men here to rescue a bunch of homeless people. It didn’t seem so at the time, of course, but now? It gave new depth to the word “cluster fuck.” And now, they were going to have to kill the people they’d come to rescue.
He was in a bad dream. But he wasn’t dreaming.
But it didn’t end there. Now somebody had stolen Dr. Corcoran’s Jeep and it looked like the thief drove it through the gate. Ollie wondered if it could have been one of the test subjects. That was a frightening thought and he wondered if it had occurred to either Dr. Corcoran or Dr. McManus. Just in case, he’d bring it up when he went back inside.
While he would like to be able to blame all of this on Dr. Corcoran and his team from Vendon Labs, Ollie could not sidestep his own responsibility. He had gotten too wrapped up in his cause and had not been practical enough. He hadn’t thought it through. He hated to admit it, but Ivan had been right about it being a mistake. It was worse than that. Ollie had fucked up by allowing his anger about the ends to cloud his judgment of the means.
A thin figure rammed the driver’s-side door of the car with his head. Ollie recognized it as a Humboldt County Sheriff’s car—white with green and black stripes. He saw another darker figure emerging from the night just beyond the car. He was black and carried a large, heavy tree branch.
The first figure crawled away from the car, then turned around and charged again, bashing his head into the window.
It was a struggle to walk across the parking lot. Ollie heard a lot of cracking and popping all around him and assumed it was the sound of trees losing branches or coming down under the violent force of the storm.
It was like the planet was throwing a tantrum. It seemed much too angry to be mere weather.
Ollie drew his gun when he got to the gate and figured he was close enough. He was surprised when the first shot put the attacking figure on the ground. He thought the storm would be more of an interference.
The black man started beating the trunk of the car with the tree branch, then the side as he made his way to the driver’s door.
Ollie moved in even closer and aimed his gun. He fired once, and when the man kept pounding the car with the branch, he fired again.
The second shot took him down.
Ollie continued toward the car, but stopped when it spoke to him.
“Stop! Do not come any closer! Put the gun down!”
Ollie stopped walking and stared at the car.
He was happy to go back inside and let the cop fend for himself, but there was no way in hell he was putting his gun down while there were test subjects running around on the premises. When no further instructions came from the car, Ollie decided to keep advancing. As he drew nearer, he heard something else.
The man at the wheel was screaming.
Ollie hurried the rest of the way as best he could and found the window in the driver’s-side door gone. The beam of his headlamp fell on the bleeding face of Sheriff Mitch Kaufman.
Ollie resisted the urge to curse loudly. He and Sheriff Kaufman did not get along. He was pretty sure Kaufman had disliked him from the moment they met and had not altered that policy since. Ollie had nothing against the man personally, even though he was a goddamned liberal and a Roman Catholic, which, he supposed, was neither here nor there, but as a sheriff, he was as useless as tits on the pope. Ollie had expressed that opinion generously in Kaufman’s presence, which might have had something to do with the sheriff ’s opinion of him.
But none of that mattered right now because the man had a face full of glass shards, which probably had something to do with that test subject bashing his head into the window.
Ollie reached in and put a hand on Kaufman’s shoulder and the sheriff jerked away, frightened. “Sheriff, it’s Ollie Monk,” he said, shouting to be heard through the wind. Kaufman stopped screaming. Ollie glanced over his shoulder and saw that his men had followed him. “We need to get you inside. Can you walk if we guide you?”
Kaufman tried to pull himself together and absorb the pain. He made an affirmative sound.
“Okay, I’m gonna open the door and help you out. Can you handle that?”
He made another sound that seemed to say, Just do it.
As Ollie helped ease him out of the car, Kaufman sucked air through his teeth sharply. Once he was standing, he bowed his head—Ollie was sure that the rain being blown into his swollen, bloody face was painful.
“Kill the engine,” Ollie said to the others, “then use the keys to open the trunk. Bring in any weapons you find.” He nodded toward the nearest body on the ground. “And make sure he and the other one are dead.”
“There’s another one,” Kaufman said, his voice thick and shaky. “I ran over him coming in. I don’t know if he’s dead.”
“Get to it,” Ollie said. “Leave the bodies where they are and come in when you’re done. I’m taking him inside.”
Once they were inside, Ollie wasn’t sure where to take the injured sheriff. The only place he knew of where Kaufman could lie down was the couch in Dr. McManus’s office.
As they approached the office, Ollie heard a sound—the slapping of bare feet on the floor moving around them, avoiding their light, and fading away behind them.
The couch was already occupied by Dr. McManus, whose face was bruised and swollen. She was reloading her revolver.
Test subjects, Ollie thought, I’ve gotta remember that. Test subjects. Test subjects.
It made them easier to kill.
“Oh, my God,” Dr. McManus said, getting up from the couch and putting her gun and box of ammo on her desk. “Put him on the couch.”
Once Kaufman was stretched out on the couch, Ollie said to Baker, “He’s gonna need some first aid.” Then he turned to McManus and said, “Where should we put the dead bodies?”
“Dead bodies?”
“The test subjects. There are at least two outside, and we’ve got others scattered around. I don’t know how many. But what do you want us to do with them?”
“Put them in the hydrotherapy room. It’s at the other end of this corridor on the right.”
Ollie watched Corcoran, who was quietly pacing and smoking.
“What’s wrong with him?” he said.
“I’m . . . not sure. Could we step outside for a minute?”
They left the office and stood just outside in the dark, windy corridor.
“Earlier,” she said, “Dr. Corcoran said we were in for an unpleasant surprise. Before that, he was talking to someone on the phone. I think it was someone from Vendon Labs.”
“What do you think he meant?”
“I don’t know, but I think we should keep it in mind. If Vendon Labs decides to step in and clean
this mess up before it gets out . . . well, that probably wouldn’t be good for us.”
Ollie needed no encouragement to believe that Vendon Labs would do anything it needed to do to protect itself and its relationship with the government. He nodded slowly and said, “Thank you for telling me that. Smart of you. I think you know as well as I do, don’t you, Dr. McManus, that if they have the chance, Vendon Labs will come in here and make all of this disappear.”
“Yes. That’s why I mentioned it.”
He smiled behind his mask. “Nice to know we’re on the same page when it comes to Vendon. Got any ice for your face?”
“I think we used it up after you hit me.”
“Too bad. You need to learn to duck.”
He left her in the office and went to join his men in the hunt.
44
Andy kept his hands on Donny’s shoulders as he stood rigidly near the living room’s entrance, watching the others. He wasn’t sure what was happening, but tension filled the air like an odorless toxic gas. They did not belong there. Andy had the sickening sense that something bad was about to happen. He had to get Donny out of there as soon as possible, but he had no idea where to go.
Everyone in the living room became silent as they stared at the doorway through which Ram had just passed, waiting tensely for . . . something. Then the moment was shattered by Ram’s voice from the kitchen, which somehow sounded at once happy and menacing.
“Well, what the fuck have we got here?”
The question was chilling because from the sound of Ram’s voice, he’d found something bad but not unexpected.
Latrice, the black woman seated in the recliner, got up slowly and walked through the living room. She suddenly broke into a run and grabbed her coat before rushing out the front door.
Donny watched her go, then looked up at Andy curiously. Andy shrugged.
Voices argued in the kitchen and heavy footsteps stomped over the floor.
“I can’t handle this shit,” Giff said as he stalked into the living room.
“Where the hell you think you’re going, Giff?” Ram said, following him. He reached out and grabbed the upper part of Giff’s left arm to stop him and turn him around.
