Awakened

by James S. Murray

  All of them.

  “We’ve done it,” Cafferty said. “We’ve damn well done it.”

  North breathed a deep sigh of relief and slumped into a chair. “But it hasn’t gotten rid of the methane.”

  That—plus losing a good man—knocked the shine off their success, but it had improved their chances of survival. Cafferty now had a personal decision to make—one he’d put off long enough. But with everything in the Pavilion back to relative safety, he allowed himself to focus on Ellen. He still didn’t know if she or any other passengers had survived the attack, but he wasn’t going to sit around wondering.

  He had to find his wife and the other passengers, dead or alive.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Seawater sprayed from the seams of the docking station door and had formed into a steady stream in the escape passage. The two black monstrosities continued to batter themselves against the opposite side, trapped inside the flooding room with Samuels, who was now likely a floating corpse. The solid bolts held, giving Munoz small consolation, but they’d been able to breach the control center’s blast door, so unless they died in the water, it was only a matter of time before they came crashing through. On top of all that, the new rescue plan had already run into a problem in the first few seconds: the steel locking wheel that opened the route to the engineering bay wouldn’t budge.

  Munoz gripped the top and bottom, clenched his teeth, and heaved. Even if they got through this one—and he certainly had his doubts now—he expected the creatures to swiftly follow, always keeping them just a single hatch from survival in a deadly game of cat and mouse.

  “Are you sure this is our only way out?” Reynolds asked, keeping both of their guns aimed at the docking station. “If what Samuels said about the laser is true . . .”

  “I’ll test it when we get through,” Munoz grunted, attempting to twist the wheel again. “Knowing Samuels, when I pull the trigger, a little flag will unfurl from the barrel with ‘bang’ printed on it.”

  Munoz stopped talking after that and focused his energy on the wheel. The creatures pounded the docking station door again, and increasingly powerful jets of water hissed through the cracks. It wasn’t just the threat of them coming through, obviously—it was also the millions of gallons from the Hudson that would blast inside the passage and quickly end things.

  Which might be the cleanest death we get, Munoz thought.

  Munoz twisted the wheel using every ounce of strength in his body.

  It didn’t move an inch.

  He unbuttoned his shirt and stripped it off, revealing his bring back firefly T-shirt. To hell with what the president thought of him; he was beyond caring about that, let alone the comeback of Serenity’s renegade crew. At this moment, he only cared about them both seeing sunlight again.

  “You’ll get there, Diego,” Reynolds said.

  “I fucking hope so. For both of our sakes.”

  “Keep trying.”

  Muffled electronic beeps came from the docking station. Munoz froze and listened: 3-4-5-6-7 . . .

  “Don’t tell me they know that code, too?” Reynolds shouted.

  “Not this time. They’re simply hitting the buttons in sequence.”

  Not that he wasn’t worried. The volume of freezing water entering the passage and flowing around his shins was rising by the second.

  Munoz wrapped his MTA shirt around one of the locking wheel’s chunky spindles, leaned back, and used the new leverage to pull on the wheel even harder.

  Again, nothing happened . . . until the wheel’s central barrel let out a metallic squeak.

  He yanked it again.

  The wheel rotated an inch.

  Thank God—

  A deafening boom rattled the docking station door, shaking all thankful thoughts out of his mind.

  The bolts groaned.

  The tunnel shook.

  The creatures would break through at any second.

  A torrent of foaming water raced past Munoz’s knees and sloshed down the passage. He guessed they had a minute, if that, for either of the deadly options to come true: torn apart by monsters, crushed by a wall of river water, or both.

  Reynolds shot him a nervous glance. For the first time, the president genuinely looked like he had shit his pants. Munoz didn’t blame him.

  The water level continued to rise past their thighs. Munoz grunted, ripping his soaked shirt downward, and the wheel finally gave, rotating with a fast spin.

  His triumph was mitigated by a massive boom as the docking station door rocked again. A foot-wide gap now appeared at the bottom, increasing the flow. A dangerous tail thrust out of it and thrashed from side to side, causing the president to back away, almost knocking into Munoz.

  “Jesus!”

  Munoz agreed but didn’t respond as the mini-bolt finally clanked. He dragged open the engineering bay’s door just wide enough for them to fit through—which was rather difficult, considering the water pressure trying to slam the door back shut. “You first, Mr. President,” he said. “And make it fast.”

  Reynolds didn’t even hesitate as he handed off the laser and rushed through the gap.

  Munoz followed, slipping inside the brightly lit bay, and turned to seal the entrance just as the docking station burst open. A wall of water thundered toward him with a creature at its center, a diabolical body surfer aimed straight at him. Adrenaline coursed through his body as he heaved the door shut, spun the internal locking wheel, and breathed a massive sigh of relief.

  A tremendous roar came from the other side of the door as water rocketed past. Munoz imagined his MTA shirt floating in the swamped emergency passage along with Samuels’ body parts . . . and a creature tearing everything to ribbons. He rested his head in his hands, coming down from the flood of hormones and chemicals his body had dumped into his bloodstream, aghast at the nonstop stream of shit hitting the fan. Today had pushed him so far beyond anything he had experienced. Hell, beyond what he could have imagined. The creatures made the Brownsville Bloods gang look like pussycats.

  “Great job, Diego,” Reynolds said. “Where from here?”

  “Down a few levels to the Jersey maintenance tunnel. It’s our fastest way out.”

  “Good.” Diego could feel the president hovering nearby, and he finally looked up. With a mix of gentleness and resolve, Reynolds said, “We need to keep moving. Lead the way.”

  Munoz nodded, took a shuddering breath, and stood up. Taking another deep breath, he moved past Reynolds and splashed by the docking station’s generators. As he moved, he continuously swept the area, aiming the laser at the dark spaces between the machinery—spaces that could easily fit more of the creatures. The bright fluorescent lights provided some comfort, but not much. If anything, the shadows they created were as bad as the light they provided was good.

  And, of course, there was always what they already knew was behind them. As if on cue, something pounded on the emergency passage door.

  Both stopped and spun to face it.

  A jet of water sprayed into the engineering bay.

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Munoz cursed.

  “They’re not going to stop, are they?”

  “I’m guessing we’ve created a desperate situation for them. They want their prey, and we’re drowning them. And this door is a piece of cake compared to the one they just busted through. We have to move.” And with that, Munoz rushed for the far end of the bay where it narrowed into a curving passage.

  “Where exactly does this lead?” Reynolds asked, following close behind.

  “It corkscrews down to the Jersey tunnels.”

  “Wait—that means we’re going farther down,” Reynolds said, as the truth of what they were about to do finally dawned on him. “The water . . .”

  “Yeah. But it’s the only way to get back up from here. Marines know how to swim, right, Mr. President?”

  “Oo-rah.”

  “Then let’s go.”

  Their footsteps slapped agains
t the concrete as they descended, echoing through the passage, and they passed entrances to supply rooms containing nothing of immediate use. While he had made the swimming comment to get the president focused on moving, the fact was that Munoz knew if the creatures battered a path after them, it was only a matter of time before the Hudson flooded the whole subway line.

  There was no swimming out of that.

  A massive implosion was almost inevitable at this point, and Diego knew it. As if to remind him, a thin sheet of water overtook them, darkening the ground.

  “Shit,” Reynolds said.

  “Just keep moving. They’re not in yet or we’d be soaked. Not far now.”

  A locked hatch appeared around the next bend and they sprinted toward it.

  “Another one?” Reynolds rested his hands on his knees and gulped in air. “You’re kidding me.”

  “Ever seen Titanic?”

  “Who hasn’t?”

  “Each level is sealed into sections, separated by a hatch that creates a watertight seal,” Munoz said while punching in the code. “It’s designed to contain small disasters.”

  “The Titanic sunk.”

  Munoz had no response for that. He’d been thinking the same thing.

  The hatch opened with a mechanical grind. Reynolds climbed through the circular gap, finally into a dry environment. Munoz followed, locking it from the other side.

  They repeated the process several times, descending the levels and putting distance between them and the creatures (and water), until they eventually reached the safety of the entrance to the Jersey maintenance tunnel.

  Safety being an incredibly relative term.

  “I need a minute,” Reynolds said. “This old body isn’t what it was.”

  “Take two.” Munoz needed a rest himself. But while his body recovered, his mind continued to run wild, and he said, “While we’re waiting, though, I think I deserve to know more about Van Ness.”

  “Let me catch my breath—”

  “Mr. President, with all due respect, fuck that. We’re in deep shit and you know something about why. I’ve got a goddamned laser in one hand and the brightest set of silver balls I’ve ever seen in my pockets. If we’re gonna die down here together, I deserve to know what’s going on.”

  “People always say that. They always say they deserve to know what’s going on. I never quite got that sentiment, never quite got why anyone would be swayed by such loose logic.”

  Munoz looked at Reynolds skeptically, and the president studied him right back. Eventually, though, he shrugged.

  “Sorry. You’re not wrong about wanting to know. Maybe wrong about why I should actually tell you, but fuck it—you want to know about Albert Van Ness?”

  “Anything that might help us get out of here, but yeah, that’s a good start.”

  “All right,” Reynolds replied. “Of course, you’re not going to believe this. I mean, I didn’t. Until today.”

  “I think I’ve got a healthy suspension of disbelief at this point, Mr. President.”

  “Touché.” Reynolds took a deep breath at the same time Munoz held his in anticipation. “I took a meeting in the Oval Office right after I was inaugurated. Literally my first week. It was with a guy named Edwards. Not quite sure if that was his first name or last. Just ‘Edwards.’ I was told I needed to hear him out. Again, not really sure why, but people I trusted were very insistent. So I sat there while he gave me a presentation about this organization called the Foundation for Human Advancement. Said every former president had been briefed on the Foundation since World War II. Now, this was probably my fiftieth meeting that day, and at first I thought this Foundation was just some think tank looking for government money or influence.”

  “But it wasn’t, was it? What did he show you?”

  “I remember it distinctly, as it sounded so ridiculous at first. The story went like this. Apparently, the Foundation was created right after World War II by a Nazi architect named Otto Van Ness. During the final days of the war, Otto was the project manager on the deep expansion of the Führerbunker in 1944. The war was going poorly, and the Nazis wanted to ensure their survival should the Allies reach the capital. Hitler’s bunker in Berlin was already a marvel of engineering, the deepest mankind had ever dug into the earth in modern times. And Van Ness’ mission was to make it even bigger—even deeper. The Nazis stumbled on a nest while digging, and Otto was the only man to make it out of the Führerbunker alive.”

  “Okay,” Munoz said slowly.

  “A few years after the war, Otto Van Ness created the Foundation for Human Advancement.”

  “This sounds like a myth,” Munoz said, dumbfounded. “It’s always the damned Nazis.”

  “That’s what I thought, too. Edwards claimed Otto Van Ness hunted creatures across the planet to learn about their weaknesses. He developed his arsenal after each encounter, in Europe, the Americas, Asia, and Africa, slowly proving himself to national governments with local witnesses and displays of his weaponry. Everyone was sworn to secrecy. Word of mouth spread and the Foundation secured long-term funding contracts.”

  “You mean Van Ness learned to extort the governments of the world for protection money. So why didn’t you take him seriously?”

  “I thought that was all he was doing—extorting money from us. Because while Edwards presented a fun little story, I was presented with no actual proof. Nothing. Just a demand for an insane amount of money to continue protecting the United States from these nests—which he wouldn’t disclose the locations of, by the way. You have to understand, I thought this guy was fucking insane. I didn’t sign the contract, so to speak. This Edwards fella just shook his head and advanced to the next slide. All it said was that as humans dug deeper and deeper into the earth over the past century, these breaches have become more and more common. When I asked how come there had been no incidents with these creatures reported, he said, ‘Because of the Foundation.’ That was the last straw. In my first week, I had been getting intelligence reports from all over the world, stuff that would scare the shit out of you—if these creatures haven’t already done that,” he said with a rueful grin.

  Munoz didn’t respond, and Reynolds sighed before continuing.

  “The last thing he said before I had him escorted out of the Oval Office was ‘The Foundation is literally saving the world every day.’

  “I laughed at him . . .”

  Munoz wasn’t sure whether to be pissed at this crazy-ass story or infuriated at the president’s lack of foresight. Ultimately, he shook his head. “Anything else?”

  “For a while, there was only silence on this front. Those trusted advisers were quietly moved out of my initial sphere, and I heard nothing else. Then, one day, my private cell rings. A phone only my wife knows about. On the other end, a man with a German accent tells me he’s allowing me one more opportunity to reconsider my decision and I should thank him for allowing me to win the presidency.”

  “Let me guess: Van Ness?”

  “Yes, but not Otto. It was Albert, his son. And now the price for his protection was double. Again, all I could do was laugh. This guy was a thug. No different than the Mafia. If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s a bully, especially one with nothing to back up their bravado—or so I thought. At the time, though, the only thing I heard was the money, and the yearly sum he demanded from us was insane. So I refused to be part of it. I remember thinking at the time, If he believes he can extort the United States government, he’s made a big mistake.”

  “So . . . ?”

  “So I told him to fuck off and that I was launching an investigation into the Foundation immediately.”

  “And did you?” Munoz asked.

  “I ordered the CIA to look into Van Ness and my secretary of defense to dig up any records relating to his foundation.”

  “And they found nothing.”

  “Nothing. It’s like he’s a ghost. There was no record of my cell phone even receiving a call. NSA couldn’t find a
nything. Defense Department, nothing. Homeland Security, nothing. But my secretary of defense told me maybe I should take the threat seriously, in case the story was true . . .”

  The president paused, lost in thought. Munoz was going to ask another question, but then Reynolds let out a quiet “Son of a bitch,” as if something had just dawned on him. He pulled a smartphone out of his pocket and scrolled through his messages. “That scheming bastard.”

  “Who?” Munoz asked.

  “Blake Mansfield. The goddamn secretary of defense. The man who’s supposed to be coordinating our rescue with Homeland Security and has been doing a shitty job of it the whole time. That motherfucker has to be working for Van Ness. Remember what Samuels said? They knew there was a nest down here and wanted revenge. And if they can’t get to me, why wouldn’t they have a contingency plan in my cabinet? I’m such a fool.”

  Reynolds slammed the heel of his hand against the wall.

  Munoz couldn’t believe how the conversation had progressed. It all seemed far-fetched, but it fit perfectly with what he had already witnessed. The creatures. The specialized weapons. The traitor. Traitors. Anger rose inside of him at the thought of his team dying in a dangerous game they knew nothing about, over what appeared to be a high-end shakedown.

  And Samuels had the balls to call me a gangster.

  Assholes!

  None of this mattered, though, if they didn’t make it out alive.

  A bloodcurdling screech rang out from the other side of the door.

  The president bolted stiff. Munoz was pretty sure his face matched Reynolds’ look of dread. All thoughts of what led them to be here vanished as the engineer focused on what faced them now. He guessed creatures were waiting in the tunnel, and they were also still following from the emergency passage. They were freakishly fast and strong, and the methane made most weapons obsolete—not to mention it was making breathing increasingly problematic. Luckily Munoz and Reynolds had Samuels’ laser and strobe grenades, but they’d yet to put them into action.