In contrast, Lyudmila did the slice-and-dice thing all too well. Soon, at least ten people lay dead or mortally wounded. More came, though, hacked and slashed and clubbed—and still more got laid out temporarily or permanently.
“Now it is my turn!” Piotr roared. With a savage grin splitting his face, he charged his way into the pack, heedless of their weapons or the damage they could do. He was too busy goring or trampling his opponents, and cries of agony rent the air.
While he was mutilating the mob, he received a fair number of cuts and slashes, and at least one person had a pistol. Piotr didn’t stop, though, just kept up his assault, snorting and grunting with pleasure when he gored someone, and occasionally squealing in rage and pain when someone shot him.
Soon another gun went off, and then another. One stray ricochet, that was all it took, and if luck wasn’t on his side, Harry knew that he could say goodbye to any possibility of getting out of there alive. Anastasia sprinted to where he was crouching and grabbed his hand. “We’re going up,” she said, pointing to a large boarded up window. “Hang on!”
With a mighty leap, she sprang to the ledge. The sudden yank on his shoulder almost tore it out of its socket, and he let out a yell. She grabbed onto the ledge with her free hand and with the other, tossed him higher to a safe spot. Panting, he reached down, she gave him her hand, and he hauled her up, although he doubted that she needed any help. “What now?” he asked.
“We leave,” she said, and used her elbow to smash the wood out.
Light and the cold from outside flooded in, and below them, Piotr and Lyudmila were still in the process of decimating the mob. It seemed that they reveled in the slaughter as they shouted with each fresh kill, and the smell of blood and entrails lay heavily upon the air. “C’mon,” Anastasia urged, and grabbed his hand. “We can do this.”
Doing it meant jumping from a height of maybe twenty feet to the concrete below. Harry’s heart jackhammered with fear, but there was no other choice.
“I know your shoulder hurts, but you have to jump. Just drop and roll at the bottom,” Anastasia counseled.
Now or never, he thought, and took the leap. Just as his feet touched ground, he shifted his body’s position and rolled over onto his side. He kept rolling over until he slammed up against the side of another building. “Where are we?” he asked, his head spinning.
Anastasia had gotten up to survey their surroundings. “We’re in an alleyway.”
Slowly getting to his feet, Harry listened to the screams of agony coming from the nearby building, and they chilled him more than the winter weather did. Then the sound of sirens cut through the air. This was not going to be good, not good at all. “You got a plan?” he asked.
“Yep,” Anastasia grinned and pointed to a manhole cover. “We go down.”
He’d hidden out in sewers before, and while it wasn’t on his to-do list, not many options remained. “This is like déjà vu all over again,” he said.
She giggled as she easily pulled the cover off and gestured for him to go first. “You lead. Someone’s gotta put the manhole back into place.”
Like most sewers, this one stank, but considering it was winter, the steam and smell output seemed to be a lot higher. Harry climbed down the ladder into a gloomy world, dropped the last two feet to the bottom, and immediately slipped on the wet concrete and fell into the river of filth.
Standing up, he wiped the slime from his head and face and then gave up in disgust. “Crap,” he muttered, feeling the slime soak his skin with its particular brand of nastiness. His shoulder still hurt like crazy. He figured it had to be partially if not totally dislocated.
A number of light bulbs had been set up on the ceiling, sending a stream of light into the surroundings and illuminating it in a sickly yellow glow. This particular part of the sewer system seemed to be older than the one he’d been in once before, as rust showed clearly on the ceiling and the walls. A few rats scurried away carrying something in their mouths...he didn’t know what it was, nor did he want to know.
“Hey, you okay?” Anastasia asked as she dropped down on the ledge, landing gracefully. Her ears twitched overtime, as did her nose.
“My shoulder still hurts,” he grunted out. “Are they following us?”
Anastasia looked up at the manhole. “When I pulled the manhole into place, I didn’t see anyone following us.” She tested the air with her nose, and shook her head. “I can’t smell any people. And if you’re going to ask me if I can smell the opposition, don’t. I can’t smell much of anything except the garbage that’s down here.”
Suddenly Harry let out a cry of agony. He’d been trying to shunt the pain to another part of his mind, and it didn’t work. He bit his lip to stifle the pain. Sound carried. He didn’t want anyone to hear. “This...isn’t good.”
“Yeah, your shoulder’s sort of out of position,” she said after surveying his stance. “Hang on.”
Before he could say anything, she grabbed his arm with one hand and his elbow with the other and jammed the shoulder back into place. The sudden stab of pain made him yell and he cut it short by biting the inside of his mouth. He bit it so hard, blood flowed out between his lips and he spit it into the river of sludge. “Thanks...let’s get going,” he said.
Keep moving...they had to keep moving. Undoubtedly the police would come and more than likely start searching the sewers. And like the mob, they would come to kill. Harry, pain and all, managed to heave his body out of the slimy river and onto the opposite side. He noticed that the tide was rising. They had to get to higher ground. If not, they might drown.
Anastasia gracefully leapt out of the water to join him. “You did well back there.”
Perhaps she’d meant to be nice, but Harry knew different. “I didn’t do anything at all,” he said, bitter that he was supposedly stuck in a permanent state of weakness. “You and the others did—well, you won,” he finished, feeling lame beyond lame.
Anastasia didn’t seem bothered by it. “This is what happened. I don’t want to be this way, you know, but this is what I am.” She touched him gently on the hand. “Thanks for sticking up for me.”
Lousy atmosphere or not, her very touch caused him to mumble, “You’re my girlfriend. I don’t care what you look like.”
Anastasia snorted in disgust. “You don’t, but they did. I’m not a freak, but I’m also not going to apologize for what happened back there.”
She pointed to a number of gashes, slashes and wounds on her torso. To Harry’s eyes, they seemed to be healing fast, but still, they had to hurt, and what with all the pollutants in the water, he wondered if they’d cause an infection. “In case you haven’t figured it out, we’re fugitives, and that was a mob. They wanted to kill us.”
“I know.”
Tired and dispirited, he nevertheless began to trudge down the narrow walkway, Anastasia following behind. The path twisted and turned and the smell never left. In fact, it seemed to get even stronger, and Harry’s eyes began to water. His shoulder hurt abominably and he hadn’t eaten since...he’d forgotten.
He stumbled and she caught him around the waist. “Can you do this?”
“Yeah, don’t worry.”
Their journey continued on for what seemed like miles, neither of them saying a word with only the sound of the rushing water for company. After another twenty minutes of continuous walking by his estimate, he slumped back against the wall. “I gotta sit down. I don’t even know where we are.”
“Sit tight,” she said. “There’s a ladder up ahead. I’ll check.”
Trotting off, he watched her form disappear up the ladder and she came back a few minutes later. “It looks like mid-afternoon. We’re on Worth Street. That’s still the Bowery. There are police cars everywhere and I saw a lot of patrolmen. I don’t think they’re going to search down here—yet—but we can’t go up, not at this time. Maybe tonight it’ll be a little clearer.”
Wordlessly, he nodded. He had no computer, no money sa
ve about three dollars in change, and no way to contact Jason or Farrell. He tried to think of a plan, but nothing came to mind.
Anastasia took a seat beside him, gracefully folding her legs up under her and wrinkling her nose, said “This place smells. I’d love to take a shower.”
He heard the longing in her voice and nodded. The pain in his shoulder had gone down somewhat, but a great lassitude filled him. Trying to tell her how he felt, his voice came out feebly.
She placed a comforting hand on his good shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze. “Listen, boyfriend,” she began. “I’m tired, and right now we both need to grab some rest. I can’t think straight. We’ll make a plan when I come to.”
“Good idea. Wait a second,” Harry said, and rearranged his body so that he lay flush against the wall. “You can stick your head on my stomach as a pillow,” he offered.
She flashed a tiny smile. “That’s the best deal I’ve heard since I came back. I miss you holding me.”
Snuggling together, he attempted to shut out the smells, couldn’t, but found himself incredibly tired after the abandoned building ordeal. Soon, he slipped into unconsciousness.
Awakening minutes or hours later, he felt somewhat better. The tide hadn’t risen very much, so maybe they’d be safe for now. Looking down, he saw that Anastasia was still asleep, but her lips were moving. Bending closer to listen in, the words sounded...Russian. Dreaming...she had to be dreaming, and perhaps her mental blocks were breaking down.
No mental block is perfect, nor is it complete. Nurmelev’s words rang in his memory. The Russian madman-scientist had apprised him of that little fact in their one and only meeting, and he’d been right. The blocks were starting to crumble, but Harry didn’t know which word or which combination of words had done it.
Maybe it hadn’t even been something he’d said or something anyone else had said. Perhaps it had just been time doing the work and causing her true memory to surface. As she stirred ever so slightly, he wondered if she did remember her past life. If she did, would she still want to be with him? Would she want to return to Russia and locate her father—if he still lived, would...
He resolved not to think about it too much. Whatever happened from now on, it would happen whether he wanted it to or not. Up ahead lay uncharted territory. A road lay ahead, unmarked, and there were any number of routes open to driving on.
“Uh, what is...?”
Anastasia started out of her sleep, blinked her eyes in confusion, and turned to face him. “I...just had a dream.”
“I figured.”
She rubbed her face with the back of her hand and briefly gave her body a quick groom job, picking out clumps of dirt and running her fingers through her fur. Her nose wrinkled as she did so, and a look of disgust formed on her face. Licking her lips, she haltingly explained things. “I saw more images, images of Siberia. I remember the lettering, the place names.”
Concerned, Harry said, “Um, if this is too, uh, y’know, painful for you, you don’t have to—”
“No,” she interrupted, her voice sharp. “I have to tell you. I remember now. My name is...” her face twisted... “My name is Anastasia Yakusheva. My mother’s name was Iliana...my father’s name was...”
Her voice trailed off then and she broke down in tears, her sobs echoing off the walls. She shook off Harry’s attempt to hold her and wrapped her arms around her body, rocking back and forth. “I saw those men. I was in high school. My father...he was an alcoholic. My mother was an alcoholic...and also a prostitute.”
She choked on her words. When she continued, it was with a tone of supreme loathing in her voice. “There were always men in our house, and they came every day, sometimes in the late afternoon, but usually at night. Our place was in an old part of the city. It was old and broken, my father was always drinking...and I was a student. I didn’t know what the men were doing there...then I heard sounds in my mother and father’s bedroom. They were moans...groans. My father was downstairs...and he told me to be quiet while mother...worked.”
Features twisted as if in psychic pain, her memories, now free, tumbled out in full force. “School was boring, but it was better than being at home...I thought. One night I came home late after studying. My mother was asleep on the couch, a bottle in her hands. Another man—he was big, hairy, and ugly—was waiting. He pointed at me, and my father told me to go with him. I was only fifteen...”
“Holy crap,” Harry whispered, truly shocked by the fact that someone would pimp out their child. What kind of people were there in the world? Up until meeting Anastasia, he’d always been sort of sheltered, and while he knew how bad the world could be, he couldn’t imagine this.
Anastasia continued to talk in a monotone. She ran away from home intending to find someone to stay with, but her friends had no room for a runaway, and the authorities weren’t interested in helping someone who wouldn’t pay them off.
With little education, no money, and only her looks, she had no choice, she felt, but to talk to men who said they found her attractive. One day, when she was sixteen, a man in his forties bought her coffee. He seemed nice enough, dressed well, showered her with money and presents, and offered her a place to stay. Knowing more or less what she was in for, she accepted his offer, and after that, one thing led to another...
“And then I got sick,” she said, bringing in the how and why she’d become what she’d become. The weight suddenly fell off her body and she felt weak all the time. Desperate, alone, and almost broke, she ended up at a hospital in Kiev, used up and dying.
“I was nineteen. I had AIDS,” she whispered. “I never knew who I got it from. It doesn’t matter now. The hospital ward I was in had thirty people, all with the same sickness. They were waiting to die...and then Nurmelev came in, promising me a better life. He had...had a paper for me to sign. I had nothing to lose.”
A shudder ran through her body. “I woke up looking like this maybe three months later. I came to New York...I don’t remember how...and I...I met you.”
Completely spent from her crying binge, Anastasia hung her head. “I never wanted to do what I did. I never liked being with someone different every night.”
With a teary-eyed face, she looked at Harry. “Lyudmila was right. I’m nothing but what she said I was. I’m a waste of life and you should be with someone else.”
He’d sat there all this time, mute, listening to her story of loss and sickness and near death. He wasn’t one to judge and he could not and would not judge her at all. In his heart, he felt that she’d been the right person for him all along. The past was the past. “C’mere,” he said, and she nestled her head into his narrow chest. “Don’t say anything else. It doesn’t matter. We’re together now.”
“Thank you,” she whispered.
Tenderly, she stroked his face, and they kissed each other fondly. While this wasn’t the most romantic place, love was where one found it and the form of it didn’t matter. He’d read that in a novel somewhere and it made a lot of sense. Her whiskers tickled, and he drew back. “Sorry, you’re tickling me.”
Anastasia chuckled. “I’m not about to shave for...”
Abruptly, her voice died away. “Did you hear that?”
“Hear what?”
“Listen!”
He did, and the sounds came again, louder this time. “Sounds like it’s coming from over there,” Anastasia whispered again and pointed.
Where she’d pointed to was down the tunnel, and curious now, they got up and carefully crept over to a set of steps. The bottom two steps were wet and stained from repeated exposure to the sewer’s elements, but the stairs above them were dry as bone. They led about five feet up to an old iron door partially torn off its hinges. Harry thought that strange, as the nearest manhole lay well down the walkway. “What is this?” she asked.
“It looks like it leads to an inner chamber,” Harry answered, thinking hard and scratching his head. “This might have been part of an abandoned subway tunnel. The
city built lots of them around a century ago and many of them were abandoned. I don’t know if anyone’s been down here for a long time.”
“Someone must be here,” she pointed out. “The door is broken, so maybe some people are living here.” Her eyes drifted to the surface, as if looking inward, searching for some information hidden in her mind. “I...remember now. In Moscow, some of the homeless people lived in the subways, hiding in chambers from the police. They had nowhere else to go.”
“Right now, we don’t, either.”
Cautiously, he pushed his hand against the door and it gave slightly. Anastasia then decided to help out, and under the force of her hand, the door creaked inward. Squeezing through the narrow entrance, they found themselves standing on a ledge. Stairs, rickety iron things with no handrails, led to a subterranean chamber roughly the size of a two-car garage. A musty smell greeted them, the smell of uncirculated air.
There were other smells as well. Body odor mixed with smoke, smelly clothes, dried feces, urine, and other stinks combined to make the sewage outside smell almost fresh. “There are people here,” Anastasia whispered.
“Let’s take a look,” he suggested.
Carefully venturing down the steps one at a time, they alit in a filthy area that could only be described as a pit. Iron pipes, some of which were broken, lined the walls and hung overhead. Cables, many of them eaten away by time and rust and rats, lay strewn along the sides of the chamber. Rats, roaches, and other lower life forms scurried here and there, and he noticed that the human residents paid them no attention.
It was somewhat warmer in here and dry, and venturing in further, curious and eager to be away from the cold and the stink they came upon a group of people, perhaps ten in all, sitting around a fire.
“Stay back,” Anastasia said as a warning and put up her hand. The group immediately turned their heads as one, many of them with wary and even hostile looks on their faces.
She didn’t have to warn him twice. These people...they probably didn’t take to surface dwellers. Creeping in closer, Harry saw that they were dressed in incredibly filthy rags, covered in bedsores, and they were roasting something over the fire. He wasn’t quite sure what it could be...and hoped that it wasn’t a person.
Rise of the Transgenics Page 14
