by S. M. Nolan
He ignited the engine and pulled into traffic. They sat in silence most of the ride, each locked in their own thoughts. A few times hails came over the police radio until Russell shut it off altogether. They drove on, unsure of what to say until a grid-locked intersection stopped them.
Russell tapped his fingers against the steering wheel, surveying the area. Fear coursed through Maggie's veins, “I don't like sitting like this.”
“I know what you mean,” he said calmly. “Feels a little exposed.”
Her eyes darted around the buildings lining the block. They broke sporadically for alley entrances. Her leg fidgeted against the pack as someone stepped past outside. They paid her no mind but the closeness made her heart race.
“We could take one of the side streets.”
Russell judged the distance between vehicles, “Yeah, alright.”
He flicked on his lights. They flashed with a squawk, forced a car in front of him further up and to the side. He diverted right, between two buildings, made a left at their rear-edge onto a half-mile stretch of alley.
It was yet another usual back-alley scene; dumpsters against the the left-side's buildings, here and there high-retaining walls that barred access to fenced in duplexes on the right.
The Impala picked up speed, cruised forward with Maggie more at ease. Breaks between the retaining walls shifted the scenery from residences to commercial offices. Russell flicked off his lights, slowed to a crawl to divert around a dumpster partially obstructing the alleyway.
In one breath, Russell glanced sideways. A black van charged from the side-entrance. His eyes widened, foot slammed the accelerator. The car lurched. Rubber screamed on asphalt. Tires caught traction just as the van slammed the rear-fender.
The Impala careened sideways, hit a brick building's edge. It ricocheted, threw the passenger's fender into a dumpster.
The force smacked Russell's head against the steering wheel. Maggie's temple splintered the passenger window. Warmth trickled through her hair and her vision narrowed.
8.
Catharsis
September 30th
12:25 PM
Back alley of 42nd street.
Russell's lapse of consciousness ended with the Impala's droning horn. He lifted his head and it stopped. His vision flickered, body ached.
He knew what had happened. The van had purposely hit them. The impact wasn't enough to detonate the airbag and his face hit the wheel instead. He opened his eyes to smoke rising from the crushed front-end, felt something jerk at his seat belt. Maggie's foggy shape came into focus.
Her hands fumbled at his side, “Damn it, wake up!” She glanced around anxiously, fought his belt's latch. “C'mon, before they get closer!”
He snapped back to reality, quickly disconnected the belt.
She urged him forward at a hush, “Good. Let's go.”
His head snapped sideways to look around the vehicle. The van had followed through on it's path from one entrance to the next. Its tail-lights flashed red beyond a waist-high retaining-wall at the Impala's rear. The van's engine grated metal-on-metal in an attempt to start.
“Good.” Maggie's voice and hands trembled, “C'mon!”
He stayed low, crawled after her with a glance through the back window. The van's rear-doors opened. Four people with large rifles filed out. Russell grabbed his pack from the back, kicked the trunk-lock and scrambled out the passenger's side. Light footsteps sounded near the retaining wall's corner.
Russell crouched, slid along the car's damaged side, “Stay low.”
The Impala formed a perpendicular blockade between the building and wall, provided ample cover against the approaching steps. They advanced, deliberate, steady. A low mutter halted them. Russell lifted the trunk-lid with one hand, the other on the pistol at his side.
“There!” A woman's voice called.
A divot appeared in the rear-window. Russell swore, drew his weapon. It popped randomly at the corner. Brick and asphalt chunks exploded. He threw up the trunk-lid, drug his duffel bag to the ground, released the pistol's empty magazine.
He shrank beside the rear fender. Muffled weapons-fire cracked, impacted the building, embedded in the car's far-side.
Maggie pulled on her pack and clasped it at her mid-section. She removed the pistol from her side with trembling hands. Russell steadied his breath, made a sliding motion. She nodded, repeated it to chamber a round.
Muffled cracks shattered a window over them. Russell glanced backward; they'd hit the dumpster. It lay overturned few yards forward, bottom out. He grabbed Maggie and ran.
Fire spit at them. Bullets pulverized asphalt and glass. The sudden departure displaced the four attackers. Russell threw Maggie behind the dumpster, dropped to a knee, and tore open the duffel bag.
Rounds sparked off the dumpster, dented it and ricocheted. Maggie balled up at the sounds, fought terror to control her body. Russell's adrenaline pumped hot into his blood. He tore the shotgun from the bag, forced in a handful of shells, then slung the bag over his back. He shouldered the gun.
“What the hell are you doing?” Maggie blurted.
“There!”
Russell shoved her sideways at a door-way. She stumbled, caught herself in it. Russell dodged into the small outcropping of cinder-block.
He shouted over sporadic gunfire, “Watch out!”
“What? What are—”
He blasted away the door's hinges with a pair of pumps. With step back, he hurled himself against the door. It gave way and fell inward with him. A line of dusty printing presses were arranged in rows across the abandoned building. A faint light from a frosted-glass ceiling high above accompanied sun rays shining in from a sky-walk's glowing mouth. They splayed through a metallic cat-walk in a rear corner, beckoning them forward.
“He's breached the building!” A man shouted in the alley.
Feet broke into a run. Russell pulled Maggie by her wrist. He ushered her into the shadows of the first row of machines, readied to move across the expansive room.
A man's hardened voice came from the doorway, “Fan out. We're not leaving 'til they're dead.”
The footsteps faded. Russell chanced a look over a machine to see three men and a woman cross the darkness with tac-lights. High-powered rifles sported foregrips beneath thick, flash-sound suppressors in their hands.
He came to a startling revelation but shrank down. With a finger to his lips, he motioned Maggie around a conveyor, and followed, the shotgun low and ready. They stopped behind adequate cover to re-assess.
The cat-walk urged them forward at the left. The glowing mouth of sunlight teased freedom. Its rays illuminated metal grating that shifted to industrial linoleum at its threshold.
Russell pointed Maggie to the stairs. She nodded with a long, stuttering breath. He checked over his shoulder; the three men had their backs turned, searching each row of machines while the woman headed for an office across the warehouse.
Russell motioned Maggie forward. She centered her gravity low, made for the stairs with her heart pounding like a frenzied war-drum. Russell faced away from the bottom of the stairs, careful of every backward step up. They crept up and across the cat-walk to the door. Flash-lights scoured the ground floor from below rifle barrels.
Maggie neared the sky-walk in violent trembles. Adrenaline overwhelmed her. She focused on her breath, the light ahead nearing, taunting.
She stepped from metal to linoleum and stifled a gasp to press beside the doorway and peer out at Russell. He crept into the light just as a beam of light blinded Maggie. She recoiled. Ammunition blasted the doorway.
“Fucking rats!” The woman bellowed. “The cat-walk!”
Russell swore. He drug Maggie forward until her body reacted. They bolted through the sun-light to the next factory. Footsteps sprinted up after them, clanged on metal. The first shots pocked the floor behind them.
“Keep moving!” A deep voice called.
Russell and Maggie sprinted through
the doorway into a mirror image of the last building.
“Head for the street!” Russell panted, his feet slamming metal.
Maggie's adrenaline forced her legs to a staircase. It rattled, threatened to give way with each step. Her feet pounded downward. The steps shook from her weight. Bullets ricocheted off metal, pulverized stone.
Russell slipped, tumbled half a flight. The shotgun came loose. Maggie slid on the rickety metal, landed beside the shotgun in a small foyer, halfway up.
“Keep going,” Russell coughed, pushing up.
Maggie grabbed the shotgun, rounded the foyer. She took the final flight of stairs two at a time. Muffled rounds cracked cement below. The staircase took a last jolt, broke off in a screech of gnarled metal. The two fell a dozen feet to the floor amid the crash. Maggie landed with a groan, Russell already urging her up.
“Are you hurt?”
“No,” Maggie gasped, winded.
Russell grabbed her upper arm, pulled her up and forward.
“Fuck!” The woman barked, halted by the stairs.
Bursts of fire crackled. They sketched the pair's progress to the door. Metal debris and concrete dusted and sparked the air.
“They're headed for the street!” The woman yelled.
Russell charged the door, slammed his weight into. He emerged in the noon-time air. Maggie ran past, legs refusing to stop. She tore off down the alley, glancing back at the scene of their accident. Russell steered her left, toward a boarded up hole along the alley floor.
He kicked out the board, “In here.”
Maggie dropped, her nose near the ground as she groaned, “Ugh, the smell.”
He urged her forward, crawled in behind her. Stagnant water and mold smothered them. Water dribbled from leaky pipes above their heads. They skittered through puddles in darkness, soaked and freezing. Russell chanced a look back, saw elongated shadows approach.
“Keep going,” he panted.
Maggie sped forward, agitated, “To where?”
Russell wasn't listening. He fished through his pockets for a small flash-light, twisted it on to examine the pipes. Less than a foot between his bags and the piping made it impossible to maneuver. He gave up, continued forward, Maggie already far ahead.
“There's something here.”
He clawed after her, “Be careful!”
“Check everywhere. I want them found!” A man's voice commanded.
Russell shut off his light, drug himself forward. Feet sprinted close by. He looked back to see a pair before the opening. His hand fell over a ledge in the floor. A face came into view behind him.
He held his breath, plunged over the ledge. He landed on his back with a thud in a small puddle. Maggie's reeking, wet hand clasped over his mouth. She pointed upward; a beam of light danced over the opening. It kissed the edges of the small hole, then withdraw.
Maggie waited to remove her hand, then whispered, “Where are we?”
“I don't know.”
Russell righted himself, twisting his light on once more. He kept the beam low to illuminate poured concrete around them. On three sides lay solid walls, a circular path of interconnected, concrete piping roughly six feet tall in the fourth.
He started forward, his beam scouting the tunnel ahead, “Must be overflow drainage.”
“You mean it's the storm-sewers?” Maggie asked, adjusting the shotgun to follow.
“If it is, it'll deposit in a drainage pond.” He followed the tunnel's curves, “We can't go back anyway. It could be hours, maybe days, before they decide to leave the area.”
Maggie shivered, her body wobbling from their adrenaline-fueled escape, “It fucking stinks down here, and I'm freezing.”
“Better than being chased through the streets,” he replied with misplaced optimism.
Maggie shook her head in disgust, her teeth chattering. Cold seeped into her bones from the clothes clinging wetly to her chest and legs. Russell followed a tunnel that branched left. His light inched along rounded stone while their soggy steps echoed into endless oblivion.
“What the hell was that all about anyway?” Maggie asked.
“I don't know, but I'm willing to bet it has something to do with Bould and Rowe—and Omega.”
“You think that's what the guy was talking about ?”
“Maybe.” He avoided a piece of crumbled stone with a wide step, “I don't think we'll be visiting the college anytime soon.”
“You mean they'll keep looking for us?” Maggie asked.
“Did you see how they moved?” Russell asked, thinking on his earlier revelation. He sensed Maggie's confusion through her silence. “I don't know where they came from, but they're military. With that kind of organization, those weapons; they're a strike-force. A team that goes in, takes out HVTs. They'll be ordered to keep looking for us.”
“What the hell are you on about?”
“They're a small team,” he explained, scanning the walls for a way out. “Expertly trained, militantly connected. The weapons they're using are mil-spec and they're wearing battle fatigues.”
“So?” Maggie balked, her eye twitching with annoyance.
Russell was tired of explaining. He sighed, “They're either military or mercenaries, ordered to neutralize specific targets. In this case, us.”
Maggie's irritation finally burst. She growled, exasperated, “You've got to be fucking kidding me! Some military assholes want me dead? What the fuck did I do?”
Russell stopped, “Maggie, it's not—”
“No, no!” Maggie spit, on the verge of tears. She shoved the shotgun into his arms. “I'm not doing this. Christ, I'm an artist! Not some god damned jar-head.”
She turned away. Russell yelled, her anger rising with each word, “How far d'you think you'll get? You think you can just walk away? You're smarter than that. Hell, I barely know you and I know that.”
Maggie whipped around with a venomous bite, “What the fuck do you know? Toting a gun and wearing a fucking badge—that's what you know!”
“You think that's all there is to me?” Russell bit back. “A badge and a gun? You know nothing more about the world than what you allow yourself to see.”
“How the fuck would you know?” Maggie spat, leaning into her anger. “How would you know anything about—Why should I trust some cop with my life?”
“You're alive now, aren't you?” Maggie gave growled to an angry crescendo. Russell barked, “I don't know it all. I do know this: someone wants us dead. They're well trained and well connected, and they're not going to stop just because some girl wants to go home.”
“I think you're—”
“It doesn't matter what you think!” He spat harshly. His tone turned brutal, caustic, “It doesn't matter what you think, what you feel, what plans you had. What matters is they want you dead!”
Without warning Maggie hit him hard in the chest and ribs, “Don't you fucking talk to me like that!”
She knocked him back into a wall. Russell took the hit, dropped the shotgun and threw his hands out.
“Don't treat me like a fucking child!”
She hit him once in the gut.
Tears filled her eyes, her voice tainted by sorrow, “Don't fucking tell me that!”
Her hits became more erratic, faster, less powerful.
Her voice cracked in sobs, “I've spent my whole life… building to this moment. Don't tell me. Don't tell me. I'm losing everything. I won't let it happen! I won't let you say it! I won't! I won't!”
All at once, her composure collapsed. She fell into his chest, weeping. Her fingers clutched him with rigid tension as she overflowed with emotion. She sank to her knees, sobbing.
The world fell away. Russell followed her downward on instinct. Her sobs turned to gasping spears that plunged her through countless terrors. They frothed to the surface, spilled over onto Russell's chest. She felt everything she'd worked for slipping from her grasp before she could close her hands around it.
“Don't fucki
ng say it! I can't… let it be for nothing. It's not fair. It's not fair.”
She repeated her last words over and over.
Russell hesitated, but caved. He cradled her shivering, sobbing mass. She choked on tears, her crumbling life suffocating her chest. Her pain echoed through the dark tunnel, swallowed by the black oblivion around them. It reached critical mass with violent tremors before the last of her adrenaline dissipated.
The tunnel fell into silence, broken only by rhythmic sniffles.
It was a long while before either of them spoke, but Russell's grip held firm; partially for heat, but otherwise to comfort the sorrowful vessel before him. He stared off in quiet contemplation.
With a final, long breath, Maggie pushed for the wall beside him.
Russell slowly pieced together what she'd said as she wiped her eyes and balled up against the cold. Her mind sprinted through a thousand gruesome deaths that she forced away to regain her composure.
Her voice was nasally, “I'm sorry.”
He remained quiet to choosing his words with care, then spoke at a crawl. “I was stationed in Afghanistan. In an area crawling with Taliban. Our job was to clear bombs so convoys could get through. Other days, it was simple patrols on base. But not a day went by that we weren't forced to kill helpless people—picked off the street, kidnapped, or indoctrinated—and strapped with explosives.”
He hung his head. Maggie watched him closely as he let the silence prevail.
He cleared his throat, “After a while, you get used to seeing people you know dying around you. They signed on, they knew the risks. It hurt, but it wasn't unexpected. The others….”
He trailed off into a stare that mourned a thousand past regrets.
“Some people you'd seen before, living their lives on the streets during the rare, easy day. The others were absolute strangers, but they weren't any different. None of them had a reason to be involved. It wasn't some divine plan, or an attempt to secure a home. It was just… fear, terror. Making everyone feel like they could be next. Even you.”
He gave a deep, stoic sigh, “The hardest choice you ever have to make is to take a life. To decide whether you want to stay alive and allow that darkness to take you over, or die and preserve yourself.”
