Empire's End (22 page)

She ran with strength she didn’t know she
had, strength that should have been ebbing from the wound in her
belly, where she had once thought she would carry Blake’s child.
She ran to the shore of Lake Michigan and dove into the icy
water.

She swam out a hundred yards and stopped. The
rotter wasn’t on the shore. Perhaps it had found new quarry.

She could tread water for a while, until the
cold overtook her, and then she’d just drift downward, into
blackness. It would be painless.

The Geek erupted from behind her and threw
its malformed limbs around her.

* * *

Voorhees pushed himself across the floor on
his back. He’d gotten out of the bedroom, and was now in search of
something with which to cut the ropes binding him. The widowmaker
was right there, pressing into the flesh of his back, but he just
couldn’t work it free.

Dammit, he wasn’t going to find anything
feeling around on the floor. He’d have to get up and start knocking
into things. There had to be at least a sharp corner where he could
start working on the ropes.

Getting up onto his knees, he shuffled along
until he struck the door. He knew they’d locked it when they left.
At least they did that much for him. He could hardly imagine what
must be unfolding outside.

He heard someone running down the hall,
trying doorknobs. Pounding. It was someone living. “Hey!” he
shouted. “You out there! Over here!”

The doorknob jiggled. “Wait a second,”
Voorhees grunted. He pressed his face to the door and grabbed the
lock in his teeth. If he could just turn it ninety degrees, he’d
have someone to cut him loose...

He did it! “It’s unlocked!”

The door opened. There was a laugh, and it
was the most awful sound he’d ever heard in his life.

“Morning, Officer Voorhees. Looks like your
luck just keeps getting worse.”

Meyer kicked Voorhees over and entered the
apartment, quietly closing the door behind him.

The cop sat up and swung his head, the only
way he could defend himself. Meyer laughed again, softly; then it
grew silent. Where was he? Voorhees listened intently.

“
Over here,
” came a whisper. He turned
to catch a fist in the face. Voorhees collapsed once more.

Meyer grabbed his hair and dragged him over
to a chair. “I’ve had a real bastard of a day too, friend. But I
get to take it out on you.”

* * *

Ernie lay under Casey’s desk with his hands
over his mouth and listened. The Dwarf’s scrabbling had stopped.
How long would he have to wait this out before the Army came
through? Would he have any way of knowing when it was over? His
radio didn’t pick up military frequencies.
Stupid
, he
thought.

He heard the door being unlocked, then the
creak as it swung open.

How... ? He remained under the desk, which
still blocked the doorway, and listened.

Keys jingled. He heard a sound like someone
shifting about. Then something thumped on top of the desk.
Something heavy.

Dear God, was Casey
still alive?

Ernie stuck his head out from under the desk.
He could see nothing from his vantage point. “Sir?” he
whispered.

Four bloody fingers crept over the edge of
the desk and curled to grip it.

Casey’s face slid into view. Or rather, the
absence of it—a black, dripping void.

His other hand came over the desk’s edge,
holding the keys, and he dropped them on the floor beside Ernie’s
head.

Casey rolled off the desk and onto the floor.
Blood splattered on the walls. He pulled his crippled body toward
Ernie, one eye rolling crazily in his crimson skull; and finally
Ernie found his voice and screamed, but only for a second before
Casey was upon him, and they rolled beneath the desk in their
struggle and then a sea of blood washed across the floor.

“That barricade isn’t gonna hold,” Zane
said.

“Where do we go? Upstairs?” Dalton shook his
head.

“How about into the damn street then?”
snapped Rhodes.

“Calm down. I know another way.” Zane started
down the hall. “Follow me.”

The doctor led them down a stairwell and
through a pair of doors labeled PATHOLOGY. Producing a set of keys,
he unlocked an unmarked door. “More stairs.”

This stairwell was pitch dark and smelled of
disinfectant. Feeling his way down, Dalton silently chastised
himself for coming into the city. Either way, there was nothing he
could have done to save Briggs, but at least he could’ve stayed out
in the field and been of some use.

Zane pushed open a heavy steel door and
flipped a light switch. The three men entered a long room lined
with counters, upon which sat clipboards and vats of preserving
fluid. Dalton was sure of what the liquid was, because inside the
greenish soup twitched severed hands and feet.

“Shit,” Rhodes whispered. He approached a
tank containing a coiled spinal cord and brain. The eyeballs were
still attached; they drifted over towards him, and the pupils
shrank. “Fuck!” Rhodes jumped away.

“This is where they were studying the
plague,” Zane said. “I guess none of the docs have gotten here yet
this morning—guess they won’t be coming in at all, will they?
Anyway, the Senate allotted a bit of pocket change to let these
guys poke and prod. Pointless, really.”

Dalton picked up a clipboard and read the
notes scribbled there. “Were they trying to find a cure?”

“Doubt it,” said Zane. “The last generation
of scientists gave up on that. I don’t know what exactly they hoped
to understand by playing with these body parts. I think they just
didn’t know what else to do with themselves.”

“‘Spiritual constitution,’” Rhodes read from
a clipboard. “‘Quantifying the temporal bond.’ What is this
shit?”

“Let me see that.” Zane took the clipboard.
“Oh dear. Looks like they bought into the ol’ spiritual strength
versus rate of infection nonsense. They really were scraping the
bottom of the barrel.”

A dull thud resonated through the room.
Dalton and Rhodes drew their weapons. “It came from down here,”
Dalton said softly.

Another thump. At the far end of the room,
Dalton noticed a tiny porthole set into the wall. Creeping towards
it, he reached out the counter beneath the glass and found that it
pulled away from the wall. The porthole was set in a door. He
pressed his face to it. “Lord.”

A priest lay on the floor of a dimly-lit
eight-by-eight cell. He looked to be in his seventies, perhaps
older. It was hard to tell because of his gaunt, sickly expression.
He had to be infected.

Zane joined Dalton at the porthole. “You’ve
gotta be fucking kidding me.”

“What in God’s name are they doing to this
man?” Dalton breathed.

“Don’t you see? He’s a man of God. They’re
testing the virus on him to see how long it takes. They’re testing
his spirit.”

“This is insane!” Dalton cried. He pounded on
the glass. “Sir! Father!”

The priest stirred a bit. He looked up
through slits and opened his mouth. Saliva ran from his lips to the
floor.

“We’ve got to get in there.” Dalton felt
along the wall. There had to be a way to open the damn door. They
couldn’t have just sealed him in there... could they?

“Forget it,” Zane said. “He’s a lost
cause.”

“But he doesn’t deserve to die like
this!”

“Don’t waste another bullet!” Zane retorted.
“It’s still a long way out of the city.”

“So you know of a way out? Down here?”

“Maybe. It’s been so long since I snooped
around down here, I don’t know if it’s still here. But I’m betting
it is.”

Dalton looked at the priest. The old man
reached a pale hand toward him. Dalton threw himself against the
door. “C’mon!”

“Let it go, man!” Rhodes pulled Dalton back.
“We’ve gotta save the uninfected! That means us!”

Zane knelt and crawled beneath the counter.
“Here it is.” He pried at a grate in the wall. “Help me out.”

Rhodes ducked down and kicked the grate with
a loud BANG! It fell away.

“Thanks.” Zane crawled through the hole.
“Follow me.”

Dalton shook his head sadly at the priest,
mouthing “I’m sorry.”

The old man shook his head in response, as if
to dismiss the matter, and gave him a small smile.

* * *

They made their way through a cramped passage
and rose in an enormous tunnel. Zane produced a penlight and
illuminated a set of metal tracks. “Old subway system. They closed
it off years back. I just knew they meant to use it as an escape
route. Tricky bastards.”

“Did you hear that?” Rhodes pointed his Glock
down the tunnel. From around a sharp bend they saw moving lights.
Electric torches.

Dalton took point, peering through his scope.
He saw the silhouette of a man in uniform. “Army,” he whispered,
and quickened his pace.

“Hey!” he called as others came into view.
They trained their weapons on him. “I’m one of you!” he yelled.

A sergeant approached him. “Where did you
come from?”

“They hospital. I have two civilians with me.
Can I get them out through here?”

“We’re not letting anyone out,” the sergeant
replied gruffly. He turned to his men, and for the first time
Dalton saw what they were doing, hunched along the walls—laying
charges.

“What?” Dalton gasped. “You’re going to blow
it? You can’t! There are tens of thousands of people still in the
city!”

“It’s a hot zone,” the sergeant said. “No one
gets out. I’m afraid that includes you, soldier.”

“Are you fuckin’ with me?” Rhodes pushed past
Dalton and grabbed the sergeant by his shirt. “You’d better—”

A pistol was pressed against his temple.
“Back off,” a private stammered. “Let him go.”

“Better do what he says,” the sergeant
muttered.

“You can’t just sentence all those people to
die!” Rhodes cried. “You’re supposed to protect people!”

“We are! We’re protecting the other
cities!”

“Let him go, Rhodes,” Dalton said.

The cop released the sergeant and threw his
arms in the air. “This is bullshit!”

“Sergeant,” Dalton pleaded, “you’ve got to
let us evacuate civilians. They can be placed under quarantine as
soon as they get out! Just let them out for God’s sake!”

“That’s directly defying the Senate’s
orders,” the sergeant said.

“To Hell with them! They’ve never been part
of this war! We’re all the same to them—one of these days it’s
gonna be your ass on the line, Sergeant!”

“My ass is
already
on the line,
son!”

“Those people up there aren’t dead,” Zane
said. “Even if the Senate’s written them off, they’re not dead. Not
unless you do this.”

“I don’t take orders from—” the sergeant
snapped, then stopped.

“From who? Civilians? Is that what you were
gonna say?” Dalton stood toe-to-toe with the sergeant. “For the
love of God, just give us a little time. We can get people out
through here. You don’t have to help. Just don’t blow the tunnels
yet.”

“I... I can’t.”

“Yes you can.” Dalton looked at the other
soldiers, who were all watching the confrontation. “Is this what
you want to do? Is this how we win?”

“Sergeant,” said Zane. “Women. Children.”

“Shit.” The sergeant turned from them. He
looked into the faces of his men and said, “Shit!”

He stabbed his finger into Dalton’s face.
“I’ll give you a few hours. That’s it. I can’t give you any more
than that. Understand?”

“All right.” Dalton gave the man a crisp
salute. “Thank you.”

“I can’t stop the others in the other
tunnels. I can only give you this.”

“It’s enough,” Dalton said.

Logan was wasted. He’d drained a bottle of
Scotch and was slumped, bleary-eyed, against the bar.

“Dead weight,” Tripper muttered under his
breath.

“Is Officer Voorhees going to be safe at your
place?” Lily asked him. Tripper shrugged.

Shoving an elbow into his ribs, Cam stepped
forward and said, “He’ll be fine. New locks.”

“But that man said they’re setting the city
on fire.” Lily pointed to Logan.

“Lily,” said Halstead, kneeling beside the
girl, “I’m sure he’ll be okay. We wouldn’t just leave him helpless
like that...” Her voice trailed off. Even she couldn’t say it with
a straight face.

Lily turned from the others and stalked
across the room. Tripper walked over to the dead goons and
collected their pistols. “We’re gonna have to get moving here. No
time to waste.”

“We need a plan,” Halstead protested.

“Stay alive,” Tripper replied. “That’s the
plan.”

“Like I said, we continue east. Using the
tunnels,” Cam said. “If we run out of tunnels we’ll take to the
streets. I’m not worried about the rotters—it’s the soldiers that
have got me nervous.”

“They won’t let us out,” Logan said. “They’ll
shoot us dead. I heard their orders. Have to stay underground.”

“Do you know of a way out of the city,
Private?” Halstead asked.

“I don’t know.” Logan took a swig from a
bottle of vodka.

Tripper swept it from his hand. It smashed
into the mirror behind the bar. “We need you to stay sharp,
asshole, or else you’re not coming with us!”

Logan laughed bitterly. “You’re not listening
to me. We’re already dead! All of us! You, me, the kid—dead!”

Lily pushed open a door at the rear of the
room. “Hey, I know this place.”

“Close that,” Halstead called.

“Wait,” said Cam. “Lily, how do you know this
place?”

“I’ve been here. Upstairs is where the girls
sleep.”

“Oh, God,” Tripper said.

“What girls?” said Halstead.