Wet Work: The Definitive Edition (30 page)

Seven young women, looking barely out of their teens. Two boys, aged maybe six or seven. Four more men. All were dirty, their clothes torn. One man was shoeless, his once-white socks soiled with mud.

“
Look.” Stipe pointed at one of the guards who stood slack-jawed beside the truck, staring off into the sky. His M-16 slipped from his grasp to clatter on the ground. Another guard broke away from the group ushering the new prisoners inside, and gave the immobile private a slap across his cheeks. He swayed for an instant, then the guard pushed him. He shrugged off the push, then started uttering meaningless sentences. The rest of the guards had stopped their herding now to watch. The prisoners huddled together beside them meekly.

The guard next to the babbler slapped him again, hard across the face. The soldier dropped to his knees, crying and clutching his skull.

Finally he threw his head back to howl like a wolf. Then, in one quick movement, he pulled his handgun from its holster and shot the other guard at point-blank range.

There was a moment of stunned stillness, then he opened fire at random on his audience.

A bullet hit one of the women prisoners. She fell. Another hit a guard. He merely lurched. More bullets ricocheted off the front of the Pentagon.

The other soldiers retaliated, sending a hail of lead at the guard.

The little boys screamed.

The crazy guard jerked spastically.

Then the man with no shoes jumped the guard nearest him, pushing his M-16 around. Bullets tore into the guard next to him.

Stipe, Nick, and the men unloading the truck hit the ground as gunfire sprayed in their direction. The guard who’d been overseeing their work took a hit to the chest, dropping like a stone beside Nick.

He saw his chance.

As the guard writhed on the ground, Nick reached over and grabbed the soldier’s .45 from his belt and shot him in the head.

The guard went limp.

Nick spun around to see if he’d been spotted.

All eyes had turned to the entrance. Four more soldiers had appeared with MAC-10s, sending high-speed waves of lead into the prisoners and the other guards.

Nick rolled under the truck for cover.

As suddenly as it had started, the shooting stopped.

“
Enough!” shouted Hershman, appearing in the doorway behind his troops.

Nick rolled out from under the truck, tucking the gun down the front of his dirty trousers. He left his shirttails out, hoping the overhang would conceal its shape.

Now he had a weapon.

All he needed was a chance.

ABERDEEN, MARYLAND.

09:16 P.M.

They had arrived, and Sandy shivered with apprehension. So near yet still so far. It was twenty miles north from Aberdeen to Keaton, and they all agreed it was too risky to attempt the journey in the dark. Dick and Briggs would search for a suitable vehicle at first light.

Until then they would sleep.

Or, in Sandy’s case, try to sleep.

Within twenty-four hours, she could be in Nick’s arms.

Or maybe she wouldn’t.

The uncertainty gnawed at her nerves. Sleep, when it finally came, was fitful.

THE PENTAGON.

10:01 P.M.

It was time to end it.

For Mitra. For Ryan. For himself.

Corvino strapped a second handgun to his belt, picked up a MAC-10 from the desk in front of him, left the office which had been his room for the past few days, and headed for a final meeting with Hershman.

It was three minutes to ten by Nick’s watch. Nearly time for the guards to come fetch dinner.

He waited behind the conference room door. Stipe, Gifford, and Kitchen were in position on the other side, seated on the floor, ready to ambush the guards.

Everyone one was tense with anticipation.

Some of the other men had broken the legs off of a couple of chairs.

The women tended those who were dying of the virus, Ellen among them.

Nick stiffened at the sound of boots coming down the corridor. He raised a finger and signaled.

Stipe nodded.

The door opened.

Corvino listened outside Hershman’s office door. Good. It was quiet. No Skolomowski. Still, the Pole would come running as soon as he heard shots. His room was down the hall. But Corvino was ready. The MAC-10 was hidden inside his jacket. He took a deep breath, then knocked on the oak paneling.

A pause, then: “Who is it?”

“
Corvino. Skolomowski’s gone berserk.”

Hershman pulled open the door.

Corvino punched him full on in the face. Hershman flew backwards into the room, blood pouring from his broken nose.

Corvino stepped inside, closing the door behind him.

“
You lied. You betrayed us.”

Hershman smiled an insane grin as he wiped the blood and surprise from his face.

“
You’re a fool.”

“
This is for Mitra,” Corvino said, pointing his .45 at Hershman’s chest.

He fired. Hershman jerked back, the grin still frozen on his bloody lips.

“
This is for Ryan.” He fired again.

“
And this is for me.”

Corvino raised the gun and shot Hershman straight between the eyes, blowing his corrupt brains all over the wall.

He stepped forward, emptying the gun into the body.

“
Son of a bitch,” he muttered.

Then he heard Skolomowski coming down the hallway.

He moved just in time. The door blew apart as the Pole opened up with his Ingram, a rain of hot lead slicing through the wood in a section.

Corvino threw himself backwards, splinters showering his legs as his back connected with a desk. He rolled over it to the other side. His stiffening joints flared in agony at the sudden movement, air rushing from his lungs as he landed badly.

A second stream of bullets tore through the door. Then someone kicked it in. A soldier he didn’t know leapt inside, M-16 blazing, strafing the desk. Corvino returned fire from beneath the wood, his burst slicing upwards, cutting his attacker down at crotch level.

Skolomowski’s arm appeared around the door, Ingram in hand. He fired blindly until the clip was spent, plaster, framed pictures, books on shelves disintegrating under the onslaught. Corvino squeezed off a short burst in return. The pole withdrew a split-second before the door frame flew apart.

The hoped-for breakout from the conference room had quickly been reduced to a Mexican standoff. Nick, Stipe, Kitchen, Gifford and two women who’d liberated guns from their dead captors were faced off by six soldiers outside in the corridor. From his vantage point to the left of the open doorway, Nick could make out the positions of two of them, hunkered down behind makeshift barricades of office equipment strewn across the hallway. Before anyone could make it to the hallway, they’d be dead. The only comfort was at least the soldiers couldn’t get in.

An M-16 fired from the corridor. Nick pushed himself flat on the floor. Behind him, at the rear of the room, several children were crying, the women’s attempts to quiet them futile.

“
Can we make it?” Stipe called out from beneath the conference table.

“
No chance still,” Nick replied. “Too many of them.”

Stipe crawled snakelike across the floor on his hands and knees towards the window. Crouching, he looked out. It seemed the only apparent escape route, but they were on the third floor. Too high.

He turned to face Nick, who shook his head. He’d already thought of it and dismissed the idea. The only way out was via the door, and that choice seemed impossible.

The soldier in the hallway fired again. The two men positioned on either side of the door shot back.

“
Hold it! Save your ammo!” Stipe shouted above the noise. The men complied.

“
We’ve got to do something!” Gifford shouted now, diverting Nick’s attention from the doorway. “They can keep us pinned down forever!”

Nick glanced back at the door as Kitchen fired, jerking backwards as a bullet took him in the chest. Then Nick saw the soldier charging the room, running headlong towards them. Nick and Gifford fired together. The soldier fell as bullets took out his legs. Nick went for the head. The soldier spasmed and stopped moving. The kids in the back were screaming now, the women covering their bodies with their own behind the fragile cover of tables and chairs.

This was it. The End, Nick thought bleakly. They weren’t going to get out. There was no chance of making it into the corridor. He was going to die in the Pentagon, shot by dead soldiers, supper after all. But if that was the way it was going to be…

He frowned, trying to make out what was going on down the corridor. There was movement, then he saw another soldier stumble into view for an instant. The man staggered, fell. Someone fired and he saw another soldier dive on the downed man’s body. More shooting. But not at the conference room.

They’re attacking each other.

Could there be hope after all? Could the dead ones be coming unhinged, turning on themselves? If they were weakening so fast, then maybe Stipe was right. He and the others could overwhelm them.

Corvino replaced the spent clip on the Ingram with a full one from his ammo belt just as another soldier stepped inside the room and sprayed the desk, uncertain where his target was. Corvino hit him in the chest with a concentrated burst, sending the figure back through the door.

Three down. How many more did Skolomowski have with him?

He continued crawling around the side of the second desk towards the right of the doorway.

“
Come on, Corvino,” the Pole called out from the corridor. “Let’s get this over with. Man to man, downstairs. No more bullshit.”

Skolomowski threw his Ingram into the office. It landed beside Hershman’s body with a clunk.

“
Come on, you chickenshit. No guns. Or are you afraid to go one on one?” The Pole stepped into the doorway, his hands raised above his head. He was unarmed apart from the large knife sheathed at his right hip. Corvino bit down on his lower lip. All he had to do was squeeze the trigger, and no more Skolomowski. Just one movement and the fucking Pole would come apart at the seams. But it would be a hollow victory. Of all those who had betrayed him, excavated the foundations of everything he had believed in, Skolomowski was the one who offended him the most. If it was going to be over, it had to be done right.

“
Did you kill Mitra?”

A slight, sick smile curled the corners of Skolomowski’s mouth.

“
Twenty questions? Fuck that shit, Corvino. You want answers, you’ll have to beat them out of me. We going to do this or what?”

Sounds of gunfire erupted from above them.

Corvino raised himself from behind the desk, the Ingram pointing at Skolomowski’s chest.

“
Either kill me now or let’s do it.” The Pole looked tired. “Don’t matter either way. We’re dying.” He laughed. “Shit,
we’re dead already!
And we ain’t going to last much longer. Do it before I die a second time of boredom!”

He laughed again, a long, loud insane laugh.

Corvino stood, placing the gun down on the desk. More gunfire came from the third floor.

“
Down in the lobby. Hand-to-hand—guns are toys.” Skolomowski clenched his left fist, lowering his arm. “This is what counts. And this”

He pulled the nine-inch knife from its sheath.

It was a crazy idea but a frontal attack was their only option. And with the soldiers losing their control, it might just work.

When Nick was a kid his father had taken him to see a movie called
Zulu
at a revival house. It had been one of the few times father and son had shared social time together, and Will Packard’s subsequent behavior made the memory bitter, resentful. They’d gone to see a war movie triple bill:
Tora, Tora, Tora,
The Battle of the Bulge
and
Zulu
. The latter movie was the bottom of the bill being the oldest of the three, but something about
Zulu
had captivated Nick’s imagination more than the others. The true story of how a garrison of British soldiers had fought the entire Zulu nation had seemed an inspiration to his young mind. With limited manpower and weaponry, but with precise military efficiency, the soldiers had made a valiant stand, killing hundreds of native warriors. One of the ways they’d done it was by having two ranks of soldiers, the front rank firing while the second reloaded, the second firing while the first reloaded, a constant wave of firepower decimating the attacking Zulus.

If this tiny army was going to make it out into the corridor, it needed to do the same. Of course, they and their opponents had automatic weapons. But if they could keep the dead ones pinned down with a constant barrage, they could advance until the opposition was taken out. If it didn’t work, it didn’t matter. Better to die trying than end up as junk food to ghouls in uniforms.

Nick waved Stipe over.

“
I’ve got an idea,” he said as the Captain joined him. Then he explained his plan.

“
Okay, let’s try,” Stipe said after a pause. “Give ‘em a little hell to choke on.”

It was suddenly quiet—no shooting or movement from the corridor since the soldier had attacked his comrade.

Stipe crawled over to Gifford and told him Nick’s strategy.

“
Search the bodies.” He motioned to the two corpses of their captors slumped against the far wall. “See if they have any more ammunition.”

Gifford went over to the bodies as Stipe crept forward to speak to the other man covering the door.

He was halfway through explaining Nick’s plan when Gifford found the hand grenade.

Corvino and Skolomowski faced each other in the Pentagon lobby. Each had a knife in hand. The Pole held his ubiquitous military issue, glare from the fluorescent light glinting off the curved blade; Corvino clutched his serrated SEAL knife. The nerve endings in his left arm were sending out intense messages to his brain. He tried to ignore the pain. All he wanted was to kill the Pole, to tear him limb from limb, to end it once and for all. Everything. Himself included.