“Good. Was that woman who worked for you among them? What was her name, Grace, err, somebody—”
“Delaney, Grace Delaney. No, she wasn’t among them, why?”
“Just wondered, that’s all. Now you get that done, okay, and you might want to get a direct line with the ranking police and National Guard officer at the scene just in case there are more breakouts, okay?”
“Yes, I’ll do that…oh, and by the way.”
“Yes?” Moya raised his eyebrows, not sure if it was to be good or bad news that was about to be delivered.
“The broken windows were repaired and reinforced.”
“The what?” Moya didn’t grasp what Calgleef told him.
“The windows at the hospital, they’ve been repaired.”
“Oh Good, that’s good.” Said then pushed the button to end the call. “Perfect damn idiot, is what he is!”
It appeared obvious that none of Grace Delaney’s attackers were among those that had escaped. Calgleef would have mentioned if they had, if any were so infected and had become raving mad that they attacked on sight…
“Holy sweet Jesus… what if the disease spreads inside a prison?” The thought of being without any avenue of escape terrified him. He remembered that sound in Delaney’s voice, it was anger sure, but also fear—unmitigated fear.
He didn’t want to think of the ramifications as he sat down on the edge of the bed. He’d have to do his level best to prevent the Baltic flu from breaking out across the United States before the new serum was produced. If it got out of control beforehand, there would be no use for a vaccine. And the only money-making enterprises would be morgues, funeral homes and cemeteries.
“Wait here,” Grace said to Sanders, then pointed to the doorway which led to the stairs. “Isaac, get the door!”
Tilford nodded, rushed forward and flung the door open, then jumped back. Grace stepped directly in front of the open door. When she saw it was clear, she moved forward and looked inside the stairwell, to the left, then right, then up the stairs.
“Okay, we’re good. Let’s go!” Her voice echoed in the concrete and steel cavern.
Tilford followed with Sanders in tow. “Come on, Beth, come on.” He pushed the door shut behind him, then tried to lock it without success.
“Isaac, what are doing?” Grace called from the third step up.
“Trying to find a way to lock this door, but I—”
“Smash the keycard number pad.” It was Sanders who spoke up, her voice still ghostly, distant.
“What?”
“Try it, Isaac, try it!” Grace urged.
Tilford took the end of his mop and wielding it overhead in both hands jammed it into the keycard control like a knight of old would use a spear against a fire-breathing dragon when administering the final coup de grace. After several hearty blows, he tried the door.
“It works. There’s still a bit of give, but it appears to have set the latch in place. Good thinking, Beth!”
Grace noticed that Tilford’s praise put a smile back on Sanders face, however slight. Satisfied the door was locked they continued toward the third floor without a word said; time was not on their side for any of this. With blood-eyed ghouls seeking to drain their blood and undoubtedly an infectious disease running rampant throughout the hospital, they had to keep moving until they found a way out. Grace, because of her position, knew they shouldn’t even consider leaving the hospital. Not until they’d been quarantined and checked. But this was no longer a functioning hospital, it had become a blood bank to bunch a crazed ghouls infected with an insidious virus. They would die inside one way or another. She wasn’t confident of surrendering to the authorities outside either, not after her conversations with Calgleef and Moya. They might shoot first—indeed, that might even be their standing orders.
But why, then, did Moya give us the combination to the storeroom? It saved our lives but, but why? Grace couldn’t explain it nor was she of a mind to, not at this moment, not right now.
“No, not that door!” Tilford called to Grace, who was about to go straight out into the third floor. “Keep going right. The blue door at the end will take us to up to the roof.”
Grace got halfway up the stairs when she heard a clanging sound below her. She skipped—two steps at a time—down to the landing, gun drawn, expecting the worst, but was relieved to found Tilford slamming his mop into the number pad of the keycard lock.
“You’re getting pretty handy with that,” she said.
“I’ve always been pretty handy with tools.”
“I bet you—”
“I don’t mean to interrupt your tête-à-tête, but what if there’s more infected on the roof and we have to run back down?”
It was a good question and one that neither of the two most cognizant of the group thought of. Grace paused before answering her, she wanted to appraise Sanders’s condition. Her pupils had contracted to normal and she didn’t seem as hyper. Good signs to have, good signs indeed.
“Well, I’m going to go out on a limb here,” Grace began. It was far from a perfect answer and that bothered her. “I would presume all the interest for these infected would be patients and staff members, none of whom would be on the roof. And I’ve got a whole box of ammo here!”
“I’d agree with that assumption, but let’s get up there. I can hear some banging on the door below.” Tilford motioned below with a flick of his thumb. No one needed to take a second guess as to who it would be, and they headed for the rooftop door. At the top of the stairs was a small landing that led to a red door with roughly a two-foot-thick window in the center.
“Let me look…” Tilford ran to the side, thrusting his shoulder into the frame before taking a peek. He ducked his head out, looked then pulled it back just like he’d seen in the movies a dozen or more times. Bending over, he skirted to the other side of the door and did the same. “I can’t see anyone at all, I think we’re good.”
“Okay, you ready, Beth?” Grace waited until she received a positive acknowledgement. “Let’s go then!”
As before, Tilford pushed the door open and let Grace burst through. She held the revolver in a two-handed grip, her elbows slightly bent and level with her shoulders, ready to fire.
“Clear!” she called. A combat veteran would have been proud.
“You look pretty comfortable with that thing.” Tilford said.
“Are you two at it again? For God’s sake, we’ve got people turning into blood-drinking beasts, roaming the hospital and you two are having a chit-chat?”
Avoiding the comment, Grace concerned herself with the rooftop. The only sight was the of Des Moines skyline that surrounded them and the river of the same name, barely visible in the distance. The brightness of the mid-afternoon sun took them by surprise in more ways than one. First, their eyes weren’t used to the light after the low-level emergency lighting inside. Secondly, they’d forgotten about the time. From the first attack on Dr. Tilford by the patient with the enticing tits, to their escape to the roof, less than four hours had passed.
“Okay, what now?” Sanders looked around the desolate rooftop, which seemed as barren as the Sahara.
“Can that door be locked?” Grace asked Tilford.
“Not from here, no.”
“Okay splinter off that mop handle and jam it into the door crack. Keep doing it until you run out of handle.”
“And what are you going to do?”
“Nurse Sanders and I are going to figure out a way of getting off this fucking roof, unless you’d like to stay here?” She gave Tilford a “play along” wink, which he did. Grace deliberately mentioned Sanders. Including Sanders in more decisions—or at least giving her the impression she was included—would benefit the morale of the three, otherwise it could lead to a division; and that usually spelled trouble.
“Right then, I’ll leave you to it…” He made it appear as if he’d just been given an order he didn’t like but wasn’t about to question, either. He be
gan breaking the mop handle in a way that would leave it sharp and pointed at one end.
Tilford left the two women and headed over to the door. The splintered mop handle resembled a stake to drive through a vampire’s heart, Tilford thought, as looked at his handiwork. In this case it was infected hospital patients, technically still alive, but like vampires’ they sought the same thing.
Blood.
He had just jammed the second jagged piece of handle into the crack of the door and wedged a few quarters in the gap between the door and the frame, when he heard it not too far off and unmistakable. A helicopter.
Sanders had also heard it.
“Look, look!” She pointed about twenty degrees above her shoulder line. “There, it’s a helicopter,” she screamed, “a fucking helicopter! We’re saved!”
When the story broke out in the midmorning news that Riverside Hospital had an outbreak of Legionnaires’, it was news but not big enough to displace the usual main stories: the quarterback for the Chicago Bears’ knee surgery; the latest celebrity admitting to drug addiction, appearing naked at a party or in a music video, coming out as gay, or having a complete or partial sex-change operation. Most of which had becoming trite and boring. But when the CDC, backed by the city police and the National Guard, sealed the hospital, the TV news became interested. A partial state of emergency around the hospital had been called by the governor, an action most in the media had never heard about. Every electronic news outlet sent reporters to the scene, with the TV news teams jostling against one another for the best and first footage of the area. It was these first crews who took the police and National Guard by surprise and filmed the staff members smashing through the windows to escape the horror within. The hazmat-suit-wearing CDC men took them into custody for “a routine checkup” soon after and prevented the media from uncovering the true horror that lurked within. Now that the authorities had regained control at the front of the hospital and forced the film crews back, the TV station sent in helicopters.
“There’s three people on the roof, over there,” the chopper pilot said over the comms.
The reporter from the news leaned forward for a better look, then tapped the pilot on the shoulder. “Thanks, Mike.”
“Richard,” the reporter moved one side of his headphones from his ear and called to his camera operator, “can you get a decent shot of those people?”
Richard took a look at the roof of the hospital, hoisted the JVC camera to his shoulder and took a look through the viewfinder. He gave Steve Donalds, the adventurous reporter—at least in his own mind—a thumbs-up sign, then twisted in his seat and began filming. As he did the three people on the rooftop jumped and waved to the chopper.
“They’re going away… What’s wrong, can’t they see us?” Sanders panicked.
“They’re circling, just circling, they can see us all right.” Tilford started doing jumping jacks, to make sure of that. “Over here, over here,” all three yelled, elation and relief all rolled into one.
Grace stepped back from the other two and cocked her head slightly. Aside from the thumping woff-woff-woff of the helicopter’s rotor’s, she was sure she heard something else, something closer. She turned back to the door that led onto the roof; she didn’t want to look, but she had to, there was no choice.
“OH SHIT, THEY’RE HERE!” Her scream was louder than the incoming chopper. She was just in time to see the red door being forced open about a foot or so. The quarters jammed underneath prevented it from moving farther. Three blood-soaked men scurried about like rats from a sinking ship in their effort to squeeze through. The Two at the bottom were in blue scrubs, while the other, who was trying to crawl over the top, wore a white coat over his shirt and tie; obviously he’d once been a doctor. All three had the unmistakable blood-filled eyes.
“Isaac, Isaac!” Grace panicked. The excitement of the chopper, so close they were… so close.
“Shoot! Shoot them while they’re stuck in the doorway, Grace. Shoot them!”
She shook her head hard and snapped back to reality; the arrival and noise of the chopper had her confused. She pulled the .38 out from the top of her pants, checked to see it was fully loaded then took aim. Her first shot from shaky hands went wide and high, the second wasn’t much better.
“Get up close and blow their fuckin’ brains out, Grace!” Sanders commanded, excitement and fear on the edge of her voice. They were all so close, but if the chopper didn’t get here soon, it wouldn’t matter.
12
Twelve
“Steve, Steve,” the chopper pilot called to the rear and pointed to his headset when he finally got the reporter’s attention.
Steve pulled the headphones over his ears and was now able to hear the pilot.
“Go ahead, Mike, what is it?”
“There appear to be some others trying to get through the access door on the roof.”
Steve had to take a long look before he saw it, then gave Mike a thumbs-up. He tapped his camera operator on the shoulder, then pointed to the doorway area, jabbing his finger in the air.
“Okay, I’m on it!” Richard yelled, then returned to his filming. “Holy shit!”
Steve didn’t hear him but saw his reaction. “What happened?” He put his mouth to Richard’s ear.
“There’s a woman,” he pointed in the direction of the rooftop. “A redhead, she just started shooting at some others in the doorway!”
“Did you get it?” Steve shouted. Video of an incident of that nature would give his career a substantial lift. “Please tell me you got that.”
“I got it for you, boss!” Richard raised his fist; thumb extended skyward.
Steve patted Richard on the shoulder for a job well done.
“Great, make sure the station gets it pronto!” He then adjusted his headset so he could converse with the pilot once more.
“What do you think, should we pick them up?”
“Pick them up, are you crazy. They might have this Legionnaires thing?” Mike half turned in his seat to look at the reporter.
“That’s possible, but from here they look like hospital staff, and they might have information to share.”
Mike nodded to Steve and turned back to the controls. He knew the reporter couldn’t give two knobs of goat shit for what they knew. It was all about him getting an exclusive. He didn’t care for reporters, the TV station or people in general; not that you could tell from his expression. Like all good chopper jockeys, his face was covered by a ball cap, mirrored aviator-style sunglasses and a thick mustache that Sam Elliot would envy. The job was good; he got to do what he did best, which was fly choppers, and unlike in Iraq, was able to do so without being shot at.
“Just circle around the building for a minute or two. Richard told me one of them has a gun and—”
“A gun?” The chopper bucked to one side when Mike turned to the reporter.
“Holy shit!” the camera operator grabbed hold the back of the seat to prevent himself from sliding out the open door.
“They look like doctors and desperate to get out,” Steve said after the chopper steadied.
“Okay, but the first shot in our direction, I’m taking this bird down.” Mike placed a hand over the mic at his mouth and muttered an obscenity. He was sure this reporter was more concerned with getting the big story than rescuing these people on the roof; if that’s what it was. Flying over a city area, a pilot couldn’t afford an error or a lapse in judgment, and neither of these would be helped if someone began shooting at the helicopter. As he circled Riverside Hospital, he received a call from air traffic control informing him of two more approaching helicopters. The difficulty of the safety factor just multiplied.
“Okay, let’s get this done and fast!” Mike yelled to no one in particular.
“What, get what done?”
“Pick them up! We’ll pick them up, okay?”
Steve answered with an exuberant nod and a thumbs up.
My God, what a dork! Mike said to
himself.
”Damn, this is going to be a big story all right,” Steve said aloud. Neither the pilot nor the camera operator could hear him. He could see himself walking to the stage to receive his IRE award for investigative journalism.
He, along with the other two in the chopper, had no idea just how big this story would be or what their future role would be—or if he would live to tell it.
The camera operator was the only one to clearly see Grace Delaney’s execution—style shooting of three people as they attempted to squeeze through the door, through the aid of the viewfinder. What wasn’t quite picked up in the lens of the camera, however, was that the executed, were no longer people in the strictest sense of the word.
After missing with her first shots, Grace moved forward, encouraged by Nurse Sanders, who was showing signs of a relapsing back into shock. Grace loaded the revolver one shell at a time as she moved forward; she didn’t have the luxury of her speed—loaders she used at the gun range. It was a difficult task with her trembling fingers and dropped several shells. Tilford followed behind and picked up the fallen bullets.
“All right, all right!” Grace yelled, her voice high—pitched and nervous. She closed her left hand over her right in a double-handed grip on the revolver when she got near the exit door. Her call was an incentive to push herself further into actions she wouldn’t normally take but had to—if she were to survive. It wasn’t perfect, and that was the hard part. This entire situation was far from perfect.
The three infected who struggled to get through the partially open door, became more frenzied when they saw Grace standing in front of them. They snarled and lashed out at her without any concern for the gun in her hand.
It was still hard. Apart from the pale skin, the animal like snarl’s and the blood-filled eyes, they still looked human, disease ravaged, and plague—infected, but human.
She took aim, took in a deep breath, let half out—then fired. One round each to the forehead. The impact wasn’t like the movies; there were no exploding craniums, just a puff of pink mist as the bullets made contact. The heads of all three jolted backward, one after the other before they collapsed like wet rags. Their hands and fingers trembled for a good while before they went limp.
Pestilence Boxed Set [Books 1 & 2] Page 10