Pitfall

by Cameron Bane

  I could even hear the capital P when she said it.

  “You know how Trask tells everybody nothing is ever wasted at GeneSys?” she asked. “That’s true, but not in a way most are ever told.”

  Shelly put her limp handkerchief back in her jeans pocket, having done about as much damage to it as she could. I couldn’t tell if her expression was just a strange trick of the moonlight, or if she really was feeling as sick as she appeared.

  “You get off the elevator on Level Seven. Right across the hall is a big door. From that you go through an airlock, and through a last door. You’ll find yourself in a huge mirrored room. Like a great big empty water tank or something.”

  “You said huge. That’s a relative term. How huge?”

  “Maybe fifty feet across, twenty feet high.”

  It did sound like an underground tank. But holding what?

  “And right in the middle, right in the center of the floor, is this …” She fluttered her fingers, groping for the word. “Camera thing.”

  That made no sense. “Explain.”

  She shook her head. “You know that thing in a camera, right behind the lens, that thing that looks like a flower?”

  Recognition dawned. “An iris opening.”

  “That’s it. It’s like that, but big, maybe fifteen feet wide, set flush in the floor.”

  “But what is it?”

  “I’m not really sure. I guess you might call it, well, the opening to a kind of garbage disposal.” Her tone betrayed the fact she must have felt it was a lot worse than that. “When you come in there’s this big, steel bin on metal wheels against the wall. But stained. Used. Like a small dump truck, you know?”

  “If you say so.”

  “It fits into this track that leads up to the iris. You load garbage in it, bags or boxes or whatever will fit, and you press this button on the wall next to the door. And then that iris opens up.” Fear filled her face. “And when it does, it never makes a sound. Never.”

  I didn’t know why that seemed so unnerving to her, unless she was trying to convey something more by its very silence.

  “You press another button, and that starts the bin rolling down the track to the opening. When it gets there it tilts up, and the stuff inside dumps in. Then it rolls back to where it started, you press the button again, and the iris closes.”

  “I still don’t understand. Why is that so frightening to you?”

  Her voice grew as tight as the skin on an apple. “I can’t even describe the awful stench that rises up out of that hole when the iris cycles open. Some kind of harsh enzymes are down in there. Sooner or later everything ends up in the Pit. Trash, medical waste, food.” Painted white by a moon-goblin’s brush, Shelly’s face looked cadaverous. “And bodies.”

  Even though I’d expected it, the word still hit me like a blow. “Bodies?”

  She shuddered again. “Have you heard the story of Buddy Mordetti, the man that gave Boneless Chuck his nickname?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, I was there the night Buddy’s body was dumped, two weeks ago. Thank God, I wasn’t part of the burial detail; I guess that’s because it was my first night on the special squad. But I saw some of Boneless’s troops wheel Buddy in there. What was left of him, anyway.”

  She stared down at the ground, and I asked her to continue. She looked back up.

  “I’ve never seen a man beaten so badly, Mr. Brenner, and growing up the way I did, I’ve seen my share. Buddy was like a bag of broken glass. My God, the blood …”

  “They let you watch?”

  “Sure.” Her laugh was humorless. “I was just one of the gang now. A press of the button, and Buddy was history.” Her expression seemed haunted and ashamed, as if she was remembering things best left forgotten.

  “But it wasn’t just him.” She’d grown even grimmer, if such a thing were possible. “A week before I was promoted, I heard one of the girls in the dorm died of an infection or something, and she was put in there too. And then three nights ago one of those old doctors just dropped dead. They said he had a stroke. He ended up there too. I personally saw Boneless pitch the man’s body in with no more thought than you’d give a squashed bug.”

  Nightmare fuel, and then some. “Do you know what’s down there? Beneath the iris?”

  “Cross says it’s like a huge chemical toilet, and everything thrown in there gets dissolved in some kind of an enzyme bath. The methane gas that’s released gets drawn off, and they use that to help power the dome.”

  I’d heard enough. More than enough. I had to end this, now, and I started to turn away. But what Shelly said next seemed to come from straight out of left field.

  “Wait a minute, please.” With a will she’d calmed herself, as if she’d had a lot of practice at it, and she lightly placed her hand on my arm. “Don’t think I’m crazy for asking this, but I have to know what’s in that rig you’re carrying.” Using her other hand she pointed to my shoulder holster, where it rested snugly under my left armpit.

  For some reason it seemed vitally important to her that I answer. “A Browning Hi Power 9mm Pathfinder.” I regarded her strangely. “Why?”

  “Because you’ll need more than that to impress Boneless and his boys. I don’t want your death on my conscience, not that on top of everything else. That key card I gave you will open my locker door when you get inside. Take my gun. Keep it for backup if for nothing else.” Her eyes were pleading. “Please.”

  “Okay, but why?”

  “Because there’s another piece of firepower Boneless has his elite corps carry. An FN P-90. With frangible bullets.”

  I knew of P-90s, and had fired them on more than one occasion. It’s a Star Wars-looking machine gun imported from Belgium, with forward grips and downward ejection. It only weighs in at seven pounds, and is totally illegal for civilians to own or operate, their use exclusive to black ops military units and federal agents.

  The rounds it shoots are five point seven by twenty-five millimeter armor-piercing, and it fires them at the rate of nine hundred a minute; in other words it can fully empty its fifty-round magazine in less than two and a half seconds. But it was the frangible part that gave me pause. Those particular bullets break apart in pieces when they hit. If I got in their way, it would look as if a dragon had chewed me.

  Vainly I tried to push that picture out of my mind, my body being cored by a slew of those things. “All right, you convinced me. I’ll get your piece out of your locker when I get inside.”

  “Good,” she nodded, seemingly relieved. “Otherwise you don’t stand a chance of living to see the morning.”

  “Thanks, Shelly.” I bit back a grim laugh. “That’s the spirit.”

  With a long sigh I again reached for the Camry’s door when Shelly dropped her car keys. We both bent down to retrieve them. She got to them first, and I offered her my hand to help her up. She took it.

  And as she did, the craziest thing happened. From the warm, slightly puzzled look in her eyes, it appeared that attraction I’d felt for her was going both ways.

  No. Impossible. This was insanity of the first degree, and for a wrenching moment I felt like I was being unfaithful to my late wife. If I lived through this, I thought, then we’d see.

  But first I’d have to live.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  “Do you know what time it is, sir?”

  The young guard manning the gate was looking at me about the way you’d think, like I was about a half-bubble off plumb. I’d just showed him my EPA badge. He hadn’t seemed terribly awestruck by it.

  “Yeah, I do. My Granny taught me how to tell time when I was just four. She used an old mantle clock that sat on a metal box holding Grandpap’s ashes. There wasn’t a whole lot left after the lightning had cooked him.” I flashed a madcap smile.

  “Huh?”

  “Well put, son. I can always spot a college man. Are you going to let me in or not?” I’ve always been long on audacity, and I was jazzed with adre
nalin about what was surely coming, like I was before any action, and my speech was sharp.

  He started to pick up the phone just inside his shack. “You know, maybe I should call Mr. Cross …”

  “You do that. And he’ll tell you that as a duly authorized inspector of the EPA, I have carte blanche authority to make spot checks of any facility I choose in these United States, just about any old time I feel like it.” I had no idea if that was true; the important thing was that this dude believed it. “And then, in gratitude for your waking him from what I’m sure was a sound sleep, you and Mr. Cross can discuss your career options here. There probably won’t be as many as you might think.”

  I could almost see the wheels turning in the guard’s head as he put the phone back down. “You at least need to sign in.”

  “Fine.” He handed me his clipboard, and a second later I’d signed John Fields for what I hoped was the last time. Giving it back to him, the guard waved me through.

  As I headed for the lot, I wondered what would I have done if he’d called my bluff and phoned Eli. I wasn’t sure, but I’d have laid even money Eli Cross has been a lot tougher to buffalo than that pimply faced post-adolescent at the gate.

  From Shelly’s intel, the clock was rapidly ticking down to zero for Sarah. It looked like it was time to call in the cavalry. After parking the car and picking up my Blackberry off the seat, I punched in Seth Delacroix’s phone number, ready to give him our code word. I placed it up to my ear and listened. One ring. Two. Three. Uh-oh. Where was he? He told me he’d stay close. This wasn’t like him. Four rings. Five. His voicemail kicked in.

  As the outgoing message finished, I tried to keep the frustration out of my tone. “Seth? John. Where are you? Pick up.” I waited. Nothing. “Listen, things are going down fast. Code word, Trebuchet. And when you come, bring friends.” I bit off the words like jerky as I considered all that Shelly had told me, adding, “Sooner rather than later, man. Oh, and one more thing. Once you’re inside, know you’re being tracked.” Holding the unit low, I texted him the same message, laboriously pecking it out. Stupid dinky buttons. Putting the unit away, I shook my head. I hoped he got it.

  Now that I’d made it past the gate, one hurdle was over. I’d face another when I encountered whatever night guard was just inside at the desk. But I was mildly surprised. After coming down the tunnel and entering the lobby, go bag firmly in hand, I found the area unoccupied.

  Reaching in my pocket, I pulled out the flash drive and headed over Albert Trask’s console. Once there I saw his computer was in standby mode and I awakened it. Putting the device in the port, I pulled up drive E. Moment of truth.

  Pressing the enter key, I stared at the screen. An “installing” bar appeared, with one blue box at the far left. As I watched, another appeared. Okay, it was working. As it ground along I idly wondered why I hadn’t been rushed by Boneless and his pet thugs yet, but there was no time to ponder it. A moment later, and the download was complete.

  I hoped this would work. I sincerely did.

  Making my way left and over to the golf carts, I noticed each one did indeed carry a number etched into a small brass tag attached to the bumper. Studiously avoiding number five, I chose the next one down. Once on I flipped the switch, and a second later was whizzing down the hall toward the far bank of elevators. Strangely enough, during the trip I didn’t encounter a single soul. On this level at least, so far the place seemed as deserted as a whist tournament, not even a skeleton crew.

  Then I remembered the Pit, and tried to shut skeletons out of my mind.

  Once at the elevator bank I shut the cart off, dismounted, and strode up to the middle elevator, pulling Shelly’s key card out of my shirt pocket as I walked. Touching it brought her face to mind. I hoped she and her boy were going be all right.

  Shoving the card into the slot next to the door, I saw the small red light glowing above it instantly turn bright green. At the same time a soft ding sounded, and the door slid silently open, welcoming me inside.

  I hesitated. Maybe it really would be best to wait for Seth and the cavalry to arrive … I shook that off. Unlike the old Rolling Stones song, I knew time wasn’t on my side, or Sarah’s. Or Shelly and her son’s, for that matter.

  Squaring my shoulders, I walked in on the elevator’s black carpet. Inside, I glanced around, scanning the immediate area for sensors, and found none readily visible. The lift I was in appeared to be nothing more than what it seemed, an unadorned metal box with its controls recessed into a panel on my right.

  Lips pressed together, I punched six. The doors slid smoothly closed, and I started to sink. Less than ten seconds later the descent slowed, and then stopped. Sticking my head out, I peered to my left and right down a sterile metal hallway. Deserted. Cautiously I stepped out, and the doors slid silently closed behind me. Every combat sense I possessed was screaming like banshees. This was too easy.

  During out final chat Shelly had told me that once I left the elevators, turning right would take me to the dorms. As I sprinted, the area struck me as quite a bit smaller than Level One—no surprise there; it’s hard digging into rock. To get a firmer grasp of my bearings, I pictured GeneSys as a hideously huge deformed mushroom sunk deep into the earth, the dome above me being the elongated cap and the levels below, the stem.

  Then I pulled up short. I could hear a muted humming all around, but very low, nearly in the subsonic range. Stopping, and feeling a bit foolish, I put my ear against the metal wall. The sound was louder here, but still as deep, like a Gregorian monk holding one long bass note. Machinery. Obviously the skunk works powering this nightmare.

  In another few paces I found a door coming up on my right reading Locker Room. That’s where Shelly said I could find her Glock. Hoping I wouldn’t find the place full of black-garbed gents, I keyed the door swiftly and cleared it. The room was empty.

  Walking over to the row of lockers, right away I found the one that read S. Thornhill. Again using the card, I opened the door. The inside of the locker was neat and organized, and hanging on a hook on the left was Shelly’s rig. The holster, like her uniform next to it, was as black as midnight. I pulled the Glock 23 from it and ejected the magazine. Full, all thirteen rounds. I knew if I racked the slide I’d find the fourteenth round “up the pipe” as enthusiasts put it; in other words, chambered. Reinserting the magazine, I placed the gun in the small of my back, well under my suit coat. Closing the locker door, I exited the room.

  After going another few steps, I still hadn’t seen or heard anyone. That was both good, and bad. It was the kind of silence that slices through you, promising disaster. But as I rounded a curve, just a few feet away my question was answered. I drew up short, flattening myself against the wall. Just past me stood some sort of freestanding small cubicle, containing a seated man in hospital whites.

  From this angle he looked fairly big, and I saw he was watching a bank of video screens. It took a second before I registered what this was: the equivalent of a nurse’s station. I glanced up. I must have been well-hidden because the man’s gaze at the monitors remained unchanged.

  I hoped my luck would hold. One of the last things Shelly had told me during our chat was that if somebody ever got this far in, Boneless believed the combination of his lethally-armed troops and his own physical prowess would be enough to handle that unfortunate sod. All things considered, I didn’t have the time nor the inclination to test the security measures here if I could avoid it.

  It was obvious there was no way around that station, and I wasn’t about to make like Little Egypt and try crawling past the thing on my belly like a reptile, so in the end there was nothing else for it but to stride boldly up and bluff my way past with a little country blather. The nurse manning the console was a swarthy, curly-haired cuss, and his eyes widened in alarm when he saw me. “What the—? Who are you? How did you get—”

  “Evening. John Fields, EPA.” I held my go bag low, so he couldn’t see it. The man’s nametag read Mari
o Amonitos, RN, and my greeting was commanding as I addressed him. Lifting up my badge a bit (which by that time was looking a mite ratty), I went on, “I’m conducting an inspection.”

  He didn’t buy it, his answer an unintelligible snarl as he reached down and yanked out something beneath his console.

  Being that he was a male nurse, and to my old-line, nearly unreconstructed Southern chauvinist thinking, there to help people, I was almost a second too slow as I saw what Mario had clutched in his hand. A Glock 23, hell-black and swinging fast toward my sternum.

  Happily my old unreconstructed reflexes kicked in, and before he had the chance to bring the weapon fully to bear I stretched across the partition and sent my fist crashing right into the bridge of Nurse Mario’s nose. With a startled cry and his eyes rolling in two separate directions, the man slammed over backwards, chair and all, out. No doubt about it, Cross’s men really needed some training. Cross. Training. Cross-training. Har.

  Sucking my knuckles I muttered several harsh expletives as I waited for the pain to subside. I guessed I needed a refresher course myself. That was a highly stupid move I’d just pulled. I could well have broken my hand on the fool’s head, and then what?

  Satisfied that Mario was no longer a threat, I took a cursory glance around, listening hard for the sound of black-clad reinforcements coming my way. Nothing. And that was good enough. It was high time for me to find that dorm, rescue Sarah, and get in the wind.

  I started double-timing it, still hoping I was headed the right way. Common sense said the dorm had to be close to the nurse’s station … not that common sense was at a premium around here. Surprisingly, the dorm was closer than I’d thought. Fifty feet further down, and after stealthily following the curve of the wall, I came upon a recessed door. The sign on it read, simply, Female. Inserting the key card into the slot, I held my breath.