Phil wanted anybody and everybody to post pictures on the Internet. He had no idea how to do it himself, but he was nothing if he couldn’t recognize the most effective way to communicate since the first written word. He wanted the world to know that this was the bombing suspect, and that later, the suspect would attempt to escape and be killed in the process.
“Daddy!” Grace screamed, and ripped out of her mother’s clutch. That dumb whore. He’d told her to keep a tight hold on her daughter, and she’d listened about as well as his idiot nephew when he’d told Lee that Kimmy was nothing but trouble, and wouldn’t help advance his career. “A single mother? Are you fucking kidding me?”
Phil was not a man burdened by sentimentality. Or gentleness. As Grace ran past, charging toward her father, Phil simply reached out and caught a fistful of her hair. He yanked her back, and her feet flew out from under her. She fell backwards, hanging in midair, hair snared in his fist. Her surprised, sharp scream echoed around the plaza.
Tommy drove an elbow into the nearest soldier’s chest, and Phil heard the crack even fifteen feet away. The rest of the soldiers surrounding him responded with a flurry of blows. Some of them even used their rifle butts. Tommy’s knees buckled and he went back down.
Kimmy rushed forward, but Phil stopped her with a single index finger, jammed up into her face. “Get the fuck back, you stupid bitch. You might be along for the ride, but you’re nothing but scenery. And that’s easy to replace. Remember that.”
Lee, the dumbshit, couldn’t resist taunting Tommy. Lee ambled over to the group of soldiers and squatted on his haunches in front of a barely conscious Tommy and said, “Told ya, asshole. Told you I’d make you wish you’d never been born. Told you I’m the man here. All this over some dumb cooze that hates your guts.”
Phil said, “Lee. Let’s go.” Fucking idiot didn’t know to quit when he was ahead. Phil kept hold of Grace, because he knew damn well that this girl was the only thing that could control Tommy, and pulled out his phone with his other hand. Grace whimpered but stood carefully so he wouldn’t tear any more hair out. He dialed Dr. Reischtal.
“We got him. Send in the chopper.”
“He is alive, yes?”
“He’s alive. A little banged up, and probably isn’t in the mood to talk right now, but yeah, he’s alive.”
“And the others?”
Phil glanced back over his shoulder to where a group of four soldiers had the two detectives and the crazy homeless woman in the middle of Clark, hands on their heads. “We got ’em.”
Dr. Reischtal was silent a touch too long and Phil thought that he had hung up. Dr. Reischtal said, “Ah yes. I can see. I can also see that hell is marching up the street, straight at you. You have less than ten minutes before every infected individual left in the city is pouring into that plaza. I want the two detectives and the woman dead. When it is done, I will let the helicopter know you are ready.” He hung up.
Phil called one of the soldiers over. He knew his authority as an alderman with the soldiers carried about as much weight as a flustered nanny, so he started by saying, “Just talked to your boss, Dr. Reischtal. You know who I’m talking about, right?” The soldier nodded. “Good.” Phil pointed at Tommy. “This fuck here, he’s the one responsible for Soldier Field. Dr. Reischtal does not want him harmed. But those fuckers over there, they helped him. Execute them. Dr. Reischtal’s orders.”
The soldier cocked his head and gave Phil a look like he’d just stepped in dog shit and was trying to be polite about it. He walked over to inform the soldiers guarding the three. They pushed the two detectives and the homeless woman around one of the military trucks and disappeared.
Phil still couldn’t wipe his grin away. Everything was falling into place. First off, they now had a guaranteed safe passage out of the city, but they also had someone to blame everything on, and on top of everything else, he might get to watch soldiers blast the living shit out of a couple of detectives who had always been a pain in the ass.
A deep throbbing sound reached him and he looked up. A gigantic Sikorsky CH-53K Super Stallion appeared over the buildings to the east, the rotors slapping the air with a relentless, inhuman beat. The two Apaches slowed and hovered at a higher altitude, giving the larger helicopter all the room it needed as it settled into the plaza.
“Go, go!” Phil yelled into the storm of dust and vibration. The soldiers dragged Tommy across Clark, Lee took Kimmy under his arm, hustling her off the stage past the subway stairs, and Phil pulled Grace along by a fistful of hair. Once they passed the tree planters, they crouched along the sandbag wall and waited for a signal.
As the chopper landed, none of them heard the almost liquid pops under the street. White wisps began to curl out of the holes in the manhole covers and the grates of the storm drains along Washington across Clark. Thick gray smoke wafted out of the subway steps at the northeastern corner of Clark and Washington. More rats fled up the subway steps and cringed in the sudden light, then bolted into the shadows of Clark or Washington.
Sam didn’t get on his knees like they wanted.
So they knocked his feet out from under him. He landed heavily on his side, tried to take a breath and something gave, so deep inside he felt it in his back. He doubled over, hacking red globules across the sidewalk.
Ed spoke slowly and relentlessly, taking his time getting on his knees. “Chicago PD, Detective Jones and Johnson, we’re here under orders, you have our badges, we’re just like you guys, radio it in, check it out, we’re supposed to be here.”
The lead soldier, an older merc with tired eyes, ignored Ed and repeated, “On your fucking knees. Head against the wall. Now.”
Qween helped Sam onto his knees. The three pressed their foreheads against the rough-hewn rock of City Hall.
“Hands behind your head.”
Ed wouldn’t stop talking. “Just check with your superiors, we’re on your side, you don’t have to do this right away, give it a minute, just give it a minute.”
The leader gave a call, a grunted “Hup,” and the three soldiers stared at him for a moment. He glared back. They glanced at their weapons and readied them as quietly as possible. If they didn’t like executing three civilians, too damn bad. The folks that signed the paychecks didn’t give a shit if the soldiers liked their jobs or not. The three soldiers didn’t dwell on it too much. This was the job.
Sam knew they were dead once they had been lined up and had prepared himself. He also knew that he was leaking blood, as if someone had popped open an old oil can, and now it was now taking its sweet time dribbling out of him. He’d been wearing his seat belt, but hitting that fucking Stryker had been like hitting one of the concrete slabs they’d erected around the Chicago Board of Trade after 9/11. He knew that unless he got to a hospital in the next five minutes, nobody was going to be able to plug the hole before he was empty.
A bullet in the head from the soldiers didn’t concern him much. But the thought of bullets in his friends’ heads did. So before the leader could get the second command out, Sam rose and spun, using the inertia of his twisting body for leverage as he unfurled his arm, reaching out with Qween’s straight razor. The blade slashed up through the leader’s face, catching him on the chin and slicing both lips in half, severing the entire right side of the nose, splitting the cheek and carving through the right eye.
At the same instant, Ed fought to get off his knees, twisting and trying desperately to pull his feet under him so he could lunge at the last soldier in the line. The two soldiers in the middle sensed this and turned to cut him down when the street rumbled. Sam thought the sudden vibration was coming from inside his own head, and ignored it. He got control of the leader’s assault rifle, and fired. His aim was off and instead of killing both of the middle soldiers outright, the bullets tore through their legs, shattering bones and knees.
They went down, writhing and howling, where they met Qween. She couldn’t quite rise to her feet yet, and went after them on her h
ands and knees. She got her hip on one of their shattered knees, and starting kicking out with her other leg, driving her heel into the shredded muscles and blood and jabbing the closest one in the chest with her elbow.
Sam ripped the rifle away from the leader, who couldn’t resist and raised his hands to his face. He had to touch himself, see the damage. Blood ran down the fresh canyon like an ancient river. Sam did him a favor and shot him in the head.
Ed fought to rise, reaching out, clutching at empty space.
The last soldier had just enough time to pivot, raise his rifle, and fire. Three bullets stitched through Sam’s chest. The third spiraled through the left ventricle, killing him instantly.
Then Ed was on the soldier, catching hold of the assault rifle, twisting it against the soldier’s arms, jamming the barrel up into the soft flesh between the V of the jawbone, and pushed on the trigger finger. He emptied the clip. Nearly thirty rounds exploded up through the soldier’s skull, obliterating the brain, transforming it into a fine red mist that hung in the air like steam over a hot dog stand.
Ed brought his foot down on the next soldier’s head, driving his heel through the man’s temple. He ripped that assault rifle away and unloaded it into the man in a blind tsunami of rage.
Qween rolled onto the last living soldier and drove her thumb and forefinger into his eyes, brought them together in the soft meat behind the bridge of his nose, and pulled. The man’s mouth flopped open, and he moaned. It was an alien, uncomprehending sound of pain and confusion. She shook his skull back and forth, the way a small dog will shake its master’s sock. Eventually, the man stopped twitching and lay quiet.
Ed dropped the assault rifle. He stumbled past Qween, and knelt next to his partner. Sam was dead. Ed knew this immediately. He did not try to shake his friend. He did not try to speak, to try and reach the man. He laid his hand over Sam’s chest, then patted it once.
He found another clip, reloaded, and stalked off, heading for the helicopter. Qween retrieved her razor and followed.
CHAPTER 75
9:09 PM
August 14
They kept Tommy pinned to the ground, a boot on his head. When he’d been pushed to the sidewalk, he’d had a quick flash of everyone kneeling down behind the wall of sandbags. He couldn’t be sure, but he thought that Grace and Phil were somewhere behind him, fifteen to twenty feet back down the wall. Kimmy too. Tommy tried to concentrate.
How many soldiers?
He couldn’t remember. He tried to twist his head slightly, feeling the grit of the concrete grind into the side of his face, just to count the boots. The pressure on his skull was unrelenting. When the soldier felt him trying to move, the weight increased. Black stars bloomed and popped in front of his eyes.
Maybe a dozen soldiers. Maybe.
All he could really see was that the smoke was really pouring out of the subway tunnels now, obscuring everything in an acrid mist. He didn’t think he could hear anything over the thunder of the helicopter, but he recognized the brief burst of shooting across the street, back toward City Hall.
“It’s done!” Phil called out. “Let’s go!”
More gunfire.
The soldiers paused. Maybe one of the prisoners wasn’t quite dead, and that could explain the second round of shooting. They watched the trucks lined up along City Hall. For a moment, nothing moved but the smoke rising from underground. Then more gunfire, this time long and sustained. Someone was emptying a clip. Then, incredibly, even more firing.
Tommy rolled his eyes, trying to see how the soldiers were reacting. Several pairs of boots gathered, and he could hear them arguing. The crack from a single shot echoed across the plaza and was lost in the roar of the helicopter. Tommy barely heard it. But he felt the sudden release as the boot squashing his face against the sidewalk was suddenly gone. He twisted slightly and saw the soldier falling askew over the sandbag wall.
The soldiers around him opened up, sending a long, continuous barrage at the trucks across Clark. The gunfire even drowned out the Sikorsky for a quick second. Curved ammunition magazines hit the sidewalk around Tommy, bouncing and hollow. Fresh, full clips were slammed into place in the soldiers’ rifles.
Several soldiers started back across Clark.
Tommy eased into a sitting position, when he felt a hot barrel against the back of his head. “Sit still, or I will kill you outright, I shit you not,” a voice yelled above him.
Tommy froze.
Another burst of gunfire. This time it came from farther up Clark, halfway to Randolph. Another soldier fell. The rest responded, drenching the area with bullets. More clips hit the cement and more soldiers started drifting across the street.
Tommy glanced to his right. Only three soldiers crouched between him and his daughter. He could take them, but he wasn’t sure he would survive. And if he couldn’t get his daughter out of the city, then she would die as well. He curled his toes, flexed the muscles in his legs, and waited for a chance.
Five soldiers crept across Clark. Their rifles were up and ready, eyes alert, sweeping through the thickening smoke. Their boots were silent, hard rubber on pavement. A flickering flash of gunfire exploded from between two of the M939s. One of the soldiers went down. The rest answered immediately, squeezing triggers until the clips were empty.
Another single shot. Another soldier down.
More empty clips dropped. More full magazines were slapped into place.
More shooting. But this time, it came from a totally different direction.
A group of five or six soldiers erupted from the subway steps. They turned as one and fired back down into the subway. One of them suddenly noticed the giant Sikorsky, empty and waiting, in the middle of Daley Plaza. He punched the nearest soldier and pointed. They backed out of the stairs as one and bolted for the chopper.
Phil saw this and screamed, “Stop! Stop! That’s ours!” He sat up on the berm, pulled the girl up by her hair and flung her over the other side. He ran after the soldiers, dragging Grace along. The Sikorsky could seat over thirty passengers, but Phil was afraid it would leave without him. When he got close to the blades he turned and screamed back at Tommy and the remaining soldiers, “Come on! Run!” His hand was starting to cramp on him, so he wound his other hand through Grace’s hair and squeezed.
He flexed his first hand for a while, watching as two soldiers popped out and ran toward him. The soldiers fleeing from the subway started shouting at them. One of the soldiers from the Sikorsky shook his head and gestured at the circle of lights. The subway soldiers didn’t like it, but they took up posts halfway between the spinning blades and the circle of lights.
The soldier in charge jogged over to Phil. “Where’s the patient?”
Phil pointed back at Tommy, who was being pushed over the wall. For a minute, they had to drag him along, but only because he thought Grace was still back behind the berm. When he saw her with Phil near the chopper, he straightened up and walked on his own. The soldiers were content to follow him peacefully, keeping their guns aimed at the ground, as long as he was headed in the right direction.
The soldier nodded and jerked his head back at the chopper. Phil took that as a signal to get onboard, so he pulled Grace with him and climbed through the single door. Inside, an aisle ran up through the rows of seats, three on one side, two on the other. He dragged Grace up to the first row behind the cockpit and threw the girl into the seat nearest the window.
Phil stuck his head into the cockpit. “Soon as the patient is onboard, we’re out of here, you got me?” He left before the pilot could answer and went back down the aisle and stood in the doorway. Tommy was making his way across the plaza, getting closer to the whipping blades, but still moving unbelievably slow.
“Hurry the fuck up!” Phil yelled. His words were lost in the wash of the rotors. No matter. Tommy would be inside the chopper within thirty seconds, and they would be safely in the air, leaving all the shooting and infection and death beneath them. They would de
liver Tommy to Dr. Reischtal, and Phil and Lee could take their rightful place in the media as heroes of the pandemic.
Phil was just beginning to bask in the glow of the anticipated admiration, and yes, even awe, when the lights of the city disappeared, plunging Chicago into near total darkness.
Every light surrounding the plaza winked out, and the only illumination left came from the blue flashing lights of the Sikorsky. The soldiers let loose with a few panicked bursts of gunfire, then stopped when they realized they couldn’t see anything. The soldier closest to Tommy said, “Oh . . . you fucking, oh fuck . . .”
Tommy guessed one of the fires or explosions in the subways had fried one of the ComEd transformer stations. It had happened before, leaving most of the Loop without power for a summer afternoon. Beyond that, he ignored the darkness, focusing only on Grace, somewhere on that chopper. It was lit up like an angry, monochromatic Christmas tree, settled in the middle of Daley Plaza and none too happy about it.
As he got closer though, Tommy faced the stark realization that once he was onboard, it would be over. Once he was inside, they would continue to use Grace against him. He was back where he started, powerless while they threatened his daughter.
He ducked under the massive spinning blades, crept to the doorway, and stopped. He’d gotten far enough ahead of the soldiers that he could afford to sit and wait a moment.
Phil stuck his head out and saw Tommy just standing there. It drove Phil crazy. “Get inside, now!”
“No,” Tommy said.
Phil pulled a snub-nosed .38 from his waistband. It looked like something an old-fashioned mobster would carry. Beyond five feet, it was about as accurate as a crumpled paper airplane. He’d be lucky to hit a tank if he was shooting from inside. Phil had waved away the teasing from his buddies at their dinners. “If I’m not up close enough to let this baby take care of a problem, then I deserve to die for being a dumb fuck.”
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