Apocalypticon x-2

by Walter Greatshell

  That's a good girl, Alice thought, eyes brimming with tears. You're doing so good! Voice steady, she said, "There's a large liquid-nitrogen tank at the back of the train-it's used for storing blood specimens. There are racks of test tubes inside. Some of them will be labeled PMS for positive mutagenic serum. That's the stuff."

  As the girl obediently complied, Langhorne ordered, "Boys, don't crowd her, but keep those lights on her. Stay out of the way of the camera."

  Lulu entered the open doorway of the first train car. It was full of deep, wavering shadows from their portable lights. Computer workstations, office furniture, and bulkier equipment crowded the long compartment. There were human knickknacks here and there: family pictures, silly coffee mugs, dead potted plants. Lulu saw a picture of Langhorne pushing a little girl in a swing. Moving on, the next car was full of sterilizing equipment and a row of chemical showers. There were warning signs posted in stages along the way and illustrated instructions for all the proper decontamination procedures. The third car was full of high-tech medical equipment-it had the look of a hospital operating theater, with tiers of benches looking in from outside on the platform. Within the car were several beds with elaborate metal restraints, and three large white tanks with glass viewports. Two of the tanks had Xombies in them.

  Lulu remembered almost drowning in a tank like that as she was being interrogated at Thule. Two of her friends had died right next to her as she climbed their bodies to survive. They were both here now, Jake and Julian, serenely bearing lights and batteries. The memory held no terror for them or for Lulu. It was all just very… interesting.

  The fourth and last car was shrouded in layers of heavy plastic sheeting. At one time the baffles had obviously been pumped up with air, now they hung limp. Lulu and the others tore carelessly through the seals to enter. It was a "clean room," containing air locks, biohazard suits, vacuum tanks, and all manner of UV lamps and microscopes, as well as more arcane scientific gear. Stainless-steel cabinets and refrigerators lined the walls. Like the compartments before it, the place didn't appear ransacked.

  "I knew it," Langhorne said. "They went after our facilities downtown, where the spectrometer and the X-ray diffraction labs are. They didn't even touch this place. Very few people knew about it, and to those who did, it was totally taboo-the secret Mogul burial chamber. Hallowed ground. No one belonged here unless they were dead. But this is where we collated and stored all our information. This is where Miska tied the threads together."

  Lulu approached the back of the car. Something was off there; something didn't fit. Amid all the wildly redundant human safety precautions, a door had been left open. It faced down the tunnel, a gaping window of black void. Beside the doorway was a large, stainless-steel vat. It was almost as tall as she was, plastered with bright yellow and orange warning signs: LIQUID NITROGEN-HANDLE WITH CAUTION. HAZARDOUS MATERIALS. BIOHAZARD. MUTAGEN.

  "Cellular aging is associated with patterns of phosphorylation-proteins breaking down-so we developed a fast, synthetic delivery agent that could rewire each cell's nucleus to correct these patterns. The ideal was a hardy, self-replicating cell doctor that would never let the cells die-for any reason. And that's exactly what we came up with: a viral mechanism that enabled each cell to function independently and self-sufficiently. This thing… this thing-it was bigger than penicillin, bigger than the invention of fire!"

  Lulu unclamped the heavy lid and peered inside. The tank was empty.

  "Well?" said Langhorne eagerly, unable to see what was wrong. "Get it and let's go!"

  There was a distant splashing. Lulu turned and stared blankly out the back of the carriage, her slight body framed by the doorway. From the echoes in that hollow gulf of air, she could sense the tunnel's length: a mile-long river sealed at both ends. A flooded crypt. Its temperature matched that of Lulu's own inner sea: fifty-five degrees. The light from the doorway cast a brown swath across the blackness, out of which loomed her own elongated shadow. Directly below her feet, she could make out the sepia glimmer of submerged railroad tracks receding into the murk.

  Her attention followed the line of the tracks to the vanishing point, fixating on something deep in the darkness, a ghostly, lurking presence she could not quite pin down. The unfamiliar sensation caused a ripple of gooseflesh, bristled her hair. Her own reaction shocked and amused her: How interesting. She hadn't known she was still capable of fear.

  But what am I afraid of? she thought. I'm the boogeyman here.

  Summoning the awkward instrument of speech, she said, "Big." Her voice sounded alien to her, rusty and shrill. It repulsed her. She cleared her throat and tried again: "There's something big out there."

  Listening from the sub, Langhorne wasn't sure who had spoken. She knew it couldn't be one of the boys, and certainly not Ed Albemarle. The raw, high-pitched sound paralyzed her for a second, because she knew from experience it could only be the voice of an articulate Xombie, but none of her Xombies had ever said a word. With dawning excitement, she realized it had to be Lulu-Lulu was talking! While Alice was absorbing this development, she also scrambled to make sense of what the girl was trying to tell her.

  "Something big? Out-out where?" she asked.

  Just then the ceiling came down.

  Above the tunnel there was an explosion-a series of explosions. Demolition charges had been planted in Miska's basement and along the secret stairwell, detonating in sequence to amplify their effect. Xombies trailing at the end of the cable were first shredded by the blasts, then pulverized by the collapsing mass of the structures above, first the stone ceiling, then the iron scrollwork, then centuries-old timbers, bricks, and lead pipes. Above, Miska's house folded in upon itself, three stories compacting into one, then none, as walls and floorboards buckled, windows coughed out glass, and heavy enameled bath fixtures were sucked downward as if swallowed by a leviathan. In an instant, it all vanished in a billow of smoke, leaving a gap in Benefit Street like a yanked tooth.

  In the tunnel beneath, the avalanche of rubble crashed to the bottom, burying the concrete platform and hitting the water with enough force to create sea waves that actually lifted the first Pullman car off its tracks. Dust, smoke, and hundreds of tons of debris roared down as if through a chute, perforating the train like volleys of grapeshot, pelting the Xombies within.

  Then, all at once, it was done.

  As dust and silence settled, all who were not buried or blown to bits climbed indifferently to their feet. They were filthy and dinged, but unperturbed. Lulu, at the far rear of the train, was one of the least damaged. The shock wave had blown her out the doorway, and she now stood up in sloshing, chest-deep water, sensing the silvery spray of glass and shrapnel embedded in her back. There was no blood or pain; all it took was a serpentine ripple to dislodge the shards, the clean wounds pursing shut like dozens of freakish eyelids.

  Lulu's senses were clouded, her body still ringing from the physical shock, but she knew that she was not alone in that water. There was someone else out there with her-someone or something that was both alive and dead, both Xombie and human, the pale shine of its life force eclipsed by the shadow of death, yet not any kind of Xombie she had ever encountered. Who's there?

  Now a light appeared at the far end of the tunnel, getting brighter and brighter as it came around the bend. As it hove into view, Lulu could see an enormous plunging silhouette wreathed in spray. If she didn't know better, she would have sworn it was a train. She was clear on one point, though: Whatever it was, it had no fear of her and was coming fast.

  The memory of her mother-her mummy-rose like a phantom out of Lulu's amorphous mind, that familiar carping voice that in life she so loved and reviled:

  What is this, Mummy squawked, Grand Central Station?

  "Everybody move!" Russell barked. "You heard the man! Everybody off your ass!"

  "Where you think we goin'?" demanded Kyle, frozen in place. He was not only terrified, but angry that his brother Russell was suddenly so eager to th
row in with a loser like Sal DeLuca-especially at a time like this. After all they'd been through together, he was gonna start taking orders from that guy? No way, uh-uh. What did that fool have that they didn't? Except maybe the map.

  "In here!" Sal shouted. He was standing behind the counter, pointing through the doorway of the minimart's utility room. It stank from the boys all having used the employee toilet even though there was no water pressure for flushing.

  The boys looked doubtfully at the dark, stinking little cell. "Can we all fit in there?" Freddy asked.

  Kyle yelled, "That's a death trap, man!"

  "Not there!" Sal impatiently pointed through the room to a door marked EMERGENCY EXIT ONLY-ALARM WILL SOUND. "There!"

  The Xombies were coming fast; if the boys didn't move quickly, they were going to be trapped in that glass box of a convenience store.

  They moved. In an explosion of panic, they trampled each other to reach the back door, the lucky ones bursting outside into an alley. Sal had the advantage of a head start, then Russell and Kyle and the rest of the stronger boys.

  "Which way now?" Russell gasped.

  "Why you askin' him for?" Kyle said. "Just go!"

  There didn't seem to be much choice. They were walled in on three sides by several buildings-a church, the rear of the minimart, and a hardware store. Directly ahead, the alley opened onto a back street. Sal went that way, the others following close behind.

  Meanwhile, the boys at the rear, who were still trying to get out the exit door, found themselves trapped.

  "Hurry up!" they screamed, trying to crush through as leering blue Xombies entered the store.

  Micah Franklin, the last kid in line, whose nickname on the boat was Sleepy because he walked around in a trance all the time, perpetually in shock because of the loss of his family, suddenly felt a hard, cold arm around his throat. Ah, damn, he thought, unsurprised. Then he was jerked backward off his feet and was gone. The same thing happened to Carl and Scott and Elijah, all snatched up as they climbed over one another to get out. With naked Xombies crashing through the windows, some guys broke and ran, trying to dodge or fight their attackers, and were picked off like rabbits. The last boy to leave the store, Aram Fischer, the boat's resident cardsharp, the con artist, could see Xombies coming up fast as he slammed the exit door. But there was no lock from outside, no way to secure it.

  "Oh God oh God," he cried, trapped there with the door shuddering against his back. He could hear a hideous whinnying sound from the other side. "Somebody help me!" But the other boys were running away as fast as they could and not looking back. As he strained with all his might, the door popped open an inch, and a long arm slithered through the crack. It seized Aram by the face, thick fingers rooting in his eyes, going all the way up his nose. Before he had time to scream, it yanked him back inside, his legs kicking furiously.

  Now Sal and the others were running down the street, trying to stay low as they scurried behind rows of cars piled up at the intersection. They didn't speak, but Sal could hear their gasps and sobbed curses as they caught glimpses of Xombies converging on the gas station, heard the sound of breaking glass. He hoped everybody got out. Any second now, those things were going to spot them, and it would be all over. They had to get off the street, out of sight, but anyplace they went would be another trap.

  Face it, dude, we're screwed.

  Even as he thought this, Sal felt that odd peace that always came over him during a race. Running, ducking, jumping obstacles, his attention streamlined into a familiar tunnel vision, everything focusing laserlike on a single goal. It was his training kicking in; he was conditioned to think under pressure. As an aspiring stunt rider, he had cultivated the mind-set of a kamikaze: In the heat of competition, you didn't have time to dwell on what was behind you, or the risks of the next jump-you just went. Fuck the law of gravity. You had to ride balls-out into the teeth of pain, grievous injury, possibly even death. Because that was the game. If you couldn't do that, you couldn't win.

  They were emerging into a neighborhood of hip-looking shops and restaurants, past a futon store, an upscale bar. Nothing that looked very promising as a hiding place. Continuing up Brook Street, they passed a small market and a liquor store. "Liquor store!" Sal heard Freddy hiss at his back. Sal ignored him, kept running. That was all they needed-access to free beer. On the next block was a hole-in-the-wall video joint, then something that almost caused Sal to jump out of his skin:

  A bike shop.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  RIDERS ON THE STORM

  Q: Does everyone who dies come back to life, like in a zombie movie? A: This is a hard question. Not because we don't know the answer, but because it is so vital that we treat all those who are about to die as an imminent threat. But the truth is no, most people who die from causes other than direct Maenad infection-which means a Xombie attack-remain dead. The reasons for this are twofold: One, the person's tissues may be insufficiently saturated with the Maenad morphocyte to permit revival; two, a level of cellular degradation has occurred that makes revival impossible. Dead is dead-Agent X can't infect a body with any degree of decay. The only absolutely predictable danger is from those who have become infected spontaneously while still alive, such as menstruating women, and anyone who has been "expired" by them.

  Q: So the dead are not returning to life? A: If a body has not revived within a few minutes of clinical death, it will not revive. This is not Hollywood. -The Maenad Project Xibalba…

  They didn't waste any time arresting her, once it was clear she couldn't regain contact with her shore party. Dr. Langhorne didn't give a damn now that Lulu was lost.

  Sitting with ex-skipper Harvey Coombs in the goat locker, unable to do anything but wait, she drifted in and out of the trance state that now constituted a good part of her waking life. Alice wasn't the only one. Nearly everyone on the boat was haunted by the past, visited by dreams and visions that came on so strong it was sometimes difficult to return to reality-the dead world refusing to let go, gripping tight as a Xombie. But Langhorne was a bit different in that the past was as loathsome to her as the present:

  Alice! Help me-my legs are broken. That insistent voice, so hard to ignore, harder still to forget. Almost as bad as the actual sight of him had been, smashed and bleeding on the red-stained ice, pitiful as a dog maimed by a car. Helpless in a way that was alien to both of them; she could hear the disgust in his voice-the new and awkward experience of having to beg for help. Alice Langhorne understood perfectly; it was shocking to her as well, after all this time, at long last. But she kept moving, made herself keep moving. Toward the submarine.

  Alice! What are you doing? Help me!

  I'm sorry, Jim.

  You can't leave me like this. Then, to her escaping back, I saved your life!

  It was true. He had saved her life. Not out of love, though-God forbid. Their marriage, never about love or romance, had always been more of a business arrangement, a limited partnership with emphasis on the limited: Jim amp; Alice Enterprises. And she had been the silent partner, the spy, working as Jim Sandoval's personal mole into Uri Miska's organization, serving as a direct link to Mogul Research Division, a subsidiary of MoCo.

  Had he ever loved her? Alice wasn't sure if Jim was even capable of such an emotion. She was useful to him; he valued her. Then again, she wasn't the most warm and fuzzy person herself, and the street ran both ways. Jim funded her research and provided the business and political connections that enabled the ASR project to be carried on without government interference-even if it was only so he could glean a hefty tax write-off-and she provided the product. But there was no denying that neither her work nor Miska's… nor Agent X itself… could have existed without the contributions of Chairman James Sandoval.

  When the ASR prototype, the artificial microorganism that would come to be known as Agent X, got loose in the environment, Alice couldn't help but feel that it had been inevitable, a form of cosmic justice. Looking at those contaminated soi
l and water samples, she had to laugh: Why not add failure and professional disgrace to her catalogue of sins? And when both Miska and Sandoval had downplayed the threat, advising her to sweep it under the rug, she had no energy left to resist. Nor did she resist much when her ex approached her at the company Christmas party, just one short week before the epidemic.

  They were on the top floor of the Biltmore Hotel, with a beautiful view of Providence, when he started blathering some nonsense about the installation of a research laboratory at a military base somewhere in the frozen Arctic-a place she'd never heard of, called Thule.

  Air Force base? she asked, only half-listening to him. It was her third drink. Laboratory where? Arctic what?

  There's an old Air Force base up there, left over from the Cold War. It's in Greenland. The government's converting part of the site into a storage depot for sensitive materials and personnel in case of a pandemic. Homeland Security stuff, all very hush-hush. We got the contract-mucho dinero. The downside is that they want it done yesterday.

  I can't go to Greenland.

  Why not?

  Why not? Are you trying to be funny? With all this crap going on?

  I know you're burned-out; we've all been under tremendous stress lately. That's why I think a change of scenery could do you some good-not just you, but your whole division. Miska's already agreed to hold the fort. Get away from here for a little while, a paid vacation out of that dungeon.

  Why? Are indictments coming down?

  I could think of nicer places if that were the case. This isn't Acapulco.

  When would I have to leave?

  That's the catch: You have to report by next weekend, preferably sooner.

  Well, it's out of the question then. You know I can't go anywhere until after New Year's.