Elias watched Terry grab a rifle and use the barrel to draw a diagram in the dirt and then explained in fierce detail how they might try and lure Longman’s men out and make a deal for Liza and Ava. Moses would move slowly toward the wall, clanker box in hand, while Jessup and the others would lie back in sniping positions, armed to the teeth, providing cover.
Elias and Marisol continued to observe the discussion from a distance, Jessup and the other men speaking in hushed tones as they discussed every possible detail. Marisol heard them discuss a variety of outcomes, how it could go wrong or right. When she looked back over her shoulder, Elias had vanished.
The moon gilded the ground as she slipped between the trees and spotted Elias brooding on a slab of cracked concrete in what had once been a neighborhood park.
“You think I was wrong?” Elias said. “You think we should’a helped ‘em and gone back?”
Marisol mulled this over. “You remember how it was back inside the wall? How your family, how people you know would just … disappear sometimes.”
“At night mostly,” he said. “I know that. I remember how they came for them at night. But you … you worked for ‘em. You don’t know how it really was when they came looking for you.”
“I was an Ape, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t do us all kinds of wrong. There was one of us once, a man, a good man named Wolfe who wouldn’t do it. Who wouldn’t take part in the lettings, wouldn’t shoot one of the Runners. He had the room right next to mine and one day he was there, and the next they came for him and he was gone and it was like … like he never even was, y’know?”
“He’s a demon I think,” Elias whispered, before looking up at Marisol. “Longman. Do you remember stories about evil things … about demons?”
She ignored this, whispering, “All I remember my mama saying is that Longman could never be trusted and could never be killed.”
“Let them do it,” Elias said before kicking violently at the ground. “That’s their stuff inside the wall, right? Their people. Let them go get it.”
“What happens if they go and don’t come back?” she asked.
“Then I guess that’ll be that,” said Elias.
Back near the weapons, the conversation had almost come to an end. The plans had been made and the weapons loaded, readied, and handed out. Jessup stole a final look at Moses who dipped his fingers in a metal tin of grease to lube the heavy friction parts on a machine-pistol.
Jessup moved away from the others until he was standing directly over the clanker box.
“It may not be enough to make a trade,” Terry said.
Jessup peered back over a shoulder to see Terry duct-taping magazines of ammunition together.
“That thing I mean,” Terry said, pointing to the box. “I got a feeling whoever it is that runs what’s behind that wall wants those kids.”
“He’s not getting them,” Jessup replied.
“My thoughts exactly. But what if this Longman thinks different. We’ve seen what he’s capable of.”
“Then we give as much as we receive.”
Terry slapped a magazine of ammo into his rifle. “A righteous fire burns all, huh?”
“Fucking-A right,” Jessup replied.
The men traded a long look and then Jessup stood before Terry and slapped him on the shoulder. “We move out at first light.”
80
Farrow knew from his days enforcing the law that there were two kinds of time. There was beat time, or cop time, and then there was civvie, civilian time. Civvie time was fast and loose and it came at you when you were least expecting it. The final seconds before a car accident, for instance, that phone call at 2:17 in the morning letting you know that a loved one has died. Beat time was slower and it oozed past you usually when the chips were down and you’d been given just enough of a heads up to contemplate how bad things were about to get.
Beat time was at hand as Farrow and Locks spiraled through the Codex Building, listening to the shouts, the sirens, and the bedlam above as people scurried across metal flooring, searching for the pair as they continued down through the silo of cement, metal and glass. He was still shocked to have escaped from Longman’s prison cell with his new friend Locks.
“They’re coming,” Locks said.
“Really?” Farrow replied. “What gave it away? The screams or the sirens?”
“Less lip and more fancy footwork,” Locks replied with a grim smirk.
They doubled their efforts, galloping down, Farrow’s chest heaving, his heart hammering in his ears.
Had anyone ever done it before? Had anyone ever escaped from the Codex Building? From Longman? If they hadn’t he would be the first. He would make it out of this building and find a way to—
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Bullets flared and metal shards kicked up into the air as Farrow lost his grip on the ladder rail and fell straight down, hitting Locks, causing them to fall four feet onto a concrete landing.
His head ringing, Farrow glanced around in a daze at Locks.
“Good Lord you’re heavy,” said Locks, jabbing a finger in Farrow’s generous midsection.
“That’s relaxed muscle,” Farrow replied.
“Now I know where all the food in New Chicago went.”
“I’ll have you know that I’m planning on dieting as soon as we get out of here.” Farrow glanced around. “Where the hell are we by the way?”
“Right where we need to be,” Locks said.
Farrow squinted and he caught sight of a space that was wide and low-ceilinged. Some kind of loading dock. Rushing out of a patch of darkness at the back of the dock was a form busily reloading a magazine into an AK-47. The form, a guard it seemed, slapped a mag in the gun, hoisted and fired, shrapnel from the concrete walls slapping Farrow’s cheeks as he and Locks dropped to their haunches.
The guard snapped off a few more shots, emptying the magazine on his rifle as it rolled over empty. Locks whipped out a foot that kicked the rifle’s barrel up as Farrow locked his arm around the guard’s head. As he wrenched the guard’s neck a sickening crack sounded, and the man’s legs flapped as if he’d been electrocuted. Pulsing twice, the man’s legs fell limp as Farrow slowly lowered his body to the ground. He watched the guard staring up at him, the light seeping away from still open eyes. Farrow let out a little gasp , then he and Locks spun around and sped toward the far side of the dock.
“C’mon!” Locks shouted.
Farrow ran past Locks and jump-kicked the only door in sight. Fresh air filled his lungs and for a moment he tasted freedom, until he realized they had tripped a battery of sensors. Bonfire bright flood-lights clicked on, momentarily blinding Farrow and Locks. That's when the shooting started again. Automatic weapons clattering from hidden spots, bullets slicing the air as the two ducked and hauled forward, falling, rising, clawing their way under the sabled glow of a quarter moon.
They hit a fence on a dead run and grappled over it as slugs nipped the wire and they careened to the other side. Farrow felt his heart pulse in spasmodic beats as he plunged through the pitch, arms and legs windmilling before—
WHAM!
He hit the ground hard, webbed in blackness against the backdrop of gunshots and barking dogs, willing himself upright. A wave of bile foamed inside his throat as he looked in every direction. He was all alone. Crabbing left, his eyes recalibrated, screams from Longman’s men sounding off in the distance. Farrow dove down a slope and rolled over. A form skipped on the fringe of his vision. Something moving toward him. Locks?
The thing moved rapidly. Too fast for most humans. Farrow squinted, barely able to discern that it was a dog. A canine the size of a hog whose eyes blazed in the night like a fire in a cave.
One of Longman’s hounds.
One of the very same ones whose teeth he’d had ripped out and replaced with honed metal incisors that right now, to Farrow, appeared as big as steak knives.
“Nice doggy,” Farrow said, holding up his hands defens
ively.
The beast lunged at Farrow, rolling right over him in a blur of flailing legs and snapping teeth that turned the world on its side.
Titanium teeth flashed, Farrow screaming, rage clamping his muscles. He swung wildly, arms up, doing his best to keep the monster from fingers still ragged from the torturers’ handiwork. The dog snarled and latched onto his left wrist as Farrow pummeled it with jabs from his free hand.
The dog was thick-necked and weighed a good ninety pounds. It slowly began working its way up towards Farrow’s neck. His punches had little impact, and the sinking sensation overtook him as he considered that the monster was about to clamp down on his throat and end it.
Blood swelled in his ears and he saw visions of his wife and little girl and realized he’d soon be reunited with them.
I’m coming, Jane, I’m coming, Ellie, daddy’s finally coming home.
And then, in a flash, the dog looked sideways, distracted for just an instant by something only it could sense. Reflex took hold of Farrow, the hot stabbing pain from the dog’s teeth and claws ebbing for a second as he threw an elbow. The thick meat of his middle arm caught the mutt under the jaw. The dog reacted, disoriented for an instant as Farrow stabbed his bloody, stumped fingers in the dog’s eyes. The beast howled and fell back as Farrow rose and booted it in the chest. The dog whimpered, a rib or two cracked, stuttering off to one side before retreating into the undergrowth.
Farrow braced himself, refusing to collapse as waves of pain filled his body and the sounds continued to echo all around. A rumbling mixture of noises: boots trampling undergrowth, the bark of more and bigger dogs, the shouts of the men who trained and handled them.
Farrow ran bloody, shaking fingers through his hair, dark pupils searching for Locks who was still nowhere in sight. Seeing no sign of him, Farrow stumbled forward, nearly falling for the first few steps on trembling legs that gradually picked up speed as he slanted to the left and ran downhill.
Faster now, Farrow sprinting headfirst, swatting aside branches and small boughs, the trees seeming to bend with him as he slalomed past.
He continued his retreat, moving from one foot purchase to the next, willing himself to leave no visible footprints. He was fighting to put as much distance as possible between him and the Codex Building when the ground gave way under his feet and he fell back, rolling down until he came to a stop as a thin light raked his eyes. Figures moved into his line of sight with almost ghostly indistinctness as Farrow tottered, consciousness flickering like a candle filtered through tar-paper.
Shielding his face with a hand, he looked up into the grim visages of a pack of patch-work clothed men who looked as if they’d just returned from a day’s labor in the fields. One of them held an ancient-looking flashlight, the others gripped hand-fashioned weapons made of metal and wood. Farrow recognized them. Mudders. Bottom-feeders. One of them, an older man with a crooked mouth and a face like a shovel, stepped up.
“Thank God,” said Farrow. “You … saved me.”
“Hey. I know you,” the older man said, cantering around Farrow. “Yeah. I seen you in the days before. You was one of ‘em. You was one of ‘em Apes!”
Farrow fought for a smile. “Sorry, but I think you’ve got the wrong guy.”
The older man’s gaze narrowed. “I seen you myself, ya bastard. I seen you hunting down people for the dictator.”
Farrow raised his hands and was about to offer an explanation, but there was none to give. A mournful smile stitched his mouth as the man raised a dagger fashioned from a metal file.
“Wait!” a voice boomed.
Farrow’s head canted and he sighed upon spotting Locks who stumbled out of the darkness, clutching a bloody shoulder, face white as a tombstone.
“Don’t touch him,” Locks said.
“Why the hell not?!” the man with the blade asked.
“Because,” Locks said, “he was inside with me. He’s one of us now. He’s gonna help us … he’s gonna help us get this whole thing started.”
81
Liza’s brain was foggy with sleep as she awakened, still strapped to her chair in the Codex Building. Ava was next to her, chin on chest, the girl in some kind of fitful half sleep. Liza wasn’t as lucky. She was awake now and listening to the sounds booming all around her, the tail-end of the confusion caused by the escape of Farrow and Locks.
How long had they been in this room? An hour? A day? Vague memories swam in her head, distant thoughts about Jessup and the others and the attack on the boat. It was all so real, the smell, the sensation, the gnarled hands rubbing her back, stroking, roughly clutching.
She jolted fully awake to see a guard leering down at her, sucking on a child’s pacifier that was filthy and tooth-gouged. The man was heavily tattooed and muscle-yoked with the kind of nuclear tan that farmers and fisherman have.
“Wake up, oh won’t ya wake up, sleeping beauty,” he sing-songed to her, removing the pacifier with a wet, slurping sound.
The guard appeared soused, or half asleep, as he grabbed her hair and snapped her head back. She could see him unfastening his belt, the ghoul’s red tongue sidewinding between blackened, misshapen teeth.
She felt a fatalistic acceptance of what was to come, her teeth grating together, mind assembling the pieces to some response. Bite the man? Head-butt him? Try to reason her way out of it?
Her stomach tightened, her bowels constricting in a way she’d never felt before. A warm rush filled her stomach and made its way down between her legs. Something was definitely happening.
Looking up, a frail plea uttered from her mouth which seemed only to energize the guard who stroked her inner thigh and slid his pants down when—
WHAM!
The far door swung in and Longman himself appeared and the guard turned and blundered a few steps before Longman grabbed him by the neck and lifted him off the ground.
The man dangled at the end of Longman’s massive hand like a fleshy toy, staring up at the dictator’s angry eyes. Longman had been watching the room through a closed-circuit device. For some reason, the sight of this mutt readying to defile the two women aroused in him feelings that had been dormant for longer than he could recall.
The older of the two women reminded him of someone from his past. A woman from that first horrible year in New Chicago, whose name he could not even bring himself to utter. Tall and lean with vigorous, coffee-colored hair and eyes that passersby described as chilly, atmospheric blue. She may have been the only woman he had ever had feelings for in his whole life. And then she started questioning things. Questioning him. Wondering why this and why that and how it was that he preferred to rule by fear rather than love. Longman had heard a wise man once say that all successful movements are premised on identifying converts rather than heretics, but still. He had a long ear and thin skin and would not abide anyone seeking to alter him from his destiny.
When he caught her making what he thought were eyes at a bodyguard, he’d had the pair wrapped up like pupa in leather tresses, their tongues removed, and then flung down the metal chute that fed to the Silent Room.
Of all the things he’d done since the world ended, that was perhaps the only one that kept him up at night: the thought that she might still be alive. Still down in the bottom of that hellish pit. Wriggling around like a worm. Waiting for him.
Longman’s vision swam and then he gasped and snapped out of his haze and stared down at the man
“I-I’m s-sorry, sir, I didn’t think—”
“I know you didn’t,” Longman whispered. “That’s the problem.”
Longman turned and propelled the man into the brutal embrace of Cozzard and Lout who appeared through the open door and pulled the man’s arms behind his back.
“I think you need to contemplate what you’ve done,” Longman intoned.
At the very mention of this, the guard squirmed and screamed. He knew what it meant.
“Oh, God! Oh, Jesus, no! Please! Anything but that, sir!”
<
br /> Cozzard and Lout pulled the shrieking man down the hallway as Longman closed the door and gently turned to Liza, and Ava who was sobbing quietly.
“I’m sorry that had to happen,” Longman said.
“I don’t think you are,” Liza said. “You would’ve liked that to happen maybe somewhere else, but you’re not entirely troubled that one of your people put a little fear in us, right?”
Longman smiled.
“I knew you were someone,” he said to her. “I could tell that the moment I laid eyes on you. What were you back in the world? An enforcer of the laws? A person who finagled with money? Tell true.”
“A nurse,” she said defiantly. “I was nurse.”
“Ah, one of the few who actually served a purpose,” he chuckled. “What’s your name?”
“Liza.”
“And your friend?”
“Ava.”
Before Longman could reply, Liza blurted, “I’ve seen it all, sir,” she said. “I worked on a pediatric floor and at a hospice center so anything you’ve got planned for us, I’ve probably seen it and worse. I’m not scared if you were wondering.”
“Your eyes and mouth suggest otherwise, Liza,” Longman replied.
Liza pursed her lips.
“We don’t know what you think we do, and even if we did, you’d still do something terrible to us,” Liza said.
“How could you possibly know that, without knowing me?” Longman asked.
“I know men like you,” she replied. “There have always been men like you and there always will be.”
Longman removed a blade as long as a railroad spike and moved over to Ava and pressed it against her neck. Ava’s eyes bulged like an oxygen-deprived goldfish.
“What about her, nurse? Do you think she’s scared?”
Liza watched the blade press closer and then Ava moaned and a riffle of blood oozed down the blade.
“We’re from the other side of the Lake,” she said.
“Good girl,” Longman replied, easing back on the blade. “Nothing is secret anymore. Everything is out in the open. Total transparency. Best to tell all that you know. Give me a little more.”
Blood Runners: Box Set Page 35