“Oh, none taken,” I say without meaning it. “Believe it or not, I tend to agree with Oleg on this one. Right now, our real enemy is Skuld and the few misguided saps who were foolish enough to follow him.”
“But what could he have promised them in exchange for turning the world into his own personal Hive?” Ret wonders.
Now it’s my turn to laugh. “You’d be surprised what men will do for nothing more than a fistful of empty promises.”
“And all the Zee concubines a man could ever want,” Bron says, laughing uncontrollably at his own joke.
“Skuld’s gotta go,” Krantz says, “no question about it. But Oleg might be right. These documents don’t indicate Kemper Inc. was trying to lay waste to the world. They were trying to create a sort of utopia and on some level, I admire what they were trying to accomplish. A world free of sickness, starvation and death.” Krantz flips through a half dozen sheets, then runs his finger down one of them until he finds what he’s looking for. “And by the looks of things. they didn’t pump barrels of the stuff into the water supply as we thought. Hell, it didn’t take more than a single jug of the stuff to start a chain reaction they were powerless to stop. Sounds more like a Keeper Science Academy project gone wrong than a group of evil geniuses.”
I gather up the folders and put them in Dhal’s pack. “Look, if we don’t stop Skuld, then it won’t matter one damn bit who started this mess. Ret and I will take lead. Bron, you and Krantz watch our backs.”
-23-
It isn’t long before we come to the intersection of four separate hallways with an odd looking platform in the center of it. We approach and Oleg shouts out from behind. “It’s a freight elevator. A box attached to cables that transports people and goods between the floors of a building.” He doesn’t even wait for us to ask anymore.
“But there aren’t any doors.”
“No, but it looks like there’s a grated roof, so we’ll need to hang on tight.”
Heights are not good in my book and I can already feel my teeth begin to grind with anxiety.
We’re less than twenty feet away when I feel an electrified tingle jolt through my body. Then comes a signal. The Hive leader’s pushing them on, as if he can already feel me within his grasp. They’re close, no doubt about that, but I haven’t the foggiest idea how they could have broken through that doorway so quickly.
Then movement up ahead. Past the elevator and through the hallway on the other side. It’s dim, but even from here I can make out figures scrambling through the shadows.
“Zees straight ahead,” I bark. “We can’t let them cut us off from the elevator.”
And almost on cue their eyes fill the hallway with beams of dancing light. Their hissing is growing louder and I know it’s going to be close.
Dhal’s running directly behind me and I shout at him. “For everyone’s sake, I hope you know how to work that thing.”
I glance back for no longer than a second and catch the panic on his face.
We reach the elevator first and I swing my repeater off my shoulder and into my hands. I’m about to fire when I realize that our situation is so much worse than I originally thought. Dhal’s hunkered down over the control panel, trying to make head or tail of the buttons, while Oleg hovers over his shoulder, pointing and shouting. Before them is a number pad and below that more buttons, presumably one for each floor.
The Zees are less than fifty feet out and closing fast, but not from only one direction. Each of the four corridors is jammed with masses of darkened flesh and electrified eyes. They’re coming from everywhere and for a second I’m not sure where to fire. The elevator platform is huge, more than big enough to hold our entire party, but all of us are bunched together.
Thirty feet away now. Dhal and Oleg are yelling at each other. Oleg’s trying to press buttons and the kid’s knocking his hands away. “You plug in the wrong password and the system will lock us out.”
Bron springs to his feet with a savage grin on his face. “Ladies and gentlemen, please keep your heads and arms in at all times,” he barely gets the words out before he howls with laughter. His own arms are pointing in opposite directions when he opens fire. The concussion nearly knocks me over. Zees in two hallways are torn clean in two. Shells that miss their mark detonate overhead and decimate groups of them with loads of deadly shrapnel. I’m doing what I can with my repeater, but even on full auto the lack of firepower is humbling. Bron switches corridors and resumes firing, but already his barrels are starting to glow and I know he can’t sustain this for more than another few seconds. The Zees are less than fifteen feet away and I draw my Katana. I nod to Sneak and Krantz. Once those things reach the elevator, close quarters is all we’ll have left. Bron’s guns choke up and he ejects the blades from the palms of his hands.
A Zee dressed in a Sotercity guard’s uniform is about to make it onto the platform when it starts to descend. Cries of triumph rise up from Dhal and Oleg and they’re hugging each other as though they just landed a man on the moon. Then the platform jerks violently, sending us all on our asses. Now there’s a gap between the corridor level and the platform and that uniformed Zee flings himself on top of me. He grabs my ankles and starts dragging me to the edge. The Hive leader’s probably told them to take me and kill the rest, but this drone’s too stupid to realize we’re going down. I swing the Katana and sever his arms at the elbows then stick the point up through his nasal cavity. My foot digs into his gut for leverage and I push him off the blade. The gap between the top of the elevator grate and the floor above is quickly diminishing, but that doesn’t stop the Zees. Nearly a dozen of them are on their bellies, trying to crawl in after us. But none of them manage to get farther than their chests before the elevator roof descends on them. The platform buckles as their bodies are torn in half. Soon it’s raining Zee heads and mangled torsos. One, severed right below the rib cage, grabs Dhal’s pack and starts clawing up his body, entrails tumbling out of it like lengths of loose rope, its jaws snapping and oozing thick black liquid.
Dhal starts spinning in circles. “Get it off me, get it off me!”
Bron stomps out the brains of a Zee at his feet and points to Dhal, bellowing laughter.
“Please someone grab that thing before I piss myself.”
Krantz does a spinning kick to kill it, but instead sends it flying toward me. The Zees jaws lock onto my forearm and I howl with pain. A second later, the knife from my boot opens a window into his skull. The light in his eyes begins to fade and I wedge the blade into its mouth to pry the dead Zee’s jaws apart. Blood gushes from the wound and now Bron isn’t laughing anymore. Ret’s by my side in a flash, bandaging my arm. I flex my fingers, thankful it didn’t sever a tendon. Suddenly, from out of the silence, comes a crashing sound that violently rocks the platform. One of those stupid ass Zees just stepped off the edge after us and landed on the caged ceiling, splattering his brains all over us. A second later there’s another crash and then another. We’re all thrown to the ground and with every jolt I become more certain that thin cable holding us up is about to snap and send us freefalling to our deaths.
-24-
Peering through the grated floor of the platform I can see we’re almost there, but every meter we put between us and the Zees above us only magnifies the impact of their bodies landing on the elevator roof. The ceiling of the metal cage we’re in is beginning to buckle. Bron jumps to his feet, trying to brace the supports and I warn him to avoid the Zee blood oozing down from above.
Another jarring impact, but thankfully this one is us reaching the ground floor. We collectively sigh with relief and no one needs to be told to rush from the platform.
We’re in a darkened hallway with low lighting. Ahead is a blast door and beside that, another keypad. We find that this one doesn’t have any numbers at all, just a bunch of squiggly lines.
Oleg leans in for a closer look. “Letters A through I in the old tongue. It’s an alphabetic cipher.”
I glance
over at Dhal who fidgets through his packsack and comes out with a small black notebook. That smug look is plastered all over his sweaty face. “Master Lund had me write down the important door codes and it’s a good thing, ‘cause this door is booby trapped.”
“What do you mean, booby trapped?”
“I mean we have three shots to key in the proper code, or else.” Dhal drags his thumb across his neck.
“That really doesn’t help us,” Ret says. “Can you be a little more specific other than…” He mimics the gesture.
“No, because I haven’t the foggiest idea what will happen.”
Bron looks just as pissed as I feel. “I thought you said you built this place?”
“I never said I built it, I said I helped to design it. Master Lund and I recommended cyanide gas and Prior Skuld vetoed it. Not enough suffering, he said.”
“But you already know the password, so we’re fine then, right?”
His lips twitch. “Should be.”
“I hate the word ‘should,’” Bron says, “especially coming from a bratty little puke like you.”
The sound of metal squeaking and grinding interrupts us.
“What just happened?” Oleg asks, examining the lock combination.
Sneak races to the other end of the hall and quickly signs back.
“The elevator just lifted off.”
“Is that bad?” Krantz asks. “I mean, these things don’t have brains; no offense, Azina.”
Ret can see the annoyance on my face and smiles.
Oleg looks squarely at Krantz. “Our research shows the Hive leader has the mental faculties of a five or six year old. Some basic reasoning, although even he runs mostly on instinct.”
“Then we’re okay,” Krantz concludes.
I rest a hand on Krantz’ shoulder and catch a flash of jealousy from Ret. “No, it means we gotta get this door open cause this hallway’s about to become a highway.”
-25-
“H-E-F-F-A,” Dhal says as he inputs the letters. He’s reading off the grease stained pages of his notebook. He’s about to hit the enter button below the keypad when Oleg stops his hand.
“Are you sure this is correct?”
“Heffa is Skuld’s wife. I’m sure it hasn’t changed since we installed it.”
His finger mashes the enter button and three quick beeps ring back which doesn’t sound good. Dhal grabs at the door anyway, jars it violently, but the handle won’t budge.
“I don’t believe this!” he says, exasperated.
Ret’s shaking his head. “I do.”
“What other passwords you got?” I ask him.
“That’s it.”
Bron wiggles his index finger at Dhal. “Little boy, I love a good laugh as much as the next man, but please tell me you’re kidding us.”
Beads of sweat form on Dhal’s forehead and it’s about all the proof I need. From down the hall comes the faint sound of the distorted elevator grinding to a stop far above.
“I’ll have to use the decoder,” Dhal says, his voice cracking.
I help him get the pack off. “Yes, do that.”
“Only problem is it may take several minutes.”
“Then stop blabbing and start getting it done,” I say.
Dhal pulls out a strange looking device with a suction cup and attaches it to the metal next to the keypad. Then he uses a screwdriver to undo a bolt at the bottom and attaches a set of red and blue wires to a circuit board of some kind. The device has tiny windows for each possible letter. Suddenly the machine comes alive with letters whizzing by at lightning speed. I hear the elevator begin its lumbering descent as the first letter appears.
“It’s an A,” Dhal says gleefully.
Oleg lets out a long breath. “All right, it seems to be working.”
I can still hear the elevator rumbling at a decent clip when another letter appears: I.
“A. I.,” Dhal says as though he expects one of us to guess the rest of it.
Bron leans over and shows me the ammo gage on his arms. He’s almost empty. Blasting through that wall must have done it.
Ret catches on to what we’re talking about and all the color goes out of his cheeks. “What are we supposed to do, fight them back with sharp blades and curse words?”
“How many you think are on that platform?” I ask them.
Dhal erupts into cheers. “Another I. A.I.I. No clue what it means. I hope this thing is working properly.”
Ret loads more shells into the barrel of his shotgun. “Not sure, knowing those Zees it could be as many as a hundred if he packed them in like sardines.”
The rattling sound from the elevator shaft is getting louder and so is another sound, one that was barely audible before. Hissing. Lots of it.
“D. We got a D.”
“Gotta make every shot count.”
Bron flicks his head in Dhal’s direction. “Kid thinks he’s running a bloody game show in the entertainment district.”
“They’ll trade flesh for distance,” I say ignoring the comment. “That’s why we gotta hit em hard the minute they touch down.”
“E,” Dhal shouts and inputs the code. “Anybody know what an AIIDE is?”
Even Oleg ignores the boy. He’s spinning the barrel of his revolver, no doubt wondering whether one of those six shots has his name on it. Beside him, Krantz racks the bolt on his assault rifle.
“I want clean lines of fire. We can’t afford to waste a single shot.”
Dhal starts shouting that he’s got another A when the elevator touches down and it’s packed with Zees with glowing eyes and suddenly all of them turn in our direction at once – they’re less than a split second away from breaking into a run.
Bron raises his arms and opens up right over us. Boom, boom, boom, boom. Four shells go flying over our heads. The few hairs clinging to Oleg’s scalp go whipping back and forth. A dozen Zees out front and funneled through the narrow darkened hallway have their insides splattered against the walls. Arms and legs and bits of skull are all that’s left and then, just as fast, comes the ominous sound of Bron’s guns growing quiet. He only has a few shots left, and he’s probably reserving those for when things get really bad. Now it’s our turn and we rise to our feet and fire. Krantz, me and even Oleg with his pistol. Only Ret and his shotgun hold back for when they get in too close for comfort.
Some of Krantz’ shots are missing their mark, hitting Zees in the body and a few below the waist. “Aim for the head, damnit,” I shout.
I’m doing the best I can with my repeater, but the truth is we just don’t have enough firepower. Stopping a horde of charging Zees is about as easy as trying to shoot water up a hill.
-26-
They’re close enough now that I can see their blackened mouths hissing back at me and nearly all of them are new Zees, turned in Sotercity or the outlying regions, dressed in roughhewn tunics and bits of shredded fabric. Only a few are wealthy looking Duster types from the complex.
I hear Dhal hollering behind us.
“D. Final letter’s a d. AIIDEAD. AII DEAD. All dead.” His voice trails off.
He inputs the final letter and a long single beep follows, but most of this is drowned out in the chaos of battle. The door opens a moment later and that part we hear just fine. Krantz and I are still firing. We’re trying to stagger it properly so both of us aren’t reloading at the same time. The Zees continue to stumble forward, the walls around them oozing with gore and there’s more of it at their feet but they trample over it without even noticing. We’re trying to pull back and doing our damndest not to trip over each other. Tripping would be bad but this is not an easy maneuver, especially when you can’t see what’s behind you…
Oleg, who must have run out of bullets long ago, rushes for the open door, as do Dhal and Sneak. But Sneak isn’t running from battle. She’s scouting up ahead, making sure the way is safe for the rest of us to follow. In the distance, the elevator lifts off for another load of Zees.
Krantz and I stop firing long enough to slide behind Ret. Together we snag Ret by the belt and start pulling him toward the exit as he fires into the crowd, his feet sliding along the dusty floor as though hovering on a cushion of air. Buckshot works best against large numbers of Zees packed tightly together and from over his shoulder, I have a ringside view of packs of them, only feet away, being turned to pulp.
We scoot inside and Bron slams the door shut, except instead of the sound of a lock clicking into place, all we hear is a sick crunch. I look back and gasp. Dozens of Zee arms bristle in the opening. Bron pushes harder and I see the veins in his neck beginning to bulge. We all pile on, pushing with everything we’ve got and even still the door is inching further and further ajar. The sheer weight of them is what’s causing the problem and if we can’t get this door closed, we’re finished. I slide out the Katana and start hacking at any leathery arms and legs poking through. Soon only a handful of bloodied, squirting stumps remain, but still we can’t get it shut.
I take a step back and now the others turn to me, probably wondering if I’ve given up, ready to accept whatever that red bastard has in store for me. Really though, I’m trying to quiet the frantic thoughts swirling around in my head, trying to quiet my pounding heart. My mouth feels like it’s filled with a bucket of sand and my chest is heaving wildly, but I try and put all of that to the back of my mind so I can pluck out the thread of Zee chatter, buzzing in the air all around me. The door’s inching open and I know full well the consequences of what I’m about to do, that it’s slowly changing me into something more Zee and so much less human.
I close my eyes nevertheless and imagine the horde outside backing away. Can see their feet in my mind, retreating, one behind the other along the cold hard floor until the entire mass outside begins to look like a horrible dream being played in reverse; all the while I feel that patch of dry, leathery skin, inching further up my face and toward my brain like a dark, evil hand.
Hive II Page 6