The captain nodded and stopped struggling.
Riker loosened his grip and slowly dragged his hand from the man’s mouth. As he spun the captain (whose nametape read HALL) around to face them, a knee rocketed toward his family jewels and the man’s bound hands shot up towards his neck.
Riker easily parried the knee with one hand, then lashed out with the other, his enormous fist impacting Hall below the solar plexus.
All fight left the captain and he started a slow fall to the floor, doubled up and wheezing.
Riker grabbed a handful of collar, yanked Hall to his feet, and wrapped one arm around his neck.
Voice barely rising above Riker’s labored breathing, Hall called out for help.
Riker took a soiled scrap of fabric from the trashcan and force fed the makeshift gag into Hall’s mouth. “That’s not what we call cooperation where I come from,” he hissed, standing Hall up straight.
Already one step ahead of her brother, Tara had snatched a roll of training tape from a nearby shelf and was tearing a long strip from it when Riker spun the soldier around to face them. Staring daggers at the captain, she lashed the tape twice around his head, securing the gag in place.
Pointing at the pouch on Hall’s belt, Riker said, “Take the spare mags. And then check his pockets.”
While Tara was doing her thing, Hall’s gaze went to the trashcan, lingered there for a beat, then flicked to Riker. Eyes wide and terror-filled, he twisted free of Riker’s grip and slumped limply onto the training table as if he’d just taken a right cross to the chin.
Tara placed the items on the counter, lining the pair of magazines for the pistol side by side. Then she leaned over and looked Hall in the eye. “Where’s our stuff? Phones, wallets, keys?”
Hall’s gaze swung toward the door and his head jerked to the left a couple of times.
Riker made eye contact. “Down the hall away from the dorm?”
Hall nodded emphatically.
Tara said, “The coach’s room?”
Again with the enthusiastic head bob.
“I hate to do this to you,” said Riker, extracting another pair of nylon cuffs. “Can you breathe okay?”
Hall nodded.
“Good. Cause we’re not bad people.” He lifted Hall up, sat him on the table facing them, then proceeded to cuff his ankles together. “Not too tight, is it, sir?”
A muffled, “Uh, uh,” from Hall.
“Good,” said Riker. He held a hand out to Tara, palm up. “Gimme the gun.”
“You’re going to shoot him?”
Hall’s eyes bulged from his head. His breathing intensified and he began to moan.
“Don’t worry, Captain,” said Riker. “I once walked in your boots. I just want to make sure you can’t use it against us after we leave.”
Tara shook her head side to side. “No Lee, we need it. What if we come across more of those things?”
Fingers beckoning, Riker repeated himself. “Gimme the gun.”
And she did, reaching to her waistband and bringing it around butt first. “You sure about this?”
“Hand me the magazines,” he said, again with the hand gesture. “We’re not bad people, Captain. Want you to remember that.” He pocketed the spare magazines. After a cursory glance at the semiautomatic, he ejected the magazine and racked the slide. He caught the single 9mm shell in his free hand and tossed it into the trashcan. Working fast, he thumbed the remaining nine rounds in after. As the bullets made their way to the bottom of the can in quiet little spurts, he quickly disassembled the weapon and placed the slide and empty magazine on a shelf with the tape and other supplies. The rest went in his pocket with the spare magazines. As he turned from the garbage can, his eye was drawn to a scrap of paper torn from a yellow legal pad. It was laying flat on a shelf to his left, its edges rippled from getting wet and drying again. On the sheet, scrawled in black Sharpie, in all caps, were the words DO NOT LET THEM BITE YOU!!
Whoever had written the warning had taken the trouble to underscore each word twice. The note was succinct and to the point and grabbed Riker by the short hairs, that was for sure.
Tara jangled the keys and cracked the door.
Eyeing the eerily quiet radio on the counter below the shelf, Riker cocked his head toward the door and listened hard. From somewhere down the hallway he heard the squeaks of sneakers on freshly polished tiles. Looking back to the Army captain, Riker said, “Remember … we’re not bad people,” and stepped into the hall.
Chapter 24
Head still throbbing from overindulging at the Misfits’ show the night before, Victoria Davis stepped from the Prius and thrust a five-dollar bill through the open passenger side window.
Flashing a palm at his fare, the college-aged Uber driver spilled about the hundred-dollar tip a man named Underhill promised to post to his PayPal account if he got the “pretty brunette” to 4WTC in record time.
“Mission accomplished,” said Victoria, stuffing the Lincoln into her jean’s pocket. “I don’t know about the ‘pretty’ part.” A little pissed at being upstaged by her boss on her day off, she slammed the door and stepped onto the sidewalk bordering Church Street. Wincing from the dual attack of glaring sunlight to her optic nerves and the incessant pounding of wood on plastic coming from the trio of street drummers camped under the glass portico angling out over the entrance to 4WTC, she clutched her courier’s bag tight to her body and wove between the throng of tourists watching the show.
With no pass to gain entry, she resorted to pressing the Call button on the intercom.
As she watched the teenagers punishing the makeshift drums in the reflection on the glass to her left, she saw the silver-painted cowboy arrive and drop his like-colored wooden pedestal a few feet from the drummers. In the two minutes she spent waiting for the weekend watchman, Tony, to arrive to let her in, the crowd had nearly doubled in size and a mime complete with white-painted face and ruby lips had taken up station opposite the drummers and started performing the old “invisible wall” routine.
There’s a mint to be made today, she thought as a sharp rap drew her attention back to the glass door where she saw a large uniformed man peering back at her from within.
The door hinged inward and the keys rattled on Tony’s belt as he stepped aside to allow Victoria entry to 4WTC’s marble-clad grand foyer. The ceiling fifty feet overhead was lost in shadow and she could see oak trees and snippets of the south reflecting pool mirrored in the polished black granite gracing the far wall.
“Morning,” the watchman said, glancing nonchalantly up and down the street, one hand resting on the pistol-shaped TASER holstered on his patrolman’s belt.
“I should still be asleep, Tony.”
“Long night?” he asked as the door shut behind them with a metallic click.
“Bright lights, big city.”
“Live fast, die young, and leave a beautiful corpse,” Tony said, chuckling. “Oh to be young again.” He sighed. “Even if I could pull a Cher and turn back time … I’d be rubbing shoulders again with stinky hippies instead of a beauty such as yourself.”
Three compliments in twenty minutes, Victoria thought to herself. Maybe I should come in hungover more often. “Stop it, Tony,” she said, cheeks flushing red. “You’re old enough to be my father.”
Tony worked his pass card in the slide to call the elevator. “I’m harmless,” he said, hitching up his pants. “You want the Executive Level?”
Nodding, she said, “I sense a shred party coming on.” She stepped into the car first and quickly spun around to face him. “Between you and me?”
Tony nodded, eyes wide behind his thick glasses.
“I bet Mr. Merkur’s scientists went afoul of some FDA rule and I’m here to help hide that fact.”
“Maybe ZP has got something to do with what’s going on in Indiana.” He pressed 74 and, when the doors closed, added, “You didn’t catch the news about the Middletown, Indiana shooter? Guy was hopped up on pharmaceu
ticals. That’s what ZP is pushing, right? Oxy and the like?”
On the wall display above the lighted buttons the red digital number denoting each floor ticked by rapidly as the elevator picked up speed.
Victoria shook her head. “I didn’t see it. My boss didn’t mention it, either. No news is good news for this girl. I punch out at five on Friday and avoid all of that shit until seven on Monday. I want to live life, not cower in fear.”
Fair enough. Tony tipped his ball cap and stared at the ceiling as the express car rocketed by half a billion dollars’ worth of prime real estate located on the high-rise floors.
Suddenly, shattering the quiet, Victoria’s stomach growled.
“You going to be all right?”
“One too many bourbons last night, is all.”
As the elevator began to slow, Tony pointed to the skull face logo on her black tee shirt, then read the squiggly font above it. “Misfits … is that the band you were listening to while drinking said bourbons?”
The display on the wall showed 69. Then 70. Finally, Victoria said, “Yep. I’ve seen them a dozen times.”
The number 74 showed up on the display and turned green as the elevator decelerated and came to a gentle halt.
“Here we are,” said Tony, removing his mesh ball cap. “Hope you get to feeling better.”
Me too, she thought, swallowing hard against the sharp, acid tang of rising bile tickling her throat. “Thanks for the escort.”
As the doors began to part, Tony winked and donned his hat. “Hail me if you need anything. I’m all alone downstairs until four o’clock.”
Martin Underhill’s puffed-out chest and pasty round face were the first things Victoria saw when she turned back to face the parting elevator doors.
“I’ll remember that,” she said to Tony over a shoulder as she grimaced and brushed past her immediate supervisor.
Chapter 25
After a quick turkey peek, Riker stepped into the hall, leaving Tara in the trainer’s room with the bound and gagged Army captain. Looking right, he saw people streaming from the room he and Tara had been forced to spend the night in. Swinging his gaze left, he saw mostly a dark void. The scant amount of ambient light coming in from the opening and closing of the double doors behind him reflected strobe-like off a trio of evenly spaced windows on the left wall.
Exiting the room behind her brother, Tara took a final look back at Captain Hall and mouthed, “We’re sorry.”
Hearing the door seat with a soft click, she overtook her brother and stopped in front of the first of three doors all accessing rooms on the same side of the hall as the trainer’s room. A placard inset above the pane of wire-reinforced glass read: Coach Grant Phillips. PAIN IS JUST WEAKNESS LEAVING YOUR BODY was emblazoned on a sign affixed to the inside of the window.
A key on the ring opened the door. Again using the iPod’s flashlight feature, Tara went in first. The room was six by six at best. Just a desk and filing cabinet. Posters were pinned to corkboards affixed to the walls.
“This is the room they brought me to,” said Riker.
“Mine is one door down,” she replied.
Tara illuminated a trio of large Rubbermaid bins sitting atop the desk. Bin number one was nearly full to the top with men’s and women’s wallets. Various loose pieces of identification were mixed in with the leather and nylon and fabric items.
Bin number two was half full and held nothing but cell phones. Not a sound was coming from the box, which meant they were likely all powered down or there was no service.
The third box held nothing but keys on rings and dozens of the electronic fobs that passed for keys in today’s modern automobiles.
Peering over Tara’s shoulder, Riker said, “You find our wallets. I’ll go through the keys.” He closed the door then dumped the wallets onto the desktop. Next, he upended the keys beside the wallets and stacked the empty bins atop the filing cabinet.
A shouted order drifted down from the direction of the quarantine room.
Tara set the iPod on the desk with its face resting against the wall so that its rear-mounted beam fell across the piles of personal effects. “What’s your wallet look like?”
Already working through the pile of keys and fobs, Riker paused and looked sidelong at his sister. Speaking from the corner of his mouth, he said, “It’s green nylon, secured with Velcro, and damn near empty.”
Tara spotted her black anodized aluminum card keeper right away. Pocketing it, she asked, “Any other distinguishing marks on yours?”
“It’s an Izod,” said Riker. “Got a little alligator patch on it.”
“Isn’t that cute,” she replied, fanning the small mound out before her.
“Got it for cheap at the discount store in Atlanta.”
“I bet you did,” she answered. “Never knew you were a closet preppie.”
Riker pocketed a handful of the electronic fobs. “Now that I know you’re keeping tabs,” he said, “I’ll pay more attention to my fashion choices.”
“Found it.” She passed it over to him then swept the rest of the wallets and billfolds onto the floor.
Riker did the same with the keys and fobs. Finished, he slowly poured the phones and tablets from the third bin onto the desk top.
His archaic flip phone stood out like a sore thumb. He pocketed it and began inspecting the high tech items, choosing any that he thought resembled Tara’s iPhone.
“This it?”
“Nope.”
“This one?”
“Look for a scratched-up face,” she said, pawing through the shifting pile on her side.
There were several loud pops out in the hall.
“Gunshots,” said Riker.
“One more minute,” Tara insisted. “Everything is in my phone.”
“Pictures of Mom?”
Simultaneously, she nodded and dragged her phone from the pile.
Riker said, “Light up the screen and illuminate the walls over the desk.”
Tara activated the flashlight feature on her phone and aimed it at the walls. With both phones lit up in the enclosed space, a lot more was revealed.
There were trophies for wrestling and various gymnastic and track and field events on a shelf above the desk. Mostly second and third place finishes—or Silver and Bronze—Riker wasn’t sure what they called them these days. Sitting front and center amongst the trophies and propped-up plaques was their mother’s urn.
Thank you, Logan.
Seeing the light glint off of brass and her mother’s name spelled out in cursive lettering, Tara let out a sigh of relief.
Without a word, Riker took the urn down from the shelf and snatched his NRA bag from a peg behind the door. It was empty, his clothes and spare sleeves for his stump nowhere to be found.
“Logan came through for us with Mom,” he said as he put the urn inside and zipped the bag shut. “But, damn it, someone swiped my only change of clothes.”
Another fusillade of gunshots echoed loudly outside the door.
“Least of our worries,” remarked Tara.
“You’re right,” said Riker agreeably. “Let’s go.”
Again he cracked the door a few inches.
Again with the turkey peek.
And once again he filed out ahead of Tara. But instead of going right toward the light where the long string of gunshots had sounded, he went left, into the dark, Mom safe and sound in the bag and the promise he’d made to her on her deathbed much closer to becoming reality.
The puny bulbs on the pair of Apple devices clutched in Tara’s hands splashed weak pools of light ahead of them as they passed the doors to two small rooms assigned to different coaches. The motivational signs on the windows here were nothing like the ones on the walls in the recruiter’s office on 9/12/2001 when Riker joined the Army. The signs on these windows were aimed at a slightly younger crowd. Nobody in these colorful placards was armed to the hilt and wearing night vision goggles. None of them were pouring from the
back of a tracked Bradley in full battle rattle and brimming with swagger and determination. And most notable of all to Riker, none of them were driving high-level brass in and out of the Green Zone in an armored Land Cruiser or Rover—the job he’d inherited upon finishing basic and arriving at his overseas deployment brimming with swagger and determination and eager to “get some.”
After leaving the beaming faces of the teens in the PSAs behind, they came to the end of the hall and found their choices limited.
“What’s it going to be, Mister Right?” asked Tara. “Right, or … right?”
Riker ignored the quip, about faced right, and led them deeper into the darkened tunnel.
Pipes and electrical conduits snaking overhead reflected light from the iPhones back down on the siblings. Doors on their left opened into dressing rooms and equipment closets. On the right were banks of orange lockers stretching all the way down the hall to what Riker guessed was a pair of doors players and coaches used to access the football field. The faint slivers of light around the doors grew brighter the nearer they got to them.
“You know where this is taking us, right?” said Tara.
Knowing the answer, Riker responded with a grunt.
More gunshots followed by shouts and screams sounded down the hall from the direction they had come. It was all followed by an animalistic grunting noise. Then the staccato slapping of what could only be the bare feet of someone running their way was echoing down the tunnel at their back.
Riker slowed and came to a stop at the doors.
Tara pulled up, too. Voice full of concern, she said, “That wasn’t you. And it sure as heck wasn’t me.” She turned a slow one-eighty in the widening tunnel.
Riker's Apocalypse (Book 1): The Promise Page 12