by Bobby Adair
I did.
The stairs coming down from the Capitol’s basement led to the underground annex, where I suspected Baird’s ragtag men had led the soldiers.
Murphy reached a landing and stopped as he peeked around a corner.
I came to a stop with my back to the wall as I looked up the stairs toward the Capitol basement. I listened.
Murphy glanced over at me. He grinned.
He was as much a junkie for the adrenaline as I was.
I smiled back and suppressed a laugh. Whoever had been on the basement level with the flashlight was either confused and looking around in the darkness or frightened and peeking around corners for noisy ghosts.
I whispered, “Are they down there?”
Murphy nodded, “About halfway up the length of the annex. Down on the bottom floor.”
“You wanna follow along on the second floor?” I asked, knowing we could take quick peeks over the rail to see them all below.
“Gotta stay quiet,” Murphy told me before rounding the corner.
Running on our toes to keep the noise down, I pulled away from the wall for a few steps and took a quick glance over the railing. Indeed, the ragtag soldiers were leading the real soldiers down toward the helicopter.
Murphy pulled up to stop at a side hall.
Coming up beside him again, I said, “That’s where those other guys were going to get the White Skins.”
Murphy said, “Maybe they’ve converted some rooms down there into holding pens or a jail or something. Do you remember what’s down there? You’re Mr. Capitol Tourist, right?”
I pointed. “Some big ass conference rooms are past the helicopters.”
“If they’ve got a bunch of Whites stored somewhere, it’ll make sense to put them in one big room,” Murphy said. “Easier to keep them corralled that way.”
“Makes sense.”
Murphy took off again, running silently to the next crossing hallway.
From there, we saw directly out into the round atrium. Plenty of moonlight flowed in, casting us in much more light than I felt comfortable with. I crept back further into the hall’s shadows when I spotted loitering movement below and across the atrium. At least one guard was over there. I knew they had to have someone guarding the helicopters, even though I hadn’t spotted them earlier.
“What do you think?” I asked.
“You know the place,” Murphy conceded. “You’re the Mighty Null Spot.”
“Valiant,” I muttered. “The Valiant Null Spot.” I pointed down the hallway into the darkness. “If we go that way we can loop around. Judging by where the stairwells came up on the plaza, I think there might be some stairs back around there we can use to get down to the bottom level and maybe sneak up on the guards from behind.”
“Behind?” Murphy asked, shaking his head. “It’s not like the guys will know which direction to guard in.” He pointed all around. “There are stairs in every direction.”
“At least we won’t be coming down the main hall,” I told him. “That seems to be the route everybody uses when they come and go.”
“And when we get down there,” he asked, “then what?”
I shrugged. “Do we ever know?” I took off at a run into the darkness.
We found the stairs, just as I’d deduced. We made our way down to the lowest level undetected, crept silently up a short stub of a hallway and I peeked around a corner at a moment of complete luck.
Two guards were standing less than a dozen feet away, looking across the floor of the atrium toward the main Capitol building as they stood between the helicopter and the stacks of crated munitions. Both men had rifles.
I pulled my head back quickly, my nervousness clear on my face. I raised a finger to my lips so Murphy would know to stay quiet, and I raised two fingers more and pointed toward the corner. I motioned Murphy back toward the stairwell that we’d just used to enter the hallway. Once inside, with the door quietly closed behind us, I whispered, “I’ve got an idea.”
Chapter 34
Murphy, never shy about telling me just how bad my ideas were, made every effort to tell me about this one. Unfortunately, he didn’t have a better idea. So I said, “Unless you’ve got something else to say.”
“Yeah,” he answered, “we’re guessing the supposed Dalhover relative is in one of the conference rooms right around the corner.”
“That’s where the guards are,” I told him. It made perfect sense to me.
Murphy glanced up through the stairwell. “Guys were up there too. Were they guarding people hiding in the bushes?”
“Yes,” I told him, pretending complete seriousness with the lie.
“Whatever.” Murphy shook his head and looked around. “Fine. But one more thing.”
“Yeah?” I asked.
“We’re gonna run over there and bust those soldiers out because you think one of them kinda looks like Dalhover’s son.” Murphy rolled his eyes at that one. “The thing that gets me is this—you don’t know if these hillbillies around here are the good guys or the bad guys. And you don’t know if the soldiers are the good guys or the bad guys.”
“The good guys or the bad guys?” I interrupted. “This isn’t a cowboy movie.”
“People that want to kill you or not,” Murphy explained.
I understood that perfectly clear.
“What if they all want to kill us?” Murphy asked. “And they all might. You know that’s true, right?”
I nodded. I couldn’t argue. In fact, I more than half expected it. Still, I felt loyalty to Dalhover and if there was a chance the soldier was his son, though I felt pretty damn sure it was, then I had to get him out of a jam. If he wanted to kill me, well, he’d have to do that some other time. I said, “We’ll bust ‘em out, and if you don’t get a warm fuzzy, we’ll go our separate ways once we’re over the wall.”
“Warm fuzzy or not,” said Murphy, “you know as well as I do—matter of fact, you keep preaching it to me—us and normals don’t mix. It only takes time. Before long, things go to shit.”
I nodded. True enough. “We’ll bust ‘em out. Then we’ll split up.”
With all of Murphy’s objections tabled for the moment, I explained the plan. It was simple. They all were. Well, maybe not all of them. The ones that had a chance of working were. In complicated plans, things always went wrong.
Chapter 35
From inside the stairwell, I yanked the door handle once to loudly rattle it against its frame before pulling it open. A little louder than natural, I said, “I hear what you’re saying. I just don’t see why he always picks on us.”
“It’s because you won’t stop talking all the time,” Murphy said, playing his part in the charade.
We were already a few steps into the dark hall.
“If he doesn’t like me,” I argued, “why doesn’t he man up and tell me. That’s all I’m saying.”
One of the guards that had been in front of the two conference rooms leaned around the corner for a quick peek into the hall. Seemingly satisfied, he didn’t linger.
In the dark, it was hard to see that Murphy and I wore lighter skin than normal.
“Maybe you’re not listening when he talks to you.” Murphy looked at me with a question on his face.
I nodded. It seemed to be working.
“What if—”
A desperate cry echoed from up the hall.
Murphy and I both froze.
The cry came again.
Shit.
It was Don.
“What’s that?” I asked Murphy as I hurried to get to the corner.
“Um,” Murphy said, “I don’t know. A cat?”
Don hollered again, trying to get someone to come and help.
I rounded the corner and saw the two guards. They’d taken some steps in the direction of Don’s yelling, but they were waiting, hands on weapons, deciding what to do. One of them glanced at me.
“What’s going on?” I asked as he turned to look back up t
he hall. Then I saw him tense as he turned quickly back to me.
It was only a few long strides to reach him. Just as his mouth opened to say something, I lunged.
Words came out, but I hit him with a shoulder in his midsection and drove the air out of his lungs with a loud ‘oomph.’
We collided with the other guard, and all three of us went down in a tumble of arms and legs.
They cursed. They punched, elbowed, and kicked.
I absorbed the blows and tried my best simply to keep them entangled on the ground.
A moment later one froze and then the other did too.
I saw the barrel of Murphy’s M4, held in just one of his hands, pressed to a guard’s face. In his other hand, his pistol was pressed against the other guy’s cheek. Nodding, Murphy said, “Yeah, you figured it out. Now stay that way. If either of you moves, BAM! You got me?”
Don wailed again from down the hall.
I disentangled myself, taking the guards’ weapons and sliding them across the floor before I stood up.
“Somebody help me,” Don called.
I glanced up at Murphy.
He looked disappointed. It had been my choice to leave Don alive. I wondered if I would be able to afford the cost of that kindness. I told Murphy, “Don’t say anything.”
One of the guards started to plead, but a hard glare from Murphy shut him up.
Running footsteps echoed up the long corridor.
Murphy said, “Let’s get this show on the road.”
“You got these guys?” I asked, pointing at the prone guards.
Murphy nodded.
I bounded over to one of the conference room doors, hoping I was right. I yanked it hard. It didn’t open. I glanced back at Murphy. “Locked.”
Murphy pushed his M4 against the guard’s head so hard that the man’s head made an audible thunk when it hit the floor. “Keys now, motherfucker.”
I guess the guy understood Murphy’s tone of voice as well as I did. There would be no second request. The guard wasted not a second in digging into his pocket, retrieving the keys, and sliding them across the smooth floor toward me.
Murphy shot me a quick grin before turning his angry glare back at the two prone guards.
I picked up the key ring. Four keys. Argh. “Which one?” I asked.
Murphy pressed his barrel harder against the guy’s head.
“The brass one,” he answered. “The Schlage.”
I looked down at the keys. Two were brass. Only one had the brand name written on the side. It was a Schlage.
Murphy said, “They’re coming.”
I unlocked the door and swung it halfway open when the smell hit me with a mix of outhouse and body odor. The conference room with seating for maybe a hundred was full of Whites. “Shit.” I pushed the door closed and jammed the key back in the lock. “Wait,” I said aloud.
“Wait what?” Murphy asked.
“Whites,” I told him.
I ran over to the doors for the other conference room.
“Good ones or bad ones?” Murphy asked me.
I looked over at Murphy. “What?”
Murphy wasn’t asking me, he was asking the guys on the floor.
“Good?” the compliant guy answered.
“In here?” I asked as I put the key into the lock on the other door.
“Guys,” he said. “Aggies.”
“What?” Murphy asked.
The compliant guys stammered through an explanation as I opened the second door. I looked back at Murphy, “They’re here.”
“C’mon, c’mon,” I hollered into the room as I waved.
The four soldiers inside the room jumped out of their chairs and ran toward the open door. I let go of it as I stepped away.
Glancing past the helicopter and up to the second level, Murphy said, “They’re up there. Things are going to get exciting pretty quick here.”
“You two,” I said to the disarmed guards on the floor. “In there.” I pointed at the room the soldiers were coming out of.
“Now,” Murphy growled.
The two guys on the ground quickly got up and hurried into the room, pushing past the four soldiers.
I looked at the one I figured to be Dalhover’s son and said, “Dalhover?”
He looked at me, completely confused. “What?”
“Your name,” I explained, though I already knew I’d screwed up. He would have known the name if it had been his.
“Fritz,” he said. “I’m Parker Fritz.”
“Told you.” Murphy laughed.
I handed Fritz the keys. “Lock those guards up.” I pointed at the weapons on the floor as I glanced at the others. “Get those. We’re busting you out.”
Two of the soldiers jumped to grab the weapons. The third simply stared at me. He said, “You’re normal?”
“Get a gun, dumbass.” I pointed at the two rifles and two pistols being picked up by the others. “Everybody gets one.”
Fritz turned back to me, handing me the keys.
I didn’t want them. I pointed to the other door and said, “Unlock that one and prop it open. Careful. It’s full of Whites.”
“Whites?” Fritz asked. “You mean infected.” He was already putting the key into the lock.
“Yep,” I told him. “I think they’re the docile ones.” I looked up the hall. “If not, well, run like a motherfucker because things will get real interesting real fast. Know what I mean?”
One of the soldiers with a rifle asked, “What next? Which way?”
Chapter 36
“Hey you.”
I looked down the hall. Two guys were leaning over the railing on the second floor, looking at us.
“Oh fuck it.” I swung my shotgun in their general direction. They were way out of range, but if they were only half as far, I’d have had no chance of hitting them anyway. I pumped out three blasts. I looked over at Murphy while pointing at the helicopter. “You wouldn’t know how to fly that, would you?”
“You watched too many movies, dumbass.” Murphy laughed as he started toward the stairs we’d used to sneak up on the guards.
The escaping soldiers were following Murphy. Fritz had the door open and two of the infected were already coming out—not urgent, not chasing, just curious. I almost wished for the crazed ones. A hundred of them loose inside the Capitol would aid greatly in our escape.
I rounded the corner, running first at full speed then starting to slow. Murphy was in the doorway of the stairwell, looking up. The three soldiers were slowing down as they neared.
In the time it took for me to cover the distance, Murphy stepped out of the doorway, pushing it closed. “They’re coming down.”
I looked up at the ceiling, getting my bearings and thinking the only way the other guys could be coming down already was if they were at the top of the stairs when I fired the shotgun. I recalled the smokers we’d seen on the plaza. Damn crappy luck. They must have been outside the top of that very stairwell.
More voices bellowed from down the long corridor leading to the Capitol. Orders were being shouted. Men were coordinating an assault. Reinforcements were coming. Things were going to go from exciting to dire pretty quickly.
Fritz ran up beside me and pointed at two metal doors on a wall that I’d assumed contained a janitor’s closet. “Through there,” he said.
Two of the soldiers ran at the doors and slammed them hard. They didn’t budge. As they stepped back, I saw immediately that the two doors had been spot-welded down the abutment. Shit.
I stopped, turned, looked up the hall, took a long, slow breath and thought through the situation. I turned to Fritz, “Where does that hall lead?”
He pointed. The building next door. He pointed toward other corners of the underground complex. “Corridors connect to all of the neighboring government buildings.”
“This one’s welded,” said Murphy, I guess in case anyone hadn’t noticed yet.
“How many grenades you got left?” I ask
ed.
“Four.” Murphy was already pulling one off.
“Find cover,” Fritz ordered his guys.
I turned and followed Fritz’s soldiers down a side hall. A second later, Murphy came running around the corner and stuffed himself into an alcove in which most of us were already huddled.
The grenade exploded with a bang, near deafening in the confined space.
For a moment after the blast, all was quiet. Feet stopped running. Voices stopped shouting. Or maybe my ears were stunned into a temporary deafness.
“Let’s go,” Fritz shouted.
I guess I still could hear.
Fritz ran up the hall. His guys took off after him. Murphy looked at me for a second with a question on his face. I thought we were in charge? He ran, and so did I.
Rounding the corner just ahead of me, one of the soldiers lurched sideways. I heard gunshots and saw blood splatter from his skull in one simultaneous instant of horror.
I shouted, “Motherfucker,” but didn’t slow, jumping over the dying man as I ran.
The two metal doors, welded shut a moment before, now swung open, a little cockeyed, but open nevertheless. Dust filled the hall and made each of us cough as we entered the cloud. Murphy ran between the doors and Fritz pushed him to the side as I followed. I raised a fist to pummel Fritz for what I at first thought was an attack, but I heard him yell at Murphy, “Give me a grenade.”
Murphy ducked behind one of the metal doors. I pushed through the gap and pressed myself against the other side of the hall, taking advantage of the door’s thick steel.
Guns were blasting. Bullets were pinging against metal and ricocheting off the concrete.
Murphy gave Fritz a grenade.
Fritz pointed up the hall to where two of his men were kneeling, aiming their rifles back down our way. He said, “Go. I’ll give these guys something to think about.”
Murphy looked at me as if for permission. I waved him to go.
Fritz got behind one of the bent doors and pushed. I copied him with my door.
When a gap of about a foot remained, the bent doors stuck. Fritz cursed.
Gunshots rang through the hall, pinging all over the doors. Fritz threw himself against the wall.