Poveglia (After the Cure Book 4) Page 5

  Sevita shook her head. “No, but I bet I can find blueprints in the manager’s office. And that will give you time to plan with your men.”

  Dan shook his head. “This is insane.”

  “You have a better plan?”

  “We could wait and see if we’re overreacting. We don’t even know if this is the Plague or just a few coincidental incidences of workplace tension—”

  “Did that radio call from the prison sound like just a guard having a bad day?” Sevita interrupted. “If we wait for the test results, the people in here will already have turned. Some of their family members too maybe. Sure, we might have a week before becoming symptomatic, but panic’s going to spread a lot faster. Enough debate, if you’re willing to help, meet me in the generator room in an hour, that’s where the electric lines start, the tunnels must start in there somewhere. I’ll find out for sure. If you don’t show up, at least keep the others off me, because I’m going anyway.”

  Dan sighed. “In an hour then,” he said, handing her the radio. “I know you have a dedicated channel.”

  “I didn’t think you’d notice, sorry, I should have asked.”

  “Yeah, you should have. But you were careful. Don’t lose it and don’t let anyone hear you. I don’t know if you’re going to get another chance to call her.”

  Sevita nodded and clutched the phone. She checked the hall and then crept toward the offices.

  Nine

  “Even I know this is crazy, Boss. You can’t do this. We were told to stay put. You’d be disobeying a direct order.” Paul hissed in a low voice, watching as the others piled into the conference room.

  “Someone has to do something,” said Dan.

  “I agree, but why us? Radio the Platoon Leader. Let them handle it.”

  Dan shook his head. “I can’t, Paul. How many working radios are there in the City? We know people are listening in on us, that’s why Barb was being so careful. I didn’t even get today’s dispatch over the radio, it was hand delivered by a runner. If this gets out, we’ll start the panic we’re trying to prevent.”

  “Then go tell the Quarantine team. Tell them to get to the Governor. Use the chain of command.”

  “They’ll think we’re overreacting. Crazy Cured, always scared of their shadow. They already think we’re cowards. Or they’ll think we’re lying, just trying to escape. We’ll just be ignored and this whole thing will roll on as if we’d done nothing at all.”

  “Dan— even if you managed to get the entire team out—”

  “No, that’s too many. And the workers would notice immediately if we all just left. Me and you and one other. That’s it.”

  “How’s a fire squad supposed to take out the City gate? There’s got to be at least a hundred men between the gate and the barracks, even now. And they’re our guys.”

  “I said we couldn’t use the radio, I didn’t say we weren’t going to get help.”

  “You just said nobody’s going to listen to us.”

  “The Military Governor will. He’s got to.”

  Paul shook his head in disbelief. “This is insane. We’re just going to get ourselves killed or— or tried as traitors, Dan. Do you understand what you’re talking about doing?”

  Dan put a hand on Paul’s shoulder. “I have to do something. The City cured me—”

  “Barely, you were a guinea pig. How can you trust that man—”

  “He cured me, Paul. He gave me another chance. I know you don’t understand that, I don’t expect you to. I know why you’re angry with him, I get it. But somebody had to test it. I got lucky. And now I need to give somebody else a second chance. We have to protect the people that haven’t been exposed. He’ll see that. He’ll help.”

  Paul raised an eyebrow. “I really hope you’re right,” he said. “I guess we have to tell the others then.”

  “I need you with me on this. There’s no way we’ll pull this off without a united front.” He squeezed Paul’s shoulder.

  “I’m always with you, Boss. I haven’t let you down yet and we’ve been through a lot worse than this together.”

  No, Paul, I don’t think we have. This is going to be the worst by far, Dan thought, but smiled anyway.

  Ten

  Closing the door of the manager’s office, she slumped into his office chair. There wasn’t even any need to hunt for it, the entire layout of the plant was tacked to the board behind his desk. She found the tunnel entrance easily and sat staring at Dan’s phone for a few moments. She realized she had no way to call Christine. The hospital’s satellite phone was in admitting, not the bunker. She was going to have to break into the hospital and use the bunker’s intercom.

  It was almost a relief, Sevita knew their next conversation had to be a very difficult one. She just hoped Christine would stay safe in the shelter until she got there. She regretted not telling her what was happening. Chris would have understood the urgency then. But she also may have tried to take others. Others who were already Infected. She wasn’t careful with her own safety when it came to helping others. Sevita knew that better than anybody.

  When the December Plague hit, Sevita had been the news station’s production assistant. She worked hard and hoped she’d get noticed, but three years of getting there early and staying late, snide comments from the anchors and extra abuse from the other crew had yielded nothing. She had received an offer from a competing station the week before the Plague hit critical mass, and she’d been considering it. But then the disease swept it all away, the City’s slide from civilization into gibbering madness had taken only a few weeks, and Sevita had gradually done more and more at the station as her coworkers turned or stopped showing up.

  Martial law was declared even before most of the crew succumbed to the disease, and the military urged the station to keep reporting for as long as possible. Sevita should have known right then, that the Plague was unlike anything anyone had ever seen. The military weren’t trying to cover it up at all. They didn’t order numbers to be fudged or censor the violent film that kept rolling in. The more the public knew, the military liaison had said, the better they’d survive. So when the streets became dangerous, the small crew ended up sleeping inside the station. They piled desks in front of the glass doors and cowered in the studio. When the power died, they started the massive generator. And when the news feeds from stations around the world went to static one by one, Sevita started filming out of the building’s windows, watching the crowds of Infected chase down Immunes in the street outside, powerless to help them. They weren’t safe inside either.

  One of the cameramen turned in the middle of the night when everyone was sleeping, snarling and drooling over the crew before ripping into the arm of one of the remaining copy editors. Rick Framden had then done the only useful thing in his entire life and shoved the maddened cameraman through an upper office window. The breaking glass and the short fall didn’t kill him. Incredibly, the cameraman had dragged himself up off the pavement slammed himself repeatedly into the heavy doors until he bled out, but it was too late. The man’s shrieks and thuds had drawn other Infected. Some of them fought each other making the street into a gruesome battlefield, but others concentrated on the building, smashing themselves against the windows and doors, climbing over corpses trying to reach the shattered office window.

  Sevita had filled the generator with one last can of gas while the others fortified the upper level with anything they could find. She was running for the stairs when one of the lobby windows crumbled and a flood of people scrambled over one another to reach her. She’d screamed and flung herself halfway up the steps before feeling her legs knocked out underneath her. Her chin had smashed into the linoleum covered stair as she looked up to her fellows for help. Sandra, the weather girl, was reaching for her, but she was too far away.

  Sevita had a few seconds to realize she was going to die as she was yanked toward the shrieking, growling, grinding jaws of the Infected. Her nylons snapped and shredded and the skin of h
er legs was scraped and scratched until it felt as if they were on fire. Dozens of fingers tangled into her long hair and yanked, ripping large clumps abruptly from her skull. And then the biting began, sharp, bruising pressure on her arms as she flailed trying to grip the stairs again to pull herself out. And then a sudden warmth and tug as her skin separated between their teeth. She screamed again, only thinking that she wanted it over, and suddenly, it was. Sandra was stabbing at the mob of claws and teeth with the end of a boom. Sandra, the woman who’d been the worst to Sevita before the Plague, was rescuing her. Rick had run down to pick Sevita up and they retreated together. Sevita had finally fainted once they were safe behind the thick metal door of the second floor.

  They’d put her on the top of a desk, her wounds clumsily bandaged while the others made an emergency appeal to the military to save the station. She turned her throbbing head carefully toward the door. They aren’t coming, she thought, Why would they save a news station? The door shuddered and the plaster around the frame cracked as bodies slammed into it. For the second time that day, Sevita prepared herself to die. Most of the skin had been stripped from her legs and the pain from the deep bites on her arms crushed into her conscious thought and soaked through the thick gauze covering them. She just wanted it to be over quickly. Just wanted to be done. She hovered just below consciousness for several hours, until the gunshots started out in the street. Someone pulled her off the desk and onto the floor. She landed a little roughly and woke with a groan.

  “Sorry,” whispered Sandra crouching next to her in the dark leg space below the desk, “The soldiers said to get behind something.”

  “Soldiers?” mumbled Sevita.

  “The military doesn’t want to lose this station, it has the largest broadcast field in the region and they think they are going to need it. So they are extracting us and securing the building.”

  “How many?”

  “Soldiers? I don’t know, sounds like everything they’ve got.”

  Sevita shook her head and gasped as searing stars burst over the back of her scalp where the hair was missing. “No, Infected. How many are out there?” she asked at last.

  “Hundreds. Thousands maybe. They just keep coming. Most of them are fighting each other, though, they must be getting really— really hungry.”

  Sevita laughed a little in spite of the pain she was in. “Yeah, they weren’t just nibbling,” she said.

  “I’m really sorry,” whispered Sandra, her eyes sparkling with tears, “I should have helped sooner.”

  “I’m just glad you did,” said Sevita, though in her heart, she wasn’t sure that she was glad. All those hours of pain, just to die anyway.

  “I’m— I’m sorry we haven’t been friends before. I know it’s my fault. It’s just the job, you know?”

  Sevita smiled. “I know,” she said, and for once, she meant it. The shots were louder now, just at the bottom of the stairs maybe, men and women yelled and the door slammed with extra weight. There was a massive explosion from the street and then a terrifying silence. Sevita wasn’t sure if the blast had affected her hearing or if everyone was dead. There was a voice at the door.

  “For Pete’s sake, let us in,” it said.

  Sevita heard the door open and footsteps shook the carpet under her head. “We have to go, we don’t have enough to hold them.” The voice was shaky and loud.

  “We thought you were coming to secure the station,” said Rick.

  “Negative, we’ll have to regroup and find re-enforcements first. Meanwhile, the Infected will probably either abandon the area or wipe each other out. We need to leave before the lobby becomes overrun again.”

  Sevita could hear the others making for the door. Sandra popped her head over the desk.

  “We have a wounded co-worker. She can’t run, she needs help.”

  “No time, we’ve got seconds only, leave her,” came the voice, already halfway down the stairs. Sevita squeezed her eyes shut.

  “Go,” Sevita said, “Run!”

  Sandra looked down at her doubtfully. “I’m sorry,” she said, and ran toward the door. Sevita heard it clang shut behind her, but knew it wasn’t locked. She could only hope the Infected didn’t investigate. The door squealed open only a few seconds later and running feet rounded the desk. Sevita still had her eyes clenched closed. She heard a knee thud to the floor beside her and felt warm breath on her face. And then a soft hand touched her wrist.

  “It’s okay,” the woman’s voice rasped as her breath caught up, but it was gentle. Sevita opened her eyes. The underside of the desk was still very dark and the woman was just a shadow against the brighter studio. “I’m going to move you now,” she said, “it’s going to hurt, and I’m sorry for that.”

  “You don’t have time—” began Sevita.

  The woman slid a long board beside Sevita’s prone body. “It’s my ambulance. It’s my call.” She slowly lifted Sevita onto the board and gently tied the straps around her, taking precious extra seconds to avoid tightening them around Sevita’s worst injuries.

  “Okay,” she called to someone. A soldier rounded the desk and stood at Sevita’s feet, nervously peering into the stairwell.

  “Hey,” snapped the woman, “Pay attention. Don’t jar her.”

  The soldier nodded and bent over.

  “On three, one, two, three.”

  Sevita was lifted smoothly into the air and clear of the desk. She could see the woman’s face hovering over her now. Her expression was grim, but not stern. She was damp with sweat and Sevita could see she had been scratched on her face and arms. Sevita looked toward the soldier at her feet. He, too, had a bloody gash along the side of his head, and his uniform was torn. They moved quickly down the steps. Sevita heard some gunfire and the soldier glanced back at the woman.

  “Easy,” she said, “they aren’t leaving without us. I’ve got the keys.”

  “You’re one crazy freak, you know that, right?” the soldier squeaked.

  The woman’s face relaxed into a soft grin. They had made it to the bottom of the stairs and were racing for the shattered window. In the street, four other soldiers were shooting their weapons as quickly as possible as a massive crowd of enraged Infected pressed in toward them. The ambulance was a white star motionless between them. The news crew was standing in the back, one cameraman still filming. All Sevita could see were flailing arms and the whites of eyes and teeth sparking out of a writhing tumble of skin. The shrieks and roars had become so loud, the gunshots barely cut through it all, sounding more like thin pops. With every shot, a body fell and was immediately surrounded by other Infected. Then a wave of others trampled past them, over them, through them and grew closer to the tiny group and the ambulance.

  “Move,” yelled the woman to the cameraman. He backed up just in time for the woman and the soldier to slide Sevita in. “Let’s go,” the paramedic shouted while she secured Sevita’s board. “Just hang on,” she said quietly and gave Sevita’s hand a gentle squeeze before jumping into the front seat. The soldiers backed into the ambulance and slammed the doors. The vehicle started with a roar.

  “Sit down, and hold on,” called the woman, “This isn’t going to be pleasant.”

  Sevita watched as the other occupants pressed themselves into the wall and hung on to straps or bars, even the board Sevita was lying on. The ambulance was already warm with extra body heat and the only sounds were the heaving breath of the soldiers. The vehicle began rolling forward. There were metallic thumps on the walls, on the hood, and then the screeching rattle of dozens of fingernails along the metal.

  “You have to punch it!” shouted the soldier in the front seat.

  “They’re still people,” cried the paramedic, “I can’t just run them over.”

  “I know you aren’t trained for this, but it’s them or us. If you don’t move this vehicle, we’re dead in the next thirty seconds. Do it. Do it now!” He lifted his leg and slammed his boot down on her foot and the ambulance jerked forwa
rd.

  “Stop!” she cried, but he kept his foot down and gripped the wheel with his left hand, helping her steer through the thinnest parts of the crowd. His mouth was clenched and he winced with each bump, but he didn’t let go. At last, they were through and he released the wheel and her foot. They drove on in utter silence. A few of the news crew were crying. After a while, Sevita again heard gunshots and the vehicle slowly rolled through a thick barrier of sandbags and concrete as several soldier cleared a path through the large metal gate. Inside, it was quiet, and the ambulance soon stopped for good. Sevita was left alone for a long while as the ambulance emptied. She felt chilled as the vehicle lost the body heat of the others. At last, the paramedic climbed into the back.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said, “we didn’t have a bed ready for you and I wanted to make sure we moved you as little as possible.”

  “Thank you,” said Sevita.

  The woman blushed. “Oh, it’s nothing much, the field hospital is full. Besides, it’s noisy there. I’m taking you to my apartment instead. I hope that’s okay.”

  Sevita shook her head gently, trying not to bounce the tender spots, “No,” she said, “I mean thank you for coming back for me. For getting me out of there. I don’t even know your name, but you’ve already been the best friend I’ve ever had.”

  The woman’s smile was like a firework, surprising and sudden and wide. “My name’s Christine,” she said.

  Sevita could almost see that first real smile again, even in the dim plant manager’s office. She had known she was in love, right then. And she’d never left Christine’s apartment. Realizing she would probably never see that smile again made Sevita dizzy, as if something had sucked her breath away. She crawled underneath the desk and let herself cry for a few moments. She knew that she was sick. She’d tripped or bumped herself enough times in the past few days to be pretty certain that it wasn’t just clumsiness. She’d been lucky last time, but she wasn’t Immune this time. There was too much to do to keep pretending she had the time to do it. She started her handheld camera again, intending to leave some message, some explanation for afterward. But it felt too much like Dr. Pazzo’s recordings. She clicked the camera off again. Let somebody else explain. It was time for acting. Stories could come later. After. She pulled herself up and made her way to the generator.