Stephen Cannell - Final Victim

"I've never been down here. Gotta be a way out," he said.

Lockwood picked up the emergency phone in the elevator and tried to dial out. He couldn't get a dial tone. "Is all this stuff on one central computer?" Lockwood asked, his heart rate beginning to climb.

"Yeah, this is a 'smart' building. They retooled it a few years ago. Systems are all on the main computer on the first floor," Carter Van Lendt said.

"Shit." Lockwood had already begun to suspect the worst. He looked up, saw a security camera, and wondered if The Rat was watching them. "Anybody got a cellphone?"

"Why?" Kulack said. "Let's just go find the fire stairs on the other side."

"They're gonna be locked. Gimme a cell."

Hixon popped open his briefcase and handed his to Lockwood. Lockwood dialed the DOJ building's switchboard.

"Department of Justice, one moment please," the operator said and immediately put him on hold. His heart was racing and he made a conscious effort to calm down. There was not much down here. How could The Rat attack them with a room full of files? Take it easy, he told himself.

"Whatta you doing? This is nuts," Kulack said, reaching for the phone.

Lockwood yanked the phone out of his reach. "What's down here?" he asked Van Lendt.

"Files."

"Not the files. What kinda systems?"

And then they heard a Klaxon horn from above and all of them looked up. Immediately a siren started to sound from the other end of the sub-basement.

"What the fuck is that?" Lockwood asked.

"I think it's the halon system. All the paper file rooms got 'em last year," Van Lendt answered.

"Halon? Doesn't that shit eat oxygen?" Lockwood said, as the switchboard finally took him off hold.

Then over the screaming Klaxon they heard vibrating coming from the vents above them. They looked up. A white gas was flowing from vents in the ceiling and cascading down off the file cabinets like dry ice vapor. It started to swirl and pool on the floor.

"Department of Justice," the operator chirped in his ear.

"This is a medical emergency. I'm with Customs DOAO Laurence Heath. We're trapped in the basement of this building. The door's jammed! He's had a heart attack! Get down here fast! Break the door and bring oxygen!"

"I'm sorry, sir… what?"

"Do what I said. Now! He's dying."

Lockwood had instantly decided not to try to explain to her what was really happening. He had read only one report on halon gas and it had stuck in his mind. A system in Denver had accidentally gone off and killed several people in less than three minutes. If the heavy fog-like substance continued to pour into the room, within minutes there would be no breathable air left in the sub-basement. Already Lockwood felt a shortness of breath… a ringing in his ears.

"Hold your breath," he said, "don't breathe this shit. If it gets in you, you're gonna lose oxygen."

They were all backing away from the halon, which was rolling toward them, flowing freely from the ceiling. The cloud of gas was expanding as it flowed into the elevator, where they had retreated. It began to fill the box. Even the air above them was dissipating. It began to climb rapidly in the enclosed space.

On the monitor The Rat watched the suffocation of Lockwood and the four strangers with rapt interest. He was rocking back and forth, his huge body causing the wooden chair to creak loudly.

He watched as the first death occurred. The narrow-shouldered man dropped his armload of folders and fell to his knees. He reached up and grabbed at his shirt collar, ripping at his tie. His mouth was open, his teeth protruding. The Rat remembered the cats he had strangled as a boy… They also died with their mouths wide open, their tongues curled and out. Then the narrow-shouldered man was clawing at his neck. Lockwood reached out to pull him up, but before he could get to him, the man fell sideways into the white fog. The Rat could barely see him in the mist. The man bucked once in a final convulsion, swirling the cloud of gas, then fell beneath its deadly blanket.

In the elevator, Lockwood was holding his breath. His lungs were aching, his nose and throat burning. The halon was now all around them. He tried to reach up and punch the top out of the elevator ceiling but, when he hit it, it rang solidly, sending a bolt of pain down his arm.

Heath was beginning to gag and foam at the mouth. "Can't breathe," he gasped. Then his barrel chest heaved five times as he sucked in huge lungfuls of nothing. He grabbed at his chest and, with his mouth wide open, fell forward on his face.

Kulack went down seconds later. Both of them disappeared under the heavy blanket of white gas. Lockwood and his lawyer, Alex, were the last ones standing. Both holding their breath, looking across and through the sea of halon with bulging eyes. Finally, Alex couldn't hold his breath any longer and took one gulp of the deadly lifeless atmosphere. He looked at Lockwood for a moment and then, in panic, took another gulp, and another. He convulsed while still standing. His wire glasses fell off his face. His brain was dying. He started to lose consciousness… falling slowly to one knee. He reached out to Lockwood, who grabbed his wrist to hold him upright. The gas was now chin high and the oxygen around them was dissipating. Then Hixon fell backwards, slipping from Lockwood's grasp, dropping from sight.

Lockwood could hear pounding somewhere in the basement. He slowly let out all of his breath. His lungs were empty. His reflexes were screaming at him to breathe, while his iron will was forcing him not to. He couldn't hold his breath any longer. He was seconds from death when his hand brushed against his side coat pocket and he felt something. His allergy inhaler! He yanked it out and jammed it against his nose, then took one life-sustaining inhalation, sucking the little plastic vaporizer empty. He almost choked on its pungent fragrance, but he had quarter-filled his lungs with the aerosol mist. Then, seconds later, he began to lose consciousness. Falling forward, he grabbed the elevator rail, his chin just above the deadly fog.

As Lockwood floated into the tunnel of death, he thought he saw the fire door at the far end of the building fly open. He thought he saw Heather rushing toward him, carrying an oxygen bottle, but she was too far away to save him. "Daddy, Daddy, don't leave me," she cried, but it was too late.

Lockwood fell forward into the deadly mist.

The Rat shut off his computer and went up on the deck of the barge. He climbed down the ladder into the water. He rolled in the shallows next to the rustling hull, to cool his blazing skin. The salt water stung him, bringing tears to his eyes. He could bear the pain no longer. Finally, he rolled up on his knees. He raised his hands over his head.

"The Wind Minstrel is coming," he screamed at the heavens, "and He is God!"

A flock of herons broke from the treetops and wheeled in crazy circles above him.

Karen had visited Malavida for an hour on Thursday night. He was conscious but very weak. The Federal agent sat outside the door with one ear cocked, but they were talking so softly that he finally gave up and went back to the book he was reading.

Karen filled Malavida in on the close call he'd had with his blood type, and the one she and Lockwood had had at the Ramada Inn.

"Where's Lockwood now?" he said, his voice raspy from the anesthetic tube he'd had down his throat for ten hours yesterday.

"He got arrested," she said softly. "They took him back to Washington Tuesday. He's having a hearing tomorrow at nine, for a bunch'a stuff they say he did… It's all bullshit. In the meantime, I'm going to get you out of here."

Malavida lay there looking at the ceiling for a minute. She watched him and, when he didn't comment, she went on. "Look, I think if you stay here with all the shit they're pumping into you, you're taking a big chance. The Rat will out-think this bunch'a white coats. You'll be getting battery acid in your coffee or some damn thing."