Adam Baker - Terminus

Maybe the address will give us a clear indication of the situation above ground. Perhaps our infantry have regrouped and are preparing to reclaim all major cities. Or perhaps our position is truly hopeless: we are marooned in this troglodytic twilight, without the slightest chance of rescue. In which case I hope firm knowledge of our situation will be enough to galvanise the men. Once they realise their only shot at safety is to walk off this island, battle their way street by street across the bridge and into Brooklyn, maybe they will pull together.

My greatest disappointment these past few days has been Moxon, the guard who accompanied us from Bellevue. I regarded him as an ally. He alone among our number remained sober and focussed. He shaved, while others grew beards. He maintained his uniform while others shambled in sweat-stained lab coats. But he overheard a discussion in which I suggested the remaining prisoners represented an ongoing threat to our safety and should be euthanized. He has threatened to unshackle the prisoners and release them into the tunnels, if we attempt to take any action against them.

So there is nothing to do but watch my companions succumb to orgiastic squalor. I monitor our supplies of food and water and make an hourly inspection of the station gate. And I alone seem to care that Doctor Ekks, the man who embodies the entire purpose of our mission, is currently held captive by an apparent lunatic.

Wednesday September 25th

The standoff continues.

Private Tetsell, one of the least experienced members of our company, has shut himself in the station supervisor’s office with Doctor Ekks. He is armed with a shotgun. He has constructed a barricade. We heard furniture moved around, the squeak of chairs pushed against the door, pinning it shut.

He has demanded a helicopter fly him to Philadelphia.

Tetsell is a good man. He’s scared, confused, but fundamentally decent. I doubt he will harm Ekks. But I can’t be certain. These are extraordinary times. Each day brings fresh horrors. Minds break like porcelain.

We could storm the office, I suppose. We could ram the door until it splits and the furniture stacked behind it falls aside. But the consequences could be catastrophic. It would take many seconds, possibly a full minute, to gain entry to the room. Tetsell might kill himself, or worse, kill Ekks. Our orders were specific. Protect Doctor Ekks. Protect him at all costs. My one and only priority.

Perhaps we could use the ventilation conduits. There are brick tunnels built into the station walls. Maybe a man with a pistol could crawl through the narrow ducts. Maybe he could reach the IRT office, punch out a wall vent and shoot Tetsell dead.

I keep running hostage rescue scenarios. If the world were still intact, our course of action would be clear. We would summon reinforcements, deploy a tac team and have them storm the office. Start a conversation on the radio to distract the guy. Have SWAT kill the lights and simultaneously blow out the hinges with Shok-Lok rounds. An efficient breech-entry. They would kick the door aside, toss a couple of concussion grenades. Tetsell left flash-blind and reeling. SWAT swarming through the doorway equipped with laser sights and night vision helmet rigs. The siege would be concluded in two or three seconds.

But I can’t summon a trained takedown team. These elaborate rescue fantasies are a product of impotence and frustration. Tetsell is barricaded behind a heavy door. I have limited men, limited ammunition. Best to avoid a confrontation. I must be patient. Maintain a dialogue. Starve him out.

In the meantime, I have a grim task to perform. Rosa’s body is still lying beneath a blanket in the plant room. I suppose I must carry her deep into the tunnels, far enough that we won’t breathe the stink of decomposition.

There is a niche in the tunnel wall several hundred yards north near Canal Street. A branch of track aborted during the initial construction of the Liberty Line. It is little more than a cave. A brick arch framing rough walls of schist scarred by chisels and dynamite cartridges.

It is where I laid the remains of Knox, days ago.

I carried a garbage bag full of offal and bone deep into the tunnel. All that was left of him, all that wasn’t suspended in jars. No sound but the steady drip of water.

Foolish to travel alone. Plenty of infected stumbling round the passageways.

I dumped the bag in the wall niche, doused it in kerosene and set it alight. The tunnel was filled with smoke, meat-stink, the pop and fizz of boiling body fat.

I don’t know why I went to such lengths to destroy all trace of Knox. I could have put his carcass out in the alley. Or I could have dumped the bag a few yards into the tunnel near Fenwick and let rats gnaw the marrow from his bones. His death was necessary, legally sanctioned. No reason to feel ashamed.

No one gives a damn about Knox. He was a non-person long before this disease stalked the earth. No one will mourn him, no one will care. There will be no judge, no tribunal. He has been erased. It is as if he never lived.

Cloke folded the notepaper.

‘Donavan. Wasn’t he the soldier we found floating in the tunnel? That guy turned to rat food?’

‘Yeah,’ said Lupe. ‘Sorry bastard succumbed to infection.’

‘How old do you think he was?’

‘Young, at a guess. One of those blue-eyed, god-and-country types.’

‘Seems the lad walked into the dark rather than become a threat to his companions.’

‘Is that what you want to believe?’

‘Why not?’ said Cloke. ‘A good soldier. Took action rather than jeopardise the people around him. Some people do the right thing.’

‘You got kids?’ asked Lupe. ‘Family?’

‘No. You?’

She shook her head.

‘Times like these, it’s good to travel light.’

Cloke stuffed the notepaper back in the bag.

‘There’s nothing in these letters. Nothing of use. A dozen goodbyes. It seems indecent to read this stuff. Prurient. Eavesdropping on their final hours. Ought to put a match to them all.’

‘Then you’re back where you started,’ said Lupe. ‘Ekks. You’ve got to get inside his head, find out what he knows.’

Donahue sat in the dark, back to the office wall. She closed her eyes and rested her head against cement. She blanked her mind and tried to sink into hibernation.

She put herself on a wooded hillside. Dappled shade. A trickling stream. Silence and solitude. She lay in long grass and sipped from her canteen.

She expanded the daydream, added detail and backstory.

She had fled the ruins of civilisation and found safety in deep wilderness. She was camped in a forest, far from the horror. A dome tent draped in camouflage netting hidden among trees. Maybe, when noonday heat gave way to evening cool, she would fish from the stream. Lower a hook and line, snag a couple of trout.

Dread crept over her. The hillside dissolved. Summer heat was replaced by bone-chilling cold. Sunlight turned to darkness. The smell of forest pine was supplanted by the stink of mildew and decay.

Back in the IRT office.

She stared into absolute black. Her optic nerves projected fleeting monster shapes.

She couldn’t escape a skin-crawling, preternatural sense she was not alone. Something else in the room, inches away, hidden in darkness.

She fumbled her watch and pressed for the face-light. She half expected to see a rotted visage leaning over her, arms outstretched.

Nothing.

She held her wrist and monitored her pulse. She breathed slow, tried to calm her jack-hammer heart.

How much time had passed? It felt like an hour. She checked. Eight minutes.

‘Christ.’

She stood. She stretched. Toe touches and back twists.