Adam Baker: Terminus

Nariko helped drag a Peli trunk from the elevator. Lid stencil:

She slammed the gate and spoke into her radio.

‘Clear. Sending her back up.’

‘Ten-four.’

‘Where’s the street entrance?’ asked Cloke.

‘This way.’

A brass arrow pointed upwards to street level.

They climbed the steps. A cage gate sealed the entrance like a portcullis. Nariko shone her flashlight through the lattice grille.

Darkness. Merciless rain.

A garbage-strewn side street. Toppled dumpsters. An abandoned motorcycle on its side.

Flakes of ash drifted to earth: fallout blown from ledges, parapets and rooftops. Burned paper. Melted textile fibres. Carbonised people.

A warning notice spray-stencilled on brickwork next to a fire escape:

A lightning flash lit a broken, skeletal figure as it feebly dragged itself through rainwater. Ratty overcoat and a watch cap. Advanced infection: metallic sarcomas erupted from flesh.

A homeless guy. Probably didn’t have the resources to flee the city when the outbreak began. Hid in a shitty basement somewhere, ate from cans and sucked a crack stem while loudspeaker trucks cruised street-to-street broadcasting martial law.

The creature hauled shattered, useless legs. Terrible blistered burns down the left side of its body. An empty eye socket wept pus. The remaining jet-black eye fixed on Nariko.

‘Jesus,’ said Nariko. ‘That guy really caught the crispy.’

‘Must have been out in the open when the bomb dropped,’ said Cloke. ‘Seared by the thermal flash. Classic gamma burn.’

‘They were people once. The infected. Easy to forget.’

Nariko raised the pistol and took aim. The slow-dying creature turned towards her and struggled to raise an arm. It reached towards the light.

‘Don’t waste your ammunition,’ said Cloke. ‘It stopped being human a long time ago. It’s beyond your help.’

She lowered the Glock.

‘How many prowlers are left, do you think?’ she asked.

‘Most died in the initial blast, I suppose. Those inside the detonation zone would have been vaporised in a millisecond. Those outside the heat-core would have been ripped apart by a hurricane of high velocity glass and metal. The rest, those that were far enough from the hypocentre to survive the initial explosion, are fatally irradiated. They won’t last long. Accelerated cellular breakdown. Couple of weeks from now Manhattan will be truly lifeless. No birds, no grass. Nothing but scorched rubble.’

‘When do you think New York will be safe for human habitation?’

‘Some of the isotopes will decay over the next few months, but plenty of contaminants will seep into the soil, the water. This region will be lingering death for the next quarter of a million years.’

Cloke jerked the gate.

‘I don’t trust this latch. Do we have any chain?’

‘I’ll look around, see what I can find.’

‘Help me curtain the entrance. We’ll decontaminate as best we can.’

They lashed polythene sheet across the lattice gate, then returned to the ticket hall.

Cloke strapped a water tank to his back. A steam cleaner for blasting graffiti from brickwork. He hosed walls and pillars with 0.5% hypochlorite solution.

‘Now you.’

Nariko stood cruciform, enveloped in a jet of broiling vapour.

‘Do me.’

She shouldered the cleaner and scoured Cloke front and back. Condensed water pooled on the floor. She blasted run-off towards the platform steps.

Cloke flipped latches and opened the crate. Radiological equipment set in foam. He selected a Geiger counter. A yellow handset with an LCD screen. He tested for power. He took a reading.

‘It’s okay. You can take off your mask.’

Nariko pulled the respirator from her face. She massaged strap welts.

She unzipped, and stepped out of her C-BURN radiological suit. She kicked off heavy butyl overboots and stripped down to Fire Department fatigues. A blue T-shirt with an embroidered breast patch: a snarling rodentine face.

She lifted the hem of the shirt and towelled sweat from her face.

Cloke shrugged off his suit.

‘Stinks in here. Damp and rot.’

Nariko sniffed.

The acrid stink of melted synthetics and seared flesh filtered from the streets above.

‘Burned plastic. The whole city.’

Cloke checked the Geiger unit. He held it towards the station entrance, watched numerals flicker.

‘How bad?’ asked Nariko.

‘Hard to tell without proper dosimeters. Those minutes we spent outside were the worst. Fully exposed, transferring gear from the chopper to the roof. Got to be eighty, ninety roentgens, out in the open. Maybe more. How long were we up there? Six, seven minutes before we got under cover? The suits gave us some protection, but we still took a heavy hit. Not so bad down here. Concrete and bedrock protect us from the worst. Every hour probably the equivalent of a chest X-ray.’

‘Twenty-four hours until the chopper picks us up.’

‘We should be okay if we stay below ground.’

‘We’re on our way down.’

‘Ten-four,’ said Nariko.

The elevator hummed and rattled. The floor indicator counted down from 6 to Sub.

Lupe and Galloway slowly descended into view.

Nariko pulled back the rusted gate. Metal shriek.

Jab with the shotgun barrel.

‘Move.’

Lupe shuffled out into the ticket hall. Her ankle shackle forced baby steps.

‘Stand still, both of you,’ said Cloke.

He hosed them head to toe.

‘All right,’ said Nariko. ‘You can take off your masks.’

Galloway pulled back his rubber hood and peeled off his respirator.

Nariko loosened head harness straps and removed Lupe’s mask.

‘How you doing?’ asked Nariko.

Lupe held out her hands.

‘You folks going to uncuff me, or what? I got nowhere to run.’

Galloway unzipped his NBC suit. His armpits were blotched dark with sweat. He unclipped cuff keys from a belt ring. He threw them to Nariko.

Nariko released Lupe’s shackles. Galloway stood back, shotgun raised.

‘Pull any shit, I’ll blow your fucking legs off.’

Lupe stretched, slow and defiant. She looked around.

‘Take off your gear,’ said Galloway.

‘Freezing in here.’

‘Take it off.’

Lupe unzipped the heavy rubber suit and stepped out of the overboots.

‘Hold out your hands.’

‘What the fuck, dude?’ protested Lupe.

‘I said hold out your hands.’

Nariko re-cuffed Lupe’s wrists. She looped a chain round a pillar and padlocked Lupe’s ankle.

‘Down,’ said Galloway. He prodded her shoulder with the shotgun barrel. ‘Down on the ground.’

Lupe sat cross-legged on the floor.

‘There’ll be no warning shot, all right? If you mess with me, I’ll waste you.’

The freight platform juddered back into view. Donahue and Tombes. Quick decon drill. They stripped off their suits.

They both wore RESCUE 4 – TUNNEL RATS shirts.

They struck a fresh flare and unloaded the elevator. A pallet of holdalls and equipment trunks. Rescue gear, trauma bags, coils of polypropylene rope. They threw them skidding across the floor.

Lupe sat with her back to the pillar and watched them work.

‘Anyone got a smoke?’

They ignored her.