Pavel Kravchenko - Project Antichrist

I turned to Paul again, contemplating removing the helmet and asking him to remove his, so that we could see each other’s faces. Before I could, Paul’s hand rose up once more. Placing his thumb under the fingers, he opened and closed the palm three times, paused, turned the palm sideways, curling his fingers in and leaving the index pointing straight forward and the thumb up. That wasn’t in any of the episodes I’d seen, but I understood. Talk or shoot. It was up to me.

Only for a short time.

Hurried footsteps resounded in the hallway behind us. It seemed the squad of guards we’d passed was returning for a couple of questions.

“Go!” I shouted, forgetting the silence. “Go!”

And off went Paul. He charged around the bend, and I followed closely, screaming “Ahhh!” at the top of my lungs, drowning out the chanting that continued to grow in my head. In what I thought would be my last moments, I couldn’t come up with anything better. So much for actors being creative.

As we came around the curve, I saw that the hallway from there ran straight for about fifty feet, ending in a single silvery door. Three guards in white heard me. The hallway began to crackle with gunfire.

Paul stumbled and went down. Thinking he’d been hit I screamed louder and started shooting, still running towards the guards. One of them was thrown back against the door. Before I had the chance to cheer, something like an invisible freight train smashed into my left shoulder, tossing me back in a triple toe-loop.

Oh, that hurts, I thought to myself as I spun, watching a familiar-looking submachine gun float by me. Then, right before I lost consciousness, I saw Paul, sliding along the floor on his belly and shooting. “No more ice-cream, mister,” said my mother’s voice. “Or you will be sick.” The lights went out.

When my eyes opened Paul’s red, wet face hovered above me. His lips and eyes were moving frantically, but I couldn’t hear a thing. It was about to tell him as much, when a stab of pain woke me up better than any latte. I almost bit my tongue off.

I groaned and struggled to get up. “How long was I out?”

“Two, maybe three seconds!” he shouted in my ear. “Now fucking move!”

Through the door he pulled me into… an elevator. I twisted around, not comprehending. Outside there was the hallway and the bodies. A bunch of armed people in white ran out of the curve.

“Close, you piece of shit! Close!” Paul was shouting and shooting as bullets whizzed by, and finally, the door obeyed. Several dull thuds sent the elevator on its way up.

“Get up! Can’t rest here!” Paul shouted at me and pulled me to my feet. “We’re still alive, brother! Haha! Man, this is just like BF5, man!”

My head throbbed, but he didn’t seem capable of lowering the volume. Leaning against the wall, which was soft and orange , I shook my head. As I did, another burst of pain tore through me, almost causing me to collapse. Yes, I’m alive, I mused, but I wish a small part of me, namely from the left shoulder down the arm, was dead. Or, if that’s what dead feels like, I want no part of it at all.

“Whoa, whoa! Hold it, man! The ride will be short! I need you awake!”

I realized, absently, that he’d slapped my face. He was right, I knew, I needed to get it together, but everything else was wrong. Why were we going up? The prisoners had to be on the underground level. Yet, even as I thought that, I heard the chanting in my head, stronger than ever. We had to be on the right track. Had to be, unless there was no chanting and I was crazy. What a time to find that out, I reflected.

I brought my good hand up to my face and found no glass. Just sweat. Somewhere along the way I’d lost my helmet. Pare’s helmet, really. But who gave a damn? It felt good to touch my face.

The elevator stopped. Paul pushed me against one wall and leaned flat against the other, gun ready. The door opened. On the other side of it was a room, an office, large and empty. Inside the room only the ceiling was white. Under it, the walls were painted sea-foam, with malachite desk, spinach carpeting and viridian arm-chairs. Hideous colors all, as far as I was concerned, but after the maddening white of the underground, the room looked like it was from another, better world. It looked like we made it out alive. Beyond the window that filled the opposite wall, smoke was rising. There’s a fire out there in the Emerald City, I thought. Or emerald people are having a barbecue.

“What button did you press?” I asked.

“Wait here,” Paul whispered and stepped out cautiously. Having made sure the empty room was empty he returned with an arm-chair, jammed the elevator’s doorway and motioned me out. On the left there was a door. Paul checked it. Locked from the inside. The wall on the right had a dozen monitors, all tuned in to the news. I recalled the Pope’s morning announcement, which seemed like it had happened last year, expecting to see broadcasts from Vatican. Instead, I saw myself. And I seemed to be in a lot of trouble again, only this time it was worse.

This time, I was dead.

They were showing an extended collage of images, which included frightening, sudden close-ups of initially distant, grim, some bordering on catatonic shots of my face recycled from the fugitive days broadcasts, a shot of me grinning maniacally while brandishing the “Silver Killer” from the day before, and assorted other pictures or short feeds of me being an asshole to someone on the show. Then they decided to let us see the “disturbing footage from this morning’s bombing” one more time. I figured it would be the Ace. And boy, was it ever.

There I was, sure as Friday, seated beside Dr. Coughlin in the BMW, having a pretty heated argument with some guard in regular, non-white uniform. The guy reminded me of Ted from Waukegan. The angle switched, so that you couldn’t see the inside of the car any longer, and Ted’s look-alike pulled out a gun and screamed something. Next was the explosion and the camera feed was finally cut off. From the commentary that followed I learned that two other doctors were missing and feared dead. “Dr. Benjamin Young, a retired ex-employee of Freedom Corp., and Dr. Colin Wright, Whales’s supervising psychiatrist.”

“Damn,” Paul remarked in a hushed and largely unenthusiastic voice.

His lack of interest surprised me less than his voice control. When I turned, he pointed at a new door in the corner. Before following, I limped towards the window and looked outside. The BMW was still mostly there, but parts of the wall and the whole guardhouse were missing. Four police cars, two fire trucks and an ambulance were parked in a semi-circle on the outer side of the black smoking crater. Behind them, on the road (neither yellow nor brick) several more of each kind were approaching and leaving. Various emergency response people talked in groups beyond the screen of their vehicles. None of them had entered the compound. I wondered if any of them had the chance to see the news. Then it occurred to me that there were no news vans out there, despite the footage on the national TV, but that thought was pushed back by a more pressing one.

I wondered what would happen if I shot out the window and called for help. Even if they had seen the news, I was almost certain I could convince them I hadn’t gone up in flames inside that BMW. Maybe I would be rescued. Probably arrested for something minutes later. But guards in white overalls would not shoot at me any more. I would be alive. I would get some pain medicine.

I turned and walked to where Paul was waiting. Dr. Young’s persistent chanting reminded me why I was there. If all I had wanted was to stay alive, I would not be. Iris, my Iris had to be somewhere close. We needed to hurry.