Walter Greatshell - Apocalypse blues

We only climbed as far as the next level, emerging in an electrical substation just off Broadway, and followed that spacious avenue forward to the Galleria. We knew when we had arrived by the echo. Suddenly, we were in a huge hollow place, a soaring atrium within the ship's superstructure. Only my high-powered lantern could begin to penetrate it, and the pinprick flashlights of the others made me think of ducklings following their mother.

Here was a movie theater, a casino, a ballroom, a disco, several theme bars and clubs, a video arcade, a hair salon, duty-free shops, and ATM machines on every level. It was a seagoing shopping mall. It was a towering crypt.

"Oh, that's dope, dude," said Shawn. "That is awesome."

Cole said, "My boy Shawn be feelin' right at home. All he need is an Orange Julius."

We had picked up the trail of our predecessors once again and began following it up dead escalators as we searched for the drugstore. I announced our elapsed time at five-minute intervals. We were approaching the halfway point-forty-five minutes-when it would be sensible to turn back. But since I counted on it being easier to return than it had been to get there, I wasn't going to be a stickler about it. Not when we were so close.

"Hey, Lulu," Lemuel said, huffing and puffing. "How could that other team have covered so much ground? Have you noticed that these footprints go in and out of every doorway? I mean, they're everywhere! We didn't take that long to get here."

As soon as Lemuel spoke, I knew what he said was incontrovertible; in fact it had been gnawing at me, too, and I had been rationalizing it away.

Julian said, "Not only that, but a lot of them go in the wrong direction." He pointed out a very clear set of boot prints facing us. "And these soles are different than ours, look."

"Holy crap," said Hector. "It's true."

Suddenly the echoing void seemed very haunted. Several of the guys began babbling at once: "I knew it!" "Let's get the fuck outta here, then!" "I fucking knew this would happen."

"Hold on," said Julian, clinging to his composure. "We don't know how old those footprints are. They could've been here for weeks. Months. Maybe a rescue party came through, anything! All I know is, there's nothing to be afraid of." I loved Julian just then.

"I don't know, dude," said Shawn. "Does anybody else smell smoke?"

"I don't smell anything," said Jake, all jumpy.

"I do," said Lemuel. "It's stronger the higher we climb."

"Shut up, man, there's no smoke!" Jake was on the verge of panic.

But I could smell it, too, the faintest tang of burnt wood. Shushing the boys, I called out, "Hello? Is anybody there?" We waited.

Julian broke the silence. "Come on, we're wasting time. If you think about it, the frost in here probably condensed out of the air as soon as the heating plant shut down. Those tracks were probably made before the ship was even abandoned…" He trailed off, listening hard.

We all flinched as somewhere above us a door was thrown open. Hectic footsteps pattered a short distance and stopped. I leaned out over the glass-and-chrome balustrade, shining my beam up at the higher galleries. It's just the other guys, I thought.

For a second I saw nothing, until I turned the light straight up. Then I froze as if electrocuted. Staring directly at me from the top floor were four horrific creatures-I only had a glimpse before they vanished, leaving a red afterimage of gleaming saucer eyes burned in my retinas-but I knew I had seen something like giant black birds with vicious beaks. Monstrous hooded crows. It can't be, I thought, scalp prickling.

Then we could hear them moving again, and ghastly croaking sounds as they scuttled, heedless of the dark, down toward us. The boys were practically jumping out of their skins, knowing I had seen something terrible. They were desperate for a signal.

I couldn't think of what else to do. "They're coming!" I said sharply. "Move!"

We fled, tripping over one another as we chased my spot of light down the concourse. Knowing the guys were all but blind, I tried to keep up a running patter that they could follow: "This way, this way! Keep up! No, left, left! Watch the stairs! Now down! Keep going! Careful! Watch it! Don't let anybody fall behind! Ow! Wait up!" I had no idea where I was going.

The sound of our pursuers was lost in the tumult, but I imagined those wicked beaks jabbing at the back of my neck.

"Where are we going?" Hector panted on the escalator.

"I don't know," I said. "Just go."

"Lemuel is falling behind," he said urgently. "We can't keep running like this!"

"In here!" I shouted, lunging through the next open doorway I came to. It was a bank, with a glassed-in counter and currency exchange rates posted on a board. I had to stop short to keep from tripping over velvet ropes, but someone piled into me from behind, and I went flying into a leaf litter of scattered money. If not for my thick winter padding I might have been seriously hurt, but as it was, the only thing damaged by contact with the parquet floor was my flashlight. Slammed down with the force of several bodies behind it, the bulb winked out.

Then I was the blindest of all, seeing nothing but the light's residual dazzle. "Is everyone here?" I shouted.

"Yeah, we're here," said Hector, waving his flashlight. Soon I could see them all, six fireflies in the night.

"The door!" I yelled. "Somebody shut the door!"

"There is no door," said Julian.

"What?"

"It's an electric gate-it won't budge."

This unbelievable bit of bad luck left me stunned. With no way to shut ourselves in and no back door, we were cornered, and if we tried to run with only those feeble reading lights to guide us, we would break our necks. I tried to remember if on our way up we had passed any possible escape routes, but nothing came to mind. There was no time anyway. A crust of frozen sweat fringed my hood as if the ice were closing around me.

Hector called, "Lulu, we need your light!"

"It broke."

"It broke?"

"Damn!" said Cole. "What the fuck we gonna do?"

"I… don't know," I said.

"Oh God, oh God…" moaned Jake.

Icy-calm, Julian said, "We better do something. They'll be here any second."

Coming to a hopeless decision, I said, "Everyone be quiet! Turn off your flashlights and don't move!"

"Dude, you're fucking crazy!" Shawn said. "We have to book it outta here!"

Grimly, I said, "There's no place to go, and no time. All we can do is hide."

"Then we're fucked! No way!"

"She's right, man," Julian told him, disgusted to have been left with this poorest of options. "If we just sit tight in here, they might lose us in the dark. It's a big place. Everybody come in from the doorway! Line up against the wall."

I didn't care that Julian was giving orders. "Hurry, do what he says," I whispered.

"This is nuts," Hector muttered, brushing past me.

"Shhh. Quiet."

There was no sound outside. Without even the toy flashlights, it was a total abyss.

"Listen," Hector whispered. "If they come through that door, two of us rush them with the rope stretched between us and drive them back to the railing. Then we all dump them over."

"Why the hell not?" said Julian.

"I've wrestled before," offered Lemuel. "I'll take one end."

"Aw, shit. Gimme the other," said Cole.

Touched by their futile machismo, I said, "Good idea. Now hush up."

Silence settled in our bones like the cold, freezing time itself. I would have given anything to be able to run in place and get my blood going. My hood was cinched to a tiny peephole, and my face still ached. Gradually, I became aware that I was looking out the peephole. It wasn't light exactly, more like shades of black, but I could see it: a snow-strained gloom filtering through the atrium skylights. Moonrise.