Стефани Перри: Zero Hour

Billy leaned forward, carefully sliding his dogtags under his collar so they wouldn't jingle, moving slowly, until he could just see around the edge of the aisle seat. Someone was stepping through the connecting door, thin, short—a girl, or a young man, maybe, dressed in a Kevlar vest and army green.

He could just make out a few letters on the back of the vest, an S, a T, an A—and then he or she was gone.

S.T.A.R.S. Had they sent out a team looking for him? Couldn't be, not so fast—the jeep had crashed maybe an hour ago, tops, and the S.T.A.R.S. didn't have a military affiliation, they were a PD offshoot, no one would have called them in. It probably had to do with the dogs he saw, obviously some mutant feral pack; the S.T.A.R.S. usually dealt with the weird shit that local cops couldn't or wouldn't handle. Or maybe they'd come in to investigate whatever had gone down on the train.

Doesn't matter why, does it? They'll have guns, and if they figure out who you are, this taste of freedom will be your last. Get out of here. Now

With man-eating dogs running around in the woods? Not without a weapon, no way. There had to be some kind of security on board, a rented uniform with a gun; he just had to look. It would be a risk, with a S.T.A.R.S. on board—but there was only one of them, after all. If he had to ...

Billy shook his head. He'd seen his share of death in Special Forces. If it came down to it, here and now, he'd fight, or ran. He wouldn't kill, not ever again. At least not one of the good guys.

Billy crawled to his feet, keeping low, the handcuffs dangling from his wrist. He'd look through the stuff in this car, first, then move away from the S.T.A.R.S. interloper, see what he could find. No point in having a confrontation if it could be avoided. He'd just—

Bam! Bam! Bam!

Three shots, from the car ahead. A pause, then three, four more ... then nothing.

Apparently, not all the train cars were empty. The knot in his stomach tightened, but he didn't let it slow him down as he picked up the first briefcase he saw and started to dig.

The first train car was empty of life—but something very bad had occurred there, no question.

A crash? No, there's no structural damage . . . but so much blood!

Rebecca closed the door behind her, shutting out the thickening curtain of rain, and stared at the chaos around her. The cabin had been a nice one, all dark wood and expensive carpeting, the light fixtures antique, the wallpaper flocked. Now there were newspapers, suitcases, coats, bags open and spilled across the floor—it looked like there'd been a crash, and the drips and smears of blood that liberally dappled the cabin's walls and seats backed up the scenario. Except where were the passengers?

She stepped further into the train car, aiming the handgun up and down the aisle. There were a few low lights on, enough to see, but the shadows were deep. Nothing moved.

The back of the seat to her left was stained with blood. She reached out and touched the large splotch, then wiped her hand on her pants, grimacing. It was wet.

Lights are on, blood's fresh. Whatever happened, it happened recently. Lieutenant Billy, maybe? He was wanted for murder . . . Unless he had a gang with him, though, it didn't seem likely; the destruction was too widespread, too extreme, more like a natural disaster than some kind of hostage situation.

Or more like the forest murders.

She nodded inwardly, taking a deep breath. The killers must have struck again. The bodies that had been recovered had been torn apart, mutilated, and the crime scenes had probably looked exactly like this blood-spattered train car. She should get off now, radio the captain, call in the rest of the team. She started to turn back to the door—and hesitated.

I could secure the train first.

Ridiculous. It would be crazy to stay here by herself, stupid and dangerous. No one would expect her to check out a murder scene alone—assuming any-one had been murdered. For all she knew, there'd been a shooting or something, and the train had been evacuated.

No, that's stupid. There'd be cops all over the place, EMTs, helicopters, reporters. Whatever happened here, I'm the first one on the scene... and securing the scene is the first priority.

She couldn't help wondering what the guys might say when they saw she'd handled things herself.

They'd stop calling her “kiddo,” for one thing. At the very least, her rookie status would be behind her that much quicker. She could take a quick look around, nothing major, and if things seemed even the slightest bit dangerous, she'd call in the team, pronto.

She nodded to herself. Right. She could handle a look-see, no problem. A deep breath, and she started for the front of the car, carefully stepping through the scattered luggage. When she reached the connecting door, she braced herself and quickly stepped through, opening the second door before she lost her nerve.

Oh, no.

The first car had been bad, but here, there were people. Three, four—five that she could see from where she stood, and all of them obviously dead, faces ravaged by unknown claws, bodies drenched in dark wetness. A few were slumped in seats, as if they'd been brutally murdered where they'd been sitting. The smell of death was a palpable thing, like copper and feces, like rotting fruit on a hot day.

The door automatically closed behind her and she started, her heart beating fast, faintly aware that she was way out of her league, she needed to call for help—and then she heard the whispering, and realized that she wasn't alone.

She aimed her weapon at the empty aisle ahead, not sure where it was coming from, her heartbeat going double-time.

“Identify yourself!” she said, her voice firmer and more authoritative than she expected. The whispering continued, choking and distant, strangely muted in the otherwise silent car, like she imagined a crazed killer might sound, sitting and whispering to himself after a murder spree.

She was about to repeat herself when she saw the source of the whispering, halfway up the aisle on the floor. It was a tiny transistor radio, apparently tuned to an AM news station. She walked toward it, dazed by a sudden rush of relief; she was alone, after all.

She stopped in front of the radio, lowering her semi-automatic. There was a body in the window seat to her left, and after an initial glance, she avoided looking at it; the man's throat had been slashed, and his eyes had rolled back into his head. His gray face and tattered clothes were shining with viscous-looking fluids, making him look like a zombie from a bad horror movie.

She bent and picked the radio up, smirking at herself in spite of the fear that still coursed through her. Her “crazed killef’ was a woman delivering a news report. The reception was bad, the tiny unit hissing static at every other sentence.

Okay, so she was an idiot. In any case, it was time to call Enrico, and Rebecca turned, thinking she'd get better reception if she stepped back outside, and the movement that came from the window seat was so slow and subtle that for a moment, she thought it was just the rain she was seeing. Then the movement groaned, a deep, low sound of misery, and she understood that it wasn't the rain at all.

The corpse had risen from his seat, and was moving toward her. His misshapen head lolled back and to the side, cruelly exposing the mauled flesh of his throat, and the moaning grew deeper, more yearning, as he stretched his arms in front of him, his ruined face dripping blood and slime.

She dropped the radio and took one stumbling step back, horrified. She'd been wrong, he wasn't dead, but he was obviously out of his mind with pain. She had to help him. Not much in the medkit, there's morphine, though, gotta get him to lay down, oh, God, what happened here—