فصل 36

CHAPTER 36

Mark woke up shivering in complete darkness.

His body was stiff; he shifted on the cot and it creaked as he tried to get comfortable, find a position in which his muscles didn’t ache. He heard Alec and Anton both snoring loudly. Alec obviously hadn’t lasted long at first watch.

Mark finally settled on his back. Sleep had officially washed away, and there was nothing to do but wait until his friend woke up. He’d let the man get as much rest as possible—they were probably going to need it.

The dream had seemed so vivid, so lifelike. His heart was still beating from the rush of the experience, like he’d just relived it for real. He could taste the foul water, feel the burns on his skin. He remembered the exhausting climb up the endless flight of stairs afterward, the winding, the dizzying back-and-forth. Sapped of strength and hurting from the water burn, he didn’t know how he’d kept up with the others. But up and up they’d gone as the water rose below them. He’d never forget the feeling of looking over the railing, down at the roiling, dirty liquid as it slowly ascended, thinking that his life had almost ended in its depths.

Alec had saved them that day. They’d spent the next two weeks in that skyscraper, realizing quickly that they couldn’t search for loved ones yet. The heat and radiation and rising waters were too much. That was when Mark’s hopes of ever finding his family had truly begun to fade.

The Lincoln Building. A place that held plenty of its own nightmares. They’d stayed as close to the center of the building as possible, in the structure’s middle corridors, to protect themselves from the sun’s ruthless radiation. Even so, they’d all been a little sick those first few months.

He heard a groan from the direction of Alec’s cot, and the thoughts floated away, pushed to the back of his mind to torment him later. But that feeling of terror he’d experienced in those last moments in the subtrans tunnel wouldn’t leave, lingering like the smoke from an extinguished fire.

“Oh … crap,” Alec said.

Mark popped up onto his elbow, looking in the direction of his friend. “What?”

“I didn’t mean to fall asleep. Fine soldier I am. And I left the damn workpad on. We can forget using that thing again.” “Meh, the battery was probably almost dead anyway,” Mark said. Though in truth, he’d have given anything for five more minutes of the device’s glow right then.

Alec groaned and Mark heard the sounds of the cot creaking as the older man got to his feet.

“We need to go find this guy’s coworkers. He said they were meeting farther down in the bunker. So we need to find our way to some stairs,” the man said.

“What do we do about him?” Mark pointed to Anton, forgetting for a second that Alec couldn’t see him in the darkness.

“Let him sleep out his sorrows. Come on.”

Mark took a moment to get his bearings, then got up and felt his way to the end of the cot toward the middle aisle of the room.

“How long do you think we slept?” he asked.

“No idea,” Alec answered. “Maybe two hours?”

They spent the next few minutes slowly making their way through the room and out into the hallway. The light above the door still sputtered a bit, but barely enough to see by. They eventually found the stairwell Alec had been hoping for. Even the dim sight of it, mostly lines and edges of shadow descending into blackness, brought back to Mark the memory of the flood and their mad clamber up the stairs of the skyscraper. It’d been so close that day. If he’d known all that would come after, would he still have fought so hard to survive?

Yes, he told himself. Yes, he would’ve. And he was going to find Trina and get out of hot water again. He almost laughed at his own joke.

“Let’s get on with it,” Alec whispered as he started down the steps.

Mark followed him, determined to stop dwelling on the past. He had to focus on the future or he’d never reach it.

The flight of stairs only descended three levels, though there was no exit until they reached the final one. They pushed through the door and found themselves in another hallway. They’d finally come upon the section of the bunker that used the raving generators above: a line of lights along the ceiling illuminated the passage. Unlike the hallway they’d come from, this one curved.

Mark shot a glance at Alec and they started down the hall. There were doors lining the walls, but Alec suggested that they explore the length of the corridor before they tried each one. They slipped along, as quietly as possible, and it wasn’t long before it became clear that the hallway was a giant crescent.

They’d traversed about half of what they could see of its length when Mark heard voices, then saw their source. Up ahead, on the left, there was a set of double doors, one propped all the way open. The sounds were coming from whatever was happening in that room. A gathering of some sort, men and women talking over each other so that Mark couldn’t make out a single word being said. Anton’s meeting, his coworkers.

Alec slowed as he approached the room, and carefully stepped forward until he was right next to it, his back pressed against the closed door. He turned to look at Mark, shrugged as if to say it’s now or never, then craned his neck toward the opening and leaned in for a peek. Mark held his breath, remembering all too well that they had no weapons.

Alec pulled his head back and sidled a couple feet toward Mark. “It’s an auditorium. It’s pretty big, seats about two hundred, maybe. They’re all down at the bottom watching some guy on the stage.” “How many are there?” Mark whispered.

“At least forty. Maybe fifty. No sign of our friends, as far as I can tell. They all seem to be arguing about something, but I can’t tell what they’re saying.” “So what do we do?” Mark asked. “Keep going? This hall can’t go on much longer.”

“If we get down on our hands and knees we can crawl in there and down the back. We can hide in a corner over on the right. I think we need to hear what these people are saying.” Mark agreed. They didn’t know who these people were or what they were up to, but it seemed like the only way to find out. The safest way, at least. “Okay, let’s do it.” They crouched on all fours and got ready, Mark right behind Alec. The soldier leaned forward to take a look around the edge of the door; then he started crawling into the large room. Mark followed, feeling almost naked as they entered the open air of the auditorium. But no one was close to the back—the voices were all coming from below and sounded far enough away. And judging from the fact that they all seemed to be talking at once, Mark had a feeling they weren’t on the alert for intruders.

Alec crawled along the last row, his side pressed against the black plastic of the chairs, until he got all the way to the far right side of the room, where the corner was shadowed in darkness. He stopped and situated himself, his legs crossed, his body wedged into the space between the last chair and the wall. Mark moved to sit next to him. He had to tuck himself in closer than was comfortable in order to stay as hidden as possible.

Alec stretched up and peeked over the chair in front of them, then sank down again quickly.

“Can’t see much. Seems like they’re waiting for something to begin. Or maybe they’re taking a break. I don’t know.” Mark closed his eyes and leaned his head against the wall. They sat there for what seemed like forever. At least ten excruciating minutes passed with nothing changing. Just the buzz of mixed conversation. Then, suddenly, a blur of movement made him catch his breath. A man had walked into the auditorium from the hallway, a quick flash of motion as he entered and began walking down the aisle toward the front. Mark breathed a sigh of relief that he hadn’t been seen.

The crowd grew quiet and still, the room dropping into an almost eerie silence. Mark could actually hear the man’s footsteps as he reached the bottom of the room and climbed a set of stairs onto the stage.

“I’ll take over from here, Stanley,” a deep voice said, echoing off the ceiling even though he’d said it softly. Acoustics.

“Thanks, Bruce,” came the reply from Stanley, a man with a much higher voice. “Everyone give him your full attention.” There was the sound of someone descending the stairs and then the rattle of him sitting in one of the chairs. When silence fell once again, the newcomer began to speak.

“Let’s get this started, people. It won’t be long before we all lose our minds.”