Dirge Danorum
Chapter 17
As we'd learned back on the outskirts, detonating explosives indoors is not optimal. We were all stunned by the explosion, but that didn't stop us from fleeing. The fish people came up after us, now that it was clear the frontrunners wouldn't have to eat a full magazine from that piece of junk masquerading as a rifle.
As the metal and splinters of the gun fell, I was scrambling up after my friends, and they were right behind me. After some desperate grabbing and a few kicks, I reached the break created by Grigor's TNT and hauled myself through. The opening was tight and jagged, but I made it.
Pale, slimy claws reached through after me. A sharp kick snapped one amphibian arm, and they backed down. The females could probably fit through, but they weren't that stupid. We didn't need to worry about the fish people anymore; now we had other things to worry about. I shoved Velvet, but I wasn't fast enough. A piece of the burst struck her in the back. Of course, none of us even heard the shots. None of us could hear anything but the ringing in our ears.
I whipped around a flung a knife. Venge was struggling with a door. Ever was shielding Grigor with his body, shouting something in Russian – that's Ever, always got his eye on the prize, always looking to defuse everything. There was no defusing this; Velvet was falling, and in the flickering light, there was much more to see, and no doubt to hear, not that any of us could hear.
You can't go around the Zone blasting through walls forever; sooner or later you're going to find something on the other side.
The charge had damaged the electrical systems of this new place, and the flickering lights weren't easy on the eyes. We were in a world of imperfect silence, flying bullets and papers, and the ringing in our ears.
Venge had the door open. I dragged Velvet up, heedless of the protests I couldn't even hear, and pushed her toward Ever. Blood was staining my black fatigues, but I didn't know where I was bleeding from. Velvet was still wearing my armor, and it had saved her life, though there'd be some nice black bruises along with her new tattoo to mar her perfect skin.
A screen exploded. Glass shattered. I ducked under the arm of a man in a white coat, snatched the pistol from his hand, and knocked him over. I could barely see; I couldn't hear at all. There was no time to kill, only to buy and sell.
Drawn to the chaos, a pale white female amphibian was wriggling through the hole. I released the pistol with my left hand, caught it with my right, and shot her twice as I spun away to roll out of the path of several more bullets from someone I couldn't see, and probably couldn't see me either. I didn't know what kind of party we'd crashed, but the people on the guest list had handguns at the very least.
The emergency lights were light flash bulbs or lightning, showing me my surroundings one frame at a time. I rose, revolving, looking for another target – but the others had already fled the room. I did the same, closing the metal door behind me in time to feel something thud against it on the other side. A fish woman, no doubt.
The corridor was narrow and cramped. Venge was in an intersection not far away, motioning frantically at me. There was a body on the floor, but I barely looked. Fresh blood decorated the gray concrete walls. There was rusted metal above and underfoot.
As I ran after him, time slowed down, and music began to fill the void that the blast had left in my hearing. We rushed through the corridors, stumbling over bodies, and it didn't seem at all strange to me that a song from the outside world would come to me now. Just like it would if I were working a boring hourly job somewhere, and my mind began to wonder after hearing some lame, overplayed pop song too many times from a tinny store speaker.
Because that was what this was. Business as usual. I caught the glare of a muzzle flash and turned back, pistol outstretched, to return fire. The gun bucked in my hand four times, and the slide locked back. My right hand lit up; I had hostiles in close. I dropped the magazine and threw it, then the pistol at the other man, rushing in as they both flinched.
Venge and the others were ahead. In the flashing light, I caught a glimpse of an ID badge clipped to a shirt. Americans.
One of them raised his gun, and he was out of reach. I dropped my foot on a rusted bit of railing, breaking it off and shooting up the other end to knock the gun aside as it discharged. I sensed the bullet ricocheting around the corridor as I drove both fists into the man's chest, knocking him off the walkway. I turned to deal with the other, letting a knife fall from my sleeve into my hand. He cocked a revolver and fired straight into my chest.
I caught the glare of a muzzle flash and turned back, pistol outstretched, to return fire. The gun bucked in my hand four times, and the slide locked back. I let it go and threw myself down, flicking out a knife to hamstring one man, while I tackled the other in the same slide. I rolled over and brought down both knives like spreading wings, plunging them into both of their chests. Then I was on my feet and running again.
The others weren't sure where to go. There was no way to know. Velvet, jaw locked against what must have been considerable pain, gamely chose a direction and moved. There was more blood on the walls. I hadn't put it there.
We entered a big room which had undergone at least some degree of renovation. There was a lot of technology around, but our eyes were immediately drawn to the two great glass holding tanks. They were both standing open. There was a body in one, and a lot of blood. We never stopped running.
A man in white appeared on a walkway above, and Ever pivoted, raising a pistol, but a drinker materialized behind the man and seized him, pulling him back into the dark. A great spray of blood fell from above, sparkling droplets falling to scatter across the sterilized counters and computers, splattering onto screens and papers. Ever's pistol was swinging toward me, and I dove clear as he fired back the way we'd come. I landed heavily, seeing words I wouldn't remember on the papers scattered beneath me.
I didn't stay down. No brakes, no breaks. Velvet could barely run, but everyone knew better than to try and help her. Grigor had been at his limit down in the caverns; he didn't have much left in him. He wasn't a young man anymore, and Ever was onto us. He knew what Velvet was up to, and that was why he was protecting Grigor. Just what kind of Duty man was he?
I thought about that as we tore through another corridor, and up a flight of metal stairs. The ceiling was high here, but the corridor was still stiflingly narrow. A catwalk spanned it ahead, and a man in American military garb was running across. He skidded to a stop, putting an AR to his shoulder and shouting something at us. Good.
If they didn't want us getting out, maybe we were headed for an exit. I boosted from the left wall, then the right, catching hold of the catwalk and vaulting up to sweep the soldier's legs from under him. I kicked the carbine off and followed it, hitting and rolling to follow the others, who hadn't even broken pace.
There were more blood and bodies ahead. In a way, that was encouraging. In another way, it wasn't. Had these men fled for the exit? Whatever had killed them was ahead.
Though we only a ran a fraction of the distance we had in the tunnel, it felt like much longer because we were all deaf. We all knew exactly what had happened; that didn't make it any easier.
American soldiers appeared ahead, but they weren't attacking, they were trying to get out, too.
"Follow them!" I called to the others, scooping up a handgun, though I couldn't even hear myself. Something grabbed my ankle, and I went down hard, losing the pistol. I snatched it back up and rolled over with it outstretched in both hands. A drinker materialized on the floor. It was wounded, and one of its claws was securely on my ankle. Glowing red eyes were fixed on the gun. I had all three dots between his eyes.
"You don't want me," I said. But it did. If it didn't drink, it wouldn't regenerate. If it didn't regenerate, it would never see the surface. And it wanted to see the surface just as badly as I did. Only one of us was getting up there. Some people say the Zone has only one law. Others say it has none. Both schools of thought pointed to one course of action, so I did the opposite. I lowered the gun.
Bullets struck the creature in succession, throwing out gouts of gummy black blood, and bits of bone. Venge advanced, firing rapidly until he was standing over the drinker. He held out the gun and fired the final bullet into the monster's skull. He let the empty pistol fall and held his hand out to me.
We were both wearing gloves. He couldn't feel how cold my hand was as he pulled me to my feet.