The Last 3 Days (16): When Goals Collide

Previous chapter - The Last 3 Days (15): The Great Powers Bail

All published chapters can be found here.

34:45:57

An emotionless slap from the Consort jerked Nick awake. Raising his arm to deflect another, he found his hands bound with rope — as were his ankles.

At least he wasn’t upside down again, he thought. Instead, he lay supine across piled sacks of grain stacked to the low ceiling in a room lit by a weak bulb over the door.

The Consort was not alone. He turned to a young man behind him.

“Bring some water.”

The young man left, closing the door behind him. His footsteps receded into the greater silence.

Leaning forward, the Consort opened his hand. Nick flinched, then tried to squirm away when he saw the older man held a box-cutter. The Consort slid the tool between some nearby sacks.

“This place is not for you,” he told Nick, “and to let you stay invites a chaos far beyond the value of your genes. You are everything we have worked to scourge from our community. Hold out your palm.”

The Consort took Nick’s palm in his own, then turned his head towards the door, listening briefly before pulling a second item from his pocket. A marker.

“Quickly,” the older man ordered. “Watch.”

He sketched a crude series of lines marked with arrowheads, to which he added several ‘X’s.

“I give you a chance to escape. When the corridor lights dim, cut your bonds and wait for a time. Follow this path to the stairs. Be careful when you pass the points I have marked — here you could be discovered.”

Approaching footsteps interrupted the tense but quiet exchange.

Sliding the marker into his pocket, the Consort said, “If you are caught, I will see you dead before I am implicated.”

34:38:19

Don emerged from a crowd of revellers into an open space at the edge of Veteran’s Park, a physical gulf between those he left and those seated quietly on the grass listening to the Pastor, now dressed in a white robe.

He turned around and retraced his path.

34:32:08

Eileen sat on the edge of Jay’s bed, holding his hand in hers and staring into the shadows, when his hand twitched.

His eyes were mere slits, but they were open.

“Mom. I — “

She covered his mouth with a hand.

“Shhh. Your father’s death wasn’t your fault. You weren’t drunk and behind the wheel of a truck. All we can do is help each other move on. And you’re home, now. Just rest. We can talk tomorrow.”

She kissed his forehead then stood to leave.

“I love you, Jay.”

“Love you, too, Mom.”

30:45:17

SQUEAK.

The sound seemed unnaturally loud in the claustrophobic silence of the bunker.

Nick froze in the doorway and listened as he counted down from a hundred, just to be sure. Then he crouched and slipped off his sneakers, tying the laces together and slinging them over a shoulder to keep his hands free.

A glance at his palm and he moved off, padding softly in his stockinged feet, darting from shadow to shadow. The bunker remained quiet as a tomb, so he increased his pace.

He came to a corner and slowed, but did not stop to check his path was clear. Nor was it. A young woman in a pale grey dress counted boxes. Likely not yet sixteen, though it was hard for Nick to judge since her hair was hidden by a scarf that also shadowed her face. Nick tensed and eased behind the corner.

The girl hesitated, then added a number to others on a clipboard and walked away. In the direction Nick needed to go.

He followed her from a distance, keeping out of sight whenever she stopped to continue her count and mark the page.

Eventually she turned into a room and, after another silent count, he crept past.

“Nicholas.”

Caught. He had almost made it. He turned to see the girl, her clipboard — and her scarf — gone, her clasped hands contradicting a wide smile and the daring glint in her eyes.

“I am Ruth,” she told him. Her movements as she approached him were at once graceful and sinuous. “I am one of those promised to you. Why do you break curfew?”

Promised?

Then she noticed his shoe dangling from his shoulder, and her tone stiffened with her posture.

“And you carry your shoes. Do you think to leave? You cannot.” Disappointment filled her next words. “You were promised — “

Nick bolted.

Behind him a bell rang, harsh and urgent, echoing through the concrete halls. Beneath it was a growing percussion of rapid boots.

He reached the stairs and climbed quick as he could, regretting the rough grating against his feet. The bell receded, only to be replaced with shouted orders.

Stopping to catch his breath, he heard the elevator door rattle close and then the hum of the winch.

Grabbing the railing, he added his arms to help his climb.

Still, the elevator gained, so when his sneakers slipped down his arm, he had no thought to stop for them.

It was almost even as he threw himself up the final flight, tripping on the last step to sprawl on the floor as the elevator rose into view.

Angry faces scowled through the metal scissor doors.

Nick pulled the box-cutter from his pocket and dropped it into the channel of the outer door as the inner door clattered open.

The outer door stuck, but the footsteps on the stairs echoed like thunder all around him.

Pushing through the outer steel doors, he closed them and for a brief moment imagined holding them against the horde behind him. Then he saw the rubber stops used to keep them open. He pressed them into place and stepped away to catch his breath.

Or tried to. Something crashed from the other side, but the doors held. For now.

Nick ran blindly into the night.

27:23:58

Most of Veteran Park’s spontaneous squatters still slumbered, though some stirred in the growing light.

The Pastor and a few others knelt in prayer before an enormous cross crafted from repurposed traffic signs.

26:02:32

Don found the precinct lobby quiet, yet filled with people, the front counter shuttered. He stepped among the sleeping bodies as if they were mines until he reached the squad room door and swiped his card.

Nothing.

He tried again. Still nothing.

He pounded on the door in frustration. Nothing.

Well, almost nothing. The noise roused those in the lobby, including the battered group of homeless evicted by Ryan from Februzzio’s.

The victim of Ryan’s tequila bottle walked up behind Don, one side of his head tracked with dried blood.

“You must be the last cop in the city,” the man said. “I want to report an assault.”

Don spun around, right hand covering his weapon, but quickly dismissed any threat and relaxed.

Other homeless gathered behind Ryan’s victim.

The squad door opened. Peter Thurro, wearing an apron, brandished a cup of coffee. A lit cigarette dangled from his lips.

Don stepped past Thurro, plucking the cigarette away and dropping it in the coffee.

“Don’t smoke in here. Is the Sarge around?”

The Sergeant walked out of his office, shaking a box of matches. He was also smoking.

“Easy, Don. What does it matter now? Any news of Nick?”

Don just shook his head. And saw this side of the front counter was laden with food.

Thurro leaned into the lobby. “Anyone who’s hungry line up at the counter.”

“Then why are you here?” The Sergeant asked.

“To check the morgue and hospital lists.”

Thurro raised the front counter’s shutter.

25:40:21

In the rear of Februzzio’s van, Ryan and Bobby shared a makeshift mattress of random furniture cushions looted from a store.

Bobby rolled over, so he faced Ryan.

Moments later, Ryan’s nose wrinkled, then his eyes opened and he pushed away from his friend. When he sat up he discovered the partial bottle of tequila that he’d kept in a tight embrace through the night.

Ryan pushed open the rear doors of Februzzio’s van and stepped out, shielding his eyes in the bright morning light to look around.

Through the broken windows of the discount furniture store from which Bobby had collected the impromptu bedding, Ryan could see people sleeping off last night’s epic party.

He took in the vandalized detritus of the previous night’s farewell party to end all farewell parties and gave an impressed nod of his head. Burned cars and appliances first looted then abandoned punctuated a sea of goods and garbage litter in every direction.

Ryan thought it looked like a paused war zone, quiet now while both sides ate lunch. Then he recalled his purpose and the reason he woke where he did.

Thurro Cleaning Co.’s offices were in the building opposite.

He hammered on the van’s side panel. “Bobby. Wake up!”

Also published here.