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They would catch up, and sooner or later you’d have to deal with the implacability of them. There was no way to ever outrun their utter reality.
The realization terrified me on a level I’d never felt before. When Echo Team had faced other infected monsters similar to these, it had been in contained settings. A warehouse and a meat packing plant in Baltimore, inside the Liberty Bell Center in Philly. Not out in the open. Not with it spread so far already.
I think that’s when I realized that the world had changed. It was no longer creaking on broken hinges. It had fallen off. Unless there was some radical way the president had to reverse this, I knew that I was looking at the future.
I was staring through a ragged hole in the now to an actual apocalypse.
To Armageddon.
I wanted to cry. I wanted to hide.
I wanted to die.
I did not do any of that. Instead I turned and shoved Murphy toward the hotel door. “Let’s go,” I roared. Top, Bunny, and Torres walked backward behind me, firing at the oncoming tide of death.
— 10 —
We helped the people reinforce the doorway as best we could, and we shared a few of the weapons we’d brought with us. Murphy led us through the hotel to the elevators. There were a lot of scared people in there, but so far none of them were infected.
However, I took Torres aside and asked her about the people at the barricade who had visible bites.
“You understand that they’re going to get sick, right?” I said quietly.
She nodded, eyes big and filled with pain.
“Have you seen how fast this plays out?” I asked. “From bite to, um, transition?”
“Depends on how bad it is,” said Torres, and Murphy, who overheard, nodded.
“From what I’ve seen, sir,” said Murphy, “there seems to be some connection to consciousness. If they pass out then something happens and it accelerates, but someone with the same injury who stays awake seems to be able to fight it.”
“Fight it or last longer?” asked Top.
Murphy shook his head. “I . . . don’t know. This is all just happening now.”
“Okay,” I said, “but if anyone gets some reliable intel on this thing then we have to get it out to everyone. Bunny, call your theory in to Pruitt. Top, watch our backs.”
All of the hotel’s power was still on and the fires were in the other tower. Murphy said we could trust the elevators, so we crammed inside. When the doors opened on seventeen, Torres nearly blew the head off a terrified room waiter. The poor little guy staggered backward, let out a cry like a kicked seagull, whirled and fled.
After the door closed Top nudged me and touched his hand. I nodded. I’d seen the bloody bandage, too. Poor bastard.
We stopped at four other goddamn floors. Twice people tried to get on. They were scared, crazed, but we could not let them in. One of them held a baby in her arms. It was slack and smeared with red, and when the door closed Top leaned his forehead against the wall, eyes closed, and cursed God. Bunny stood with his hand on Top’s shoulder but didn’t say anything. Really, what the hell can you say to that?
The last time the doors opened on the wrong floor we saw a scene out of some kind of nightmare. Two completely nude women knelt on the floor eating the face off a third. I don’t know what the story was. They all looked like they’d been beautiful. They were all too young for what happened to them.
We shot them before the doors closed. Call it a mercy. That’s what we told ourselves. Didn’t really help all that much.
Then the doors opened on the top floor and suddenly there were guns everywhere. Pointing out from the inside of the car; pointing at us from the hall. A mix of Secret Service agents and cops. All of them disheveled, splashed with blood that was more black than red, with eyes that were too wide and showed too much white around the irises.
“Okay, let’s all calm the fuck down,” I said. When nobody moved, I showed good faith by raising my pistol barrel to the ceiling, and told my guys to stand down. The door started to close and I put my foot against it. “We’re U.S. Special Forces. Who’s in charge here?”
A tall Asian woman pushed past the others, snapping at her people to lower their weapons, which they did grudgingly and with hands that visibly shook. She wore a black suit over a torn white blouse spattered with blood. She looked to be about forty but there were deep lines around her mouth that aged her. I suspected they’d been carved there over the last day or two.
Guns were lowered but nobody holstered anything. I stepped out of the elevator and faced the woman.
“Mary Chang,” she said, “assistant special agent in charge.”
“Where the AIC?” I asked.
