Hernandez held his breath. He could hear booted footfalls trace a steady, heavy jog out of sight. Hear a plastic material shuck loosely against its human occupant, both sounds growing distant. Hernandez strained to see what was producing the noise, not smelling the dead flesh of the infected.
A second group entered his limited frame of sight, holding their ground just below his position.
Men, he assumed, in full hazmat environmental suits. No need for EVA capabilities, their ship had clearly docked and coupled at the ring in an orthodox fashion. Regardless, Hernandez could make out the cumbersome outline of breathing apparatus beneath the yellow tarp like covering of the suit. They’d come prepared, no Soviet insignia, no insignia of any type. These were Dr. Smith’s cleanup team and they were carrying low calibre semi-automatic pistols.
“Squadron leader, backup. Finally got word from Vanguard. Abandon main corridors. Central Command main deck compromised.” The voice was male, or at least synthesized male. The words were processed through a small microphone at the front of the suit in a squeaky, static laced American brogue.
They waited back-to-back until the point team returned, ready. They’d received the briefing the crew of the Riyadh never did.
“No sign of hostiles in Central Command yet,” one of the point men reported, this voice similar but different.
“Vanguard reports large numbers of walkers in the engine compartment, pinning down the bystanders. Says we should proceed via personnel corridors that lead directly into the command centre.”
“Copy that.”
The knot of yellow suited soldiers disentangled with an economy of movement that belied military training. They set off in the return direction. At least Hernandez now had a datum point for Central Command and the outer service corridors. He also knew he was out of time. The Doctors people were aboard, soon they would reach Central Command and Tala.
Hernandez felt the weight of the Chiefs rifle, tied to his long johns with elastic he’d pulled from the cuffs and ankles. He would be heavily outgunned, but at least he would have the bigger gun. A fatalistic smirk crossed his lips as he carefully removed the vent cover. The ducts had been a bust, he wouldn’t make it back in time. He just hoped Pettersson and Nielsen would distract the throng of infected long enough for him to cross Central Command and head off the hazmat squad.
Then what? He’d have to get the cell key and the code for the antechamber. After walking into the lions maw. Well too bad, there wasn’t an option now. Hernandez wished he was loaded up, somehow he thought certain death would feel more finite and less intimidating under the influence.
He pulled the vent cover into the shaft and eased himself out over the corridor, sliding to his full arms extent before dropping the last couple of meters to the deck. Hernandez wheeled around to ensure the passageway was empty. In the distance he heard a door close with a creek. The hazmat squad had entered the personnel corridor. The only way left was forward.
The “Welcome to Murmansk-13” sign was two hundred meters maybe less ahead. The corridor was otherwise empty. Devoid, yet Hernandez couldn’t shake the feeling he was being watched and not just by the security camera above the doorway. Hernandez sighted the camera, then thought better. If someone was watching the video relay they’d see him coming anyway. If somebody wasn’t and he squeezed off a round on their doorstep everyone and everything would know he was coming for sure.
Hernandez cradled the rifle against his chest and entered a sustainable jog. He could feel his heart flutter in his chest as his bare feet padded over the cool epoxy coated decking, pleased with the stealth his state of undress afforded. His breaths came quick and shallow as much with excitement as exhaustion. Hernandez felt free as he ran toward the shadow of the valley of death, he only hoped he wouldn’t be late.
As he flatfooted across the threshold of the atrium, Hernandez sensed movement on his left. Figures obscured from sight until the very last second. He barely had time to turn as a blunt instrument swung round from the right. He felt the rifle skitter away from his grip as the pipe smashed into the bridge of his nose, the cartilage collapsing under the force of the blow.
Hernandez felt his arms reaching out behind him as his body atavistically switched to survival mode. He slammed backward onto the deck, his momentum carrying him a little way into the Command Centre foyer. For a second his eyes fluttered closed, the soft lights above him an orange faded to darkening red, black spots threatened to close out his vision altogether from the peripheries.
“Oh shit, did I kill him?” A light voiced male with a Russian accent asked.
“Better not, or you’re next. Get the rifle.” The second man was also Eastern European, his voice preternaturally deep.
Hernandez sensed light footsteps hesitate beside his ear. He tried to turn his head but the muscles in his neck were seized with whiplash, the very fibres in spasm.
“Oh, now she is a pretty little thing…”
“Give it to me, Mikhail.”
Hernandez could feel his eyes roll about in his head. Something in his face felt fractured, his cheek or orbital bone, a knifing ache that transcended the otherwise pained numbness. Two figures peered down, silhouettes obfuscated by the foyer lighting. One of them was bald and tall with broad shoulders, the other small with long hair.
“He’s alive,” the deep voiced man said with a detached nonchalance.
“He from the ship?”
“Ain’t no spiks here before, pick him up before more of those guys in yellow show up.” The deep voice man handed Mikhail something like a rag. “Bind him.”
Hernandez felt arms trying to scoop him off the deck, jarring whatever was loose behind the flesh of his face, jarring the damaged musculature in his neck. He yowled in pain and tried to make his body heavy and awkward, tried to marshal his fleeting thoughts.
“Keep quiet or I’ll fucking kill you, understand?” Something like a prison shank was waved in Hernandez’s face by the bald man. It was a cannibalized screwdriver, caked in dried blood. The bald man held his rifle in one hand, but preferred the tactile threat of the shank.
Hernandez couldn’t nod, didn’t want to although he had little doubt the man would kill him. His legs were dead, flaccid things beneath him. He felt his arms being pulled, tight behind his back. “No, no I need to be somewhere,” he slurred. Every movement of his face was like trying to shift marble slabs.
“So do we,” replied the ogre voiced man. “And you’re going to take us there.”
“No, my crew,” Hernandez vision quaked, little aftershocks of the impact. A shimmering veil of tears traced the ruined mess that had been his nose. The tears comingled with blood, pulsing from his nostrils, that made it difficult to breath, made everything smell and taste like iron. The suicidal excitement and freedom ebbed away leaving a void of sorrow and failure.
The mural of Lenin looked down upon Hernandez blearily. His lifeless, black eyes expressed a grim, hard pity as Hernandez was escorted from Central Command.
Chapter 21
“Jamal,” Oleg spoke his name like a question, eyelids flickering over blackened sclera. His voice was a thin rasp, “I’m sorry.”