HL 04-The Final Hour (29 page)

Above me now, I could hear the voices of the New Year’s revelers. I could hear horns and noisemakers and people shouting, singing, and laughing. I could hear the live band as if it was right down the street. The glare of the jumbo TV and the blinking neon shone in my eyes. I caught a glimpse of a gigantic smiling face—some movie star on a billboard or something—grinning down at me through the grate.

Then Prince tore his arm free of my grasp and hammered blindly at my face with his fist. One blow struck me high on the head. It dazed me. But I wouldn’t let go; I wouldn’t back off. I grabbed his backpack and pulled myself up behind him. My feet lost their purchase on the ladder and dangled free. I clung to Prince’s pack with one hand, and to the outside of the ladder with the other. Prince tried to throw me off, twisting, hitting out with one hand.

Turning, he saw my hand on the ladder. He grabbed at it, started to pry my fingers loose. I could feel myself losing my grip. So I let go of the ladder and grabbed him.

Now I was holding on to Prince’s backpack with both hands, my feet dangling in the air. If I let go, if I lost my hold, I’d drop like a stone and he’d be free to release his poison into the city above me.

Using all that was left of my strength, I pulled myself up, climbing over him. I released his pack with one hand and grabbed him by the collar. I struggled to get a foothold on the ladder but couldn’t find a place, couldn’t get around his body. Prince meanwhile fought ferociously, trying to pry me off him with one hand, while clinging to the ladder with the other.

I continued to climb up Prince’s body until I could wrap my arm around his throat. I pulled the arm tight, choking him as he tried to pull away and thrashed his free hand around at me, trying to gouge my eyes.

An idea came to me now—so clear in the midst of that frantic fight, it was almost like a voice speaking quietly into my mind. Prince had one hand on the ladder as he tried to knock me off with the other. There’s a nerve in the back of the hand—I learned this in karate—Mike taught it to me. If you drill that nerve with a knuckle, just right, it causes a lot of pain, enough pain to break any hold. If I drilled the back of Prince’s hand with my knuckle, he would let go of the ladder and with my arm around his throat, I could pull him off. We would both go down, both fall to the platform below. We would both almost surely be killed, but the threat would be over, the city would be safe.

Here’s a funny thing. You’d think I’d be afraid. Of falling, I mean. Of dying most likely, down there in that abandoned station. But the reverse was true, weirdly enough. I’d been afraid all this time up till now, but now I wasn’t. Until this moment—until the moment I realized that I could end this—I’d been really terrified that I might fail, that I might do the wrong thing and get lost or killed or something and let Prince succeed with his plan and let Mike down. But now—now that fear was gone. I had him. I knew I had him. I knew it was over. There was nothing left but to deliver this final strike the way Mike taught me and bring Prince down with me to the ground.

Everybody dies, chucklehead. It’s the first rule of the
game
.

I wasn’t afraid.

One arm around Prince’s throat, I lifted my free hand, setting the knuckle for a piercing blow.

I did my best to live true, and whatever happens next,
I’m gonna be fine
.

I hesitated only half a second. The questions flashed through my mind:
What about me? Have I done my best? Have I tried to live true?
The questions came and images came—images of the people I knew. My parents. My friends. Beth—Beth, most of all. Would they be angry at me for leaving them? Would they understand? Would they know why I had done what I’d done?

All that in half a second. Then I drove the strike into the back of Prince’s hand.

He cried out and lost his hold on the ladder. I dragged him backward and we fell.

Prince let out a shriek. We tumbled over once in the shadowy air. I saw the lights of Times Square through the grate above me falling away. I heard the music of the world fading.

I was so committed to the fall, so ready to do what I had to do, that I almost didn’t think to snatch at the ladder as it went past.

But then I did. I reached out wildly. My fingers touched metal and I grabbed hold. I had a rung of the ladder. I dropped and held there, and the jolt nearly pulled my arm out of its socket. I lost my hold on Prince, but he clutched at my sleeve and caught it. I grabbed his wrist. The two of us dangled there far above the platform, me holding on to a ladder rung, Prince holding on to me. I tried to get my feet back on the ladder, but Prince’s weight was pulling me straight down, pulling my fingers off the rung so that I could not move.

I looked down at him, straining to keep my grip on the ladder, straining to keep my grip on him. He looked up at me, his eyes desperate, pleading.

“Drop the pack!” I shouted down at him.

He shouted a curse back at me, his eyes hot with rage and hatred.

His weight kept pulling me, pulling me. My fingers kept slipping off the ladder rung, little by little.

“Drop it, Prince, and I’ll try to pull you up!”

His answer was the same.

I was losing my grip. I couldn’t hold on to him any longer. I shook my head at him.

“No!” Prince shouted—a cry of pure terror.

But another second and I would fall. I let go of him, yanked my arm away. I grabbed hold of the ladder with both hands and clung on.

I saw Prince fall, turning in the air. He had time to scream out once more—then his body hit the platform far below.

It made an awful sound.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
The End

I climbed down the ladder as quickly as I could. I went to Prince and stood over him. He was still alive, but his body was twisted in a strange position and I knew he would not last long. He lay completely still, staring up at me. Only his lips were moving. He was trying to speak. I knelt down next to him. Put my ear close to his lips and listened.

“We will . . . destroy you . . . ,” he whispered.

Startled, I turned to look in his eyes. They still burned hot with rage and hatred. If he could’ve moved, I think he would’ve spent his last breath trying to strangle me.

It was a terrible way to die, I thought. Feeling like that, being like that. That much anger: It must be like having acid in your heart.
God save me from it
, I thought.
God
save me from ever hating anything or anyone that much
.

I put my hand on Prince’s shoulder. To be honest, I almost felt sorry for the guy. I did feel sorry for him. Only God knew what had made his life what it was, what had filled him with that kind of passion for destruction. Only God knew and only God could judge. I had stopped him from killing the people above me. That was the job that had fallen to me. Not to hate him, just to stop him. The job was done now. It was enough.

He died a few seconds later. I watched him go. I heard his last breath rattle in his throat. I watched the life leave his eyes. Anyone who’s ever seen that happen will tell you: You can almost see the soul depart. It made me wonder: Did the world look different to him now that he was gone? Was the hatred gone too? I bet if we could see the world from the perspective of the dead, it would look a whole lot different. I bet no one would ever hurt anyone then.

I knelt there and worked the backpack off Prince’s corpse. I opened the flap and looked inside. I could see the solid black object in there, the thing they called “the device.” I closed the pack and looped its strap over my shoulder.

I had to go. I had to get back to Mike. If he was still alive—and he had to be still alive, he had to be—I would get him help, get him to a hospital, even if I had to carry him the whole way.

Toting Prince’s backpack, I lowered myself off the platform, down to the train tracks. I began jogging back the way I came, back toward Mike. I knew I had to hurry, but I was so exhausted, I stumbled every other step. My mouth was hanging open. My vision was blurred.

I stepped out of the tunnel into the arcade—and a light shone in my eyes. A train, I thought. Heading for me.

But it wasn’t a train. Because then another light shone at me out of the darkness and another.

What now?
I thought wearily. If there were any Home-landers left, I was finished. I couldn’t fight anymore.

A voice shouted at me: “Drop the pack, West! Put it down and put your hands up!”

I stopped. Stood there, confused, squinting into the glare of the bobbing lights coming toward me.

“Who’s there?” I asked—I barely had the strength to speak. “Who are you?”

“Police,” said one voice.

“FBI,” said another.

“Put the pack down, West!” yet another voice called. “Put your hands up!”

Blinking with exhaustion, I slipped the pack off my shoulder and dropped it onto the tracks. I lifted my hands in the air so they could see them. I stood there, swaying unsteadily on my feet.

A moment later, seven men came out of the darkness, all of them carrying flashlights, all of them carrying guns. Four of the men were in uniform—New York Police Department—NYPD. Three other guys were in suits and ties. One of the NYPD patrolmen came forward, took my raised hands and brought them around behind my back. I felt the cold metal of the handcuffs as they snapped around my wrists.

“Mike,” I said. “My friend—Mike. He was shot. He’s hurt.”

One of the plainclothes guys, a tall, broad-shouldered balding man, nodded at me. “Yeah, we found him. Looks like he took a few people with him.”

“He’s dead?”

“Not yet he’s not. He was breathing when we got to him, anyway. He’s being carried out to an EMS unit.”

“Alive,” I murmured dully. The word was like a small flame of hope flaring inside me.

The balding man nodded. “So far, yeah. He’s still alive.”

Another of the plainclothesmen, a small, narrow, red-haired guy, said, “Here it is.” He was kneeling on the tracks, looking in the backpack. “Looks like what they said. We better get the bomb squad down here.”

Then, “We got a dead one!” someone shouted from behind me in the tunnel.

“That’s Prince,” I told the balding guy. “He was one of the Homelanders. He was trying . . .”

“We know who he was. We know what he was trying to do,” Balding Guy said. He stepped forward to where I stood with my hands cuffed behind me. He put his hand on my shoulder. “Your friend Rose told us.”

Dazed, I could only look at him. Then I said, “You mean, you believe him? You finally believe him?”

Balding Guy gave a hollow laugh. “I guess we do now, don’t we?”

For a second, I couldn’t take this in. I couldn’t comprehend what it meant. Then I did. It meant that it was over. Finally over. People knew the truth now. They understood what had happened, what I’d done, why I’d done it. I wasn’t alone anymore.

My vision blurred as my eyes filled with tears. Not alone. Never alone.

The plainclothesman with the red hair glanced at the balding plainclothesman.

“Looks like this kid just saved the entire city of New York,” Red Hair said.

Balding Guy smiled wryly and nodded. Lifted his chin to the patrolman beside me. “Take those cuffs off him, will you?”

“But aren’t we supposed—” a patrolman began.

“Just take them off,” said Balding Guy.

I felt my hands come free as the cuffs were removed. I rubbed my wrists to take the tingling out of them.

My voice was unsteady. “Does this mean . . . ?” I swallowed hard. “Does this mean I won’t have to go back to prison?”

Balding Guy let out another thick laugh. He glanced at Red Hair. Red Hair shook his head, smiling.

“I don’t write the laws, kid,” Balding Guy said. “And I can’t make any promises. But as far as I’m concerned, you deserve a medal and a parade.” He slapped me on the shoulder again.

“Happy New Year,” he said.

Epilogue

I was lying in my bed with the covers pulled up around my
chin. The mattress was soft and I was warm and comfortable.
It was just about time for breakfast. I could smell the
eggs cooking in the kitchen below. Any minute now, I knew
my mom was going to call me from the bottom of the stairs.