Werewolf Suspense (Book 4): Outage 4 (The Reckoning) (9 page)

"The people from the maintenance room," Kelsey confirmed. "They were with us in the next wing, and they ran for the elevator."

"That must've distracted the thing. It tore off after them instead of coming in to get us. That's the only reason we're alive." Abraham's eyes were still filled with terror. "We managed to evade another one. It crashed through the window." He gestured toward the broken windowpane.

Tom relayed the details of his trip to the ground floor, including his battle with the beast in the cafeteria. He described how he'd found Silas, how they'd taken the elevator, and how he'd reunited with Kelsey and Tabatha. He left out the dead woman in the laundry bin, which seemed like it would only upset the children.

"What happened to Sigrid?" Abraham asked.

Kelsey shook her head. "She didn't make it."
 

"I take it you didn't get ahold of the police?" Tom asked Kelsey.

He could already see the answer on her face as she dug the cell phone from her pocket. She swiped the screen uselessly.

Tom sighed. As grateful as he was to have found his companions alive, circumstances were grave. The creatures had infested the building. He might've disposed of a few, but there was no telling how many others lurked on this floor, or in the building.

Morning was a distant hope, too far away to bank on.

Kelsey and Tabatha walked over to the window, accompanied by Sally and the children. Abraham remained by Tom's side.

"Is the eastern exit broken down?" Abraham asked.

"Yes. I assume the western exit is, too. Blocking the doors won't do much."

"At least we have the axe," Abraham said, trying to sound hopeful.

Tom looked at the weapon he was holding, stained with the creatures' blood. "This won't do much good against a horde of them. If more show up, we'll be killed."

Noticing Abraham looking at his leg, Tom inspected his bandage. Blood leaked around the frayed edges. "I guess I'll need a new bandage," he said grimly.

Abraham nodded, watching Tom strangely.
 

"What's wrong, Abraham?"

Abraham cleared his throat. While the others were engaged in quiet, nervous conversation, he asked Tom, "Earlier, Sally and I were talking about your wound. Are you positive you weren't…?"

Tom looked down at his pale leg. He bit his lip.

"It happened in the basement of the Knights of Columbus. There were glass shards all over the floor. I was fighting the creature, and it threw me into them. I think I sliced it on a piece of glass."

Abraham expelled a long breath and put his hand on Tom's shoulder. "We were afraid you'd been bitten. We were afraid you might…turn, Tom."

Tom shook his head and smiled. "I don't think so. I would've shown symptoms by now. It's just a cut."

Kelsey and Tabatha walked across the room to join Abraham and Tom, staring nervously at the door. After the conversation with Abraham, Tom suddenly felt a tinge of suspicion toward everyone in the room. He looked around, trying to ascertain if anyone else was injured. It didn't seem like it. But then he recalled the story he'd heard about the nurses from the night before. According to the police, they'd hidden in a storage closet. And just now, they'd been the only survivors in the maintenance room. What if Kelsey and Tabatha were beasts? That might explain why they survived.

They might be waiting for the opportune moment to attack.
 

He studied Kelsey's emotional face, Tabatha's fear-stricken eyes. He was pretty sure they weren't afflicted. They'd had plenty of chances to turn and savage the patients, and yet they'd continued to try to help them. And Kelsey had saved his life.

She wouldn't have done that if she were planning on killing him.
Would she?
 

Besides, Sigrid had been with them, and now she was dead.

Feeling less suspicious, Tom asked, "Do you know of anywhere else we can go, Kelsey? A more secure place to hide?" He gestured to the open window, watching snow and ice pelt the floor. A cold wind chilled the room. Katherine, Silas, and Sally were huddled by the heating vent, but the heat was no match for the encroaching elements. They should've gone to another room, but even that wouldn't save them from the beasts.

"We need to get out of here," Tom said. "What about the maintenance room, Kelsey?"

"The door is thicker, but it won't hold much longer than this one," Kelsey said gravely, gesturing at the bed blocking the door.

"I have an idea," Abraham said, biting his lip. "What about the roof?"

"That might be an option, if we can get up the staircase without trouble." Kelsey pursed her lips, patting the keys in her pocket. "But even if we make it, it's bound to be freezing up there. The exposure won't do us good."

"We'd be subjecting ourselves to frostbite and hypothermia," Tabatha reaffirmed. "There's a chance the beasts won't smell us when we're high off the ground, but they'd track us through the stairwell, from what we've seen."

Tom walked the length of the room until he reached the window. The moon had settled behind the clouds, enveloping the landscape with its eerie glow. The police cruiser sat idly, splashing its headlights over the land. The windows had been smashed; the hood was bent. One of the tires was flattened. Even if they could get to it, they'd have little chance at getting away. He looked for the bodies of the police officers.
 

They were gone—dragged off and eaten, according to Abraham.

Tom swallowed. He recalled how he'd made the sprint to the station wagon the night before from the machine shop. That seemed like ages ago. His mission of revenge had been eclipsed by his need to protect the people in this room.

From what he knew, they were the only ones left.

He grabbed a blanket from the floor and handed it to Katherine and Silas.

"Wrap this around you," he told them.

They took it with gratitude, draping it over their shoulders. The storm's breeze kicked up the snow, drifting and melting it on the radiator with a quiet hiss. They needed to get out of here, but first, they needed a plan. The hallway was quiet for the moment. But the creatures would be coming soon.

Tom sighed. "There must be another way we can defend ourselves. Something we can use."

Abraham shrugged. "Right before everyone came in, I was looking at the sharps container on the wall. That gave me an idea. Couldn't we inject these things? Drug them, somehow?" He turned to Kelsey and Tabatha.

Kelsey shook her head. "With a needle, we'd need to be close. I don't think that'd work without getting us killed."

Tabatha added, "Even if we could inject them, the effects wouldn't be instantaneous."

"Are there any supply rooms up here?" Tom asked.

"Yes, we have a supply room on each floor, and a larger one on the ground floor." Kelsey furrowed her brow. "But most of the supplies are things we can't use."

"What about gases?" Tom asked, grasping for any solution. "Laughing gas, maybe?"

"We do have nitrous oxide containers. If you were to let the container run in a confined area, let's say a room, you could possibly sedate anyone inside. But I doubt that would work, either." Kelsey thought on it further. "Even if we filled such a room, we'd have to lead the creatures into it. Which would mean whoever went inside would pass out with them. And the chances of shutting the creatures inside and keeping them in there are pretty small."

Tom blew a breath. He pictured luring the beasts into the room, watching them topple. After that, he'd finish them off with his axe. The image was satisfying, but he couldn't imagine putting it into practice. "There has to be something else we can use," he said, frustrated.
 

"All we have in there are a lot of supplies: bedpans, masks, syringes, and shelves of linens."

They fell quiet for a moment, glancing out the window or listening for noises from the hallway. Tom recalled a time when he had thought the snow was beautiful, a peaceful part of nature. That was before Jeremy had died in the accident. Before Lorena had been killed. He couldn't imagine looking at it the same way anymore.
 

He had to get the group out of this. He had to. He wracked his brain for answers.

Before he could conjure an idea, Katherine turned her head.

"There's someone outside!"

The group snapped to attention.

Tom hovered next to the others, staring out into the parking lot. A man was trudging across the snow in a hooded winter coat. He was carrying a pistol, shielding his face with a hood. The wind and snow pummeled his body, threatening to pitch him over.
 

Tom furrowed his brow. "Who is it? Someone from the bus?"

"It looks like it," Abraham confirmed.
 

"Maybe he escaped and found his way back," Tom said.

"Could be."

Immediately after saying the words, Katherine's and Silas' faces perked up. Tom wondered if they thought it was their father.

"As soon as he gets inside, he'll be killed," Sally worried. "We need to warn him."

"I'm sure he knows already," Tom said, pointing at the man's gun.

They watched the man travel the parking lot, approaching the police cruiser. The man studied the vehicle. The car sat idly at the front of the building, the headlights covered in a layer of white, the windows smashed. Its dim beams poked through the parking lot. The flat tire was a giveaway that it wasn't drivable.

"We should call out to him," Abraham said, echoing his wife's suggestion.

"Wait a minute," Tom said, holding up his finger. "Let's see what he does first. I don't want to put him in danger."

They watched quietly as the man came up alongside the vehicle, ducking inside. He fiddled with something in the interior. For a moment, Tom was certain the man would drive away, heedless of the flat tire. He was about to call out to him when the man exited the vehicle.
 

In the man's hands was the policeman's rifle.
 

The man dashed toward the canopy at the hospital entrance. Before disappearing, he looked up at the window briefly, but Tom couldn't make out his features.

"Whoever it is will never make it up here!" Sally said, her lips quivering.

"Do you think he's really coming for us?" Abraham asked.

"I'm not sure." Tom felt a pang of responsibility. Not only had he neglected to warn the man, but he'd allowed him to come inside.

"He must know what's in here," Abraham reasoned. "He grabbed another gun from the police car. It looked like he saw us. Maybe he's coming to help us."

"Maybe it's the bus driver," Sally suggested. "He probably heard us yelling, after all."

The group looked over at the barricaded door, as if to confirm her theory.
 

"You might be right," Tom said. As much as he'd appreciate the help, he'd seen the lower floors, and he couldn't fathom someone getting through them.
 

A gunshot echoed from somewhere in the lower floors, reinforcing his concern.

"Did you hear that?" Abraham asked.

Tom turned to face the barricaded door. The others stared at it with pale faces. Some part of him wanted to rush downstairs, to help the man, but that would be as suicidal as chasing the people in the elevator. Katherine and Silas bit their nails.
 

A feeling of helplessness washed over Tom, more potent than anything he'd felt all night.

The man has two guns,
he told himself.
That's more than we have up here. Maybe he has a better chance at survival than we do
.

Another gunshot echoed from a lower floor, followed by an inhuman cry. Whether the man had wounded or killed one of the beasts, Tom wasn't sure, but the noise gave him a small sense of satisfaction. Maybe the man would take them all out. Maybe he'd make it. Maybe he'd reach the third floor and help them.

Tom said a silent prayer, envisioning the man's location downstairs. Had he made it past the lobby? Was he nearing the elevator?

Another gunshot preceded a bestial moan.

The lack of visibility was disconcerting. All Tom could do was root the man on from the hospital room, praying he'd make it. Another few reports of the guns later, Tom turned to the others.
 

"I should go out there. Signal him, somehow."

The others surveyed him with wary eyes, unwilling to agree to his suggestion.
 

"I mean it," he repeated. "There's a chance he hasn't seen us. Maybe he did, but who can say for sure? This could be our only chance at help." Tom held up his axe, insinuating he was ready to leave.

"I don't think it's a good idea," Abraham tried. "What if he shoots you by accident?"

"I can try to get his attention, somehow," Tom argued. "We'll do a lot better fighting these things together than apart."

The group fell silent, but the worry was evident in their eyes.

"If anything goes wrong…" Kelsey started.

She didn't need to finish the sentence.
 

"I'll be fine," Tom assured her, though he had little confidence. He had to try
something
.