End of Days (20 page)

Detective Baddon pushed his glasses up on his nose, turned on the bedside light, angled it away from his son's face, and started to read out loud. I thought it was odd he would do this with his son sleeping. He was just turning a page when a knock came at the
door. The detective stood. A man entered. He was wearing a collared, short-sleeve T-shirt and a pair of slacks that were pulled up too high. He looked to be a bit older, in his sixties maybe. He was flipping through pages on a clipboard. I guessed this was the boy's doctor. After a few seconds, he peered over his glasses. “You get any sleep this week?”

“Not much. Things are a bit crazy at the moment. Any news?”

“Yes. Good news.” The doctor stared at the pages a moment longer. “The cancer's gone.”

The detective looked down at his son. He removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “I don't get it. I thought we were starting a more aggressive treatment tomorrow. You said his chances were low. That the cancer was spreading.”

“I can't explain it, Adam. The cancer is in total remission. His blood sample came back from the lab clean. The tissue biopsies came back this afternoon. Also clean. His white blood cell count is off the charts. Given the medications he was taking, it should be low, almost nonexistent. Not high. I've never seen anything like it. No one around here has.”

Detective Baddon rubbed a hand over his scalp. I noticed the scar on his wrist again. A nasty swath of pink skin, as if he'd been burned or cut open. He looked exhausted. His eyes were red-rimmed and bloodshot, with deep ditches underneath. He slipped the arms of his glasses back over his ears, then stared at his son. When he started to speak, his voice broke. It took him a few moments to pull himself together.

“Is he ever going to wake up?” he asked.

The doctor didn't answer right away. He looked at the charts in his clipboard one last time, then slipped them into a tray at the base of the boy's bed.

“Usually I tell people in situations like this that you can't tell. All you can do is wait. But your son's a fighter, Adam. He's not a big kid, but . . .” The doctor shook his head. “Most people would have died from a head injury like that. The MRI came back and it looks
like we were off with our first assessment, because his brain tissue is in better shape than we thought. His heartbeat is more regular. His breathing's stronger. It's all good news, Adam. The only problem is his red blood cell count. We can't keep it elevated. I've sent samples to a few specialists in Toronto. We should hear back soon.”

“Do you need me to leave you with some more?”

“Give it a few days. We'll see what happens to his hematocrit levels. If he needs more blood, I'll let you know.”

If he needs more blood? I looked at Charlie. He looked at me. Was he thinking what I was thinking? I examined the boy more carefully. He was emaciated, his features well-defined for a child so young—just as mine were when I was that age. Was he was one of us? A vampire? His blood was our first clue. He'd obviously had cancer, then it had gone away. Could he be carrying the pathogen? That would get rid of his cancer. It would also heal a damaged brain, which wasn't always possible for a normal person.

“You need to get some rest,” the doctor said. “When did you eat last?”

The detective looked as if he was about to respond, but was interrupted by the old theme song from
Hockey Night in Canada.
He frowned and reached to his belt, then unclipped a cell phone and read the display.

“I have to take this. Who's in tomorrow?”

“Dr. Spink.”

The detective nodded, then pulled the cell phone away from his ear to hear the last thing the doctor said.

“You should take a day off, Adam. You look like the walking dead.”

The doctor turned and left the room. Detective Baddon waited until the door was closed before he answered the phone.

“Baddon here. What's up, Matt?” There was a pause. “Good.” He tipped his wrist to check his watch. “Can you give me half an hour? . . . Perfect.” He snapped the phone closed and clipped it back to his belt. A lock of his son's hair had fallen over his eyes. The
detective brushed it away with a thick finger, then bent and kissed the boy's forehead. A few seconds later, the book was in his hand and he was reading again.

I started backing away. This was a private moment between a man and his son. It didn't feel right to hang around. The sun would soon be up. Charlie took one last look, then followed. I turned my head to see the best route out, then reached over to a neighboring pipe. It must have been all the dust in the air because I didn't see the jagged end of the bracket holding the pipe in place until I scraped my wrist against it, cutting my skin. It caught me by surprise. I pressed my teeth together to smother a snarl. I didn't want to give myself away. Because I was hanging upside down, I couldn't use my other hand to cover the gash, so I pressed it against my mouth instead in hopes that it would quickly clot. It was little more than a scratch. The taste of my blood got me thinking about the detective's son. If he was one of us, the scent of his blood would give him away. I could probably have picked it up from his arm, where the needle was inserted under his skin. But there wasn't enough time to wait for Detective Baddon to leave.

“Why are you waiting?” Charlie asked.

“I cut myself.”

“Yeah, I can smell it.”

I gave the cut a few seconds to start drying, then I began crawling, hand over hand back to my uncle's room. Once there, I exited the ceiling the same way I came in, by stepping off the machine and onto the bed. Through the window, I could see the dark night sky growing lighter at the horizon. Sunrise was about a half hour away.

“What do you make of that?” Charlie asked, dropping quietly beside me.

“What? The boy?”

“No—the plastic flowers by his bed. Of course the boy, you dough head!”

“I think he must be one of us.”

Charlie crept to the door. “Exactly what I was thinking.” He glanced up and down the hallway, then nodded. “The coast is clear. Let's go.”

We slipped out without a sound and headed for the elevators.

“What was he doing in the room?” Charlie asked.

“What?”

“That bald dude. How did he know to look for us there?”

He hadn't been looking for us, he'd been looking for my uncle. “He must have been looking for Agent X.”

Charlie hit the button for the elevator. “Well, this was a wasted trip.”

A bell dinged and the door in front of us slid open. Charlie stepped in and I followed. He hit
L
for “lobby.”

“What is it?” Charlie said. “You look like you lost your brain.”

My brain was actually right where it belonged. It just wasn't working particularly well. I couldn't decide if I should tell Charlie that Agent X was really my uncle. And I was worried about Mr. Entwistle. Why wasn't he here? At the same time, a vague uneasiness had settled over me, as if I'd forgotten something important. Did it have to do with my uncle? Our conversation was difficult to recall. Like remembering an old dream. I reached back to scratch behind my shoulder. It was sore for some reason. Itchy. The skin raised like a blister. The doors closed, and the floor indicator started dropping from 4 to 3. Had I missed something?

“Speak up,” said Charlie. “You're worse than a rock sometimes.”

“Sorry, I'm just thinking.”

“Well, I know that, Brainiac. When are you not thinking?”

Never
was the correct answer, but I didn't get a chance to say so, because the top of the elevator exploded. The overhead lights burst and an alarm started to ring. The wall behind Charlie folded inward, knocking him against the door. The elevator jerked to an instant stop, buckling me at the knees. Then Mr. Entwistle's words came back. “Just make certain when you boys leave, that you take the stairs. Got it?” Not the best thing to forget, apparently, because
the elevator was flying apart. A corner of the roof above me disintegrated, creating a hole that brought the elevator shaft into view. Hairy fingers, half again as long as mine, reached down through the opening and tore it wider. Through the smoke and spark of burning wires I glimpsed an enormous, man-shaped shadow. It snarled, then dropped down beside me.

From a distance, you might have mistaken him for the world's largest vampire. His shape was human. And he was clothed. Tattered leather jacket. Harley-Davidson belt buckle. Jeans that were way too short, like Hulk pants. But the odor was wrong. Even with the elevator wires sparking, and the stink of burning plastic everywhere, I could tell he wasn't one of us. He smelled musty—like an animal. And he was huge. Seven feet at least, and so wide at the shoulders he filled the elevator. Something about his shape was off. His arms were heavily muscled, but just a bit too long. His fingers, too. The nails of each were black and tapered to a sharp point. So were his toenails, which clacked on the elevator tiles when he landed. The floor lurched and my knees gave way. It gave me a good view of his feet. His arches were all stretched up so that he seemed to be perched on the balls of his feet, his ankle a foot above the floor. It made me think of the paw of a dog, or a wolf.

He bent down and glared at me with his large, yellow eyes. They were set wide apart on his face, and the irises were covered with flecks of red, like tiny drops of blood. The rest of his face was only vaguely human. The skin, where it wasn't covered in hair, looked as if it had been pulled back, so his nose was broad and flat against his skull. His nostrils flared with each breath. His forehead sloped backward, as did his ears, which were long and pointed. The top of his head was covered with coarse, black hair. It ran down each jaw, and even down his neck, but the whiskers didn't stretch across his
chin, so they looked more like long sideburns. His thin lips pulled back and a low rumble leaked from his mouth. I could see a row of teeth not unlike my own. Incisors, long and pointed. They would have been right at home in a dinosaur exhibit. It made the hair on the back of my neck stand up. Then he growled. The sound was like electricity. It rippled through the bones of my chest. I glanced at Charlie. He'd been knocked flat and was crouched behind Hyde's feet. He looked as if he'd been hit by lightning.

I had one chance—the knife my uncle had given me. It was still in the back pocket of my jeans. I reached for it, but before I could get it free, Hyde snapped out his hand and took hold of me around the throat. He was so fast, I'm not even sure I saw it. It was more like my mind took its best guess from the blur of movement and then, afterward, tried to patch together what had happened. I felt myself rise, then the air flew from my chest as he pushed me up against the elevator wall. Charlie got to his feet. I have to give him credit. He wasn't looking for the exit. He balled a fist and swung. Like his dancing, it was smooth. But Hyde reacted as if his eyes were on the back of his head. He quickly shifted his body. Charlie missed. I saw a blur of movement, followed by a dull thud, and Charlie collapsed.

Hyde turned back to me. He leaned closer, so his teeth were a few inches from my face. A hoarse, guttural sound crackled up from his throat. He might have been speaking, but I couldn't make sense of the words. Then he hissed and slammed me up against the elevator wall a second time. I couldn't breathe. Or cry for help. I glanced down toward Charlie to see if he was all right, if he could do something to help me, but I couldn't angle my head properly. The Beast tightened his grip and my eyes started to go spotty. He started to speak to me again, but I still couldn't tell what he was saying. His teeth gnashed together and his head turned sideways so I could see straight into one of his yellow eyes. He loosened his grip and tried to speak a third time.

I answered with the knife.

While he was slowly strangling me, I'd been working it free of the
sheath. I was blacking out as I swung. He blocked the stroke, but the blade must have cut through his skin because his body stiffened. The only explanation I could think of was the poison my uncle had smeared on the blade. It must have been as lethal as he said, to work so quickly. Then I noticed something around Hyde's neck—a nylon rope, white and red threaded together like a candy cane. My eyes followed it up through the darkness to the top of the elevator. Mr. Entwistle was leaning in from the hole above. He held the rope tightly in both hands like a garrote. He'd slipped it over Hyde's head and was trying to tighten it, so that the Beast's face was red and the veins of his neck bulged. That explained why Hyde had stopped moving. He was suffocating. This should have brought me some relief, but I was still suffocating myself. It was hard to feel anything but panic.

“Quickly, boys,” Mr. Entwistle shouted. “Get out.”

Get out. Happily. But I still couldn't breathe, let alone move. And I thought Charlie was unconscious.

Hyde's fingers dug into my throat. The knife clattered to the floor and my eyes started to go spotty again. I clawed at his hand, but it was no use. I couldn't pry it loose. Then he let go. I dropped to the floor and took a desperate gasp of air. By the time I could see clearly, the candy-cane rope was in pieces beside me. Hyde was snarling and staring upward. Just past his shoulder I caught a glimpse of Mr. Entwistle's overcoat disappearing into the shadows above. As my eyes improved their focus, I could see the old vampire retreating up a set of rungs set in the elevator shaft.

In an instant, Hyde was in pursuit. He pulled himself up through the hole, then launched himself into the air. Using the cables and the wall, he scrambled upward with a strength and speed that were dizzying. It was both awesome and terrifying. My whole body started shaking. How had Mr. Entwistle faced this thing down so many times? All I could do was cough and sputter.

I rose, still trembling, on legs that felt hollow, and moved over to where Charlie was lying in a heap on the ground. His arm was twisted awkwardly underneath him, and his eyes were glazed. One of his feet
was twitching, and a huge welt was on the corner of his forehead. I straightened him out, then checked to make sure he was breathing. His heartbeat was strong. His eyelids started to flutter and his head shook slightly as he came to. Then a quiet moan escaped his lips.