Flood Plains (11 page)

Alan held his breath, but nothing happened.

The prisoner pulled the trigger again, but the gun refused to fire.

“Never heard of a Smart Gun?” Richards asked, indicating a metal ring around his index finger.

He pulled the trigger on his shotgun and shot the gangbanger in the torso. The force of the blast almost cut the man in half. Richards ejected the spent shell and chambered a second one before turning the gun on the dead man’s companion.

“On your knees! Hands behind your head!”

The gangbanger stared at his dead friend without comprehension. One moment alive, the next dead. It seemed like too much for him to fathom.

“You all right, man?” Richards called to Vining.

But then he looked over and saw that his partner had been knocked cold. Blood dribbled out of his eye socket and nose. Richards turned back to Alan.

“Get my partner’s cuffs,” he ordered. “Put them around the prisoner’s wrists. Now.”

As he moved over to Vining, Alan prayed that the gangbanger was too rattled to attempt another breakout. Nodding to Richards, Alan moved from behind the blue tape and over to the fallen officer, feeling the other cop’s shotgun aimed at the side of his head the whole way.

When he reached the officer, he pulled the handcuffs from a pouch on the man’s belt and got behind the gangbanger. The prisoner had done exactly what he was told and was on his knees, fingers interlaced at the back of his skull. Alan wrapped the first metal bracelet around the man’s wrist, closing it tightly. He was just about to place the second one on the man’s other wrist when he and everybody else in the room heard the sound of water splashing down the steps from upstairs.

The thick liquid pooled at the base of the stairs. In the dim light, Alan thought it looked black but flecked with a reddish sheen. That’s when he felt the handcuffs torn from his hand by the gangbanger.

Capitalizing on the distraction, the second gangbanger lifted Vining’s shotgun, clicked the cuff’s second bracelet around the officer’s wrist, and raised it next to the trigger. The dull “click” of the shotgun’s Smart Gun lock being unlatched entered Alan’s ears before he fully grasped what was happening.

“Never heard of a Smart Gun?” the gangbanger sneered at Richards as he pulled the trigger.

The gun had been aimed directly at the guard’s face, so the pellets immediately flayed off the man’s face, sending brains, bits of skull, and swatches of skin in every direction as the man’s body flew backwards. The gangbanger turned the gun on the still unconscious Vining and chambered another round.

“Fuck you, too.”

The blast took off Vining’s head as well, smearing it across the floor like a watermelon hit by the business end of a sledgehammer.

With the two men dead, the gangbanger went quiet. The prisoners against the wall glanced furtively around, unsure what to do next. It was hard to tell what they were more frightened of: the man who had just shotgunned a pair of guards or the mysterious goings-on up the stairs.

For his part, Alan tried not to make a sound. He hoped the gangbanger had forgotten all about him.

But then, the sleepy-eyed man turned around with the shotgun aimed at his face.

“Keys.”

Alan nodded, knowing what the man wanted. He crept over to Vining’s body to search his pockets for the handcuff keys but saw that the liquid from the stairs had oozed around the fallen officer’s corpse. He tried not to look at it as he tried to figure out where the man would keep his keys.

That’s when he noticed that the water was also moving towards Richards’ body. It didn’t pool around the desks, trash cans, chairs, or anything else, only the dead men. As a puddle formed around the chunks of Richards’ ruined head, Alan watched the pieces dissolve into the black.

“What the hell is that?” the sleepy-eyed gangbanger asked.

“I don’t know,” Alan whispered, shaking his head.

The oozing liquid quickly dissolved the loose pieces and then slid over to the body proper. It rose up and over Richards’ broken skull like an amoeba absorbing its microbiotic lunch.

By now, a couple of the other prisoners were staring at this as well and were equally awed. It was an otherworldly sight, the oily liquid seeming to have a mind of its own.

“Keys, motherfucker,” the gangbanger hissed.

Alan nodded. He dove back over to Vining’s body. The keys had to be in his pants pocket, but even as he searched, he saw the liquid crawling up Vining’s torso from his feet.

“Come on!”

Alan knew what was going to happen next. The ooze consumed Vining’s body as quickly as the other tendril dissolved Richards and was now moving towards the gangbanger attached at the wrist. Suddenly, his quick-thinking move to access the Smart Gun seemed like suicide.

“KEYS!” he bellowed.

Alan nodded and finally saw the edge of a key ring poking out of the man’s left breast pocket. But just as he reached for them, the liquid swam over his torso and subsumed the man’s entire chest. Alan, fearing exposure, leapt backwards.

“What the fuck, man?” the gangster shouted, turning the shotgun on Alan. “Keys!”

“They’re gone.”

The gangbanger pulled the dead man’s wrist close in order to activate the gun and shoot Alan. He pulled the trigger, but there was no report, no kick. The ooze had already eaten away much of the man’s fingers, dropping the ring to the floor.

“Shit!”

The gangbanger tried to yank his arm away even as the liquid sluiced across the handcuffs and began burning into his hand.

“
Keys!
”

But it was too late. The oil was now racing up his arm, burning away his flesh as it marched towards his face. The gangbanger tried to wipe it away with his other hand and ended up leaving his fingers behind as he yanked his arm away a second later.

That was it for Alan and the prisoners. They’d been frozen in place by the horrific sight, but as the man melted into the ground, they got the message. It was now or never. Several ran towards the door leading to the garage. Alan rose to follow them just as seven of the prisoners were lifted off their feet and thrown across the room.

Alan ducked down as the men screamed and flew overhead. He looked back up when he realized they hadn’t landed. Instead of crashing into the wall, the prisoners were now being held aloft by towers of the black ooze. It swarmed over them in torrents, obscuring them from sight. They would begin to scream and shout for help, only to have their voices get sucked away a second later.

The surviving prisoners ran back to the cafeteria, but Alan held still. Even though he couldn’t see the invisible force, he could feel the change in the air as it rushed past. The oily liquid on the floor was trailing after it.

The stairs up to the cell block.

Alan could barely see them in the dark, but there appeared to be only the thinnest of liquid tendrils trailing down them. He knew it was now or never.

Leaping to his feet, he crossed the room in seconds flat. He took the stairs three at a time, careful not to step in the oil. With each footfall, the liquid shot towards him, as if attracted by the scent of his flesh, but it was too diluted to reach him. Expecting to have his legs yanked out from under him at any second, Alan closed his eyes and powered his way up to the next floor.

The smell hit him first. Like stepping into an abattoir and a sewer at the same time, the odor of blood and shit filled his nose. On the floor were half a dozen guards, including the sergeant who had come up before, now shredded. Two cell doors were open, and piles of bodies were crowded at the exit as if the occupants of each had flooded to the doorway in a last-ditch effort to escape when they were attacked.

All that was left were bones and bloody clothes. The walls, floor, and ceiling were stained deep red with the blood of two dozen men.

Alan looked into one of the closed cells and saw the same thing. Stains of black appeared around the sinks and toilets in each. It suggested that that was where the villain emerged.

At the end of the hallway, the remains of a guard were hanging from a fire door left slightly ajar. The magnetic lock was clicking angrily, frustrated at being left unlatched.

Alan thanked the Lord for small favors and raced straight for it. He tried to avoid stepping in the blood as he went, but this proved impossible. Still, it didn’t seem to be burning through his shoes, so he kept going.

When he reached the fire door, he kicked it open. The empty and, more importantly,
dry
stairwell extended down to…somewhere. Hearing more slams and screams below in the cafeteria, Alan took a deep breath and raced down the steps.

•  •  •

As the candles flickered in her parlor, Sineada did her best to parse the cacophony she was hearing on the other side. It frightened her. She tried to extend her voice to any one individual, but the rush of anguish shut her out completely. Fighting against it, she concentrated on one idea and pushed aside all others, trying to find its match.

When she did not, she breathed out a sigh of relief. She looked across the table at Mia and smiled.

“Your daddy’s fine. He’s got a ways to go, but for the moment, he is safe where he is.”

Mia nodded furtively but didn’t seem as relieved as Sineada hoped she’d be. There was something else hiding behind her eyes, troubling her mind.

Chapter 13

M
uhammad thought it would be easy when he got to America.

He would learn English, he would present his impressive credentials (a bachelor’s and a master’s in computer engineering from a prestigious college in Kharagpur) at the right company, and he’d get a marvelous job.

He’d heard anti-Muslim sentiment described as “the last socially acceptable prejudice in America” but had spoken with a few former colleagues in Houston who said they never felt. They didn’t grow out their beards, and their wives might wear a hijab to cover their heads but never a burqa. They joked that Muhammad would be at a disadvantage because of his name.

Mostly, Muhammad was told, he’d be lumped in as “Indian” and taken for someone who believed in reincarnation and the sacredness of cows.

But then they arrived just after the mass migration into Houston following Katrina and Muhammad had been unable to find an engineering position. He blamed his lack of English. His wife, Fadela, was better at meeting people than he was and quickly discovered the temp agency that supplied assembly line workers to Deltech. By hiring temps, the State of Texas didn’t require the company to pay health and social security benefits to its factory employees until they worked 750 hours. The workers were complicit in this arrangement, working their 750 as quickly as they could. Double-shifting, working overtime, people did whatever it took to finish their Deltech tour in just three or four months, bank the money, and then work a second seasonal job the rest of the year like driving a truck or roughnecking on a rig in the Gulf.

Some just stayed home and collected unemployment, stretching the money as far as they could.

Muhammad, however, looked at it as an opportunity. He wanted to do a good job and get noticed by the corporate bosses. His partner at the test station, Mukul, had warned him away from this belief, saying that Deltech never promoted from the floor. There was just a separation between the two. Mukul was banking his money to buy into a convenience store franchise that relatives of his had some success with in Houston and invited Muhammad to join him.

Muhammad was determined to work in his field, however, and had declined.

“You gonna be okay running ‘test’ by yourself today?”

Muhammad nodded to Big Time as the big man walked down to his station from pack.

“Guess Mukul didn’t need the money,” Big Time offered.

“He drives in from Baytown. Hour and a half both ways.”

“Is that right?” Big Time asked, realizing this was the most he’d heard Muhammad ever say.

“Yes. Would be twice that with this typhoon.”

“Well, if it gets too much, I’m sure I can find someone to pick up the slack,” Big Time said, noticing Scott walking by. “You know ‘test,’ right?”

Scott scowled, eyeing Muhammad.

“No fucking clue.”

Big Time rolled his eyes. He knew Scott could be a racist fuck, but also knew that without any supervisor around, it was highly unlikely that they’d be getting any real work out of him that day.

A couple of months back, a group of observers from a consulting firm were brought on to measure the line’s efficiency. They went from line to line, timing each station. When they reached Scott’s, he spent the entire twelve hours creatively dragging his feet to such a degree that it skewed the results for entire factory.

Big Time was dismayed that Scott wasn’t reprimanded. What he soon learned was that the observers didn’t give a shit any more than Scott did. They were there to start and stop a timer and report their findings. While the rest of the workers had doubled their efforts under the watchful eye of the consultants and earned near-impossible daily quotas, Scott was handed one that allowed him to get paid the same for goofing off most of the day.

Big Time was among many who were simply impressed by Scott’s foresight.

“Regardless of my friend’s bullshit, if you need help, we’ll find it for you,” Big Time told Muhammad. “Cool?”

“Cool.”

Big Time headed back to pack, leaving Muhammad to ponder the strangeness of America. A black man who was close friends with a white man who clearly hated people because of the color of their skin? He would enjoy debating this conundrum with Fadela that night.

•  •  •

Alan ran as fast as he could through downtown. He had no idea where the hell he was going but was focused on finding one thing: dry land.

He had never been in rain this heavy. The storm drains were overflowing, water was a foot high on the sidewalks, and was sluicing into the lobbies and parking lots of buildings, but this was hardly paramount in Alan’s mind. What Alan was trying to avoid looking at, what he was trying to force from his ear, were the sights and sounds of every other human being in downtown being torn apart or inside-out.