Ah, hell, thought Kline.
When he got there the man was still moving, weakly folding up, eyes glazing over in the dark, blood pumping out of his chest as he took crazed little breaths. Kline broke the man's neck with his heel, then rolled him off the roadway and between the guard box and the fence. Then he stood in front of the guard box and waited.
A few minutes later he heard the sound of steps and there, at a little distance, was a human figure, his outline clear, his features far from distinct in the darkness. Kline, his back to the guard box, hoped he was even less distinct, that the gun would look enough like a gun-arm to pass.
"Everything okay?" the figure asked.
"Everything okay," Kline said.
"What about the shots?"
"That wasn't from here," said Kline.
"No? Where's your partner?"
"Down the fence a little way," said Kline. "He went to see if there's a problem."
"That's not procedure," said the man.
"I told him not to do it."
The man cursed softly, then sighed. And then, a different note entering his voice, he asked, "Why haven't you turned on the lights?"
Kline quickly shot him, aiming for his head. The man disappeared into the darkness of the ground and Kline could hear him thrashing loudly, gurgling. Kline rushed forward and fell on him and struck him on the head with the pistol, then dropped the pistol and strangled him with one hand, the guard's eyes vague glints in the darkness that slowly went away.
The guard's neck was wet and slippery, and to strangle him properly Kline had to block the hole he had shot in his throat. By the time he pulled his arm away it was slippery and wet with blood, and he had to wipe his hand as best he could on the dead man's pants before groping the gun out of the darkness and getting up.
Three dead, he thought. But four bullets. But still human.
He started along the road, keeping to one side of it. Ahead were a few lights, the heart of the compound.
Two bullets left, he thought, and then wished he'd thought to ask for a Browning.
He passed a row of houses, light coming out of most of them, then turned down a smaller road, keeping to one side, houses a little more spread out now. He entered a third, smaller, tree-lined alley that dead-ended in front of the small two-story building he had briefly lived in.
From there, he backtracked, searched around until he found the path cutting away from the road, its crushed white shells luminous and unearthly in the darkness. He followed the path carefully, keeping to one side of it to avoid crunching the shells beneath his feet.
The path moved into the trees, then dipped down. There was, he remembered suddenly, a security camera somewhere, affixed to a tree, and then he wondered how many cameras he had already passed without noticing. Did they broadcast to the guard box by the gate, he wondered, or to somewhere else? He should have gone inside the guard box, at least looked, but it was too late now.
There it was, an angular irregularity high on the shadow of one of the trees. He pushed his way through the brush and back into the trees and around the camera, slowly working his way back to the path, which turned out to be difficult, because the path had curved away. He followed the path uphill where it widened into a tree-lined avenue.
There, in front of him and behind its fence, was the old manor house, some of its windows lit and casting a gentle glow on the lawn. There was still, Kline noticed, the smell of burning in the air. It grew stronger as, crouching, he came closer. The lawn was darker in spots and probably burnt away, streaks of smoke all up one side of the building. Looking through the fence he saw, near the entrance, a pile of lumber, a bandsaw. At least, he thought, I made an impression.
What now? he wondered, and started searching for the guard. There he was, just inside the fence, there near the gate. What now? he wondered.
He stood up and moved rapidly toward the gate.
"Don't shoot," he said. "Don't shoot. It's me, Ramse."
"Ramse," said the guard. "What-" and by that time Kline was close enough to shoot him in the head.
Only the guard didn't go down. He seemed instead like he'd been switched off. He just stood there unmoving, his empty eye socket open, the side of his head torn away and oozing. Kline lifted the gun again, but the guard didn't even respond. He slowly lowered the gun, then helped the guard first to sit then lie down. He left him there, staring into the sky.
One bullet left, he thought. Still human.
Mostly, he thought, and moved toward the door.
He knocked, and the door opened slightly.
"What is wanted?" asked the guard, and then saw Kline's face. He tried to close the door, but Kline already had the barrel of the pistol wedged in the crack and shot him in the chest. The guard fell back, gasping, trying to raise his gun prosthesis, but Kline was already through the doorway and on top of him, forcing the man's arm to fold the gun prosthesis back so that when it went off it fired into the guard's belly and was muffled between their two bodies.
Kline held still and listened, keeping his hand over the guard's mouth as the man slowly died beneath him. The shots, despite being muffled, still echoed down the hall, or so it seemed to Kline, right on top of the gun.
He waited, but nothing happened. How is it possible, he thought, that nobody heard? He rolled slowly off the guard and lay beside him, gathering his breath. He was soaked with blood now, wet with it from neck to knees. The guard beside him was even bloodier, though his face was pale as porcelain, expressionless as a plate. Kline sat up.
Out of bullets, he thought and dropped the pistol. He reached for the gun holstered at his waist and then hesitated, picking the first gun off the floor. He ejected the clip, reloaded it.
Six bullets left, he told himself. Still human.
I've beat the system, he thought, and then thought, no. This was simply a sign that he'd already stopped being human and wasn't planning on coming back.
How was it that they had done it? he tried to remember, staring at the end of the white hall. Two times? Three times?
Three, he thought it was. He knocked three times and waited. Nothing happened. He tried it again and heard movement on the other side, and a moment later the door opened and a guard pushed his face out, his single eye puffy with sleep, and Kline shot him dead.
How many does that make? Kline wondered idly, and then was amazed that he didn't immediately know. He shoved at the door until he'd slid the dead guard forward enough that he could squeeze his way in and step over him and into the stairwell. Slowly he started up, only beginning to become aware of the smell that the blood he was covered with seemed to have. It reminded him of something, but he couldn't place it. What if the Pauls are right? he couldn't help but wonder. He tried not to think about it.
He stopped at the third and final landing. Very carefully he opened the door a crack, half-expecting to see a dozen guards there waiting for him, but he saw nobody. I can't be killed, thought Kline, and then thought, I'm slowly going mad.