‘The guy is long gone.’
‘We know where he is. Just got to figure how to reach him.’
‘You’ve got a chopper set to pick you up?’
‘Yeah. A JetRanger. It’s fucked up, but it flies.’
‘And go where?’ asked Wade.
‘Ridgeway. An old airfield upstate. It’s a temporary base. A few cops, reservists and civilians. Handful of folks trying to stay alive. You can join us, maybe find a role. Or we can dump you by the side of a highway somewhere, if you want. Try and make it on your own. Your choice.’
Wade cocked his head, tried to gauge if she was lying.
‘Yeah?’
‘It’s Year Zero,’ said Nariko. ‘I don’t give a damn who you are, or what you did. Doesn’t matter much any more. I’m happy to give you a ride out of here. I’m happy to blow your brains out. Honestly don’t care either way. I came here to do a job.’
‘On the level?’
‘A straight deal. Stay out of our way, and you get a ride.’
‘What’s waiting for us at this airbase?’
‘It’s safe. Safer than here.’
‘Have they got doctors? Can they fix my sight?’
‘Let me take a look.’
Nariko shone a pen torch into Wade’s eyes. No dilation.
‘They’re okay, yeah? My eyes. No actual damage?’
‘Where were you when the device exploded?’
‘Hiding in the plant room. Me and my buddy. Waiting for the bomb. Felt it before we heard it. I was about to drink some water. Had the bottle raised to my lips when there was a sudden weird change of air pressure. My ears popped like I was dropping in an elevator. Then the ground shook. A massive jolt. Half a second later, we heard the blast. The loudest thunderclap you can imagine. We covered our heads. Thought the roof was coming down. Thought we were dead for sure.’
‘We have to tell him,’ said Cloke.
‘Tell me what?’ demanded Wade.
‘The bomb,’ said Cloke. ‘It was a Sandman. A tactical nuke. Small. Probably fit in the trunk of a car.’
‘And?’
‘The Sandman is an enhanced radiation warhead: a fissile core jacketed with cobalt. At the moment of detonation the device pulsed a wave of fierce neutron energy strong enough to pass through bedrock. Everyone for miles around caught a lethal dose. Wouldn’t matter if you were sheltered within a building or hidden in a basement. Wouldn’t matter if you were shielded by lead, steel, or concrete. The wave would pass right through you like an X-ray.’
‘We were forty feet below ground.’
‘Not deep enough.’
‘But I feel good. Apart from my eyes. I feel fine.’
‘Open your mouth.’
Wade opened his mouth. Cloke peered inside.
‘Ulcers. Bleeding gums.’
‘Yeah.’
‘You’ve got a sweet taste in your mouth right now, don’t you?’ said Cloke. ‘Kind of like honey.’
Wade nodded.
‘You’re exhibiting the typical symptoms of acute radiation poisoning. The prodromal stage lasts a couple of days. Nausea and vomiting. Dry throat, hacking cough. Burns, blisters. Random neurological effects, like blindness. Then there is a latent phase, the illusion of recovery. The initial symptoms abate for a while, but remission doesn’t last long. Day or two at the most. You’ll go downhill fast. It’ll be bad. Brain swelling. Congested lungs, internal bleeding. You may shit your guts out, literally excrete your own stomach lining. That’s the reality of the situation. So if you’ve got any thoughts about hijacking the chopper and heading south to the Caribbean, put them from your mind. You’d never make it.’
‘Can we beat this thing? Me and Sicknote? Do we have a chance?’
‘The dose you took? No. Nobody has received that kind of exposure and lived. You’re going to die. You should be dead already.’
‘Take us back to Ridgeway. Send for the chopper.’
‘If the world were still intact, if there were hospitals and surgeons, then we might have options. We could put up an oxygen tent, isolate you from infection. We could transfuse blood, maybe find a marrow donor. But we don’t have much equipment back at base. A few bandages. A few antibiotics. Enough to fix a broken arm, maybe pull a tooth. Basic first aid. But we’ve got morphine. We can manage the pain. That might not matter much right now. But in a day or so you’ll be screaming for a shot. At that moment you’ll need us more than you’ve needed anyone in your life.’
‘Fuck.’
‘There’s an alternative.’
Cloke unzipped the trauma bag. He took out a cardboard box. The box looked like it had sat on a shelf for a couple of decades. Faded serial number. Faded radiation emblem.
He opened the box. Little brass cylinders in rows, like a pack of rifle bullets. He put a cylinder in Wade’s hand. Wade held it to his ear and shook it. Faint rattle.
‘What’s this? Lipstick?’
He uncapped the cylinder and shook a glass ampoule into his palm. He rolled it between his fingers.
‘Cyanide,’ said Cloke. ‘We all carry one. My advice? Keep that capsule in your pocket. Hold out as long as you can, then use it.’
‘You’re kidding.’
‘Like I said. Forget about fleeing south. You got bigger problems.’
Wade stroked cold glass.
‘Does it hurt?’
‘Cyanide? I hear it’s a pretty quick way to go. Takes effect within seconds. Shuts down respiration. You might convulse a little, fight for breath, but not for long. Your world will be over in less than a minute.’
‘Christ.’
‘Better than the alternative.’
‘You should have just put it on my tongue,’ he said quietly. ‘Told me it was a painkiller or some shit.’
‘If I were dying, if I had hours to live, I would want to know. I would want to choose my moment, make my peace.’
‘Sorry man,’ said Nariko. ‘Guess you reached the end of the line.’
22
Wade turned the cyanide cylinder between his fingers.
‘Do you think he’s lying?’
‘About the radiation?’ said Lupe. ‘About the bomb? I doubt it.’
‘You trust him?’ asked Wade.
‘Yeah, I guess. Broom up his ass, but he’s on the level.’
‘We were below ground. Me and Sicknote. Miles from the blast site. We didn’t set foot outside. We didn’t breathe fallout. Maybe we’ll be all right.’
‘Yeah,’ said Lupe. ‘Asi es, asi será. Some people beat the odds. It’s like cancer. Someone has a big-ass tumour. Melanoma the size of an apple lodged in their lung. Next time they take an X-ray it’s gone. It happens. Don’t bite that capsule just yet.’
She looked towards Sicknote. He sat on the street exit steps, staring into space, lost in waking nightmares. His lips moved. He whispered to himself. He pulled strands of hair out of his scalp and watched them drift to the floor.
‘Is he cool with this truce?’
‘He’ll do whatever I say.’
‘So what do we tell him?’ asked Lupe.
‘Nothing. When the time comes, I’ll feed him the capsule myself. Say it’s vitamins or some shit. Let him bite down and fall asleep.’
Nariko and Cloke stood in the IRT supervisor’s office. They leaned over schematics spread on the table.
Cloke uncapped a Sharpie and scribbled a break in a Liberty Line tunnel.
‘One of the buildings flanking Broadway must have pancaked, crushed the tunnel flat. And I’m guessing there was another collapse, further north.’ He scribbled a second break. ‘It’s created an air pocket. That’s how this Ivanek guy, the young man you heard on the radio, survived. The subway train must be sitting in a sealed section of tunnel, cut off from rising flood water.’
‘We haven’t got equipment to shift that much concrete aside,’ said Nariko.