Last Hope, Book One: Onslaught (6 page)

Nothing moved.

All was still.

Cars stood idle, many of them straddled on sidewalks or crashed against buildings. Others waited at intersections, waited and waited, never moving on.

Even from such a height, Budd was sure that there were no pedestrians on the sidewalks. The streets were empty. Nor was there any activity on the Thames; the wide stretches of the river were empty of all moving boat traffic on the long loop of running water that past the New Millennium Hotel. A rolling bank of mist and fog moved along the watery surface, creeping onto the land.

Looking back up at the skyline, Budd saw columns of smoke from several places as unseen fires burned. Other than the noise of the wind, the balcony was silent. No sound drifted up from the streets below.

The cityscape was dead.

Budd left the balcony, instinctively locking the French doors as soon as he was inside. The moment he did, a series of small, green-colored lights lit up on the floor, shining through the carpet and guiding the way to the suite’s entrance.

Juliette roused on the bed. She sat up and yawned happily, stretching her arms. “Were you getting some fresh air,
Monsieur
Ashby?”

“Not exactly,” Budd answered. He sat on the foot of the bed and looked at Juliette. “I’m having a nightmare.”

“A nightmare? About what?”

“The end of the world,” he said with a chuckle. He pinched the skin on his forearm.

Juliette watched the action and a puzzled expression formed on her face. “You are awake now,
Monsieur
Ashby.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Yes, you are. I am awake, too.”

“Oh yeah? Then why don’t you go out on the balcony and tell me you’re not part of my nightmare.” Budd leant over and turned on the bedside cabinet’s lamp. The bulb did not light. “There’s only emergency power.”

“That does not make this a nightmare,
Monsieur
Ashby. There is just a problem with the electricity.”

“When I was a kid, my folks used to drag me to church every Sunday. There was this woman who worked in the local bar. Her husband died, so she took a second job to earn a little extra money for her kids. You know, one of the two jobs you can do on your back. And she couldn’t fix a tap. Anyway, she always came to church, rain or shine, but everyone shunned her. Even the good ol’ Rev had nothing to say. I grew up thinking sex was bad, something to feel ashamed of. I guess that’s why I’ve always had nightmares when I’ve made love to a beautiful woman, you know, some sort of repressed feeling of guilt.”

Juliette smiled sympathetically and then reached over to stroke the side of Budd’s face. “If that is true,
Monsieur
Ashby, then it is a sad story. But this is not a nightmare. I am awake, too.”

Just for the record, that story is true. By the time I was thirteen, I spent every sermon trying to look at her, imagining how great it would be to take advantage of the services she offered. I felt as though my pipes could use a good seeing to. But between my comic-book collection and trips to the arcade, my paper route never quite left me with enough moolah for a call out, so to speak.

I thought it best not to tell Juliette that bit. You know how touchy women can be ’bout that kind of thing…

Budd took Juliette’s hand and led her to the balcony doors. “If we’re awake, then what the heck’s goin’ on?”

Juliette gasped.

Budd put on his brown pants and blue sweatshirt, and then tightened his boots and placed his Stetson on his head. When he was done, he sat on the edge of the unmade bed and let his attention switch between looking out across the vacant skyline and watching Juliette as she dressed.

“What has happened out there?” Juliette asked as she rummaged through her wardrobe for something more suitable to wear than her evening dress. She chose a pair of close-fitting black tracksuit pants, socks, gym shoes, and a red long-sleeved T-shirt that she eased over her body. She wore no bra. Glancing in the mirror, she pulled her brown hair into a short ponytail and secured it with a band. Finally, she put on a black, biker- style leather jacket that tucked in around her narrow waist.

“I don’t know. I’m still hoping this is a nightmare.”

“So am I,
Monsieur
Ashby.”

“Do you have a cell?”

“A what?”

“A mobile phone?”

“Yes, it is in the bedside cabinet.”

Budd clambered over the bed and opened the drawer. Apart from the standard-issue bible, the sleek mobile phone was the only item inside. He took it out and held down the power button. When it had finished loading, the screen indicated that there was no signal. He moved to the door, hoping for more luck, but he guessed the French words that appeared on the screen meant that there was no network coverage.

“It doesn’t work,” he said and tossed the phone onto the ruffled bed sheets. “Let’s get moving.”

Juliette followed Budd to the suite’s front door, slowly tracing the course of the green emergency lights. He knelt down by her red dress to retrieve the suite’s key-card. He handed it to her and she tucked it into her pants pocket.

Next, Budd picked up his rucksack and slung it over his shoulder. He gripped the door handle. “Ready?” he asked.

“Yes.”

Budd turned the handle and tugged the door inwards, revealing the pitch-black corridor outside. The darkness was tangible, appearing to have enough substance for him to be able to reach out and touch it. The windowless hallway was absent of natural light and the emergency lights did little to help. The line of green bulbs continued out of the room, down the center of the corridor, vanishing as they rounded the left-hand corner that led back to the elevators. Although they guided the way, the bulbs were not bright enough to offer any useful illumination and merely formed a pale green glow that tracked across the floor. Whether the lighting was poorly designed, or it simply lacked the correct amount of power to work as it was supposed to, Budd couldn’t tell, but as he stepped forward, glancing uselessly left and right, he felt as though he was blind.

From out in the corridor came a sound that halted Budd in his tracks. He turned towards what he thought was the source: around the corner and off towards the elevators. While he replayed the sound in his mind, trying to establish what it had been, the same noise came again. He was sure that it had a metallic ring to it, but there was no clink of metal on metal.

It was more of a thud.

“Back up, princess. Is there a flashlight in the suite, maybe some candles?”

“None I have seen.”

“Is it worth a second look?”

“No,
Monsieur
Ashby, I am certain.”

Budd grimaced. With his right hand he reached back for Juliette. He felt her delicate fingers wrap around his own. “Don’t let go,” he whispered, unsure why his voice had lowered in volume. It had been a subconscious decision.

Juliette nodded, her white teeth showing faintly in the gloom as she smiled half-heartedly.

Budd started into the corridor, following the green emergency lights. In the distance, the thud sounded again. Slowly, his eyes adjusted to the faint glow beneath the carpet, but he still struggled to see more than the vague outline of the walls and floor. Each step he took was filled with caution and, after a while, he realized that he was holding his breath.

He exhaled gently.

The thud sounded again. Budd estimated that it was taking place at intervals of about five or six seconds. He took another few steps.

The thud struck out once more.

“What is it?” Juliette asked, tightening her grip on his hand.

“I don’t know.”

After a few more paces, the thud repeated.

Step by step, they approached the left-hand turn in the corridor. They continued towards it, staying close to the inside wall.

Budd peered around the corner in the hope of seeing something.

The thud rang out.

There was a narrow strip of light, perhaps six inches wide and seven feet tall, 200 feet or so further along the corridor. As he watched, the bright light started to expand in width. It flooded out into the corridor, illuminating the floor and the opposite wall. The gap continued to widen, spreading sideways until it spanned six feet. At that point it started to shrink, contracting much quicker than it had grown. When it reached six inches, where it had begun, the thud sounded out.

Budd’s throat went dry and his body tensed up. There was something trapped between the elevator doors, something that wouldn’t let them close. It looked like a person’s head.

The doors began to open.

You might be wondering why I’m so quiet at the moment. Well, I couldn’t get my head around what was happening then, and, to be honest, I still can’t think of much to say…

“Stay here, sugar,” Budd said to Juliette, who was still behind him and could not see the body. He tried to let go of her hand.

“No,
Monsieur
Ashby,” she said. “We stay together.”

Budd nodded. “Sure.”

He stepped around the corner and moved down the hallway, quicker now because the light from the elevator gave some definition to the area.

“
Monsieur
Ashby?” Juliette said when she saw the dark head of hair in the doorway. Budd ignored her and carried on. There was a mauve cap on the floor a short distance from the body. He reached the elevator and looked inside, keeping Juliette behind him to obscure her view.

The head jamming the elevator doors belonged to a lift attendant. He was face down, his skull partially crushed by the repeated blows.

Despite the injuries, Budd thought there was a surprising lack of blood on the carpet.

An old man was slumped against the back wall of the elevator car, a guest wearing a suit and tie. His head was tilted so that his chin rested on his chest, while his white hair was parted in the center and held in place with wax. Budd stepped over the lift attendant’s corpse and knelt beside the old man to check his wrist for a pulse. The arm was cold and a little stiff.

“He’s dead.”

“What has happened?” Juliette asked, crouching beside Budd.

I didn’t answer. Aside from it all being a nightmare, I didn’t have a clue. She might as well have asked which religion is the one true faith…

Next to the door, on the control panel for the elevator, a solitary neon bulb was lit. It was the top floor, the Skyview Restaurant. Someone had pressed the call button. Budd looked at it, wondering what to do. “Should we let this one go? Call another?”

“I do not like this dark,
Monsieur
Ashby.”

“Me neither. But I ain’t too hot on our company.”

“The dead cannot hurt us.”

“I guess not. Up, then?”

Juliette nodded.

Grabbing hold of the lift attendant’s ankles, Budd dragged the corpse inside. During the movement, the squashed head dropped to one side. Budd instinctively examined the face.

It was Stephen Doring.

The bell chimed and the elevator started to climb.

Neither Budd nor Juliette spoke as the elevator rose through the building, and nor did they take their eyes away from the panel of floor numbers. Budd thought he heard Juliette breathe a sigh of relief when their movement slowed.

I think, just that once, even I was glad to hear that awful bell chime before the doors finally opened. I didn’t like be cooped up in there with two dead bodies.

Unfortunately, I had a shock coming…

The long, narrow room where the maître d’ had worked from his podium was in darkness, lit only by the light from the elevator and another line of green bulbs on the floor. Budd stepped out and his gaze settled on the two wooden restaurant doors. He started towards them.

A pace behind, Juliette hesitated. “What about the lift?” she asked.

Budd stopped and glanced around, searching for a way to stop the elevator from leaving after they were gone. He could only think of one: he took Stephen Doring’s corpse by the shoulders and slid the head back between the doors. When he straightened up, Juliette had a look of disbelief upon her face.

“That is not right,” she said.

“It was his life’s work,” Budd replied, a grim smile forming on his lips. “I’m sure this is what he would’ve wanted.”

Juliette’s expression showed her displeasure, but she shrugged her shoulders and pointed to the restaurant. “Let us go,” she said, and turned away.

Budd jogged to overtake her. When he reached the double doors, he took hold of the handles just as the pulpy thud of the elevator doors closing against their human stop rang out.

Juliette winced.

After counting to three in his head, Budd opened the right-hand door. Bright light burst in and he shielded his eyes with his arm. The Skyview Restaurant was filled with the grey ambience of dawn, which flooded in through the glass walls and roof.