Omega Plague: Collapse (14 page)

Bruno started up the stairs that led to the Leap. He picked
his way with care until he heard the sounds and shouts of men wrestling. Bruno
leapt up the rest of the stairs, but just before emerging onto the flat top of
the hill, he paused out of sight, trying to plan as cursing and yells rattled
his concentration. Then, the blast of a shotgun followed by a scream rang in
Bruno’s ears. He poked his head just enough above the wall along the stairs to
get a look.

Stones and weeds littered the small hilltop, some twenty
meters across, that was the Leap. A low, black railing ran around the area,
defining the safe zone where people could admire the views of the island and
the sea without risking death on the cliffs. Some tall grass and bushes grew
along parts of the railing. Bruno could not see Carla anywhere. Damiano stood
with his back to Bruno, but Bruno could see he held a shotgun. Damiano stood no
more than three meters from the stairs. Bruno saw Battisti on his knees, the
red of his blood making a shocking contrast to the grey camouflage pattern on
his shirt. For a moment, Battisti seemed suspended upright. Then, in an
instant, he fell on his face in the dirt, like a puppet with its strings cut.

Bruno rushed towards the scene hoping to get a hand on the
shotgun before Damiano turned and dealt Bruno the same fate. Damiano whirled,
his ponytail whipping around his face, but Bruno wrapped his hands on the
barrel of the shotgun just in time.

The shotgun blasted into the earth, spraying up soil and
pebbles. Bruno clung to the barrel and butted his forehead against Damiano’s
face. Bruno pressed the advantage, pushing the shotgun toward Damiano, but
Damiano tripped and fell, jerking the shotgun out of Bruno’s grip. It fell,
clattering over the rail and down the cliffs.

The split-second Bruno watched the falling gun gave Damiano
a chance to grab Bruno’s ankle and yank. Bruno fell to his back. Damiano pulled
a pistol from the small of his back and Bruno kicked at his hand, knocking the
pistol into the grass. Damiano turned to find the pistol, but Bruno scrambled
on top of him. They struggled, rolling in the grass, looking for the pistol,
but Damiano ended up on Bruno’s chest. Bruno clutched at Damiano’s hands as
they squeezed his neck. He bore down, throttling Bruno’s windpipe. Against all
instinct, Bruno let his right hand off Damiano’s and slid it underneath his
back.

Frenzy shone in Damiano’s eyes just before they flickered to
his left and he saw a black blade. Bruno felt his blade nick past Damiano’s
ribs as he buried the knife up to its hilt. Damiano fell forward, gurgling, and
Bruno’s breath came in gasps as he rolled Damiano off of him. Bruno yanked the
blade from Damiano’s chest.

He stood and looked at his hands, the black leather of his
gloves now covered in the dead man’s blood.

Bruno dropped his knife and yanked off his gloves. As he
fought to keep from vomiting into his respirator, he felt more than saw some
shadow behind him. He ducked, but something grazed across the back of his head
and knocked him forward over Damiano’s body.

“Pig, you’re dead!” someone shouted.

Bruno rolled to his back, next to Damiano.

Alessio held a flat red brick in one hand, its color
standing out like a stain against the black leather of the chiodo jacket he
wore. Alessio’s shadow fell over Bruno as he tried to slither backwards, all
the while feeling around for the pistol, or even his knife. Alessio simply kept
stepping forward, and when he smiled, Bruno saw a mouth full of yellowed teeth.
“You came back for the girl, eh? You’re that cop, aren’t you?” he spat. “You
know, when we took turns, she screamed like a real dirty fu—”

A gunshot reverberated around the Leap. Alessio staggered
forward a step, then turned. Another shot. Alessio clutched at his gut and fell
forward to his knees. Chest heaving, he collapsed on his face in the stones and
grass.

Bruno pushed himself up on his elbows.

“Carla!”

She stood there holding a pistol with her arms stretched
forward. Her hands, still bound, shook, and she dropped the pistol to the
ground.

Bruno rose to his feet with caution, staggering. He touched
the back of his head; his fingers came back sticky with blood.

He wiped his hand on his pants before he spoke, then looked
at Carla and smiled.

Carla smiled too, but when he approached her, she backed
away, shaking her head.

“Carla?” He gathered his pistol off the ground. “What are
you doing—”

By now, Carla stood dangerously close to the rail. Bruno
stepped toward her. “Carla,” he said, “you’ll fall! Come ba—” But he heard the
sound of a stone clattering on the stairs to his right. He yanked out his
pistol and fired toward the sound. The crack of responding gunfire echoed in
Bruno’s ears.

He threw himself behind the crumbling remains of a partial
wall at the top of the stairs and continued firing four or five shots without
looking. Then he heard a thud. When he peeked down the stairs from behind his cover,
Bruno caught a glimpse of the back of Enzo’s head before he rounded a bend and
disappeared into the ruins.

Bruno felt the urge to press his unlikely advantage now that
Il Serbo’s gang lay dead, to find Enzo and kill him. If Enzo escaped, Il Serbo
would almost certainly guess that Bruno was on Capri and still lived, for who
else would have tried to rescue Carla? But the pain in Bruno’s head and
wobbling knees forced him to rethink. That, and Carla. He couldn’t leave her
again. He would never leave her again, not while there was breath in his body.
Bruno holstered his pistol and turned, walking toward her.

“Please,” she said. “Please don’t come any closer.”

“Look, we’ve got to get out of here, to get to my place.
Come on, there’s no time for—”

“Bruno, look at my hands!” she screamed. “Look at my hands!”
They were trembling.

“Carla, I know you’re scared, but you have to come back with
me to—”

Carla looked at him. “I’m infected.”

He shook his head. “No, no, that isn’t true, you’re just
nervous, you—”

“There’s nothing you can do. I don’t want to get you sick.”

She stepped back, almost to the rocky edge. “This is the
only way . . .”

“Not like this.” Bruno’s voice was barely above a whisper.

She smiled. “Thank you for coming back for me, Bruno. I wish
. . .”

Then her lips mouthed the words, “I’m sorry,” and she took
her final step, tumbling backwards over the edge in complete silence.

Bruno’s shouts broke over the Leap, masking the dull thud of
her body as it tumbled over the rocks on the way down to the sea below. He wept
like he’d never done before, not even that night when his mother and younger
brother had died. When his sobs finally faded, Bruno gazed around, still in
bewilderment and shock. He did not know what to do. But then his hand strayed to
the ground and he felt something cold, something metal. His eyes, blurry from
tears, looked down and made out the sharp lines of his knife in the grass. Its
dark blade was a black shadow amid the scrub and grey stones. He grasped it, an
anchor, pulling him out of his stupor and back to reality.

Bruno stood up, the handle of his knife biting into his
palm. He stared at the knife before wiping it on the grass. Once he had removed
most of the blood, Bruno placed the knife with care in its sheath at the small
of his back. He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. He looked around the
hilltop, surveying the carnage around him, his senses slowly returning.

His gaze fell on the man Carla had shot. To Bruno’s
amazement, Alessio still lived. He crawled on his belly, dragging himself
toward the stairs and leaving a trail of blood, like a slug leaves mucus. For a
while, Bruno stared at Alessio as he inched his way over weeds and rocks
towards the stairs. Then he walked over and stood beside the prostrate man.
Bruno heard him suppressing gasps of pain, his whimpering growing louder. With
one foot, Bruno rolled Alessio onto his back. Blood and foam oozed from the
corner of the Alessio’s mouth, and his dark eyes filled with fear.

Bruno retrieved his gloves. He returned to the dying man and
knelt beside him on one knee. As he tried to speak, Alessio’s lips trembled.
Bruno took his knife from its sheath. Alessio began to sob. Holding the knife
in a reverse grip, Bruno plunged his knife down into Alessio’s throat. He left
the knife in for a long moment, then pulled it out.

“Brutto pezzo di merda,” said Bruno as he wiped his knife on
the grass.

Bruno stood up and cast off his bloody gloves, their purpose
fulfilled. He looked down at his naked hands. Not a trace of blood stained
them. Bruno searched the area, scavenging whatever he thought he could use from
the dead bodies. He found that Battisti still had Bruno’s pistol stashed at the
small of his back. Battisti’s pistol was the one Bruno had kicked away, the one
that Carla had used. A standard 9mm and the same model as Bruno’s, he put it in
his waistband, then dumped the bodies over the side of the cliffs down to the
sea. He walked the short distance back from outside the railing to the top of
the stairs. Bruno stood at the top of the stairs and started down. After a few
steps he turned to his right, peering out over the ruined wall at the top of
the stairs before he descended too far to see over it. He stopped just before
he reached eye level to the ground.

Tiberius’ Leap remained the same grassy, stony patch, just
as it always had, barely scarred by the centuries or by the death on it today.
The morning light bathed it in a beautiful glow, belying the horrors that had
gone on there. Bruno supposed he should not have been surprised. This place had
seen much death all those centuries ago. Why should these four deaths today be
special? In the end, what did they really matter?

Bruno walked down the stairs, pistol in hand and senses
acute, but utterly alone.

Chapter 11

December 15

The reds and oranges of the evening sky lightened Bruno’s
mood. He started through the balcony doors and over the water. But the perfect
tones of the synthvoice brought him back. He laughed at the bullshit she
spouted while he sat at his kitchen table, tearing sheets into wide strips.

—The following hospitals in the Province of Caserta are
accepting patients: Saint Anne and Sebastian Hospital, Saint Michael’s
Hospital. Entrance is limited to those currently manifesting symptoms of HAV.
All patients will be treated with care and dignity during in-processing—

“Care and dignity?”

—Please bring your national ID card or other form of
identification—

“Why? So that you can notify next of kin when you murder
them?” Bruno shook his head. “Can’t they program you to sing? Something from
Aida
,
maybe?”

—All individuals admitted must abide by emergency
regulations or face expulsion—

“What’s the matter, Teresa? You don’t like opera?”

Bruno continued to tear strips down the length of the sheet.
“Or just not
Aida
?” Sometimes he used his knife to get a tear started.

—Asymptomatic individuals will not be admitted under any
circumstances—

“Of course; no reason to kill them, eh?”

—Asymptomatic individuals will be directed to the nearest
emergency shelter for further assistance—

“Oh, I mean—no reason to kill them
yet
, right?”

—Treatment will begin as soon as possible on all those
admitted—

Bruno surveyed the wide strips in a pile on his table.
“There, I think that might be enough to reach from here to the ground.” He
sighed. “Hopefully, I’ll never need to go out over my balcony, right? But,
before I finish the rope, first: the door.”

Teresa continued to speak as Bruno gathered up some tools
and brackets scavenged from a hardware store. Bruno was tired of her lies. He
knew there was one other station still operating. But he scanned the FM and AM
bands hoping for something other than that station, his last alternative, his
only alternative: Radio Vaticano. Finding no other, he left the radio tuned
there. Its signal was crisp. Bruno sighed when the man’s voice filled the room.
Whatever group had taken over the Vatican after the pope died was incessant in
its broadcasts. The voice hissed at Bruno as he moved to the door with his
equipment.

—I am your way, your truth and your life now. Not Him—

Bruno began to screw a bracket into the wood frame on the
left side of the door. Without power tools, he wasn’t sure how long this would
take. What did that matter? He had nothing but time. He turned the screwdriver,
firmly pressing the screw. It bit into the wood. Slowly. He turned the screw
again. And again.

—I am the Lord, your God. Not that carpenter from Nazareth—

As the man’s voice droned on, Bruno envisioned the brackets
mounted, holding a wooden beam across the door, making his apartment that much
safer.

—Caesar and Pontiff, we are one—

Turn. Turn.

—Those who can hear my voice, you must know that your end
approaches! Your end is—

Bruno threw down his screwdriver, stomped over to the radio,
and tuned the dial in to the pirate radio frequency. The only sound that came
from the speaker was a soft hiss.

He lingered for a moment over the radio. Then he picked up
the screwdriver and returned to the door.

The white noise soothed him. But sometimes Bruno thought he
could hear voices in the static.

Chapter 12

January 23

The cool winter sun shone down, making the afternoon shadows
sharp and movement easy to spot. Bruno darted into the alley behind his
apartment building, hoping he hadn’t been seen. He heard them smashing windows,
laughing. This wasn’t the first group Bruno had seen, here and there. Some
looked like families and friends. Others looked like people together because
they had no one else. Bruno didn’t go out of his way to hide, reasoning that if
they spotted him hiding, they might think he was a threat. He kept weapons
concealed, relying on the respirator and dark sunglasses to make him look
alien, ominous. And he always moved with a purpose, never looking like he was
just wandering. Even though he really was wandering, looking for some untouched
shop or home, searching for food or equipment. He kept an eye out for antennas
or something that would give away the location of the pirate radio broadcaster,
who must have had quite a radio setup, and given his conspiracy-minded
rantings, maybe other even more useful items as well, like firearms. But old
antennas from another era littered the roofs of Anacapri, making the search
difficult.

So far, when others saw Bruno, they avoided him. But this
was the first group in Anacapri he’d seen vandalize for fun. Bruno needed to
avoid them.

His pack was heavy with cans of soup and sauce and a book. A
good haul. Carla would have liked that chickpea soup he found and—Bruno
squeezed his eyes shut. Thoughts of her were a distraction; they would have to
wait until he was safe.

When Bruno opened his eyes, the sounds of people were gone.

He crept out of the alley and around to the front of his
building. The empty street stretched in both directions. That prick Battisti
had broken the lock on the front door of his apartment building, so there was
nothing to stop anyone from coming in. Bruno needed to find materials to fix
that on his next run. He pushed the door open with one hand while he held his
pistol in the other. Empty and quiet.

He took off his sunglasses and climbed the wide, flat
stairs, making sure his footfalls were soft. He arrived on the third floor and
walked off the landing. The light from the few windows in the stairway did
little to illuminate the gloom of the hall.

He turned right and walked past poor Signora Locurto’s
apartment. He thought about her corpse, probably still lying where he last saw
it those long months ago. Her biscotti were the best he’d ever tasted, and he
never had the heart to go back there after seeing her body, twisted and naked
on her kitchen floor. But as he approached the door of his own flat, he noticed
a bit of light coming from Father Tommaso’s door. After what happened on
Tiberius’ Leap, Bruno had sought the old priest’s company. No one ever answered
the door, no matter what time of day or night Bruno knocked, and he had given
up weeks ago, assuming Father Tommaso must either be dead or gone. Now he saw
that the door to the priest’s flat was partially open. Was he there? Bruno
crept up to the door. He could hear someone moving, rustling inside. With his
free hand Bruno pushed open the door.

Father Tommaso’s flat was one room, with glass doors to the
balcony at the far end. The rest of the mess and disarray barely registered
because Bruno saw a man rummaging around the cabinets in the small kitchen area
on the right wall.

Bruno pointed his pistol at the man and shouted, “Hands up!”

He turned, stepped back from the cabinets, and retreated
away from Bruno towards a small upturned table just to the left of the balcony
doors.

“Don’t shoot! I’m just looking for food!”

Bruno entered the hallway of the small apartment, keeping
his pistol trained on the man. Bruno realized he was not a man, but a pimply
faced teenage boy.

“Where is Father Tommaso?”

“Who?”

“The priest who lived here! Did you see him?”

The teenager shook his head, and his voice trembled. “I
don’t know him! We’re just looking for food!”

Bruno paused, wondering what he was going to do, when he
realized what the boy had said. We.

“Put your gun on the ground!” said a voice from behind
Bruno. “And turn around slowly!” Bruno glanced over his shoulder, just enough
to see the glint of a weapon. Bruno complied, gently placing his pistol on the
floor. Then he turned. Another teenage kid in blue jeans with shaggy hair
pointed a revolver at Bruno.

“Now kick it to me, then sit down.”

Bruno did as he was told. As Bruno sat down, the boy with
the revolver picked up Bruno’s pistol.

“Now that’s why we always move with two people!” He tossed
the revolver to his partner in the kitchen and laughed. “You take mine. Now
I’ve got the sweet gun, not some old piece of shit!”

“Hey, I wanted his gun,” the first one said.

Bruno said nothing as he looked both of them over. The one
who had got the drop on Bruno shut the door. This second boy stood in front of
the open closet near the entrance, keeping his attention and the pistol firmly
trained on Bruno.

“Take off your pack, slowly! And don’t stand up.”

Bruno shrugged the pack off. “What are you going to do?”

The shaggy-haired boy laughed. “If you’re lucky, we’ll let
you live.”

Bruno opened his mouth to speak, but a hand reached out of
the closet behind the boy. Bruno saw a flash of steel and blood splattered
everywhere. The boy dropped Bruno’s pistol with a gurgling scream.

Bruno rolled, grabbed his pistol, and pumped three bullets
into the kid with the revolver. The kid dropped to his knees with a cry, his
revolver clattering on the stone floor. Ears ringing from the shots in such a
confined space, Bruno rolled back to face the threat from the closet.

“Come out slowly, or I’ll blow your fucking head off!”

Bruno scrambled to his feet as a figure stepped through the
dark clothes and out of the closet. The clothes parted to reveal an old man
clutching a bloody butcher’s knife.

Bruno gasped. Father Tommaso, wearing an unkempt, grey
beard, stepped over the twitching body of the boy.