Slow Burn (Book 7): City of Stin (19 page)

We left the art gallery and crossed the street, climbing through the remains of the front door of a small printing company. We passed through the lobby, through another door, past a few empty offices, and onto the production floor where big machines rusted in the ten inches of water pooled on the sunken floor. A portion of the roof had collapsed. I guess during the storm.

Many roofs on commercial buildings in Texas are flat—or pretty close to it—with parapets that stand up several feet all around the edge, hiding mechanical equipment and giving the impression of a much taller, more impressive building. I suspected the drains on this one had become clogged, with somebody’s remains perhaps. During the hurricane, the roof had simply started to fill. Unable to support the extra tons of water in the new upstairs swimming pool, the roof collapsed.

We had to wade through the water to get to the back door, which stood at the top of four single stairs on the rear wall of the building. The door looked to be intact.

Going through that door put us out onto another street. Whites were out, but those who were moving seemed to be going in the opposite direction, to an area several blocks away where the Whites who’d spotted us were still searching, howling, and squabbling.

We passed two more blocks, sneaking through buildings and doing our best to stay behind cover when outside. We were heading south, away from the direction we’d all wanted to go, but also away from the latest mob of Whites who’d wanted to put us on the dinner plate.

We found ourselves crossing a wide road clogged with hundreds of cars, some abandoned while trying to head west toward one highway, others left there by drivers headed east toward the other highway. Whatever traffic mess had been on the road prior to the hurricane, the floodwaters had made it worse by floating many of the cars and pushing them into piles. Among the piles were trees, pieces of house walls and roofs, appliances, and the bones of the dead.

Murphy paused along the edge of one pile, pointed south past rows of giant cypress trees, and whispered, “The river is right over there. Maybe it’s time we found a boat and floated out of downtown. We’re gonna get killed if we stay here.” He looked at me. “Even the Valiant Null Spot’s luck doesn’t last forever.”

“The Valiant Null Spot?” Fritz asked.

I ignored him and said, “If we can find a boat washed up in the trees, I think that’s a good idea.” I looked at each of the others for consensus.

Gabe and Fritz nodded. Why not? They probably would have gone along with anything, just happy that Murphy and I hadn’t ditched them yet. I’m sure they felt like they could take care of themselves, but Murphy and I had the night vision goggles and the firepower.

Whites nearby were making some noise, bickering over something, perhaps a rotted body in the jumble of the flood aftermath.

Murphy led us off the road. Among the trees, even more debris had accumulated, so much, in fact, that we couldn’t cross through it to get to the river. Well, we probably could have at the risk of injury, while making so much noise that we’d certainly draw the nearby Whites.

We instead chose stealth, walking in single file as Murphy led us along a path that roughly paralleled the river, looking for a way to get through the mounds of debris between us and the water. It was treacherous going—even the relatively flat path we traveled was scattered with sharp pieces of metal bent and torn from cars, shards of glass, some small, some several feet in length and sticking out of the piles, ready to slice the leg of anyone passing by who wasn’t paying attention.

As we moved, the number of jagged, injury-threatening pieces of metal sticking out into the paths seemed to grow in number. So much so that I started to wonder if something peculiar in the topography had caused the receding waters to settle the debris in such an odd, spiky fashion.

I also noticed that more and more pieces of the metal bore stains of the blood from the last White who’d come this way, running at a speed too reckless.

We came to a bend where the debris had been pushed up onto some structure that hadn’t collapsed under the pressure of the waters flowing over it. We found ourselves standing in a crescent-shaped clearing, over a hundred feet from end to end, with no apparent way to get out, save climbing over the dangerous debris.

Murphy pointed to the old Seaholm Power Plant. The building had been derelict for years. He said, “City of Stin.”

Fritz looked puzzled. “What?”

I looked up at the side of the building and read,
City of Austin Power Plant
.

“Old joke,” said Murphy, pointing at the giant retro-style letters mounted high up on the three-story wall. He grinned and looked at me. “I know you know what I’m talking about. You’ve been to the bars down here plenty of times at night, I’ll bet.”

I looked up at the building and smiled. “You tell ‘em.”

Murphy said, “Gather ‘round kiddies.”

“Don’t make a career of it,” I said, “we got shit to do, you know.”

“The Grumpy Null Spot.” Murphy chuckled.

I looked around for danger.

Murphy looked at Fritz and Gabe. “It’s nothing. Lights behind the A and U in the sign were burned out forever. So at night, it said ‘CITY of STIN’ instead of ‘CITY of AUSTIN’. When we were drunk, and talkin’ shit, it seemed really funny that the power plant wouldn’t change their light bulbs.”

“Interesting,” said Fritz.

“Don’t humor him,” I said, “it only makes it worse. Tell him you don’t give a shit. Trust me.”

Murphy said, “I’m his only friend.”

That got a laugh from Fritz and Gabe. Did I say that when the tension is high, any joke will do?

Murphy looked at the piles of flood debris around us. “Should we go back?” He looked up the trail we’d followed to get there.

I pointed to one end of the rough crescent shape. “I’ll go that way first, and see if there’s a safe way over. Would one of you go the other way?”

Fritz said, “I’ve got it.”

I continued, “Murphy, you and Gabe stay here and keep an eye out back up the trail. You know, in case a White or two are following.”

“Got it, boss.” Murphy raised his rifle to his shoulder and pointed it down the path we’d taken between the mounds.

Fritz took off, cautiously looking, stopping about twenty feet down the path to make an attempt to climb up and over the piled debris in front of him.

I hoped we wouldn’t have to do that, but said nothing. It might be the only way through without doubling back. Then again, we weren’t in a hurry. We weren’t being pursued. At the moment, we were safe and no Whites knew our whereabouts.

I walked along the path as the depth of the junk seemed to thicken underfoot, getting noisier. I had to step more and more gently. The jagged pieces of metal sticking randomly out from the sides seemed to squeeze me along a narrower and narrower walkway, making me feel very uncomfortable. If a White did come over the mound on either side, I’d be hard pressed to defend myself without getting injured, not by them, but by the debris.

Nearing the end of the crescent, I was nearly ready to give up and turn around when I spotted something curious, a break in the junk, along the wall of the building that had stood against the flood. I saw a concrete wall and a steel door.

Why not peek inside?

Maybe a window on the other side of the building would provide a path through the mound. That was my hope when I holstered my pistol, lifted my machete, and stepped up to the door. Slowly. Quietly. Of course, everything I did was quiet, and slow, especially if I wasn’t being chased by a herd of snappy-jawed Whites.

I turned the knob and pushed the door open, expecting to see jostled, moldy equipment. What I saw was some kind of electrical cabling snaked up out of a large round hole in the center of the floor. All the cables spread out along the floor and ran up the walls to big switch boxes mounted there. More importantly, some dim light down in the tunnel somewhere made it glow bright green through the night vision goggles while it silhouetted a thin, white-skinned girl with short, spiky hair and big, dark eyes, piercings, and tattoos.

The sight of the girl startled me and I involuntarily took a half step back as I gulped. That gulp was all the time I needed to recover, raise my machete, and step back forward to cut her down.

That dim light down the tunnel gave me pause.

I wondered as I swung my machete at the female White whether that light in the tunnel was an anomaly in the night vision software or whether something was down there that shouldn’t have been.

In that moment as I paused, the girl stepped back. She didn’t howl. She didn’t bare her teeth. She didn’t lunge at me. She raised her arm in a useless defense and tried to stifle her scream as she mouthed, “No!”

I turned and let the machete whoosh past her as I pulled up on my swing.

No?

I froze.

The girl froze, perhaps wondering why she was alive.

Maybe planning her attack.

I raised my machete again, sticking my other hand out to push back if that was needed.

The girl’s face turned to pure fright as she softly said, “Please.”

“What?” I asked in the same low tones.

“Please, don’t.”

I looked around the small room again, double-checking that no ambush lay in there. How could there be? The whole space couldn’t have been more than ten feet square with only the tunnel and the cables. No furnishings. Only the girl.

I looked her up and down. She carried no gun but had a knife in a sheath on her hip, a bow in one hand, and a quiver over her shoulder.

She wasn’t a White. Well, she was. She had to be a Slow Burn.

I moved my mouth to speak, but in my surprise I couldn’t come to a choice of what to say first.

The girl’s free hand slowly slipped down to touch the handle of her knife.

My surprise clicked off and self-preservation kicked in. “Don’t,” I told her. “Don’t move.”

Don’t move? What the fuck kind of greeting is that?

She took another half step back, closer to the tunnel.

“Stop,” I said, much more gently. I slowly lowered my machete. “I’m… I’m not here to hurt you.”

That didn’t change the girl’s facial expression one bit. Her eyes darted from side to side, then went back to staring at me in what—for her at least—had to be very dim light. I realized she probably couldn’t see much more than my silhouette against the moonlight coming in through the open door.

I said, “I know you can’t see in this light, but I’m like you.” I raised my hand and slowly turned it. “White skin, just like yours.”

The girl touched the skin on her arm, running her fingers over a full sleeve tattoo—or so I guessed based on how much of her arm was visible. She asked, “Who are you? How did you find this place?”

This place?

Okay, enough clues clicked into place. This little ten-by-ten concrete building was more than just some kind of switching station for the power company.

“I just came in through the door,” I told her. “I was curious.”

She glanced back at the tunnel.

“I’m wearing night vision goggles,” I told her. “You maybe can’t see them in this light, but I can see everything you’re doing. What’s in the tunnel?”

Something shuffled in the tunnel.

The girl turned and started to speak.

I raised my machete again and hissed, “Quiet.”

She froze.

More shuffling in the tunnel, footsteps, the creak of rusty metal. A voice whispered, “Jazz.”

Jazz?

“Jasmine,” it whispered again. “Wait up.”

I slowly lowered my machete and deliberately laid the edge on Jasmine’s throat. I removed my pistol from its holster and pointed it at the tunnel. I tilted my head to the right, silently ordering Jasmine to move a little to her left. I needed a clear view of the tunnel. I stepped to the side so I’d be in a shadow, rather than silhouetted by the moonlight coming through the open door.

The dim light in the tunnel went out. Hands and feet were climbing a ladder.

A woman’s head came up out of the tunnel, looking around in the darkness of the small structure. She saw the open door and cursed. She didn’t see me. She didn’t see Jazz either. She stopped halfway out of the hole, hearing or sensing something and becoming suddenly tense. She had a pistol in a holster on her hip and she was reaching for it when I said, “Don’t do it. Come up out of the hole. Don’t put that hand on your gun.”

She looked toward my voice, I guessed seeing only blackness. Just moments before, she’d been down in the tunnel with a candle or flashlight on. Her eyes hadn’t yet adjusted to darkness.

“I’m wearing night vision goggles,” I told her. “You’ve got medium-length, sandy-colored hair. Mid thirties. Good shape. You’re wearing a black leather jacket. I can see everything.”

The woman’s face turned hard, her eyes darting from side to side. She was going to try something.

“Don’t,” I said. “Take a deep breath. Stop looking around for something to hit me with, okay? Be cool for a sec’.”

Slow footsteps outside told me someone was coming up through the debris toward the hut. Not a surprise. I’d been out of sight long enough to make the guys curious.

A moment later, Fritz’s voice whispered, “Zed? Zed?”

I whispered back, “I’m in here. Take it slow. Some people are in here with me.”

To the girl coming out of the tunnel, I said, “You’re a White, I’m—”

“A White?” she asked. “What?”

“Your skin,” I told her. “You caught the virus. You got better, right? So did I. My skin is white just like yours.”

“You keep saying you’re like us,” said Jazz. “Why don’t you put down your weapons and just go. Leave us alone.”

Why indeed? To trust or not to trust?

“My name is Zed.” It seemed like a good way to start the de-escalation.

From outside, Fritz asked, “You okay in there, buddy?”

“Come in slowly,” I said over my shoulder.

Fritz leaned around the edge of the doorframe, pistol first, pointed at the roof.

Both girls tensed on seeing Fritz.

“He’s immune, but he’s cool,” I told them. “Here’s what I’m gonna do. I’m going to lower my machete and point my pistol at the floor. Please don’t do anything stupid.”

I took my machete away from Jazz’s neck and she relaxed by a small fraction. As promised, I pointed my pistol down. “We really don’t mean you any harm,” I told them. “We were just trying to find a way down to the river to see if we could find a boat or something.”

“For what?” the girl from the tunnel asked, immediately trying to poke holes in my story.

“For what yourself.” I took offense although I probably shouldn’t have. “Who are you, Sherlock Holmes? We want to get the fuck out of town. Do you think we’re going fishing?”

She shared a knowing glance with the other girl.

I heaved a dramatic sigh and looked at the girl who’d had my machete at her neck. “Your name is Jazz, right? And you?” I asked, looking at the other girl.

“Grace,” she said.

“This is Fritz,” I replied, nodding back toward the door where Fritz hadn’t moved or spoken since coming in.

He took that as a cue. “Are they like you?” he asked.

“Yeah,” I answered.

“Slow Burns?”

Grace and Jazz both looked at Fritz with silent questions on their faces. “How could he not know that?”

At least that’s what it looked like to me. I said, “He’s not from around here. Apparently, we Slow Burns are a bit of a geographical oddity.”

“Are you with the soldiers at the Capitol?” Grace nodded in the general direction of the complex.

“You asking me or him?” I replied.

She was glaring at Fritz, but she said, “Both.”

“We’re not with them,” I said. “As a matter of fact, they got kinda pissed when I burned down the Governor’s Mansion and blew up one of their helicopters.”

“That was you?” Jazz asked.

Grace shot her a look that said
be quiet
.

Looking at Jazz, I replied, “You know about that?”

Glaring petulantly at Grace, she said, “We all saw the fires and heard the explosions. We were wondering.”

We all?

“Jazz,” Grace scolded.

“That was us,” I told them. “Look, I don’t know what y’all’s deal is here. I don’t know how many more people you’ve got hiding up the tunnel and I don’t care. We’ve been running around downtown Austin for a day and a half with assholes shooting at us and Whites trying to have us for dinner. We just want to get the fuck out of downtown. So we’re just gonna go and leave you to yourselves. Are we cool?”

Grace looked suspicious.

More footsteps crunched in the debris outside.

Jazz looked toward the door.

“There are four of us,” I said. “One like me—like us—another Slow Burn. Fritz and his buddy are on some kind of mission to collect blood samples.”

“Yeah,” Fritz said. “We don’t have our stuff. Justice Baird’s guys took it when they arrested us. I need to come back this way, though, and get samples from all of you.” Fritz looked around outside. “Can I come back here to find you?”

“No,” Grace told him. “Don’t ever come back here. You might bring them with you.”

“The Whites?” I asked.

“Sure,” she said. “Whatever you call them.”

“Let’s go with Whites,” I told her.

“How many of you are there?” Fritz asked.

Grace and Jazz shared a look.

“Everything all right in there?” Murphy whispered from outside.

“Cool,” I softly called back.

Fritz looked down at his uniform, looked back up at Grace and said, “I’ll bet you think that because I’ve got a uniform on I’m tied with those guys at the Capitol.”

Grace said nothing, but to me it was clear Fritz had guessed exactly right.

“I’m not,” he told them. “Neither is Gabe. We’re Aggies. We were in the Corps. We’ve got a safe zone—if you could call it that—set up at A&M on the campus. They’re trying to develop a vaccine.”

“A vaccine won’t do us any good,” said Grace. She raised an arm to show her white skin. “We already caught the virus.”

“It might do us some good,” said Fritz, “but it’s not for us. It’s for our future.”