Draculas (10 page)

The ice machine hummed in the corner.

As he filled the bucket, he thought he heard those distant
pops
again over the racket of the falling ice, several floors below.

Back out in the hall, Adam stopped at the big window and peered into the nursery.

Low lit.

None of the glass isolettes was occupied.

His son or daughter would be in there soon.

The doors to the maternity wing swung open and footsteps padded quickly down the hall.

Nurse Herrick emerged around the corner. She was a cute, petite, thirty-something blonde, bit of a cowgirl twang in her voice. He thought he'd seen her at his church before with a seven or eight-year-old boy, but he couldn't be sure.

Adam called out to her.

She stopped and looked at him.

Something was wrong, very wrong--he could see it in her sheet-white face long before he was close enough to notice the speckles of blood that dotted her pink scrubs.

When he reached her, he put a hand on her shoulder--couldn't help himself, comforting was engrained into his nature.

"Carla, what's wrong?"

She shook her head, tears welling.

The ice cracked and settled in his bucket.

"There's been...some kind of outbreak," she said softly, almost too evenly. "It started in the ER, and it's spreading. Fast."

"What do you mean, 'outbreak?'"

She finally met his eyes, and in them, he glimpsed real fear. "People are changing. They're killing each other."

"Where's hospital security?"

"Dead."

Adam quickly turned around. "I have to get Stacie out of here."

He started down the corridor, but Herrick grabbed his arm and pointed back toward the thick, automatic doors she'd just come though, thirty feet beyond the nurses' station.

"That's the only way out, Pastor. You need to understand--the other nurses tried to leave." Her bottom lip quivered. "They didn't make it. I didn't come back up here to help you and Stacie escape. I came back to lock you in, because that's the only chance we have."

AS the elevator climbed slowly toward the third floor, Oasis felt like her stomach was turning itself inside out.

She bent over, vomiting up a pile of black bile laced with birthday cake into the corner of the elevator car.

She cried out, mewling like a kitten.

The bell dinged as The car lifted past the second level.

She stared at her arm, and an idea occurred to her--both comforting and horrifying.

She
was filled with red candy.

Oasis turned her talons over, stared down at the periwinkle veins running like a highway system under the skin of her forearm.

Her teeth would pass so easily through her skin, it probably wouldn't even hurt. Just a little taste was all she needed. She swore she could smell the blood through her flesh. But what if she loved it too much? What if she didn't want to stop and kept sucking and sucking and--

The bell dinged.

The elevator doors parted.

Oasis crossed the threshold and stepped onto the third floor.

Two bounding strides brought her around the corner into a long corridor of rooms.

A fat, old nurse in purple scrubs had been torn apart twenty feet ahead. Oasis sprinted toward her and buried her face in the open chest cavity like a dog into a bowl of Alpo, but nothing was left. The body held only the faintest scent of red candy.

Oasis stood, big tears trailing down what was left of her face.

She sulked down the corridor, and had just started to think about eating her own arm again when she saw a sliver of light escaping from a room up ahead.

Even as she approached, she could smell it, and when she pushed the door open with one of her black, scythe-like talons, she let out a sharp, involuntary cry of joy.

THERE were seven children and three adults in what was called the playroom--an area with several activity tables, a toy chest, and various dry erase boards and easels for watercolors and crayon masterpieces. Running along the far wall was a room-length window, decorated brightly with finger paint. A crudely-drawn bird caught Jenny's eye, its oversized head reminding her of one of the creatures.

When she first became a nurse, pediatrics was her favorite ward. Children, even sick children, had a wonderful innocence about them. They were optimists, even when they were scared and facing death sentences. Though she and Randall had tried, Jenny hadn't become pregnant. If she had, divorcing him would have been so much harder.

She cast a glance at her ex, and saw he was barricading the door they'd entered through, piling chairs and tables against it. Randall...he really seemed to be back to the old Randall. It was almost too much to hope for.

His leg was still bleeding, and Jenny knew she'd have to re-stitch his wound. But first things first. When doing triage, it was important to assess who needed immediate care. She turned her attention back to the sobbing families.

Three of the kids--two boys and a little girl--were sitting with their backs to the window, holding hands. No blood on them, though the boy on the right was bald from chemo. One pre-teen was with an older woman--probably Grandma. They clutched each other tightly, and Jenny wasn't sure who was consoling whom. Another little boy clung to his mom, whose slack, pale expression was an obvious indicator of shock. The last boy, the eldest of them, knelt next to a man, prostrate on the floor, who was bleeding from a neck injury.

Jenny set the bloody hatchet on a table next to some coloring books and hurried to them. The blood pooling around the man was significant. The boy--no more than fifteen--was holding a towel to the man's neck. Before looking at the injury, Jenny checked his radial pulse. The man's skin was cool, sweaty. His face lacked color. Tachycardia--his heart was beating wildly--accompanied by rapid breathing.

Hypovolemia. Stage three or four.

This man was bleeding to death.

"Help my Dad. Please help him."

"Can you hear me, sir?"

Glassy eyes. No response.

The man needed a transfusion, but the hospital's blood bank was in the basement, and even if she made a run for it, and survived the dracula gauntlet, there was no guarantee the man would still be alive by the time she got back.

Jenny hurried to a closet in the corner of the room, the door decorated with crayon pictures. Inside were supplies. No blood, but a saline IV that would help restore some blood volume, oxygen, noradrenaline...

Her finger attacked the keypad over the lock, punching in the four digit code by memory.

A red light came on, and an unpleasant raspberry buzz indicating she'd gotten it wrong.

She tried it again, slower this time.

Another raspberry. They had changed the code. Son of a--

"Lady, can you help me find my mommy?"

Jenny stared down at the little girl tugging on her uniform. Then she cast a frantic glance around for Randall, who was barricading the second entrance.

"Randall! I need to get this door open!"

His head cocked up at the sound of her voice, and after tossing another chair onto the pile he limped over, pulling a screwdriver off of his tool belt.

"Dad! DAD!"

Jenny stared back at the bleeding man, but even at that distance she could see his chest was no longer moving.

"Got it!" Randall had jammed his screwdriver into the door jamb and popped the lock.

But it was too late. Even if Jenny tried CPR, the man had lost too much blood, and his wound was still open.

She walked to the teen, put a hand on his shoulder, and then he hugged her legs, squeezing them hard as he cried.

"Ah, shit," Randall said, noticing the dead man.

Jenny tousled the boy's hair, then motioned for her husband to come over.

"You need to clear a path to one of the doors, so we can drag this man out of here, before he turns into..."

Her voice trailed off, but Randall got the point, limping back to the barricade he'd made. Jenny helped the boy to his feet.

"What's your name?" she asked.

"Peter. Peter Bernacky."

"Peter, my name is Jenny. I'm very sorry about your dad. We're going to put him in another part of the hospital."

"He's...dead..."

"I know he's dead. But I need you to be strong for me. See those little kids sitting by the window? They're really scared right now. Can you help me try to calm them down?"

Peter nodded, and Jenny took his hand and led him to the two boys huddling together, crying hysterically. Peter knelt next to them, his face a mask of tears, and dragged over a toy fire truck. Jenny watched as he tried to engage the younger children, and had to turn away because she felt her own tears coming.

"Please help me find my mommy. One of the monsters took her away." The little girl was tugging on her uniform.

"I'll help in a second, sweetie. But first I need to help Randall. I'll just be a second."

Her husband had pushed aside the pile of chairs, returning access to the door. Checking to make sure Peter wasn't watching, she wrapped her hands around his father's collar and began to drag him toward the exit. He was a man of average size, but the blood loss not only made him lighter, but functioned as a lubricant. She managed to get him three quarters of the way there by herself, and then Randall joined her.

They tugged the dead man into the hall, outside the picture window.

"We can't leave him here," Jenny said. "Peter can still see him."

"We'll take him around the corner. He won't be able to--"

"Mommy!"

The little girl sprinted past, beelining down the hall.

Jenny automatically sprang up to run after her, but her husband's strong arm wrapped around her waist, holding her back.

"I've got to get her, Randall."

"I'll get her. You're staying here."

"Randall..."

Randall shoved her back into the room, then limped off after the child.

Damn him. He probably won't even be able to catch her with that bad leg.

What a stupid, stubborn, selfless fool.

"Randall!" she called out after he rounded the corner. "Be careful! I..."

She almost said
I love you
, but stopped herself. Old habits die hard. Though, if she were forced to tell the truth in a court of law, Jenny still did love the hopeless dope.

Staring down the hallway, she wondered if she should have just said it.

Wondered if she'd ever get another chance.

Squeak...

Squeak...

Squeak...

It was such a familiar sound. Jenny could swear she'd heard it before. Just a little while ago.

What could it be?

Then Jenny remembered.

Benny the Clown's shoes.

She took a fearful look behind her and saw him standing at the other end of the hallway. Just standing there, watching her, his clown outfit drenched in gore. The dracula teeth had broken through his lips and cheeks. But, incredibly, he still wore the red clown nose and the fright wig.

Squeaksqueaksqueaksqueaksqueak!

The clown sprinted at her, its hands outstretched, talons wiggling. Jenny barely had time to scoot back when it pounced--

--on Peter's dead father. Benny the Clown's fangs tore into the corpse's throat, and it shook its head like a dog and pulled away, stretching out the carotid artery as if it were a long string of spaghetti. Jenny managed to get to her feet. Then she danced around Benny the Clown and sprinted toward the playroom. Slamming the door after her, she got behind the nearest table and braced it up against the entrance.

"Help me! Everyone, help!"

Peter and one of the boys began to stack chairs against the door. The others watched through the picture window as Benny the Clown feasted. The woman--the one Jenny guessed was in shock--had locked her eyes on the spectacle. They widened abruptly, and the woman began to scream.

When the door was as secure as Randall had had it, Jenny told Peter and the one boy to sit on the other side of the room and look away. Then she rushed to the screaming woman.

"Miss, you need to be quiet. You're upsetting the--"

"What is that terrible clown doing?" the Grandmother cried.

Jenny forced herself to look. Benny the Clown had torn open the man's abdominal cavity, his claws cradling several loops of glistening intestines. But rather than gorging on them, the clown was stretching and pulling the bloody loops, twisting the organ into knots.

Familiar knots.

"Is that...a flamingo?" asked the old woman.

Jenny couldn't answer. She stared, slack-jawed, as Benny the Clown continued to make balloon animals out of that poor man's innards.

One of the boys passed out.

The screaming woman passed out.

The old woman threw up, her dentures plopping into the puddle of puke.

Besides the flamingo, Benny the Clown also created a wiener dog, a giraffe, and what could have been either a lion or a poodle--some animal with a poofy mane. Jenny summoned up her last bit of courage and rushed the window, banging her palm on the glass.

"Get away from here! Get away from us, you fucking evil clown!"

Benny stared at Jenny. Stared without moving. Without making a sound. Jenny saw cunning, there. Cunning, and the same kind of cold, watchful malevolence that alligators had.

Then Benny the Clown reached up and squeezed his red nose, the fake flower on his chest squirting blood on the window, blurring Jenny's view.

A moment later, the clown was gone, his oversized shoes
squeak-squeaking
down the hallway...

In the same direction Randall went.