Draculas (5 page)

Gunshots.

Somebody was shooting up the lobby.

Her heart began to thud as she hammered her palm against the button bank, pushing them all, any floor, she didn't care, just not the lobby. Wasn't there a way to stop these things? No sooner had the thought cleared than she saw the red STOP button. But as she reached for it the doors slid open.

Ernie looked up at her from the floor just outside the doors.

No, not Ernie. Just his head.

She screamed and began banging on the floor buttons again. She caught a flash of movement beyond Ernie's head. Someone racing for the elevator.

No--some
thing
. It was shaped like a man and dressed like a man, though its shirt was in tatters. But there the resemblance stopped. Splattered head to toe with blood and its face...a horror of bloody jutting fangs and black eyes.

And it was charging her!

Shanna screamed again. As the elevator doors began to slide toward each other, she pressed her palms against them and tried to speed their progress. Through the narrowing opening she saw the fanged monster with its arms extended, its taloned hands scoring the air as it raced toward her.

The doors...just a few more inches...an inch...

Steel met steel just as a heavy weight slammed against the other side. The cab began to rise.

Shanna sobbed with relief and slumped to the floor.

That
thing
...its wild, insane teeth resembled the skull Mortimer received earlier...the teeth that had pierced Mortimer's throat.

And despite all the blood, Shanna had recognized the gold belt buckle on its pants.

She sobbed again, this time in disbelief.

"Mortimer?"

"HER name's Oasis," the new LPN said from the head of the gurney.

Her nametag read
Rodriguez
and she was all dark eyes and mocha skin and black hair. Not bad looking if you went for the Hispanic thing. Lanz preferred blondes.

He shook his head.
Oasis
...was that who her mother was listening to when she conceived her? He brushed the question away and tried to focus on the girl's arm.

Not an easy thing. But at least the ER was secured. The guard had returned Ernie's head to his body, Winslow was escorting the orderlies and the four new corpses down to the cooler, and two gun-toting uniforms were ready for trouble.

Okay. Now to Oasis. The kid was sedated with a little diazepam but strapped down anyway. She had five tears in her forearm where she'd been bitten. The EMT stood by to help restrain her if she started struggling.

Lanz held out his hand. "Lido."

Rodriguez placed a syringe of local anesthetic on his palm. He was about to begin injecting when the EMT backed away.

"Ooh, man."

Lanz glanced up at him. He wore a strange look.

"Don't tell me you're afraid of needles."

"No, man." His voice was slurred. "I stick 'em in people alla time. I just feel like shit alla sudden."

He rubbed a hand across his face and Lanz noticed that one of his fingers was red and swollen to twice its size. Hadn't he said he'd been bitten by Moorecook? Cellulitis already?

"Sit down before you fall down."

Christ, was the EMT going to wind up a patient too? What else could go wrong?

He turned back to the kid. She began squirming as he injected the local--burned like hell for a few seconds going in, then the area went numb. He heard a hiss off to his right and glanced over to where the EMT slumped in a chair with his head lolling back. His mouth hung open and he was breathing funny.

Lanz had heard that sound before...just a little while ago--

Suddenly the EMT choked and bent forward. He hacked and spit. Not mucous.

Teeth.

He looked up at Lanz, his eyes tortured...and
red
. "Doc, I feel like sh--
aaagh
"

A claw exploded from his infected fingertip, and then his other fingers followed.

Just like with Moorecook.

And then huge fangs extruded from his jaws, ripping through his cheeks and lips.

Just like Moorecook.

Oh, Christ, was it contagious?

Another hiss, closer. He looked down at the girl. Her red-rimmed ebony eyes were wide open, and she was spitting teeth, but rows at a time, the braces linking them like bloody little fence posts.

Lanz backed away. Both bitten, both changing. It
was
contagious.

Oasis ripped her clawed hands free of the restraints as fangs ripped through her face. The EMT was up now, approaching the gurney as Oasis sat up. Both had their eyes fixed on Lanz and Rodriguez. The LPN was backing away too. She bumped into Lanz. Instinctively he grabbed her and shoved her toward the gurney. She screamed horribly when the claws pulled her forward and fangs tore her flesh. As blood sprayed, Lanz turned and ran.

Out of the treatment room, into the ER proper. Ignore the terrified, questioning faces. Find a place to hide. A door--SUPPLIES. The handle won't turn. Locked. Of course. But he has a key. He fumbles it free, unlocks the steel door, ducks inside, closes and locks it behind him.

Safe! OhgoodChrist, safe!

Lanz slumped to the floor and leaned with his back against some shelving. Gradually he controlled his breathing, felt his heart slow.

He got a grip. He had control.

Okay. Assess the problem.

Some sort of contagious agent--viral, chemical, whatever--had invaded the hospital. Moorecook seemed to be patient zero, at least in Blessed Crucifixion. The two who'd changed had been bitten by him, which was a good indicator it was blood or saliva borne.

He quickly checked himself for cuts or scratches. None. Good. He was infection free. He had a steel door between him and the contaminated. He--

Something in his mouth. He spit it out.

A tooth.

No!

AS Randall marched down the corridor, it occurred to him that limping out to his truck to retrieve a chainsaw in order to cut up a feral beast that gobbled intestines was exactly the kind of "acting without thinking" behavior that had caused so many problems in his marriage. Well, that and the drinking.

He was in no shape to be walking around like this--he was, after all, hospitalized with a severe leg injury. He didn't actually
need
his chainsaw--it was a hospital, so they probably had giant bone saws or other tools for dismemberment that were closer than the parking lot. Not to mention that by the time he actually limped out there, got his chainsaw, and limped all the way back, somebody else probably would have already dealt with the dracula creature issue. And hospital security was probably not inclined to let a gown-wearing, stitched-up lumberjack enter the facility with a chainsaw, even in a time of crisis.

But when Randall got set on an idea, he saw it through. No matter what. He wasn't going to turn around and sheepishly say, "Ummmm, changed my mind." Jenny had little enough respect for him as it was. Whatever respect he'd earned before their marriage he'd pissed away during it. He'd let the booze turn him into someone he'd never choose to be, someone he never wanted to be again.

But when Randall Bolton started something, he finished it, whether it was building a treehouse for the son that he hoped to have someday or sitting through an entire wedding for somebody he didn't know because he'd gone to the wrong church.

And if he
did
manage to protect his ex-wife with his chainsaw, maybe he'd regain some of his dignity. He loved his chainsaw. Loved being a lumberjack, even if other people liked to sing that cross-dressing song by those British assholes. Loved the sound of falling trees smashing to the ground. Loved the outdoors. Even loved the word "lumberjack," despite the fact that a couple of his buddies insisted on being called "arborists."

But the day before yesterday, he'd been humiliated. Oh, sure, he could see where it would be funny to the other lumberjacks--he would've been laughing his ass off if it happened to somebody else--but his face burned red just thinking about it. He knew people thought he'd fallen off the wagon, but he hadn't touched a drop in almost a hundred days. And you know, it used to be a struggle--that whole one-day-at-a-time thing--but now it felt
good
to be sober.

The accident wasn't his fault. Really. He hadn't done anything stupid or careless. He'd been happily chainsawing away, and as the tree started to wobble a squirrel was dislodged from the branches, landing on his hard hat and then scampering down his back. He hadn't shrieked like a girl or anything, but
anybody
would yelp if a goddamn squirrel dropped on their head from thirty feet. Randall flinched, twisted around, and his chainsaw blade hit the back of his leg.

He couldn't hear his buddies laughing over the chainsaw motor, but oh, they were in hysterics. Blood was gushing from his shredded flesh and they were having themselves a great big ol' guffaw. Again, he would've laughed too...but still,
fuck
those guys.

He refused to let them drive him to the hospital. He'd drive there his goddamn self. He only needed one good leg to drive, so those giggling bastards could burn in hell for all he cared.

Of course, he'd started to get dizzy as he drove, and realized that because of his stubbornness he was bleeding all over his own truck instead of somebody else's. But he didn't pull over. He drove all the way to the hospital (while Jack and Frank drove behind him, presumably to make sure he didn't pass out at the wheel) and checked himself in.

Randall desperately wanted to make peace with his chainsaw.

Putting it through the head of a dracula would do just fine.

He picked up his pace as he walked out of that big room where they made you wait. A nurse covered in blood was having a panic attack while a doctor shook her. Randall didn't like seeing that kind of shit--you didn't put your hand on a woman like that even if she
was
freaking out--but he had to focus. Ignore the chaos. Think only of Jenny and his chainsaw.

He exited the hospital, half-expecting somebody to say "Hey! That gown is hospital property!" He'd grabbed his shoes on his way out of his room and put them on during the elevator ride down, but hadn't taken the time to grab his pants. He wished he had them. His chainsaw-the-monster redemption would be a lot better if his ass wasn't hanging out.

Unfortunately, he hadn't parked close. By the time he'd driven to the hospital, woozy from blood loss, he'd misjudged the distance to the building by over a hundred yards. He had a vague recollection of Jack and Frank helping him get into the ER, but couldn't for the life of him remember where he'd left his Dodge. The lot was full, and apparently every other driver in the county owned a red pick-up. He weaved through the rows, wishing he had one of those little clicky-things he could press to make his horn honk.

When he finally caught sight of his Dodge, he picked up the pace even more, but that seemed to pull at his stitches and he slowed his pace again to something that wouldn't rip his leg back open.

It never occurred to him to just get in the truck and drive away. It occurred to him that maybe he
should
think about that, but no way in hell was Randall going to abandon Jenny. He had more flaws than he had stitches in his leg, but fear was not one of them. Jenny could be a complete bitch to him--and probably would be--but he'd make sure she got out of there safely.

Of course, you could have done that better by staying with her, instead of limping out here to get a chainsaw...

Fuck you, brain.

Thirty-eight calls. Wow. He'd thought it was more like ten. He could blame about thirty-five of them on the heavy-duty painkillers, but the last three...well, he'd just really wanted to talk to Jenny. He wouldn't have minded if she laughed about the squirrel. At least he'd hear her laugh. He missed her laugh. They used to laugh a lot, but he'd killed that.

Focus. He needed to focus.

He walked up to his truck. The chainsaw rested there on the seat where he'd left it. (Normally it went in the back, but it hadn't been a normal day. And would Jack and Frank have brought along their chainsaw if it cut open their leg? Hell no, they wouldn't have. They could laugh all they wanted, but the proof of his manly nature was right there.)

There was dried blood all over the seat. It was going to cost a fortune to have that cleaned, assuming it
could
be cleaned. He might have to just rip the seat out and have it replaced. Shit.

He focused again.

Then he cursed as he realized that the truck door was locked. His keys were in his hospital room on the third floor. Son of a bitch.

He let out an angry sigh. No possible way was he returning to that hospital without a chainsaw. Not a chance. He walked to the back of the truck and picked up his metal toolbox. There were plenty of other tools in the back, including a hatchet, but he'd rather have a broken window and his chainsaw. If he were wearing actual pants, he could've wedged the hatchet into the waist, but the gown left little opportunity to...

No, wait. He had a utility belt. He quickly lifted his gown and put on the thick belt, which had a nice assortment of tools, then slid the hatchet in there. Cool. He looked absolutely ridiculous, but he had lots of toys now.

He returned to the passenger-side door, turned his head to avoid getting glass chunks in his eyes, and used the toolbox to smash through the window. He unlocked the door, opened it, and grabbed the chainsaw. Yes!

It still had his blood on the blade. He kind of liked that.

He limped back toward the building.

Screams from inside. Lots of them.

What the hell was going on?

He'd seen that
Dracula
movie when he was a kid, but that slick-haired guy didn't do anything like this.

Randall walked back inside. The room (it was the Emergency Room, right? Or did they take people to the Emergency Room after they waited in this room?) was absolute chaos. He could barely process it all. People were screaming and panicking and
getting ripped apart and eaten.
He'd known that things were bad when he left...but he'd only gone to the parking lot for a few minutes!