“I dunno,” he said. “Barely enough room for someone to wiggle through. Motion sensors should have turned on the big floods. If they even work.”
He looked up at his partner, who kept looking all around, the M-16 held in ready position.
“What you thinking, Jacko? Anything come through here?”
“Someone cut a goddamn hole. I dunno, and—”
“Right. Shit. I hear you. All right, we go talk to the tenant. The eagle eyes who saw something.”
Jack stood back up, shifting his own gun into a ready position.
“Yeah. Maybe we got lucky. False alarm. Some dog.”
Rodriguez looked right at Jack and laughed.
“Yeah. You think there are still
“Well, that hole—”
“Dream on, brother,” Rodriguez said. “Dogs. Shit. Just walking around.” Another big laugh. “Like the good old days? Dream the fuck on.”
They headed to the front door of the building.
3
Inside the Apartments
They took the stairs.
Way too many stories about elevators that just stopped. And then you were truly trapped. All boxed up and waiting for whatever would work its way down the steel cables to you.
Because whatever the Can Heads were, they weren’t completely mindless. They could still think a bit, even when they looked and acted like crazed rabid animals desperate for food.
Only in this case, food meant other people. The ones who hadn’t turned cannibal.
Did they turn on themselves?
Undoubtedly. Hungry enough, they certainly would.
But like any other predator, it was much more efficient for them to hunt weaker prey. Humans.
Jack and Rodriguez took the steps slowly, ears cocked for any sounds from the hallways.
“Seems all quiet,” Rodriguez said.
“Hmm?” Jack said.
Rodriguez turned to him. “See, Jacko? That new stuff around your head. Cuts down on your hearing. Not the best idea.”
Jack pushed the armored flap away from his right ear. “I hear fine. You were just whispering.”
“Riiiight.”
Past the third-floor entrance door, and up one more flight. The steps littered with trash. Kids probably still came here to screw or ingest whatever they could find in hopes that it might get them high. Maybe doing drugs was all the more exciting with the thought that there were dangerous things out there.
These teenagers had grown up with the idea of Can Heads for more than half their lives.
Just part of the wonderful landscape.
Yeah, different world from the one your parents grew up in.
That’s for fucking sure.
“Here we are,” Rodriguez said.
As the senior partner, he’d set up their recon plan.
“Okay, after we’re in, you lay back here. Just watch the hallway, the other apartments, ’kay?”
“Sure.”
“I’ll go talk to our Mr. Tomkins and see what the hell it is he thought he saw. Did the big lights go on outside, then go off? Where did he see them go? Maybe we can be out of here in ten minutes. Shit, maybe even stop for a beer on the way back.”
A local dive, The Hook, stayed open 24/7. Right near the 63rd Precinct, its customers were cops and those who didn’t really have any good place to hide for the night.
Sucking down beers and shots on a stool rather than facing the streets.
“Maybe.”
Rodriguez hesitated at the door to the hallway.
“What? You are
Jack grinned. He doubted there were too many women on the planet who could live with Rodriguez.
Rodriguez grabbed the doorknob.
“Okay. Here we go.”
They walked into the hallway.
* * *
Jack stayed twenty feet back from Rodriguez as he went to the apartment door.
The door moved as he knocked. Just an inch. It was open.
Jack kept looking to the rear, down to the other end of the dingy hallway for any signs of movement. Everyone was probably safely locked down and asleep for the night.
After the knock, no reaction.
Rodriguez looked back at Jack and gave a shrug.
Now a small push while at the same time pressing the doorbell.
The bell gave out a raspy shriek, way too loud, as if they had put the ringer on the wrong side of the door.
“Shit. I’m going in,” Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez kicked at the open door, the noise loud, the door banging open. Jack didn’t like making noise. He kept looking around.
Always fucking bad, he thought. Not knowing if something was about to happen.
Rodriguez took a few steps inside. Then: “Hello?”
Back to Jack.
Gesturing. Two fingers to his eyes. A freaking army move.
Like they were in a goddamn war zone. Police as army.
The ear bud in Jack’s left ear was silent. The two-way radios were so damn unreliable. No one from the station house asking how things were going. Everyone dozing. Though Miller undoubtedly had their audio on a speaker somewhere.
Very low.
Wouldn’t want to wake anyone up.
If he could pick them up at all.
Jack took another look behind him and then started moving closer to the open door. If it all looked cool, he’d follow his partner in.
He got to the doorway.
Rodriguez, louder now to an apparently empty apartment. “Hello? Anyone the hell here?”
Nervous.
