Midnight Mass

"The pepperoni—does it have garlic in it?"

"Probably, I—oops. Sorry about that."

"Throw it out."

"No way, Unk. We might never see another pepperoni again. But we'll eat it outside the car."

Joe was halfway turned around, ready to grab the damn pepperoni and shove it down her throat when he stopped himself.

He turned back and leaned his head against the steering wheel.

What's happening to me?

- 15 -

CAROLE. . . .

At dawn, and not a minute before, Joseph, Carole, and Lacey stepped out of the garage and started toward Fifth Avenue. The pistol in Carole's hand— Joseph had told her it was a 9mm Glock—felt heavy as it swung with her gait, muzzle toward the sidewalk.

They'd been waiting for Joseph when he awoke an hour ago. After Carole had fed him a few drops of her blood, they'd gone to work checking weapons and mentally preparing themselves for the coming ordeal.

While Joseph and Lacey had tinkered with their guns, Carole sidled off with her gear to a far corner of the garage to make her own preparations. In a little while they'd be entering the heart of darkness, with a fair chance of not coming out alive. Carole wasn't afraid of dying. It was undying that terrified her. So while Joseph and Lacey armed themselves from the collection of weapons confiscated along the way, Carole added extra precautions to guarantee she'd never be an undead: extra charges front and back, and extra triggers. If it came to the point where all hope was lost, she'd make her exit. But not alone.

If worse came to worst, she'd be risking eternal damnation to avoid undeath. Carole shuddered at the prospect. She'd been taught that suicide was a one-way ticket to hell, but she hoped and prayed that God would understand. Death before dishonor . . . death before undeath . . . surely that was the right thing to do.

And now they were on the street, heading toward . . . what?

"All right," Joseph said as they neared Fifth Avenue. He was walking between them. "This is it. We take it slow down to Thirty-fourth. If things went as pla

Carole knew all this but let him talk. She sensed an unusual tension in

Joseph. Was it because this was their D-Day, when all their pla

He stopped them at Fifth and worked the slide on his gun.

"Ladies—time to lock and load."

Carole followed his example. The slide gave more resistance than she'd expected.

"Remember what I said," Joseph told them. "If anything happens to me, get out of town and do your best to reach unoccupied territory."

He leaned away and peered around the corner, then turned back to them and nodded.

"I think we're in business."

He motioned them to follow when Carole cleared the corner she saw what he meant. Down the gentle slope, past Thirty-Fourth Street, she spotted three still figures lying on the sidewalk under the Empire State Building's front canopy.

As they passed a smashed and looted Duane Reade, Houlihan's came into view. Writhing forms littered the sidewalk in front of it. One lay in the open doorway next to the revolving door. The odor of fresh coffee wafted across the street through the cool dawn air. On another day, in another place, the smell would have had her salivating, but right now her stomach had shrunk to a tight little knot the size of a walnut.

They crossed the street and now Carole could see the Vichy close up— their gray faces, their bloodshot eyes, their blue lips. She tensed and ducked into a half crouch as she caught movement to her right. One of the Vichy was convulsing on the sidewalk. Her first impulse was to run to his side and help him, but she suppressed it. She, after all, was the reason for his seizure.

Carole stared in horror at the thrashing arms, the foam-flecked lips. It was one thing to plan for their deaths, to imagine them dead. It was something else entirely to witness their death throes.

"Dear God, what have I done?"

JOE . . .

"Let's keep moving," Joe said.

He noticed Carole's sick look. He felt for her, but this was no time for Carole to start second-guessing herself. The old Father Joe might have been appalled, but ex-Father Joe was more fatalistic. It was an ugly scene, but what was done was done. No turning back now.

"Eight," Lacey said. "Your window is shrinking."

Joe checked his watch. He had less than fifty minutes before daysleep took hold. They entered the building and he led Lacey and Carole on a winding course through the prostrate forms in the Empire State's front lobby.

At the elevator banks he stopped when he noticed the closed doors to the local car. He pressed the call button, then stepped back and aimed his pistol at the doors.

He motioned Carole and Lacey to the side. "Be ready to fire. This may not arrive empty."

"But this car is waiting," Carole said, pointing to a set of open doors.

"That's the Observation Deck express. At this point we only want to go to three."

The car arrived empty. Joe got on after Lacey and Carole, stabbed the 3 button, and they were on their way. Mentally he was anxious, but physically he was calm—no butterflies in his gut, no pounding heart. As if his emotions were divorced from his body. Or maybe because his body had entered a new mode of existence, one without adrenaline.

Joe pointed his gun at the doors as the car slowed to a stop on three. They parted to reveal an empty hallway. He touched his fingers to his lips and stepped out. Keeping his pistol raised before him, he approached the open double doors to the security center. He was four feet away when a heavyset Vichy stepped into view.

"About fuckin—"

His eyes widened as he saw them and he was reaching for the pistol in his belt when Joe shot him once in the chest. He staggered back, eyes even wider, and then another shot rang out, catching him below the left eye and snapping his head back. He fell like a tree to lay stretched out on the hall carpet.

Joe glanced at Lacey who had her pistol extended in a two-handed grip.

She smiled. "Just making sure."

He looked at Carol. She clutched her pistol waist high, pointed at the wall. She looked like a startled deer.

Joe stepped into the security area and found the three technicians staring at him in shock. He pointed to the fallen Vichy in the hall.

"Any more like him here?"

They shook their heads.

"No," said the oldest of the three. He looked about sixty with gray hair and a receding hairline. "But there will be soon. He was waiting for his relief so he could go get breakfast."

"His relief's not coming," Joe said. "And breakfast has been canceled."

He allowed himself a moment of congratulation. They'd done it. They'd knocked out the Vichy and captured the Security Center.

Now they had to hold it.

"Who are you?" said the technician. He couldn't seem to pull his gaze from Joe's face.

Joe opened his mouth to speak but Lacey beat him to it.

"Just some nobodies who've come to liberate the building."

"No shit?" said the youngest, who appeared to be in his forties.

"No shit," Lacey agreed. "Who are you three and why are you working for the bloodsuckers?"

"I'm Marty Considine," said the gray-headed one. He pointed to the young one. "This is Mike Leland, and that's Kevin Fowler." The third technician was fat and wore a stained half-sleeve white shirt. He nodded but said nothing.

"As for being here," Considine went on, "we don't have much choice."

"Yeah," said the fat one, Fowler. "Not if we want our wives and kids to live."