She was unfazed. “Are you listening? We’ll be all right. Breathe slowly.”

The biker’s red, bearded face leaned toward hers. Close. He gripped her neck. He was looking past her and for a moment it seemed as if he’d snap bones.

“Breathe,” she said.

And he started to.

“You’re all right. Everybody’s all right. Nothing’s happened to us. We’re fine. There’re sprinklers. The fire department’s on its way.”

This calmed four or five of the passengers, but among the others panic was growing.

“Where the fuck are they?”

“Jesus, Jesus. We’re going to die!”

“No no no!”

“I feel the heat, the flames. You feel that?”

“It’s underneath us. It’s getting hotter!”

“No, please! Somebody.”

“Hey!” the woman aide said calmly. “Just, everybody chill!”

Some people did. But others were still in the grip of panic. They began pounding on the walls, screaming, ripping the hair and clothes of their fellows to get to the door. One woman, in her forties, knocked the biker aside, jammed her nails into the seam between the sliding doors and tried to muscle them open, as he had attempted. “Relax, relax,” the aide said. And pulled her away.

A man screamed into the intercom, “Why aren’t you answering? Why aren’t they answering? Nobody’s answering.”

Sobbing, cries.

Someone defecated.

The orderly realized he’d bit his tongue. He tasted blood.

“The walls! They’re hot. And the smoke.”

“We’re going to burn to death!”

The orderly looked at the doctor. He was unconscious. A heart attack? Had he fainted?

“Can’t you hear us? We’re stuck.” No response from security.

“No, no!”

More screams.

“It’s not that hot!” the biker called, now more or less calm. “I don’t think the fire’s that close. We’re going to be okay.”

The nurse said, “Listen to him! We’ll be all right.”

And, slowly, the panicked passengers began to calm.

Which had no effect on the orderly at all. He couldn’t take the confinement for a moment longer. He suddenly felt himself consumed by a wholly new level of panic. He turned his back to the people in the car and whispered, “I’m sorry.” To his wife and son.

His last words before panic became something else. A snake winding through his mouth and into his gut.

Frenzy…

Sobbing, he tore the pocket from his scrubs, wadded it into a ball and stuffed it down his own throat. Inhaling the cloth into his windpipe.

Die, please let me die… Please let this horror be over.

The suffocation was terrible, but nothing compared to the claustrophobia.

Please let me…let me…

His vision went black.

Chapter 64

Listen to me!” Kathryn Dance shouted. “Listen!”

“I’ve got my orders.”

She was on the third floor of the East Wing of the hospital, speaking to one of the maintenance men.

“We need that door open now.”

“Lady, Officer, sorry. We gotta wait for the elevator repair people. These things are dangerous. It’s not gonna fall. There’s no fire. I mean, there was a little one but it’s out now and—”