“What if it doesn’t have the keys in it?” asked Murphy.

“I grew up in Baltimore,” I said, and left it at that.

“Lot of those things down there,” said the president. “Feel free to run them over with that truck. Might as well have some fun.”

Maybe it was meant as gallows humor, but it landed flat and nobody cracked even a little smile. The president gave a disgusted shake of his head. I saw him mouth the word “pussies.”

Top unzipped the equipment bag he’d brought from the SUV. It was full of guns, grenades, and ammunition. The president walked over and looked at them, and he gave an appreciative nod. He even chuckled.

“Isn’t this the point where you SpecOps jocks make some hard-ass quip about kicking ass and taking names?” he asked.

Top straightened and gave him a warm, genial, almost fatherly smile. “I’m probably going to die out there, Mr. President, and I’m definitely going to get my ass in trouble for anything I say,” he said quietly, “so I guess I better make it good. Fuck you. Fuck you all to hell and back. Fuck you to death. Fuck you and everyone you ever knew.” His smile brightened. “How’s that for a quip?”

The Secret Service agents all started to take a threatening step forward. Bunny was standing right behind Top, and I was behind him. They looked at us, at their president, and then into the middle of nowhere. POTUS stood there with a face that had gone as red as the blood on the streets.

“Get me to my goddamn plane,” was all he said.

— 13 —

We went down in the elevators. Chang and Murphy, POTUS, my team, and Torres in one car; everyone else squeezed into the other. We’d brought spare body armor and had helped the president strap it on, and I gave him my ballistic helmet. Top didn’t like that but kept it to himself. Bunny asked him if he knew how to use a gun, but the president shook his head.

When the elevator doors opened, we stepped into one of the inner rings of hell.

The barricaded door had failed. All the people who had been trying to keep the infected out were among the first to rush at us with dead eyes and bloody teeth. I heard someone in our car sob. Not sure who it was. Could have been me for all I know.

We stepped into madness.

Bunny led the way with his shotgun. It holds fifty rounds of twelve-gauge and it was a target-rich environment. Top and I flanked him while the others formed a defensive ring around the president. We waited as long as we could for the second car to arrive.

It never did.

It must have stopped on another floor, as ours had on the way up. There was too much noise and distance to hear if they were up there making a fight of it. I hoped they were alive, but I never found out. We never saw them again.