Survivor Read Online Free PDF Page B

that.
    The doors of the Plaza were locked, shin-deep snow had drifted up against them. It was dark inside. The only signs of human intervention since the attack were marks on the doors, and on the buildings on the opposite corner. Large spray-painted Xs, with numbers and letters in each quadrant, seemed to record some kind of coded information. I heard a gunshot, far-off, then a few more in quick succession.
    A group of people were coming down Fifth Avenue, moving dark silhouettes, barely visible amidst the snow shower. Six of them. I watched them as they neared me. The soldiers? No. Chasers. Time to move away. I stayed low, keeping against the cars and buildings, and moved up Fifth Avenue.
    There was a pile of rubble up ahead. The figures had stopped in the street, about where I had been standing. Above them was a building with a ten-story billboard running down its side: a woman dressed in not much, advertising . . . a handbag, I think. Despite its size it was hard to tell for sure; hard to imagine a time when anything about that ad made sense.
    I jogged north up Fifth, holding my coat collar tight around my neck to keep the wet out, huddling to the right, sticking close to the buildings for shelter. They were still there behind me, still coming, and matching my speed. I knew they’d not yet seen me, otherwise they’d be chasing hard. They were following my footprints, fresh in the snow. I started to run, flat out, giving everything I had.
    The roads here looked no different from the sidewalks—they were all covered in smashed and crashed cars and vans and trucks, everything buried in ice and snow and ash and debris—and now rain. Up ahead was the mountain of rubble strewn across the road, impassable. I was pretty sure I’d watched this very building come down from the observation deck at 30 Rock in those first few days; a cloud of dust and ash in the still air. Ragged, dangerous.
    I had three options: go around the rubble and through the likely dangers of Central Park, find my way eastward around the next block or two and probably encounter more of the same impassable ruins, or go back the way I’d come.
    I looked back at the figures. They’d stopped momentarily, but started up again no sooner than I’d recounted the six of them. They moved more quickly this time, running hard—then two peeled off down a side street.
    I went with my first choice, and ran across the road to the Central Park side. There was a building set inside the park, brick with white timber-framed windows, set down a couple of flights of steps from street level. It was big and regal looking; four or five stories high, with towers at the corners like some sort of castle. It looked undamaged, safe, and secure.
    To my right there was a stone pillar supporting the steel handrail that led down the stairs. Set into the pillar was a green copper sign that read “To the Zoo and Cafeteria.” I held onto the handrail and walked down the steps, slippery underfoot, icy slick, descending as quickly as I dared. I rushed towards the doors, which were set at the top of a short flight of stone stairs. I was scared and it was raining and I was cold. I shouldn’t have come here, not today, not now.
    Even if those Chasers overshot me, there might not be time in the daylight to make it somewhere safe to spend the night. I could see the Chasers up at street level, closing in; they were following my tracks just as they had been since the Plaza. Maybe the rain would wash them away just enough . . .
    The front doors were brass-framed with clear glass inserts. They were locked. I stood still and listened. I could not hear anything, but I could see the tops of heads walking up the last block on the street up above. I had two minutes, max. Maybe I could smash the glass and unhook a latch or something? I cupped my hands around my eyes and peered through the door, trying to make out details through the glass. It was too dark. I