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The trip up took twenty damned minutes Hundreds of feet Finally we jolted to a stop and an opening appeared in the wall We were looking at a long corridor, rounded at the top and ranite It was lit with fluorescent lights and decorated arning signs about contaht around the plastic handle of the chainsaw and stepped into the hall, Molly following a step behind We went th of four or five city blocks, John with the little pi lot fla how much noise the chainsaould as in it

We reached a door Just a regularit open and we ducked inside

The floor turned into a ed onto a catwalk I looked over the rail and saere suspended over an expanse the size of an airplane hangar, but dimly lit The floor was populated with people in white, bustling around like aaround tables and equip of feet, people working in the dark

We took a few steps forward and realized eren’t alone A lass faceplate that reminded me of the conta in labs, stood on the catwalk about ten feet away He had a Subway sandwich bag in one gloved hand and a pack of cigarettes in the other He stared at us for a long er of fla from a tool that thesquirt gun

John said, "We’re from the fire department"

The man spun on his heels and sprinted the other direction, feet clanging on the grated h a doorway We followed and found ourselves on a spiral stairwell going down, John shouting at theto see his flammability permit

The man hit bottom and threw himself out of another doorway We followed and found ourselves at ground level on the factory floor, or what ever it was, surrounded by people in white ju us These men did not wear the face masks and seemed, to a hts here and there on pieces of hts and no la patches that cast upside-down shadows Thedisappeared into the crowded darkness and we didn’t follow

To my left were blue plastic barrels, rows and rows of thee were tithout lids, full of a deep crimson fluid that indeed looked like trans over one of the open barrels, dipping into it and collecting samples in vials One of the men turned to face me, and I saw that he did not have a face

Or, I should say he had half a face The forehead curled down over where the eyes should be, joining the cheeks The nostrils ide and flat, African He had a thin, lipless uy next to hiuys were hefting huge translucent plastic bags, vacuum-packed and shrunk around what looked like sides of beef

I gawked around like a little tourist kid Alongyou’d see at a city aquariu inside were pale blurred shapes that s, ss and things like squirrels I walked down the row, dazed I blinked, trying desperately to adjust to the se in I had the crazy thought that no wonder they didn’t pay to light the place Most of the people here didn’t have eyes No need to pay the extra electric bill

No ement is always a bunch of cheap bastards

I heard John ust or both I followed his gaze and saire cage twenty or so feet away, containing a thin, young boy Maybe ten years old He stood there, looking terrified, fingers hooked through the wireat e, round andon the side The light flipped to green, an electronic sound emitted The boy screamed

The boy’s skin bubbled and wrinkled One of his eyes deflated and ran down his cheek as a white goo, not unlike semen Muscle liquefied and fell off his bones He folded into the ground, left as a quivering lump The lump bubbled and twitched and took on shape Two stued A cloven hoof Twobehindwith e at a pink, well-fed pig

"Mother Fucker"

That was John, behind e, sniffing at ht, but wasn’t sure, I saw the same imprinted pi tattoo Molly once had and Drake had and--what the fuck did it all ht I’d rip it out The saw roared to life

John looked down at Molly and said, "You better poop that bo this place to Hell"

"PUT IT DOWN!"

John and I spun to see a man in one of the "clean" suits,an enormous rifle at us that seeh a s his way past the white-suited workers

John did not put the fla end of the thing at the man and say, "You put yours down, asshole"

I said, "I’d do it, sir We’re pissed"

"YOU HAVE ONE SECOND TO DROP THAT CHAINSAW AND THATTHING"

At this point, John flung hiround and screamed, "YOU SHOT ME! AAARRRRGHHH!"