"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--"
"You don't understand. The people inside, they're going to hurt themselves. They don't know there's no fire."
She was in front of the doors to Elevator Number Two. From inside she could hear screams and thuds.
"Well, I'm not authorized."
"Oh, Jesus Christ." Dance stepped past him and grabbed a screwdriver from his tool kit, a long one.
"Hey, you can't--"
"Let her, Harry," another worker said. "It don't sound too good in there."
The screams were louder now.
"Fuck," Harry muttered. "I'll do it."
He took the screwdriver and set it down then extracted a separate tool from the bag, an elevator door key. He slipped it into the hole and a moment later was muscling aside the doors.
Dance dropped to her belly, hit by a disgusting smell wafting out of the car, vomit, sweat, feces, urine. She squinted. Security lights, mounted on the CCTV camera inside the elevator, were glaring into her face. The ceiling of the car was about eighteen inches above the hospital's linoleum floor. To Dance's surprise, the passengers were fairly calm, their attention on two of their fellows: a pregnant woman, the source of the screaming. And a man in a hospital uniform was passed out, though vertical, since the car was so packed. His face was an eerie blue.
"The fire's out! You're safe!" This was the best way to convince them to calm, she'd decided. Telling them it was a prank, much less an intentional attack, didn't seem advisable.
"He's dying!" somebody called, nodding at the man who seemed to be an orderly. One passenger suddenly snapped, stepped on a fellow occupant and boosted himself up. He lunged and grabbed Dance's collar, trying to pull himself out. Dance screamed as her head was jammed against the metal frame of the car, cutting into her cheek.
"No, listen!" she shouted.