The Sleepers: Quarantined New York

CHAPTER4

And suddenly, everything fell apart. One of the criminals reached for the gun in his belt with a swift movement. Time seemed to slow down, but the sound of gunfire was deafening. The police immediately returned fire. A short but terrifyingly fierce shootout ensued. Bullets struck the concrete, sparks flew, and dust swept through the air. Then, as suddenly as it began, everything stopped.

Silence returned, but this time it carried the smell of death. Two men lay motionless on the ground, amidst the dust and rubble.

A few hours passed. The sun had risen a little higher, casting a grey light on the construction site. Crime scene investigators swarmed everywhere like ants, yellow tape fluttering in the wind. Flashes went off, cameras clicked… Everything proceeded like a cold, routine part of a procedure.

Tommy, standing aside, lit a cigarette, trying not to hide his trembling hands. The smoke slowly rose and dispersed in the cold air. Jack stood a little further away. His gaze was fixed on the lifeless bodies on the ground, but his mind was far removed from the construction site. Tommy took a deep drag of smoke and turned to Jack: “You’re unusually quiet today, Jack.” Jack didn’t answer. After watching the corpses for a while longer, he spoke without looking at Tommy: “I’ve been thinking about Bob’s offer.”

Tommy pulled the cigarette from his mouth in surprise, slowly turning his head towards Jack: “Are you serious? Are you really going to go there, to that quarantine?”

Jack shrugged slightly, his voice hanging in the air: “I don’t know.” Another short silence followed. Tommy’s voice was now more warning, darker: “That place… isn’t normal, Jack. People who go don’t come back, nobody tells you what’s going on inside.”

Jack slowly shook his head and looked into his friend’s eyes: “This place isn’t normal either, Tommy. Nothing is normal here anymore.”

Tommy threw the cigarette butt on the ground and crushed it hard with the tip of his boot. “Let me check that car, maybe we’ll find something,” he said, leaving Jack to his own thoughts as he walked away. Jack was alone. The wind whistled through the reinforcing steel. He slowly turned and looked at one of the bodies on the ground, the man whose life had just been taken. He narrowed his eyes, focused. For a moment, it was as if nothing existed, only the rigidity of death.

Then—at that very moment—something terrifying happened. The finger of the corpse on the ground…moved very slightly, almost imperceptibly.

Jack froze. He felt his heart pounding in his chest. He blinked rapidly and looked again. The body was completely motionless; blood mixed with dust, the man’s eyes staring into space. But he was sure he had seen the movement. Jack’s breath caught in his throat, the air in his lungs turning icy.

He whispered to himself: “…No. No, it can’t be.” He didn’t want to believe what he had seen. His mind must be playing tricks on him. He recoiled in horror, feeling as if the lifeless body might come alive at any moment and seize him by the throat. He averted his eyes, shaking his head rapidly from side to side; he tried to erase that image, that tiny tremor, from his mind. He turned around and began walking quickly towards Tommy. But his walk was no longer the same. His steps had become heavy, an invisible weight on his shoulders. Inside him, there was only one thing growing like a gnawing worm: an irreversible suspicion. The weariness of the evening hung in the corridors of the police station. The sharp, orange light of the sunset filtered in through the tall windows, creating long, crooked shadows on the dusty floors. The interior of the building, cleansed of the chaotic noise of the day, was enveloped in a strange and unsettling silence. Jack was nowhere to be seen; it was as if his soul had left the place the moment the decision was made. An officer approached Bob's room with heavy steps.