David Golemon - Ripper

“Thanks, Doc,” Jack said as he gained his feet and pulled Ellenshaw to his. He quickly reached out and grabbed the three remaining assault packages strapped to Charlie’s back. He immediately knew what their only escape could be. He pulled out several large coils of very thin black nylon rope. It wasn’t thick but had the tensile strength of a thousand pounds. Jack quickly brought out his rapelling ring and attached it to his pants at the waist. Then he repeated the same for Ellenshaw who was staring at him with wider-than-normal befuddled eyes.

“What is this?” Charlie asked with a small whine.

“Have you ever rapelled before Doc?”

“Uh, no,” he said shaking his head even though Jack had already started prying at the elevator doors next to the stairwell.

“Well, suck it up Doc because you’re about to get a crash course,” he said as he finally parted the two doors and looked down the black tube until it vanished forty-two levels below. The draft produced by the empty and powered-down shaft lifted the colonel’s collar as he watched and listened.

“Suck it up?” Ellenshaw said with panic forcing his eyes now even wider than the thick lenses could account for.

Jack continued to stare into the deep, dark elevator tube. He looked back through the doors when the sounds of crashing and breaking stopped inside the distant laboratories.

“We’re out of time here, Doc.” Jack went to Charlie and quickly threaded the rope through the tungsten steel ring attached to Charlie’s waist. He could feel Ellenshaw shaking almost uncontrollably as he made the connection. “You have to go first, Charlie. I hate to say it, but if for some reason you fall you won’t take me with you. I have to get to the reactors and start the cooling pumps.” Jack added this last little tidbit to take the sting off of Ellenshaw’s possible, no imminent, death.

“Reactors?” he said as he watched Jack reach into the tube and find a good solid attach point for the rope. Then he pulled out another coil of black rope and double-knotted the two together, adding the last of the rope from Charlie’s third assault package. “I hope this is enough,” he said as he stood and patted Ellenshaw on the back.

“What do you mean, you hope ? What if it isn’t?”

Jack smiled. “Isn’t being a soldier fun Charlie?”

“If I get out of this I am never leaving my lab again.”

Jack quickly reached into the bag and pulled out two pairs of leather gloves, slapping one of them into Ellenshaw’s hand. “Put these on, that rope’s going to get hot.”

“Hot? What do you mean—”

“Okay, sling that weapon, no, no, sling it to your back. If it’s in the front it’ll take your head off when … when you land. Now, take your left hand and hold the rope here. Then bring your left to your back and take hold of it there just above your spine. You control the speed of your descent by tightening and loosening your grip at your spine. Do you understand?”

“Uh, no, not—”

“Good, now lean out backward with a firm grip … that’s it, just lean out over the tube. Balance yourself Charlie and hold both rope points tightly,” Jack said as he heard another crash of glass, this time outward into the hallway close by. “I hate to be a little wimp here, Doc, but something wicked this way comes. Hang on,” he said as he kicked Ellenshaw’s feet away from the edge of the elevator doors.

Jack was shocked when Charlie disappeared in a split-second. All he saw was the last of Charlie’s white hair as it vanished into the darkness below just as the colonel’s heart fell through his chest. He knew he had just basically murdered Ellenshaw. He quickly came to his senses.

“Tighten your grip damn it!” Jack screamed fast realizing he had just alerted the thing in back of them to exactly where he was. He leaned into the tube and tried to see Ellenshaw’s bent and broken body anywhere far below. “Doc!”

“Wahoo, that was a rush!” came Ellenshaw’s voice from deep inside the tube. The statement echoed six times before it vanished.

“Damn!” Jack said as he attached his own rope. “Go ahead, Doc, get moving and make it fast. Bizzaro superman is coming.” He had to smile when he heard Ellenshaw zip farther down the tube into the black hole where there was once nothing but good people, and now was filled with monsters. “Good boy Charlie.”

Collins slung three weapons, the shotgun, the Ingram, and an M-14 carbine over his shoulder, and then positioned himself facing away from the tube just as the creature hunting them came around the bend in the corridor. Their eyes locked and the creature exposed its teeth, which were wide and long and were showing through a surprised but very pleased grinning mouth. The abnormal eyes shown in the semidark like those of a hunting cat. It shook its head at the easy prey ahead of it and charged.

“You’ll excuse me if I don’t wait around dickhead,” Jack said as he pushed off into the great abyss of the tube just as the beast roared in anger and defeat.

As the six men and women scrambled down the stairs, it was Mendenhall who realized after half an hour that he was not hearing the sound of pursuit from the creature that had surprised him in the doorway. He held his hand up and the others stopped their descent. Sarah reached around Henri and felt the blood flowing pretty freely.

“Will, the colonel’s wounds have opened up,” she said, trying not to shout.

Denise Gilliam raised the Frenchman’s lab coat and surgical blouse. She shook her head. “Damn it, it’s like he wasn’t stitched up at all.” She looked up at Farbeaux and shook her head, knowing he would have a hard time seeing her disapproval in the darkness of the stairwell. “You stupid Frenchman; why didn’t you say something?”

“Well, Doctor, I didn’t really want to stop and receive any more wounds. That chap in the doorway up there didn’t look like the type that would pause for a wounded man. I don’t think mercy to the fallen is one of their strong suits.”

“Good point,” Sarah said, finally smiling up at him.

“Okay, if he dies, it may be a better death than what’s waiting for us,” Will said as he turned and faced his charges. “Dr. Pollock, we’re on sixty-one. The first vault enclosures are here. Is there anything we can use on this level to help us?”

Virginia tried to bring up the inventory secured inside vaults 0001–1000 from memory to see if anything stood out. She shook her head. “I don’t know, Will. We just moved new artifacts in four days ago. Hell, my mind isn’t working.”

“Can’t say as I blame you for that,” Mendenhall said as he cracked the stairwell door and looked through into the darkened corridor. He saw the security arch leading to the vault section. He could see the dead laser grid and darkened arch, meaning they could enter that section without getting zapped by ten thousand volts of electricity.

“Lieutenant, I think locking ourselves inside one of your magnificent vaults is a very good idea at this point. I prefer it to running aimlessly in this dark stairwell,” Henri said as he tightened his grip on Sarah, who returned the gesture. He was beginning to like being the helpless one in the group.

Mendenhall looked back at the five people behind and above him on the stairs. Gloria looked at him with the hope that he knew what to do. He was loath to disappoint the doctor, so he nodded his head.

“Okay, Colonel, I think you may have something. But the electricity is out, meaning that the vaults are all open. But maybe we can find one of the larger ones and barricade ourselves inside until the cavalry comes.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Virginia said.

“Let’s do it. I have a real bad feeling our luck on this stairwell is fast running out,” Denise offered, looking nervously up into the darkness.