Gregg Hurwitz - The Survivor

The strain of holding Yuri’s body for all that time had cost him, his right arm, too, now weak and tingling. He waited, listening. Was that the faint sound of breathing he heard off the concrete and glass? Someone else’s or his own, thrown back at him?

The pillars were broad, industrial; Pavlo could even be hiding on the opposite side of the very one Nate had shouldered into. Bracing himself, he pivoted around the corner and then the next, keeping an eye out for movement behind the other pillars as well. His left foot dragging, his shoulder complaining with every jolt, he broke cover, running to the next pillar. He made the same painful progress around it. When he sprinted for the third, he heard footsteps somewhere else in the room, echoes disguising the source. Gunshots blew out the windows behind him, and he arrived at the far pillar, panting, the fresh draft chilling the sweat on his face.

“I’m here, Pavlo,” he called out.

No response.

The AR-15 rattled in his grip. Blood streaked down his left arm, dripping off the elbow. Each limb, skewered by pinpricks. He looked down at his fingers, willing them to hold on. A spate of light-headedness came on in a fury, then departed just as abruptly.

He risked a glance across the enormous space. Three equidistant pillars marked the long stretch of the opposing wall as well. The glow of the moon through the skylight cast ghostly reflections off some of the windows. Peering out, he studied the glass behind the far pillars for mirrored images, finally spotting a shard of a figure, barely visible given the angle. Narrow build, cap of blond hair, gun held in both hands, pointing at the floor.

Misha.

Which meant Pavlo was on the roof.

With the blood loss and the state of his muscles, Nate wouldn’t have much time before he was too weak to be useful. Quietly, he withdrew the light Glock from his waistband. The AR-15 slipped in his left hand, almost clattering to the concrete; he’d have to do everything with his right. He set the Glock silently on the floor beyond the pillar, the handle positioned for a quick grab. Then he switched the assault rifle to his right hand. Easing from behind the pillar, he knelt in a shooter’s position. Using his remaining strength, he tossed the assault rifle to the side of the pillar.

Before the gun reached the peak of its trajectory, he snatched up the Glock, doing his best to steady the pistol in his right hand. Insensate as a slab of meat, his left hand pressed to the base of the handle, propping it up. Static fuzzed his vision, and he blinked it away, and then everything went down in three quick claps.

The assault rifle striking the floor.

Misha darting from behind the pillar, firing at the blank air above the rifle.

And Nate squeezing the trigger.

Misha spun, a spray of blood painting the window behind him, then struck the floor, half concealed by the pillar, his shoes twitching.

Grunting, Nate started across, each step a fresh agony. His limbs felt so weak that it seemed he was moving himself with his core, dragging his feet along with his stomach muscles. The cold air of the room smelled of spicy cologne. He passed the mattress, rotating the gun barrel from Misha’s feet to the square of black sky atop the floating staircase.

Step, pause. Step, pause. Keep moving.

To his left he heard a whisper of fabric, and, too late, he realized.

He flung himself away, landing on his back and firing as Pavlo reared up from the mattress, a silk sheet fluttering behind him like a cape. The room exploded with gunfire, each crack amplified, each muzzle flare multiplied off the walls of facing glass. Concrete chipped near Nate’s face, flecks biting into his cheek, and he saw two holes open up in the still-descending sheet behind Pavlo, everything miraculously missing until a bullet slammed into Nate’s side. The howl issuing from his lips was little more than a heated rush of air.

The old man leaped from the mattress onto the floating staircase and bounced toward the laid-open hatch, lunging two, three steps at a time. On his back, Nate aimed the trembling pistol and squeezed off one shot after another, the sparks catching up to the man until a round finally caught his calf just before it pulled up out of sight.

Pavlo’s body thumped down on the roof, unseen. Not so much as a yelp. An instant of silence.

Then a scraping.

Nate looked down at his side. A quarter-size hole, leaking ink. He reached behind, found the exit wound. Through and through.

Rolling to all fours, he forced himself to his feet. The only way he could walk was in a half shuffle, tugging one leg along. His right hand held the gun, so he tried to clamp the wound with his left but could apply virtually no pressure at all. He mounted the stairs, drizzling blood in a neat line at his feet.

His vision spotted, his legs growing wobbly beneath him. He pictured Cielle with her coloring book on that airplane, bouncing over the Rockies.

Is it gonna be okay?

Yeah. It’s gonna be okay.

Climbing the stairs took such focus that he barely noticed when his head pulled up into the sight line. A flash of light and a bullet wavered the air inches from his temple, the bark of the gun coming on a split-second delay. Across the roof Pavlo backed up, tender on his wounded leg, readying for a second shot.

Nate lifted the gun as far as his strength allowed and fired. A bullet embedded in Pavlo’s thigh, tearing his pants, revealing the tattooed star on his kneecap. Pavlo’s gun clattered to the rooftop, sliding to the edge and then off, and he clenched his jaw and took a few hobbling steps toward Nate, his sinewy face contorting with rage.

“I will not kneel to you.”

Nate’s next shot shattered his hip. Pavlo jerked ninety degrees, red mist puffing from his waist. He wobbled on his feet, then squared himself again, screaming, tendons standing out on his blue-inked neck.

“I will not-”

Hand shaking around the Glock, Nate shot out his ankle.

Pavlo collapsed onto the roof, his knees striking hard, jolting him before he fell flat onto his stomach. Then he started dragging himself away, elbow over elbow, toward the brink of the roof. Nate started after him.

The staggering openness and panoramic view snatched the breath from his lungs, and he paused for a drunken instant to regain his balance. It seemed he was standing on top of the entire city. Los Angeles unfurled below, a bejeweled blanket. The digital billboards and flashing club signs, green stoplights and stalled cars, all the stop-go, all that hot-cold, all those souls floating through the streets on gleaming rims, walking the corners on patched-up pumps, clogging the alleys gripping brown-bagged bottles. Everything was flayed open and laid bare, the gonna-bes and winged dreamers, the glittering lights coursing block to block, the blood of the city. Here Nate had soared and crashed. And here he had salvaged from the wreckage the slivers worth keeping, had pieced them together with trembling hands to form something better, something true.

The taste of the night air was oddly pleasing, wild fennel and sage of the canyon mixed with ash from the explosion. His blood felt warm against his skin and then quickly cold. He sent a signal to his legs, and a moment later they started moving again.

On his belly ahead, Pavlo grunted and scraped, grunted and scraped. Walking across the wide skylight, Nate left footprints of blood. He’d just reached the other side when a voice said, “Stop.”

Nate halted, gun lowered, shoulders slumping, his inhalations coming in weak rasps. For a moment he just breathed, and he heard Misha breathing behind him, too, waiting for a single wrong move.

Slowly, Nate turned. Misha stood on the skylight, aiming directly at his forehead. Nate’s Glock remained at his side in his all-but-dead right hand; he couldn’t raise it if he tried. Misha’s boyish face looked smooth and innocent in the pale light. Blood gleamed on one of his hands, a pinkie finger sticking out at the wrong angle, but that didn’t stop him from keeping the sights dead level.