Michael Palmer - Extreme Measures

Laura started with a few slow arcs. Then she began whirling the bucket around, increasing the speed and the length of the belts each time.

"That's it, that's it," Scott said. The bucket grazed the metal.

"Keep going. Keep going."

Laura's upper arms and shoulders began to cramp. Her smooth swings became weaker and more erratic.

"Don't stop," he urged. "Find the strength. Come on, you can do it."

She bit into her lower lip and grasped the belt tightly with both hands, increasing the speed of her swings. Her arms quickly grew numb and heavy. The cramps worsened. Then, at the moment when she felt she had to stop, the bucket slammed against the metal guard, popping it free, and sending it clattering against the wall. The bulb sheared off, spraying small shards of glass across the room. Laura let the bucket drop soundlessly onto the blankets, and then raced over and retrieved the protector.

"That was good," Scott said, pausing between words to breathe.

"That was real good." He studied the metal piece by the right of the window. "Stamp on this as hard as you can. I need a piece of it about this long.

Laura set the guard on the concrete floor and stamped it flat.

The welds holding the stiff wire broke apart, yielding several pieces of the length Scott had indicated. She snapped one off and passed it over.

He studied it briefly and then handed it back. With Scott directing her, she pinned the metal beneath the lip of the bucket and bent two right angles into it, and a loop handle at one end.

"Now put it in the keyhole with this end down and Turn it slowly until you feel it catch."

Laura knelt by the door as Scott kept watch.

"I don't feel anything," she said.

"Push it in farther. Use both hands to hold it, and use that little handle you built."

"I can't feel anything- Wait, wait a second."

The makeshift key turned half an inch.

"Keep going. Keep going. I think you've got it."

There was a muffled click from inside the door.

Laura released the wire and sank back on her hands, smiling up at her brother.

"Nice job," he said, opening the door a fraction of inch.

"There's a crowbar resting on some cases over there. I need it.

You're going to carry that bucket. You may have to hit someone hard with it. Can you do that?"

Laura glanced over at his hands.

"I can do it," she said.

She stood up and moved beside him. Carefully, he eased the door open.

The area around them was deserted.

"The lift is somewhere down there," he whispered, gesturing with his head. "We'll go straight across to where that crowbar is and work from there."

Laura's heart was pounding in her ears as they slipped out the door, closing it behind them, and stepped quickly across the narrow aisle.

Scott, who had looked fairly solid while leaning against the wall, stumbled and pitched heavily against the crates.

"You okay?" she asked.

He slipped the crowbar free and halted it gingerly in his one functioning hand.

"Better now," he said.

From somewhere to their right they could hear voices. Staying flat against the cases, they worked their way toward the sound. At one point they passed not ten yards from a pair of workmen without being seen.

Scott moved painfully, at times dragging his left leg. Even in the shadows Laura could see the pallor of his face and the flecks of drying blood that dotted his lips and chin.

The voices were close now-very close. Scott peered around the corner of a stack of crates and held up two fingers.

"I'm going for the forklift," he whispered. "Head straight for the man in the cap, and use that bucket."

He pointed to a spot just behind his ear. Then'he reached up with his crippled hand and gently touched her face. "Ready?"

She put her arm around him and, for a moment, held him close.

"Ready," she said.

They broke around the corner and headed straight for the two men.

One, a heavyset black man, was seated on the forklift. The other, wearing a woolen cap, was several feet closer. He turned at the sound of their approach and was fumbling beneath his jacket when Laura swung the galvanized metal bucket with all her strength, connecting solidly with the side of his face. He cried out and fell heavily, pawing feverishly at the gush of blood from just beneath his ear.

The man on the forklift had no chance at all.

Scott lunged across the seat, thrusting the beveled edge of the crowbar upward through the soft tissue beneath his jaw, and then on through the bone of his palate. The man slumped forward before toppling off the seat and onto the concrete floor. Scott fell back with the effort, but just as quickly Laura had him back on his feet. She helped him onto the seat, took her place beside him, and turned the key.

The forklift's electric engine whirred to LIFE at the moment they heard the cries and footsteps of approaching men.

Scott spun the wheel to the right, heading at full speed across the aisle by their cell, and then left into the corridor leading straight to the huge front doors.

Laura glanced over her shoulder just as several men rounded the corner behind them.

"Stay low!" Scott yelled, crouching behind the wheel.

The forklift sped ahead toward the doors as several shots were fired.

"Not there, asshole!" someone screamed. "Those are the goddam ammo crates!"

His screaming was punctuated by a rumbling from within one of the crates. Suddenly the entire wall exploded, showering the forklift with debris. Another explosion followed, and then another. The warehouse instantly filled with hot black smoke. Scott hunched over the wheel, staring intently ahead.

I'll be damned," Laura heard him say.

"They were here. They were here all the time."

She glanced over and saw him actually smiling.

They were less than twenty feet from the door. Behind them, the exploding maelstrom continued. Then, directly ahead of them, Lester Wheeler stepped into view, his pistol ready.

"Get down and hang on!" Scott ordered.

The sound of Wheeler's rapid volley of shots was lost in the explosions, but bullets clanged off the forklift. An instant after the last shot, they slammed against the warehouse doors at top speed. The two central panels flew apart, ripped free of their supports, and crashed to the pavement. Black smoke billowed out from the gaping opening, and moments later, Lester Wheeler raced through.

"Stay down!" Scott demanded, looking back over his shoulder at the scene.

At that instant his head snapped oddly to his left, and he pitched forward onto the wheel. The forklift swerved right, then left. Laura steadied the wheel with one hand as she pulled her brother free with the other. His body was limp, although his foot remained pressed on the accelerator. Then Laura saw the hole-a small black rent in his forehead just above his right eye. A trickle of blood had already begun to seep from the margins of the wound. Beneath the hole, Scott's eyes were glazed and unseeing.

"No!" she screamed. "God, no!" The forklift had skidded past an oil-drum pyramid and out onto the long pier. Scott was totally lifeless except for his hands, which still clutched the wheel, and his foot, which held fast on the accelerator. Behind them, with the rumble of a hundred freight trains, Warehouse 18 blew apart.

Still steadying the wheel, Laura looked back. A fireball of pitch-black smoke was rising from the destruction. Lester Wheeler, who had stumbled during the blast, was scrambling to his feet.

"You bastard!" Laura screamed. "You goddam fucking bastard!"

Wheeler stopped, leveled his gun at her, and fired at the moment the forklift careened off the end of the pier. Scott's body lolled off the seat as the heavy machine yawed in the air and plummeted the fifteen feet to the harbor. It landed on its side, nose first, hurling Laura ahead as if she were shot from a cannon. She skimmed several feet across the surface, then hit the chilly water with dizzying force.