Andy McDermott - The Tomb Of Hercules

Nina only had a moment to stare before the sound of feet pounding up the stairs yanked her back to the remaining dangers. She grabbed the dead man’s gun, then ran to the end of the room to retrieve Mac’s shotgun.

“Get to the back stairs!” Mac ordered, twisting to kick off the impaled corpse.

“But you-”

“They want to catch you, not kill you! Go! I’ll hold them off!”

Nina hesitated, then gave him his gun and ran to the door. She glanced out. Two men were halfway up the second flight of stairs, another pair having just entered the hall. She gave a last look back at Mac, who frowned at her for still being there, then turned and ran through the connecting door to the library.

Another deafening retort from Mac’s shotgun blew a chunk of the balcony rail to smithereens as the first man ran past the door. But the shot was a fraction of a second too late to catch him. The second man jerked to a standstill just before reaching the door, the ka-chack of another shell being chambered deterring him from crossing in front of it.

“Get her!” he yelled to his companion. “I’ll nail the old bastard!”

He pointed his MP9 around the door frame, unleashing a devastating spray of fire into the room. Wood cracked and baize shredded as bullets ripped into the snooker table, the slate bed beneath the green surface splintering under the onslaught.

Already ejecting his spent magazine and reloading, the gunman jerked his head around the edge of the door for the briefest moment, not so much to see the results of his assault as to draw any fire, making his target waste both a round and the time it took to reload. The room remained silent. More confident now, the intruder swung through the door with his gun at the ready.

No sign of the old man, just one of the other members of the snatch team dead on the floor and a battle-scarred snooker table-

The shotgun blast from under the table ripped his thighs into bloody mince. Screaming in agony, the man staggered back-and toppled through the hole blown in the railing. He fell, still wailing, to land with a neck-breaking crunch beside the first of his dead compatriots.

Mac bumped an appreciative fist against the underside of the slate that had protected him as effectively as any armor, then crawled out from beneath it.

Nina ran across the library to the nearer of the two doors at its rear, throwing it open to find herself in a narrow passage that vanished into darkness in either direction. Only then did it occur to her that she didn’t know whether to go left or right to reach the stairs.

Her pursuer entered the library from the landing…

She went left. The light from behind her provided just enough illumination to pick out the door to the other half of the library as she passed it, then another door directly ahead. She grabbed the handle and threw it open, expecting to see the promised stairs-only to find a cupboard, dusty suitcases squatting on its shelves.

“Shit!”

The level of illumination plunged. She whirled, seeing the man standing in the open doorway, blocking the light. The gun was a menacing black shape in his hand.

The gun-

She had one of her own!

Nina snapped up the stolen MP9 and yelled a battle cry of pure fury as she hosed the passage with the entire contents of the clip. Spent shell casings pinged off the wall and sizzled past her as she swung the gun back and forth, almost blinded by the muzzle flash.

The hail of fire ceased abruptly as the magazine ran dry. Her shout died as she tried to blink away the wafting afterimages of flame, hoping to see the man lying dead on the floor…

He wasn’t. He wasn’t even in sight. He must have flung himself back into the library just as she started shooting-

The second, nearer library door opened, more light filling the passage. The man stepped through it, gun raised. Through the hole in his black balaclava, his mouth twisted into an unpleasant smile.

“Ooh, out of bullets,” he said in a patronizing tone. “Never mind, I’ve still got plenty.”

“You won’t shoot me,” said Nina, faking defiance. “You need me alive.”

The gun tilted down to aim at her bare legs beneath the long shirt. “You can shoot someone and not kill them, you know.” He advanced on her. “Just give me an excuse-”

There was a discordant squeal from the other end of the passage as something flew through the far door and hit the wall before dropping to the floor. The startled gunman whirled, gun blazing-and blew Mac’s wailing bagpipes to shreds.

He stepped forward. “What the fu-”

The shotgun boomed from the library, blowing the man’s knees to a gruesome pulp. He fell, howling in agony.

Mac hobbled over with a snooker cue wedged under his arm as a makeshift crutch. “Oh, shut up,” he growled at the screaming man, slamming the butt of his shotgun against his head. The noise stopped immediately. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Nina said.

“Get to the stairs. Go!”

She didn’t hesitate this time, running for the far end of the corridor to find another door. To her relief, there were stairs beyond this one. She started to run down them-only to stop at a noise from below. Someone was running up them!

She turned back, reentering the library. “They’ve cut us off!”

Mac muttered a curse. “Onto the landing!”

“But they’ll be coming up the stairs-”

“Come on!” The tip of the cue banging against the floor, he staggered to the door. Nina followed.

Another man was on the landing below. Mac loosed a shotgun blast at him, forcing him to dive back behind a support pillar for cover.

The intact rope still hung from the broken skylight. “Can you climb a rope?” Mac asked, swinging the barrel of his gun to snag it.

“I can hang on to a rope,” Nina said nervously, realizing what he had in mind, “but that’s not the same thing!”

“It’s your only way down! Just get out the front door, and run!” He thrust the black line into her hands, then pumped another round and fired again at the man on the floor below. Plaster spat from the pillar. “Go!”

“Oh, God!” Nina wailed as she gripped the rope as tightly as she could…

And swung out from the landing over empty space.

If she hadn’t trained with Chase, she would have lost her grip. Shirt billowing in the breeze, one slipper falling from her foot, she lowered herself hand over hand as quickly as she dared.

It wasn’t quickly enough. Even as she heard Mac reloading, the man leaned out from behind the pillar and saw her. He jerked his gun towards her, then hesitated, remembering his orders to take her alive. He ducked back as Mac fired again, pellets cratering the walls. “She’s going down on her own!” the man yelled, Nina for the first time seeing the line of a radio microphone curving in front of his mouth.

She increased her pace, dropping faster. Her hands, damp with sweat and fear, started to slip on the rope, friction burning her palms-

“Fire in the hole!” The man, now level with her, swung out of cover to throw something up at Mac’s position.

A grenade-

Mac saw it arc through the air towards him. He turned and dived into the bathroom.

Nina loosened her grip and slid down the rope, barely able to control her descent. Her hands seared. Above, she heard a clack as the grenade landed just outside the bathroom.

Mac dropped his gun and the makeshift crutch, using his one good leg to propel himself over the rim of the bath-

The grenade detonated.

This was no stun grenade, but a lethal explosive.

The balustrade was blasted to pieces, shattered wood spinning through the air into the hall below. The blast ripped through the open door of the bathroom, the window blowing out.