Darren Lemke - Gemini Man

“Shut your mouth about him,” Junior said, his anger and frustration turning to rage. “You’re just trying to rattle me.”

“I’m trying to save you,” Brogan replied. “What are you, twenty-three? And still a virgin, right? Dying to be in a relationship and connect, but terrified to let anyone near you because what if someone saw who you actually are. If they did, how could they ever love you? So everybody else are only targets, and you’re just a real good weapon. ”

The bullshit psychoanalysis finally pushed him over the edge. Junior grabbed the end of Brogan’s rifle and yanked it toward himself, hard. Brogan came with it and Junior kneed him in the groin, making him let go of the weapon as he fell. Junior reached for it but Brogan surprised him by kicking it straight to Zakarewski, then gave him an elbow to the head. Junior sprawled on the dirty stone floor, rolled over quickly to see Brogan had drawn his commando knife; he flipped himself to a standing position and kicked it out of Brogan’s hand.

That blow hurt, he could see it in his face. This will hurt worse, Junior promised him silently as he lowered his head and charged him like a linebacker, driving both of them into the wall of bones.

The impact sent clouds of dust billowing into the air as the shelves collapsed and bones that had lain undisturbed for hundreds of years broke into pieces and flew in all directions. This was the perfect place for Brogan, Junior thought—buried under a mountain of old, forgotten bones. He pulled away from the old guy and his hand fell on a broken thigh bone with a viciously jagged end. Junior tried to jab it into Brogan’s throat and discovered Brogan had also found a jagged femur and was trying to do the same thing to him.

More bones cracked and scattered as he struggled to get on top of Brogan, trying to get the upper hand. He almost had him a couple of times but before he could drive the jagged bone into the old guy’s throat, Brogan would somehow find the strength to heave him off or go upside his head, or trap his leg and twist it, forcing him to let go before the old guy broke his knee. Junior just couldn’t get the better of him. But at least Brogan wasn’t getting the better of him, either—

“Drop it!” Zakarewski yelled suddenly, aiming the rifle at him. Junior looked at Brogan’s face covered with dirt and bone dust. Brogan’s face; his face. He couldn’t deny it, now or ever.

“ Drop it! ” Zakarewski yelled again, louder now. “I will shoot you!”

“ Don’t shoot him! ” Brogan yelled.

Junior saw her freeze. Thanks, old man, he thought with a grin. She really wouldn’t shoot him, not if Brogan told her not to. He twisted his left hand out of the old guy’s grasp and punched him. At this angle he didn’t have the leverage for a knockout blow, but the feel of Brogan’s jaw slewing sideways gave him a moment of satisfaction before the old guy surprised him with a hard jab to his throat.

He fell away from Brogan, rolled over, and got to his feet, rubbing his neck and coughing. Zakarewski had a clean shot now; she could drop him easily.

Only she still couldn’t—he saw it in her face. No matter how much she wanted to, she just couldn’t put a bullet in someone who looked so much like her hero. Good to know, he thought just as Brogan used the linebacker charge on him.

It crossed his mind as they crashed into another section of wall that Brogan’s old-man shoulder didn’t have as much muscle on it as his but it seemed to be just as strong, and damn, this wall was so thick with bones, they were tunneling through it with their bodies.

Some kind of barrier broke apart behind him and then all the bones and shelves were gone, everything was gone, even the dust. Suddenly they were hurtling out and down through dark empty air and before he could even wonder what was waiting below them, they plunged into water, momentum still driving them downward.

Son of a bitch—they were in the goddam cistern .

Now the old guy was flailing with all his might, his movements desperate and panicky. Right—that would be Brogan’s special problem with water; it scared the shit out of him. Junior grinned triumphantly. This was such a lucky break—it was like Fate itself wanted Henry Brogan dead.

Crashing through a wall of bones into thin air took Henry completely by surprise. He had barely had any time to look up information about the catacombs and most of what had come up on his phone had been in Hungarian.

He had no idea how long the fall would last or what might be waiting for them at the bottom but he did his best to keep Junior Hitman under him. Landing on him would give him a better chance of surviving the impact—better than Junior Hitman’s, at least.

Unless there was no impact and they fell forever.

The thought was fleeting, there and gone in a tiny fraction of a second, and it should have been ridiculous, utter nonsense. On the other hand, he had just crashed through a wall of bones in the middle of the night going mano-a-mano with his clone. The bar for strange and farfetched was higher than it had ever been. But the possibility of landing in water had never occurred to him.

All thought ceased as he thrashed madly with his arms and legs, trying to get to the surface. But this time, the weights on his legs weren’t just impossibly heavy, they were alive and actively fighting him, trying to drag him down into the dark. This wasn’t how the dream went—the weights were always inanimate objects .

Which meant this was no dream. It wasn’t Hell, either—otherwise his father would have been there laughing at him and telling him to concentrate , dammit, this was easy . No, he was awake and alive, and if he wanted to stay that way he had to get the hell out of the goddam water NOW.

Henry finally kicked free of the hands pulling at him and propelled himself upward. When he finally broke the surface, he caught a glimpse of Danny high overhead, holding a flare as she peered down at them from the hole he and Junior had punched in the Quartz Chamber. He was about to call out to her when the kid surged up out of the water and threw himself on top of him, trying to push him under.

Instead of resisting, he let the clone push him down with a force that actually pushed him away. Henry slipped around him and broke the surface again, looking for some way to get out of the water. Off to his left, he spotted a jagged ledge, the remains of a floor or platform. As he started to swim for it, Junior Hitman’s hands clutched his shoulders hard from behind.

Henry jerked his head back sharply, hitting the clone in the face, grinning when the kid yelped in surprised pain. Treading water, he turned to see the clone coming at him with his nose bleeding profusely and a broken femur in one hand.

How the hell had he managed to hold onto that, he wondered as the clone jabbed it at him. Henry put his hands up as if he were going to try to push him away, then let the clone get just close enough for another, harder head-butt before he swam for the ledge.

No yelp this time but Henry knew that one must have hurt him a lot more. His clothes dragged heavily on him as he pulled himself out of the water onto the ledge and rolled over onto his back, out of breath. Something on his neck was stinging. Henry touched the spot and his fingers came away bloody. Then all at once the kid was there with him, leaping up out of the water and onto the ledge seemingly with no effort at all.

Henry threw one arm across his face. The clone knocked it away easily and pounced on him. His nose was still bleeding copiously but he seemed oblivious to it as he put both hands around Henry’s neck and squeezed.