Peter Hernon - 8.4

Swiveling with his lamp on, Wren saw him and fired. Gunshots hammering in his ears, Atkins ducked back behind the pillar.

A section of the roof crashed to the floor. When the powdery dust cleared, Atkins saw Wren standing there, his headlamp pointed at his feet. A six-foot-long block of stone had just missed him.

Atkins realized that Wren had dropped his pistol and was searching for it.

Before he knew what he was doing or had time to think about it, he ran straight at Wren, driving a shoulder into his chest, knocking him backward. They both fell down and rolled. Every time Atkins’ right arm scraped the ground, sparklers of white light exploded in front of his eyes.

Pushing up on his knees, Wren threw a hard punch at Atkins’ head. The blow knocked him down. Stunned, he was aware of footsteps. Wren was running off.

Atkins rolled over on his back and lay there, trying not to pass out. He could smell the sweet, unmistakable odor of blood. He touched his nose and felt cartilage move. It was broken.

He stood up gingerly, leaning against the wall as he fumbled with the switch to his headlamp. Elizabeth was at his side.

“We’ve got to go after him,” Atkins said. “If he gets to the fire extinguishers and uses them we’re stuck down here.” He thought about trying to find the pistol that Wren had dropped. There wasn’t time.

They started jogging, Atkins moving stiffly, and turned at the first crosscut. They came to another tunnel and turned right. Atkins hoped they were headed toward the skip shaft. He wasn’t sure anymore. It was so damned easy to get disoriented in the dark. They had their lamps on and were making no effort to conceal themselves. Atkins checked his watch. They had about eighty minutes until the bomb detonated.

“It can’t be much farther,” Atkins said. His right arm throbbed where the bullet had grazed him just below the elbow. It hurt every time he moved it. The pain and tightness worried him. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to stop Wren if it came to that. The guy was strong.

They felt a blast of heat, hot air moving down the skip shaft from the fires one level above them. They’d gone the right way.

Suddenly, a dark shape hurtled at them from a recess in the tunnel. Atkins heard the footsteps and turned just as Wren came at him, clutching something in his hands. He swung the object, and Atkins ducked and heard sharp metal chink into the wall. Coal fragments stung his face.

Wren had a pickax. He’d found it lying in one of the passageways, just as Atkins had found the crowbar. He was enraged. He was desperate to kill them. He dug the pick out of the coal and swung again, slashing sideways this time.

Atkins leaped back, pushing Elizabeth out of the way.

“Turn your light off!” he shouted.

Wren kept trying to catch Atkins in the light from his headlamp. He was wielding the pickax like a club, savagely chopping at the walls and floor.

Atkins edged backward, one cautious step at a time, keeping his right hand on the wall for balance. Wren was getting close. Atkins knew he’d have to make a move soon. He was losing strength. He took another step backward and almost fell. There was nothing behind him, just open space. He knelt down and carefully felt in back of him with his hands. He’d nearly fallen into some kind of shaft or pit.

Groping on his knees in the darkness, he touched the edges of some kind of drop-off. It was a rectangular hole three or four feet wide. He remembered that Murray had pointed out narrow openings between the floors, runs for electric and water lines. Most were covered with steel plates. A few, like this one, had been left open.

A thought took shape.

Do it, he told himself. Don’t wait.

Keeping his back to the hole, Atkins turned on his headlamp and stood up. “Here I am, you bastard!”

Wren charged as soon as he saw him, gripping the pick with both hands like a baseball bat.

Atkins waited until Wren was almost upon him, then dropped to his knees and pushed up with his left forearm and shoulder as Wren stumbled over him. Falling through the opening, Wren managed to get his hands up and grab the edge of the hole. He hung there, his feet kicking at the sides of the narrow shaft, trying to get a toehold.

“Help me!” he screamed. “Please, for God’s sakes.”

Atkins hesitated, but knew he had no choice, not if he wanted to live with himself. He offered the struggling man his left hand.

Wren gripped it and started pulling himself up through the hole. He got his head over the edge, then part of a shoulder. Atkins reached down, trying to get the other arm when Wren, with a powerful thrust of his arms, suddenly pushed up and grabbed the shoulder strap of Atkins’ air tank.

Halfway out of the hole and holding onto the edge, propping himself there. Wren tried to yank Atkins down through the opening. His left arm pinned, Atkins could only swing with his injured right. He punched Wren in the face with no effect. Wren kept pulling him down in a steel grip.

Atkins felt himself starting to go when Wren suddenly let loose.

Atkins rolled over on his back and lay on the floor of the tunnel, trying to get his wind back, trying to suck air into his lungs. Elizabeth stood over him, clutching the pick. She’d hit Wren hard in the face with the wooden handle.

Blood pouring from his forehead, Wren managed to hold on to the edge of the hole. Screaming in rage, he started pulling himself up with both hands. Atkins tried to stand. His head was spinning. He got to his knees. Wren grabbed one of his legs.

Elizabeth swung again, catching Wren squarely in the head. The long handle of the pick made a dull crack when it hit his cheekbone.

Wren fell back through the hole. Atkins heard him slam against the floor of the tunnel below them. He looked over the edge. In the light from his headlamp, he saw that Wren had fallen about a hundred feet. His right leg was folded under him at a severe angle. He wasn’t moving.

“Are you all right?” Elizabeth asked.

“Where did you learn to swing like that?” Atkins said, standing up slowly, gripping the wall for balance.

“Girls’ Softball,” Elizabeth said, smiling.

The tunnel ahead of them was suddenly very bright. Someone was approaching with a powerful spotlight, playing it on the walls. It looked odd. The angle was all wrong. The light was low to the ground.

It was Neutron.

“FOLLOW the robot back to the skip shaft.”

The voice was Booker’s, amplified by a small speaker mounted on Neutron’s video camera.

Atkins and Elizabeth hurried after the robot as it rolled quickly down the tunnel. It made a turn, then another and came out at the entrance to the skip shaft, which glowed a dull yellow from the fires burning one level above them.

“This isn’t going to be easy,” Booker said over the radio. “You’ll have to get through the fire up on Level 10. Neutron’s going to lay down foam spray. Stay as close to him as you can. We’ll be fighting the flames from this end.”

They heard Murray’s voice. “Get your masks on. Button yourselves up real good. Don’t leave any exposed skin. Get the collars up around your throat. Your bunker gear will protect you from the fire. Try not to stand in one place too long coming up that shaft. Keep moving and trust that foam. It’ll knock the shit out of that fire. Good luck to you. Now let’s go!”

Before they followed the robot into the skip shaft, Atkins took Elizabeth in his arms. They stood there a few moments, holding each other.

“Let’s do this,” Atkins said.

“You’re on,” Elizabeth said, her eyes as clear as he’d ever seen them. “We can do whatever a robot can, right?”

They put on their air masks and tightened them, then picked up their fire extinguishers. They made sure all their skin was covered. It hurt like hell when the edge of the mask grazed his broken nose. He winced again as he looped the straps of the foam canister over his shoulders.