Robert Sawyer - Frameshift

Up one half-flight, around the corner, then up another. He was now opposite the door labeled “40.” But — damn it, he wasn’t thinking straight — the heliport was on the roof, another two staircases above him.

And all his efforts were predicated on the assumption that there was an exit to the roof at the top. If not, he’d have to come back down to the fortieth floor and try to find the correct way up to the helipad.

He yanked himself up, step after agonizing step. The footfalls below sounded closer; the Justice agents had perhaps made it as high as the twentieth floor by now.

Finally Pierre reached the top. There was a door here, painted blue instead of gray, with the word ROOF stenciled on it. Pierre turned the knob, then pushed on it, and the door swung outward, revealing the wide concrete top of the Condor Health Insurance tower. After all that time in the dim stairwell, the late-afternoon sunlight, positioned directly in front of him, pierced his eyes. Pierre held on to the doorjamb for support. High winds whipped by him, their sound masking that of the door opening.

Marchenko was standing about twenty meters away, his back to Pierre, waiting by a small green-and-white metal shed that presumably held tools for helicopter maintenance. There was no helicopter in sight, but the rooftop near Marchenko was painted with a circular yellow landing target, and the old man was impatiently watching the skies.

The wind shrieked as it went down the stairwell. Pierre stepped out.

The rooftop was square, with a meter-high lip around its edges. Gulls were perched in a neat row along the southern lip. Nearby were two cement enclosures, presumably housing the elevator equipment. Three small and two large satellite dishes sat at one corner of the roof and a microwave relay jutted up from another. There was a rotating red light mounted on top of one of the elevator houses, and two searchlights, both off, on top of the other.

Marchenko hadn’t noticed Pierre’s arrival yet. The old man was holding a cellular phone at his side in his left hand — doubtless he’d used that to call for a chopper to come and get him.

Pierre tried to assess his chances. He was thirty-five, for God’s sake.

Marchenko was eighty-seven. There should be no contest. Pierre should be able to simply walk up to the old geezer and haul him back downstairs into the arms of justice.

But now — now, who could say? Pierre leaned on his cane. There was a good chance that Marchenko could kill him — especially if he was armed.

There was no indication that he had a gun, and, indeed, a lead pipe had been Ivan Grozny’s favorite weapon half a century ago. But even unarmed, Marchenko might well be able to take Pierre.

Maybe he didn’t have to do anything. He looked up, scanned the sky again. There was no sign of an approaching copter. Avi’s agents would be up here soon enough, and—

“You!” Marchenko had turned around and spotted Pierre. His shout startled the gulls into flight; their cries were faintly audible above the whipping wind. The old man started moving toward Pierre with a slow and ancient gait. Pierre realized he should move away from the open door leading to the stairwell. All it would take for Marchenko to defeat him would be a good, swift shove down the stairs.

Pierre hobbled to the north. Marchenko changed course and continued to close the distance. Pierre thought of the Pequod and Moby Dick, wallowing in high waves, each ponderously maneuvering around the other.

Marchenko continued to circle in.

He tasks me , thought Pierre, and I shall have him . With an Ahab-like gait, his cane substituting for the peg leg, Pierre moved forward as quickly as he could. He knew that retreating would be stupid. If he allowed himself to be backed up against the meter-high wall around the edge of the roof, Marchenko would have little trouble pushing him over the side to plummet forty stories to a splattering death. Pierre moved toward the center of the roof, wind whipping his hair, cutting through him with fingers of ice.

Marchenko’s broad face was contorted in fury — not just at him, Pierre guessed, but also at whomever he had called to come and get him. There was still no sign of an approaching chopper, although several jet contrails crisscrossed the sky, like lash marks on a prisoner’s back.

Just five meters separated them now. Marchenko’s bald head glistened with a sheen of sweat, looking, in the ruddy late-afternoon light, almost like a film of blood. The climb up the stairs had been hard on him, too; whatever secret exit he’d had from his office had apparently given him access to the stairwell rather than the elevator lobby.

Marchenko stretched his arms out, as if he expected Pierre to try to slip past him. Pierre wanted to lift his cane high enough to use it as a weapon — something he could only do, he realized, if he were backed up for support against the toolshed or elevator houses. He started crabbing sidewise, moving toward the closest of the concrete structures.

Marchenko narrowed the distance between them. He was still holding the phone in his left hand, but swung out with his right. His fist hit Pierre on the shoulder, but it wasn’t hard enough to really hurt. Marchenko apparently realized that; his right hand dug into his hip pocket and came out with a set of keys, which he proceeded to intertwine between his skeletal fingers — just as Pierre had done more than two years before when Marchenko’s henchman, Chuck Hanratty, had tried to kill him.

They were now about three meters from the elevator house. Pierre thought he heard another gunshot coming from the still-open door to the stairs. The OSI men were apparently being held at bay by security guards on one of the upper levels. Still, Avi would have doubtless called for reinforcements by now.

Pierre got his back against the elevator house’s wall. He lifted his cane high and smashed it down as hard as he could. He’d been aiming for the top of Marchenko’s head, but his arm had shaken coming down and the impact had been on Marchenko’s right shoulder instead. There was a loud cracking sound. Pierre hoped it was Marchenko’s scapula, but it turned out to be the cane. As Pierre pulled it back, he saw that it was partially broken in the middle, at the point that had taken the brunt of his weight during his earlier tumble down the stairs. Still, the impact had knocked the cellular phone from Marchenko’s gnarled hand. It hit the concrete and its black battery pack popped loose.

More gunshots in the background. Pierre looked beyond Marchenko and now saw a helicopter on the horizon, but it was impossible to tell if it was coming toward them. Marchenko started to back away. He was unaware of the copter, but apparently realized he was putting himself at a disadvantage by letting Pierre have both hands free.

“Come on, you piece of shit,” taunted Marchenko in his reedy, accented voice. “Come and get me, you fucking piece of shit.” He swiped his hand out, the keys glinting in the sunlight. “Come on, you—”

“ Morceau de merde ,” supplied Pierre, pushing off the elevator house’s wall with his left hand and leaning on his damaged cane, hoping it would continue to support him as long as he only put pressure straight down on it.

Marchenko was dancing backward now, baiting Pierre closer to — to the toolshed, it looked like, where the old man could probably find a better weapon than a set of keys. Pierre hoped Marchenko would trip as he walked backward. Pierre might not be able to club him into submission, but he still outweighed the geriatric by at least ten kilos. Just sitting on him might be enough to subdue him.

Marchenko looked behind him to make sure the way was clear, and saw the helicopter, now only a couple of kilometers away. Pierre stole a glance behind himself, too, but there was no sign of anyone emerging from the stairwell.