David Robbins - Cincinnati Run

Ten feet.

“What, exactly, is a laser?” Blade inquired.

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” General Stoljarov rejoined.

“Where is the pilot now?”

“None of your business.”

Blade was five feet from the door. If one of the troopers came around in front, his plan was doomed. He needed to be the first one to reach the door, so he increased his pace and gripped the doorknob with his right hand.

“Hold it,” General Stoljarov snapped.

Smiling innocently, Blade turned, opening the door as he did, allowing Geronimo to stride inside.

“Stop right there!” the Butcher barked, standing six feet off.

The nearest soldier started toward the giant, raising the barrel of his AK-47, “You heard the general!”

“So I did,” Blade said, holding his left hand palm out. “And I wouldn’t want to disobey the general, now would I?”

Geronimo had halted in the doorway.

“One of my men will take the lead,” General Stoljarov said. “Let him pass.”

Blade gave a little bow. “Be my guest.”

“Stand aside,” the trooper directed, coming forward, the AK-47 trained on Geronimo.

It was now or never. Blade surreptitiously scanned the soldiers, noting that only three had a clear field of fire. The rest were behind or to the side of the general, and they would not dare risk firing for fear of hitting the Butcher. His abdominal muscles tightened as he girded his body, and when the unsuspecting trooper took another pace, Blade brought his left hand down and in, snatching the AK-47 by the barrel and tugging on the gun even as he swept his right fist into the Russian’s stomach.

The soldier gurgled and bent in half.

Blade wrenched the AK-47 free, gripped the trooper by the shirt and tossed him into the general, then darted into the doorway as a short burst from another soldier smacked into the door. Geronimo was already racing down a well-lit corridor. Blade angled the AK-47 out the door and blasted a charging Russian, his round taking the man high in the chest and flipping the trooper to the ground.

General Stoljarov was on his back on the asphalt, struggling to extricate himself from under the guard Blade had slugged. “Get them!” he shouted. “I want them alive or your lives are forfeit!”

His men rushed the door.

Blade stood to the left of the door, his back to the wall, and grasped the AK-47 by the barrel. A Russian appeared in the doorway, and Blade swung the AK-47 with all of his prodigious might, the stock connecting with the trooper’s face with a pronounced thud. The soldier fell on the spot, his visage a bloody ruin.

That should hold them for a few seconds!

Blade spun and raced along the hallway, his boots thumping on clean, white tiles. The walls were a pale red. Overhead fluorescent lamps provided the bright illumination. He passed a series of brown doors without encountering anyone else and came to a fork. A hasty glance in both directions confirmed two empty corridors.

But no Geronimo.

Which way had Geronimo taken? Blade hesitated, nervously chewing on his lower lip. Had Geronimo ducked through one of the doors he’d passed? He hoped not. A structure as immense as the silver spire would contain dozens upon dozens of passages and rooms, and if they became separated now they might stay separated.

“There he is!” a soldier shouted to his rear.

Damn!

Blade took the right-hand corridor, hoping his choice was the correct one. The absence of Russian personnel bothered him. Why was this lowest level vacant? Had General Stoljarov purposely escorted them into Lenin’s Needle by way of a seldom-used entrance? The corridor curved to the right, and he sped around the corner with the AK-47 clutched in his left hand, looking to find Geronimo.

Instead, not 12 feet away, startled by his abrupt arrival, stood a six-man Russian squad.

Hickok elevated the Pythons and trained them on the bum. “Don’t even think it, old-timer,” he warned.

Elmer gaped at the revolvers, then at the knife in his hand, and tittered.

“What’s so blamed funny?”

“You figured I was going to try and cut you with this dinky knife?”

Elmer asked.

“Looked that way,” Hickok said.

“You must be nuts.”

“Nope. Just real cautious,” Hickok stated.

“Watch, sonny,” Elmer said, turning and walking to the southwest corner of the room. He knelt and inspected the floorboards. “Now where is it?”

Hickok ambled over, the Colts leveled, unwilling to lower his guard, still distrustful. “What are you lookin’ for?”

“Here it is!” Elmer declared, and leaned down to carefully insert the tip of the blunt knife into a crack in the floor. He grunted and strained, and a section of wood two feet square lifted from its recessed groves. Elmer took hold of the trapdoor and shoved it aside, exposing a pitch-black hole.

“What’s that?” Hickok inquired.

“Haven’t you ever seen a crawl space before?”

“Not that I recollect.”

“Repairmen and such use crawl spaces for checking pipes and wiring and whatnot.”

“We’re going down there?”

“Sure enough.”

“Must we?” Hickok questioned, lowering the Pythons.

Elmer glanced at the gunman and chuckled. “Don’t worry, sonny. The Browns and the rats will leave you alone if you make a little noise. Do what I do.”

“What’s that?”

“I fart a lot.”

Hickok slid the Colts under his shirt, insuring the barrels were securely wedged underneath his belt.

“I’ve been down this hole tons of times,” Elmer informed him. “I’ve never had any problem. The roaches bug me, though.”

“Roaches?”

“Cockroaches. The city is crawling with them, and I don’t mind telling you that they give me the creeps.”

“A few teensy bugs won’t bother me.”

“Teensy?” Elmer repeated, and laughed softly. “I’ll show you how teensy they are.” So saying, he extended his left arm into the hole, all the way to the shoulder, his forehead creasing as he felt here and there. “Usually there’s a couple near the opening. These buggers climb all over you when you’re in the crawl space, so don’t pay them no mind. They don’t bite.” He muttered an unintelligible word and straightened, smiling. “Take a look.”

His left hand came out of the hole.

Hickok felt goose bumps erupt all over his skin, and his eyes widened at the sight of the four-inch insect, with its flat, brown, oval body, its long, swept-back antennae, overlapping wings, and six writhing legs.

“This is a medium-sized roach,” Elmer said. “Some of these suckers grow over six inches long.”

“And there are a passel of them down there?”

“A what?”

“A lot of those bugs?”

“Yep. But don’t let them rattle you. They don’t bite,” Elmer told the gunman, then pressed the cockroach onto the floor and crushed the insect with the palm of his hand. “Want me to tell you a secret?”

Hickok stared at the mushy pieces of cockroach oozing between the bum’s fingers. “What?”

Elmer looked up and grinned. “The roaches make great eating.”

“You eat them?”

“Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it. When you’re down on your luck and can’t find a square anywhere, you take what you can get. A few of these will fill you right up,” Elmer divulged. “You should eat one sometime and see for yourself.”

Hickok’s stomach flip-flopped. “Not on your life.”

“Suit yourself, sonny,” Elmer said, and shrugged. He wiped his hand off on the floor, then bent toward the crawl space. “Let’s go.”

“Hold it.”

Elmer paused and gazed at the gunfighter. “Something wrong?”