Douglas Preston - Two Graves

The man didn’t seem to hear him, which raised Berger’s anger a notch.

“Bring him forward,” he told the soldier.

The soldier, propping his Sturmgewehr 44 rifle against the wall, approached Pendergast and pushed him roughly toward Berger. Then he moved back toward the door, picked up his rifle again, and resumed guarding the prisoner.

“Pendergast,” said Berger, tapping Pendergast’s chest with the quirt. “Look at me.”

The bedraggled man raised his head. His eyes focused on Berger.

“First, you dig your grave. Then, you will suffer. And finally, you will be buried in it, perhaps alive, perhaps not. I haven’t quite decided yet.”

No sign of comprehension.

“Get that pick and shovel.” Berger gestured toward the corner of the room.

The soldier underscored the order with a wave of his gun. “ Beweg Dich! ” he barked.

Slowly, the prisoner shuffled toward the far corner, the hobbles clanking awkwardly, the chains dragging.

“Dig here.” Berger took his heel and scraped it along the floor, outlining a crude rectangle in the volcanic dirt. “Hurry! Spute Dich! ”

As Pendergast began digging, Berger kept a safe distance, well beyond the swinging range of the tools. He watched the man lift the pick and bring it down painfully into the dirt, again and again, until he had broken up the top layer. He labored awkwardly, heavily encumbered with steel, and the short length of the chains greatly restricted the movement of his arms. When he slowed, Berger stepped forward and gave him a few brisk lashes with the quirt for motivation. Gasping with effort, the prisoner switched to the shovel and removed the loose dirt. At one point he laid the shovel down and mumbled that he needed to rest; Berger responded to that request with a kick that sent the man sprawling. That woke him up a bit.

“No stopping,” Berger said.

The grave made slow progress. The prisoner worked doggedly, chains rattling against the cuffs, his face a mask of mental apathy and physical exhaustion. Here, thought Berger, was a man who knew he had failed; a man who wanted nothing more than to die. And die he would.

An hour dragged by, and finally Berger’s impatience got the better of him. “Enough!” he cried. “ Schluss jetzt! ” The grave was only two and a half feet deep, but Berger had grown eager to move on to the next stage. The prisoner stood there, at the edge of the grave, waiting. Turning to the soldier, Berger said in German: “Cover me while I work on him. Take no risks. If anything happens, shoot him.”

The soldier took a few steps forward, raising his weapon.

“Drop the shovel,” Berger ordered.

The prisoner dropped the shovel and stood there, arms at his sides, head drooping, waiting for the end. Berger advanced on him, picked up the shovel, and—bracing himself—swung it against the prisoner’s side. With a thwack the prisoner dropped to his knees, a look of pained surprise on his face. Placing the flat of his foot on the prisoner’s chest, Berger gave him a push that sent him sprawling backward into the grave. Making sure the guard had a good bead on the prisoner, Berger stepped over and picked up the rucksack containing the torch and its heavy acetylene tanks. Holding its nozzle up like a candle, he snapped the torch on. It popped into life, an intense white light that filled the cell with harsh shadows.

“ Ich werde Dich bei lebendigem Leib verbrennen ,” he said, leering at Pendergast and gesturing meaningfully with the torch.

He stepped back to the grave and looked down. The prisoner lay there, eyes widening in fear. He tried to sit up, but Berger planted his foot on the prisoner’s chest again and stepped down, pushing him back. Keeping pressure on the foot, he leaned in and brought the needle-like flame toward the prisoner’s face. It cast a ghastly light, turning the prisoner’s eyes into gleaming points of fire. Closer and closer grew the flame. The prisoner struggled, trying to turn his face aside, first one way and then the other, but Berger pressed relentlessly with his foot, holding him in place, while the very edge of the flame began to sear the prisoner’s cheek. Now he could see a gratifying terror fill the prisoner’s eyes as the flame blistered the skin—

An extremely rapid and forceful—but slight—movement occurred; suddenly the prisoner seemed to contort himself in the strangest way, accompanied by a grinding pop of dislocating bone and sinew. Berger, starting back in surprise, saw, suddenly, the prisoner’s hand rise. He felt the nozzle twitched out of his grasp, and an instant later a brilliant white light filled his field of vision. He pulled back, crying out, and was astonished to feel the cold bite of steel around the back of his neck, one of the prisoner’s chains looping around and pulling him forward into the white light, closer and closer. It seemed to last forever—and yet it could have taken no longer than a second or two. The hissing spear of white drove like a needle into his mouth, nose, and then eyes; there was a sudden boiling and a soft, bubbly explosion, followed by pain to end all pain; and then all dissolved into white, white heat.

Pendergast fell back into the makeshift grave, yanking Berger’s body on top of his own, using the hole and the body as cover while the soldier—having recovered from his surprise at this unexpected development—fired, the bullets kicking up dirt all along the rim of the grave. The depth was shallower than Pendergast would have liked, but it was enough. Still covered by Berger, he directed the needle flame of the torch to the chain that attached his left wrist to the steel belly band, slicing it away not at the wrist but at the band, leaving six feet of loose chain attached to his wrist. Bullets nicked and whined around him, several thudding into Berger’s body with a sound like a hand slapping meat. With a sudden cry, Pendergast rose from the grave, flinging aside the body and swinging his arm around, wielding the now-free chain like a whip. It swung in an arc toward the ceiling, shattering the bulb.

As the room was plunged into darkness, he came forward, avoiding the soldier’s panicked fire by staying low and moving in an arc diagonally and very fast. Meanwhile, he gave the chain another massive swing, wrapping it around the soldier’s Sturmgewehr and wrenching it out of his hands, into his own. A single burst of the weapon dropped the soldier. Pendergast dove back into the grave just as the door burst open and the guard detail outside came pouring in, sweeping the room with fire. He waited until he was sure they were all within the room, and then—lying flat on his back in the makeshift grave—he raised the Sturmgewehr and raked them all with the weapon on full auto, emptying the massive box magazine in less than three seconds.

Suddenly all was silent.

Scrambling back out of the grave, Pendergast dropped the weapon and walked to the closest wall, stepping over still-twitching bodies. He took a deep breath, then another. And then, with all his strength, he slammed his shoulder against the wall, resetting the joint he had been forced to dislocate in order to get enough extra play with the chain to strangle Berger with it. Wincing at the pain, he waited until he was sure the shoulder was set properly and could be moved. He then grabbed the acetylene torch, switched it on, and used it to slice off his leg irons, belly band, and wrist cuffs, in his haste setting afire his shirt, which he pulled off while it was still burning. Throwing the rucksack containing the torch and tanks over his good shoulder, he looted a handgun, knife, lighter, wristwatch, flashlight, and a couple of box magazines from the corpses, scooped up the pick he’d used to dig the grave, grabbed the least bloody shirt he could find from one of the dead guards, and then charged out the door and sprinted down the tunnel beyond.