Ultimate Thriller Box Set - Crouch Blake - Страница 55
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“I can seeeeee you in the daaaaaark,” Bub whispered.
“Not for long,” Race said.
He put everything into the lunge; his rage over Helen, his frustration at wasting forty years being Bub's caretaker, his pure hatred for being forced back to life. The spear went into Bub's eye, through his brain, and stuck in the back of his unholy skull.
The demon fell, screeching.
Race sensed movement behind him. He turned, and saw the huge glowing eyes of the giant gate-breaking demon draw nearer.
“Well, ain't you a big sonuvabitch,” Race said.
He felt along the floor and found his spear, yanking it out of Bub.
“You hungry, big boy? I got something for you to chew on.”
Race smiled, and when the monster opened its mouth and bit down on him, Race jammed in the spear as far as it could go, his very last thought of dancing cheek to cheek with his beloved Helen.
*
Andy and Sun threw everything they could find in front of the door while Belgium banged away at the wall.
Strangely, nothing tried to get in.
“Maybe he's finally dead,” Andy said. He yelled, “Race!”
No answer.
Sun rushed to Dr. Belgium and began to strip off his lab coat.
“The torch is dying.”
He shrugged out of it and Sun ripped the garment in half, winding one part around the dimming flame.
Andy took the sledgehammer from Belgium and pounded away at the blocks until he could no longer lift his arms. Then Frank took over, breathing like an asthmatic. Sun had the next crack at it, struggling with the heavy weight but able to swing it underhanded.
The cinder block broke in half, leaving an L-shaped opening in the wall.
“It's not big enough,” Belgium said.
“Yes, it is.” Sun tossed the torch through the hole and then squeezed herself into it. The cinder block scraped her bare shoulders and back, but she made it through intact.
“Go on, Frank,” Andy prompted.
The biologist had to tilt his shoulders, but he managed to fit his upper body in the opening. Sun helped pull him the rest of the way through.
“C'mon Andy, let's go!” Andy looked at the opening and knew it was too small. Belgium was a thin man, one hundred and fifty pounds max. Andy was one eighty, with a broader chest and shoulders.
“I won't make it.”
“Try,” Sun pleaded.
He stuck his head and one arm through the opening, but he couldn't get the other arm in.
“Go on,” he said. “Go ahead without me.”
“No. Just get your other hand through. Then you can make it.”
Andy was wedged so tightly in the space that there was no way he could get his other hand through. The corner of the L was digging into his breast bone.
“I can't. I'm going to try to widen the hole.”
“There's no time!” Sun screamed at him.
Dr. Belgium said, “Exhale.”
“What?”
“You're lungs are full of air. Breathe all of your air out and your chest will contract.”
Andy blew out air, blew until his lungs were empty, blew until he was seeing spots. It freed up just enough space to force his other wrist through. Sun and Belgium grabbed it and pulled like crazy. The skin on Andy's arm scraped against the cinder block, and his chest felt as if he was pinned under a dump truck, but it was coming... coming...
He was through.
They yanked him the rest of the way and Sun held him, even tighter than it had been squeezing through the hole.
“I can't breathe,” Andy croaked.
She released her grip.
“The cave leads off this way,” Belgium picked up the torch. “What's our time?”
Andy looked at his watch.
“Twenty-eight minutes.”
They ran.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
This was the scariest part of all for Andy. Everything that happened prior had been beyond his control, but this last attempt at survival was completely up to him. If he ran fast enough, he'd live. If he didn't, he'd die.
The natural limestone caverns they ran through were completely dark. Sun led the way, carrying the torch, keeping it low to illuminate their footing. The ground was sometimes hard jagged rock, and other times loose gravel that sucked at their shoes like hungry fish. They ran past natural stone columns and underground pools, razor sharp walls and stalagmites, alongside steep drop offs that fell into oblivion.
Sometimes the cavern widened to the size of an auditorium, other times it was as thin as a hallway. They were following the original trail the excavation crew had made one hundred years prior, when Samhain was born. It surprised Andy to occasionally see a bootprint in the ground, the mark of someone who helped build the compound, someone long dead.
They ran as fast as safety allowed. When there was an open area ahead, Sun picked up the pace, and they sprinted until their lungs were bursting and their stomachs clenched.
There was a bad moment, at the fifteen minute mark, when the trail couldn't be found and they hit a dead end. All of them began to panic, Sun almost to the point of tears, when Dr. Belgium found a fork in the cave a hundred yards prior. They backtracked and took the fork, but precious minutes had been lost.
Andy fought the fatigue. He fought the many pains he'd incurred. But he couldn't fight his own mind, which kept telling him that this was the end, it was all over, his existence was about to be snuffed out forever.
“Please,” he begged the universe, “don't let this happen. Don't let my life stop here. There's so much I haven't done, haven't seen.”
The universe didn't answer. But surprisingly, his mind focused on something he'd long ago memorized, when he was just a boy.
Pater noster, qui es in coelis, sanctificetur nomen tuum.
Our Father, Who art in heaven, Hallowed be Thy Name.
The Lord's Prayer.
He ran on, repeating it over and over in his head.
*
Sun was in better physical shape than her male companions, and she knew it. But she couldn't slow her pace, even when they began to fall behind. She had to be the goal for them, the one in the lead who forced them to catch up.
Belgium surprised Sun. He was thin and long limbed, and on the sprints he lacked breath control, but for the most part he kept up.
Andy was the problem. He was in fair shape, but he'd suffered so many injuries. The batling attack, his wrist, all the blood he lost—it was surprising he could even stand up. Still, Sun couldn't slow down for him. If she did, they all might as well give up.
Sun only stopped once, when the torch was dying and she had to wrap the other half of Belgium's lab coat around it. The rest of the time she ran as fast as her little legs could move.
The cavern was cool, and the air was good, two things that surprised her. Her conception of caves had always been of the mining type, cramped and choked with coal dust. These caves were pleasant, even tranquil. She could see how she might enjoy exploring them one day, possibly with Andy.
It was the first time she'd considered her future since Steven died, and it opened up a floodgate of emotion. Suddenly there was so much she wanted out of life. She wanted to be married, have kids, get her medical license back, buy a little house someplace—things she'd given up on ever doing. She thought about how many times she'd worried about money, and of how little importance it actually was.
If they lived through this, she promised to herself she'd be different. More open. Less worried. More fun. Less angry. More loving.
If they lived.
*
Dr. Belgium was playing tricks with himself so as to not give in to exhaustion. He recited the Periodic Table of the Elements, then he gave himself quadratic equations to solve.
But the cave kept interfering with his ploy.
It was the most eerily quiet place Belgium had even been in. Their heavy breathing seemed to echo and amplify in the silence, sometimes chasing them through the dark.
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