20
By the time Nina, Eddie, Eleanor and Broates reached the chamber housing the sarcophagus, Miller, Harhund and the other men had come back down in the elevator and caught up, guns drawn. Miller glared at Eddie. ‘Why is he still alive?’
‘Because I need him,’ said Eleanor. ‘Which is something I often wonder about with you.’ She waved for the newcomers to lower their weapons, then moved to the great crystalline coffin at the room’s centre. ‘Although I have a better use for him than a mere hostage.’
‘Just don’t ask me to do any sex stuff,’ Eddie told her. ‘You’re not my type.’
Her face crinkled in disgust. ‘Has anyone ever told you that you have the attitude of an especially unpleasant teenage boy?’
Eddie grinned. ‘Been hearing it from Nina ever since I met her. She still married me, though. Dunno what that says about her tastes in men.’
Nina sighed. ‘I’m still questioning them.’
‘Broates, bring me the key,’ said Eleanor. The butler took it from Nina and handed it to the old woman. ‘Thank you. Now that I finally,’ a pointed glance at Harhund, ‘have the key, the sarcophagus and Professor Wilde, we can find out if the Chinese theories were correct.’
‘If they’re not, a lot of people have died for nothing,’ Nina told her.
She didn’t reply, instead dismissively turning to face the sarcophagus, arms outstretched to bring the key to the matching recess in its base. Broates moved to assist her, but she waved him back. ‘I want to do this myself,’ she said, straining to slot it into place. ‘There!’
The frisson of anticipation amongst the observers quickly turned to disappointment when nothing happened. ‘It’s not working,’ said Miller.
‘Of course it isn’t,’ snapped his mother. ‘Do you ever listen to a word I say? It needs somebody with the proper DNA profile to activate it – someone of Atlantean ancestry.’ She gave Nina a probing look. ‘Or Nephilim ancestry, perhaps.’
‘You think the Atlanteans are descended from the Nephilim?’ Nina replied dubiously.
‘The Chinese think it’s highly likely, based on their genetic testing.’
‘Seems like pointing out the obvious, but Nina’s not ten feet tall,’ said Eddie.
‘Probably a result of cross-breeding over hundreds of generations,’ Eleanor said, gazing up at the figure inside the coffin. ‘The human genes controlling the physical form became dominant. But there are more important questions to answer right now. The first is: can a human be put into stasis in this sarcophagus?’
‘I guess you’ll find out for yourself in a hundred years,’ said Nina.
A thin smile – with a hint of cruelty behind it. ‘Do you really think I’m going to climb into an ancient contraption filled with poison gas without knowing if it works? Somebody else will test it first.’ She pointed a bony finger at Eddie. ‘Him!’
Miller’s expression brightened. ‘And if it kills him, nothing lost!’
‘If it kills him, we’ll have to seriously rethink the plan,’ Eleanor chided. ‘But everything provided by my Chinese source suggests it should work. So Professor Wilde will get that,’ a flick of her hand at the frozen figure, ‘out of there, then we’ll prepare Mr Chase for the experiment.’
‘Like fuck you will,’ Eddie growled.
Harhund stood before him and brought up his gun again, while Wintz and one of the security guards moved to flank the Englishman.
‘You should be honoured,’ said Eleanor. ‘You’ll effectively become humanity’s first time traveller, skipping over the period in stasis. Assuming you survive, that is.’
‘I don’t even know how to make that thing work!’ Nina protested.
Another nasty smile slit the old woman’s face. ‘Having your husband inside should give you an incentive to learn quickly.’
Eddie shook his head. ‘Typical. After fighting loads of evil billionaires, we finally met one who was half decent, then the next one’s right back to being evil!’
‘I resent that,’ Eleanor sniffed. ‘Wanting to ensure that humanity doesn’t disappear from the world like the Nephilim is anything but evil.’
‘The ends justify the means, huh?’ said Nina.
If she had hoped to land a stinging rebuke, she failed.
‘Always,’ the older woman replied. ‘History has proven that over and over. You of all people should know, Professor. Decorum and timidity achieve nothing – only strong, decisive action gets results.’
‘And if anyone’s killed in the process, it’s just their tough luck?’
‘There are people who shape history, and people forgotten by it. I intend to be one of the former. Now, use the key to open the sarcophagus.’
‘Wait!’ Harhund said urgently, glancing towards her. ‘The gas will leak—’
Eddie saw the mercenary’s momentary distraction – and leapt at him.
He collided with Harhund, both men reeling as he tried to grab his weapon. The gun went off—
The round lanced past the Englishman – and hit one of the gas tanks.
The bulbous cylinders were thick steel, strong enough to resist a bullet impact, but the shot struck the valve assembly on its end. It fractured a hose connector – and a shrieking jet of highly pressurised gas burst free.
Wintz threw himself clear, but the yellow rush caught the unprepared guard. He staggered, choking on the toxic miasma.
An alarm blared, amber warning lights flashing. Harhund retreated fearfully from the expanding cloud, Eddie moving with him – then letting go to deliver a punishing kidney punch. The Scandinavian fell. ‘Nina!’ the Yorkshireman cried, running for the exit.
She sprinted after him, weaving past Miller and the remaining guard, but their adversaries quickly overcame their shock. Guns came up—
Eddie shoved Nina sidelong as they cleared the chamber’s entrance. Shots tore through the opening behind them, hitting the console beyond the doorway. ‘Through here!’ he cried, heading for one of the lab’s side exits.
‘We’ve got to get to the lift,’ he said as he hurried through the next room.
‘They’ll shoot us before we reach it,’ Nina replied. ‘But I saw a plan of the bunker when I arrived – there’s another way out!’ They ran on through the underground maze.
‘Shut the door!’ Eleanor cried as Broates pushed her out of the chamber at a run. ‘Switch on the extractors, vent the gas!’
The butler hurried to the control panel – only to look up in alarm. ‘It’s not working!’
She saw the bullet holes in the console. ‘You idiots!’ she shouted at her men, before glaring at the side exit. ‘They must be trying to reach the emergency stairwell. Get after them! Now!’
Wintz and the last guard raced in pursuit. Harhund and Miller, though, headed for the main corridor. ‘Where are you going?’ she demanded.
‘Are you kidding, Mother?’ Miller said, jabbing a finger back at the roiling poison. ‘I’m getting away from that!’
‘I suggest you do too,’ Harhund added as they exited.
Broates hurried to Eleanor. ‘Mrs Miller, I can’t stop the gas from spreading. You must get out of here. Quickly!’ He pushed her after the two men.
Miller and Harhund charged through the bunker to the elevator. Behind them, more alarms sounded: the toxin was spreading through the ventilation system to other rooms. ‘Come on, come on,’ Miller gasped as he stabbed at the call button. ‘Come on! We were the last people to use it, why the fuck isn’t it—’ The doors slid open. He rushed inside, Harhund joining him.
‘Donny! Wait!’ They looked back to see Eleanor, Broates propelling her at a straining run. ‘Hold the door!’
Miller reached out to stop it from closing – then caught Harhund’s eye. A pause, mixed emotions crossing his face . . . and he stepped back.
Eleanor’s own expression was one
of disbelief. ‘What are you doing? Donny! Hold the door!’
He said nothing, remaining motionless – until the doors started to close again. He held up his hands in a shrug as if there was nothing he could do as metal slammed shut between them.
She stared at the elevator, speechless, before exploding in anger. ‘You little shit!’
Broates quickly turned her around. ‘I’ll get you to the emergency stairs.’ He pushed the furious old woman back down the corridor.
‘This map you saw,’ Eddie said to Nina as they ran pell-mell through the concrete warren. ‘Don’t suppose you remember any details from it? ’Cause I think we’re lost!’
‘The other exit was at the opposite end to the elevator,’ she told him. ‘If we keep going this way, we should reach it. Eventually.’
‘Be just our luck if it’s at the end of a five-mile tunnel!’ They reached a T-junction. ‘Okay, which way?’
Nina looked in both directions, seeing numerous doors, but neither option appeared preferable. ‘Uh . . . left?’
Over the spreading cacophony of alarms, Eddie heard a shout behind them. ‘We’ll try it.’ They set off. ‘So this whole place was built for Eleanor to sit out the apocalypse? Why’s it so huge?’
‘She was planning to preserve all human knowledge down here – at least, the parts she thought were worth keeping. So it’s got archives, tools, weapons—’
‘Weapons? Why didn’t you bloody say so? These are all storerooms!’ The doors they passed bore signs, but in her hurry, Nina hadn’t read them. Eddie glanced at the next as he ran past. ‘Seeds – not much use!’
‘Maybe these?’ she suggested. There were three more doors ahead before the passage made a right turn.
But the labels told them the rooms’ contents were no more use than the seed bank. They rounded the corner – only to stop in dismay. ‘Shit!’ said Eddie. It was a dead end, a last door in the far wall thirty feet away. ‘We’ll never get back to that junction before they catch up.’
‘Eddie, wait!’ Nina cried, hurrying onwards. ‘You want weapons? Here you are!’
The door’s sign read Arsenal. ‘Hope it’s not just because Ellie supports the Gunners,’ he said, joining her. He tried the door, and was surprised when it opened. ‘What, they don’t even lock their fucking gun room?’
‘Eleanor meant for everyone down here to be asleep,’ Nina pointed out as they entered. ‘But they only recovered one sarcophagus. And maybe she planned to lock up properly before entering stasis.’
‘Still slack. Works for us, though!’ The walls were lined with hundreds of metal drawers. Eddie pulled one open at random. ‘All right!’ he said, taking out an M16, the US Army’s standard infantry weapon. ‘Now just need some ammo . . .’
He opened more drawers nearby, but found only guns, all lacking magazines and ammunition. ‘This is no bloody good!’
Nina joined in. ‘Guns, guns, guns – but no frickin’ bullets!’ She reached for another handle, then paused: bullets would be stored in large quantities, a heavy load, so most likely were in the larger drawers at floor level. She tried one, and was relieved to find it full of neatly packed cardboard boxes. ‘Got them!’
Eddie shook his head. ‘They’re nine mil – I need five-point-five-six. And a mag.’ He opened more drawers himself. ‘Nine mil, nine mil, fifty cal . . .’
A noise over the alarms: running footsteps. Getting louder.
‘Someone’s coming!’ Nina cried, trying more drawers.
More nine-millimetre ammunition, shotgun cartridges—
‘Yes!’ Military-issue cases stencilled 5.56 mm. She pulled one open and withdrew a card sleeve holding thirty gleaming rounds. ‘Got the bullets!’
‘Magazine?’
‘Oh, God damn it!’ She hurriedly gave him the bullets before yanking open more drawers. ‘I can’t find any!’
They were out of time. Their pursuer rounded the corner, pounding towards the arsenal—
Eddie tore a bullet from the sleeve and pulled back the charging handle to open the rifle’s chamber. He pushed the round inside and tipped the weapon slightly upwards to minimise the chance of a slamfire – an accidental weapons discharge – then thumbed the bolt release.
Clack! The handle sprang back into place. No slamfire. The M16 was ready for action.
But he only had one shot.
And the guard had heard the unmistakable sound of the bolt closing. He ran into the room, gun raised—
Eddie whipped up the rifle – and fired.
The bullet hit the guard’s chest just as he pulled his own trigger. The impact threw off his aim, the pistol round clanking into a drawer beside the Yorkshireman. The man spun, blood spouting from both the pencil-width entry wound and the much larger exit wound in his back, and fell nerveless to the floor.
Ears ringing, Eddie exhaled. ‘Shit! That was close.’ He picked up the fallen man’s SIG Sauer P320. ‘Get another bullet,’ he told the wincing Nina.
‘What for?’
‘For you. I’ve got this,’ he waved the pistol, ‘so you can have this.’ He held up the rifle.
She collected another round, then joined him. ‘There’s no magazine – it’ll still only have one shot.’
‘One shot’s better than none.’ He quickly reloaded the M16. She reluctantly took it. ‘Okay, we took a wrong turn somewhere. Hopefully the other way isn’t a dead end too!’
They ran back towards the junction as more alarms sounded.
Broates had taken a different route from Nina and Eddie, pushing Eleanor into a machine room. ‘If I remember correctly, this service passage cuts behind the archive wing and leads almost directly to the emergency stairs,’ he said as he let go of the wheelchair and went to a door. ‘We can get ahead of Professor Wilde and Mr Chase. I’ll deal with them.’
‘Good,’ Eleanor replied. ‘But keep her alive if you can. I still need—’
He opened the door – and reeled as dirty yellow gas rushed through it.
Eleanor pulled back on her chair’s control stick in fright as the butler collapsed. ‘Broates!’ she cried, but the cloud had already rolled over the convulsing man. A new alarm sounded as sensors in the machine room detected the contaminant; the service passage, intended only as a conduit for water pipes and electricity cables, had not been similarly equipped.
Panic rising, she spun and retreated at top speed, the chair’s motors whining. With the shortcut blocked, she now had to navigate the whole underground maze to reach the other exit.
An exit with no elevator, only stairs.
To Nina and Eddie’s relief, the other route beyond the junction led deeper into the complex. They entered a wider corridor that curved away into the distance. ‘It’s got to be this way,’ said Nina, panting. The wail of alarms faded behind them. ‘And we’re clear of the gas; now we’ve just got to—’
An echoing gunshot – and a red-hot spike tore through her left arm.
Eddie whirled to see Wintz in a doorway a hundred feet away. He snapped off a shot, forcing the mercenary back into cover.
But they were completely exposed in the stark concrete passage. ‘In here!’ he shouted, pushing Nina to a nearby door. Another bullet impact blasted stinging cement fragments at his head as they rushed through.
The new room was a large archive, tall shelving racks filled with countless white-spined hardback volumes. Nina crashed against the long shelves, clutching her wounded arm. ‘I’m fine,’ she gasped.
‘Let me see.’ She winced as she lifted her hand. There was some blood, but the bullet had only clipped her. ‘It’ll need treating, but you’ll be okay. See if there’s another way out, I’ll hold him off.’
‘Eddie—’
‘Just go!’ He returned to the doorway, watching for Wintz—
The mercenary was already running towards him.
‘S
hit!’ Eddie threw himself back as more bullets slammed into the door frame. He loosed a couple of suppressing rounds to force the other man to swerve, then scrambled away from the entrance. ‘He’s coming! Is there another exit?’
Nina ran down the aisle, reference volumes flicking past on both sides. She reached its end – and found the wall ahead was an unbroken barricade of books. ‘Oh, crap!’
‘I’ll take that as a no!’ He heard motion outside and sent another shot through the doorway. A thump and a grunt as the other man flattened himself against the wall.
That gave him a few extra seconds. But he had nowhere to go, trapped in the archive. And the rising cry of alarms warned that the gas was still spreading. If Wintz pinned them down until it reached the door, they were dead . . .
He had to take the mercenary down, fast – which meant drawing him into the archive. He shouted at the top of his voice: ‘Nina! Get out of that back door, now! I’ll be right behind you!’
Praying she wouldn’t instantly blow his ruse by yelling ‘What back door?’ he ran a short way, then used the shelves as a ladder to climb onto the top of the stack. The ceiling was mere claustrophobic inches above him. He slid over so Wintz wouldn’t see him when he entered, then waited. Faint steps outside – then the mercenary darted through the door.
Eddie glimpsed the top of his head as he swept his gun from side to side, seeing no sign of his prey. Wintz hesitated, then headed deeper into the archive.
The Yorkshireman slid quietly to the edge. A shot to the back was hardly sporting, but survival trumped honour – and Wintz wouldn’t hesitate to do the same to him.
The mercenary passed him. Eddie swung his legs over the edge, finding a narrow foothold on a shelf and easing himself out—
His boot slipped.
He clawed at the shelving’s metal top, but found no purchase – and fell.
He made a hard and painful landing, toppling backwards. Wintz spun at the unexpected noise, his weapon aimed at chest height before he realised his target was sprawled on the floor.
The gun came down at Eddie’s head.
21
The Resurrection Key Page 22
