“I can manage, thanks.” Emily tried to stand. Although Hannah helped her rise, her leg buckled under her weight, and she clamped down her teeth, holding back a cry of pain. “Shit!”
“I’ll help you, it’s okay,” Hannah said.
“It’s not okay. We’re going to have to haul ass at some point and I’m limping along with one good leg.” She sighed. “Just . . . just leave me here and come back and get me afterward.”
“No one gets left behind,” Deacon said. “I’ll carry you on my goddamn back if I have to.”
“I’m only going to slow you guys down,” Emily said. “Look at what we just dealt with, all those sick animals attacking us. How much worse do you think it will be if we ever find Kent Falcon?”
“We’re not leaving you alone, injured,” Deacon said. “Out of the question. Period.”
“I’m not going to put you guys at risk,” Emily said.
“All right, let’s end the stalemate.” Hannah shifted her gaze to Deacon. “Deacon, I’ll stay with her.”
“What?” he said. “No. No way.”
“We aren’t going to sit here knitting afghans,” Hannah said. “You continue down to level three and find Kent Falcon, while Emily and I verify this alternate route out of the mine system. We keep in touch with our radios.”
It was tough to argue with her logic. That was a major part of what made her so appealing to him. She had a knack for cutting through the crap and focusing on the important details.
“Okay, let me check out those explosives you found,” Deacon said. “Depending on what I find down there, I want to be prepared to use them.”
***
Deacon was on his own.
Hannah had examined the knot on his head, where the falling debris had struck him. She had wanted to apply a bandage, but he declined and asked for some ibuprofen instead. His body had suffered a multitude of aches and bruises. Anything that could dull the pain for a bit was all he needed.
When this was all over, he was going to sleep for a week.
They’d parted ways at an intersection of three tunnels. Hannah and Emily took the branch that Emily was convinced would lead back to the upper levels. Deacon’s decision was easier: of the other two corridors, one was impassable, water streaming over the stones, rusted drill bits mingled in with the rocks. He followed the only passageway left to take. Emily’s map indicated that it would plunge into the mine’s deepest level.
He had the bag full of explosives strapped across his shoulder, the pump-action shotgun, the .357, extra ammo for the firearms, his tac-light, and his two-way radio. Everything else—light sticks, the laptop they’d looted from the lab, and other items—he had given to Hannah.
He’d purposely avoided an emotional good-bye. Hannah, too, had kept her cool, and he liked that about her. They were heading off to complete separate tasks—that was how he chose to view it. They would see each other again when their work was done.
The truth was, if he’d pulled her into his arms like he wanted to, he wouldn’t have been able to let her go.
Sweeping the flashlight ahead of him, he followed the mine track as it sloped deeper into the earth. The only noises were his boots crunching across shale, the ever-present trickle of water dribbling down the walls, and his labored breathing.
The light didn’t reveal any signs of whether Ronald Falcon, or anyone else, had come this way. He saw only scattered, ancient-looking mining tools, like artifacts left behind by a lost tribe.
Was there anyone actually down at this level, except for the infected animals?
Small tunnels branched off the main passageway. He glanced at them, but kept to the widest path, as Emily had assured him that there was one primary artery that would take him to the deepest level. All he had to do was stick to it.
The echo of a scream cut through the darkness. It was the rough-edged howl of a man in agony.
Ronald Falcon, he thought.
He quickened his pace. The satchel bounced against his ribs.
The tunnel twisted to the right. He followed the path, his breath roaring in his ears, heart pounding.
Two more passageways split off the main tunnel. But flickering light came from up ahead. He stayed the course.
As he advanced, he noticed paintings had been scrawled on the stone walls. He panned his light across them. They were crude chalk drawings, reminiscent of cave artwork done in prehistoric times. One depicted a stick-figure with flowing hair, gripping a spear. Others dramatized a man leading a herd of wild animals of various sizes; two stick figures copulating on the ground; someone setting fire to a tall building, torch held high.
Another drawing showed only a man’s head, hair standing on end like spikes, pupils dilated and mouth peeled open in a scream.
Was this Kent Falcon’s work? What strange compulsion had driven the man, supposedly a PhD, to scribble on the walls like a child?
The corridor emptied into a vast chamber, some sort of materials processing area. Mine carts and old drills and pumps were heaped along the walls. The jagged rock ceiling was perhaps twenty feet high, crisscrossed with wooden beams. A series of bonfires spat and sizzled throughout the area, casting flickering light, throwing wriggling shadows on the walls.
In the bonfire glow, he discovered Ronald Falcon.
Wrists bound in rope, Falcon hung from the support beams, his feet dangling above the floor. Most of his clothing had been torn away. Blood streamed from various cuts and dripped to the ground, as if he were a hog being butchered in a slaughterhouse.
His butcher paced the ground in front of him: Kent Falcon.
***
But Kent Falcon wasn’t in the state that Deacon had expected.
In the video journal entries Deacon had seen, Kent was professorial, intense but soft-spoken. The kind of man who might have found it inappropriate to take off his shirt in public.
But there, deep in the mine, he was completely naked. Oozing sores mapped his body. He moved on all fours, like an ape. He clenched a large, blood-streaked knife between his teeth.
Frenzied, Deacon thought. More than anyone else I’ve seen.
There were lots of others in the room, too. Assorted animals licked and sniffed the floor where Ronald’s blood had collected: Rats, dogs, cats, possum, chimpanzees . . . a thick cluster of creatures moving as if controlled by a single hive mind.
Ronald Falcon lifted his head at Deacon’s entrance. Blood streamed down his face and bare chest. It looked as if Kent had cut deep into his brother’s chest, as though intent upon carving out his heart.
But those piercing blue eyes of Ronald Falcon’s located Deacon, and they glinted with something approaching pride.
Kent Falcon turned and noticed Deacon, too. The quantity of hair and sores that covered his face almost entirely concealed his swollen eyes.
He pulled the knife from between his teeth. He snarled.
“Umlaut tukok!” Kent shouted in a hoarse voice, spittle flying from his cracked lips. “Thwack do!”
There would be no forced confession of his crimes, Deacon realized. No contentious debate about the evils this man had produced. This Kent Falcon, his brain blitzed by parasitic neurotoxin, was about as coherent as a prehistoric man would have been if one had been strapped into a time machine and transported fifty thousand years into the present.
Almost as one, the mass of infected animals took note of Deacon. Dozens of crimson eyes simmered with primordial bloodlust.
Deacon brandished the bundle of dynamite.
He had already set the fuse afire. The flame crawled toward the blasting cap. Once the blasting cap exploded, it would ignite the nitroglycerin and bring down the whole room.
“Did my job,” Deacon said, and glared at Ronald Falcon. “Paid in full.”
Ever so slightly, Falcon nodded.
Kent Falcon roared. He surged forward, his assembled mob of creatures flanking him.
Using what last bit of strength he had remaining, Ronald Falcon lifted his long
legs and wrapped them around Kent’s neck in a scissor hold, trapping his brother with him. He grinned as Kent struggled in vain to slip free.
Deacon tossed the dynamite toward them.
And ran.
***
Emily was right.
Her confidence in the map she’d found paid off. They discovered an alternate route back up to level one of the mine.
Hannah’s only concern was ensuring Deacon would be able to follow their path. She had left behind a breadcrumb trail for him: a chemical light stick at each key juncture, each one placed to indicate the direction he should travel.
If he survived—no, he will survive, she told herself—he should find his way to them with no problem.
As she and Emily picked their way along the service tunnel, Emily leaning against her for support, Hannah scanning the flashlight ahead of them, Hannah heard what sounded like a distant rumble of thunder. The ground trembled, a thin hail of rocks and dust falling from the ceiling.
“Dynamite,” Emily said. “Wow, he really did it.”
Hannah felt a laugh bubbling at her lips. She hadn’t had much to laugh about throughout this entire hellish adventure, but the thought of putting all of this behind them, of seeing Deacon again, lifted her spirits to euphoric levels.
She needed to hear his voice. She unclipped her two-way radio and tried to raise Deacon. He didn’t answer.
“He’s probably running out of there, can’t hear it for all the noise,” Emily said.
“Right,” Hannah said, but a stone had rolled over her heart. “I’m sure he’s on his way.”
They shuffled along in silence for a few paces. The worst of the trembling had subsided, but smaller disturbances rippled through the mine, like the aftershocks of a major earthquake.
“You two make a beautiful couple, you know,” Emily said. “You’d have gorgeous children.”
“I think you’re getting ahead of yourself, girl.” Hannah smiled. “We aren’t dating.”
“Promise to invite me to the wedding, okay?” Emily said.
“You’re only being silly,” Hannah said.
“Hey, what’s that?” Emily lifted her own flashlight.
Hannah saw it, too. A vehicle parked ahead of them in the tunnel: a black Chevy Silverado, the back panels splashed with whorls of red clay. It had a Georgia plate. The truck’s lights were off.
“Kent’s pickup, you think?” Hannah asked.
“Let’s check it out. It would be nice to drive the rest of the way out of here.”
They drew closer to it. The driver’s side door hung open a few inches. Emily reached for the handle.
“Wait,” Hannah said, struck with a premonition of danger. Why was the door open? Kent wouldn’t have left it that way, would he?
But Emily was already swinging the door open all of the way. “It’s all right . . .”
Inside the cabin, something shrieked. Emily screamed, too.
A chimpanzee leaped out of the truck. It bounded onto Emily, its long, powerful arms wrapping around her torso.
It’s the same one that attacked Em earlier, Hannah thought, in a flash. It’s come back to finish her off.
Hannah had, in that instant, a terrifying vision of how it could all play out. The enraged chimp would rip a plug out of Emily’s neck. Meanwhile, she would fumble the pistol Deacon had given her because she was really no good at using guns anyway. The infected animal would move from Emily and jump onto her and tear her apart as if she were made of confetti paper.
But that flash of thought was overcome by sheer survival instinct. She already had the pistol in her other hand, had never relinquished her grip on it. She lifted the gun, took aim at the primate attacking her friend, and pulled the trigger one, two, three times.
The sick animal dropped to the ground, tried to get up again but didn’t have the strength.
Hannah took no pleasure in killing the chimp, wished it hadn’t been necessary. The animal had been only a pawn and hadn’t deserved its fate.
“You okay, Em?” Hannah went to where Emily huddled on the ground.
“Yeah.” Emily nodded. “It didn’t bite me again, thank God. Came awfully close, though.”
Hannah helped her to stand. Together, they examined the pickup truck. The interior was spotless, and had that new-car smell that Hannah had always found appealing.
Emily found the key fob nestled under the sun visor.
“Not as though he would have expected anyone to steal his truck down here,” Emily said.
Emily offered to drive, and clambered behind the wheel. The engine started with a rumble. The fuel tank gauge indicated it was three-quarters full, head lamps carving away the darkness ahead. Hannah couldn’t see the exit out of the mine, but she saw nothing stopping them from progressing.
“Wait for Deacon?” Emily asked.
“He’ll be here soon. I’m sure of it.”
Hannah twisted around in the passenger seat and stared out the rear window, at the empty blackness beyond the red glow of the tail lights.
Don’t make a liar out of me, Deacon, she thought.
***
The mine was collapsing.
Deacon dropped everything except for the flashlight and the shotgun, and ran pell-mell down the tunnel. The ground shook beneath his feet. Rocks fell from the ceiling. Dust got into his eyes and mouth. The sound of destruction was like nothing he had ever heard—it sounded as if the earth itself were falling apart.
But he kept running.
He hit a curve in the tunnel, a turn he remembered taking earlier, except from the opposite direction. He was confident so far of finding his way back, up to a certain point, but Hannah and Emily would need to come through for him if he were to escape the mine entirely.
As he hustled down the passageways, whipping the flashlight back and forth, the most destructive tremors eventually subsided, but rumbles and rattles continued. He became aware, however, of another set of noises echoing along the tunnel: rapid, heavy footsteps.
Someone—or something—was following him.
Swinging around, Deacon shone the light in the tunnel behind him. He saw nothing but veils of dusty darkness, rippling like curtains.
But the noises of something stalking him were unmistakable. Whatever it was, it had weight. It would be bigger than him—it would be something they hadn’t seen before.
He flashed back to all of those empty cages in the lab, and the largest enclosure of all, and had a strong sense of exactly what might be out there looking for him.
The shotgun had a mount large enough to accommodate his tac-light. He slammed the light into the slot. It wasn’t a perfect fit, but it would serve fine for his purposes.
He tightened his grip on the gun and resumed moving.
A roar of pure rage washed over him, echoes assaulting his ears.
Cold sweat coated Deacon’s hands. He steadied his grip on the gun.
Keep moving, keep moving, keep moving . . .
Bluish light glowed ahead near a juncture of the tunnels. One of the light sticks Hannah and Emily had left behind for him, pointing the way to freedom. He plunged ahead, past the intersection.
As he passed through, he caught lumbering movement, on his left, something immense coming out of the shadows, a giant killing machine that could be only one thing, a creature from his most terrifying nightmares.
The black bear bellowed in murderous fury.
Deacon kept running. He didn’t look back. He kept the shotgun aimed ahead to light his way. His boots kicked up shale and dust. Random pieces of debris continued to pelt him as the mine rumbled and pitched.
He heard the bear gaining on him, massive paws splashing through pools of water.
He’d watched a nature documentary some time ago and remembered that bears could run up to thirty miles an hour. The animal on his heels couldn’t travel that fast in a shifting tunnel full of debris. But it still held a substantial speed advantage over him.
Doesn’t matter. Run
. Run for your life.
The animal’s roar reverberated all around him as it closed the gap. As if from far away, he heard a tinny voice, Hannah’s voice, issuing from the walkie-talkie riding on his hip. He couldn’t spend time responding, but hearing her calling for him, wanting to know if he was okay, stirred something in him, a sudden compulsion to fight back instead of running, to face the beast on his heels and let loose with buckshot until the shotgun clicked on an empty chamber.
Deacon swung around, and the bear was so close that he could smell its rank breath, could see the whites of its crimson, swollen eyes in the glare of the mounted flashlight.
He started shooting—at the already weakened support beams bracketing the tunnel ceiling.
The shotgun leapt in his grip. Chunks of wood fractured and flew like shrapnel. Roaring, the bear surged forward and swiped at him with its mighty paw.
Feeling as if he’d been flayed open like a fish, Deacon went down.
The tunnel came down, too.
***
Sitting in the passenger seat of the truck, Hannah checked her watch for perhaps the tenth time, and looked out the rear windshield again. She was starting to feel sick.
She had tried to raise Deacon several times on the two-way radio, with no luck.
“He’ll make it,” Emily said, but she had begun drumming her fingers on the steering wheel.
“Maybe he missed one of our markers,” Hannah said. “Maybe debris from the explosion covered up one of them and he’s lost.”
“Or maybe he’s almost here.” Emily touched her arm.
Hannah shrugged off her hand. “I’m going to look for him. Wait here.”
She got out of the truck before Emily could talk her out of it. Emily meant well, and she appreciated her quiet faith in a positive outcome, but Hannah couldn’t sit there and hope that this man made it back to them, she had to do something.
The glowing tail lights brightened the tunnel for a radius of perhaps ten feet. Beyond that range, darkness came down like a solid wall.
Hannah realized she had left behind her flashlight in the truck. She was so distraught she wasn’t thinking clearly.
A noise, close by. A groan of exhaustion, pain.
Frenzied - A Suspense Thriller Page 28
