Destroying Angel

by Michael Wallace

  Jacob gave pursuit.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  “It has to be along here somewhere.” Lillian’s voice sounded hollow through her mask.

  The ground rumbled ominously. Eliza sniffed the air in her mask for the poisonous vapors, the noxious, bitter odor that had filled her nose and mouth during the earlier earthquake. She smelled rubber with a faint scent of something that reminded her of a coconut husk. It had smelled stronger when she first put on the mask, but over time the rubber smell dominated.

  “We’ve been searching this blasted ledge for the last half hour,” Miriam said.

  “It hasn’t been that long,” Krantz said. Still, impatience sounded in his own voice. “Lillian, where the hell is it?”

  “I told you,” the young woman said in a frustrated tone. “He came out right here, below where we’re standing.”

  They had discovered the missile openings easily enough. The entire site apparently had been an underground silo for a trio of intercontinental ballistic missiles. Above the ridge were three circular cement plugs, forty feet across, that could open when the rockets were fueled and in launch mode. No entrance there. Eliza imagined they were hardened against a nuclear blast. The main entrance was just as hopeless. It sat in the side of the rocky ledge and looked like the massive metal door of a bank safe, only wide enough for a delivery truck to drive through, had it been open. A driveway of broken cement—the same tan color as the surrounding earth—stretched from the entrance before disappearing less than twenty feet away. Humvee tracks led away across the desert.

  They searched the cement cylinders for an entrance, cutting back and forth with their flashlights and looking like giant insects behind their masks, with long snouts, mandible-like hoses, and huge, glossy eyes that reflected the light.

  Miriam pressed Lillian as they looked, but the young woman insisted she knew where the silos were relative to the lounge. She sketched it out in the dirt, with the shaft to the surface on one side, the three silos in a row, and finally the lounge and living quarters, bisected by a main corridor for getting from one side of the facility to the other. She took Eliza’s wrist and turned her flashlight to the ledge, which ran roughly east to west as far as they could see in the dark. “The main passageway follows that ledge exactly.” She led them past the last cement plug. “And this has to be right above the lounge where Taylor Junior dropped through the roof. I’m sure of it.”

  Miriam checked her pressure gauge with a grunt. “That’s all great, but we’re wasting oxygen.”

  They climbed down from the ledge and walked its length, inspecting every inch, even hacking sagebrush roots with Miriam’s KA-BAR knife and kicking gravel out of the way.

  The ground rumbled again. Everyone stopped, and then the ground fell silent. Every moment that passed the gas bubble would be creeping over the ground, sinking into the underground compound. Soon it would be too late. Maybe people were dying already.

  Eliza forced herself to be calm. “Steve, how far are we from the entrance?”

  He glanced at the GPS. “A hundred and fifty feet.”

  “And we’ve got to be fifty feet beyond the last silo by now. You measured that distance?” Eliza asked Lillian.

  “I told you that already.” Lillian’s voice quivered with frustration. “It has to be right here.”

  Eliza took her arm. “Okay, but maybe the shaft bent north or south before it dropped into the room. Maybe the army figured there was a problem with the air circulation, so they built a bigger opening and piped in air from as far away from the pond as possible.”

  “If you’re right,” Miriam said, “then we’re looking in the wrong place.”

  Eliza turned it over in her head, trying to think like Jacob. “Not south, toward the pond, or north, through the ridge. If the base runs east to west, I’m guessing this way.”

  They followed her east along the ledge. Five minutes later they found it, a full fifty yards beyond the last room of the base, according to Lillian.

  A metal grating sat on the ground, together with several metal bolts, each as thick as Eliza’s thumb, scattered in the dirt. It had been removed from a hole in the hillside, and they shone their lights inside to reveal a culvert-like metal pipe extending deep into the hillside before dropping vertically. Eliza’s mouth went dry at the thought of maneuvering through that tight, dark space and then squirming her way down the pipe a hundred feet without falling to her death.

  Krantz took one look inside and then stepped back. “Oh, crap.”

  “I know how you are about heights,” Eliza said, “but we don’t have any choice.” She put her hand on his arm. “Taylor Junior did it. If that jerk can manage, so can you.”

  “It’s not that. I could handle the drop. I wouldn’t like it, but I’d manage. But look at the size of that thing. And look at my shoulders.”

  “It must get wider farther in,” Lillian said. “At least, it was wider where it dropped into the room. Maybe there’s a second ventilation shaft that connects with the main pipe.”

  “Doesn’t matter how big it is on the other side if he can’t squeeze through the opening,” Eliza said as she checked her pistol in its holster and double-checked her spare clip. She turned to Krantz. “Steve, I think—”

  “Don’t say it. I can’t let you do that.”

  “I’m going to say it, and you know it’s the only choice. You stay here with Lillian. Take the ATVs to higher ground, wherever the air is fresh, so you don’t use any more oxygen. Watch the main entrance. If anyone tries to escape, you’ll be ready to help. Or stop them from doing some awful thing, if it comes to that.”

  “I need to go down too,” Lillian said. “I can talk them into surrendering peacefully. They trust me.”

  “You can handle the tunnel?” Eliza asked.

  “I can handle it,” Lillian said. She squared her shoulders and lifted her mask, as if to show the determination on her face. “Let’s go.”

  Eliza looked at Miriam, trying to read any hesitation behind the woman’s mask, but if her sister-in-law harbored lingering suspicions about Lillian, she didn’t voice them. And there was something in Miriam’s posture that was uncharacteristically timid.

  “Let’s get you fresh tanks,” Krantz said. He returned from the ATVs a moment later with the duffel bag full of pressure tanks. They spent a minute swapping out canisters for each of the three women, and then he stepped out of the way as the women approached the hole in the ledge.

  Eliza sent Lillian in first, followed by herself, with Miriam bringing up the rear. They crawled into the shaft on their hands and knees, with Lillian reaching the first bend just as Miriam entered behind them. Krantz was still at the mouth of the tunnel, with his light shining over their shoulders. Lillian squirmed around so she could enter the vertical part of the shaft feetfirst.

  “Eliza, wait,” Miriam said, her voice sharp and urgent.

  “What is it?”

  Miriam pushed against Eliza and spoke in a low voice, meant only for her ears. “I don’t feel so hot. I think I might be sick.”

  “Is it your mask?” Eliza asked. “Go back, have Krantz check your air. You can catch up.” Meanwhile, Lillian positioned herself in the vertical shaft and began to edge down the pipe.

  “No, it’s not that.”

  It occurred to Eliza that Miriam had been acting strangely for the last few hours. She seemed exhausted all afternoon, and then queasy at all the dead animals. And she was willing to let others take the lead, whereas she usually wanted to be in charge. Was she afraid? Had the surreal landscape spooked her?

  “It’s okay,” Eliza said. “I’m scared too.”

  “I’m not scared.” Miriam’s voice held its familiar edge on this last part, but she hesitated again before speaking. “The thing is…well, I’m pregnant. There. That’s it.”

  Eliza drew in her breath. “Are you sure? Since when?”

  “Almost three months. I’ve known since Memorial Day. And I get morning sickness now, exc
ept it doesn’t always come in the morning. I think I’m going to throw up. It’s the smell and the bad air.”

  “I’d say congratulations,” Eliza said, “but it might have been helpful to know this before we left Blister Creek, don’t you think?”

  “I thought I could handle it. I’m sorry, I really am.”

  “And that’s what the argument with David was about, wasn’t it?”

  “He said it wasn’t safe for me or for the baby. What does he expect me to do, cower with the old women and children? I don’t want to be like Fernie.”

  “Miriam.”

  “I’m sorry, I don’t mean it like that, but if that happened to me, I’d rather die. Being strong is who I am, it’s how I answer people like Krantz and Fayer, prove to them I belong in Blister Creek. It’s different for you—you were born in the church. You don’t have to explain why you’d give up the outside world to be ordered around because you’re a woman.”

  “Miriam, we don’t have time for this.”

  Lillian had continued to move down the shaft, slowly but relentlessly making her way toward the bottom. Eliza continued to the end and turned herself around, as Lillian had, to lower herself feetfirst.

  “Don’t tell Krantz, please.”

  “I won’t tell,” she said, “but you have to decide. And hurry. I need you—you’re a better shot, and you’re trained for this kind of thing.”

  “What if I throw up?”

  “Then you throw up.”

  “But I’ll be above you, and it will go all over the place.”

  “A little barf is the least of my worries,” Eliza said. “Throw up if you have to, but don’t fall. That’s all that matters.”

  “You all right in there?” Krantz called. The light flashed over their shoulders.

  “We’re good,” Eliza said.

  But she was more shaken than she let on. She’d never seen Miriam like this. Lowered into the hole, Eliza was facing Miriam now, her feet against the side of the tunnel, wedging herself into the vertical pipe so she wouldn’t fall. Miriam stared back, her face a silhouette against Krantz’s flashlight at the mouth of the tunnel. Her breath huffed, amplified by the mouthpiece.

  She reached out a hand and grabbed Miriam’s arm. “There’s nobody else I’d rather have by my side to face the Kimballs. Now let’s get down there and finish it.”

  “Eliza…”

  “No. Not now.” She squeezed Miriam’s arm as hard as she could. “Later. You’re going to back me up. I’m going down. You follow.”

  She thought Miriam would break, but then something tensed in the woman’s body and she gave a curt nod. “Okay, go.”

  Eliza lowered herself into the vertical shaft. The darkness enveloped her.

  Lillian was only a few feet down from the sound of it, inching her way ever lower, her breathing ragged through her rebreather mask. She hadn’t gone far, and Eliza realized she had two terrified women on her hands.

  “You’re doing great,” Eliza said to the darkness below her. “But you have to go faster.”

  “I’m trying. I’m getting tired. I don’t think I can do this. Can we get back out?”

  “Wedge your back against one side and your feet against the other. Let yourself slide to the next set of rivets. They’ll stop your slide. Miriam, you good? Miriam?”

  “Coming.” The nerves sounded in her voice.

  Eliza would have been fine but for the weakness in her two companions. A rising tide of panic came up from her gut. Amplified by the mask, her own breathing roared in her ears.

  This is nothing. I killed Gideon. I survived the purification pit in the desert. I killed Caleb Kimball. I fought off Taylor Junior. I can do this. I can save those people.

  “Everyone good?” she said, hoping they didn’t hear the tremble in her voice. “Okay, all three of us down to the next segment. Ready? Slide.”

  Foot by foot they crept down. Sweat dampened Eliza’s armpits, and the muscles in her back screamed for relief. The pipe kept going and going. Would the blasted thing never end?

  And then, unexpectedly, Lillian called up to say that she’d reached the bottom, her voice heavy with relief. She was only a few feet below them. Eliza let herself slide down until she reached the bottom. Miriam joined them a moment later.

  At the bottom, each woman took a turn wriggling until she got herself into the next horizontal shaft, where she could crawl forward on her belly. If Krantz had struggled through the upper shaft, he would have become hopelessly wedged down here. As it was, Eliza had to scrunch and twist to get herself in position.

  “The air isn’t moving,” Lillian said over her shoulder.

  “Is it supposed to?” Eliza asked.

  “Remember how I said we almost got poisoned one other time? I figured the bad air was entering from the shafts on the other side, so I went down there and closed the air vents. It caused a pressure change in the east lounge. You could feel a breeze coming down this pipe and into the room. I don’t feel anything this time.”

  “Maybe we’re blocking the flow,” Eliza said. “I can’t imagine they’d forget to close the other vent again to keep the bad air out.”

  But what about Caleb Kimball’s followers in the desert outside Vegas? They’d walked into the trailer as the fire took hold and then barricaded themselves inside. Could these people be in the process of killing themselves too? Instead of fire, had they closed the vents and waited for poisonous air to seep into their bunkers and kill them all?

  Light entered the ventilation shaft, enough to show Lillian’s dim figure and the gray metal walls around them. The glow grew as they continued, marking the end of their tortuous passage through the pipes. And then the tunnel ended with a square of light between Lillian’s hands and knees. There was no ventilation cover, just a straight drop into the room.

  Lillian lowered herself down, followed by Eliza and Miriam. They found themselves in a lounge, almost like a shabby hotel lobby but with no windows. There were couches, a fridge, pale fluorescent lights, and an old-fashioned console TV mounted on one wall, black and dead.

  And people. Women and children lay in neat rows on the floor, more than twenty people in total. None of them moved.

  Lillian’s voice sounded like lead. “We’re too late.”

  The bubble of carbon dioxide and noxious gasses must have overwhelmed the ventilation system faster than Lillian had imagined, filled the underground compound, and suffocated them all. They’d come all the way down for nothing.

  Miriam had taken out her gun at some point, but now she tucked it back into her holster and made her way to the nearest woman. She bent, and the woman stirred.

  Miriam rose with a start. “They’re not dead. Hurry, we have to—” She stopped abruptly.

  Someone entered the room through the doorway on the far side, wearing a yellow hazmat-style suit with a mask and ventilator. And holding an assault rifle lowered in their direction.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Stephen Paul took a bullet.

  One minute he was by David’s side, calmly rising to fire his rifle at the Humvee, which spit death in all directions like a fire-breathing monster. The next he lay on the ground, writhing and groaning. David dragged him fully behind the boulder.

  The .50-caliber machine gun chewed at the rock for a few seconds before turning south to engage the rifle fire to the southeast. The guns on that side immediately fell silent, and David imagined the people—many if not most of them women—would be cowering, unable to stand before the hundreds of rounds pouring into their position. Survive until the guns turned away, and then fire with their feeble arsenal until they enraged the beast sufficiently to repeat the entire hopeless process.

  Stephen Paul groaned and grabbed at his left leg. He’d been hit a few inches above the knee. He must have exposed his leg while firing. Not the .50-cal, thank goodness, or the leg would be gone. One of the assault rifles, then. But it was a big, gaping wound, and David felt suddenly light-headed and had to look away.


  He glanced at the boys. Diego and Daniel sat to one side, their rifles in the dirt in front of them, hands clamped over their ears. Terrified by the ear-bruising sound of battle.

  David tore away Stephen Paul’s shredded pant leg. There was a lot of blood. He needed Jacob’s help to tell him what to do. But his brother would be deep in Witch’s Warts by now, hopefully finishing off that bastard for good. Doubtful Jacob could get a radio signal down among the stones, and if he could, surely he’d have the thing turned off.

  “Is it bad?” Stephen Paul asked between clenched teeth.

  “You’ll live.”

  But only if David could stop the bleeding. He pulled off his belt, wrapped it around the man’s leg, and cinched it as tight as he dared. Stephen Paul grunted when David tied off the ends in a knot, but he didn’t cry out, though it must have hurt like hell. Blood still oozed around the sides, but it wasn’t gushing.

  Stephen Paul leaned forward and peered through the darkness. “Give me my gun.” He tried to rise, but David pushed him back down.

  “Don’t be an idiot. If you move, that belt will come loose and you’ll bleed to death.”

  “It’s not that bad. I need to help.”

  “It is that bad. You need a doctor or you’ll lose that leg, and you sure as hell aren’t going to go limping around on it like some kind of movie star. We’ve got plenty of firepower. Enough to keep them pinned down.”

  “But not enough to finish it,” Stephen Paul said.

  No, not enough, either with or without Stephen Paul’s rifle. And that was the problem. They’d taken out the Humvee’s tires, but Taylor Junior’s men could back up at any time on their rims, laying down a withering hail of bullets until they were safely out of range. And then what if they had another vehicle stowed away up the road? They’d get away unscathed.

  A rocket-propelled grenade screamed through the air and detonated a few feet away. Sand and rock rained down on their heads. The boys cried out and clutched each other.

  An assault rifle rattled to the north, and the .50-cal swung in that direction. It must be Rebecca, and even though her gun fell silent under the withering fire of the heavy machine gun, that assault rifle was the only thing that seemed to get their attention. The rifle fire simply pinged off the side of the Humvee with no more efficacy than a handful of flung pebbles.