by George Wier
“Okay,” I said. “Last question. Why me?”
Hague sighed. “Because when Sonny Raleigh told me you were looking into it, I had to know who you were and how far you would go. And you went farther than I thought. You got me to the files on Freeman and Logan, and I needed those to track them down and try to save them. I admit, I did use you to get the files, and you did that. But also you were instrumental in throwing off Daniken's men when they came looking for the files.”
“But Central Texas Diagnostics was one of your companies. That's how Ralph, the security guard, knew that we were okay. He recognized you.”
“Yes, he did.”
“I knew it was too easy.”
At that moment, Keithley coughed.
Hague bent over Keithley and peeled back his shirt sleeve to reveal a wristband the twin of his own.
“It's yellow. We haven't got much time. I've got to get him out of here.
“Time?” Hank said. He walked over to the closed door. He examined it carefully, traced a finger along the vertical length of its seam, moved his fingers around the hasps.
He turned to face us.
“I can get us out of here any time,” he said.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“What the hell is that?” Hague asked.
Hank had a small square of paper between his fingers. It could have been a piece of cigarette rolling paper, but it was shiny and thick.
“You don't want to know,” I said.
We watched as Hank pulled a second and a third little square of the paper from his wallet. He took one between thumb and forefinger and peeled a square and discarded the peeled portion. What had been between sandwiched between the two bits of paper appeared to be a small circular wafer of putty about an inch in diameter. Hank rolled it into a long, thin string, then removed a second circle from its sheath and did the same. He attached the two strings together, making it about nine or ten inches of putty, and began work on a third.
When he was done he divided the string in half and took one string and pressed it into the crack of the door near the top hasp, repeating this procedure on the bottom half.
“What are you guys, a couple of secret agents or some shit?” Hague asked.
“No,” Hank said. “Just resourceful.”
“Yeah, but nobody has those kinds of resources.”
Hank looked over at Hague, dropped him a wink and grinned. “I do,” he said.
After a minute, Hank came over to where Keithley lay on the cold floor panel, sat down beside him and began taking off his own shoes.
“How is your aim, Bill?” he asked me.
“I'll bet it's better than his,” I hooked a thumb toward Keithley.
Hank held a shoe out one of his shoes to me and I took it. Then the other one.
“Get back against the wall, Dr. Hague,” Hank said. “Pull that chair in front of you the best you can. I'll cover Keithley.”
While Hague got behind a chair and tried to make himself as small as possible, Hank instructed me to go to the far corner of the room away from the door and wait for his signal to throw his shoes.
“We have to wait a minute while the stuff hardens from the cold,” Hank said. “That's why I keep it in my wallet and I always keep my wallet on me. Like clay, it has to be kept warm so that it stays soft.”
“You keep small explosives in your wallet?” Hague asked.
“Doesn't everybody,” I said, and laughed.
We waited in silence.
After a few minutes, Hank nodded to me.
I fully expected to have to lob the shoes at the thin strip of putty a dozen times or more, retrieving Hanks shoes each time between tries. This was why I wasn't the least prepared for what happened on my first throw.
*****
There was a momentary blinding flash of light and a concussive pressure on my ears and head, followed immediately by a thunder clap. A few seconds later, while I was shaking my head in an attempt to disperse the purple spots before my vision, the vague form of Hank, gun drawn and ready, hurdled toward the cleared doorway and out it.
I couldn't see well and I couldn't hear a damned thing. Also, I'd been knocked on my backside with my head wedged in the exact corner of the room. My nose worked, however, and the most acrid smell I had ever encountered hung in the air of the room.
My vision was the first sense to clear as I slowly gained my feet. I noted Hague coming out from behind his chair, albeit slowly. The second thing to improve was my hearing. And with it, outside in the main chamber, I heard a fight in progress.
*****
By the time I got to the door, Hague was on his feet and making sure Keithley was alright. The blasted door had sailed across the room and struck the wall to my right, and I couldn't help but think that Hank had accurately predicted its path.
Outside, Hank was in action. He had one of the lab technicians down on the floor holding a bloody nose while another sailed horizontally across the room toward the exit, head first. I anticipated a horrible crunch and winced, but the door opened and the technician slammed into Archer Daniken, knocking him backwards.
Hank stopped and snapped a look at the two remaining technicians, but they quickly moved along the far wall and towards the door, apparently not wishing to become embroiled with the karate man with the gun.
“Hank,” I said. “I thought you were going to start shooting people.”
“Hell,” he said. “I didn't have to. These guys are wimps.”
The technician with the bloody nose tried getting to his feet and slipped on his own blood. After a moment he scrambled up and away toward the exit, sobbing as he went.
Daniken came in after the last technician had fled.
Hank leveled his forty-five on him at eye level from twenty feet away. “Can I help you with something?” he asked.
Daniken turned and fled.
“I thought not,” Hank said.
“A little help in here,” Hague called out.
I went back into the room and helped Hague get Keithley up. We had to do a fireman's carry with Keithley between us and his arms hooked around our necks. The man was still out of it.
“Which way?” I asked.
“I'll show you. To the door and out.”
Before leaving Hague paused. “Mr. Sterling,” he said. “I would like to take Daniken's core offline. Permanently. You strike me as the man for the job.”
Hank laughed. “Now that I can do,” he said. “I need to retrieve my backpack. It's outside.”
“Your brown rice?” I asked.
“That too.”
Hank started towards the exit.
“Wait,” I said. I turned to Hague. “How is Hank going to find us?”
“When you've got your backpack,” Hague said to Hank, “circle around to the rear of the complex. About two hundred yards back, at the edge of the sand dunes, there is a narrow cleft. Sort of a ravine. Go down it. It's the only other way into the cavern.”
“I'll find it,” Hank said and turned to sprint down the hallway beyond the door.”
“And hurry!” I called after him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
At the forest of banyan trees in the atrium we turned to the right and went down one of the octopus tentacles. For such a thin man, Keithley was heavy. Either that or my strength was beginning to flag.
We carried Keithley another fifty yards before Hague indicated an open doorway with a nod. The door bore a placard beside it which read: UTILITY.
Through the room and down a short staircase, we entered into a cramped basement.
“Back there,” Hague said. “Behind that fuse panel.”
The panel was a fake and opened up with Hague's flip of what otherwise would have been a circuit breaker switch. We moved down a series of steps and into a narrow, sandstone-walled defile.
“You sure about this?” I asked, half out of breath.
“I know what I'm doing.”
I wanted to relate a few choice words to the m
an. I wanted to drop Keithley and punch Hague in the mouth. I wanted to do a lot of things. In the end, I carried as much of Keithley's and my own weight as I could and kept my mouth shut. Sometimes it's not easy being Bill Travis.
We carried Keithley what seemed like half a mile along the undulating path with a string of jerry-rigged forty-watt bulbs to light the way. Then the defile opened onto a chamber.
We let Keithley slip down to sand floor against the far sandstone wall. I dropped down beside him, gasping for breath.
Hague himself was winded, but he managed to walk back a few steps and slid down into a chair.
The chamber had a large computer console, monitor and workstation, as well as a few end tables covered with blueprints.
And across the floor from me, against the far wall, was the first of four additional occupants I hadn't yet had the pleasure of meeting.
I stared at the first grotesque form for a whole minute and began to get my breath back.
I turned my head to Hague. I was going to ask him something.
Hague had a gun in his hand, pointed at me.
I looked back toward the inert figure opposite me.
In the corner was the mummified remains of a conquistador.
*****
“Bill Travis,” Hague said, “meet Antonio Alvarado Nunez.”
I regarded the mummified remains. His burnished-gold yet dusty conquistador helmet lay beside him next to an armored breastplate. His back was against the cavern wall, as if he had decided to shuffle off the mortal coil while in a sitting position, and then had slumped backwards and a little to the right to fetch up against an outcrop of sandstone.
“And here is what is left of his journal,” Hague stated, and from beneath a small stone on one of the end tables lifted a sheaf of loose-leaf parchment.
“Most of the conquistadors who came through Texas have been accounted for,” I said.
“You know your history, but not as well as, say, a professor at The University of Texas, whom I spoke with during my brief stay in Austin. I got the whole rundown on the Narvaez Expedition.”
“Narvaez?” I asked. “I've heard of that one. A fleet of ships took off from Hispaniola, what is now Cuba, and met with a hurricane while crossing to Florida. I'm a little sketchy on it, but they made it across the southern states, down through Texas and back to Mexico City.”
“Not bad,” Hague said. “Not bad at all. I could give you the whole rundown on it, if you'd like.”
“That's not necessary,” I said. “Except for how this man,” I gestured to the mummified corpse, “came to be here.”
“Here's the brief version: Narvaez kept dividing his forces during their expedition. What started out as six hundred men and horses was a mere three by the time they returned to New Spain, which was what Mexico City was called back then. Nunez was a Basque from the mountains between Portugal and Spain. He was adopted by the Nunez family as a young boy after an earthquake destroyed his village. Later he became a Spanish Lord and left Spain with his retainer,” Hague pointed the way I hadn't yet looked. I followed his finger and saw another mummy, and two others beyond, “and his two sons. There, and there. By the time that Narvaez was coming up the Rio Grande River and into Apache territory, Nunez and his men broke off from the main host—what was probably no more than thirty or forty men by that time—and struck northward, looking for Coronado's Seven Cities of Gold. The journal tells the tale. They sheltered here during a bad sandstorm, and died when they were sealed inside as part of the roof collapsed. Nunez last words were written by candle light. God had deserted him because of his lust for gold.”
“He always does,” I said. “Much the way he probably deserts doctors who abandon their oaths.”
Hague laughed. “You are an opinionated fellow, Travis. But right now, you can shut up while I finish what I'm doing.” He turned to his computer and tapped out a command with one hand. The gun was apparently getting heavy in his hand. I noted the drop in the barrel. At the moment it was pointed at my feet.
“Just one question,” I said, and slowly regained my feet. “How did you find this cave?”
“The cave opened up during construction of the plant. A worker actually fell in and when a light was shined down to see if he was alright, the fellow went to screaming and making an awful racket.” Hague laughed. “He found out he wasn't alone down here. Nunez, over there, was grinning at him.”
“Nunez,” I said, addressing the mummy. “Still scaring the natives after all these years.”
Hague laughed.
“You could say that. Anyway, I took my copy of the plans for the plant and marked it all up for the contractor. I had to swear him to secrecy on it. You know, I didn't want anyone finding this place. The contractor made the entryway into the cave. All of this, just in case Daniken decided to take over and get rid of me. I needed an ace in the hole, so to speak.”
“That's a great deal of planning for something that might not happen,” I said.
“The writing was on the wall. Daniken finally ousted me.”
Hague turned from me and back to his computer console for a moment. As he did a drift of sand from the cavern roof fell on the floor between us. By the time he turned back around the drift had ceased.
I thought of Nunez and his men and the inexorable passage of time. They had holed up here on the spot where I was standing, riding out the mother of all sand storms while they prayed fervently to a God who had seemingly abandoned them. And the cave was their crypt, a burial plot from which I very badly desired to exit.
“What about Keithley?” I asked. “He needs medical attention. I'd say it's time to call it a day on your little project here. You know, cut your losses.”
“Cut my losses?” Hague turned to face me. He stood up. “Cut my—Look, Travis. You were of some use to me before. But you're beginning to outlive your usefulness. This,” he said, and waved an arm at the array of machinery around him. “All this was my life's work, and—”
“Was,” I repeated for him.
“Yes, was. And if I'm going to lose it, I'll be damned if I'll let anyone else have it. Particularly not Daniken.”
“Yes,” I said. “I believe you will be damned.”
“Whatever,” he laughed. “The sequence is nearly done. In another minute I can send out the pulse that will order the nanites to shut down.”
“It doesn't matter,” I said. “Daniken still has the essential technology. It's all up there in that core. Your notes, your schematics, your samples. Your technology. And with that, he can build it all again.
“Maybe,” Hague said. “But not today.”
The pistol wavered slightly as he turned to glance at the computer screen behind him. I could either rush him or spring away and around the corner. Still, it was risky. I opted to wait it out. Hague was supposed to be a doctor, not a killer.
“And there we go,” he said. He looked back at me, corrected his aim, paused a finger over the ENTER key on the keyboard. And then pushed it.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The sand moaned. It moaned like an army of four hundred year old ghosts. Then it ceased.
“What the hell was that?” Hague stated into the sudden silence.
“Maybe,” I began, “your creation isn't ready to commit suicide, Dr. Frankenstein.”
“Shut up!” Hague shouted at me.
A low susuration began about the level of the cavern floor, as if the sand itself was shifting, seeking its own level.
The gun in Hague's hand shook.
I noted a change in the curled form of Keithley. The redness on his face and hands turned pink. He almost looked normal, yet still asleep. Then a finger of sand extended from Keithley's bare ankle and slithered towards the mummified corpse of Nunez.
“I think we should get out of here,” I said. And I meant it. I took a step backwards.
“Stop,” Hague commanded, the gun in his hand suddenly stock still and steady. “We wait.”
“Suit yourself,” I s
aid.
The body of Nunez was to Hague's left and just out of eyesight. I noticed it began to change. The sand silted upwards from the cavern floor and into the hollow patches between its ribs.
I focused on Hague and waited. But in my periphery, the mummy of Nunez began to undergo a decided change. Gradually, Hague became aware that something was amiss. His eyes widened slightly. His gun-hand began again to quiver. His eyes very slowly moved to his left in suspicion.
“We have company,” I said quietly.
Hague's head turned toward Nunez, whose torso no longer rested against the stone outcrop. Nunez rose slowly to his feet and Hague's gun tracked slowly that way.
Hague's mental state, at that moment, underwent a dramatic change. Not that my own was wholly intact, but my operating basis has always been based on observation and less on judging and reacting. The difference between those two fundamental habits can be quite marked, as was evident in Hague's demeanor.
“This can’t be happening!” he shouted. “It’s impossible!”
Nunez stood fully erect. He very slowly turned to face Hague.
“Whhyyyy... killlll... ussss?” Nunez stated in a voice that was less a voice and more the sound of a slow-falling rockslide.
Hague fired at Nunez, point blank.
Nunez fell backwards and lay still. Then the sand that had been blasted back and away and into the wall behind him came drifting back along the cavern floor on a reverse vector. A look at Hague's face revealed the man's utter horror and disbelief in what he was seeing.
Nunez arose again.
And what happened next defies all description.
*****
At that moment I detected the presence beside me. It was Hank.
“What the hell?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said. “It's hell. Or it's as close to hell as we'll ever see.”
Then the mummy of Nunez blurred through the space between itself and Hague in an instant. And thus began the dance of death.
