by Sarah Dreher
The cave was very dark. Only the entrance showed with any clarity, but a faint breeze seemed to be blowing from the rear. Possibly another entrance, though there was nothing to see.
“Are we all here?” Stoner asked.
They were. Even Callie Rose, who had stayed behind briefly to distract the dinosaurs, but announced that she was learning she could move with a good bit of speed and ease by thinking herself from one place to another. She declared it was one of the advantages of being “passed over.”
There was one problem. Now that they were in the cave, how were they going to get out? The brontos weren’t a problem—even if they walked out the entrance in broad daylight they were probably too far away to catch their attention. But the dimetrodon was awake now, and in a particularly foul mood. There was nothing bovine or Newfoundland Retrieverish about the dimetrodon. At the moment it was pacing back and forth in front of the cave, shaking the ground as it stamped its feet, and grumbling to itself angrily. Every few passes, it stuck its head into the opening and snarled. From the rancidity of its breath, Stoner figured it for a meat-eater. And she figured it figured them for hors d’oeuvres or party mix. It seemed nasty, relentless, and willing to wait a long time for its snack.
The safest bet seemed to be to explore for the other entrance.
She passed the word to the others and walked toward the back of the cave, touching the walls for guidance and going deeper and deeper into the darkness.
It was cold and damp back here. Well, it was damp everywhere in this world, what else was new?
There might be bugs. She recalled the giant centipedes she had seen on the ride—cute little things, about the size of horses, with hairy legs and hard armor and sharp little pincers. It would be just dandy to have one of those little mothers come scuttling out of the dark. Just dandy.
To say nothing of what else there might be that she didn’t know about. Monster ticks, perhaps. Or worms the size of the Loch Ness monster.
Spiders. That was something to think about. Prehistoric spiders. There would be a worthy challenge...
She stopped short, holding her breath. There was something back there. Something growling, or humming, something making insect noises. Noises that were almost like words, like a subliminal learning tape. She didn’t like this. She wanted to turn and run back to the entrance, where there was light, no matter how dim, and warmth, no matter how soggy—and friends.
But she knew what impossibilities lay in that direction. Whatever she was hearing, if it was something they could get past, it might lead them to the second entrance...
...if it didn’t kill them first.
She moved forward, slowly, easing one foot along the ground, carefully picking up the other and placing it very, very quietly.
The growling sound grew louder. Now it was even more like words. She thought she could make them out. Words like “dawn,” and “tomorrow,” and “launch”...
236
She recognized the voice. It was human, and it was Walter Cronkite.
* * *
David paused and stepped back. He didn’t want to leave Tunes behind him. The woman was capable of anything, especially a sleazy trick like shoving him into the room and locking the door and getting away herself and leaving him to straighten out the mess.
Fat chance.
He waved his gun in her direction. “You first,” he said.
* * *
Stape and George slid along the wall, keeping to the shadows. Keeping out of sight. It didn’t really make a lot of sense, going into this unarmed. But they had to try. They couldn’t just let that man wipe out a bunch of people without trying to stop him. If that was what he intended. If he was only going to take hostages, they’d stay out of sight and let him pass, and let Ed deal with it topside. But if it looked as if he had killing in mind...
George wondered if it had been a good idea to have Ed alert Edith Kesselbaum. After all, it might expose a civilian to danger. But she was Marylou’s mother, and in her place George would want to be in on it, no matter what. Better to see the worst than sit alone in silence wondering what was happening to someone you loved. Besides, the woman was a psychiatrist, a doctor. They might need one before the night was over. Maybe she’d be able to help out. Like figuring out what made Frenchie and Tom such jerks.
* * *
The cave grew wider, the sounds of talking louder. They followed the voice to gray light and suddenly they were on a landing on the stairs inside Spaceship Earth. The exit was there, and—Stoner breathed a prayer of thanks to the Goddess—the stairs were there, leading underground.
Callie Rose was holding back, obviously frightened. Stoner couldn’t blame her. She was frightened, too. But they were out of options. If anything was going to save them, it had to be this.
The stairs clanged and clattered beneath their feet. Stoner didn’t care about being careful now, didn’t care if they tossed Gwen around, even if they hurt her. It was her life they were concerned with—pain was something they could deal with later.
They were at the bottom. The door faced them. On the other side of the door...
She yanked it open.
Oily fog oozed and crawled over the edge of the pit.
Stoner drew back.
“We have to do this, Stoner,” she heard her aunt say softly.
“You’re sure it’s the right thing?”
“No, but it’s the best hunch we have, isn’t it?”
Yeah, it was the best hunch.
Callie Rose came up beside her and looked down into the darkness. “You want me to jump in that?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“Well, I ain’t gonna do it,” Callie Rose said loudly. “I don’t care if I have to stay in this dumb place forever. I ain’t goin’ in there.”
“We all have to go,” Aunt Hermione said. She took the girl’s hand. “It’s the only way, Callie. You can’t stay here forever, and neither can we. It’s time to go our separate ways.”
Callie Rose looked at her and started to cry. “I don’t know anybody over there. Not like you. Not real friends.”
“You’ll find a lot of friends. The people are very kind.” She pulled the girl to her and embraced her. “Remember, your family’s there, and your baby, and all the people you used to love.”
“I don’t care,” Callie Rose sobbed. “I love you now.”
“Remember, we talked about visiting?”
“That ain’t the same.”
“No, it isn’t,” Aunt Hermione said. “But it will have to do until we can really be together.” She took the girl by the shoulders and held her away so she could look directly in her eyes. “You know this is the right thing, Callie. You know it’s time.”
Callie Rose snuffled and wiped her nose on her sleeve. “Yeah. You want me to go first?”
“That would be good,” Aunt Hermione said. She leaned close to the girl’s ear. “You see, these other women are afraid, and it would help if you could set an example.”
“Okay.” She moved to the edge of the Pit. “See you in Forever,” she said. She pinched her nose shut and jumped.
Aunt Hermione turned inward for a moment. Then her face broke into a gigantic smile. “She’s over.”
Stoner stood looking down into the dark fog. “If we go through here and she’s waiting for us on the other side,” she said, “we’ll know we made a wrong turn somewhere.”
“I think we should be touching,” Aunt Hermione said.
They put Gwen on the floor and lifted her from the blanket, holding her unconscious body between them.
“Blessed be,” Aunt Hermione said, and pushed.
* * *
David heard the sirens. He was out of time.
He cocked his pistol, twisted the door knob, and pulled.
* * *
There was darkness everywhere, and a metallic odor. Like blood. Pain shot through her knee like a knife.
Light flooded into the room, searing white light.
She was wearing her old clothes.
The silhouette of a man stood in the doorway, holding a gun.
Stoner looked down.
She was holding Gwen’s body in her arms.
CHAPTER 16
The man reached back, swung his arm forward. The figure of a woman hurtled through the door and crashed to the floor at Aunt Hermione’s feet. The room light went on.
Stoner looked down. Millicent Tunes was propped at an ungainly and graceless angle, one hip on the mattress, one on the floor. She had broken the heel of one shoe; it hung down like an exhausted dog’s tongue. Her stockings had runs the size of fireman’s ladders.
“My goodness,” Aunt Hermione said to her. “You look like something the cat dragged in and wouldn’t eat.”
“Shut up!” David barked. He tilted his head toward Marylou. “You. Come with me.”
“Oh, not again!” Marylou said with a heavy sigh.
“Marylou,” Stoner warned. “He has a gun.”
“All right, all right.” She got to her feet and spent minutes arranging her waist, tucking in her blouse, adjusting her hat.
“The rest of you,” he said. “Up against the wall.”
“She can’t,” Stoner spat out furiously, and indicated Gwen’s limp body. “She’s dying. You…”
“Not me,” David said. His glance implicated Millicent Tunes. “It was her.”
“And I, for one, am not the least bit surprised.” Marylou slipped her arm through David’s and cuddled up to him. She batted her eyelashes. “What’s up?”
The man reddened, obviously taken off guard. He swallowed. “We’re getting out of here.”
“Oh, thank God,” Marylou said. “I can’t tell you how tired I am of this dump. Where are we going? Some place with a decent restaurant, I hope. And a ladies’ room. I really do need to freshen up.”
Be careful, Marylou, Stoner thought. Don’t take it too far.
Something was moving behind the man. It looked like...
“Come on, come on,” David growled. He kept his gun swiveling, back and forth, ready for action. “I said up against the wall.”
Stoner placed Gwen’s body gently on the mattress and stood up. There was blood all over her, all over Gwen, all over the dirty gray blanket that covered the make-shift bed. Gwen’s body was lifeless, inert. Not even the faintest movement in her chest.
Stoner felt as if someone had turned her to ice and cracked her—her chest, her heart, her mind. She ached with an ache that would never go away. All right, he could do what he wanted with her. It didn’t matter. Nothing would ever matter again. “We tried,” she whispered, and hoped Gwen could hear her, wherever she was. “We really tried, Gwen. I’m sorry.”
Someone touched her hand. She glanced over. Aunt Hermione shook her head, so slightly she wouldn’t have seen it if she hadn’t been attending. Her aunt’s eyes flickered toward Gwen. She gave a little wink.
She saw something. Something I missed. Maybe it isn’t too late.
“You, too,” David said to Millicent Tunes.
Slowly, resenting every move, the woman got up and stood next to the rest of them. “I suppose you’re going to kill us all now,” she said in a disgusted voice.
“That’s right. Except for her.” He gave Marylou an affectionate little squeeze.
“No more than I’d expect,” Tunes said, “from someone with absolutely no imagination.” She turned to Stoner. “You’re so brilliant, why don’t you come up with a solution for us?”
“You make me tired,” Stoner said. There it was again, that movement in the hall, in the shadows. She frowned a little, trying to make out what it was.
Marylou noticed her looking. She raised one eyebrow, asking if there was something there.
Stoner blinked once, deliberately.
“What?” Marylou mouthed silently.
She wasn’t willing to bet money on it, but she thought, hoped, it might be George. Keep his attention on us, Marylou, she begged silently. Don’t let him look behind.
“David, dear,” Marylou said, rubbing against him like a cat, “do you mind waiting while I run to the Little Girls’ room? I need to change my tampon.”
He broke out into a cold sweat. “Don’t talk about things like that,” he whispered. “It’s not genteel.”
It was George, all right. She could see clearly as David leaned down to address Marylou. Not only George, but Stape. And Stape was holding a wrench. Not much of a wrench, but a wrench. She was watching David very carefully, and inching closer.
Stoner made eye contact. With Stape, then with Marylou. Hands at her side, she flashed three fingers.
Then two.
Then one.
Go!
Marylou smashed her foot down on his sneakered instep. David stared at her, his eyes wide with surprise. Holding the wrench in both hands, Stape brought it down on his head with all the muscle she could summon.
He staggered and fell against the door frame.
Stoner went for the gun.
He held onto it, doubled over and rolled, and managed to make it out the door.
“I’ll get him,” Stoner said. “Hang onto Tunes.”
She dove out into the hallway.
“He’s armed!” Marylou shouted.
Stoner didn’t care. He had kidnapped her friend, and was going to let Gwen die. Well, it was her turn now, and she wanted him. She stumbled into the hall just as he regained his balance and began to run down the tunnel. She started after him.
Someone grabbed her arm. Stape.
Stoner shook her off.
“Take this,” Stape said, and pressed a hard, square bright red object into her hand.
George reached for her. “I’ve called Security. They’re on the way.”
“Let her go,” Stape said firmly.
George let her go.
Stoner took off as fast as she could, ignoring the pain in her knee.
He was still in sight, but pulling away fast. He’d gotten too much of a head start.
She could feel the blood pounding in her ears as she ran.
Their footsteps echoed a duet off the tunnel walls.
He seemed to be slowing. She was gaining on him.
He stopped, turned quickly, and fired.
Stoner dove to the floor and felt the bullet ricochet just over her head.
He took aim again.
She glanced down at the object Stape had given her.
A pneumatic staple gun.
Staple gun?
She heard a ‘click’ as David cocked his pistol.
No time to take careful aim. She pointed the staple gun in his general direction and squeezed the trigger. It was tight, almost too tight for her to fire. She took a deep breath and forced all her energy into her hands. There was a loud ‘pop’ of compressed air as the spring released. The recoil threw her aim upward.
David dropped his pistol in surprise and grabbed his hand.
Stoner jumped to her feet. She ran to him and kicked the hand gun out of reach. “Hold it right there,” she said, “or I’ll put out an eye.”
Blood trickled between his fingers. He lunged for her, awkwardly.
She grabbed his arm and twisted it. He fell face down on the floor.
Stoner threw herself on top of him. She was dimly aware that her knee was screaming, but she didn’t care. She snatched a handful of his hair and pounded his head against the cement. “God damn you,” she gasped, as her control gave way. Tears of rage streaked down her face and fell on him. She let them fall. She hoped he’d drown in them. “God damn you, God damn you, God damn you.”
He was unconscious, his body limp and heavy, his head flopping like a broken doll’s. And still she beat on him. She couldn’t stop. Didn’t want to stop. Kill him, she didn’t care. Because it was all over for Gwen, all over for her, all...
A hand touched her shoulder, firmly but gently.
She looked up.
It was George, and behind her a phalanx of security guards wit
h drawn guns.
“The ambulance is here. She’s alive,” George said. “We’ll take over now.”
* * *
Edith Kesselbaum stormed past the Emergency Medical Technicians and into the little room to find the elegant Millicent Tunes, looking slightly the worse for wear, hog-tied with duct tape and dumped in the middle of the wretched bed in which the beasts had forced her daughter to sleep. She had half expected Marylou to be prostrate with trauma, mumbling to herself in a corner, or flinging herself about the room hysterically. Instead, Marylou stood calmly in the center of the activity, holding a small but lethal-looking pistol which she kept pointed a few inches from Millicent Tunes’ face.
“Hi, Mom,” Marylou said.
Edith took a deep breath to calm herself. It might be behavior modification, which she hated, but it worked. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine.”
“You,” Edith said, and pointed a rage-trembling finger at Tunes, “have made problems for us for the last time. I will personally see to it that you spend the rest of your life in jail.”
“Oh, give me a break,” Millicent said wearily. “I didn’t touch your precious daughter. It was all David.”
“He was working for her,” Marylou put in. “She was his therapist in prison.”
“Hah!” Edith shouted. “Behavior unbecoming a professional, usury, misuse of therapeutic power. Article 372a, Ethical Standards for Psychiatrists Handbook.”
“That shows how much you know,” Millicent Tunes said triumphantly. “I’m a psychologist, not a psychiatrist.”
“And I,” Edith topped her, tossing her scarf over her shoulder in an imperious gesture, “chaired the Joint APA/APA Committee to Coordinate and Resolve Outstanding Differences, September through November, 1986. It was a crashing bore, but we got the job done. It’s in your handbook, Sweetie, in black and white.”
Tunes glared at her.
“Your training analyst must be ashamed of you,” Edith went on. “On the other hand, it was probably a Freudian, a not-very-bright Freudian, concerned only with the Id. No moral sense.”
