by C R Trolson
The flashlight dimmed, the grinning heads moved in, alabaster and feint blue. He felt his chest tighten and thought about running back outside, back into he cold night and the stars. Easy does it. He tapped the flashlight and it brightened. Both flashlights had probably been sitting in the store for years, unsold. He concentrated on the door. He tried the handle, locked tight. He hit the door with his shoulder but only raised dust.
The air was tight now, closing in.
He tried to break the neck of the lock with the shotgun butt, but only managed to crack the stock. He wound his black tape around the stock a dozen times, good as new but worthless as a hammer.
He brushed his hand across the lock, wiping off dust, scraping off brown paint with his fingernail. The lock was fairly new, painted over to look old.
He heard something far away and put his ear to the grid. Someone screaming and in the background, clarinets?
Rusty?
He swept the shotgun around the room, the bulb again dimming. He snapped the goggles down. In the dull green shadows he saw a long pry-bar in the corner, left from some long ago project, the end resting in the carcass of a large rat, the tail running out like a tapered cord.
He picked up the bar, dislodging maggots, squirming and tinted spooky green. He wanted clean air and stars. He heard her scream, definitely her, and wedged the bar between the lock and the door jamb and pulled. The bar snapped mid-shaft. The scream again. He was losing time.
He stripped the flashlight off the shotgun and propped it to shine on the lock. He taped the barrel to the curving handle, wedging it against the lock to focus the blast. He used more tape, tearing it with his teeth.
He closed his eyes, turned his head, pulled the trigger. The blast lit the room. Pellets ricocheted with a low whir. The recoil cart wheeled the gun across the floor.
A fist-sized hole in the door. He grabbed the gun. Kicked the door open. “Hang on,” he said softly.
From a distant dream, Rusty Webber watched Ajax tear off her pants. Then her shirt. He ripped her bra, gone wild, shredding with teeth and hands, covering the floor with bits and pieces of fabric, a fierce growling from deep inside.
He smoothed his hands along her bare legs. He brought his nose to her top thighs and breathed deeply. He licked between her breasts and sighed.
Like a craftsman, he attached a new chest needle to the syringe and drove it into her leg. She felt the bone nick from deep inside and yelled.
He struck her with the needle over and over, an arcing, stabbing motion, each hit like fire. She yelled at him, every name she could think off, until her throat hurt. When the heavy needle finally broke, he changed it with an even larger needle, kept gouging and stabbing until she lost count.
“Motherfucker!” It was real now. Real time. His arm rising. Dropping. Her head spinning.
His hand flashed, the thin steel fell, a far away slapping as the hand hit. The deep bone pain melting her.
He found a vein in her left foot, finally, and she held still for him, tired of the holes. The syringe filled. He laughed, sprayed blood on her face, the rest in his mouth. Blood down his chin. The hand raised again. She tensed, waiting for the fire, but he stopped, and in the background she heard a bell ringing. Burglar alarm? Telephone?
He raised his index finger as if to test the wind. “It’s Reese, knocking at the back door. Your savior.” He darted away.
She had to stop shaking. Get control. Evaluate.
She was a mess. She tasted her own blood. Naked, blood from a dozen holes, a broken needle sticking from the middle left thigh. The smell of vomit. Don’t exaggerate. It wasn’t that bad. Mostly pinpricks. Don’t think of the needle. You’ve been in worse spots.
She saw no way out until Ted poked his face around the door, saw her, and grinned.
He taped the second flashlight to the shotgun and went through the door. He noticed the small magnetic contact bars, gray plastic, attached to the door jamb. Burglar alarm. He scanned the area in front of him, shucked another round into the chamber, made sure the safety was on, and kept his finger on the outside of the trigger guard. The passageway narrowed to a tunnel six feet high and two feet wide. He ducked slightly, felt the walls squeezing in on him, and walked for another twenty feet before the tunnel angled up sharply.
The tunnel narrowed and lost height, closing in on him. The walls glistened, seeping artesian water. The floor was slick, his running shoes soaked and cold. He went into a chamber ending in a wall of jumbled rock. He slung the shotgun and used both hands to climb. Light and shadow played along the ceiling as he moved.
When he got inside, he’d take the flashlight off the barrel. He didn’t want to be a target. With the goggles and IR lamp he could move in total darkness.
Lavour had told him that the old system of aqueducts and natural tunnels bringing water from the mountains had not been used for years, in fact, he claimed the system had been destroyed by the last earthquake. But someone had been using it. Someone had installed a new lock and alarm system. Someone had been playing hell in Father Ramon’s room.
He was nearly out of breath from the climb when he saw the rubble of sharp, horse-sized boulders blocking the path. He smelled fresh sulfur mixed with sawdust and saw the black radiance of blast patterns. Ajax had used dynamite, a small charge, to block the tunnel. He didn’t want anyone proving he had a way into the mission.
He searched until he found an opening, a jagged hole, rocks delicately balanced on each other. On his knees, he aimed the shotgun, shining the light inside. The hole widened a bit then emptied into a large room.
Facing him, twenty feet away, was another wrought-iron and oak door. Dim light came through its viewing grate. A flashing red light softly illuminated the granite floor. Probably the alarm set off by the sensor on the first door. He was under Ajax. And Ajax knew.
He heard her scream again, closer now. She sounded mad which was good. She was still fighting. Hurry. He pulled the flashlight off the barrel, breaking the tape, and pushed the shotgun in front of him, scraping it along the rock, scratching the barrel. He smiled thinking of the Chief’s face when he returned his personal shotgun.
He measured the opening with his hands, two feet, maybe less. He made his shoulders as small as possible. The goggles scraped rock. The sandstone rubbed his burned leg. He stifled a yell.
He pushed hard, his legs straining, trying to get his shoulders through. The rock shifted. A grating sandpaper noise. A shudder from the stone, a blinding but brief pressure, and he dropped the shotgun, clattering to the floor of the room in front of him. He was stuck good.
He tried to back out, but wedged tighter. The pistol horned into his side. His left arm pinned. He switched off the flashlight to conserve power. He had one arm free. He could yell, but who would hear him? Rusty had quit screaming, and he prayed that was a good sign.
The door creaked open, throwing dust and more light into the room. A head poked through. Ajax. Good. He was away from Rusty. The screams had stopped. That was good. Unless she was dead.
“Is that you Reese? Come a’calling?”
A light now above the door. A bare bulb in a socket. The room now fully lit before him. Ajax standing, smiling. Another tunnel shot off to the left. He stretched for the shotgun. Nearly a yard away, nestled in a jumble of rock that had spilled across the granite floor.
To his right a pair of shoes floated. The shoes, brown leather wingtips stained with a spattering of black, were attached to legs hanging from the roof.
Ajax moved closer. He had once resembled the perfect executive: good posture, slightly graying hair, conservative suit. Normal. But, this man in front of him was something else.
Flashy eyes. Skin slack and sick white. Two long bangs of black hair framed his face. Blood fell off his chin, the front of his ancient black suit shiny with it.
“Can it be?” Ajax said. “I told Ted to use more dynamite, to block the way in, but he never listens. I was expecting you at the front door.”
; “Rasmussen.”
Ajax came to him. He clapped his hands together. “You are late,” he scolded. “But we’ve waited for you.” Ajax pointed to the hanging figure.
He looked around. The shotgun out of reach. The pistol wedged in its holster, under him, impossible to get. He could throw the flashlight at him. He could do that or he could spit in his eye. He could call him names. But that was about it.
Reese glanced at the shoes again, close enough to touch. The smell now. He recognized the brown Verliani suit. Hernandez had bragged about it. He remembered the last time he’d seen Hernandez, the detective had been dressed casually. The fool had dressed up for Ajax, probably to impress the billionaire, maybe angling for a well paid security job. Nothing like getting dressed up for your own execution.
Quickly, quickly now Ajax stepped on Reese’s free hand, exposing the crook of the arm. He shoved in the needle and pulled back the plunger. Reese calling him names. Terrible names. Just filth.
He held the syringe to the bare light bulb and saw yellow clumps. “Hamburgers again?” He emptied the syringe into his mouth. He danced. He clapped his hands above his head. He had not been this happy, this strong in years. He was light. He was dark. He was the World.
Reese twisted his free hand underneath himself. Flatten the hand, he thought. Get the pistol. Still too tight. Ajax had taken his blood as if he were a child. Ajax now doing a weirdo tap dance in his face. He shifted. The pistol gouged his spleen. He tried to kick himself from the hole. He squirmed, got his left arm loose. Good. But his legs were still wedged and growing numb.
Ajax had disappeared into the shadows, but he still heard him laughing. He snapped the goggles down and turned them on but all he got was a dull red screen. Broken in the cave-in. Ajax lightly stepped back into the light, grinning.
He pulled the night goggles off and threw them at Ajax. Ajax laughed and nimbly danced out of the way.
Ted pulled his head out of sight, behind the open door. She heard Reese shouting up from below, a throaty, old lion sound and then silence.
Ted peeked around the door again, looking back and forth, making sure the coast was clear. He walked in carrying a cardboard box.
“You want some of this BOY?” she yelled at him.
Ted dropped the box and stumbled to her. Sewer breath. Wheezing as he breathed. Asthmatic. His tongue long. On her toes with it. The broken needle a lance in her thigh as he slowly licked the blood off her leg.
“Unbuckle my hand,” she said. “I’ll hold your head. Come on, baby.” Ted faltered. She hollered, “Do it boy!” Ted nervously looked around. “You’re afraid of Ajax aren’t you?”
“I’m not, not, afraid.”
“Then let me loose. Turn me loose, Ted. Do it, baby. Come on. You want to. I can make you feel good. You know I can make you feel good.”
Ted wiped his wet mouth. She ran her tongue over cracked lips and smiled. It was goddamned pathetic, but Ted unbuckled the strap and slobbered on her hand.
Move his head down and don’t think about it. He was lapping at her now, she patted his head once, soothing him. There, there. She clearly saw him kicking Reese off the cliff. She saw him killing Thomkins.
She grabbed the heavy needle with thumb and forefinger, surprised how easily it slipped from her leg, how easily it found his moving ear, the slight tug piercing the ear drum, then smoothly into the brain.
Ted looked up very surprised. A flicker behind the eyes. Two inches of thin steel sprouting from his ear. She slapped hard, driving the needle flush.
His eyes flashed, a long sigh, a trickle of blood from his nose as he slipped away.
His legs collapsed. He hit the floor dead. She tore at the other strap, got it loose, undid her feet. She rolled off the bed, tried to stand, fell. The room spun. She felt drained, blood empty.
Her hands were bloody. Slippery with it. Her blood was everywhere. She heard Reese yelling at Ajax to stay the fuck back. She slowly pulled herself back onto the bed. She rested a moment, made it to her pack, ripped it open. Find a shirt. Khaki. She slipped into pants, hoping they’d help soak the blood.
No time for shoes. She scattered through her tools, grabbing the pick. She found the jade whale, still in the pocket of her tattered pants.
She limped down the hall, using the pick as a half-assed crutch, past the Hispanic head framed by two flower vases filled with angel’s breath and hyacinths. The eyes stared openly beneath the brim of a ridiculous floppy hat. A pirate’s hat?
She followed Reese’s yelling down two flights of stairs to an open door, Ajax in the middle of a rock-strewn room. Flinging back his head, howling. Blood flying from his mouth. Reese sticking halfway from a wall of rocks, not looking good, but looking much better than the headless body hanging beside him, wrists handcuffed over a cast-iron pipe.
Reese saw her in the door, twenty feet away. Her legs blood wet, her pants red with it. Leaning against a pick. She looked stunned, confused. She needed time. Ajax started towards her.
If she died, he died. There it was. “Watch him!”
She swung the pick. Ajax cleared his throat as steel came out his back.
She raised her foot to kick him off the point, but he came alive, spinning, jerking the handle from her hands. He pulled the pick from his chest and held it two-handed above his head as if to drive her through the solid rock.
She pulled the whale from her pocket and blew, a high pitched wail, stunning Ajax. He cocked his head, hearing a tune he couldn’t place. He paused, suddenly immobile. He threw the pick at the light above the door, shattering the bulb, and running into darkness.
She grabbed the pick, walking backward, barefoot through the broken glass, crackling like dried leaves, through the door and back into the light.
In the dim light, she could barely make out Reese trapped in the rocks. He had to be trapped or he’d be on Ajax. She imagined Ajax slipping by and swung the pick, hitting nothing but air.
“Rusty!”
“I’m here.”
“Call the police! Get out of here! Go!”
“No.” She was not leaving him with Ajax. She advanced, walking toward his voice, jabbing the air in front of her with the pick.
Reese saw her backlit against the door, fish in a barrel. “Get back into the light. Do it now. He’s got a needle. A spike. Move!”
“Keep talking,” she said.
He turned on the flashlight but it barely glowed. Frustrated, he slammed it on rock, the lens popping out. He reached out and touched Hernandez’s shoe, the rough sock, up the dry ankle, the stiff hair, the ballistic nylon holster, the checkered plastic stock.
He fired three rounds into the black yaw before the pistol jammed. The strobe flash of the shots lit Ajax like an onyx cutout, posing in the corner, using his jacket as a cape, ten feet from her. A heartbeat. “There he is!” Reese yelled to her.
Ajax screamed, “No light! No light!”
Reese yelled again, “There’s a shotgun in the rocks. Use it.”
She didn’t move. “I can’t turn my back on him.” He cleared the jam and fired, emptying the clip, trying to hit Ajax, missing but lighting him up as he ran down the tunnel. She saw Ajax moving, dodging lead, the muzzle flash pointing the way.
Reese spun Hernandez, reaching up the other ankle, finding nothing - all this time Hernandez bragging he carried two backups. “Get back here, Rusty,” he said, knowing it would do no good.
She kept moving. She could not turn her back to get the shotgun. He was too fast. The pick would have to do. She swung against the darkness, then took a step, then another swing, moving down the tunnel.
Ajax felt her warmth, the whisper of the pick. He flattened against the cold rock and let her pass. He smelled her now, sweet bloody copper and deadly. He slipped in behind and raised the needle.
She felt trapped. So goddamn black. Reese’s voice far behind, “Get out! Goddamnit, Rusty, get out of here!” She swung, hitting solid rock. Steel rang, sparks flew, the brief flash lighting a bla
nk wall. Dead end. She’d passed him.
She turned. Ajax backlit, smiling. The needle coming quickly. She planted her feet and followed through.
Ajax felt cold steel inside his lung and dropped the syringe. His hands slipped on the wet steel, hard in his chest, she running past him, gone. He grabbed the handle, jerked the steel loose.
She ran past Ajax and into the light, positive he was on her tail, pick raised, coming fast. Coming now. She grabbed the shotgun and turned. Ajax coming quickly, low and empty-handed.
Before she could fire, he snatched her up by the neck, shaking her like a doll, both feet off the ground. She tried to bring the barrel around but he was too close. She felt weak, hanging there, but tightened her grip on the shotgun, a death grip.
“Let her go,” Reese yelled to him. “And then you go and we’ll follow. You need a doctor. I need a doctor. We’ll sort things out.”
Her neck was breaking. She felt light. Made of paper. His fingers like bone, crushing her. The breath down her neck, fire hot. She tried to yell but couldn’t. Kicking did no good, her legs catching air, no purchase. She held the gun.
She reached for the whistle one-handed, tasting the mint, blowing with her last breath, all she was worth, watching his face screw in on itself, the pressure easing on her neck, she landing and turning, clicking the safety, jacking the slide. This was it.
Ajax Rasmussen looked at her, entranced. He grabbed the barrel as if to push it away, but his touch was soft, a lover’s touch. She shoved the barrel under his chin and fired.
His face flared yellow from the blast. His hair flew up in surprise. The buckshot mushroomed, a disc of scalp spiraled out of sight, his face fell inside itself.
She worked the action, pressing the barrel to his chest, forcing him down with each blast, lighting him up with each shot.
Ajax marveled at the scorching barrel, his hand over the muzzle to stop the pellets. Hands to shape a new world, he thought. Hands to touch heaven.
He wanted to scream at her - the madness - she was losing a lifetime. Eternity, the waste. She could rule the word, if….