Death Drop (13 page)

“I’m not sure Bertie will have enough traction on these smooth walls to get me and the major up the incline, let alone hoist Malo,” Dr. Blink said worriedly.

“How’s he with stairs?” Graale shouted over a barrage of enemy gunfire that bounced off his chest. He fired
The Guardian
and waited for the explosion. Graale paused while the ensuing fire warmed his front and cast wicked shadows on his rocky features before looking over his shoulder to invite a response.

“He can navigate stairs quite easily,” Blink said with a confused look.

“Then I’ll ask you to hurry—they won’t last long. Get to the top of the shaft and get out as fast as you can. Don’t worry about being followed. I’ll take care of it.”

Graale fired two more shells at the burned-out hull shielding the Berzerkers and two more through the haze at the enemy to the south then turned to face the inside of the tunnel. He paused for only a moment to close his eyes and then a brilliant light erupted and burned into the darkness from above his stony crown. It was shaped like a comet and its head glowed white with dazzling luminosity between his spires, flowing upward into a glittering, vibrant green tail that danced and licked the roof of the cavern. He opened his eyes and they were no longer small and dark. Instead, they, too, pierced the shadows with the same green ember as the comet tail.

“Gaanaktu ee bellum, elevatumak cron kerak!”
His words rumbled through the deep expanse of the cave, touching each grain of rock and stone, reverberating and filling the bore like a streaming geyser, pouring into every fissure and crack and rushing upward to meet the cool morning air. For an instant nothing happened and every heart sank. And then the cave
moved.
It began slowly at first. A small tremor tickled at their feet but steadily grew until the walls and floor shook forcibly and waves of Banzium dust rolled down from overhead. The stone cracked and groaned and ground against itself in a roar like rolling thunder and then became silent and still as a tomb once again.

Bertie shined his light up the retreat, and instead of an impossibly steep incline an incomprehensible feature ascended up the tunnel and disappeared somewhere high above them. The smooth walls of the cave had cracked and buckled to form a set of crudely constructed steps jutting from the back side of the cylindrical vent.

“Now go!” Graale urged, unslinging his enormous cannon and easily holding it out toward Malo with one hand. “Please take
The Guardian,
Malo. I would be ashamed if it fell into the hands of those beasts.”

Malo lowered his head in respect for Graale and his offering, then removed his battle hammer from across his back and replaced it with the big cannon, sliding the heavy strap over his horns and across his shoulders.

“Now go—hurry!”

Graale turned back to face the Berzerkers and was greeted by a mortar shell directly to his torso. The explosion rocked him backward as flames lapped harmlessly at his limbs. The dark leader of the Berzerkers roared and his army flooded toward the cavern with crazed ferocity. Their mouths gnashed the open air between murderous cries as they anticipated the sweet taste of blood they hoped would flow from somewhere beneath the surface of their hardened enemy.

Graale stayed on his feet as he slid backward from the blast and retreated from sight into the tunnel. Abalias was picking himself up from the floor directly behind him and Graale turned to accept the unfortunate order he knew would issue from the colonel’s cold mouth once he was on his feet.

“It’s now or never,” said Abalias. He winked a blue eye at Graale, and then they both strode defiantly out from the cavern and into the shipyard. Graale was breathing heavily as his stony fingers twitched in anticipation of the rush of Berzerkers that would soon overtake them. Abalias walked calmly with both revolvers clutched at the barrel and the handles pointing away from his body. He deliberately and dramatically heaved the pistols to the floor a few feet in front of them and prayed his gesture of surrender would be interpreted correctly. After that, he hoped the gesture would be accepted. After all, these were Berzerkers: the bloodthirsty attack dogs of the Durax. They weren’t known for their ability to reason. They weren’t known to take prisoners.

The front line of wailing beasts surged forward and would soon pass the impotent hunks of metal lying on the cold floor. The bayonets on their guns were gouged and scratched and dulled by the flat color of dried gore. Many had slung their rifles and holstered their pistols in lieu of ragged swords, nicked axes, and serrated daggers they hoped would carve out something warm, raw, and bloody. They charged on; their screams rising in a frenzy fueled by their urge to feed as their weapons clanked against each other in time to the rhythmic footfalls of their masters.

The line of Berzerkers to the west had emerged from the haze and now joined their heinous brethren in the gruesome race to devour the last of the Dissenters. It appeared as if the contingent approaching from the east would become the murderous victors. They were twenty yards away from their prey and the distance closed with blinding speed. In a matter of seconds, they would kill the two standing in front of them and taste blood if there was any to be wrung from the stone beast and the ice king. Then they would flood the cavern behind them and drag the rest of the Dissension traitors into the shipyard, where they would force each of them to watch in horror as their comrades were eaten alive. There would be no acceptance of surrender this day.

Graale turned to Abalias and the comet burst to life above his head once more. The colonel didn’t need to speak to him to know the plan: seal off the vent tunnel to ensure that Otto, Malo, Bertie, and Blink couldn’t be followed, then collapse the whole damn cavern, robbing these vile beasts of their last supper and sending them all straight to hell! Abalias nodded his consent as the Berzerkers moved within ten yards.

“Gaanaktu ee bellum, kelapstumak cron kerak!”
The tunnel behind the colonel and Graale quaked and they both prayed that their friends had made it safely to the top of the north ridge. Time had run out. The Berzerkers were on them and the cavern was about to disappear in an avalanche of rock and dust, never to be reopened by another living soul again.

***

Bertie’s treads spun rapidly as they kissed the apex of each stone step in the back of the vent shaft, and he sped Otto and Dr. Blink to the safety of the ridge above. His table lay parallel to his treads and was elevated just enough to provide room for Otto and Blink to sit comfortably in the center channel without hitting their heads on the underside. The lighted attachment on Bertie’s outstretched arm was needlessly lighting the path in front of them as the ground blurred by at a dizzying pace. The combination of Malo and
The Guardian
was entirely too big to ride on Bertie in the confines of the small tunnel, and Otto and Dr. Blink could just make out the clop of hoofs and heavy snorts as Malo ran as fast as he could behind them in the dark. The slightest tremor vibrated through the steps in the vent and Bertie quickened his pace. Otto and Dr. Blink shared worried glances as the sounds of Malo’s pursuit faded and then vanished.

“Bertie! You don’t need the light as much as Malo—shine it backward, dammit!”

Otto had never heard so much as a slightly questionable word uttered from the refined doctor in the several years he’d known him; in fact, there was a standing quip among the Dissension soldiers that Blink had probably never cursed in his entire life. Otto thought for sure he had just witnessed the doctor’s first and his face reflected his shock at Blink’s foray into the harsh language shared by so many soldiers in the Dissension.
“He’s been through a lot—it was just one little curse—cut him some slack!”
Otto thought to himself as Bertie’s arm slid along the side of his table and illuminated the steps behind them. Dr. Blink crawled over Otto in a display of unprecedented bravery
and peered dangerously over the back edge of the channel hoping to catch a glimpse of Malo.

“Bertie, STOP!” the doctor yelled over the humming of the treads against the hard stone. Bertie came to a jerking halt and both Otto and Blink crashed into the front of the channel. Blink was up almost immediately and he scampered to the back end of Bertie’s channel again. “Do you hear him?” he asked frantically as he stared into the darkness.

Otto wavered between concern for both of his friends; although, truthfully, he was far more concerned about Blink than he was about Malo. The Moxen was a soldier and as tough as they came. Blink was beginning to unravel and Otto didn’t know if his academic mind could take the stress of all of this. The doctor was hanging precariously off Bertie’s back-end, his pointy head stretched as far away from his neck and shoulders as possible as he peered down the dark vent in search of the galloping giant they had left behind. Nothing. They had climbed so far up the column that the sounds of the battle had disappeared far below. The only noise either of them could hear was their heavy breaths as fear of the horrors beneath them and the hope of escape above set their lungs on fire.

“Malo! MALO!” Blink yelled down the bore, but the only thing that answered his frenetic calls was the echo of his own voice.

Otto’s heart ached as he listened for any sign of his friend clopping up the stairs behind them.
“Did the Berzerkers kill Graale and Abalias?”
Otto was thinking the worst as he sat in silence and stared down the tunnel.
“Did they make it into the cavern and overtake Malo? I thought Graale was going to take care of our escape?”
As he finished his final thought, he felt a slight shudder in the passage and immediately his mind raced to a razor-sharp awareness borne from his military training and the will to survive at any cost. “Time to go, Artie!” he bellowed as he gripped Blink’s arm and wrenched him back from the edge. “Bertie, move it!”

“We can’t leave MALO!” Blink roared in rebellion. “Bertie, stay put!” Bertie began to move and then jerked to a stop again and immediately gave a palms-up gesture with two of his hands, expressing his confusion. Otto leapt onto Blink with breakneck speed, clutching a handful of lab coat that covered the doctor’s chest and drawing his gun so Blink could see it.

“Listen to me, Blink! Malo’s my friend. We’ve served together and bled together and defended the Dissension with our lives. It’ll hurt more than you know to leave him here, but Graale is going to collapse this cavern any second and we’re all going to die if we don’t get the hell out of here! Now, Bertie may be your machine, but he’s in the service of the Dissension and I’m the ranking Dissension officer in combat situations. And if you haven’t noticed—this is a goddam combat situation! This is not negotiable—I’m ordering you to stand down and I’m ordering Bertie to MOVE HIS ASS BEFORE WE ALL DIE!”

The tunnel trembled again and the sound of grinding stone filled the bore once more. Bertie charged forward at maximum power, sending Otto and Blink sliding to the back of the channel and slamming against its metallic retaining wall. Dr. Blink had half a mind to peer over the back as they tore up the chasm, but his nerve was withered by Otto, who had him fixed in a scalding stare. The trembling accelerated and the stairs deformed. Otto could feel Bertie sliding on the near vertical incline as they were rocked in whiplash motions while the treads slipped, found purchase and then slipped again, over and over. Then he saw something in the light still beaming from Bertie’s arm that was pointed back down the vent in the lost hope of finding Malo. Huge cracks were streaking up the cavern and gaining on them.

The cracks danced and groaned, twisting and crackling as they forked through the rock like lightning. Glittering Banzium dust blew from their crevices like powdered blood spewing from enormous black wounds.
“Time to die,”
Otto thought to himself as disappointment crept into his heart, and every inch of his body tingled in a melancholy funk.
“I would have preferred to die next to Malo or Abalias and Graale rather than this! I wanted a soldier’s death. Blown to bits rather than crushed, eh?”
His morbid humor in the face of death surprised him again, and Otto chuckled to himself as he glanced between Bertie’s table, which was now acting as a roof, and the forward wall of the channel; and, at that very moment, hope fluttered deep inside him. He had seen their savior. He had seen their escape. Otto had seen daylight.

“Ninety percent power, Bertie!” Otto shouted over the hum of the treads and the roar of the disintegrating tunnel. Without hesitation, Bertie decreased power to his tracks. Almost instantly, they stopped lurching and sped upward as the cavern behind them let loose large chunks of broken rock that fell into their wake and toppled downward into the darkness. Otto could see the daylight streaming into the top of the vent. They were no more than ten yards away and climbing steadily. A voice inside Otto’s head shouted, “
We’re going to make it! We’re going to make it! We’re going to…DIE!
”

The stairs had disappeared and Bertie lurched backward as his treads spun in vain against the smooth rock. The cave walls above them fluttered and cracked. Blink let out a defeated, squeaking whimper as the light faded into the distance, and the cold depths of the cavity beckoned their return to its dark and hungry womb. Otto turned his head to catch one last glimpse of sunlight before he was crushed to a pulp in the vent shaft, but before he could adjust himself to see over the front of the compartment, everything went black.

Bertie didn’t wait for Otto or Dr. Blink to issue any orders this time. Instead, he sealed them in his center channel to protect them from any falling debris and sprung into action. With full power, Bertie elevated his left tread upward until it planted solidly on the tunnel’s roof, simultaneously applying the same amount of force to the tracks on his right side. For a second, Bertie and his passengers were in free-fall, but then his treads, assisted by the equal and opposing forces applied to the sides of the tunnel, shot them upward again. He had to make up five yards he had lost after the stairs crumbled and he was speeding at full power for the last ten yards and the open, sunlit expanse of the northern ridge. Five yards. Three yards. Two yards. CRUNCH!