Fast (53 page)

            Then Coleman noticed something that made the situation much more complicated.

            He had human company on the platform.

            Across the frame, someone rose unsteadily to their feet.

            It was the terrorist from the rear steering cab. The man must have climbed down from the cab, probably to find Coleman, just before Bora rammed the pack of creatures. He had been lying prone behind a broken branch, but now he carefully stood up and twisted his face in frustration.

            He stood three meters from Coleman, on the other side of the frame. He spread his hands to keep balance.

            Just one creature rampaged on the terrorist’s side of the frame. The frame itself separated the terrorist from the two creatures surrounding Coleman.

            Coleman met the man’s eyes in a moment of mutual understanding. If either man moved, it would bring the creatures charging towards both of them. They each had the other’s life in their hands.

            Except the terrorist had only one creature on his side of the frame. Coleman had two.

            Don’t…move,
willed Coleman at the terrorist.
Don’t even take one step.

            The terrorist broke eye contact.

            Both men swayed on their feet as Bora turned the truck into a new driving line. They still headed towards King’s debris field, but now their driving angle cut through the top of the wreckage instead of following Vanessa’s path.

            Coleman saw Vanessa rocket out of the debris field. She had shadowed the wrecking ball through the mayhem. Now the tray-back and the cement ball headed off at different angles. The ball continued it counter-clockwise trajectory. Vanessa kept following the pedestrian loop.

            What’s Bora doing? He’ll never beat the wrecking ball in that direction. He should be cutting down past the cafeteria’s service entrance.

            Bora’s intent crystallized in Coleman’s mind.

            Bora wasn’t avoiding the wrecking ball.

            He was driving
into
the wrecking ball’s path. He was adjusting his speed and driving line so the wrecking ball would swipe the rear section of the A-frame. Bora was planning to take out Coleman and the creatures at the same time. Two birds with one stone.

            The terrorist realized his unfortunate place in the equation. Coleman read it in his increasingly alarmed expression.

            ‘Don’t move,’ hissed Coleman.

            The man bent his knees, his dark, narrow eyes clearly calculating a dash back to the rear steering cab. He looked like he might try it.

            ‘Just don’t move!’ Coleman poured persuasion from every fiber. ‘You won’t make it.’

            The man sprinted.

            He made it three steps. It was two steps further than Coleman predicted.

            It was the creature on Coleman’s left. Its tentacles sprung though the gaps in the framework. It caught the terrorist’s waist. The man twisted, trying to pull away, but the thorns had buried through his fatigues and flesh. In one powerful jerk, the tentacles pulled the man’s body up against the frame. The creature tried to haul the man across the platform, but his body was stuck up against the framework. A length of horizontal framework bent the man’s spine. Two more horizontal pieces braced his shoulders and knees. More tentacles looped through the frame, encircling the man’s chest and thighs. The creature started pulling the man through the frame. The frame buckled, but flesh and bone tore away first.

            With a series of wet crunches, the terrorist folded backwards through the framework.

            Coleman looked away from the grizzly gymnastics. It was stomach-turning stuff. He certainly didn’t want to end up like that. Glancing at the other two creatures, he realized the strong possibility existed.

            The attack had attracted the other two. The one on Coleman’s right drew closer. Its tentacles thrashed the platform near his boot.

            He flicked his eyes up to the wrecking ball.

            He only had a few seconds. The wrecking ball and the A-frame were about to cross paths. Bora was timing the collision perfectly.

            The wrecking ball bounced up, about to sweep along the platform at head height.

            Coleman dove into the framework. He aimed for the gap underneath the frame. As he landed on the platform, right under the frame, the wrecking ball made devastating contact.

#

Forest spun in his seat.

            Everything was going to hell in a handbag. The Captain was missing in action. Vanessa was driving with a creature climbing up her hood. And co-piloting the scorpion truck felt about as safe as playing Twister in a minefield.

            Forest looked down the scorpion’s back and checked the crane’s mountings. Two more heavy-duty bolts had torn lose. Only half the original bolts remained. The crane listed backwards over the rear wheels.

            ‘The crane’s tearing off,’ warned Forest.

            ‘It’ll hold,’ grunted King.

            ‘It won’t,’ countered Forest. ‘I’m looking right at it. It’s already halfway gone.’

            ‘It’ll hold!’

            Forest groaned and checked the crane again. The remaining four heavy bolts lifted under the pressure. King was wrong about the crane.
It won’t hold.

#

Cairns railed at his men’s incompetence.

            How hard is it to stop a single truck?

            No sooner had the remaining quad bikes navigated the furniture debris field than the oncoming wrecking ball forced them to retreat.

            And now the creatures had arrived on the scene.

It’s time for Plan B

Cairns rolled up his sleeve. Strapped to his left forearm rested a slim black box with a snub-nosed antennae. The box represented his insurance policy. Nobody else knew about this device. The black box had one button and two indication lights.
Should I use it now?

            He’d planned to use the device as a last resort. He wasn’t supposed to activate the device before securing the templates.
If I don’t use it now, I may never get the chance.

            He pressed the button. A green light activated on the box. It needed a few minutes to take affect, but he’d done the right thing. Too many variables clouded the battlefield. This should remove a few.

            Hiding the device again, he tracked the path of one desperately retreating quad bike. The rider struggled to control the unfamiliar vehicle. He wasn’t balancing his weight correctly over the bike. Escaping the bouncing path of the wrecking ball, the rider suddenly found the bike aquaplaning out of control. He hit the water-slick pouring from the demolished fountain. Completely out of control, sliding sideways, the quad bike aquaplaned straight into the fountain wreckage.

            The front left wheel collapsed inwards. The bike spun upwards through the air. The rider catapulted straight over the fountain. He cartwheeled through the air for thirty feet.

            Cairns watched the man hit the floor hard.

            Beyond the crumpled gunman, one of the heavy pallets Cairns had used as a roadblock launched off the wrecking ball cable like a behemoth’s slingshot. The pallet flew through the scattered debris like a stone skipping across water. It smashed through a glass front of a hairdressers’.

            Cairns resisted the strong urge to give the ‘open fire’ order.

            Things are complicated enough.

            The gunfire would draw the creatures’ attack from the scorpion truck and its pulverizing payload. Cairns watched a quad bike veer cautiously around a creature scrambling towards the wrecking ball.

            The creatures aren’t attacking the quad bikes.

            The vibrations caused by the quad bikes seemed inconsequential to the creatures compared to the vibrations from the A-frame and the scorpion truck.

            ‘You.’ Cairns pointed out a gunman idling a quad bike nearby. ‘Give me that bike.’

            The man obligingly jumped off, leaving the bike idling.

            Cairns threw his leg over the bike and stared into the arena of high-speed destruction.

            If you want a job done properly, you need to do it yourself.

            Thumbing the bike’s accelerator, he popped the quad bike up on two wheel and powered straight into the mayhem.

#

Bora felt the A-frame violently shudder as the wrecking ball swept down the platform.

            It wasn’t as bad as when the ball had hit the cab. He glanced over his shoulder to assess the damage.

            The impact had wiped out the steel frame and the rear steering cab. The rear cab had torn right off the platform. Nearly severed, the cab was dragging behind the truck. The steel A-frame structure lay flattened over the platform, crushed down into an unrecognizably twisted mess of steel. One creature had been knocked completely off the platform. Two other creatures struggled under the twisted steel. Bora knew the creatures wouldn’t be trapped for long. Their tentacles already started warping the steel towards escape. He heard the metallic whine of the frame twisting around the two pinned creatures.

            They’ll be free in seconds.

            At first Bora spotted no sign of the two men, but then he noticed more movement in the twisted metal matrix. Gunman or Marine, he couldn’t tell.

            He mentally shrugged and scanned what little of his dashboard remained.

            When he had first climbed into the A-frame, Bora had spotted a handy feature. A small glass panel recessed into the dash near the steering column. He backhanded his fist into the glass, smashing the protective glass plate with his knuckles. Behind the glass waited a red mushroom button.

            When he thumped the button, there came an explosive hiss of releasing hydraulics.

            Bora smiled.

            Under the button were three words.

            EMERGENCY PLATFORM RELEASE.

The roar of screeching metal rammed into Coleman’s ears.

            The sound was absolutely unforgiving. Half the overhead framework instantly sheared away. When the incredible noise stopped, Coleman lay pinned under the twisted wreckage.

            The section of frame that wasn’t ripped away, the section Coleman dove under for cover, bent down over the platform like water-reeds in a flooding stream.

            The protection had been slim, but lifesaving. As it was, only Coleman’s left leg was pinned. Twisting among the wreckage, he felt his leg almost pull free from the bent frame. He wedged the pinch bar between the frame and pushed. The frame parted enough to withdraw his leg.