Well, what can I say except I'm sorry this took so long. Survived Finals, got through the flu and the walking pneumonia that followed it, and I deeply regret there was more. I know I have a standing dedication, and that will remain, but just this once I need to modify it and hope very much that it'll be a long time before I must do so again.
To the firefighters of Arlington, Washington: God bless you for your kind, compassionate hearts, and thank you for trying so very hard to make a horrific event better. To a fallen brother who left this world December 3, 2009: May you find comfort wherever you are, and I pray that next time around, your spirit will find things gentler and far, far easier.
Chapter Four
"Why, Virgil? Why do you, without question or regard for your own safety, risk everything to save the lives of complete strangers when you won't comfort me in the way I ask you to?"
"Getting into my head to figure Alan out? It won't work, he feels the same way I do."
"Alan is nothing like you. I asked you a direct question and I deserve a direct response."
"We can talk about it on the way—"
"—of all people, YOU? Evasion? I am not asking an inappropriate question!"
"We can't do this, Tin-Tin, I've gotta get back to Ops!"
"JUST THIS ONCE, I DO NOT CARE! Why do YOU, PERSONALLY, place yourself in harm's way with the FULL KNOWLEDGE that if you don't come back, PEOPLE WHO LOVE YOU WILL BE TERRIBLY HURT!"
"This is my fault, I let you drink too much. I've already answered that, remember?"
"You haven't! You've given me lip-service, the safe answer, the one you hide behind! I will NOT go unless you tell me WHY YOU DO WHAT YOU DO!"
"SHIT, SHIT, SHIT! Alright, ALRIGHT! I DO IT because every freakin' save I get means that someone, and I don't give a rat's ass who it is, won't have to go through what I didwhen I lost my mother!"
3/20/70, 15:39:41 hours, Mission 70-41, The Cellar, Day 2
"I HEAR YOU!" Virgil shouted, "I KNOW YOU'RE THERE! I WILL COME TOYOU, I PROMISE!"
There was no reply and no matter how much he wanted one, Virgil didn't expect it—
All he could hope for was that one or two of his words got through to whatever shelter the kid had found, and that the boy had enough sense to stay put for as long as it took for Virgil to get to him.
If he could get to him.
Seismic waves were ripping through the cellar, snapping stone, wood, mortar and brick like matchsticks, and the sonic roars bludgeoned Virgil's inner ears, smothering his equilibrium to a dizzying vertigo. His overextended arms strained to maintain their grip but the mangled wooden beam he hung on to was jerking hard and splintering into soggy sticks beneath his thick canvas gloves like the flaky adobe bricks crumbling behind his back—
And the waves kept coming, fiercer with every long frustrating second that passed, violently amplifying, pounding and reflecting against the curved sides of the alluvial bowl of subterranean Mexico City as if the ground itself had become the raging tumultuous seas of a Cat 5 hurricane!
"Son of a BITCH!" Virgil fought to keep his head tucked into his chest, squeezing his eyes shut against the swirling dust and increasing disorientation, battling to control both his respiration and his coordination as the slippery glass-littered floor buckled, rolled, saturated, and sunk into the liquefying ground beneath the cellar ruins…
Ride it out, he admonished himself, You know you can! Don't lock-up your legs, maintain your balance… Play your feet, shift your weight, breathe evenly and compensate! Holy God, don't let this monster pack a super-sheer!
But even as his thoughts blurred into the shattering wood beneath his hands, the entire structure seemed to shriek in fear and then it heaved towards the ceiling, swiveled sideways, thrust violently upwards again and snapped in half, one side falling to the northeast and the other thrusting up towards the southwest!
The incredible furious force threw Virgil's right hand off the beam, knocked his right leg loose from its foothold, and almost tossed him into dead air, but he twisted his left arm tighter on the wood and threw his fallen arm back against the accelerating force, grappling the beam with every ounce of strength he had—
But the moment he'd re-established his footholds, he found a new, more desperate problem.
God dammit! Will this ever friggin' stop?
Virgil couldn't see it but he could feel a fissure rupturing between his feet and grimly realized that it must be racing the length of the room. Even worse, it was gushing groundwater; he could feel the cold viscous fluid running over his boots, and remembered Scott's warning about the raw sewage, in what seemed like hours ago—
-- And was probably only forty-five or so minutes prior.
There's Hazmat Suits in the Mole… No, no, no, can't think about that, not yet! One thing at a time, one thing, I gotta get through this first!
CRRRRAAAAAAAACK!
Holy shit, NOW WHAT?
Virgil pushed his torso forward, twisted his taut neck over a straining shoulder, and threw a glance up and back to figure it out—
Jeez-us, gotta move it!
The wall supporting his beam was going, was giving way!
3/20/70, 15:40:02 hours, Mission 70-41, The Mole, Day 2
The cabin lights flickered with each pounding jolt, and even though they were insulated from the worst of the quake's effects by a thick metal fuselage, helmets, and headsets, the rescue equipment hanging on the wall racks set up an eye-piercing screech—
And Gordon ground his teeth, trying like hell to ignore it: confined spaces without an egress evoked brutally suppressed memories, and if anyone ever found out about those flashes of recall, he'd be scrubbed from rotation for the rest of his life.
That couldn't happen. Ever.
Oblivious to his brother's discomfort, Alan calmly leafed through his checklist, ticking off items as he worked-up the Mole's main boards. "Increasing drill rotation to 90 percent, side-diggers up to 75… No, make that 80, cutters on standby, engine on idle, and we're chilling." He glanced up at the FLIR, re-checked his GPR, shook his head and added more power to the wireless. "Mobile Control, IR Mole, come back."
Static – Lots of it.
"Mobile Control, IR Mole…Damn." Alan flipped away his mike and watched his torque gauges, checking the load as he eased up the drill. Under current conditions electronic interference was expected, but still, what a drag! Mission stall-out, plain and simple.
Alan tightened his safety harnesses and settled deeper into his swaying chair. "That's pretty much it for now. We've got no eyes and no comms."
"You know, Al, this can't end as a recovery. Not after yesterday."
"Got that right. How's it hanging back there?"
"Trying to interpret the last seismo John tossed. Stress transfer reads… Weird."
"Hang it up, close your gills, and recline your chair. Gotta protect that back and neck."
"In a minute," Gordon replied distractedly, "Think upping rotation's a good idea? I mean, Scott said that Virgil said—"
"--That blah, blah, I know. Virgil's not here and we are, and if he was here I'm totally sure he'd say I'm calling it right. Dropping rotation means we'd get cemented in like that old Jimmy Hoffa thing." Alan tossed another surreptitious glance at his brother, brows knit in puzzlement. "Tell me how our tunnel's doing."
Gordon powered his shuddering chair backwards, tilted his monitors, and activated the Mole's rear imaging system. "Ah… Not so good. Polymer coat's ripping and the shaft's losing integrity. Hope we don't have any criticals, we'll have to drill our way out and that'll take time. Must be really bad out there."
"Sure it is, but everyone's gone 'cept for ES and our subjects." Alan kept it cool but there was something going subtly wrong with his favorite brother; there'd been none of the usual banter, no jokes, no wry observations, and that wasn't right… Was he missing something? "It'll be good, you'll see."
But Gordon had his eyes closed and looked to be taking a quick nap.
Seems okay. Alan turned back to his controls, restlessly scanned his instruments again, and finally gave it up. He pulled a tiny sapphire ring from one of his pockets and smiled briefly. The rough jarring movements of the quake set the dim cabin lights dancing and flashing in the facets of the diamonds that surrounded the medium-blue stone. It was like frozen azure water edged by clear, crystalline ice. This'll make things better, I know it will. It's perfect.
"Hey!" Gordon roused suddenly.
"Hey yourself."
"Did Virg get in before all this came down?" And for the first time since they'd mobilized, Gordon forgot about being trapped in a closed capsule under thousands of pounds of heaving soil. "If he did— "
"Crap!" Alan yanked his chair to its upright position. "Dammit! He was going in when we fired up, I know he was, and that was a long time ago!"
"We can't just stay here—"
"Hang on to your flippers, Gordo," Alan fired up the rear booster, "We may be blind as a bat but we're moving NOW, no matter what Scott says!"
3/20/70, 15:40:54 hours, Mission 70-41, Staging Area, Day 2
"Move away!" Scott shouted, gesturing frantically, "GET AWAY FROM THE TENT!"
But the girl with the baby couldn't hold her balance and she was already falling…
Scott jumped to his feet and sprinted, catching her up and pulling her aside just before a tent pole buried itself in the mud right where she'd been standing. The tent itself was collapsing, disgorging panicked public officials as fast as a bad day at the U.S. Supreme Court, and if he hadn't been on duty and wasn't intent on saving the girl, Scott would've been laughing uproariously into his sleeve; it was exactly like turning on a light in a New York City apartment and standing back as all the cockroaches made for cover!
In fact, if Virgil had been around, they'd have probably bet on which idiot would make the Incident Command Center first…
But Scott set aside his personal musings, put his arm around the girl and steadied her as he eyed the milling crowd, looking for potential injuries and quickly determining that there wasn't anything worse than the usual punctured egos. He could feel the girl shaking against his side and how cool her skin was against his hand; figuring that the Suits, as always, would take care of themselves, he coaxed her on to a safe distance over the uneven rolling ground where he could run a perfunctory visual examination.
The poorest always suffered the most in a disaster of this magnitude.
"What's your name?" Scott asked, a discrete method of checking her mental status.
"Aida," the girl gasped between sobs, tucking her shawl in tighter around her child.
One word, yes, but it was enough to tell him she was coherent and responsive, and judging by how her head turned to view the damage around them, she was oriented too.
"That's a very pretty name, comes from an opera, right?" Scott replied loudly over the din, observing her from head to foot. "Do you feel any pain?"
"No, no…" She shook her head and stumbled as an especially large wave rolled through the ground under their feet. "Madre dios!"
"I agree, but it'll knock off soon. Let me make sure you're okay."
At the girl's frightened nod, Scott braced her, turned her under a tilted trembling light post, and quickly assessed for injuries: skin cool and moist, pupils equal and reactive, no facial lacerations, no bruising, no thoracic tenderness, respiration shallow and rapid yes, pulse rapid too but no cardio irregularities, and no deformities to extremities…
Simple fear and emotional shock, totally understandable.
"Let's get you and your child away from these nitwits, right?"
"His name… My baby's name is Petro. And yes, I'd like to go, but not far. I can't leave without knowing…"
"We won't, not in this." Scott tucked her in close and eased her over the shaking ground, settling her on his jacket just short of his station and his bird. A few seconds later and he had a solid wool blanket tucked in around her body. "You'll stay with us while you wait for news," he continued in Spanish as soft as he could over the unholy racket of the quake. "We'll take care of you, I promise."
Silent tears rolled down her cheeks but Aida raised her chin proudly, dignity settling over her classically beautiful face like a lovely mantilla; it was like a fist in the gut to Scott, the wrench of something lost for all times, a dazzling gold and gem-encrusted image of a famous and venerated icon of the Madonna and Child…
Suddenly he fervently hoped that the famous piece of art wasn't lost in the cathedral, wasn't broken and buried forever under all that shuddering, collapsing rubble. "Aida, I need you to wait here. I'm going to get someone to sit with you."
The girl tried to smile, failed, and curved protectively over her baby, her thick dark hair spilling across her cheek to hide her fear and grief.
Fighting the movements of the quake Scott bent a knee awkwardly, lowered himself to her level, and gently tucked Aida's errant locks back behind an ear. "I know you don't believe it now, but things like this don't last forever. It'll get better, someday, with time and distance… It always does, and this'll all be just a terrible dream."
He had her undivided attention for a moment and Scott used it to tuck a fold of the blanket over her head to prevent her from losing any more body heat. "For right now, I want you to understand that you're not alone. You're stuck with us for the duration, and maybe that's a little more scary than all this shaking?" His blue eyes crinkled in an apologetic grin as he nodded in the direction of his station, and as he chucked her under the chin he finally succeeded in getting the returning smile he wanted. "Stay here and you'll be safe. I'll send someone over to watch you."
Scott scrambled quickly to his station and poked at a figure huddled beneath the shuddering camp table. "Ned."
"—and the quake won't stop!" The intrepid reporter was shouting into his recorder, "It won't release us from its mighty grasp until it's destroyed the last fragment of the great heart of this fragile historic landmark! This glorious city has been brought to its knees by the most violent act of—"
"Jeezus, NED!"
"WHAT?"
"TALKING TO YOU!" Scott snatched the recorder, turned it off, stuffed it firmly into Ned's pocket, grabbed the head of cable-ready hair and turned it so Ned could see the girl. "Need you to take care of something for me."
"Uh, really?" Ned blinked and focused on the girl. "Oh. Nice."
"Welcome back, Mr. Pulitzer. Her name is Aida, the boy is Petro. Watch 'em, keep 'em warm, and when the tremor's done, for God's sake get her some coffee and errr—"
Scott paused briefly, tossed a glance at the girl, then at the baby, and ran a fast re-think. "Forget the coffee; make that hot chocolate and something substantial to eat, ASAP. Red Cross should have something, and if they don't, one of the Companies will."
And as fast as that Scott was running again, this time towards the firefighters bracing on their rigs at the sinkhole rim—
He had to be sure that the hole wasn't collapsing further, had to be certain the rappel ropes were intact and the worms still functioning, and most importantly, had to be absolutely one-hundred percent convinced that the bulldozer's support lines were holding fast!
Somewhere beneath all that shit his brother was fighting for his life, and Scott was gonna give him as much of a chance as he could.
3/20/70, 15:41:09 hours, Mission 70-41, The Cellar, Day 2
If I don't live the kid won't either!
Virgil shimmied down the length of the beam, feeling blindly ahead with each step, making sure of each foothold before swinging his weight to that side—
Go with the waves, just like at home, and don't stop, don't stop!
He blocked out the thundering crashes of the quake, meticulously working forward, lower and lower on the beam, deeper into the ruins and further from the wall, each step methodically tested, each hand-over-hand locked in before he strived for another difficult inch of clearance…
He was gonna make it!
After what seemed an eternity, the seismic waves were decaying to a more circular motion now, one he could predict with increasing accuracy. Even as the bricks popped from the wall behind him, Virgil was gaining both distance and time from the immediate danger that collapse would mean.
All I need is a little more room!
He kept moving, kept reaching,
And then he was on his knees at the base of the beam!
Virgil yanked out his Surefire and determinedly crawled on; he could hear the worms again over the grinding rolls of the earth, still working, and growing more confident he paused, punched a few controls on his wrist computer, leaned against a pile of rubble and watched the shuddering reads as closely as he could.
In the darkness ahead of him, two metallic balls uncurled, sprouted sectioned cubical bodies and mechanical legs, and resumed scurrying through the rubble, this time searching for the scents of human blood and sweat—
No cadavers this time! Get me to my target alive, that's ALL I freakin' ask!
Virgil took another moment to check the condition of the ceiling; surprisingly, most of it still seemed intact but he knew there was always a danger.
Aftershocks. They'll be coming soon.
He kept on crawling, slipping and sliding ever deeper into the ruins, instinctively heading in the direction he thought the boy's scream had come from. With every hard-won foot, he was getting closer and closer. Did the kid survive?
"CAN YOU HEAR ME?" Virgil called into the dark, "THIS IS INTERNATIONAL RESCUE, IF YOU CAN HEAR ME MAKE SOME NOISE ANY WAY YOU CAN!"
Silence.
Not happening, not this time!
Virgil moved faster, ignoring the glass shards cutting into his thick uniform. "THIS IS INTERNATIONAL RESCUE, TALK TO ME!"
Again there was no response, but that didn't mean the kid was gone!
Virgil kept going, even faster than before, working his way around the jagged debris piles, keeping his head low, feeling ahead with his gloved hands…
Then, a miracle.
First, one of the 'bots emitted a shrill pinging.
Then, as Virgil halted to check the Ghoul's location...
"Over here."
The muffled voice came from somewhere front and left to Virgil's position. "I HEAR YOU! SAY AGAIN SO I CAN GET YOUR LOCATION!"
"Here, we're here…"
Thank God! Virgil whipped his Surefire in that direction. "CAN YOU SEE MY LIGHT?"
"No… Yes, I see it…sort of."
"GOOD! DON'T MOVE, I'm coming!"
Following the powerful beams of his lights, one watchful eye on the ceiling, Virgil shimmied back and forth with the diminishing rolls of the quake, sliding over glass, ducking under beams, squeezing between broken furnishings, and jimmying his way over the huge muddy crack in the shattered floor beneath his legs.
Least the damn thing's stopped squeezing out waste, for now, anyway. Gotta watch it during the aftershock sequence, even if the epicenter's far back on the coast.
He moved closer to the inner wall of the cellar, called again, and got another response. Another few long moments and he came upon one of his formerly detested 'bots, busily chirping and clicking its titanium claws against a piece of dusty torn leather jutting from beneath a broad oaken… paneling? Bookshelf?!
What the hell?
Virgil ducked in closer and slowly played his light over the rubble. "Hey, I'm here." This time he carefully re-modulated his voice lower, knowing full well that a shout might startle his patients so much it could exacerbate their existing conditions further; the unfortunate truth was that many saves relaxed their grip on life the moment they realized that rescue was imminent, and Virgil didn't want his subjects adding to the statistic, not for anything in the world! "This is International Rescue, can you hear me?"
"Yeah. Glad… You could make it to the party," the weak voice returned hoarsely, "Was running… Out of stories…to tell Salvador. Jokes ran out… A long time ago."
"I'll bet." Filled with relief, Virgil grinned broadly and started checking site conditions. "You've gotta be one of the firefighters."
"How'd you know?"
"Attitude's everything, bro. Gimme a minute to secure things and I'll be in. Have any idea what you're under in there?"
"It's some kind of rack…or something." The muffled voice gasped, and followed it with a coughing laugh. "The Inquisition… was a big business around here…once."
"You're kidding."
"No… No shit. We're under… a torture machine… It was hanging… From the wall… It fell over… Saw it at the last minute. Gave us room to… Survive. I call it… my off-the-wall save." The voice rasped another laugh that ended in a choked cough. "Funny, no?"
"Gallows humor, just my style." Virgil smiled, "What's your name?"
"Jorge Francisco Martinez Lopez… Ladder 51… 26 years old… Allergy…penicillin. No…prior medical history. Real freaky… under here."
"Spooky yeah, but the damn thing worked." Virgil returned, quickly setting up a halogen flood, "How're you feeling?"
"My back… Think I've gotta C-spine…at the least. Right leg numb, feels like someone's sprinkling…water on it. But I can move it. Neck stiff… some pain."
Uh-oh. "How'd you…" Virgil asked, swiftly assessing the large oaken structure from floor to ceiling, calculating its length and the stability of the angles involved, looking for any lethal flaws that could present a danger to himself and his subjects. "Get down here?"
"Kid…started to slide in. Grabbed him. He rode me… Down the hole."
"Great improv, but I'll bet you're banged up. How's he doing?"
"Took off…his clothes. Wet. Put him…in my jacket. Keeping him warm, on my chest. He's got...comminuted fracture, right ankle. From when we hit. Lacerations, contusions. Can't feel carotid pulse… respiration seems okay, but… He's out of it."
"Damn," Virgil whispered. His Surefire flashed over and around the rack: large piles of debris at it's base guaranteed that the thing wouldn't slide forward and drop on the occupants under it; a collapse on the far side would keep it from moving any further to the northeast, in spite of the rupture he could dimly make out beyond; the southwest entrance where he crouched though, as well as the ceiling above it, needed reinforcement fast, especially before the Mole arrived, as the vibrations it would cause had to be compensated for immediately. Speaking of…
Virgil whipped his wrist system to his mouth. "Mole, Initial Response, do you copy?" He shoved his wireless in tighter to his ear and held his breath. Maybe the EM effects aren't cleared out yet. "Mole, Initial Response, you read me?"
A blast of static…
"Mole, Initial Response—"
"Initial Response, Mole!" Alan's voice whooped into his ear, "Nice hearing from ya buddy! How's it hanging in there?"
Had the situation been any easier Virgil would've laughed, but all things considered, "What's your ETA?"
"Three minutes tops! Now that I'm getting good reads again, maybe more like 1.5."
Virgil grabbed a deep breath of O2 and pulled his mike in closer. "Copy that but call it before entry. You still coming in on my coordinates?" Virgil looked over his shoulder at the northwest corner: intact, yeah, but strange – the blueprints John had passed down to Scott hadn't revealed how big this room really was, and that portion particularly was stronger than he'd figured when he checked the structure's building elements before coming in.
"You got a bad situation in there?" Alan asked, voice lowering to a more sober tone.
"Just some renovations prior to entry. She's a big girl and I don't want any more surprises, over."
"IR copy that, slowing it up. Advise on status."
"Copy all and out." Virgil flipped the mike out of his way and ducked down into the pocket. He still couldn't make out his subjects, there was too much in the way. "Jorge," Virgil called into the void, "You still with me?"
"Yeah," Jorge replied, but this time his voice was sleepy, setting off warning bells in Virgil's head. "Nowhere else…to go."
"You've got the training, you know you've gotta stay awake. Talk to me while I stabilize this crap."
"Trying… Have you… Found Ricket? Sorry… His real name's... Ricardo."
"That your friend?" Virgil asked as he yanked a metallic rod from his backpack, "The other firefighter?" Quickly he brushed loose debris from a small patch of crumpled floor and angled the rod carefully. Studying the ceiling above one more time he found a good beam, made a few minor adjustments in his angles, and thumbed a blinking button.
"Same company," Jorge was saying, "Cousin. Crazy man."
"Tell me what makes him so crazy," Virgil responded evenly, steadying the rod and concentrating on his aim. A soft hum resonated through the metal and a needle-sharp screw sprouted from the base, spinning fast, telescoping down and piercing the patch Virgil had cleared, diving deeply into the soil beneath. Around the rotating stem, thinner flexible metal spars arced from the whirling unit, flowered into grapples, rotated towards the floor and dug deeply in to form a perfect, stabilizing anchor. Virgil checked its position with his Surefire. "Your cousin, I mean."
"Hard to…think. Nothing scares… Ricket. Not after… the Strike… in Peru."
"Yeah, that was bad, we worked it too." Virgil paused, searched for a way to distract his subject from an unpleasant topic, found it. "Whaddo you guys do on your down-time, anyway? Heard the night-life around here's damn interesting."
Now Virgil toggled another switch: there was a muffled detonation and the top of the rod blasted a whirling titanium auger past Virgil's head and into his chosen overhead target, biting deeply into the beam and drilling into the rock beyond it. The auger locked tight and six flexible wires sprung from its central plate, spidered hair-thin guidance lasers across the uneven ceiling, and with a low hiss, the wires spooled out sheets of fine metal mesh that fanned into a circular umbrella, hooked precisely together, and molded cleanly to the damaged roof over the southwest entrance of the void.
"She'll be pissed."
"Who?" Virgil asked, inspecting his roof support and turning back to the entrance. "Talk to me, Jorge."
"Wife. Married… I'm married."
Virgil bit his lip, pulled out a smaller rod and eyed the void's entrance carefully; Jorge was talking, yeah, but he was starting to ramble from one subject to the next. Not good, the shoring had to go faster!
"Nope, she'll be glad to see you," Virgil said aloud, quickly aligning the second rod just inside the pocket's door. "After all this, you know she will."
"May…be."
"Stay with me, Jorge," Virgil activated the mechanism, "Almost done."
The second rod locked in quickly, anchored into the floor and screwed into the thick wood above. Virgil flashed his beam down its length, and satisfied with the results, ducked his head inside the dark space. "Jorge!"
"Still…here."
"Close your eyes, I'm pulling out the loose ends and the light'll be too bright for you."
Virgil set a small halogen lamp just inside the entrance and began pulling out the bits and pieces of rubble he found, ensuring first that none were bearing the weight of the structure above their heads.
"Do you feel anything penetrating your body or the kid's?"
It took a moment for Jorge to respond. "There is...nothing big. Maybe...glass."
His weakness drove Virgil ever faster, grabbing debris and tossing it out faster and faster as he dug deeper in. Finally, after too many seconds had passed, he was staring into the pocket itself…
And squinting up at him from the shredded floor, perfectly supine against the interior wall, a firefighter grinned weakly as he held onto an unconscious child wrapped in his thick, flame-resistant coat.
"Hola." Jorge wheezed, managing a shaky, ironic wave—
And then he lost consciousness.
