We're getting closer to the conclusion! Thanks again for the feedback. Makes writing this more fun. I hope you are continuing to enjoy it. As always, praise and complaints are both welcome. After all, this is just for fun . . . and it's a lot cheaper than a therapist. :)
Chapter 12Guilt rode through his hands in a torrent as he held her, taking her life. She had pleaded with him to finish what she had started, but he knew it was a sin for which he would not likely ever be able to gain sufficient forgiveness. His eyes strayed upward to the monitor, waiting for the graphic that represented what was left of the life in her body to dissipate into death and disappear. He saw her hands twitch involuntarily as she faded. He worried that she might be aware enough to realize what he was doing to her, robbing her of precious oxygen.
Muscles that he thought were already relaxed went even slacker as the last of her will to live left her. In but a moment, she was gone. Without any fanfare or announcement, her icon disappeared from the monitor, showing that Flint was the only living soul in the control room. He carefully removed his hand from her face, his fingers curling inward with the guilt of his actions. With all the care he had, he slid out from underneath her and laid her gently on the floor. Flint saw the marks where his fingers had sealed around her mouth.
He got to his feet. A rage was building inside him, like a storm on the ocean. There had been too many like her who had sacrificed themselves for the cause of freedom and justice. His emotions were roiling inside his chest as he stepped over to where James lay on the floor.
"You stupid, selfish bastard," he said low, with a shake of his head. His skin felt hot with seething rage.
The anger welled in him at an uncontrollable rate. He looked once more to where Suarez lay dead on the floor, the result of his own hand ending her life. His mind raced to Allison, keenly aware that James was also responsible for the bullet that had pierced her back and had nearly killed her. Her life would be changed forever, and it was solely James' fault. She would never be the same. The emotional scars would carry on with the physical ones, reminding her every day that she had paid a high price for ideals.
Flint reached down and grasped the man by the shirt, hauling him up with rage. The body seemed light in his arms as he flung it toward the doorway,
"You stupid bastard!" he hollered as he launched James into the shimmering field.
He wanted to see James vaporized, turned to ash as punishment. But, just as James had probably escaped most turmoil in life, he did so in death. His body sailed through the field, landing on the other side in a heap.
Flint's disappointment that James had not been fried lasted only a split second before the realization dawned on him that what Suarez had warned about the field had not come to pass. His heart quickened at the possibility. The screen showed only one icon – his. Suarez was not a factor according to the sensors. Neither was James. He had passed without incident through the field. The synapses in Flint's mind fired in calculation of the possibilities.
He wasted no time in slinging his rifle over his shoulder and picking her up, placing her over his shoulder. He could do it, he repeated to himself. At the very least, she would not be in the control room when everything ended. He owed her that much to try. Her warning that the countdown would begin once he left the control room repeated in his head. It occurred to him that having her about his shoulder might trigger a security response in the systems, but he was willing to take the chance.
He looked back once more at the monitor, ironically to ensure she was dead. With a deep breath, he plunged forward through the field. Electricity tingled over his skin. His vision was filtered with red. It seemed an eternity before the field was behind him. James lay in the hallway, obstructing the pathway to freedom. His grip around Suarez's legs tightened when he felt her slipping off his shoulder. His boots ground into James' back as he trudged forward, carrying Suarez out of the room with haste.
All at once, alarms began sounding, calling for evacuation. He glanced at his watch, noting the time. She had said fifteen minutes. He hoped that was fact and not an estimate, though something told him estimates were not a part of her repertoire.
He barely registered the dead he passed as he ran toward the staircase that led down to the cargo area. He looked out over the warehouse. The exit seemed so far away, and he did not have that kind of time to waste. Suarez deserved a better chance than that. He had to give her that chance. Flint looked about desperately for an answer and spotted a cargo mover. He was not sure how fast it could go, but his legs were beginning to burn under the strain of carrying her. He had to at least try.
The cargo carrier looked much like a golf cart to him except for the hydraulic skids pointed outward in front of it like Flint moved to the passenger side of the vehicle and carefully lowered Suarez into the seat, balancing her so that she would not fall. Then he slipped into the driver's seat. Her limp body slumped against him.
He looked down at the controls with desperation, realizing he had no idea how to operate the vehicle. There was no steering wheel, no ignition switch. Where controls should have been was a blank panel except for one tiny light, which he presumed to show the vehicle had power.
"State destination." The voice was female, coming from the panel.
His heart leapt at the development. "Out of the cargo hold."
"State transport speed."
"As fast as possible!"
The cart lurched forward under his command. It began to pick up speed, efficiently dodging stacks of pallets as it meandered toward the hold's exit. He jammed his foot into a tiny alcove in the floorboard to steady himself against the sudden changes in direction.
He turned to Suarez and pulled her to him, laying her across his lap. He closed off her nose with his fingers and covered her mouth with his, giving her the first breath in almost three minutes. She was lifeless in his arms as he tried to revive her. Her chest rose with each breath he gave her. He tried pressing down on her heart with his hand, but the angle was all wrong. He could not get the force he needed to make a difference. Still, he continued his efforts, knowing it was better than not trying at all.
The cart continued to make speed toward the cargo ramp. He could see it in the distance in the one moment he looked up from his efforts. The white light of the mountain's storage area gleamed like a beacon, beckoning the vehicle to salvation. Small flashes of light pulsed intermittently in the far reaches of the cargo hold, beyond his direct vision.
He pressed two fingers down on her neck, desperately trying to find a pulse. If there was one, it escaped his touch. Doc's numerous first aid training sessions rang out in his mind to never give up on a patient. There was hope as long as the rescuer kept trying. He redoubled his efforts to pump her heart with his hand as they traveled down the rows of cargo. It seemed that the exit was an eternity away, as though the cart would never reach it. He was tiring quickly, his muscles burning. He was breathing hard, deprived of his own natural breathing by his want to bring her back among the living.
The carrier made one last turn. He could see the ramp less than fifty feet in the distance. He had no idea where the cart would stop, but he decided to let it go. It was moving faster than he could have run with her weight on his shoulders. Flint took a moment to check his watch. It seemed like an eternity had passed, but it had only been two minutes. Despite that, he knew those few ticks of the clock had been precious seconds off her life. He had been breathing for her, but it was not enough. If he could not bring her back soon, it would be entirely too late. Her skin was already turning more pale and cold.
The cart came to an abrupt stop at the top of the ramp. Her body shifted forward in his arms. He clutched at her to keep her from falling. Flint slid out from underneath her and laid her gently on the seat. He rounded the front of the cart and positioned himself where he could pull at her arms, bringing her over his shoulder again. He had no idea what he was going to do to help her, but he knew that the last place he should be for any chance was inside the egg. His boots thumped down the ramp with resounding pings as he ran toward the mountain's control room. His slung rifle over his shoulder punched at his kidneys with each step. He ignored the bruise forming there and continued running through offloaded piles of cargo toward the exit to the egg's sanctuary.
He saw movement at the door of the control room. He reached back with his left hand to bring his rifle up into position when he heard a familiar voice.
"Flint!" Scarlett yelled, her face coming into view as she emerged at the top of the steps to the control room. Leatherneck followed a step behind her.
"Help me!" he ordered, not bothering to hide the desperation he felt. He bounded up the three steps into the control room.
Scarlett helped him lay Suarez out flat on the floor. She felt for a pulse on the doctor but found none.
"What happened?" Scarlett asked, leaning down to listen for breathing.
"She suffocated. We can't leave her here," he said adamantly yet with desperation, suddenly having no idea what to do next.
Scarlett looked up at Leatherneck. "The infirmary down the hall," she said in solution, looking up at Leatherneck.
The sergeant did not hesitate. He reached down and scooped up Suarez in his large arms. She must have been lighter to the bulked Marine than she had to Flint, who was now shaking with exhaustion. Flint noticed a deep cut on Leatherneck's forehead, where he had presumably used his skull as a weapon, as Suarez had said. Blood had been wiped away, smeared across the wide expanse of his forehead.
They ran as a group headlong down the hallway. Once again, Flint caught a view of the battle carnage he and Suarez had inflicted on the enemy. Evacuation warnings sounded throughout the facility, telling its occupants to get to a minimum safe distance, that there was extreme danger.
Leatherneck led the pack to the security doors at the end of the corridor. When Flint looked at the security doors, he realized that Scarlett and Leatherneck had used the same means to punch through it as Suarez had through other doors – they had blasted it with C4. Strangled metal flowered out toward them where the clay had torn through the door. One of the doors had been pushed to the side to allow entry into the corridor. Leatherneck stepped through it, careful to avoid the sharp edges that threatened to grab at his charge.
The hall outside the main corridor was still dark, but the light from where they were was enough to differentiate features. He remembered seeing the infirmary, registering it as a landmark when he and Suarez had infiltrated the area. Scarlett slipped on her nightvision goggles, with Flint following in kind. Leatherneck forged ahead, using the remaining light from the corridor behind them.
He looked at his watch. Time was slipping by too fast.
"We have nine minutes to get out of here," he announced to them. "A self-destruct has been started."
He expected argument from his two comrades. They deserved to know, to have a choice. There was time for them to make it out of the mountain. Trying to save Suarez would most likely prove fatal, but Leatherneck continued forward, determined.
"Then we better move fast," Leatherneck said, picking up his pace toward the infirmary, his steps falling in a quick trot.
There were voices in the distance. Flint took aim down the hall, anticipating an assault on their progress, but all he saw were the workers from the control room frantically trying to get out of the facility. They paid no attention to Flint and his crew as they blindly searched for a way out of the mountain.
He saw the medical facility entrance ahead of them. Leatherneck slipped inside it, maneuvering Suarez through the doorway.
A gurney sat in the center of the room, surrounded by cabinets with medical supplies. Large lights overhead would have illuminated a patient quite well if there had been power available. Leatherneck and Scarlett had done their part, though, plunging the facility into darkness.
"Get her on the table," Scarlett said, dropping her weapon on a counter. She looked around the room, taking an inventory of what was available to them, then pushed the nightvision goggles up to the crown of her fiery red hair.
The dim light from the hall gave Suarez's body a ghostly look in the nightvision. Leatherneck turned on his field flashlight, washing their point of their focus in a red glow. Flint ripped off his goggles once more and began to redouble his CPR efforts, this time able to do so with more value.
Scarlett called to Leatherneck. "Here," she said, tossing an ambu-bag at him.
He caught it and smoothly placed it over the doctor's mouth, squeezing off the first solid breath of air she had in more than three minutes. Flint checked his watch. It had taken just a minute to get to the infirmary.
"Eight minutes," he announced to them, putting one hand over another and pressing down on her sternum with effectiveness he lacked in the cargo transporter.
Scarlett pulled over a cart. She flicked a switch on the side. A monitor glowed to life, waiting for a signal. She pulled defibrillator paddles off the machine and stretched the line over to the gurney. Flint stopped what he was doing and began tearing at the tank top Suarez wore. The edge of the fabric was sewn strong. His shaking hands could not break the tailored seam of the scoop of the tank.
"Never mind," Scarlett said. "Back up."
She moved in with the paddles, slipped them underneath the tank top at the top and side and pressed the triggers. She waited until Flint and Leatherneck were clear of the body before firing off the first shock. Suarez's arm muscles contracted, her torso rising up and returning to the gurney hard. Scarlett held the paddles in place, watching the monitor for any signs of life. Flint remembered Lifeline gushing on about how the paddles, themselves, recorded heartbeats if held to the skin, eliminating the immediate need for monitor leads.
"Nothing. Charge it again, two-sixty," she told Leatherneck.
He adjusted the power and depressed the charge button on the unit. Flint heard a high whine as the charge built. Audible beeps signaled the machine was ready. Scarlett shocked Suarez again. The results were the same.
Scarlett returned the paddles to the station again. Flint started compressions again, assisted by Leatherneck while Scarlett tore open the drawers of the resuscitation unit. Leatherneck fell into rhythm with Flint, breathing for Suarez at even intervals.
Scarlett pulled out a vial from the drawer, drawing out a measure of the contents in a syringe in the light of Leatherneck's flashlight. She pushed up Suarez's sleeve and patted the skin there with the back of her hand, trying to raise a vein. She prodded until she found a satisfactory point and injected the contents into Suarez. Flint continued pressing down on Suarez, pumping her heart with his hands.
"You two need to get out of here," Flint said, breathing hard. "Seven minutes, and you're going to regret being my friends."
"All for one, and one for all, Flint," Leatherneck said, squeezing in another breath into Suarez. "We all go together."
"Charging again," Scarlett announced with purpose. She put the steel of the paddles on Suarez once more as Flint and Leatherneck backed away from the body on the gurney. The whine of the machine reached its highest pitch. She pressed the trigger on the paddles once more.
Suarez's muscles constricted in the shock's wake. Scarlett held the contacts in place again, looking to the monitor for a reading. Tiny dips and spikes appeared on the screen, dancing across the monitor in a choreographed pattern. Scarlett put the paddles back on the cart. The sound of Leatherneck pushing another breath of air into Suarez filled Flint's ears.
"We need to go," she announced, reiterating the sentiment of the warnings sounding in the hall through the automated system.
Leatherneck moved in and picked Suarez off the table, cradling her in his large arms. Flint checked the time.
"Six minutes," he said, picking up his goggles and slipping them on his head.
Scarlett retrieved her weapon as Flint took point in the hallway.
"There's got to be another way out of here," he said.
Leatherneck entered the hallway next to them. He turned to the left, hefting Suarez in his arms. "When you want cheese, you follow the rat."
They looked down the hall at the scientists clawing blindly at the walls for clues of their location. Flint took off after them at a dead run. He had an overwhelming urge to open fire on them, but knew it would interrupt their search for escape. Suarez was right – Cobra was big on having a means to get out if the fire got too hot. That was a secret that was probably known to those who worked in the area. They had to be close to the cheese.
Flint spotted Gideon, the scientist Suarez had spared in the control room. He was groping the wall, feeling his way in the dark. He had separated from the group, conducting his own search for a way out of the mountain. He went right while the others continued left in the intersecting hall. Flint stayed a few steps behind him, moving cautiously and watching Gideon's every move.
The mountain shook with a groan. The floor jostled from side to side. Flint was thrown to the right. He pushed out his hand to buffer his fall into the concrete walls of the corridor. Gideon was not so fortunate. He lost his balance and crashed to the floor with the shake. He scrambled to his feet again and resumed his desperate search for a way out of the complex with ardor.
Flint looked back to see how Scarlett and Leatherneck had fared against the assault. Both were on their feet. He was amazed to see Leatherneck had not succumbed to the turbulent floor with Suarez in his arms. He held her closer to him, as though using her body as a balancing rod.
Gideon felt along the wall. His fingers touched a control panel, feeling its surface. He seemed to identify with it. He began making a hasty path down the way, his hands feeling along the wall for reference as he moved. He stopped at each doorway he encountered, finally entering the fourth he found. Flint followed silently behind him, watching his every move.
Gideon stopped, looking behind him in the darkness, perhaps sensing he was being followed. Then he proceeded further into the room. Flint took time to assess the new surroundings. It looked like a data lab. It was nothing in particular but a place to research information. Computer consoles lines the walls, and binders of documents were stored on metal shelves. Gideon continued inside, groping at the consoles along the wall for guidance until he came to one of the shelves. His fingers slid over the books like a Braille student reading text. He took hold of the outer walls of the unit and pulled sharply, ducking to the side to avoid being crushed.
The shelf slammed into the concrete floor with a loud bang that made Flint jump. The sound was sharp in his ears. The complex shook again, sending another shelf to the floor on the other side of the room. It did not seem to faze Gideon. He reached out to the wall where the first shelf had stood and began feeling along its surface, searching by touch. He pulled downward suddenly, revealing a control panel that lit up in Flint's nightvision goggles. Before he could react, Gideon activated the panel.
A large door opened, spearing Flint's eyes with bright light that obliterated his vision. He tore off his goggles but was still blinded by the white that had filled the tiny screens over his eyes. When he recovered, he saw Gideon standing there, startled and with hands raised in the air.
"Please, don't kill me," Gideon said in a shaking voice.
Flint had no intention of doing that unless the man made it necessary. "Where does this lead?" he said, pointing his rifle at the opening in the wall.
"To the surface," Gideon said. "We have to leave. This place will be destroyed."
"Yeah, I heard that somewhere," Flint said as the base's warning system chanted its mantra. He flipped the barrel of his rifle to the side, indicating Gideon to get out of the way.
Leatherneck and Scarlett moved ahead of Flint into the elevator car and waited for him, with Scarlett taking guard of Gideon.
Flint rounded Gideon, staying out of his reach and possible attack. He backed into the elevator, watching the young man.
"Please," Gideon pleaded, "take me with you." He took a step forward.
Golden light flashed behind Gideon as objects began disappearing. They winked out of existence with a searing sound. It was object by object, but Flint knew it would eventually progress to larger things, like entire rooms and the structure of the underground mountain complex.
"Please!" Gideon shouted, alarmed. He stepped onto the overturned bookcase.
Flint raised his rifle at him. Under other circumstances, he might have relented and spared the man's life. Suarez, though, had said that Gideon should perish. Flint embraced the idea of evolutions and that there were certain things that must come to pass, despite the mechanism of the event. Though he did not know the details of the timeline or how things were supposed to be according to Suarez's knowledge, he did understand that her mission was to restore the timeline and keep things in a natural order. That meant Gideon must meet his fate in the mountain. At the very least, he had been a part of Allison being wounded and now, Suarez. Gideon deserved to die as an enemy of free people.
The decision was taken from Flint. The bookcase suddenly winked out of existence, taking Gideon with it without so much as a yelp. Bookcase and body were dissolved into nothingness as time began folding in on itself.
"Not this time," he said.
He backed into the elevator completely. Scarlett touched the control panel. The door closed, and the car began to rise.
Flint checked his watch. "Two minutes."
They looked to the panel on the wall, which ticked off the floors as the car rose up the mountain. Flint's legs felt heavy as the car picked up speed toward the surface. The numbers began to scroll faster, but he knew it would be close.
He looked over at Suarez. She looked small and vulnerable in Leatherneck's arms. The wound in her shoulder seeped bright red blood. He knew it was a double-edged sword. As long as she was bleeding, her heart was beating; as long as she was bleeding, she was in danger of dying.
"Any idea where this is going to put us?" Scarlett dared to ask.
Flint shook his head. "At this point, anything is better than down there."
He watched the numbers intently, willing the car to throttle faster to the surface. With seventeen floors to go, he checked his watch again. They had little over a minute to get clear once the car stopped. The numbers began to slow. He felt panic creep up his spine as he realized the drive was nearing the top of the shaft. The car had to slow so as not to slam into the top of the shaft, but it was slowing down too much. He counted down the remaining floors with furtive glances at his watch, timing the decrease in rise to the seconds of their lives ticking away with abandon.
When the last floor shown on the panel, he looked down at his watch. They had twenty-eight seconds to clear the area, to make it to safety and not be obliterated. The door to the car opened, sending a blast of cold mountain air in on them. He was immediately met by shouts of guards scrambling to leave the compound. Flint jumped out of the car, turning quickly left and right for targets. There were targets, but none of them threatened him. They were Cobra guards running for their lives and did not have time to pay attention to him. He realized, then, that the car had placed them on the opposite side of the compound where they had first infiltrated.
Scarlett pushed out past him, pointing to an open gate a hundred feet ahead of them. He looked back to make sure Leatherneck was not falling too far behind them. The marine had transferred Suarez to his shoulder, carrying her like a sack of potatoes.
Flint heard the searing sound behind them. Bright gold light reflected off the snow with blinding brilliance. He saw the silhouettes of Scarlett and Leatherneck on either side of him, backlit by the dim security lights of the compound. They were running for their lives into the rough hill that ran upward toward the peak of the mountain. They had seen what happened when a body was in contact with something was reclaimed by time and were desperately trying to escape Gideon's fate.
His boots slipped on the iced surface. The snow became deeper, slowing their progress to safety. He looked back to Leatherneck and saw him struggling to hold Suarez and run at the same time. Flint reached out and grabbed on to Leatherneck's vest, pulling him along in the deepening snow. He had no idea how far they needed to go to escape the wrath of time and space, but he knew they should just keep running until there was no more running to be done. Bright flashes were snapping off at a rapid rate behind them. He dared not look back at it lest he lose a precious second to get out of the way.
The searing became a roar in his ears as the final disassembly of the base began. Even before it really hit, he felt the wave of heat building in the air, snapping with energy. The air became warm, like a tropical breeze out of its environment. Time slowed, pulled inward toward the destruction. They were running away from it, using every ounce of energy to escape its pull. Then the tide turned like a slingshot, propelling them forward with violent force. Flint's feet left the ground as his body was suddenly brought airborne by the fold. Out of his periphery, he saw more bodies launched in the air. It all seemed to be in slow motion again. Suarez was parallel with him, body limp and unaware.
Leatherneck's arms were outstretched in a defensive manner, to ward off the impact that was coming. Scarlett was twisted sideways, her face caught in an alarmed grimace. Flint heard his own breath leaving his lungs slowly as one last blast of golden light gradually blossomed behind him. It began to illuminate the world as he knew it, turning the pristine white landscape a golden yellow, like a summer sunset on the water. Then a myriad of color invaded his vision, and sound became still silence. His body was suspended in time, frozen yet aware that there was more to come. Heat enveloped him in a loving embrace, comforting him in a time of death and destruction for others.
Just as he thought all time and space had stopped completely, he was launched forward into the snow bank in front of him. He hit hard, feeling like a linebacker had used him for practice. Hot white light filled his vision as his head impacted with the packed snow. It scraped his cheek, a contradictory burn of heat and cold as the ice dug into his skin. His body tumbled across the landscape, his arms flapping with a loss of control.
He came to a stop on his back. At first, he felt nothing. Then his body remembered to breath. The night air was icy and clean as it filled his lungs in a desperate gulp. He yearned for more, not able to get enough at one time. His eyes focused on the night sky. It was clear and pristine, the perfect window into all that was to come and all that had been. Stars were a view of history, some not even in existence anymore, their light just now reaching Earth's sight.
He lay there on the snow, prone and on his back, feeling the cold of the mountain seep through his clothes and into the core of his body. He was not even sure he could move his arms and did not care to try. They were fine just where they were. All energy had been sapped from him. It was a chore just to move his eyes. Still, the gears in his brain moved, trying to process what had just happened, even though it was still just out of reach.
Then Flint remembered Suarez. Frames of images fired in his mind. First, she was alive, then dead. Then she was alive. He was coherent enough to wonder if she was dead again.
He looked around with his eyes, trying to find her. Leatherneck – he had been carrying her just a step behind Flint. Scarlett had been there, too, though he had no reference of where she was when everything began to end. Flint looked around with his eyes, trying to find them.
The moon was rising over opposite pass, a white disc of nighttime comfort from his boyhood. He imagined walking on it one day, dreaming of its silence and mystery. The first light of the rising moon cast its glow on the mountain snow. He craned his eyes to the right. Silhouetted against the moon was Suarez, breath escaping her lips in a frosty fog.
A roar began in the back of his skull. It thumped rhythmically in his body, out of synch with his heart but patterned all its own. He looked up at the stars again, looking for the source. The wind began to pick up, whistling over the broken mountain terrain, kicking up a fine spray of snow that melted when it hit his face. He did not bother to locate what was causing it anymore. He was too tired and too sore to care.
Flint closed his eyes and fell asleep next to the breathing body of Suarez.