Ch. 4
"I feel like James Bond." Nick said as he pulled opened the door and did a duck-and-roll across the hotel hallway.
Gil laughed and followed after the younger man, only he didn't do the duck-and-roll. "A James Bond with a Texas accent."
They had been walking up the stairwells and they wanted to check every floor to make sure no one was stranded. Warrick and Catherine were doing the same on the other side of the hotel. They decided to spread out to cover more ground.
Sara, Greg, and Brass went, without stopping, to the roof to see what was happening up there. Plus, Jim had his gun with him and knew more about bombs.
"Bond definitely looked better in a tux." Nick said as he looked down at himself.
Gil huffed out a laugh. "Nick, believe me when I tell you that you look a hell of a lot better than Sean Connery in a tux."
Nick blushed and smiled. "Yeah, well, you look better than Pierce Brosnan."
Gil cocked his head and stared at Nick in confusion. "Who?"
Nick laughed and shook his head. "He's the new James Bond."
"Oh."
They found another stairwell and started their descent once again when he felt his cell phone vibrate. "Grissom."
"Gil, Jim."
"What'd you find," Gil asked as Nick entered the hallway on the thirtieth floor. He looked down and saw smoke starting to rise from a few floors down. That ruled out that stairwell.
"I found the bomb. The timer was never set. I got ahold of one of my buddies and he walked me through defusing it."
Gil could hear the stress in Jim's voice. He opened the door and saw Nick walking down the hall. "What aren't you telling me?"
"Are worst nightmare was confirmed. We can't get out, no one can get in and the fire is spreading up through the floors," he heard Jim take a deep breath, "Atwater's dead, so is the new sheriff, and many others."
"How do you know that?" Gil watched Nick continue down the hall.
"Ecklie. He called and told the fire guys what was going on inside the lobby before he could say much else the phone went dead."
A frustrated sound escaped Gil's mouth. Everyone who was in the lobby was more than likely dead. "Have you heard from Cath and Rick?"
"Yeah. They're just on their way up."
"Anything on a rescue plan?"
"They were talking about choppers, but the wind is really rough right now. They're saying we have maybe an hour or two before the entire hotel is up in flames. The fire department got in through the windows on the second floor but they aren't having any luck getting any further than that."
"Okay, thanks Jim. We'll head up soon." Gil flipped his phone closed and went up behind Nick. "There's smoke rising in the stairwell. I think we should just head up to the roof."
"That's two. Let's hope the north stairwell isn't up in smoke."
They headed toward the north stairwell. A sound coming from behind the door made them stop in their steps. They shared a look and headed for the door cautiously. A yell of 'help' caused them to run to the door and pull it open. Both men froze for a second when they saw who was leading a group of people, some injured, up the stairwell.
Conrad Ecklie was helping some man walk up the steps and holding an injured child in his other arm. "Gil…help," was all he could get out of his dry mouth.
They immediately went to help the other man. Grissom grabbed the child out of Ecklie's arm and helped him the rest of the way up.
"I thought you were dead," Gil breathed out as they continued up the stairwell. He and Ecklie had their issues like everyone else, but he liked the other man. And he knew the looks he'd get from other people if they found that out, but he was happy as hell to see Conrad alive.
From the way Ecklie was breathing and limping, they had to have walked nonstop up thirty flights of stairs. They had eleven more to go before they got to the roof.
"We almost didn't make it past the tenth floor, but the north stairwell wasn't in flames yet. It's coming this way though. We can make it up, but I don't see how we can make it down."
"They're working on a rescue," Gil told Ecklie.
Glancing back he caught sight of Nick bringing up the rear with another child in his arms and helping an elder woman up the steps. A smile crept up his face at that sight. There were at least twenty of them in the group. Hopefully they'd all make it out alive. It'd be a shame after all this.
Before long they came to the forty-first door. Gil reached around Ecklie and swung the door open. The ballroom came into view and everyone turned to see the people come through the door.
Warrick was at their side in a second helping carrying people and so were Jim, Greg, and even Catherine. Gil looked around and saw Sara on the other side doing the same. They were all safe, he thought, at least for now.
A woman yelled from across the room and came running up to Gil screaming about her child. The little girl he was carrying quickly squirmed out of his arms and into the arms of her mother. He turned from the reunited mother and daughter making sure everyone got out of the stairwell before he shut the door.
He collapsed into a chair against the wall and watched the people around him hug friends and family. Soon the crowd dispersed into respective corners and areas and Gil was left with Nick at his side and the rest of the group getting something to drink or sitting around on cell phones. He overheard Sara speaking to someone and asking what the update on the situation was.
Finding his cell phone Gil offered it to Nick. "Do you need to call anyone? Family maybe?"
Nick shook his head. "I don't need to call them unless I'm dying. We're getting out of this. Even if we have to run through flames we're getting out of this."
That sense of strength in the younger man overwhelmed Gil. Staring into Nicks' brown eyes and seeing the sincerity in them, he knew he'd help make that happen. He tucked the phone back in his jacket pocket and nodded. They were going to get out of this. He would follow Nick to the grave if he had to.
TBC…