Poe

Chapter Thirty-Six

Cooper was almost to the abandoned building when his earpiece came alive with Deuce’s hushed voice.

“You there yet?”

“Just about,” Cooper said. “Anything new?”

“Two jeep patrols have started circling the perimeter.”

UAZs, Cooper knew — the Russian equivalent of the Jeep. “Terrific. Inside or outside the fence?”

“Inside.”

That was good. The rendezvous building was right outside the prison’s double fence, so unless the patrols actually headed out the gate, they weren’t an immediate threat.

“Let me know if that changes,” he said.

There was silence for a moment, then, “You see any sign of Alex?”

“Not yet.”

When he reached the building, Cooper looked around, trying to figure out exactly where Alex would be coming from. There was no obvious route to the outside that wouldn’t require them to run over hundreds of yards of open space before they reached the ravine.

Not exactly a stealthy way to escape.

And then, of course, there were the two fences. How would they get over those?

Again wishing that Alex had given them more details, Cooper studied his surroundings, and it suddenly struck him that maybe there was no need to get over the fences.

Why not go under them?

That had to be it, right? A tunnel. Maybe one that led directly from the prison to the building?

All other possibilities would come with an almost zero chance of working.

So if there was a tunnel, where would it come out?

Inside the building?

Wishing he could block out the sound of the siren, Cooper removed a flashlight from the bag on his back, then found an opening in the side of the building that had once had a door, and made his way inside. He spent the next several minutes exploring, and discovered that the interior of the building was little more than a collection of crumbling walls.

He moved room to room, finding nothing here that would support his theory. Until, that was, he stumbled across an enclosed space no bigger than a supply closet, its badly dilapidated door barely clinging to its hinges.

Unless he was wrong, most supply closets didn’t have a manhole in the center.

So was this it? Given the complete lack of other candidates, it seemed a pretty good fit.

Cooper stood there, studying the manhole. If he was right about this, it might be wise to get the cover off so that Alex and El-Hashim could crawl out quickly and save precious time. But the task would take more than a simple grab and pull. He needed something to assist him, a crowbar or a piece of pipe that he could stick into one of the holes atop the cover and pry it off.

There was nothing in the immediate area, but two rooms over he found a three-foot section of rusted rebar lying atop a pile of rubble. It wasn’t quite as long as he would have liked, but he thought it might work.

He returned to the room, and slotted the tip through one of the holes. As he pushed on the rod, he was afraid it was going to bend before the lid canted up. It did, but only a small amount, and he was able to lift the edge of the cover just high enough to twist it so that it was sitting partially out of the hole. A couple of intense shoves later, the opening was cleared.

Cooper shone his flashlight into the hole. On the left was a wall with a built-in ladder of metal hoops leading up to the opening. To the right was a tunnel, its floor about ten feet below.

Cooper leaned through the opening and cupped his free hand at the side of his mouth. “Alex? Are you there? It’s Cooper.”

Nothing.

“Alex?”

Still dead quiet.

He pulled back up and thought for a moment, then swung his legs around, and lowered himself down the ladder.