Riptide

Chapter 49

Hatch lay on the rocks, drowsy and comfortable, the sea washing around his chest. One part of his mind was mildly annoyed at having been plucked from the bosom of the sea. The other part, small but growing, was horrified at what the first part was thinking.

He was alive, that much he knew; alive, with all the pain and misery that came along with it. How long he had lain there he could only guess.

Now he gradually became aware of aches in his shoulders, knees, and shins. As he thought about them, the aches quickly grew into throbs. His hands and feet were stiff with cold, and his head felt waterlogged. The second part of his brain—the part that was saying all this was a good thing—was now telling him to get his sorry ass out of the water and up the rocky beach.

He wheezed in a breath full of seawater and was seized with a fit of coughing. The spasm brought him to his knees; his limbs collapsed and he fell again to the wet rocks. Struggling to a crawl, he managed to make the few feet out of reach of the water. There he rested on a large outcropping of granite, the rock cool and smooth beneath his cheek.

As his head cleared, memories began to return, one by one. He remembered Neidelman, and the sword, and why he'd returned to the island. He remembered the crossing, the Plain Jane capsizing, the dinghy, Streeter . . .

Streeter.

He sat up.

Isobel had been on the boat.

He tottered to his feet, fell back, then rose again, determined now. He'd fallen out the bow end of the dinghy, and the freakish riptide had pulled him to this rocky shore around the end of the island. Ahead, dark against the angry sky, he saw the low bluffs that guarded the pirate encampment. Bonterre would have landed nearer the beach. If she landed at all.

Suddenly, he could not bear the thought of her being dead.

He moved forward unsteadily, croaking Bonterre's name. After a moment he stopped to look about, realizing that, in his confusion, he was walking away from the beach toward the low bluffs. He staggered partway up the rise, then turned seaward. There was no sign of Bonterre, or of the dinghy's remains. Beyond the shore, the ocean was pounding the cofferdam relentlessly, every blow sending seawater shooting at high pressure through a web of cracks.

There was a brief flicker of light, fingering its way along the dark shore. He looked again, and it was gone: a flash of lightning, reflected off the rocks. He began to climb back down the bluff.

Suddenly the light was back again, closer this time, bobbing along the shoulder of the island. Then it swung upward, the powerful pale light of a halogen beam stabbing into the dark. It moved back and forth along the shore, then raked inland past him. Instinctively, Hatch began backing up the slope.

Then it was flaring in his eyes, blinding him. He dropped and turned, scrabbling up the bluff. The light licked the ground around him, searching. There was a glare, and he saw his shadow rise away up the hill in front of him. He'd been targeted.

The strange, stuttering sound he'd heard from the Cerberus came again, rattling over the roar of the surf and the howl of the wind: the clatter of giant knitting needles. To his right, small puffs of dirt and mud rose madly into the air in a jagged line. Streeter was behind him, in the dark, shooting at him with the flechette.

Quickly, Hatch rolled to his left, angling desperately for the top of the bluff. There was another demonic clatter as the weapon tore into the spot where he'd lain a few seconds before, a hundred tungsten nails stitching ruin into the earth.

Half crawling, half rolling, Hatch crossed the top of the bluff and tumbled down the embankment on the far side, slipping on the wet grass. He righted himself and glanced around wildly. There was no tree cover, just a long exposed run across the meadow and up the rise of land toward Orthanc. Ahead, he could see the small equipment shed Bonterre used for fieldwork, and beside it a precise dark rectangle cut into the ground: the pirate grave.

His glance settled on the equipment shed. He could hide inside, or perhaps beneath. But that would be the first place Streeter looked.

Hatch hesitated another second. Then he sprinted down the meadow and leaped into the grave.

He staggered under the impact of the three-foot drop, then steadied himself. A tongue of lightning briefly illuminated the pit around him. Some of the pirate skeletons had been removed from the mass grave. But most remained in situ, covered with tarps. The excavation was scheduled to be filled in the following week; Bonterre, he knew, had removed only enough skeletons to get a unique cross section.

A shattering clap of thunder galvanized him into action. Quickly, he crawled beneath one of the tarps. There was something sharp and uncomfortable beneath him: he reached into the dirt and plucked out a large section of crushed cranium. Brushing it to one side, he lay still, waiting.

Beneath the tarp the dirt was damp but not muddy, and out of the rain and wind Hatch felt warmth begin to creep back into his frozen limbs.

There was the sound of a foot being pulled from sucking mud.

Hatch held his breath. He heard a sharp squeal of metal as the door to the equipment shed was torn open. Then, silence.

Footsteps again, farther, then closer. Heavy, regular breathing, perhaps ten feet away. Hatch heard the mechanical snick of a weapon being readied. And he knew that Streeter hadn't been fooled.

The flechette barked, and suddenly the floor of the grave became alive, writhing with miniature clouds of dirt and sand and bone fragments. From the corner of his eye, Hatch could see the tarp rearing and bucking, lifted into the air by the impact of hundreds of tiny nails, the bones beneath collapsing into mud and powder. The frantic, deadly trails of needles came toward him, and Hatch realized he had a second, maybe two, to decide what, if any, options remained.

The weapon coughed, then fell silent. There was a clattering of metal. Taking a desperate chance, Hatch rose from the ground and jumped blindly from the grave in the direction of the sound, the tarp stretched wide before him. He slammed into Streeter, toppling him backward into the mud. The flechette fell to the ground, a fresh ammo canister beside it, and the flashlight was knocked several feet into the grass. Streeter struggled wildly beneath the tarp, arms and legs flailing. Hatch brought his knee up into what he guessed to be Streeter's groin, and was rewarded by a gasp of pain.

"Bastard!" Hatch cried, smothering the figure with his own large body, battering and pounding through the tarp. "Runt bastard!"

There was a sudden blow to his chin and Hatch felt his teeth grind together. He staggered backward, head suddenly light; Streeter must have butted him with his head. Hatch fell heavily back onto the tarp but Streeter was wiry and strong for his size, and Hatch could feel him begin to twist free. Quickly, he leapt for the fresh canister and flung it far into the darkness. Then he moved toward the flashlight as Streeter jumped to his feet, tearing free of the muddy tarp. Streeter's hand reached toward his own belt and came away with a small automatic weapon. Making an instant decision, Hatch brought his foot down on the light.

Darkness clapped down as a shot rang out. Hatch ran blindly then, zigzagging through the meadow, heading for the central rise of land and the maze of trails beyond. A tongue of lightning illuminated Streeter, a hundred yards below; the man caught sight of him, turned, and approached at a dead run. Hatch dashed toward the main workings, moving first up one path, then another, relying on feel to keep within the borders of yellow tape. Behind, he could hear pounding tread and heavy breathing.

As he topped the rise he saw the glow of Orthanc, lancing through the mists. He started toward it, then shrank away again: even to go near the light, he realized, would give Streeter a clear shot.

Hatch thought quickly. He could head down to the Base Camp, try and lose Streeter in the cluster of buildings. But he could easily be trapped there. Besides, he had to shake Streeter soon.

He realized he wasn't going to do it on the surface of the island.

There was one tunnel, the Boston Shaft, that led down into the earth at a gentle angle. If he remembered correctly, it connected with the Water Pit at a great depth. Neidelman had pointed it out to him on the morning—just a few weeks before, was it possible?—when they'd first located the site of the original Pit.

There was no more time. He glanced up at the glow of Orthanc, oriented himself, then turned down another trail. There it was: a dark hole yawning behind safety tape, fringed with ragged weeds.

He slipped under the tape and stood at the edge of the Boston Shaft. It was very dark, and the wind blew the rain horizontally into his eyes. Gentle angle? In the blackness, the shaft looked like a vertical drop to him. He hesitated, peering downward. Then there was the sound of footsteps clattering over a metal walkway. He grabbed the slender trunk of a chokecherry bush, swung himself over the edge, and scrabbled on the slippery walls of the shaft, trying to find a purchase with his feet. But there was none; the roots came out with a tearing sound and Hatch felt himself falling through empty space.

A short, terrifying drop, and he hit muddy bottom with a jolt. He scrambled to his feet, shaken but unhurt. There was only the faintest square of sky visible above him, a blurred patch that was a lighter shade of black. But he saw, or thought he saw, a shape moving along its edge . . .

There was a deafening roar, accompanied by a brilliant flash of light. A second roar followed almost immediately, and something smacked into the muddy shaft inches from his head.

Hatch twisted out of the shaft and began running down the tunnel. He knew what Streeter was doing: using the muzzle flash from his first shot to aim a second.

The incline of the tunnel floor was steep, and Hatch found himself slipping. He began to lose his balance as he ran, and he fought to keep from plunging, out of control, into absolute darkness. After several terrifying seconds, the incline leveled out enough for him to gain a purchase and come to a stop.

He stood in the humid chill of the tunnel, listening, trying to control his gasping breath. To run blindly ahead was suicide. The tunnel could well be honeycombed with pits or shafts—

There was a wet thump behind him, followed by the sound of footsteps slapping against mud.

Hatch felt for the side of the tunnel. His hand closed over the slimy cribwork and he began descending again as quickly as he dared, trying to stay rational. Streeter would no doubt shoot again. He'd probably try another pair of shots. But Streeter's strategy could also be useful to Hatch: the light from the first shot might give him an idea of what lay ahead.

It was the second shot that would be deadly.

The first shot came almost in answer to his thought, echoing deafeningly within the narrow confines of the tunnel. As Hatch threw himself sideways into the mud, the second shot ripped into the cribbing directly behind him.

In the muzzle flash, he saw that the tunnel continued downward uninterrupted.

Pushing himself to his feet, he ran ahead blindly, arms outstretched, half stumbling, half sliding, as far as he dared and then farther. At last he stopped, felt for the wall again, and listened. Streeter would still be behind him, proceeding more cautiously. If Hatch could lose him somehow in the tunnel, maybe he could reach the point, deep beneath the ground, where the Boston Shaft intersected the Water Pit. Neidelman would be there. He couldn't possibly know what Streeter was up to; Streeter must have suffered a psychotic break, nothing else made sense. If he could just reach the main shaft. . .

Another shot came, much closer than he'd expected. He swung desperately away, the second barely missing him. Ahead, he saw that the tunnel branched, a narrow passage to his left ending in what appeared to be a gaping hole. There was a third shot, then a fourth, and something ripped through his ear with a tearing sting.

He'd been hit. Running now, he grabbed wildly at his face, feeling for the blood that trickled from his torn ear. He ducked down the narrow branch and went as far toward the hole as he dared. Then he flattened himself against the wall and waited in the close blackness, muscles tensed. At the next muzzle flash, he'd spring back, grab Streeter, and toss him down. It was even possible that Streeter, in his haste, might run right into the hole himself.

In the intense, listening dark he heard a faint pattering, barely louder than the pounding of his own heart. It was Streeter, feeling his way along the wall. Hatch waited. Now he could hear the faint rasp of breath. Streeter was being careful with his rounds. No doubt he had a limited supply. Perhaps he would be forced to...

Suddenly, there was the flash and roar of a shot. Hatch lunged, trying desperately to beat the second shot, and as he closed on Streeter there was an immense blow to his head. A stunning light filled his eyes, blotting out thought, blotting out everything.