The Codex

81

Hauser stood in the middle of the bridge, his mind having accepted the fact that a sharpshooter — no doubt that blond woman who had come with Tom Broadbent — had him in her crosshairs. A useless old hunting rifle, the soldier had told him. Right. She had placed a bullet at his feet at 350 yards. To think that she now had him in her sights was an unpleasant and yet oddly thrilling feeling.

He looked at the bottle tied to the cable. The distance from where he was standing to the bottle was less than one hundred feet. The sharpshooter was shooting from more than three hundred yards. The bridge was swaying in the updrafts. It would be a difficult shot, hitting a target moving through three dimensions. An almost impossible shot, in fact. In ten seconds he could reach the bottle, tear it off the cable, and drop it in the abyss. If he then turned and ran back toward the far end of the bridge, he would be a moving target rapidly going out of range. How likely would it be that she could hit him? He would be running fast along a swaying bridge — again moving in three spatial dimensions relative to her firing point. She would not be able to draw a bead on him. On top of that she was a woman. Obviously she could shoot, but no woman could shoot that well.

Yes, it could all be done quickly, before the Broadbents escaped, and she would never hit him or the canister. Never.

He crouched and sprang toward the can of white gas.

Almost instantly he heard the snick! of a bullet in front of him and then the report. He kept going and reached the can just as the second report reached his ears. Another miss. This was too easy. He had just put his hand on the can when he heard a pop! and saw a brilliant blossoming of light erupt in front of him with a whoosh, followed by a searing heat. He staggered back, waving his arm, surprised to see blue flames crawling all over him, his arms, his chest, his legs. He fell and rolled, thrashing around, beating at his arm, but he was like a blazing Midas and everything he touched seemed to turn to fire. He kicked, shrieked, rolled — and then suddenly he was like an angel, soaring on wings of air, and he closed his eyes and allowed the long, cool, delicious fall to happen.