CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Into the Darkness

It was a long ride. The train rushed through the tunnel, blackness at the windows. The crowd held me tight, immobile-which was just as well. Left to stand alone, I might have collapsed. I was that exhausted.

The madness of the past hours flashed through my mind. The flight over the river. The sudden death of Patel. The wild helicopter chase close to the city streets. The sight of the chopper caught in the phone wires. The gunman falling through the air to his death. The chopper exploding. And the Cessna, landing without power in the park. The crash. The fire. Getting Rose and Mike out. The race through the streets…

And New Year’s Eve was just beginning.

It was not so long ago, I thought to myself, I was an ordinary guy, an ordinary kid in an ordinary town, doing the sorts of things you do every day. You know: getting through school, hanging with your friends, thinking about girls and sports and computers and did I mention girls? There were days in that old life when I wondered if anything really exciting would ever happen to me. There were days now-lots of days-when I wondered if the excitement would ever stop, if I would ever have a quiet dinner with Beth or play a round of Medal of Honor with my gang, or just, I don’t know, listen to music, shoot some hoops, whatever, you know, the things you do.

I missed life. I missed ordinary life. I wondered if I would ever see ordinary life again. I didn’t realize how good a thing it was until I lost it.

I stood crushed in the crowd. I stared into empty space. I guess I was feeling sorry for myself a little. Sorry and so tired I didn’t know how I was going to make it through.

The train crossed into Manhattan and headed south. I stared into space. Something funny came into my mind then. English class. I know: What a weird thing to think about. But suddenly I saw myself sitting there at my desk, listening to upbeat, roly-poly Mrs. Smith reading a Rudyard Kipling poem at the front of the class.

“If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew / To serve your turn long after they are gone, / And so hold on when there is nothing in you / Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on’…”

It was strange, I thought. At the time she read the poem, I don’t think I was even listening that closely. But now the words came back as if they had been written specifically for me:

Hold on when there is nothing in you except the Will which says to them…

“Hold on,” said Mike, his voice rising above the roar and rattle of the car. “It’s the next stop.”

I saw the train begin to slow. Lights flashed in the darkness of the window. Then the scene out there opened into a large station: Columbus Circle. The train stopped. The door opened. It was like releasing water through a dam. The people poured out with enormous force. Even if I’d wanted to stay on the train, I wouldn’t have been able to. I was carried out onto the platform in the tide.

I wasn’t prepared for what I saw. The crowds had been dense out in the borough, but they were nothing compared to this.

The station was big-a broad interior space with several platforms, several tracks, visible through columns. People seemed to be coming from every direction, pouring up stairways and out of corridors, converging in front of the exits. More people than I’d ever seen in my life.

At first I was carried helplessly along in the massive human tide, up the stairs, toward the turnstiles. But before we could exit the station, Mike caught hold of my arm and pulled me to the side, against the massive swirling mosaic on the wall. We pressed against the multicolored tiles as the people flowed past us. Another opposing tide of people was flowing back into the station, back down toward the platforms, at the same time.

Mike rose up on tiptoe, stretched his neck, and looked around.

Then I heard him murmur, “This way.”

We joined the flow of people moving away from the exits, down a different flight of stairs, back toward the platforms. I hardly knew where we were going. I just followed Mike and went with the crowd.

We came out onto another platform now. A train had just arrived here. Its doors stood open and people were pouring out, then pouring in. The people who had just left the train were moving in a sludgy mass toward the exit. Others who couldn’t fit on the train were lining up along the edge of the platform to wait for the next one.

Mike kept moving, pushing against the thick cluster of bodies until we broke through and forced our way down the platform. I kept right behind Mike, but it wasn’t easy. I had to shoulder my way through the small spaces in the crowd.

After a couple of minutes, the mob seemed to thin suddenly-the grip of the crowd relaxed around me. Now I saw where Mike was going.

The platform ended just up ahead. There was a metal railing and then, beyond it, the darkness of the train tunnels and the tracks. A single police officer stood guard there, his hands behind his back, his legs akimbo, his back erect, his eyes moving and alert.

As the crowd fell away behind us, Mike continued down the platform toward the patrolman. Mike’s mustache curled as he broke into a rare, bright, toothy smile.

“Hey, Mike, where you going?” I murmured. I couldn’t believe he was walking right toward the cop.

But Mike either didn’t hear me or ignored me. He didn’t answer. He didn’t even look my way.

Now Mike was just about to reach the police officer. Nervous, I turned and looked behind me. I scanned the packed platform to see if anyone was watching us. We had gone beyond the end of the train, beyond the clusters of people. Everyone was intent on where he was going. No one was paying any attention to us at all.

Then I faced forward-and stopped short. My mouth dropped open.

The policeman was gone. He had just vanished. I had turned away for only a second and when I turned back, he seemed to have simply gone up in smoke.

Only not. Because then I looked down and saw him. Good thing it was noisy in the station, because I actually gasped out loud.

The cop lay crumpled and unconscious on the concrete platform. Mike stood over him, beckoning to me urgently.

The next instant, in one smooth, silent movement, Mike vaulted over the low railing and dropped down onto the train tracks below. As I stood there in shock, he raced away into the darkness of the train tunnel.

There was no time to hesitate. No time to think. Besides, what choice did I have? I took two long steps and reached the fallen patrolman. He was already stirring, already moving his hand to his head as he regained consciousness.

I stepped past the patrolman quickly, grabbed the railing, and vaulted over.

Then I was running after Mike, along the train tracks, into the tunnel, into the dark beneath the city.

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