CHAPTER 24

“Ow!”

I’d bumped into Calvinson on our way out. Naveena and her crew stood there, blocking our way.

“Move, move, move!” I shouted.

Harribow and the others turned and booked it back down the dark tunnel. You get used to springing into action when another smoke eater tells you to haul ass. It could mean the few seconds needed to avoid getting torched.

“Y’all run into the Code J?” Naveena asked as we all filed along at a steady jog.

“Yeah,” I said.

“What?” Harribow screeched. “Oh shit.”

“Help!” came the disembodied cry again.

Renfro whistled for a halt. “Where is that coming from?”

Both crews stopped and listened. Harribow shook and swayed on both feet like he was considering crawling back to the surface.

“We came in the same way you did,” said Naveena. “Was there another passage in that room you just left?”

“No,” I said. “Locker room. Enclosed.”

“What about this?” Calvinson shined his light ahead, illuminating a small gap between two dilapidated walls.

“That wasn’t there before,” Naveena said.

I nodded. “Which means this shit is shifting.”

“Or another dragon made that hole,” Afu said.

“We have to hurry up and get the fuck out of here,” I said.

“Somebody, please!” It was two of them now, shouting in chorus. And the voices were coming from behind the small gap Calvinson had discovered.

“We’re going to have to break this apart,” said Renfro.

The jabberwock’s creepy grunting trickled through the passage behind us.

“That might weaken the top,” Naveena said. Then, turning to me, “It’s your call, Tamerica.”

I checked behind us and then the crack. If we left now, those kids were as good as dead.

“Let’s breach the wall,” I said. “Carefully as all fuck.”

Afu got on one side of the crack while Calvinson took the other. They were doing well to take it easy and work through the groan of debris above them, the splatter of dust that rained onto their helmets as they pried and punched. We normally would have used laser swords for this sort of thing, but Afu would have lit up like a Christmas tree.

Ooh… ooh… ungh.

“Hurry it up, y’all,” said Renfro.

“They got this,” I said. “Let them focus.”

Afu yanked one final section of the wall away and crawled through without asking the rest of us if we thought it was big enough. If it was big enough for Afu…

I was the last to go through, right after Naveena. On the other side of that wall, waited a void. My steps echoed on forever into the dark. Dust trickled down, down, but I didn’t know where. So I extended my therma-goggles.

We were standing in the arena. All of the football field and most of the seats were covered with rubble, but I could tell where we were from the warped field goal reaching out from under chunks of rock, about fifty feet down a steep decline.

A teenage girl stood midway between us and the field. She held a flashlight and began flapping her arms, urging us to come quick. Behind her there was a bent piece of railing, and below that, a faint yellow glow danced off the surrounding slabs of concrete.

“T!” Afu whispered. “The phoenix is down there.”

The jabberwock’s inappropriate groans sounded from the hole behind me. “Everyone, help me cover this up.”

“That’s our only way out of here,” said Harribow. The yellow phoenix light glistened off of his sweatsoaked face.

“Yeah,” I said. “But it’s also an easy way for the Code J to get in. This will slow it down.”

We didn’t make it pretty. All I wanted was to block the passage. The teenager bitched at us the whole time, first thinking we hadn’t seen her, then whispershouting that we were taking too long.

She obviously didn’t know what was hunting for blood on the other side. But we did hurry down to her.

“His leg,” the girl pointed toward the ground as I slid along the last bit of rock.

A boy lay there, pinned under a broken electric sign. He wasn’t saying anything, and it looked like his eyes were closed.

“Hey, kid.” I rubbed his chest, but it only produced groans.

At least he was alive.

“What’s his name?” I asked the girl.

“Chris,” she said. “And I’m Rachel. You have to get us out of here. That thing is down there.”

“Shh!” I patted her arm until she shut up.

Rachel was erratic and that’s not a good thing to be when you’re trapped between two monsters.

“Renfro,” I whispered, pointing at him.

He squatted beside me.

“You have the eyes for this. Get ready to put on a rapid tourniquet. I can’t tell if he’s bleeding. Unresponsive, but he’s getting air. Afu and the two rookies, you lift this shit off as best you can so Renfro can pull him out. Rachel you go over there with Captain Jendal.”

“I can’t see anything.” The girl’s voice shook in the dark.

Naveena saved her the trouble by grabbing her hand and leading her away so the other smokies could work.

“Please help him!” Rachel said a little too loudly.

Lord, kid, calm down, I thought. It’s your damn fault we’re in this mess.

I turned toward the yellow glow on the other side of the railing, hoping Rachel’s loud ass hadn’t stirred up the firebird. Stepping to the railing, I peered over to snag a look.

The phoenix was asleep.

Its yellow fire crackled low and almost calmly, its head tucked under a wing and wrapped nice and cozy like a blazing avian burrito.

We could kill this fucker right now!

Boom… boom.

The concrete we’d used to cover the hole shook, sending pebbles of loose debris to roll down the slope. The jabberwock was trying to break through.

I chanced a look back over the railing and came face to face with the fiery eye of the phoenix.

“Guys…” I said.

The phoenix shrieked into my face, pelting my cheeks and nose with heat, blasting out my eardrums. I lowered my head so my helmet took the brunt of it.

As I slung the Impulse shotgun from my shoulder, the phoenix flapped its giant wings. Its yellow flames grew bigger, hotter like a small sun, revealing more of the surrounding arena.

I didn’t waste time shouting some wise-crack, I just pulled the trigger. The foam projectile slammed into the phoenix, dead center. It tumbled through the air as its flames died down. But the fire was still there, and the bird still flew.

A crash of rocks came from behind me.

The jabberwock slithered out of the hole at the top of the stadium. Calvinson met it with a power jump and a flashing laser, but the dragon spewed a gallon of ink into his face before slapping him with a whip of its tail. The rookie flew over the squished seats and concrete, coming to a stop just in front of his captain.

“I’m fine,” Calvinson croaked.

Someone’s voice blipped and sizzled in my helmet. Whoever was trying to radio me wasn’t getting through. We must have been deeper under the wreckage than I thought.

The jabberwock roared; no more of the oohing and grunting. Now it had the space and the proximity to the phoenix to really lose its shit. With its long fingers and toes, it skittered down the rocks. Renfro and I began shooting our lasers at it, although I was taking a glance over my shoulder to see what the phoenix was doing.

But the phoenix wasn’t where I had left it twisting in the air, and I didn’t have the time to go searching.

Zigging and zagging, the jabberwock dodged every one of our shots. Afu swung at it with his laser axe, but it slid under the blade, using its ink-soaked back to glide over the debris. The dragon didn’t stop to attack Afu or even Naveena, who ran for it with her own axe. The jabberwock was coming right for me.

When it leapt into the air, it was so sudden and goddamned terrifying I didn’t raise my laser in time. But the scaly sailed right over my head, dripping plods of ink onto my helmet.

I turned, following the jabberwock’s trajectory and there, the phoenix hovered on the other side of the railing. It had been ready to snatch me into its fiery beak before the jabberwock clawed into its face. Both of them fell to the arena floor.

The jabberwock caught fire instantly but refused to let go of the phoenix’s head, even when the bird took flight again and spiraled around the arena like a comet.

“Get the kids out of here!” I shouted, running toward the other smokies.

Renfro lifted the boy into his arms while Harribow hurried Rachel along. Calvinson, who was still spitting out wads of ink, had to grab Naveena’s arm since he couldn’t see. I ran past Afu. He’d dug in where he stood and kept his eyes on the battling monsters.

I skidded to a stop and turned back. “Let’s go, Afu.”

The phoenix twirled in the air, fast enough to shake the flaming jabberwock from its face, fast enough to throw it in Afu’s direction. I saw what would happen in a flash. The jabberwock plowing into Afu, both of them going up in flames for the phoenix to feast on, seeing the only man I ever loved die in front of me.

Shit. I guess that cat came out of the bag. I honestly didn’t know which thought was scarier.

Afu swung his laser axe at the incoming jabberwock and buried the sparking blade into its face, splitting the dragon’s head and burying the blade into its throat. The jabberwock wasn’t dropping off the axe, and it spun Afu around and around with it.

With a shriek, the phoenix righted itself and dove toward Afu.

“Drop it!” I ran toward him, about to power jump into the phoenix if I had to.

Afu let go of his axe, but not before detonating the electric charge and throwing both axe and dragon into the oncoming firebird. Embers exploded and rained to the ground as electrical sparks shot through the air. With a final shriek, the phoenix shattered into a shockwave of yellow flames. Glowing ashes began to fall down, accompanied by the loose slabs of concrete above us. I grabbed Afu, who stood there gawking at what he’d just caused, and shoved him toward the only way out of there. A hunk of rock that could have easily flattened him landed where he’d just been standing.

“Oh, dang!” he said, and power jumped toward the hole at the top of the stadium.

I followed him into the tunnel, dodging bits of debris that fell in our path, letting our power suits and helmets take the brunt of those we couldn’t.

Emergency lights bounced down into the hole. Other crews had finally arrived. We were nearly out when the tunnel rumbled and a slab dropped onto my legs, pinning them.

“Afu!” I called, but he was already too far ahead of me, everything was too loud. He couldn’t hear me. I was alone and about to be killed by a football stadium.

I didn’t even like football.

“Cast!” I said into my helmet radio. Closing my eyes from the sting of blowing dust, I reached out to find a handhold, something to grab and pull myself out. But all I found was air. “Mayday, mayday, mayday! I’m trapped and can’t move.”

I reached and reached for something other than slick tunnel floor. I couldn’t see a fucking thing. My legs were beginning to hurt pretty bad, even through the initial numbness of them going to sleep. That meant my power armor wasn’t failing but had already been smashed out of usefulness.

I widened my fingers, no longer trying to get hold of anything, but hoping some smoke eater up above could see at least a part of me sticking out of the rubble, maybe even a goodbye wave if they didn’t…

…When a hand grabbed my mine.

I blinked against the dust in my eyes. All I could see was a shadowy blob.

“I got ya,” Brannigan’s voice shouted through the rumble.

“My legs.”

“They’re okay. Just hold on to me.” Then, “I got her. Go, go, go!”

We flew. At least, that’s what it felt like. It took someone pouring water onto my eyes before I saw that Brannigan had a cable attached to his power suit and one of the Slayer truck’s down on street level had pulled us out just as the jabberwock’s hole crumbled like it had never been there.

Afu ran over and lifted me up into a bear hug. “I was so scared. Brannigan wouldn’t let me go back in. Made me go to rehab.”

I grunted against his squeeze, every inch of my body sore, but I didn’t tell him to stop hugging me.

“See that, Harribow.” Naveena walked over with hands on her hips, her driver in tow. “You need a girlfriend to massage your prostate. Then you can be as stout as Afu.”

Afu turned to me, frowning. “Dang it, Tamerica. I knew you told!”

I didn’t have time to bask in post-battle celebrations, because the battle wasn’t over and I seemed to be the only one who knew it.

“Chief,” I said, catching him as he was walking toward his truck. “We have to go back in there.”

“You’re welcome, Williams. I know you’d do the same for me any time.” His sarcasm was thicker than the dirt on his face.

“I appreciate your rescue,” I said, “but the phoenix ashes. They’re still down there. If we don’t extract them and get them to Yolanda, we’ll be back to square one.”

Chief opened his passenger door and poured himself a cup of water from the jug sitting in the seat.

Kenji sat in the back and gave a happy, digital bark when he saw me.

“Sherry wanted him out of the house,” Brannigan said before I asked what his dog was doing here. “Bethany gets him riled up.”

“Listen,” I said. “It doesn’t have to be Naveena’s crew or mine. We just need to get it done. Send someone fresh.”

Brannigan took a sip of water. “None of you is going back in there. You ash kickers shouldn’t have gone in without all of these other crews here as back up.”

I turned and looked at the newly-arrived Slayers and cannon trucks, an ambulance and EMTs treating the teens who had been trapped.

“But I’m not going to grill you about that,” Brannigan said. “Those kids would probably be dead if it wasn’t for all of you. Besides, there’s no way you could get back into the stadium. All that shit collapsed and its shut tighter than Sherry when I’m in the doghouse.”

“Naneun gaejib-eul joh-ahanda!” Kenji said.

My holoreader buzzed. Translation: “I love the doghouse!”

Looking at where the jabberwock’s hole had been, I saw that Brannigan was right. Even if we were to make entry, it would be too snug and too dangerous.

“Maybe we could get the fire department to loan us a droid,” Brannigan said.

“That would take too long. The ashes could reignite any moment.”

“I’m not sending a human being down there, Williams.”

“No, not…”

Kenji’s rubber tongue drooped from the side of his mouth. The inside of his jaws looked like a deep shovel.

“Not a human,” I said.

Brannigan followed my gaze as Kenji barked again.

“No,” Chief shook his head hard enough it made his cheeks jiggle. “No way in hell. The rescue is over. My dog isn’t…”