GRIDER

 

Tuesday January 14 - 1905 MST

One day until Turbocharger activates

 

The cables went taut and the crate with the Keystone began to rise up on its long ascent to the surface. Far up above us at the top of the pit lights panned back and forth amid the distant whine of a winch struggling to pull the heavy crate upwards. A part of me longed to be up there, because up there was not down here in the pit that swallowed up light like it was dinner.

"Hurry up!" Kuzmin barked at the last of his men to get buckled into his ascent line. "We have three minutes. This is too slow."

He was right. We were dragging ass and needed to hurry the hell up if we wanted to get out before the relief force arrived. There was also the growing chill creeping over me. It could easily have been my imagination, but it felt colder now. That biting chill cut right through the heavy layers of goose down and Goretex like they weren't even there. The ethereal light from the big rune we were standing on had gone out and now I was sure it was magic meant to keep something from escaping. That thought was creeping up at the back of my mind and could have been what was causing the chill.

Then we all heard a keening hiss that slowly morphed into an unnatural howl. I instinctively turned towards the tunnel where we'd just come from, the one where we found the Keystone. But the rest of the team faced other openings, like the sound had come from everywhere.

"What was that?" Priestley asked the suddenly silent group.

"Don't care." Kuzmin said gruffly as the last man snapped his harness into place. Then he clicked on his radio. "Okay, pull us up."

A moment later my cable went taut and I began to rise. The howl came back and this time it was much closer. Hanging there just a few dozen feet above the pit's floor I felt like bait on a fishing line. Soon the floor disappeared as we got high enough that the darkness overwhelmed our lights' collective ability to illuminate. We were stuck there floating in a black void that seemingly went on forever. If it hadn't been for the whine of the winch motor above and the gentle sensation of rising I felt I could easily be convinced that I was hovering in some endless black Purgatory.

My heart rate gradually rose as the ascent dragged on. I wanted to be up and out of the pit sooner than later because that impenetrable darkness felt like it was just under my dangling feet and at any moment something could reach up and snatch me off the line.

"Do you think something is down there?" Priestley hung from his descent line just beside me and was staring into the abyss. When he reached for one of the chem lights on his vest I put a halting hand on it.

"Don't, man." I shook my head at him. "If there is something you really don't want to see it."

Then I heard the hiss of a flare being fired up. One of Kuzmin's goons ignored my warning and dropped a signal flare into the void. It glowed a brilliant green that reflected off the smooth stone walls as it fell ever faster on its journey to the bottom. It bounced once when it hit the bottom and for a brief instant my breath caught in my throat.

The floor was nothing but a tangle of black tentacles crawling over one another and spreading out like a mold caught in a time lapse video. Stringy black tendrils lanced out across the stone and grabbed onto whatever they could grab hold of. Then at once they went taut and pulled a fleshy mass out of the cave we'd come out of a few moments ago. Before I could get a good look at the main body it landed on the flare smothering its green light and plunging the scene back into endless blackness.

There were several muffled curses and every set of eyes was looking down. I shook my head. "Told you it was something you didn't want to see."

Priestley looked back with eyes a little wider than they were before. "Can this thing move any faster?"

We all knew the answer. This was it. We were bait on a line until the ride was over.

Up above, the crate with the Keystone hit the scaffolding at the top and was pulled up and over the edge by the third Prime. We'd left him there as a backup, but he also came in handy for the last step of the raid—getting the artifact aboard the chopper. Everything was planned around the security of the Keystone, everyone was just a resource to make that happen, including the Primes.

This one was named Eddie Delgado, and in a surprise twist was an active duty Marine. That was a first for us, because it meant technically I could give him orders. The others didn't fall under the UCMJ which meant I had to politely ask them to do things, and they could theoretically refuse. Not this guy though.

His orders were simple: standby as a backup in case something happened to the first two, barring any disasters then he would grab up the Keystone crate and take it to the waiting MH-53 we'd rode in on. This was also part of another contingency. If things got hot they wanted the artifact on board so they could lift off with or without the rest of us. I still didn't understand why the Keystone was so important, but it wasn't my job to question the leadership of my nation. They simply said that in the wrong hands it could end my nation, and so we needed to get it in the right hands. Ours.

Eddie hefted up the big crate onto his wide shoulders. Then he took off, bounding over the scaffolding with so much weight I could hear the metal of the grills groaning halfway down the pit.

He was out across the snow and stepping onto the MH-53's rear ramp by the time we were climbing up onto the scaffolding. The place still reeked of burnt gunpowder and detonated explosives, but there wasn't time to ponder the carnage we'd created. I didn't even bother stripping out of the climbing harness and just concentrated on putting one boot in front of another as I jogged as fast as my weary body would carry me towards the chopper.

"Shouldn't we drop some grenades down the pit?" Priestley asked no one in particular.

Kuzmin shook his head without slowing down his pace. "No. If monster comes out then gunships will kill it. If it stays inside then it is not our problem."

Fresh snowflakes fell in the darkness with more being whipped up by the MH-53's rotor wash making the place feel like a ticker tape parade during a hurricane. As I got closer to the chopper's rear and freedom from this place of nightmares I heard a scream. It was barely audible over the roar of the chopper's turbine.

As I turned to look back over my shoulder I saw one of the Primes—Carlie—sliding backwards across the snow, a long black tentacle was wrapped around one calf and pulling back into the vault. In the blink of an eye she disappeared into the darkness.

Kuzmin kept going along with his Praetorians. That was the smart thing to do, and I was on the same page. Primes were potential danger, but beloved by people above me in the chain of the command. So I couldn't just pop one without repercussions. But if one died in the line of duty…

"No!" Priestley shouted futilely. Then he turned back and ran after her.

Hooper followed. Both of them disappeared into the darkness, and I found myself standing there just short of the helicopter's ramp looking back and forth. Did I take the smart path and leave? Or did I do the right thing and at least get Priestley back? He was after a brother-in-arms and still human. And we do not leave a brother behind.

I swore under my breath at Priestley for making me do this. But I turned and followed him back into the vault.