Chapter 20

My right leg went through the wood to the knee. I could feel warm blood trickling down my shin and there was burning pain coming from a graze above the ankle. I lurched forward and had to let go of the gun and the petrol. The floorboards groaned beneath my weight and I could hear fragments of wood hitting the loading bay below. I held my breath and waited for the noise to abate before trying to pull my leg free. I placed my hands palms down on the floor and pushed upwards. The wood cracked beneath me and I dropped through the widening hole to my chest. Debris clattered into the loading bay and I grabbed at thin air as I came to a painful stop; only my arms and shoulders preventing me from following it. My legs dangled freely as I desperately tried to find purchase on something underneath me.

My breath came in gasps, fear and adrenalin forcing my body to fight my predicament. I looked over my shoulder and twisted my body around slowly. Grabbing the door frame with my left hand, I nudged the shotgun and petrol gently through the doorway onto the landing and then tried to pull myself up. I needed both hands to budge a few inches. A loud crack from behind me stopped me struggling and a low groan followed as the tortured wood settled again. Seconds felt like hours as I held onto the door frame. I took a deep breath and pulled with all my strength. My chest came free of the rent in the floor and with a few kicks of the legs, I was lying breathless face down in the doorway. The office floor creaked loudly and a fifteen feet section simply dropped away from the structure. With the support gone, the front wall snapped and followed the floor into the loading bay, crashing and splintering into dozens of pieces. I got to my knees, grabbed my gun and the petrol and sprinted for the staircase. As I reached the third step, the remaining sections of the office gave up the struggle to stay intact. Gravity proved to be stronger than the rusted screws and corroded nails and it ripped free of the walls, hurtling onto the loading bay below. A choking cloud of dust and debris filled the cutting shed and the clatter of timber against concrete deafened me.

I jumped three steps and then leaped the last three, landing in a bruised heap on the platform. I sat up, tired and aching all over, as the clamour quietened. Giving up and walking away into anonymity suddenly became attractive; more attractive than anything before. I’d had enough. As I got to my feet, resigned to making it to the truck and driving over the mountains away from this madness, I heard engines approaching. Tyres crunched the slate shingle near the quarry gates, at least two vehicles, maybe three. I listened in the darkness as the engines laboured and then fell silent. I couldn’t see if it was the police or the niners but something inside told me that it was the latter. They were here and I didn’t have a clue what I was going to do next.