Shadows (30 page)

“
Drop
it,
”
she cried, lowering her aim and pointing her revolver
at the center of his chest. Smoke drifted from the barrel of her
gun.

Hammond winced. He let go
of the pistol grip, but his index finger remained inside the
trigger guard, causing the revolver to swing around and point at
the ground without dropping to the metal grating.

“
I said drop
it!
”
she repeated, yelling at him, surprising herself with
the vehemence of her demand. Her finger tightened on the trigger of
her gun.

The revolver slipped from
his finger, bouncing as it clattered off the metal
grate.

“
What's the
matter, little girl? Can't kill someone in cold
blood?
”

“
No,
”
she said. This was the first time
she'd replied to him. Up until now she'd ignored his taunts. Deep
down, she knew it was a mistake to engage in conversation because
it would only play in his favor.

“
It takes
guts to squeeze the trigger and end a life,
”
he said,
inching toward her. His hair was wild, blood streaked and matted.
Crimson blood seeped from his lip into his grey beard. He'd been
shot in the upper chest, near his left shoulder. Deep red stains
marred his white coveralls.

“
It would be
easy to kill you,
”
she said, backing away from him,
wanting to keep some distance between them.
“
Far too
easy.
”

“
So what are
you going to do, Missy?
”

Susan felt
her heart in her throat. She could barely speak, but she had to. In
the depths of her mind, she felt he had to understand.
“
If you die, you'll never know what's really out there,
you'll never know how wrong you were. The worst punishment I can
think of is for you to live, to understand that through all this
you were wrong, that you willingly maintained a lie. There's no
greater punishment than to live with remorse.
”

“
You're
pathetic,
”
Hammond said, sneering from behind his full
beard. Blood dripped from his mouth, staining the white, matted
hair hiding his jawline.
“
I heard your little
speech on the landing the other day. You don't get it, do you? Your
type never does. You don't have the conviction to do whatever it
takes to win. Don't you know? Someone always has to die for an
ideal to live.
”

Susan stepped back, keeping
her gun trained on him. Her boots caught on the loose wiring she'd
dragged from between the servers, causing her to stumble
backwards.

Hammond lunged at her,
knocking the gun from her hands. He grabbed at the front of her
coveralls and charged, picking her up off the ground, surprising
her with his strength. He ran, building up speed as he thundered
down the walkway before slamming her into the steel wall, knocking
the breath out of her.

Susan slumped to the
ground, clutching at the back of her head. Blood seeped through her
straggly hair.

Hammond
stepped back, towering over her as he said,
“
Don
’
t you see? Ideals
outlive us all. For this ideal to live, you must
die.
”

Susan turned toward
Charlie, helpless and stunned by the blow to her head. Charlie was
crawling across the metal grates, past the fire extinguisher,
trying to get to her, but he couldn't help. He couldn't even get to
his feet. He'd lost so much blood. With all his might, he raised
himself up on his trembling arms, but there was nothing he could do
to take on Hammond and he fell back to the floor.

Outside, Susan could hear
Jules yelling over the sound of a welding torch cutting away at the
door. Smoke drifted within the room.

“
Hang in
there!
”
Jules cried.

“
Too
late,
”
Hammond said bending over and grabbing at
Susan's throat.

Susan fought to pull his
fingers away from her neck, but his hands were like a steel vise,
clamping down over her windpipe. His fingernails dug into her
throat as she choked, gasping for air. She struck out with her
hands, smacking his face, trying to scratch at his eyes and force
him to retreat. Susan lashed out with her legs, but to no effect.
Hammond fought to hold her still as she thrashed around, slowly
weakening beneath his iron grip.

Dots appeared before her
eyes. Oxygen starvation caused her head to throb as her arms fell
limp.

An explosion of white gas
erupted from beside her. The freezing cold gas caught Hammond on
the face, causing him to yell and jump back, releasing her. Charlie
kept his hand firmly around the handle of the fire extinguisher.
White clouds of gas billowed through the air, but their initial
effect on Hammond had already worn off. He staggered backwards
through the mist, rubbing his eyes and swearing.

Susan struggled to her
feet, gasping for air.

A dark shadow loomed
through the white haze.

A light frosting of ice
clung to the side of Hammond's beard. He sprang forward out of the
billowing white cloud as Susan ducked, avoiding a fist coming out
of the mist. She grabbed the fire extinguisher, wrenching it from
Charlie's feeble hand and swung it up with all her might, catching
Hammond on the side of the head.

Hammond staggered under the
force of the blow, reaching out for the wall to steady
himself.

“
This is for
Barney,
”
she cried, wielding the fire extinguisher in two
hands and striking him on the chest, thrusting hard and aiming for
his bleeding wound. She caught him against the wall. Her blow
thundered into his ribs.

Hammond rocked backwards,
his feet shuffling beneath him as he fought not to fall.

“
This is for
Charlie,
”
she yelled, winding up with the fire
extinguisher and catching him on the shoulder with a glancing blow
that deflected up and clipped his head.

She
’
d put so much force
into swinging the heavy, metal fire extinguisher that it was
difficult to arrest the motion once she
’
d struck
Hammond. Susan was aware Hammond could come back at her with
vengeance. She had to take advantage of whatever edge she had
during those fleeting seconds.

“
And
this,
”
she screamed, readying herself as she brought
the fire extinguisher back around again.
“
This is for
me.
”

Her final blow pinned him
against one of the servers. It was a clumsy swing, but she
connected with his upper shoulder, smashing him against one of the
dark server towers. The sound of his collar bone breaking and sheet
metal crumpling was sickening to hear.

Hammond collapsed on the
grates lining the floor.

Wisps of gas drifted
through the air, dissipating and disappearing from
sight.

Hammond groaned.

Susan was enraged. She
stood before him with every muscle in her body flexed. Veins bulged
in her neck. With her teeth bared, she snarled, consumed with
anger, yelling at him incoherently. As a porter, she clocked almost
forty thousand stairs a month, hauling hundreds of pounds up and
down the silo every day. Now, every fiber of her being stood poised
to unleash her fury upon him if he so much as thought about getting
up.

Behind her dark eyes there
was a primal, visceral instinct more animal than human, prepared to
do whatever it took to survive. Hammond was right, and she knew it.
There were ideals worth fighting for, worth killing or dying for if
need be, and in that moment she would have killed him without
blinking.

She towered over him as he
had once stood over her. The fire extinguisher in her hand felt
light, as though she could throw it across the room like an empty
rucksack. With tense muscles and clenched fists, she fought to hold
herself back. The smallest twitch, the slight twist of his head, or
the spasm of his feet, each of these seemingly involuntary motions
had her on the verge of beating him to death. Her breathing was
rushed, almost panting through flared nostrils.

A hand rested gently on her
shoulder.

Jules stood
beside her, she had one hand on the fire extinguisher, the other on
Susan
’
s shoulder, saying,
“
It's OK. It's
over.
”

It took Susan a few seconds
for those words to register. The fire surging through her veins
would not be so easily quenched. She dared to relax, to stand down,
and her muscles almost gave out. The fire extinguisher fell to the
metal grate. Jules put her arm around her waist, catching her and
preventing her from falling.

“
Hey,
”
Jules said, taking her
weight.
“
We did it. We won.
”

“
Charlie,
”
Susan cried, turning and staggering
over to him. She fell to her knees, struggling not to collapse next
to him.

“
Look at
you,
”
he managed, reaching out and brushing her bloodied
hair to one side. Susan tried not to cry, but she
couldn
’
t help herself. Tears streamed from her eyes. An
overwhelming sense of release washed over her and she wept, sobbing
into her hands.

“
Not bad for
a couple of shadows,
”
he said, gently taking her hand and
pulling her fingers away from her face. Was it shock? Was it shame?
Was it the exhaustion and relief of surviving? She
wasn
’
t sure, but having him there to comfort her soothed
her troubled soul.

She smiled in
reply, saying,
“
Not bad at
all.
”

Someone was
tending to Charlie's wound, applying a large, sterile pad. They
began winding a compression bandage around his shoulder to stop the
bleeding. Susan didn
’
t recognize the man,
but he was wearing white IT coveralls and kneeling in the deep,
crimson blood covering the grating.

“
You
’
re not getting that
stain out,
”
she said to the man.

“
Least of my
worries,
”
the man replied.
“
I
’
m just
glad we got to you guys in time.
”

“
I
don
’
t understand,
”
Susan said as Jules
crouched down beside them. The server room was full of IT staff in
white overalls. They were still carrying rifles and handguns but
they were ignoring Susan, Charlie and Juliette. Their focus was on
Hammond, but not as though they were guarding him, it was as though
they were arresting him.

“
It was the
mayor,
”
Jules said.
“
When Hammond shot
her, they knew. He may have held an iron grip on a few, but
everyone loved Mayor Johns. When Hammond murdered her, they knew
they were on the wrong side of the silo and the fighting came to an
eerie halt. They just stood there, gathered around her crumpled
body in disbelief. Someone tried to revive her, but it was too
late.
”

“
And
Charlotte?
”
Susan asked.

“
Charlotte
’
s fine. She was hit
in the arm. But what about you?
”

Jules pulled
back Susan
’
s hair, looking at her throat with
concern.

“
I
’
m fine,
”
Susan insisted, but
her voice sounded hoarse, deeper than usual.

A couple of the younger IT
workers pulled Hammond to his feet, not so much helping him as
dragging him away. He winced in agony and protested, yelling, "Get
your hands off me, you damn shadow."

The shadows, though, would
not be deterred. They no longer felt threatened or bullied by him.
The spell had been broken. Susan caught glimpses of Hammond being
led around the back of the server room so that he didn't pass near
them.

“
Shadows,
”
Hammond continued to mumble as he
was led away with his arms bound behind his back. His head hung
low, his shoulders were lopsided and he walked with a limp as he
mumbled,
“
Damn the shadows.
”

Epilogue

The sun shone
in a clear blue sky. Birds flittered through the air, chasing tiny
insects. Susan hadn
’
t seen any of the
brilliant, colorful birds she
’
d admired in the
books below IT, but even the subtle browns and blues of the
swallows were fascinating to her. She doubted
she
’
d ever tire of seeing their streamlined form darting
back and forth through the sky.