Fast (57 page)

            ‘That’s right,’ he said, reading her expression. ‘We’re climbing out the front.’

            If it had been anyone else, she would have called them insane, but she didn’t question his instructions. As Forest had once explained,
If the Captain said ‘Jump’, you asked ‘How high?’ while you were in the air.

            Vanessa copied his maneuver, placing her shoes on the dash before releasing her seat belt.

            The truck groaned as their weight shifted the cab.

            Alex braced himself against the door and the roof. ‘Hold the seat headrest and kick the windshield on my count. Ready?’

            Vanessa looked through the windshield.

           
Ready? How ready can I be to kick out the windshield of a truck dangling in an elevator shaft?

           
‘Absolutely,’ she lied. ‘Let’s do it.’

            He quickly counted down. ‘Three, Two, One – KICK!’

            Together, they kicked out hard. Already weakened, the windshield popped out and flipped down the shaft. Suddenly nothing separated them from the chasm below.
That’s a big drop.

            In the darkness below, something clinging to the shaft wall dodged away from the tumbling windshield.

            Vanessa squinted. It was man-shaped. More precisely, it was King-shaped.

            Down further, she saw Forest reach the top of the elevator carriage. He activated a flashlight.

            Alex drew a small pocket knife from his webbing and quickly cut something behind her. He pulled steadily on whatever it was. His hand came back into her field of vision. The seat belt. He had cut the belt from where it joined to the seat. He steadily drew the full length of the belt from the side of the truck.

            ‘Wrap this end around your left hand,’ he instructed quickly. ‘Then squeeze both your hands into one big fist.’

            ‘Alright,’ she said, wrapping and squeezing. ‘All done.’

            ‘Now jump.’

            This was what she expected, but jumping through the windshield out the front of the truck was still a big ask. She’d be hanging in midair just by the seat belt, assuming she had the strength to hold on.

            ‘Don’t think about it,’ demanded Alex. ‘Just do it right now!’

            She jumped through the front of the truck. It was more like a drop. Gripping the belt in both hands, she half-bounced, half-slid down the steeply angled hood into the shaft.

            Suddenly the belt snapped taunt. She jerked to a halt. She hung just below the truck’s front wheels. It all happened so fast it seemed to be over before it even started. She scrabbled with her shoes on the side of the shaft. The belt twisted and sent her into a dangling spin. Her right shoe hit the shaft wall again, got a good grip, but there was nothing to stand on or take her weight. Her arms were already burning from gripping the seat belt.

            The truck lurched. Alex dropped down beside her on the cab’s other safety belt.

            He glanced down quickly. ‘We’ll never get down fast enough.’

            Vanessa heard the terrorists trying to get around the truck and access the shaft.

            Alex hauled himself up the seat belt with one hand. ‘We need to get down this shaft double-time.’

            On the front of the truck was a light winch. Alex grabbed the winch with one hand then flicked loose the seatbelt from the other. Free from the belt, he clung onto the winch’s steel frame with both hands. The winch was the kind with a steel drum-fed cable connected to a heavy-duty hook.

            He released the hook from its mounting clamp. ‘Vanessa, grab the hook with both hands.’

            Straining, she pulled herself up the belt like she was doing a chin-up. She lunged out and caught the hook. It was easier to hold than the belt. She flicked her wrist to unwind the belt from her left hand.

            She lunged across with her second hand. The momentum started her spinning on the end of the hook. There was hardly enough room for both hands. Part of the hook bit into her palm. She couldn’t keep this up long. She lost sight of what Alex was doing, but then her rotation brought her around and she saw him holding the winch’s manual control.

            ‘Hold on tight.’ Alex jerked the control lever into ‘Free play’ mode.

            Vanessa’s stomach dropped away. It was a worse feeling than when she had dropped from the windshield. She rocketed down the shaft on the end of the winch.

#

Bora watched the tray-back slide on squealing tires into the elevator shaft.

            Slowing, he turned his own vehicle to face the shaft. The tilting tray-back was just twenty meters away.

            With a metallic
thunk
, the rear tray caught the top of the elevator entrance, halting the truck from tilting fully through the entrance and plunging down the shaft.

            That was no accident.

            As the tray-back wedged into the shaft, Bora watched suspiciously. When the lights had come back on, he’d been tracking the tray-back by its vibrations across the pedestrian loop. He’d sensed the driver steering towards the shaft. He knew that skidding into the elevator shaft had been deliberate. It only
looked
accidental when the lights came back on.

            Two dead gunmen lay between the elevator and the scorpion truck. The scorpion truck was empty, the Marines gone.

           
Those two are also in the shaft. They reached the elevator entrance in the dark. They must be climbing down the service ladder.

           
No matter how chaotic the circumstances, the Marines always seemed to find something to exploit. But chaos was Bora’s specialty.

            Within seconds, three gunmen clambered up the back of the tilted truck, looking for a clear line of fire. They assumed the Marines were trapped inside.

            Trapped? Not likely. They’ll already be on the move.

            Bora roared his truck’s engine and dropped the clutch. The truck sprang forward, straight towards the elevator shaft.

            ‘Move,’ he yelled ahead, sounding his horn.

            Gunmen scattered from his path. The A-frame rammed into the tray-back’s exposed undercarriage. The suspended tray-back crumpled fully into the shaft. The impact pinned the tray-back vertical for a second, then it dropped away.

            Bora saw the tray-back disappear before his eyes. It was grinding straight down the elevator shaft.

#

The winch controls nearly tore Coleman’s fingers off.

            The winch assembly wrenched in his grasp with incomprehensible violence. If he’d had a better grip, or if he’d been in a different position in relation to the winch, the force passing through the tray-back would have snapped his wrists like dry kindling.

            But this was worse.

            His hands slipped right off the controls. He lunged out in freefall, praying he could snatch one of the dangling safety belts.

            He was too slow. The safety belt slid through the fingers on his left hand. In a split-second he was falling.

           
The winch cable.

            As Coleman’s weight left the winch, the controls had slipped out of ‘Free play’ mode. He remembered Vanessa on the end of the winch cable.

            The cable jerked to an instant halt. The unexpected stop was too much for her.

            The winch hook tore from her grasp.

            Coleman saw her hands blossom away from the hook. Both of them fell straight down the shaft.

            ‘King – heads up!’

            Forest’s voice came up the shaft. Coleman glimpsed King lunge from the service ladder and snatch Vanessa’s wrist.

            At that exact moment, Coleman saw the swinging winch hook. His only chance was the hook.

            As the hook swung into Coleman’s path, he grabbed it with every ounce of strength left in his arms.

            The jarring pain was excruciating. It felt like his arms almost tore from his shoulders. His knees banged into the shaft wall. His fingers came within a fraction of slipping off the hook, but he managed to hold on.

            King let out a roar of pain. He had just plucked Vanessa from freefall with one hand. His second hand barely held the service ladder by his fingertips.

           
Coleman struggled to keep his grip on the hook.
We’re both alive!

            Then the truck fell.

            Still clinging to the hook, Coleman felt himself plummeting again.

            The truck was falling down the shaft! It would tear King and Vanessa off the wall and pulverize them all against the top of the carriage!

            Coleman fell straight past where Vanessa dangled.

            The truck screeched down the shaft in a snarl of zipping sparks and crumbling cement.

            Gripping the falling hook, Coleman looked up, watching the horrendous sight of the tray-back careening down the shaft. Then he struck something very yielding.

            It was Forest.

            Both men crumpled onto the top of the carriage. Forest had used his body as a cushion. Coleman landed on his side and looked straight up the shaft. The truck had reached King.

            Six inches from King’s head, the tray-back’s fender bit into the cement wall. The truck jerked to a halt.

            King looked up into the tones of steel just inches from his forehead. Cement dust trickled down over his cheek.

            Coleman marveled at two incredible facts. The first was that the truck had stopped. The second was that in the face of several tones of crushing steel, King hadn’t dropped Vanessa.

            ‘Hurry,’ yelled Coleman. ‘Don’t stop. It’s going to fall.’

            Coleman scanned Forest for new injuries. He looked okay. Forest had fallen onto the tray-back’s ejected windshield. Coleman waved at the carriage underfoot.

            ‘Into the lift, Forest. Get those carriage doors open.’

            Forest jerked aside the windshield. The truck groaned and slid down the wall another inch. Its wild descent had only been temporarily averted. Any second it would come crashing down the last ten meters and crush all four of them. Cement chips tinkled down onto the carriage and windshield.

            Vanessa found her grip on the service ladder.

            ‘Slide down the ladder,’ Coleman yelled.

            She wrapped her shoes around the ladder and slid down fireman style. The moment she reached the lift, Coleman pushed her through the carriage ceiling. ‘Get in there. Go.’