The Russian studied him warily as he spoke. “In less than two hours I will be making the journey back. Where should I go first? Should I kill you when you are child?” Gernot’s fingers dug deeper into Blake’s chin and mouth, the blunted nails pressing half crescents into his skin. “Or should I take the lives of your parents before you are born?”
He seemed to reflect upon something of great importance before saying, “Knowledge is such a powerful tool. Once an event is known, it can just as easily be averted. Perhaps I could add an explosive device to that hotel room door across from the diner. Or I could just find out where Wallace’s facility is and burn it down. I can’t allow him to have the meteorite fragment. It is a variable I cannot live with any longer.”
“What about the radiation?” Blake asked.
“There is a cure for that. It is beyond your grasp, but not mine. Now, where is the rock?”
A cure. So that was the plan — to travel into the future where the medical advancements were. If that was possible, then maybe –
The hand on Blake’s face pinched again, pulling him out of his thoughts. Gernot shoved him with brutal force. Blake crashed down, unable to soften the blow of his fall, and felt his spine slam hard into the concrete. The blow sent jolts of pain up his spine and into his head.
“I said, where is the rock?” Gernot demanded.
Everything had cascaded into vibrant colors for a moment and Blake was unable to answer. He clutched his back, still reeling from pain. His stomach lurched as a wave of nausea swept over him, threatening to make him vomit.
Ethan helped him to his feet, and when he was upright again Blake grinned at Gernot. “The rock is in your heart, and it can only be found if you are open to the word of the Lord.”
Gernot made a noise of frustration and spat out a few lines of Russian to one of the soldiers behind him. The soldier lowered his weapon, put a hand to his ear, and spoke in quick Russian through the headset device.
“I see you prefer torture,” Gernot said with ill-disguised anger. “Tell me what I want now, and I will kill you quickly, thus sparing your friends a very horrible death. There are so many ways to take a man’s life, but for you … I will destroy your soul. You will plead for death before the night is done.”
Blake shook off Ethan’s supporting grip. He straightened, his earlier cold and shivering forgotten now that blood was pumping fast in his veins. He locked eyes with Gernot and said, “Your window is closing.”
“We are going to play a game. It is called, ‘Which one of you will break first?’” Gernot said.
Blake was strapped to a table that had been carried into their holding room, his legs and arms fastened at the corners. His pants had been hiked up, the bare skin exposed just above his knee. He could still move his head and did so now, craning his neck to look around. He saw Ethan tied down as well on another table a few feet away.
Something bad was about to happen, and all he could think of was how miserably his plan had failed. Ethan had trusted him, and now the escape by suicide option at New York Medical seemed preferable.
Gernot walked between the two tables, looking down at the men. “Which one of your legs should we take first? I say we flip the coin. I’ll even let you call it in the air.” He pulled a coin from his pocket and tossed it up, catching it easily as gravity brought it back into his palm.
Neither of the Tannors spoke.
“I guess since no one wants to play by the rules, I will change them. I’ll take one leg from each of you, unless you say otherwise.”
Gernot motioned with his head to one of the other men in the room, who stepped up and stabbed Blake in the shoulder with a needle that looked similar to those he’d used months ago in Adelaide after losing his arm. Only seconds after the injection, Blake’s heart revved up in his chest like it wanted to jump through his rib cage.
“I want you to feel everything,” Gernot said. “This is to keep you awake —” he plastered on a cruel smile, “- for the experience.”
Blake and Ethan remained silent, but as a power saw roared to life from somewhere in the room, they both began to struggle against their restraints.
Sweet Jesus, why hasn’t it worked? Did I not put it in deep enough? Blake’s eyes jumped around frantically, trying to see where the assault would come from.
A man holding the saw came between the tables to stand beside Gernot. “I guess it will be age before beauty then,” Gernot yelled above the sound of the machine. “If that is how the expression goes.”
The makeshift surgeon moved closer and Blake shuddered at the thought of losing another limb in just a few bloody moments. Now he knew what it felt like to be in Mikhail’s shoes. This was going to hurt like a motherfucker. His chest still felt like it was about to explode like that scene from Alien, and the breath of the blade against his unprotected skin rose goose bumps across his whole body. He could swear the saw’s teeth were millimeters from ripping into his flesh and bald panic surged through him. A thunderstorm of heartbeats roared in his eardrums, but there was something else too …
He strained to listen to the new sound. There it was, audible over the pulsating in his brain — the screech of a blaring alarm.
The saw powered off abruptly, and the blowing of air on his naked shin whispered to a stop. Gernot stared at something behind the table.
Tilting his head back to look behind him, Blake got an inverted view of the room. The two Russian door guards were huddled with four new soldiers. Commands were issued, and they each got into position.
The sound of an explosion came from somewhere outside the room. Blake felt a tremor course through the table from the force of it, and he was thankful Dr. Sawblade didn’t lose his grip on the cutting machine.
Another forceful detonation — much closer this time — and the wall Blake was staring at crumbled. When the dust began to clear, Blake saw a large hole where the smooth concrete used to be.
Beyond the wall, a bitter chill rolled in from outside. The frigid air ushered in something that would have been far more terrifying if Blake hadn’t known who they were. Two rifled men in matching black uniforms and masks ran in at a crouch, holding guns up by the stocks and grips, using their sights as they peppered off shots in three-round bursts.
Blake worked to pull his arm free as he gave another quick look behind him. Two of the six Russians were down; one unmoving, the other pressing his hand over one of three chest wounds in a helpless attempt to keep the last bit of life from leaving his body.
Blake saw Ethan struggling with his own ropes. Then he looked back to the newly formed fissure in the wall. A third uniformed man breached the room, his black outfit and gear in a silent battle with the night as to which was darkest — and striking out in bright white against the gloom was the nightmarish Death Mask. Reaper! His plan had worked after all.
Hex and Tinman were still clearing the room, and the Russians were now down to two soldiers and Gernot. Kill that son-of-a-bitch! Blake screamed in his mind.
He heard a stray bullet whiz by. Getting shot in crossfire during his self-arranged rescue was not an appealing thought. He renewed his efforts to loosen the bindings.
To Blake’s right, Hex was firing his assault rifle. There was a click as the cartridge emptied and he released the weapon, letting it dangle by the strap around his neck. In a flash of movement he went for his sidearm; it was quicker to grab a new gun than reload the old. As if Hex had read Blake’s mind, he took aim at Gernot.