A homemade sign, written in silver marker on a blackened piece of plywood, had been hammered to an adjacent wall.
HAIL FELLOW CREEPERS!
LISTEN UP, DUDES: IF YOU THINK EXPLORING WING D OFFERS A UNIQUE CHALLENGE, THINK AGAIN. THIS PLACE IS SERIOUSLY DANGEROUS. IF ANYONE GETS KILLED IN HERE IT WILL IMPACT ACCESS FOR ALL OF US. SO PLEASE, ENJOY THE REST OF BUILDING 93, BUT STAY OUT OF WING D. DON’T FORGET THE IMMORTAL WORDS OF THE GREATEST CREEPER OF THEM ALL:
ABANDON ALL HOPE, YE WHO ENTER HERE
After a moment’s hesitation, Pendergast stepped into the dark, foul-smelling labyrinth.
60
Ozmian took his time following the trail, savoring the pleasure of the stalk. There was no rush: time was on his side. Even though up to this point his quarry had disappointed him, the man was clever and dangerous and it would be fatal to underestimate him. And he was learning. He was getting better.
The long, meandering wild-goose chase of a trail eventually led him to the arts-and-crafts room. Strangely enough, he had no memory of this room, or of doing any crafts during his time at King’s Park. Even so, the space was highly unsettling, with the tables still displaying the last unfinished craft projects of the patients — half-knitted scarves, clay heads, atrocious watercolors, the pathetic productions of misshapen minds. The tracks passed by the table of scarves and instantly Ozmian divined what had happened: Pendergast had swiped some of the scarves to wrap around his feet, thus leaving a fainter, more diffuse trail.
A clever move.
And from that point on the trail became more challenging to follow, requiring frequent pauses when it intersected the tracks of earlier explorers. He continued along the hall, in and out of several rooms. Pendergast was gaining time with this diversion, slowing him down. He was planning some sort of trap or ambush — one that would take time to set up.
The general trend in the trail was westward toward Wing D, and Ozmian wondered if that was where Pendergast was headed. That would be a most unexpected move.
Another few minutes of tracking did indeed bring him to the burnt section. At the point where the track entered the tangle of debris, he examined it closely with his flashlight. It could be a diversion, an attempt to lure him into this dangerous area, but a close look revealed that Pendergast had indeed entered the unstable wing himself. There was simply no way to fake it. He was in there — somewhere.
And now, peering into the scorched interior, Ozmian felt himself taken aback. He could actually hear the entire wing groan and creak with every gust of the winter wind. It almost looked as if the walls were moving, and the unceasing sounds made him feel as if he were in the belly of some foul beast. The walls were crumbling and the floors burnt, leaving great gaps and diagonals of fallen beams. It had been a hot fire, so hot there were puddles of glass and aluminum on the floor and sections of concrete wall that had crumbled and fractured. It was truly insane for Pendergast to venture into a place like this — an indication more of desperation than cleverness.
But no matter: if this was where his quarry wanted to continue the hunt, this was where the hunt would continue.
Ozmian shut off his light. He would have to move forward now by moonlight and by feel, making his way over the sagging, gaping floors with great care while at the same time maintaining high alert, trusting in his almost supernatural sense of peril. He was sure Pendergast had set up an ambush for him. He was like that wounded lion waiting in the mopane brush to spring upon his tormenter.
Moving past a heap of concrete rubble, he came into a huge open room that had clearly once been a communal dormitory. The beds, still lined up, were now rows of blackened iron frames. The far wall had collapsed, exposing a bathroom of heat-cracked porcelain sinks, scorched urinals, and exposed shower stalls, many of the fixtures warped and melted.
Pendergast’s track led him to the main stairwell of Wing D. It was a perfect nightmare of destruction; Ozmian found it hard to believe it was still standing. Naturally, seeking the most dangerous area, the quarry had gone up the stairs. Again stealing forward with extreme care in absolute silence, expecting an ambush at any moment, Ozmian worked his way by feel up the noisome and crooked staircase. The trail exited at the second-floor landing into another ruined hall, a veritable labyrinth of charred and twisted beams. A fire hose lay stretched down the length of the hallway, evidently left by the firefighters who had put out the blaze. The end was still screwed to a standpipe. He paused. Something had been lying on the ground near the hose, and fresh scuff marks in the char and dust indicated that Pendergast had picked it up. What could it have been?
His preternatural hunting senses began to tingle. In his previous life as a big-game stalker, such a feeling meant he was getting close; that his quarry had decided to turn and face him; and that the charge was imminent. He paused, tensing. A particularly strong gust of wind caused a flurry of creaks, and it seemed to Ozmian that the whole edifice might come tumbling down at any moment. When was the fire? Only last year, he recalled. The building had stood since then; he shouldn’t be overly concerned that it would happen to collapse just now. Unless given a little help.
Ah! The thought was a revelation. He had been pondering what sort of attack Pendergast was planning — and from what direction. But would he actually bring the building down upon them both? That was a crazy idea, far too unpredictable, as likely to kill him as his pursuer — and yet as he considered the possibility he became sure that this, indeed, was what Pendergast planned to do.
Ozmian took a silent step forward, keeping to the darkness of the outside wall, positioning himself behind a heap of concrete rubble. He was in excellent cover with a clear field of fire, near the outer skin of the building, his own figure hidden in darkness, with just enough indirect moonlight ahead and behind to see. He was exactly where he wanted to be. Still in darkness, Ozmian reached out, grasped the unrolled fire hose in his free hand, and slowly and silently drew it toward him.
Every cell in his body felt alive. Something was about to happen. And he would be ready for it.
61
One floor above, braced against two wobbly beams with an exposed section of corridor visible through gaps in the floor below, Agent Pendergast waited for Ozmian. The fireman’s ax was slung over his left shoulder, the Les Baer grasped in his right. Either his pursuer would continue tracking and come into range on the second-floor corridor, in which case Pendergast would have at least a modestly reasonable shot; or he would sense a trap, stop, and wait.
The minutes ticked by and Ozmian did not appear. Pendergast wondered if, once again, he had been outfoxed. But no — not this time. Ozmian would follow him into Wing D; it was a challenge he would not be able to resist. Even though he couldn’t see or hear him, he knew Ozmian was out there, following his trail. He must be there, and very close. And evidently, he was waiting for Pendergast to make the first move.
The wind gusted outside, generating a chorus of creaks and a perceptible movement in the beams Pendergast was balanced upon. Wing D was a house of cards, a heap of pickup sticks, a wobbly stack of dominoes.
There was no point in waiting any longer. Sliding the Les Baer into his waistband, he grasped the fire ax with both hands, raised it above his head, focused his gaze on the point of impact, and swung it with tremendous force into one of the main load-bearing beams he was standing on. The massive blade bit deeply into the unburnt heart of the beam, charred bits spraying out, and a crack as sharp as gunfire signaled the breaking of the beam, instantly followed by the machine-gun fire of other load-bearing beams, supports, and concrete walls as they gave way in series. The floor lurched downward, not in free fall but in a sort of chaotic, semi-controlled descent, as Pendergast dropped the ax and whipped out his firearm; for a split second, as the debris heaved down, he had a clear field of fire at a suddenly exposed Ozmian, who was himself thrown off balance; Pendergast got off two shots before his own downward movement and the structure collapsing around him obscured everything in a great cloud of dust.