The train track rested on an elevated mound which sloped steeply away from the rails, probably a good five feet higher than the surrounding landscape. The mound was built entirely of rocks, each one at least as large as both of his fists put together. The jagged rocks disappeared into a bramble of grass and brush, interspersed with stunted pine trees. The brush might cushion his landing; the trees certainly wouldn’t.
The rhythmic thump of the steel wheels hitting track joints reminded him that the distance separating him from Anya was still growing, and he tore his gaze away from the passing scenery, and focused on climbing down from the landing.
He reckoned his best chance of surviving the leap was to get as close to the rocky rail bed as he could. Using the side rail like a ladder, as well as other protuberances that sprouted from the landing, he lowered himself down until his feet dangled only a few inches above the rail bed.
“On three, Dodge,” he told himself. “One… two…”
Just as he was about to unclench his fingers, he glimpsed something tall and solid whizzing past behind him: a telephone pole. He glanced back down the track and saw dangling telephone wires suspended between a chain of stout poles, running parallel to the rails. It was impossible for him to judge the distance between them, but if he timed his jump wrong, he would almost certainly wind up wrapped around one of those poles.
Great. Like I needed one more thing to worry about.
Another pole flashed by and Dodge started counting. Five seconds later, the train passed another pole. Five more seconds, and another. That was the narrow window of opportunity in which he would have to act. Hesitation would spell disaster.
Dodge breathed a curse, then searched for some vestige of courage to do what he knew he had to do. Another pole whizzed by and he let go.
He knew better than to try and land on his feet. Instead, as he pushed away from the train, extending his body out perpendicular to the rails, he covered his head with his arms.
The impact was like the worst football tackle he’d ever taken, magnified a thousand times. The explosion from Anya’s co-conspirator back in the Clarion conference room was a pat on the shoulder by comparison. For a few seconds that seemed like an eternity, he felt as though he’d fallen into a giant rock crusher, with mechanized hammers pounding every square inch of his body. He rolled, lengthwise, dozens of times before crashing into a bramble. Even then, his momentum carried him several yards into the thicket where thorny branches tore at his clothes and flesh.
Then, mercifully, the motion stopped.
How long he lay there, he could not say, but when he finally dared to open his eyes, the noise of the train had diminished to a mere whisper. Perhaps because he expected his leap from the train to result in broken bones or worse, he was pleasantly surprised to discover that he had suffered nothing more than scrapes and bruises — a lot of scrapes and bruises, but nothing worse. He gingerly got to his feet and disentangled himself from the thicket, then made his way up the slope to the rail bed.
In the descending twilight, he could only just make out the silhouette of the mountain through which the tunnel had passed, perhaps half a mile away. Anya was in that tunnel, though why she chose that place to make her escape, Dodge could not fathom. He lurched into motion, trying to coax his battered limbs into a run, and managed instead only a halting jog. After a few stumbles, he managed to match his stride and pace to the spacing of the wooden ties, and once he fell into a routine, he found it easier to ignore his myriad aches and pains. In no time at all, or so it seemed, he arrived at the ominously gaping mouth of the tunnel.
He stopped abruptly there, as if the blackness beyond exuded a repulsive force field. Only now, as he stood poised on the threshold, did it occur to him to think about what his quarry was doing out here. Miles from the nearest town — probably hundreds of miles from the nearest city — what had Anya hoped to accomplish by jumping from the train, particularly in the benighted depths of the tunnel? Dodge was still pondering this when he heard the footsteps.
His first thought was that he had caught her, that Anya was herself running out of the tunnel toward him. But no, the footsteps were definitely coming from behind him.
Did I pass her?
The thought, barely formed, lasted only as long as it took for him to turn around. It wasn’t Anya.
It took him a moment longer to recognize the man in the gray suit, the man who had been standing at the far end of the sleeper car when the mad chase had begun. Dodge had only glimpsed him for the merest fraction of a second, and the figure shambling toward him now did not exactly resemble that man. His suit was dirty and torn, his face — Dodge faintly recalled thinking that the man had looked Chinese — was all but completely obscured by a mask of dust, sweat and not a little blood, evidence that he too had leapt from the train.
A question formed on Dodge’s lips, but went unasked. Something about the man’s expression told him that polite conversation was out of the question. Instinctively wary, he widened his stance and braced himself to meet the impending attack.
The man stopped abruptly, only a few steps away, stamping his left foot, and striking a fighting stance that was all too familiar to Dodge. It was a te stance — the curious Oriental martial art he had written about and even seen practiced by Father Nathan Hobbs — or something very much like it. The man’s hands came up, and then with a fierce cry, he launched into motion.
Dodge threw up his arms to ward off the blows, but the man’s open hands, flat and rigid like knife blades, swept through his defense and slammed into his torso. A blow to his solar plexus stole his wind away, and another strike knocked him flat on his back between the steel rails.
He flailed his arms in a futile attempt to rise. His assailant remained upright, lapsing back into his ready stance, both hands extended forward in preparation to attack again. Then, to Dodge’s utter surprise, the man spoke. “Where is the woman?”
His English was perfect, without any trace of accent, but there was something different about it; an almost sing-song quality that Dodge associated with the Far East. Not Chinese, Dodge thought. Something else. Japanese, maybe?
Dodge’s mouth worked to form his honest answer — he didn’t know — but there was no breath to form the words. He shook his head and raised one hand in a gesture that he hoped wouldn’t be misinterpreted as a challenge. His other hand grasped one of the rails, in preparation to pull himself back to his feet, but as soon as his fingers made contact with the sun-warmed metal, all thought of getting up was forgotten.
A faint vibration tingled against his palm. Something was sending a tremor through the steel track, and as he held on, the sensation grew more intense, spreading to the ground on which he lay. Something was moving on the tracks.
Impossible, he thought. The train just passed.
There was no sign of another train coming from the west, and no tell-tale chugging of a locomotive, but the tremor was getting stronger.
He found his breath in that moment, just enough for a groan of dread as he looked over his shoulder, into the black hole of the tunnel, and saw movement. Something was coming… something big.
Chapter 5—Majestic
Everything was a blur.
Of course, that was what Findlay Newcombe thought every morning when he awoke. The first few minutes of every day, as he fumbled on the bedside table for his spectacles, were spent squinting blearily at a world made of indistinct shapes and colors.