As he dashed back to Spader, Rourke started firing his pistol.
Ethan ignored the conflict unfolding just meters away. He crouched back over Spader, holding his cupped hands above Spader's still blistering neck.
The cable tie sprung open, eaten through by the acid, and Ethan dumped the lime powder straight on Spader's wounds, rubbing the powder into the raw flesh and at the same time feeling Spader take his first shuddering breath.
He's alive.
In his wildest dreams, Spader couldn't have known the acid he carried to test precious metals would save his life. Not his weapons. Not his team. Not his first aid kit. Just basic high school chemistry. The alkaline limestone powder was neutralizing the acid. Ethan avoided disturbing the nasty poultice of blood and lime powder.
Instead, he looked toward Rourke. Slumped beside Rourke, the giant animal lay dead. Ethan couldn't see any additional wounds. Rourke had scored a lucky shot, or perhaps the wounded animal was already near death. It didn't matter. It had served its purpose. Before it died, the animal had torn Rourke's right leg off above the knee. His leg hung limply from the animal’s mouth. Rourke's left arm had an extra bend between the wrist and elbow, so using his right arm, Rourke was struggling to tourniquet the stump of his right thigh with a cable tie. He didn't have the strength. He needed two hands to thread the cable tie into a loop. He lay back and tried to use his teeth to thread the plastic eyelet. After a moment, with a harsh cry of pain, he threw the cable tie, unable to stem the bleeding.
Ethan felt nothing at the sight of Rourke’s grisly wounds. He had brought it on himself. Ethan's watch started beeping. It was time. The core chamber was about to open. Ethan didn't know what to expect, but whatever it was, it was going to happen now.
Rourke was lucid enough to speak.
'You'll never get out,' he moaned through the pain. 'You're all dead. I made sure of that.'
Ethan didn't even look at Rourke. He crossed to the barrier blocking access to the core chamber. The last three beeps sounded on his watch. 'Maybe. But I'll live long enough to get my answers. You won't. Look where you're lying, Rourke. Look what's above you.'
Rourke looked up. 'Oh, God no….'
The barriers changed, including the archway Rourke's head rested under.
Rourke turned his face away from the incoming slab of stone that pushed his head across the floor and, without stopping, pulverized his skull and brain into a wet mash that was swept away into the wall.
Before Ethan, the last barrier to the core chamber swung open.
Ethan picked up the lamp and walked inside.
Chapter 19
'Now what?' asked Dale breathlessly. 'That helicopter’s not giving up.'
He and Merc were sheltering inside the cyclops. Gordon has christened the structure the 'cyclops'. From the air, the discoloration on the roof resembled a single giant eye. Two small entrance structures resembled ears. Internal stone steps led to the exposed roof.
It was the best cover they could find.
Three times the chopper had blitzed the cyclops with gunfire. Merc and Dale had to keep moving around the single large chamber, listening to keep the chopper at a safe angle. The chamber was an obstacle course. Stored equipment was stacked and scattered everywhere.
'Do you really think that raft can take us all?' asked Dale.
'I don't know. But I'm sure our plane won't.' Merc kicked through the piles of equipment stacked around the chamber. Ropes, plastic bins, old tents, empty gas bottles — he found nothing that could damage a helicopter.
'There's nothing here!'
'What did you expect?’ asked Dale.
'Something. Anything. Just some way to force it down for a minute.'
Dale took a chance and peered out the east exit. He spotted the balloon-raft. 'She made it. Libby got the raft down. They're climbing in!'
Merc knew what would happen next. Once the pilot noticed the women on the raft, he'd cut them down with the chopper's guns. Vulnerable on the raft, Claire and Libby didn't stand a chance. Merc was powerless to stop it. He didn't have even a shred of a plan.
Dale's next outburst confirmed Merc's fears. 'The chopper's turning toward the raft. They're going to shoot!’
Pure desperation made Merc act. He ran for the steps, snatching Dale's pistol on the way past.
'Hey — wait,' yelled Dale. 'That won't do anything!'
But Merc was already halfway up the stairs. He burst out onto the roof and took aim on the chopper. Dale was right. The pistol had no chance of damaging the helicopter. At best, his shots might distract the pilot long enough for Claire and Libby to escape the raft. Merc fired. His first two shots missed, but his next two raised sparks on the chopper's fuselage. The next round seemed to hit the chopper's windscreen, because the pilot suddenly reacted. The chopper swung away from the raft and back toward Merc.
Merc braced his wrist and aimed. He had one shot left, but before he pulled the trigger an earthquake erupted. The entire cyclops shook under Merc's feet.
What the…?
No, not an earthquake. An explosion. To the east. A thick cloud of soil erupted into the air. As Merc tracked the black cloud of approaching airborne debris, he identified the source. The silt wall. Someone had demolished the silt wall with explosives.
'Look!' yelled Merc, tracking with his finger where several pieces of embankment the size of oil drums came spinning through the air, shedding clods like a comet's tail.
The helicopter pilot saw them too. He tried to bank away, but the soil was flying faster than the helicopter ever could. One clod smacked the chopper's tail rotor. The soily explosion completely obscured the helicopter. Next, Merc saw it spinning out of control. The impact had ripped the rotor clean off. The pilot couldn’t recover. The helicopter slammed down onto the middle tier, less than twenty-five meters from Merc. The still-rotating propeller flipped the chopper into a careening roll down the middle tier’s stairs.
Amazed by the spectacle, Merc barely registered Dale's insistent shoving. Open-mouthed and speechless, Dale grabbed Merc by the shoulder and spun him around, pointing toward the silt wall. Rourke's plan became terrifyingly obvious.
Rourke was flooding the Plaza.
The entire Plaza lay below ground level. The silt wall had been a dam. Now the dam had burst. Water came pounding into the Plaza like someone opened the floodgates. Rourke's security tent stood first in the flood's path. Stone stood no better than canvas. Both smashed down as though made from cardboard. Tents and scaffolding, motorbikes and stretchers, the water swept everything along. Folding tables and generators, chemical toilets and showers, pumps and ladders — the whole lot surged directly toward Merc and Dale.
The water hit the cyclops, shaking the structure beneath them.
'We're screwed,' said Merc. It didn't matter the helicopter was gone. The destructive water pounding through the Plaza was a hundred times as dangerous.
'We need to reach Libby's balloon!' yelled Dale. Merc could barely hear Dale's voice over the raging torrent swelling around them.
'There's no way,' Merc yelled back, but Dale was gone. 'Dale — wait!'
Dale had disappeared back down the stairs into the cyclops.