What the hell's he doing? thought Merc. He can't mean to shelter down there from the water. This entire place is going under.
Merc took a few steps down. Flood waters already three-quarters filled the chamber. Dale was nowhere to be seen. The water's entire surface was awash with bobbing objects. Merc yelled into the mess, 'Dale! Dale!'
Dale's head emerged near Merc's boots. He'd been underwater retrieving something.
'Help me with this,' said Dale, dragging a rope up the steps.
Merc helped Dale to the roof. 'What can you do with this?'
'It's not for me,' puffed Dale, tying one end of the rope around his waist. 'It's for you. Tie it on yourself.'
'I'll just drag you down,' Merc objected.
Dale started hunting in his cargo pants pocket. 'This is going to burn OK? But it's better than drowning.'
'What will burn — whoa, wait, wait!'
Dale had the can of expanding foam. They'd used the foam earlier to encase the artifacts for safe travel. Dale was shaking the can and eyeing Merc's shirt. 'I'll spray it under your shirt to make a life jacket. It will mold to your body and make a perfect fit.'
Merc didn’t let himself think about it. Dale was right. It was better than drowning. 'Do it.’
Dale pushed his arm down Merc's shirt and sprayed the foam. The foam expanded under Merc's armpit and puffed out his shirt front and back. For a moment Merc only felt the foam cooling his skin, but then the burning started. 'Christ — that burns like fire!'
Dale winked at Merc, opened his collar, and then sprayed the foam down his own shirt. His eyes bulged as the burning took effect.
Merc tried to shut out the pain. He still couldn't see Dale's plan. If they didn't drown, they'd be pulverized among the churning debris. Whatever Dale's plan, they had just seconds to act. The flood was transforming the eastern side of the Plaza into a tremendous three-tiered waterfall. The cyclops’s roof was the last dry outcrop. Even now water began topping the cyclops. Merc felt the water find his boots. Any moment, both men would be swept off the roof and into churning, debris-filled white water.
'Dale, what are you planning?'
'Don't you see it?' Dale sounded exhilarated, hysterical almost.
'I don't see anything, Dale.' Merc hated the hopelessness in his own voice.
Dale checked the rope around his and Merc's waists. 'Then let me show you.'
With that, Dale sprinted across the top of the cyclops and dived into the water. Merc dashed to the spot through the ankle-deep water already trying to peel him from the roof. Dale was swimming. Merc lifted the rope above his head to reduce the drag. He leaned into the rising water, watching Dale and dreading the moment when something large swept between the two men, snagging the rope and dragging Dale under. It looked inevitable. Any second now.
Merc drew his knife. Dale couldn't drag him through the water. Whatever Dale was planning, it wouldn't work. Dale had no chance tethered to Merc. There was no sense in them both dying.
That kid deserves better than this.
Merc looped the rope around the blade and looked once more toward Dale.
At that moment, he saw Dale’s plan.
Merc lowered the blade from the loop, leaving the rope intact.
Where Merc saw a jumble of chaotic swirling debris, Dale saw opportunity. Like two upside down canoes, Spader's overturned seaplane came careening through the debris. Dale was swimming madly to intercept it.
Claire leapt into the raft away from the water.
She could hardly believe the unfolding mayhem. First the helicopter was going to shoot the raft. Then it was going to shoot Merc. Then it was ripped from the sky by a ball of flying dirt! It happened so quickly, Claire took stunned seconds to realize the fountaining eruption of dirt was actually the silt wall.
Looking toward Merc when the wall exploded, she’d seen everything. Huge chunks of soil came raining down over the site. She hadn't realized how big the pieces were until the first one hit the helicopter. The back end of the aircraft had torn right off.
Then came the water.
Water like a tidal wave focused on the Plaza. The explosion had breached the silt wall, had been intended to breach the silt wall, and now the entire silt lake was emptying into the Plaza. The white water smashed through the Plaza's eastern structures. Claire saw everything being swept toward her and Libby. Everything came down with the flood. Tents, scaffolding, light towers, the demolished comm-tower — everything came rolling down toward their raft.
'Libby — we need this thing in the air right now!'
Claire saw the tents the raft had landed on start washing away.
'It's lifting. It's lifting!' yelled Libby over the roaring water. 'Quick, Claire, get up this end!'
Claire didn't know what Libby planned, but Libby understood the raft better than anyone. As water smashed over the tents behind her, Claire scrambled over the trampoline netting toward Libby's end of the raft.
As she grabbed the webbing, the wave's full force struck, pitching the raft's lighter end upward. The extra push worked as Libby planned. Claire felt the raft clear the water and gain altitude. The water rose, but the raft rose quicker, and Claire suddenly realized they were doing it. They were beating the water. She remembered Merc and Dale. Where last she'd spotted the two men was now awash with white water.
'What about the others?' yelled Claire. 'Did you see them?'
'Dale dived in with a rope,' Libby yelled back. 'There's a ladder in that box. Get it ready in case we see them.'
Claire ripped open the plastic box and withdrew the rolled safety ladder. She searched over the side of the raft. The rising maelstrom churned just five meters below. Debris jostled and heaved everywhere. At least the debris might give them something to hold onto. Panning her eyes over a larger and larger area, she saw no sign of them.
She saw someone else.
There. On the middle tier. Climbing up a tower. Chased by the water cascading over the tier in a long unbroken waterfall.
It wasn't Merc. It wasn't Dale.
It was Kline.
Their eyes met.
Kline raised his arm. He pointed something at the balloon. His arm jolted. Claire barely heard the crack of a gunshot over the roaring water. She ducked, yelling at Libby, but immediately realized Kline wasn't shooting at her.
'A hole!' yelled Libby. 'He shot a hole in the balloon.'
Claire knew they were falling fast. She dropped the safety line and grabbed the webbing. Down, down, down — wump — they hit the water's surface. Current instantly spun the raft. The current was different now. With the bottom tier now completely filled, the water circled the middle tier clockwise like a giant draining bathtub.
Ethan.
The Gallery was three-quarters underwater.
The tower Kline had climbed was gone, washed away. She couldn't see Kline. He was no doubt caught up in the same current as themselves.
'Help me!' Libby called. 'The balloon is pulling us under.'
Claire was up to her knees in water. The trampoline base let water through. Only the raft's inflated edges kept them buoyant. Countering this buoyancy, the balloon had crumpled into the water behind them and was starting to pull them under. Claire scrambled around the raft, unclipping the lines that tethered the balloon. Working together, both women got the job done seconds before the current pulled them under. With the balloon's dragging weight gone, the raft rode higher.
Claire saw they had made nearly a quarter lap around the Gallery now. She was orienting herself with the tree line when someone called her name. She spotted two people kneeling precariously on debris.