Johnny stood there helpless. What was the Wakinyan waiting for? Why wasn’t he pushing the button?
The motorcade snailed a little closer.
Of course! Johnny realized. Of course!
Suddenly, as if somehow reading the Indian’s thoughts, the president’s limousine took off. It shot forward, police cars suddenly rushing up alongside it.
“No!” Abraham screeched. “Nooooooooooo!”
And with Wareagle halfway into his lunge, the Wakinyan pressed the detonator’s button. “I’ve got them, Alley Cat!” one of the choppers had reported seconds before. “High steel building. Three floors from the top.”
“What do you mean them?” Triesman demanded.
“Two guys, big as houses. Looks like they’re fighting, Alley Cat.”
“What? Say that again.”
“I said they’re fighting.”
“Do you have a clear shot?”
The pilot checked again with his on-board marksman. “Negative, Alley Cat. We’ve got open air between us and the next office building if we miss.”
“I’ll take the responsibility.”
“This is Boston, sir. It’s my call.”
“Dammit!” Triesman yelled, and pressed the button linking him to all his men in the field. “This is an evac order. Let’s get Top Guy the hell out of here!”
Triesman was already into a sprint, heading toward the high steel shell the limo had been passing in front of, when the explosion came. The force of it staggered him; his ears filled with a terrible ringing. His vision never betrayed him, but all he could see was a gray-black cloud of rubble encompassing the entire street before him.
“Top Guy, come in! Top Guy, do you read me?”
When no response came, Triesman ran still faster.
“Okay,” Jack Tunnel said, “I’ve got one.”
“How much time have I got?”
“Under a minute before the core gets too hot for the cooling mechanism to touch it at all.” Blaine heard Tunnel take in a thick gush of air. “But if she goes critical, you’ll never get out in time, no matter what.”
“Last thing on my mind right now.”
What was first on McCracken’s mind was the pliers Jack Tunnel was dangling seventy feet above him in the open shaft. Because Abraham had taken steps to sabotage the second valve, the only chance he had now of rerouting the cooling water through the backup pipe was to open the line with pliers. Tough work under the best of conditions, and these were anything but. “Okay,” Blaine said when he reached the ladder directly beneath the open hatch. “Can you see me?”
“Just barely.”
“Well, I can’t see you at all. I’m gonna have to take my helmet off.”
“It’s approaching a hundred and seventy-five degrees on your level.”
“Call it a free face peel. Might take years off my life. When I give you the word, count to ten and then drop the pliers down. I catch them, we got a shot. I don’t, get the fuck outta here.” McCracken unhinged the locks on his helmet and made sure it was ready to come free. “Okay,” he told Tunnel. “Start counting.”
He had the helmet placed beneath him and was gazing upward by the count of four. The heat tore into his face and burned his eyeballs. He wanted so damn much to close his eyes, to stop the pain, but he didn’t. And then they started filling with tears, blurring his vision. Dammit! How was he going to catch the damn pliers?
Blaine risked a second and dabbed them with the sleeve of his radiation suit. When he looked up again, a silver blur was dropping toward him.
Too fast to catch, he had time to think. Too fast to catch….
McCracken managed to get his chest under the falling pliers, but it was a wasted motion. He caught them in his gloves with the dexterity of an all-pro receiver and stooped to retrieve his helmet. He jammed it gratefully over his head again, locking it down as he rushed back toward the bolt the valve had broken away from.
“You hear me, Jack?”
“Barely.”
“Nice toss. I’m back to the spot. What’s the time?”
“Forty seconds till we pass the point of no return. Another forty or so to get back up here. If she goes to critical stage, getting back up won’t matter.”
Blaine had trouble gripping the pliers through his gloves and pulled them off. The wet heat of the secondary loop complex burned into his hands, but his improved hold on the pliers made it worth it. The bolt began to turn.
“She’s moving, Jack.”
“Hurry!”
McCracken kept twisting. His eyes followed the bolt’s gradual clockwise turn through his faceplate. His fingers were on fire, total agony encompassing them. He could feel his flesh puckering, the top layer starting to blister. Still he worked the pliers as the last seconds ticked away, worked them until the bolt would turn no more.
“That’s it,” he told Jack Tunnel.
The pipe near him vibrated ever so slightly as the powerful jets of water found their way into it, charging through. McCracken shoved his gloves back on and rushed down the cat-walk toward the ladder. His hands were so swollen that he could barely squeeze them over his fingers.
“One minute to critical stage.…”
“What the fuck, Jack?”
“I told you, the process doesn’t work instantaneously. That water’s got plenty to cool. Just get your ass up here!”
McCracken reached the ladder and began to climb. The rungs themselves were boiling now. Bubbles of steam rose off them, and he could feel the intensity of the heat even through his gloves. It was like climbing out of a furnace, the conditions made all the worse by his already damaged fingers. They were raw now, and he had trouble closing them around the rungs to supply him the rapid lift he needed. The agony deepened by the instant, making it impossible to place himself beyond it.
“Come on, Blaine. You’ve got it!” Jack Tunnel said. “Get your ass the fuck up here!”
Blaine gazed up at the hatch through his faceplate and tried to smile. The additional two catwalks had been left behind, leaving him barely another fifteen rungs to scale. Unless the cooling water was too late to stop the core from melting down, he was going to make it.
And then the eighth rung from the top gave way under his grasp. McCracken wasn’t sure whether it had melted from its casing or simply snapped. Whatever the case, he felt himself falling, falling into a superheated hellhole from which there could be no return.
The explosion shook the steel structure. Johnny felt himself totter on the edge and grabbed for the nearest support beam for balance. Abraham was wavering badly, the girder becoming a tightrope for him. Wareagle seized the opportunity to lunge out sideways with both legs leading, holding fast to the beam as he did. The heavy blow connected with Abraham’s side and staggered him further. The Wakinyan twisted to grab Johnny’s legs, but Wareagle kicked out again and then locked Abraham’s neck in between the knees.
Abraham managed to tear free of the grasp, his momentum forcing him forward. Johnny kicked back at him in the same direction, and the blow caught the Wakinyan square in the head and pitched him over.
He headed straight for the huge hunting blade, which still protruded bloodily through the slat in the girder.
Abraham’s scream was awful as his midsection was impaled upon the knife. He spasmed and writhed there as Johnny leaped two girders over, closer to the street side and the hovering helicopter, to gaze downward.