The Disposable Man (34 page)

Rarig, Corbin-Teich, and Willy Kunkle were grouped together near the entrance to the stairwell, apparently waiting for us.

“How’re things with Sam?” Willy asked.

“She’s fine, but it’s heating up in the village,” I answered, just as my escort slammed me in the back with his hand.

“You quiet,” he shouted.

“Up yours, asshole,” Willy answered.

The other guard pulled Rarig by the sleeve and gestured up the stairs. “Go.”

Rarig led the file, followed by Corbin-Teich, the guard, me, Gail, Willy, and the man who’d shouted at us.

The stairwell was totally encased—a square, metal, windowless silo—and the stairs themselves, made of welded, open gridding, stretched up out of sight into the pitch black void, switchback-on-switchback, lending an additional sense of fantasy to our climb.

Whether stimulated by this, his own natural restlessness, or some private grand plan, Willy, just shy of where visibility yielded to total blindness, suddenly announced, “Hey, boss. You sick of this shit yet?”

I caught his meaning instantly—a now-or-never chance to turn the tables, which, given our other options, sounded good to me. After the man behind Willy let loose with his expected “
Quiet
,” I yelled, “
Yeah
,” grabbed the right wrist of the Russian above me, swung him around, and slugged him in the gut. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Willy spin on his heel, catch his man full in the face with his elbow, and send him tumbling down the stairs, his gun clattering against metal.

Willy had swung from the high ground, and his man had all but fallen into thin air. My position had been just the reverse. Even doubled over by my blow, my opponent landed up against the wall and then used it to brace himself. With my hand on his wrist, still held overhead, I found myself vulnerable to a good left hook to the ribs. The air rushed out of my lungs and my eyes filled with sparkling light.

Instinctively, I hit him close enough to the groin to make him pull back, and then Gail took over.

Standing below us, she grabbed his coat collar and hauled on it with all her strength, jamming her leg against the wall in the process. He staggered forward, caught his shin on her leg, and hurtled down the stairs. As he passed Willy Kunkle, Willy gave him one sharp, clean blow to the larynx. There was an odd sound from his throat, and he fell like a bag of rocks on top of his struggling companion.

All three of us were on them in an instant. Willy grabbed the gun from the dying man’s hand and held it to the other’s head, as Gail and I pinned him in place.

“
Don’t move
,” Willy shouted.

The hapless Russian froze.

“Let me shoot the bastard.”

I took a deep breath to clear my head. “Relax. It’s over.”

I frisked our victim, locating another pistol and a pair of handcuffs. I pulled them out, laced them through the railing, and snapped them around his wrists. “I think this’ll be enough. Check the other guy.”

The guttural noises had stopped coming from him. Willy groped for his pulse, said, “He’s dead,” and went through his pockets.

Gail had eased off the survivor and was sitting on one of the steps, her back against the cold, rattling wall. I leaned over and took her hand in mine. “Glad you were there. You did great.”

She gave me a weak smile. “Compared to what?”

“We’ll be finding out soon enough.” I turned to Willy. “What’d you get?”

He held up two guns. “Plus extra magazines and another set of cuffs.”

I stood and looked up at Rarig and Corbin-Teich, who’d been watching us in stunned silence. “You two keep climbing. John, you know what’s up top?”

“Two more levels like the ground floor, then the roof. It’s flat with a railing around it.”

“Okay—top floor and wait. And take this.” I handed him one of the guns. “Just make sure you know who it is before you shoot.”

They began climbing into the total darkness above. I looked at Gail closely. “Your choice. Stick with us, or go with them.”

She pointed at me. Willy had peeled off the dead man’s coat and jacket and now handed the former to Gail, donning the latter himself. She accepted it without comment. Her silence didn’t trouble me too much, since I recognized the set of her face—she was in her version of combat mode, which I knew would stand her in good stead, at least for the moment.

I undid the other Russian’s cuffs and ordered him to give up his coat. He did so without protest.

“You all set?” I asked Willy.

“You bet,” he said, smiling broadly.

“Then let’s see if we can find that other gun and go round up Sammie.”

Outside, daylight was getting stronger—a dark pewter now—but the wind and the cold were as intense as before. We ran doubled-over to the nearby shack and piled inside like late arrivals to a departing elevator.

Sammie stared up at us in bewilderment. “What’s happened?”

“The rats have grabbed the ship,” Willy said. “What d’ya got there?”

She showed us the screen. “Padzhev just announced they’re pulling back. He’s got about three men left. They should be here any minute.”

“Will the Covens know if you disconnect?” I asked.

Sammie’s mouth half opened. She’d spent so much time here, bent over her screen, that it had probably become like a lifeline to her. “Yeah,” she said tentatively.

I reached over and unclipped the phone cord from the back of the computer. “Then they’re officially off the hook, and so are you. Let’s go.”

I helped her to her feet, dumped the computer on the shelf, and headed back over to the tower.

“Now what?” Willy asked, as we slammed the door against the wind.

I looked back at the access road through a crack in the door.

“We bolster our manpower. Get the guy we left on the stairwell down here.”

Sam and Willy left together. Gail sidled up next to me and shared my observation point. “It’s so weird, knowing what’s happening, but not hearing anything—not a single gunshot.”

“I think that’s just about to change,” I said, half to myself.

Looming out of the swirling gray with startling speed, a car came skidding to a sudden stop near the telephone shed.

“Step on it, guys,” I yelled over my shoulder.

The three of them appeared, Willy and Sam dragging the wide-eyed Russian between them.

I grabbed him by his collar. “You wave your friends over here when I tell you, but no words. Understand?”

He shook his head. “No. I will not.”

I looked back outside. Padzhev, holding his arm against his side with his other hand, staggered out of the car, followed by three others, Anatoly among them.

“Persuade him, Willy,” I ordered.

Willy laughed in the Russian’s face, pulled out his gun, and ground it into the other man’s groin. Almost nose-to-nose, he said, “Wave, shithead.”

Across the way, Anatoly had opened the shed door and was shouting something at Padzhev.

“Now,” I said.

I pulled back the door and Willy thrust his captive’s upper half into the opening, where he began waving like a maniac.

Still looking through the crack, I saw Padzhev catch sight of us. “Okay. Enough. Close the door.”

Padzhev had turned away to summon the others, not noticing Kunkle yanking our decoy out of view like a rag doll.

“They bit,” I announced. “Cuff him again, then let’s give ’em a proper greeting.”

Willy returned the Russian to the stairs, where Sammie attached him to the nearest railing, warning him, “One sound and you’re dead.”

We then all drew our guns, Gail standing behind me, and moved just out of the doorway’s immediate line of sight.

Moments later, their caution dulled as much by their desperation as by our ruse, Padzhev and his three followers banged through the door, one of them even falling as he entered.

Sammie, Willy, and I grabbed our three and threw them to the ground, our knees in their backs and our weapons thrust in their ears. Gail stamped her heel onto the outstretched right hand of the man who’d tripped and kicked the gun he dropped across the floor.

I had Padzhev under me, writhing in pain. “
Nobody move
,” I shouted at the top of my lungs. With the instinct of cornered animals, all four of them became utterly still.

I addressed the back of Padzhev’s head. “You know better than I do that we got about thirty seconds to do this. We’re armed, you’re armed, and Kyrov’s hot on your heels. He’d just as soon see all of us dead. One choice: you want to join forces?”

“Yes,” he said, and followed it with an order in Russian.

I stood up, patted Gail on the back, and returned to my viewing spot. The shadow of a man—more ghost than substance—slipped out of the woods and hid behind Padzhev’s abandoned car.

“Okay, boys and girls,” I said, “time to go up top.”

I helped Padzhev to his feet and steered him toward the stairs.

“Where are we going?” he asked.

“We don’t have too many options,” I explained. “This is a reinforced steel building, with one way up. If we can control that, we ought to be able to last for a few days at least.”

From the sound of his voice, I guessed Padzhev to be near the end of his rope. “To what end, Lieutenant?” He stopped in mid-climb and turned to me. “It is I Kyrov wants. Why not satisfy his need?”

I pushed him along. “Because sacrificing you will get us nothing. He doesn’t want witnesses. And I want you for my own anyhow—you’re going to clear my name.”

Padzhev laughed tiredly and shook his head. “Such an optimist.” I didn’t bother telling him what my hopes were based on. Until I saw otherwise, the SOS I’d had Sammie send via computer rated right up there with putting a note in a bottle.

We continued climbing until we couldn’t see into the darkness. “
Rarig
,” I shouted. “We’re coming up—with Padzhev and company.”

I then muttered to Padzhev, “Tell your people to holster their weapons, in case Rarig thinks you’re trying to pull a fast one.”

Rarig’s disembodied voice confirmed my suspicions. “I better like what I see, Georgi, or people are going to start dying.”

Padzhev gave the order to his men. Slowly, the darkness paled to a light gray, and through the latticework of switchbacks above us, we could just make out the entrance to the second floor. I moved to the front of our line, crossing the threshold first. I paused there, my hands by my sides. “Rarig?”

“Where’s Padzhev?” he said from behind one of the huge scaffolding pillars, a continuation of those below.

“Right behind me.” I gestured for Rarig’s old nemesis to appear.

Padzhev wearily stepped into the half-light, still holding his wounded arm. “Philip—John—it is all but over. No more games.”

God only knew that in the duplicitous world these two called their own, there was always more room for games. Maybe for once Rarig heard something he could finally believe, or maybe, like Padzhev, he’d run out of gas at last. In any case, he stepped out into the open, the gun in his hand pointing somewhere at the floor between us.

“What happened?” he asked.

Padzhev gave a half-shrug. “We are on the same side, after all these years.”

“Kyrov’s just outside,” I explained. “What’s the layout up here?”

Rarig pointed behind us. “I think we should go up one more flight. The light’s better on the stairs, so we can see who’s coming, and there’s an interior ladder to the roof as a last resort.”

“Done,” I said, and stepped aside to let him lead the way.

Corbin-Teich met us on the third-floor landing, looking glad for the company, even if it did include his old boss. “I have been looking outside,” he said nervously. “There are men all around. At least ten of them.”

“That’s about what we counted,” Padzhev confirmed. He stepped onto the floor and looked around. This third level, like its predecessors, was stripped clean except for a few small piles of trash. The radar scaffolding dominated its center, and the elevator, frozen in place, stood with its doors open, blocking the otherwise open shaft beneath it. Across from us was an open door leading to a tiny exterior platform, and in a small room to our right, a ladder led to a square hatch above—the escape route Rarig had mentioned. Enough light poured through these two openings to make a view of the staircase pretty clear.

After looking around, I returned to the others. “Okay, everybody—weapons check. Who’s got what, and how much ammo do we have?”

Our inventory consisted of twelve handguns for the eleven of us, pretty evenly divided between ten millimeters and .40 caliber. Ammunition came to about two magazines per weapon. Only Lew looked a little uncomfortable, handling something he probably hadn’t touched in forty years. Given his increasingly removed, almost dreamy state of mind, however, I didn’t think it was going to matter much.

The plan, such as it was, was simplicity itself—we would guard the stairwell, shooting at anyone who came within sight.

To give us a slight advantage, we gathered together a pile of metal rubbish, including a loose bulkhead we found cast aside on the roof, and used it to barricade the threshold. Then, as an afterthought, we also threw enough odds and ends down the short stretch of stairs facing us to prohibit anyone from making an unimpeded run.

After that, it was sit and wait. Which took all of five minutes.

Willy had just stepped out onto the landing, to benefit from the stairwell’s acoustics, when he leaned back inside and announced, “Company.”

We helped him back over, took up positions, and started listening to the crash and rumble of the wind on the building, trying to discern any stray movement in its midst.

We found it with the single sharp clang of something hard hitting metal, like the toe of a shoe against one of the steps. Moments later, the vague shape of a head moved against the dark background of the landing beneath us.

Instinctively, I opened my mouth to shout the standard police warning not to move, when Anatoly’s muzzle flash exploded right next to me. In that split second of lightning clarity, I saw the man below spin like a top and vanish from sight. He never knew what hit him.

Willy looked disgusted. “So much for waiting till we see the whites of their eyes.”