Hunger (Gone 2)

“Ready?”

“Nope.”

“So let’s go,” Sam said. Then, louder, “Let’s go!”

They raced for the door that Bug had taken. Across the parking lot at a crazy run. Edilio, Steve, and one other soldier, half pushing Orc ahead of them as Howard drifted strategically slower and fell behind in relative safety.

Sam, Dekka, and the remaining soldiers kept pace, then peeled off, dodging left and racing along the building.

Taylor stayed behind with two guys guarding the rear.

Orc ran straight for the door. He plowed into it like a bull, full-speed, heedless. The sound of the impact echoed around the parking lot.

The metal door crumpled but did not give. Orc reared back and kicked it with his stone foot. He fell on his back, but the door flew open.

Gunfire erupted from inside.

Orc stayed flat. The others dodged aside.

Edilio began firing through the doorway, an earsplitting din. The muzzle flash was like a strobe light.

Sam and Dekka raced away, hugging the wall.

“About here, I think,” Sam said, panting.

The two of them stepped away from the wall, and Sam raised his hands.

Blistering green fire exploded from Sam’s upraised palms. The brick wall glowed red. Almost immediately the masonry began to crack, and then Dekka made her own move. Gravity beneath the wall ceased to exist.

The wall began to crack. Flakes of mortar and stone flew straight up in the air. Some of the smaller chunks caught fire and burned as they rose. The wall was coming apart, but too slowly.

“Orc!” Sam yelled.

The boy-monster rolled to his feet and came at a rush.

“Dekka, off!” Sam yelled.

The green fire died, gravity returned with a rain of dirt and gravel, and through it ran Orc. He hit the weakened wall with one massive shoulder. The cinder block collapsed in like a fallen pie crust.

Orc backed up, then hit it again and he was through. Sam dashed after him, but unlike Orc he was not immune to the heat he had himself created. It was like rushing into an oven. He brushed against a bit of red-hot brick and yelped in pain.

Sam froze.

Inside, beyond the cinderblock wall, was not the control room. Instead of breaking through to the control room and catching Caine off guard, he was in an outer room filled with old-style metal filing cabinets.

The whole plan had just fallen apart. The diversion was now pointless.

Dekka was right behind Sam. “So much for the element of surprise,” she said.

No time for regrets, Sam told himself, but it was a bitter moment. Surprise might have saved lives. Surprise might have allowed them to rescue the hostages.

“The next wall should be easier,” Sam said. “Take cover!”

Dekka jumped behind a row of filing cabinets as Sam attacked the inner wall. The temperature in the filing room went from stifling to dangerous in seconds.

Sam’s light burned away paint and wallboard in a few seconds, but beyond it, inside the wall, was a barrier of dull, gray metal.

“It’s a radiation shield,” Sam yelled to Dekka. “Lead.”