Empire (Empire 1)

The steel section lined up with the fireplace. Cole could now see that the wooden floor extended under the stone of the hearth.

“It slides under the fireplace,” said Cole. Stepping out a couple of paces, Cole could see how the floor planks, while they didn’t all end in a straight line, had a slightly wider separation from the abutting boards.

“No doubt they’ve turned off whatever switch runs this from up here,” said Cole.

“Think there’s a way to open it by hand?” said Cat.

“Probably. From below.”

Cole thought about how the trap door worked. It slid under the fireplace. The hearth wasn’t deep enough to hold the entire trap door. So there had to be a projection on the outside of the house to hold the rest of the trap door.

“Going out back,” said Cole.

“I’ll stay here and make sure nobody comes upstairs.”

Cole went outside. On the way around the cabin, he couldn’t resist going near enough to the edge to look over.

There were mechs and hoverbikes coming out of the big doors now and swarming up into the woods. Cole knew that if Arty and Load could get back around the eastern arm of the lake to the cache, they’d be fine—they had weapons designed to counter both vehicles. Machines weren’t so good in the deep woods anyway. And seeing how the footsoldiers—only about twenty of them—fanned out, they were clearly not trained at all for rough-country combat. Urban warfare, that’s what these guys were ready for. The other guys would be fine. And the more rebels they kept busy out here, the better it would be for Cole and Cat.

If they could even get down inside.

This was too much like a frontal assault. Two guys, and even if they got through the trap door, what would they do, ride the elevator and get blasted when they hit bottom? Or go down the stairs, where a flamethrower or a grenade could kill them before they had a chance to get off a shot?

At the same time, the longer they waited here, the better chance the rebels had of killing them. And what if Mingo and Benny couldn’t get to a phone? What if President Nielson decided not to send a strike force?

The best chance of success here would come from moving forward. Pushing. But . . . carefully.

There was a concrete road running from the huge doorway out toward the dam. It was under water the whole way till it got near the dam. There it looked like a paved marina ramp as it rose up to the usual waterline. Clever disguise. They could bring trucks in and out of here without anything looking like a highway.

Cole jogged around to the back of the cabin. Sure enough, under the grass behind the chimney brick, there was a concrete projection. Totally enclosed. No easy way in.

Cole pulled the pin on a grenade and laid it down in the corner where the brick joined the concrete. Then he threw himself to the other side of the concrete projection and rolled down the slope.

Boom.

Cole got up and ran back. Some damage to the concrete. Not a lot.

He unpinned another grenade, set it right where the most damage was, and leapt and rolled. Another explosion. More damage.

After the fourth grenade, he had a hole.

He ran back to his pack, carried it up to the hole. He pulled out the crowbar and the flashlight. He could have used a sledgehammer, but that wasn’t something that he had wanted with his gear when he was hiking.

With the flashlight, he could see the mechanism that pulled the trap door into the concrete sleeve. Not really a complicated machine. He didn’t want to damage the tracks where the trap door would slide. Just the lever that pushed the trap door closed.

It was sweaty, frustrating work, because he didn’t have great leverage. He also had to make sure he didn’t drop the crowbar, because there’d be no getting it back, and he was the only one who had brought one.

Eventually, though, he popped the lever out of its socket. Now it was dangling free.

Taking the crowbar, the flashlight, and his pack, he ran back around the cabin and went inside. Cat had poured himself some coffee from the percolator. “Good stuff,” he said. “Lots of caffeine.”

“No thanks,” said Cole. “You can go out and get your pack now.”

Cat jogged out. The broken-armed rebel glared at Cole. He was sweating with pain and looked so miserable Cole almost felt sorry for him. “I notice nobody came out to see if you’re all right,” he said.

The guy didn’t say anything.

“I guess they knew we were going to beat the shit out of you,” said Cole. “You know, before people start wars, they ought to make sure they know how to win.”