“Help me,” she yelled, but Spider was already there, reaching for a pair of the red jugs. They worked fast as Sombra barked and danced excitedly around them. Within seconds they had a mound of the containers. Gutsy fished in her pockets for several of the M-80s, the big and very dangerous firecrackers. Each of them was a small red cardboard tube, about an inch and a half long, a fuse extending from the side. According
to the writing on the tube, each contained three grams of pyrotechnic flash powder. Despite being used at celebrations, they were in no way toys.
Which is what Gutsy counted on.
She knelt and began fitting the M-80s under the edges of the kerosene containers. Spider saw what she was doing and immediately joined her.
“How many should we use?” he asked.
“All of them.”
The pounding was getting louder, and the false door was shuddering in a dangerous way. As they finished, Spider took one of the containers and removed the cap. Gutsy did the same, and they backed away together, leaving a very wet double trail as far as the kerosene would reach, which was about two hundred feet. They dropped the empty jugs. Sombra ran far down the tunnel to escape the noxious fumes. Gutsy and Spider pulled their shirts up to cover their noses and mouths.
The door continued to tremble and shudder.
“You have your lighter?” asked Spider.
She held out her hand to show him. “Get ready to run,” she said.
“I’m ready.”
With a mighty crash, the tunnel door exploded inward and a horde of the wild men came pouring into the tunnel.
“I’m sorry,” she said as she clicked the lighter and knelt to touch the small flame to the end of the kerosene trail. Yellow flame shot away from her, racing like some hellish demon toward the mound she and Spider had created.
They raced as fast as they could down the long tunnel. The howling mob of wild men boiled out of the hospital and chased them.
The fire outran them all.
It reached the mound, and suddenly the world was unbearably loud and unbearably hot. A shock wave of superheated gas punched both ways along the tunnel. By the time it reached Gutsy and Spider, they were more than halfway down the length. It didn’t matter. The blast picked them—and Sombra—up and hurled them viciously away. They shrieked as they flew through the air.
Gutsy heard Sombra yelp in pain as he hit a wall of boxes, but she could not see him. Or Spider. Her vision was seared to bright white and intense black. She felt herself hit. And land. All of the air in her lungs was knocked out of her, and there didn’t seem to be anything left to breathe.
“I’m sorry…,” she gasped again.
And then the world burned to a tiny cinder and winked out.
92
BENNY IMURA HAD NO CHANCE at all.
He didn’t even understand what was happening until a giant’s fist composed of fire punched him in the face. The blow staggered him, knocking him out of the mouth of the tunnel and ten feet into the car wash. He slammed into Chong, who went down hard beneath him.
Benny lay sprawled, dazed and stupid with pain and shock.
“Get. Off. Me.”
The three words were punctuated with gasps of pain. It took Benny a few seconds to understand what the words meant, and longer to realize who was speaking.
Then he rolled to one side, coughing and groaning.
Chong lay like a starfish: arms and legs spread wide, and his whole body looking flattened. Benny managed—somehow—to get to his hands and knees. He looked back at the tunnel mouth, seeing smoke curling out of it as if from the end of a shotgun barrel.
“What… ?” he tried to say, but a full sentence eluded him.
Flores came running over and helped him up, then saw to Chong. Neither of them was badly hurt, but both were shaky and bruised.
“What happened?” Chong wheezed.