This thing’s one big piece.”

A blast of heat hit them and they ducked, as the wall opposite them collapsed into flame, spitting chunks of burning debris near where they were standing. The smoke rolled upward and they stared at it, all of them frozen for a long moment.

Dar felt the adrenaline hit her in the gut and she blinked, deliberately turning her back on the fire and studying the wall. There was a large, tilting section they’d ignored, because it was leaning in their direction and not in their way.

“All right.” Andrew sounded grimly resigned. “You two get in that there space, hear? Maybe we can pull some of this stuff up on over us, and it’ll pass by.”

“No.” Dar’s brain kicked in, as she remembered what it was she did for a living. Just another problem to solve. “Help me get those cables Eye of the Storm 377

hanging there. We’ll tie it around this section here.” Dar scrambled up and grabbed the cables and wrapped them around the leaning section.

The rest of them helped her, tying the huge metal ropes together.

“Now…”

The fire jumped across to the nurses’ station, its heat blanching them.

Dar tugged at the edge of the leaning section. “If we can just get this to fall over...”

“Lord.” Andrew leaped up and caught the edge, lending his weight to the effort, but the section didn’t budge. Kerry and Ceci pulled also, straining against the stubborn concrete.

“The one damn thing in this place that stayed put,” Ceci muttered.

“Hang on.” Dar leaped up and pulled her body up and over the edge of the wall, getting between the section and the one blocking them. She placed her feet against one surface and her back against the other and pushed, using her powerful legs and hands braced against her knees.

“Get out of the way,” she gasped, as the rock shifted under her back.

Andrew pulled himself up and over the edge of the concrete, and added his strength to his daughter’s. “This thing lets go, we’re gonna have to jump.”

“Yep.” Dar grimaced, as the heat made her close her eyes. “Ready?

One…two…”

“Six.” They both pushed at once, and the wall creaked, then started to fall, sending them tumbling off as it tipped over, hesitating at its apex, before surrendering to gravity and falling, pulling the huge section blocking their way with it.

“There’s a way through,” Kerry yelled, in utter relief. “C’mon!” She had Dar by the sleeve and pulled, as Andy dove into the gap with Ceci clinging to his back. A burning piece of insulation fell and Kerry yelped as it hit her shoulders. Dar pulled her forward, though, and it fell off as the flames licked at the ceiling they were just standing under. She squeezed through the narrow opening, scraping her arms and legs on the shattered bits of internal wall structure that poked through the debris. It was darker where they were going and she blinked, trying to see ahead of her.

Then a roar sounded behind her and a hot wave slammed against her body, burning the hair on her arms as she yelled a warning.

Then she felt a tremendous lurch, and something fell on top of her, and it got a lot darker.

THINGS WERE MOVING. Kerry jolted back into awareness to the sounds of things falling and a dull roaring sound. She heard yells and realized she was being carried in a cradle of strong arms that gripped her around the shoulders and under her knees.

It was still very dark, but it was cooler and she tried to collect her scattered senses as the pace quickened and a puff of cooler, fresher air washed over her.


378 Melissa Good She heard a rapid pounding noise and puzzled over that until she realized it was a heartbeat against her ear. She forced her eyes open, to see a familiar profile outlined in the low, reddish light. Of course. It was Dar’s heartbeat, sounding rapid and strained.

Well, you know, Kerry, her mind muzzily considered the problem , you aren’t the lightweight you used to be and it probably would speed things up if she wasn’t carrying your butt. “Dar?”

The blue eyes looked down at her. “Hey.” Dar was clearly out of breath, but she kept moving, following a dimly seen back just in front of them.

“I can walk. Let me down.” Kerry hoped that was true. She had no real recollection of what happened after they’d started going through the wall.

“You sure?” Dar ducked under a piece of protruding wall framing and almost tripped, keeping her balance with her load by some miracle of luck.

“Yes. C’mon, before you pass out,” Kerry insisted.

“Okay.”

She was let down onto her feet and she straightened tentatively, finding everything relatively in one piece, save her still aching shoulder and now a tender, burning forearm. Dar put a hand on her back and guided her after her father and mother.

“What happened?”

Dar didn’t answer for a moment. “That blowout knocked you against a piece of the wall. Just had to get you out of there, that’s all.”

“You okay?”

Dar nodded. “Yeah, c’mon. Dad thinks he sees an open area up there.”

Kerry looked around. They were in the corridor that led towards Angie’s room, but it was almost unrecognizably full of debris. “Any sign of my parents?”

“No.” Dar pulled up short as Andy stopped ahead of her and turned towards them. “Problem, Dad?”

“Shh.” Andrew put a finger up to his lips. “You hear something?”

Lots of things. Dar was exhausted from the emotional and sensory overload of the past few hours. “Like what?”

Kerry put her uninjured arm around her partner and listened. “I don’t hear anything but the fire.”

Andrew cocked his head to one side and closed his eyes.

They were all silent for a moment. Faintly, there was a scream, then a sodden crash off to the left. Then… “Wait…is that…” Kerry could hear something vaguely rhythmic. “Is someone pounding?”

Andrew nodded. “S’what I thought I heard.” They walked along the shattered wall and slowly, the sound got louder, then stopped.

Then started again, this time with an unmistakable frustration and urgency behind it.

“Lord.” Andrew sighed, hefting a sledge hammer that seemed to Eye of the Storm 379

have magically appeared in his hand. “Stand out the way, let’s see if we kin make a dent in this.”

“Where did you get that?” Ceci murmured, putting a hand on his arm. “Andy…”

“Damnfool construction guys musta sealed it up behind the drywall.” The ex-SEAL lifted the hammer and swung it against the surface before them—a section of wall that had fallen down and covered a corner of the corridor. “Must be a damn room back there.”

Dar exhaled, then started pulling chunks of fallen concrete away, clearing a path for her father to edge down. There was only room for two, so Kerry stayed back out of the way with Ceci, who had tied her husband’s shirt sleeve over her eyes to keep her hair back. “Are you okay?”

she asked the older woman.

“I’ve had better days,” Ceci admitted, leaning against a bent wall support. She looked exhausted. “Most strenuous thing I’ve had to do in a couple years is walk down to the drugstore.”

Kerry gave her a wan look. “Don’t feel bad. I spend four to five nights a week in the gym and I feel like I’ve been run over by an rhino.”

“Well, seeing as how you got blown ten feet through a plaster wall back there, you’re entitled.” Ceci patted her good arm. “I’m glad you’re okay.”

Ten feet? Plaster wall? Kerry blinked. “I guess that’s why I have such a headache,” she murmured, watching Dar’s back tense as her lover lifted a huge chunk of something or other out of the way. “I’m sorry about all this.”

“Why? Did you plant a bomb?” Ceci inquired.

“No.” Kerry smiled. “Of course not, but…”

“Then why apologize?” The smaller woman gazed at her with surprising compassion. “Kerry, we all do enough things in our lives to feel sorry for. Don’t take on someone else’s karma on top of that.”

Kerry could barely see Ceci’s face in the dim light, but she could feel the sad smile directed at her. She was about to answer, when a crash drew her eyes towards the wall. “Oh. Looks like they’ve about…” She edged forward, helping Dar to move a last two by four.

Only a wooden door was now between them and the hammering and Andy took a swing at it, the heavy sledge shattering the surface just over the warped knob. Splinters flew, and she ducked, then the frame sprung free from the wall and it tilted towards them. Kerry took hold of its edge one handed and wrenched the wood back, then stumbled as the panel burst outwards and two figures half fell out, almost on top of them.

They halted and stared at each other.

Kerry felt a roiling uneasiness almost mitigated by a sense of profound relief as she recognized her father’s face, covered in plaster and soot though it was. A tremendous weight came off her shoulders and she took hold of the crumbled wall, as her knees threatened to collapse on her. “I’m glad we found you.”

“Get out of my way.” Those pale eyes just looked through her, as her 380 Melissa Good father walked right past, brushing by them and stumbling down the hallway without another word. Kerry’s mother glanced uncomfortably at them, the front of her shirt covered in blood spots.

“Thank you.” She addressed herself to Andrew, though her gaze slipped briefly to Kerry’s face, then she dropped her eyes to the ground and followed her husband.

Kerry’s shoulders slumped, as she studied the concrete chunks at her feet.

Dar brushed her hands off, went over to her, circled her with both arms and patted the back of her head gently as she gave her a hug.