Anarchy of the Mice

Chapter Seventy-Four

GooooOOOOOOMMMMmmm.

At first I thought it was another alarm, something beyond the alarme primaire—something to do with the American Dynamics attack.

The noise, even with three fingertips pressed in each of my ears, was exquisite. Noise beyond noise, a relentless invisible intensity from all sides. I once had a ten-quart pressure cooker blow on me, and the sensations before that—in the moment before my cilantro-lime black beans sprayed the ceiling—were a bit similar: tetchy, dangerous.

Quaid and everybody from Rivard's side were sprawled out holding their heads. Durwood jumped into action, dragging Quaid by the arm and Sue-Ann—who'd been flattened by the sonic disturbance—by the foreleg.

Bumping along the limestone, Quaid moaned and screamed and cried out in agony. Durwood pantomimed for him to plug his ears, but Quaid wouldn't open his eyes to see.

Yves, Piper, and I staggered away from the device, which laid on the floor vibrating, still emitting its terrible sounds.

Durwood dropped Quaid and Sue-Ann safely apart from Rivard, then rifled through the canvas bag for a grenade. He went to pull the pin then stopped, looked thoughtful, and dug back into the bag for another.

He yanked both pins and tossed the grenades sidearm into the overhang area. Then he kicked that noise box—whatever it was—in after them.

The explosion raised the pressure in my head unbearably—then it was done. The sudden quiet was disorienting.

"There!" Durwood said, rushing into the fresh gap in the limestone. "The supply tunnels, right there!"

While Rivard writhed among the rubble, Piper and I scrambled forward to look over Durwood's shoulder. The explosion had blasted an exit straight down: an eight-foot drop to tracks of some kind. Steel rails glinted in the dark.

Durwood said, "She'll take us right into gay Paris. Let's roll."

Piper sneered into the chasm. "We're s'posed to jump down there?"

Durwood didn't waste time answering. Setting his jaw, he lent his sturdy arm to each of us in turn, lowered everyone into the tunnel until they were close enough to drop.

I landed crookedly on one of the rails, twisting my ankle. Yves Pomeroy came next, in a heap. I thought he'd been knocked unconscious until he popped up in a panther's stance and cried, "Paris, ma chérie, je viens!"

Once Piper made it, the three of us supported Quaid—still incoherent and crunching his eyes—and Sue-Ann as Durwood eased them down to us.

The dog hadn't moved a muscle on her own. If she was breathing, I couldn't tell.

Finally Durwood descended himself. He peered left up the tunnel, then right. Both ways were dark.

He looked again using night-vision goggles from the canvas bag. After adjusting a dial on the nose piece (these were from Yakov, no ordinary night-vision goggles), he pointed.

"The boxcart!" he said, dropping the goggles. "It's not far, hang tight."

He ran off. Minutes later, from the direction he'd gone, a chugging began. I squinted to see. A ramshackle cart puttered into view, clanking and wheezing. Durwood stood in the back working what must've been a steering stick.

The cart limped to a stop. We helped Durwood offload different guns and ammunition, then all pitched in loading Quaid and Sue-Ann inside. Yves and Piper crammed in with them. I sat up on the cart's front edge—the last seat left—while Durwood manned his steering stick in back again.