Gulliver's Fugitives - Keith Sharee [72]
It hit the concrete wall with tremendous force, shaking the ground under Troi’s feet.
A great cloud of dust rose in the air. Odysseus pulled Troi toward it, and all the Dissenters followed. They swam across the river, holding on to the rope that the Nummo had strung. Then, coughing concrete dust from their lungs, they clambered up over the remnants of the boulder and the broken slabs of the wall itself, which had indeed shattered.
They were now in a square room with large water pipes on one side.
Two men, shocked into immobility, wearing blue CS service coveralls, stood at their water-control station. A television set on a stand intoned a rerun of the news report about the new CS truth drug. Cups of coffee sat steaming on top of the television.
“Hello gents,” said Odysseus. “I gather you handle a lot of water here. Do you know how to swim?”
As the CS men tried to reach for a phone, Odysseus and Lomov each grabbed one, pulled them to the hole in the wall, and pitched them out. Their splashes were followed by shouts that faded as they were carried downstream.
The Nummo twins were already taking readings and pulling switches on the water-mains console.
“They were hydraulic engineers when they lived above ground,” Odysseus whispered to Troi. “They designed this system. They’re going to overload the water pressure and burst the pipes right above us.”
Meanwhile Lomov wedged a huge piece of concrete against the one door into the room, and other Dissenters jimmied the elevator controls and forced open the elevator’s hoistway.
“Rhiannon,” said Odysseus, “you know what to do.”
The adolescent girl almost started directly on her way; but instead, walked over to Troi and gave her a hug. Troi realized this was her good-bye. She found herself hugging back.
Then Rhiannon let go, and without looking back, climbed into the hoistway and disappeared up a ladder.
Odysseus climbed in after her and motioned Troi to follow. They began to climb the ladder. The steel rungs were slippery with black grease, and Troi had trouble maintaining footing.
Far up the shaft Troi could see Rhiannon climbing fast, fearlessly. She was already several floors above them.
Troi waited while Odysseus peered through the crack between the hoistway doors. “Wait here,” he said, then parted the doors and stepped out.
The doors shut again and Troi watched through the crack. Beyond was a huge parking garage housing fleets of CS vans and armored personnel carriers. There was chaos as CS soldiers and service personnel ran in all directions. Water spouted from burst pipes along the walls. The floor was a lake.
A helmeted CS man fumbled with the door of a huge personnel carrier-truck, scrambling to get it out of the garage before the flooding got worse. Odysseus approached him with the body language of a vagrant asking for a handout.
The CS man shook his head, annoyed but obviously not surprised—there were a lot of poor on this planet.
Other CS officers watched for a moment, then, seeing no danger from the pitiful homeless person, went back to moving vehicles.
The CS officer Odysseus was petitioning grew impatient and pushed at him. Odysseus let himself be pushed until both men were hidden from the view of the rest of the garage. Then Odysseus yanked the man’s helmet off and knocked him unconscious.
Odysseus hid him under a mobile radiation cannon, took his keys, and jumped into the armored truck. He started the monstrous diesel-turbine engine, drove over to the elevator doors, and slammed a switch that opened the back of the truck.
The Dissenters climbed in. Troi sat next to Odysseus in the cab.
Odysseus drove his Trojan Horse ahead through the lapping waters. He’d gone only a few yards when a one-eye pulled up beside his window and peered in.
Odysseus floored the gas and spun the truck’s wheel. The truck bounded over a barrier and crashed onto a spiral ramp.