Chapter 10 - The Labyrinth of Iron
The central junction of the Apache Mine opened up into a cavernous, wooden-timbered chamber where three separate ore shafts met. Old rusted iron rails ran along the dirt floor, disappearing into the darkness of the side tunnels. In the center of the chamber sat a rusted ore cart, its wheels frozen in time, surrounded by abandoned iron pickaxes and decaying wooden crates.
Frank stopped, leaning heavily against the ore cart, his face slick with cold sweat. The wound in his shoulder was burning like a hot iron, and his vision was beginning to fray at the edges into dark, swimming spots.
"Frank!" Martha rushed to his side, catching him before his knees could buckle completely. "You're losing too much blood. We have to stop and tie off that wound!"
"No time," Frank gasped, his breathing shallow and rapid. "The air... the air is changing. Feel that?"
Martha paused, lifting her face toward the darkness. A faint, cool breeze was moving through the chamber—not the hot, dusty air from the desert above, but a damp, fresh draft carrying the smell of pine needles and open space.
"The drainage outlet," Martha breathed, a spark of hope lighting up her tired eyes. "It's open!"
"Two hundred yards down the right tunnel," Frank muttered, pointing his flashlight toward the lowest of the three shafts. "Follow the rails... it leads straight out to the old railway cutting."
Before they could take a single step toward the right tunnel, a mechanical, clicking sound resonated from the upper shaft above them.
A red laser sight cut through the darkness of the cavern, its thin, crimson beam scanning the floor before locking directly onto the center of Lily's yellow jacket.
"Don't move," a voice echoed down from a iron gantry platform mounted twenty feet up near the chamber ceiling.
It was not Julian.
Stepping out onto the gantry platform was a middle-aged man wearing a dark tailored suit, completely out of place in the damp filth of the mine shaft. He wore silver-rimmed spectacles that caught the faint beam of Frank's flashlight. His hair was pristine, slicked back, and his hands were encased in sterile white medical gloves.
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In his right hand, he held a sleek, lightweight carbine fitted with a night-vision scope and the red laser module currently pointing at the little girl.
"Dr. Vance," Frank growled, his voice dropping into a guttural register of pure, unadulterated venom.
