Chapter 5 - The Reckoning
"NATHAN!" Sarah screamed from inside the pit.
Nathan’s surgical reflexes saved his life.
The moment he heard the loud snap of the steel cables, he didn't try to run down the stairs. He threw himself backward, vaulting over the metal handrail of the catwalk and dropping twelve feet down onto a pile of discarded canvas sacks on the lower floor.
CRASH!
The massive timber bundle slammed into the spiral staircase with catastrophic force, crushing the steel structure into a mangled mess of twisted metal and flying wood splinters. The entire mill shook to its foundation, dust raining down from the high rafters.
Nathan hit the ground hard, rolling instantly to absorb the impact. The breath was knocked from his lungs, and his pistol slid across the dusty concrete floor, coming to rest ten feet away under a heavy conveyor belt.
Marcus didn't waste a second. He pulled a long hunting knife from his belt and lunged toward Nathan with a guttural roar.
Nathan scrambled to his feet just as Marcus swung the blade. The razor-sharp steel sliced through the heavy fabric of Nathan’s coat across his chest, missing his skin by millimeters.
Marcus lunged again, his eyes wild and bloodshot. "You ruined everything, Pierce! I was going to be untouchable!"
Nathan stepped inside the strike, using his left forearm to block Marcus’s wrist, just as he had practiced in martial arts training during his university days. He grabbed Marcus’s arm, twisting the joint violently downward while slamming his right elbow directly into Marcus’s jaw.
CRACK!
Marcus’s head snapped back, his teeth clacking together as blood spurted from his lip. He stumbled backward, dropping the knife, but quickly tackled Nathan around the waist, bringing both of them crashing down onto the cold concrete floor.
The two men tumbled across the floor, punching and clawing in a desperate, brutal struggle for survival. Marcus was heavier, driven by psychotic desperation, but Nathan was fueled by seven years of accumulated guilt and an unrelenting drive to save his sister.
Marcus managed to pin Nathan’s shoulders, his heavy hands closing around Nathan’s throat, pressing down with crushing force.
"You're... just... a doctor..." Marcus hissed, his face red, his eyes bulging as he squeezed Nathan’s windpipe. "You... don't... know... how... to kill..."
Nathan’s vision began to blur into dark red spots. Air refused to enter his lungs.
He didn't fight Marcus’s hands directly. Instead, Nathan reached down to his waist belt, his gloved fingers finding the rigid plastic casing of the emergency medical epinephrine injector he had brought from the house.
Nathan flipped the safety cap off with his thumb, brought the heavy auto-injector up, and slammed it directly into the side of Marcus’s exposed thigh!
THWACK!
The spring-loaded needle drove deep into Marcus’s muscle, instantly discharging three hundred micrograms of pure, concentrated adrenaline straight into his bloodstream.
Marcus gasped violently, his eyes opening wide as his heart rate spiked instantly from ninety beats per minute to over two hundred and twenty. The sudden, overwhelming surge of concentrated epinephrine flooded his central nervous system, causing severe chest pain, extreme dizziness, and immediate muscle spasms.
Marcus collapsed sideways, clutching his chest, gasping for air as his body went into hyper-adrenergic shock.
Nathan rolled over, coughing violently as he drew sweet, cold air back into his lungs. He slowly got to his feet, wiping blood from his lip, and stood over the writhing man.
"I am a doctor, Marcus," Nathan rasped, his voice rough and deep. "I know exactly how the human body works."
Nathan didn't look at Marcus again. He grabbed a heavy coil of nylon rope hanging from a nearby pillar, quickly and securely tying Marcus’s hands and ankles to a heavy iron support beam.
Then, Nathan turned and ran toward the basement hatch.
"Sarah!" he called out, kneeling at the edge of the opening.
He pointed his headlamp down into the pit. Ten feet below, sitting on a cold concrete floor beside an old iron boiler, was Sarah. She was wrapped in a thin, grease-stained burlap sack, her skin a terrifying shade of pale blue, her lips dark, her body shaking uncontrollable.
Beside her lay a heavy black laptop connected to a portable satellite drive, its screen flashing with green progress bars indicating a completed data transfer.
"Nathan...?" she whispered, raising her heavy, frost-covered eyelids. "Is it... really you...?"
Nathan lowered the emergency ladder into the pit and climbed down in three fast bounds.
He dropped to his knees beside his sister, pulling her shivering, freezing body directly into his arms, wrapping his heavy thermal coat around her shoulders.
"I’m here, Sarah," Nathan choked out, tears finally breaking past his eyes as he kissed her frozen hair. "I’m here. I’ve got you. I’m so sorry... I’m so sorry it took me seven years to get here."
Sarah rested her cold forehead against his shoulder, her faint, shuddering breath warm against his neck.
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"Lily..." she whispered weakly. "Did she make it to your gate...?"
Nathan smiled through his tears, holding her tighter. "She brought her brothers all the way to my door, Sarah. She was the bravest little girl in the world. They are safe. They are warm. And they are waiting for you."
