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He took another swing. I dodged away.
Of course it was Alvarez. That’s what my subconscious had tried to tell me. Rudy’s office was the same as I always remembered. But it was supposed to have Alvarez locked up in the air shelter.
The whole sequence of events played out in my mind: The shelter had protected Alvarez from the chloroform. Once Rudy conked out, the now-unsupervised murderer had wrenched a meter-long pipe loose and used it to force the hatch handle. The lock and chain on the other side stood no chance against that kind of torque.
Alvarez might not be a chemical engineer, but it wouldn’t have taken a genius to work out something was wrong with the air. Either that or he’d
spent a second almost passing out before realizing. Either way, the shelter had air tanks and hoses. So he’d rigged up a life-support system.
And hey, as an added bonus, the pipe had a jagged, sharp end where he’d broken it off. Wonderful. He didn’t just have a club. He had a spear.
“There’s a gas leak,” I said. “Everyone in town will die if I don’t fix it.”
He lunged without hesitation. He was an assassin with a job. Got to admire his professionalism.
“Oh, fuck you!” I said.
He was bigger, stronger, a far superior fighter, and armed with a pointy metal stick.
I turned as if to run, then kicked backward. I figured it would throw off his attack and I was right. He ended up swinging the pipe around me instead of bashing my head in. Now I had his hand in front of me and my back to his chest. I’d never get a better shot at disarming him than this.
I grabbed his hand with both of mine and twisted it outward. Classic disarming move, and it should have fucking worked, but it didn’t. He just reached around me with his other hand and pulled the pipe up to my throat.
He was strong. Very strong. Even with the injury to his arm he easily overpowered me. I got both my hands between the pipe and my neck, but it still dug in. I couldn’t breathe. There’s a special kind of panic that overwhelms you when that happens. I flailed uselessly for a few seconds, then used every ounce of willpower I had to get myself under control.
He’d either break my neck or choke me out and then break my neck. The breather mask was useless—it couldn’t force air through a closed throat. But the air tank on my hip might help. Solid metal blunt object. Better than nothing. I reached down for it.
Pain!
Taking my hand off the pipe was a terrible idea. It got rid of half my resistance. Alvarez dug it deeper into my throat. My legs gave out and I sank to my knees. He followed me down and kept the pipe perfectly in place.
Darkness closed in around me. If only I had another hand.
Another hand…
The thought echoed in my increasingly foggy mind.
Another hand.
Another hand.
Too many hands.
Alvarez had too many hands.
What?
My eyes shot back open. Alvarez had too many hands!
A second ago he’d had the pipe in one hand and an air tank in the other. But now both hands were on the pipe. That meant he’d set the tank on the floor!
I summoned the tiny amount of strength I had left, coiled my legs, and lurched forward. The pipe dug into my throat even deeper but that was okay—the pain helped keep me awake. I pressed again, harder this time, and finally brought him off balance. The two of us toppled forward, me on the bottom, him lying atop me.
Then I heard the sweetest sound I’d ever heard.
He coughed.
His grip relaxed slightly and he coughed again. I got my chin under the pipe and finally my throat was free! I wheezed and took great gasping breaths from my mask. The black fog around me receded.
