"Fortunately," Annja said. "But I almost missed it. And if I had, that would be me down there at the foot of those stairs instead of her."

"She was terrifying and incredible," Tuk said. "I know it seems silly, but I almost respected her for her ability."

"It's not silly," Annja said. "She should be respected. G.o.d knows I sure as h.e.l.l do. I've faced a lot of foes and I remember only a few of the highly skilled ones. Hsu Xiao goes to the top of the list as far as I'm concerned."

Tsing cleared his throat. "I hate to break up this precious bonding moment and all, but according to your friend Mike, we only have two minutes to make our escape."

Annja looked up at Mike. "Is that true?"

Mike nodded gravely. "I'm afraid it is."

Annja glanced at Tuk. "Help me to my feet, would you?"

"Sure." Tuk got behind Annja and helped her up.

Annja wobbled once but then took a breath and got her heart beating steadily. "All right, let's go."

Tsing stood. "What about me?"

Annja looked at him. "What about you?"

"You're not going to kill me?"

"Tsing, I don't give a d.a.m.n about you right now. All I care about is getting the h.e.l.l out of here. You can come with us or you can stay. But no one's going to help you. You live or die by your own hand. Not mine or anyone else's."

Mike led the way toward the corridor and Tuk and Annja followed. From deep below them, there came a rumbling sound. All of them paused and then Mike waved them on.

"It's starting! We have to run!"

Tsing shoved Tuk out of the way. "Let me through, you pathetic people!" He dashed for the corridor ahead of them and disappeared from view.

Mike leveled the gun on him but Annja called out, "No!"

Mike stopped. "Why?"

"Let him go. If he gets himself out of this, we'll worry about him on the other side."

"You're being merciful," Tuk said.

Annja shook her head. "No, it's just I don't care about him anymore."

Another rumble caused the stone floor to shake and start to break apart. It was like being in the middle of an earthquake. From above, rocks and stones tumbled loose and cascaded down.

"Get inside the temple!" Mike shouted. "It's all going to come down around us!"

Tuk helped get Annja into the corridor. Behind them, the pavilion started to cave in and the floor buckled. As they ran past the statues, the closest one toppled over and then there was a terrific explosion.

Annja felt herself knocked clear off her feet and she crumbled to the floor as bits of stone came showering down around them.

"Annja!"

She felt Tuk's hand clutch at her own. He pulled her free of the debris, masonry dust caking his face. He coughed and brought her to her feet.

Annja tried to breathe but coughed on the dusty air, too.

"We've got to keep moving!" Mike said.

Annja could barely see Mike in front of them. He was struggling to stay upright and Annja realized that the floor was slanting. Like being on a listing s.h.i.+p, the entire surface was heaving as the facility beneath them started to explode and crumble in upon itself.

Another tremor rocked the temple and more rocks and stone came flying at them. Tuk steered Annja around some of the larger boulders.

From someplace ahead of them they heard a scream.

They hurried on and found Mike standing over Tsing. A large section of stone lay atop Tsing's body, but he was still conscious.

"Hurry! You've got to get this off of me!" he pleaded.

Mike looked at Annja and shook his head. "There's no way we can lift it. It must weight a ton or more."

Tsing's face showed terror. "No! You cannot leave me here to die. You've got to help me!"

"We're out of time, Annja," Mike said.

Annja looked down at Tsing. "I told you that you were free to help yourself. But by your own hand. Not by ours."

"But surely you don't mean that! Help me, Annja Creed! Help me!"

Annja looked at Tuk. "Let's get the h.e.l.l out of here."

Tuk nodded and they pressed on. Behind them they could still hear Tsing crying for help. "Don't leave me!"

Another rumble sounded and the room behind them crumpled and caved in, drowning out any more of Tsing's pleas for mercy or help.

Dust clouds followed them as they pressed toward the prison cell that had held Tuk. And then the doorway to freedom stood before them at long last.

Mike reached it first and waved them through. "Come on! We're almost there!"

Annja pushed Tuk ahead of her. "I'll make it. Just get yourself out."

Tuk looked at her once and then rushed ahead. Annja smiled and knew he'd survive. She urged her feet to keep moving.

Another tremor rocked the room she stood in and then she heard an incredible sound of something being torn wide-open. The floor behind her started to yawn and a gaping hole erupted beneath her feet.

"Annja!"

She turned back and saw Mike waving her on. Tuk screamed for her to jump.

Annja saw the fissure growing wider and she knew she would have one chance to make the jump.

As the fissure spread, Annja dug deep and felt her heart thundering in her chest as the last bits of her adrenaline gave her a sudden turbo boost of power. She leaped through the air as the floor fell away, finally reaching out for the doorway.

Her hands found the doorjamb of stone and she felt the floor give way beneath her. She found herself dangling in open s.p.a.ce as the stone fell into a seething ma.s.s of angry greens and yellows a hundred feet below.

All of the nuclear waste that had been stored in the facility was churning like a boiling cesspool of h.e.l.l.

Annja felt her grip slipping.

She had no more strength anywhere in her body.

And just as she was about to lose it all-just as she was about to topple backward and fall into the swirling nuclear mists-she felt two hands clutch her and pull her through the doorway.

She fell into Tuk and Mike and they dragged her toward the staircase.

More explosions thundered around them as they clambered up the stairs toward the trapdoor.

Mike made it through the trapdoor first. Annja felt herself lifted up and then Tuk's face appeared behind her.

"Quickly, Tuk, shut the door," Mike said.

Annja managed to pull herself clear and then she heard Tuk slamming the stone trapdoor behind them.

Cold winds pounded them as the cave itself started to crumble.

"It's not safe here!" Mike said. "The whole mountain is going to give way."

"Outside!" yelled Tuk. "We've got to get outside!"

Mike and Tuk eased Annja through the opening in the cave and then followed her out. Blinding sunlight greeted her and the numbing cold bit at every pore of her body. Annja felt pain like she'd never experienced before in her life. Every fiber of her soul seemed like it was on fire.

She bled and sweated and froze as the mountain rumbled around her like an angry volcano.

"This way!"

Mike pointed down the slope toward the crash site of the plane. Tuk helped Annja up. "We've got to keep going!"

Annja shook her head. "I can't."

"You must! Don't give up on me now, Annja Creed!"

Mike came back and tried to scoop Annja up in his arms. He took two steps forward and then fell into the snow. It was too deep and he was still too weak himself to carry Annja.

"You've got to walk! We'll help you!"

Miniavalanches started breaking loose from the ice sheets and tons of snow and ice started rocketing down from the peak toward them. "Run!"

Annja felt like her legs were lead but she pushed herself further than she ever had before. She had to get down the slope.

Tuk ran along beside her, his legs still pumping like mad pistons.

Mike's big arms tried to lift Annja along when he could and the three of them kept stumbling along.

"Look out!"

A snow boulder rumbled past them, barely missing them all by mere inches. They kept trying to run through the waist-deep snows back toward the plane.

Annja wanted to tell Tuk to use his cell phone, but if she did he would have stopped and that would have been the end of them all. They had to keep moving. They had to make it back down the mountain.

And then Annja heard an incredible sound amid the thundering rumbles and cracks of rocks tumbling loose from their millennia-old perches.

A helicopter.

At first she thought she was imagining it, but then she saw the chopper appear overhead, its rotors beating the sky around it.

"It's Garin!" shouted Tuk. "He's found us!"

Annja tried to smile, but only took two more steps toward the helicopter before she tumbled and fell facefirst into the white snow.

37.

A gray, cloying mist surrounded Annja as she floated with no sense of time or s.p.a.ce. She could feel her strength returning slowly, and yet a big part of her had no desire to relinquish the peace she felt in this strange limbo world. It was easier here, she thought, than to have to go back to the real world.

But something needled at her persistently, poking its way into her dreamworld consciousness. It refused to leave her alone. And finally, after trying to ignore it for a long while, Annja succ.u.mbed.

"Annja!"

She heard the voices calling her, but resisted opening her eyes until the very last moment, hoping against hope that this was all part of a dream. That when she opened her eyes, it would be dark outside, she'd stare at the clock and see it was only three in the morning, heave a grateful sigh and then roll over to go back to sleep.

"Annja!"

Not this time.

She groaned and opened her eyes. The first thing she saw was Tuk's face roughly an inch from hers.

She nearly jerked herself right out of bed. "Tuk! Jeez, give a woman some room, would you?"

Tuk pulled back, his eyes moist with tears. "Oh, thank G.o.d you're back. The doctors, they said you were going to be fine, but I worried. I've never seen anyone take the abuse you took and live to tell the tale. I was worried. I sure was. But you're back now. Everything's great."

Annja pushed herself to sit up in the bed.

Tuk smiled, wiping his tears. "I've been keeping a watch over you every day just to make sure the doctors don't screw up."