They were catching up, and she could hear the echoes of their footfalls. A phasor bolt hit the tunnel wall beside her and dissipated in a brilliant, red flash. They switched to ‘kill,’ she thought. They no longer want to capture me. From the sounds of boot leather hitting the floor she estimated they were forty yards behind in the low, dark tunnel.
Unexpectedly she came to a dead end. Her heart leapt into her throat as she thought the tunnel had ended and all was lost, but then she saw the bend and the tunnel continued into the dark.
She lengthened her pace and tried to speed up her stride, but running wasn’t easy, even with her short stature. The tunnel, no more than five feet from the floor to the ceiling and had been carved through solid rock.
Explosives had to be used causing the tunnel to be roughly hewn. It was irregular with abrupt turns.
She ran hard in a crouched position. Her head was bent while trying to look ahead. She avoided stepping on chunks of rock lying on the tunnel floor. She crouched lower as she jumped over a large patch of slimy, orange fungus expanding the width of the tunnel and growing up the walls.
She knew the men behind her had the same problem with running and even more since they were taller and had to stoop lower. The sound of their running, which echoed through the tunnel, grew fainter. She was putting distance between her and them.
For only a moment she took her light off the floor and shone it ahead trying to see the opening into the workman's tunnel, but this quick glance turned out to be a painful mistake. She didn't see the rock in time, stepped on it, and went sprawling to the ground. An excruciating pain shot up her leg, and she felt a warm sticky fluid oozing from her knee. Damn, she thought. The pain was excruciating, not so much from her knee as from her ankle. Get the hell up, she told herself as she lay gasping for breath on the tunnel floor. She wanted to lie there and rest, but knew she couldn't. Get up! she yelled at herself.
Finally, she rose to one knee and staggered to her feet. She started to run. But for all her effort, a sharp pain bit into her ankle, and she fell again to the ground. She was starting to feel panic—the patrollers were gaining. She urged herself up again and this time she adjusted her running in order to keep most of the weight off her injured ankle.
By the time she saw the opening into the workmen's tunnel most of the strain had been worked out of her ankle. Her ability to run, however, was not a hundred percent.
She heard voices in the access tunnel behind her. They sounded frustrated and angry as they ran and yelled back and forth.
Her injury had slowed her down enough that they had almost caught up. But they hadn't spotted her. She stepped gingerly into the workman's tunnel. She turned right and started running toward the city entrance. There was a slight limp in her gait, but she blocked the pain, stretched her stride, and fled into the darkness.
How much further? She remembered they had passed four access tunnels while traversing the main tunnel in search of Everette. And before that there was a sliding door leading into a hallway which had been reconditioned and put into operation by the underground. It was near the city entrance and ran parallel to the access tunnels.
It’s at least a half-mile, she thought. It’s too far. I'll never make it. As she continued to run she started thinking about the crystal pit. If she ended up there maybe her father could help her out, but if not, she would be at the mercy of the elements. They would put her to work in the cold—mining crystals. Her clothing wouldn’t be adequate, and the food wouldn’t be enough for the physical labor. She knew, and everybody in Newusa knew, if you were sent to the crystal pit, it was a death sentence.
She looked ahead. If she could reach that sliding door . . .
Behind her the footfalls of the patrollers became audible as they exited the small tunnel and started off in hot pursuit.
She could tell they were rapidly gaining, and she knew it was because they were in a larger tunnel. They didn't have to stoop while running
She quickened her pace. If she ran faster she might fall again, but if she didn’t, they would surely catch her.
Her footfalls kicked up dust, putting dirt and fungi spores into the air. It was a path a blind man could follow. In a distant corner of her mind she could still feel the pain from her ankle. By now she was gasping for breath, and beginning to feel weak.
If she had stayed home as Sam had suggested, she wouldn’t be in this mess. She knew there were informants working in the ranks of the revolutionaries. Why did she take this chance? Of course she wanted to help the people, and of course she wanted the revolution to succeed, but she should have been more selective about the work.
As she ran she continued to stare into the light of her handbeam illuminating the railroad ties and the rubble lying on or between them. She couldn't fall again.
Last one, she thought with a glimmer of hope. She passed the access tunnel. The passage had to be close, and if she could get there, she would be able to elude her enemy. She flashed her beam ahead. There it was, twenty yards away.
It gave her hope as she realized there was a chance for escape. Keep it going, she thought. Keep the legs pumping. I'm almost there.
But at that moment a flashing red bolt seared the top of her shoulder. Pain raced up her neck. Her pace slowed. Her chest was heaving in desperation for air.
From behind she could hear the footfalls of her pursuers coming quickly. The men were closer than she had thought. The entrance to the passage was only ten feet away. She dropped her handbeam, and with extreme effort she strove for the doorway. Three strides, long and fast. Her heart was pounding. Her lungs were rasping. Her knees began to buckle as she lunged into the passageway.
From the floor she reached up and hit the palm lock. The door slide shut before the man's outstretched fingers.