Dantes' Inferno (45 page)

That night, as I wander downtown, past the Nickel, where fires rage in oil drums, past the sleeping streets of commerce, the ziggurat gleams like the Tower of
Babel and Broadway flows like a holy river toward the promised lands of San Gabriel, Rosemead, El Monte.

John Dantes

6:31
A.M
.
Just outside Dantes' basement cell, U.S. Marshal Fitz nodded to Officer Jones. Through the window, both men could see what appeared to be the prisoner stretched on the bed, his body almost hidden by a blanket.

“Let's go,” Fitz snapped.

Jones glanced at his watch and frowned. “You're early.”

“Security move,” Fitz said gruffly, as Jones unlocked the door.

Marshal Fitz entered first, followed by Jones, who stepped reluctantly into the darkened cell.

“Put your hands where I can see them,” Marshal Fitz ordered. “I need you to stand up—slowly—and move away from the bed.”

Dantes' head emerged from under the blanket. “We're leaving now?” He sounded groggy and confused.

“Put your hands where I can see them,” Marshal Fitz repeated. “Over your head,
now
.”

Dantes stared down at the blanket. Then he looked back at the marshal. “I may need some help,” he said softly.

Marshal Fitz took one step forward. That was enough. Dantes swung the section of pipe like a baseball bat, and it connected with the marshal's right arm with a sickening crack. A second blow landed on Fitz's temple, and he stumbled backward.

Dantes had already lunged off the bed, and he grabbed Jones, pulling him forward so his head thumped against the wall.

There wasn't time to do anything else.

The explosion ripped up the floor, blasting through
concrete, sending a spray of shrapnel 360 degrees around the cell; like some fuming satanic beast, it tore its way up from hell, clawing through earth, through metal, spewing refuse, devouring life with its toxic breath.

Bringing darkness.

I neither died, nor kept alive—consider

With your own wits what I, alike denuded

Of death and life, became as I heard my leader.

The Inferno of Dante
, canto XXXIV; translated by Robert Pinsky

6:34
A.M
.
Sylvia opened her eyes to discover darkness.

She struggled to orient herself. Had it been minutes since the explosion? She didn't know if she'd been unconscious. She felt dazed, stunned.

Dust clogged her throat and lungs. She was trapped. An unbearable weight was pressing down upon her body.

If she tried to move, pain shot through her muscles. She couldn't see Sweetheart and Molly. She was deaf to every sound except the rush of blood through her arteries.

Abruptly, the sky seemed to lift up, dirt and rubble rained down, and then she could breath again—and move. She gulped air; wiping grit from her eyes, opening them to see a gray ghost. He was inches from her, on bent knees, straining to lift half a ton of rusting metal.

Sweetheart, illuminated by a faint glow, covered with dust.

“Get going,” he groaned, heaving the deadweight of the fallen ladder. Molly lay crumpled at his feet. “Find Purcell or Pete. They'll know how to get us out.”

Sylvia scrambled for the opening they had used to enter the vault; but it was gone, covered by debris.

“The other way,” Sweetheart whispered.

She turned slowly, searching for the only other possible exit. The flashlight on her hard hat still emitted a faint light. Her eyes found the outlines of an opening.

“You know where we are—I'll make sure we stay alive. Get help.”

Sylvia scrambled through the gaping black hole.

6:41
A.M
.
Here in the earthen tunnel, hot dark air pressed in on her like the breath of some massive enveloping beast. The passage was large enough so that she could pick up speed, moving at a crouching jog. At first the tunnel ran straight, and she had visibility up to ten or fifteen feet. But soon it took on more of a slope, angling up, then down. She was beginning to hyperventilate, and her legs threatened to cramp from the strain of maintaining the stooping posture.

Water trickled onto concrete; she splashed through the fetid puddles. As she moved, the space narrowed and flared, again and again.

At one point in the tunnel, the earth was so damp, water drizzled like misting rain, soaking through her clothes, stinging her eyes. The smell of wet earth was pungent; sticks and roots scraped her skin. She protected her face with raised arms, not stopping, afraid to slow down, all the while trying to gain some sense of orientation.

She must have been between ten and twenty feet below-ground. At most, she'd traveled a quarter mile since leaving the vault where Sweetheart and Molly were trapped. She
had no way of knowing if she had moved west, east, north, or south.

The beam of her flashlight flickered.

This is a dead end. The tunnel will collapse
.

The internal voice taunted.

I'm crawling into my own grave. I'll be buried alive
.

Angrily, she fought off the dread, ignoring the threat of another explosion, moving forward until someone grabbed her shoulder.

She cried out, slapping away rough arms. Adrenaline flooded her system; it took seconds to comprehend that her attacker was a
thing
, not a person. She gripped the loose segment of vertical pipe, groaning in frustration and fear.

Dirt stung her eyes, and she wiped her sleeve roughly against her face. For the first time, she realized minuscule splinters had penetrated her body and tiny dots of blood freckled her skin. She steadied herself, taking a few deep, slow breaths.

Her flashlight flickered out.

She was alone in the dark—alone with the quickening rhythm of her own heart.

She wrapped her arms around herself, rocking like a lost child in need of comfort. There was no going back—no going forward.

This is what it's like to die, she thought.

She pictured Serena's face.

This is dying
.

Then she thought of Sweetheart and Molly trapped in the ruined vault.

M and Dantes had enticed them into hell. She would fail to find help, and they would suffocate beneath the City of Angels.

She let out a single sound, and it echoed.

It echoed
 . . .

She felt around in the darkness, touching cold, clammy earth, rocks, sharp objects that cut into her palms. She shifted her body, scrambling 360 degrees until she caught it—

Light
. A faint circular stream seeping up through the ground.

She began to inch forward.

She crawled until she reached a ledge—and a black hole. The air was cooler here. Her pupils had dilated to absorb even a hint of light. She found herself staring down a twelve- or fifteen-foot drop.

She could barely make out the live gleam of water, a brackish stream, and the double thread of tracks directly below. This must have been a railroad tunnel (now abandoned) that connected to Union Station.

She looked for a way to lower herself into the tunnel. Within reach, a tangle of exposed re-bar extended into space.

Inching herself out over the edge of the hole, she gripped ridged metal. She crawled another few feet until her torso was suspended in air. She was using her body as a counter-weight.

Her feet slipped free, pulling the rest of her down through the opening. She clung to the re-bar as she reached full extension, swinging in midair.

She moved her hands slowly along rusting metal. The muscles in her shoulders and arms burned. Halfway out, the re-bar began to bend, giving way in slow motion.

Don't let it snap, she prayed.

When she was only a few feet from the end of the bar, she lost her grip. Abruptly, she was falling.

She landed hard. The flashlight on her hat flickered to life.

She lay stunned. When she finally moved, she did it
slowly. She made it to her knees. After a few moments, she righted herself, gingerly standing to survey the surroundings.

Apparently, she was inside an old railroad service and storage area. The space was cavernous, and the walls had been shored with beams and lined with metal transport crates.

The tracks were centered like a seam. She began to follow them, searching for daylight, air, freedom.

Within minutes, she reached a dead end. Long ago the tunnel had collapsed, or it had been intentionally sealed off. She retraced her steps.

Only to discover another dead end.

Fear made her light-headed. She forced herself to concentrate.

At some point, this tunnel had connected to main tracks. No longer. Entry and exit had been walled off.

Sylvia circled, letting the thin thread of light illuminate crevices, curves. But she found no evidence of a passage, a door, an egress. She sat down abruptly, exhausted.

That's when she saw the word sprayed in red on the earthen wall.
COCYTUS
.

She recognized it. Cocytus was the name of a river in the ninth circle of hell. A river where damned souls stayed immersed, frozen to the neck.

There was an opening above M's graffiti. The mouth of a narrow crawlway, roughly three feet by three feet. She'd missed it before because it was well above eye level.

She guessed she was near the site of the old Spanish pueblo of Los Angeles. Perhaps the passage had been part of an aqueduct, or maybe a primitive pipeline left over from the oil boom in the twenties? If so, it might provide escape.

She tried to gauge the distance to the opening. It was
out of reach. She'd never make it without a boost. She rolled a metal drum slowly across the floor.

When it was finally in place, she had the leverage she needed. She vaulted, pushing off with one foot, scrambling with the other. She dove headfirst into the hole, using her entire body to boost herself forward, gaining a few more inches.

The flashlight died.

She lay still in darkness.

It was a kind of surrender. For a few minutes, the fear evaporated. When she was ready, she moved. The passage was just large enough to allow her to belly-crawl.

To lose track of time. And space. To become completely disoriented
.

She reached a section so narrow, she found herself wedged in place. Her pulse—already fast—accelerated, and her breathing became quick and shallow. She could only wait out the worst: the dizziness, the nausea. She felt faint, and then her body became weightless; all pain dissolved as she called out . . .

Sound faded until there was only a ghostly, plaintive wind that whispered back.

“ . . . and demons from the deepest circle of hell would journey up to earth to steal the souls of the dead . . . but for earthly traitors these demons were not forced to wait for death . . . they could steal the soul at the very moment of betrayal . . . from which point, the soul would reside in hell, but the body would remain on earth, inhabited by the demon . . . they took your soul fifteen years ago, my friend, my enemy . . .”

“Dr. Strange, welcome.”

Blinding light exploded. Hot. White.

To reveal a metal-lined bunker, a type of Quonset hut.
Boxes, tanks, lumber, utility containers were stacked along the walls. The floor was dirt. The air smelled faintly of gas.

A figure came into focus. A man with short blond hair, a compact muscled body, striking features.

“You're just in time,” he said, squatting down until he was at eye level. He gripped a small knife in one hand.

“I know who you are,” Sylvia whispered, shifting her body gingerly so she could lean her weight against the wall. Her shoulders, her spine felt bruised and tender.

For the first time she noticed John Dantes, fifteen feet away, seated on a crate; his wrists were bound with duct tape, which was attached to a hook overhead.

“And you know John. It simplifies matters if you call me M.” He smiled ruefully.

“When you've caught your breath,” M began, “you might notice you are attached to an explosive device.”

She looked down. Her left arm was taped to a large, rectangularly shaped bomb.

“No sudden moves,” M said gently. “What with the explosives, and the tanks of acetylene. And I'd ignore any urge to smoke if I were you. Isn't that right, John?”

Dantes didn't respond.

Sylvia stared at him; there it was—the familiar sense that some unknown soul lived inside his skin. “Why are you doing this?”

M clapped his hands twice. “Excellent question. We were in the middle of something when you dropped by.” He eyed her speculatively. “Actually, I thought by now you'd be dead, suffocated, along with Sweetheart and his precious niece.” He shrugged.

“We don't have time for this.” Dantes sounded bored.

M waved him away, saying, “I was reminding Dantes that the
Inferno
was a journey of self-discovery—a journey to God. Historical and eternal. You're a student of the
human psyche—wouldn't you agree it's a journey to God?”