Free The Fallen 3 by Thomas E. Sniegoski Page A

of woe about how fat his wife was becoming—when their world exploded in a flash of fire and the deafening roar of the end.
    But it wasn’t the end for all of them. Anatoli slowly turned his head, the beam of light from his safety helmet shining through the choking, dust-filled air as he sought out his friends. Bodies were scattered about, some partially buried beneath crushing rock, all of them lying horribly still. The sight of his friends stirred him to move. He carefully rolled onto his side, then slowly pushed himself up onto his hands and knees. Miraculously, he didn’t think hehad broken anything. He crawled across the rubble to the first of his comrades.
    “Hey,” he said, nudging the man who lay facedown. “Hey there, are you all right?”
    Anatoli rolled the man over. It was his closest friend, Pavel, who now stared up at him with empty eyes, dark blood streaming from his mouth and nose.
    There will be time for mourning later
, Anatoli told himself, fighting back tears. For now, he had to concentrate on finding other survivors and holding on until he could be rescued.
    He left Pavel where he’d found him and moved on to the others. He found Nikolai alive but barely conscious. Another worker—Vadim—who had begun working in Ulyanovskaya only a few weeks previous, was also living, although his legs had been badly injured, likely broken.
    The rest of Anatoli’s crew were not so lucky.
    He appeared to be the most unscathed from the blast and ensuing cave-in, and was able to cautiously crawl about to investigate their surroundings. It didn’t look good. They were trapped within a fairly large pocket, fallen rock surrounding them on all sides. The phone that was their only connection to the surface had been smashed beyond repair.
    Anatoli half considered trying to dig out some of the smaller rocks to see if he could find his way into an adjoining passage, but he was afraid of loosening more stone and jeopardizing their small sanctuary.
    “Looks like we’re going to be here for a little while,” he said, turning from the wall of rock to the other two survivors.
    Nikolai moaned as he sank into the grip of unconsciousness, while Vadim began to sob.
    Anatoli busied himself with trying to find the first-aid kit amid the debris, anything to help his two comrades with their pain. And that was when the screaming began.
    It was Vadim.
    Anatoli turned, illuminating the man’s thrashing body with his headlamp. He crawled on his belly over broken rock to his comrade, and was ready to lay a comforting hand upon his shoulder when he realized that there already was a hand on Vadim’s shoulder. In fact, there were two, one on either side of the man’s head. And the hands were sticking out from the wall of loose rock behind Vadim.
    Anatoli could not fathom what he was seeing, his brain attempting to rationalize. At first he thought it was one of their own, reaching through the rock wall from a pocket on the other side, but there was something not quite right about the hands.
    They were large, the skin leathery and dark brown. The thick fingers were clawed, and they ripped through Vadim’s heavy work shirt into his flesh beneath. Anatoli glimpsed the reflective shine of blood in his headlamp.
    “Help me,” Vadim begged, eyes wide with fear.
    Anatoli reached out to grab Vadim’s outstretched arms,but he did not act quickly enough. The clawed hands yanked mightily upon Vadim’s shoulders, pulling his injured body closer to the rock wall at his back.
    Vadim cried out in pain and terror. Suddenly there were more hands pushing through the rock and grabbing at the injured man’s arms and sides. They continued to pull on him, and Vadim shrieked all the louder, struggling to escape their clutches.
    Anatoli grabbed one of Vadim’s legs, which caused him to cry out in agony. On reflex, Anatoli released it, not wanting to cause his comrade any more pain than he was already feeling.
    The inhuman hands weren’t so considerate.