“Getting it,” Mac said at last. But his legs were still tied when I saw the door opening.
“No more,” I whispered. The two of us sat frozen as Van Lyle walked again in front of us. Mac had left the cords around both wrists, and his forearms rested on the arms of the wheelchair. It looked as though he was securely tied, hand and foot. As for me, I was still taped like a trussed chicken, arms and legs.
“So, Jeanie,” Lyle said. “You don’t know if you’ll ask for mercy, eh? Well, I ought to tell you that Dr. Griss left the final steps in my hands. How you go is completely up to me — and to you. Quick and easy, or slow and hard. Do you think you can persuade me to be nice to you? Let’s find out.”
He moved behind me and pushed my wheelchair forward. Then he came past me, to the panel that controlled the great double doors.
“Take a look at this, Jeanie.”
The doors slid open. Pungent fumes rose from the pit that was revealed before me, searing my throat. I saw a great pond of dark liquid, just beyond the doors and a few feet down.
“Ten seconds in there,” Lyle said conversationally, “and you’d be choking. Half a minute, and your skin would start to peel off. But we don’t have to rush everything like that. You can be dipped in and out like a bit of beef fondue, a toe or a foot or a hand at a time, as often and as slow as I choose to do it. Would you like to beg now, Jeanie? Or would you like to take your trial dip this very minute? Or maybe you would like me to be really merciful, and knock you unconscious first?”
I could hardly move, but I jerked and screamed and writhed against the tapes, making as much noise as I possibly could. Lyle laughed delightedly. Between us we were making a frightful din. How much of my screaming was genuine panic? I don’t know, but I’m sure a good deal of it was, because my chair was rolling steadily closer to the edge without being pushed. There was a small lip at the very brink of the pit, but it might not be enough to halt the forward motion.
I was an arm’s length from death — the chair nearing the edge — Van Lyle walking by my side and peering at my face, savoring my expression.
Then, from behind — at last — came the squeak of unoiled wheels.
Before Van Lyle could move, McAndrew was on him. Mac had freed his legs and was out of the wheelchair. Smarter than I would have been, he came forward in one silent rush, pushing the wheelchair in front of him like a ram. The edge of the seat caught Lyle behind the thighs at knee level. He fell backward into a sitting position. Before he could cry out he was at the edge. He and the chair went right on over. There was a scream and a great splash. McAndrew halted at the brink, staring down.
“Mac!” I screamed. I was still rolling.
He half-turned and threw himself in front of my wheelchair, stopping it with his own body. At the very edge, we both peered into the pit.
Lyle had gone in flat and facedown. He rose to the surface in a cloud of steam, screaming and clawing at his eyes. As we watched, his hair and skin began to smoke and frizzle. His arms waved and thrashed down on either side of him. Then he went under again.
The vat was more corrosive than Lyle had suggested. Twice more he rose, howling in agony. But the liquid must have reached his lungs. By the time he went under for the last time he was silent, a dark-green mass that was already losing its human form.
And while Van Lyle was dying, McAndrew kept tearing at the tapes that held me. I think it was the only thing that kept him from plunging in himself to try to help.
The tapes were strong, and Mac’s hands were trembling. It was two more minutes before I could stand up, advance shakily to the brink, and peer down into the choking green fumes. I saw a dark vat, with sluggish ripples moving across the surface. About ten feet away from the edge floated an amorphous rounded lump.
“Don’t look,” McAndrew said. “He’s dead.”
“Of course he is. But it was his own damned fault.”
I don’t know how angry I sounded, but Mac winced. “Come on, Jeanie,” he said. “It’s over now. Let’s get out of here.”
“It’s not.” And then, when he stared at me. “It’s not over. Not yet. Come on, Mac. I may need help.”
I ran back, through the sequence of chambers that threaded the food production facility like beads on a necklace. Anna Griss sat at a table in the third one, calmly reading. She had just enough time to cry out in surprise before I reached her.
I lashed out and caught her with my fist high on the left cheek. While she was still reeling backward, partly stunned, I grabbed her in a neck lock.
“Come on, Mac. Help me. Back to the vats.”
He wasn’t much use, but it didn’t matter. My own adrenaline level was so high, I could easily have carried her all the way myself. She was faintly struggling when I thrust her into the remaining wheelchair. The sticky tape that had held me was no good any more, but the cords that had bound Mac were enough to tie her.
I wheeled her to the very edge, so that the acrid corrosive vapors filled her throat and mine.
“That’s Van Lyle down there.” I pointed to the sodden green hulk, floating almost submerged. “You’re going after him.”
“Ohmygod. No, no.” She was panting, shaking her head with its newly disordered hair and smudged make-up. “Don’t push me over. Don’t kill me. Please.”
“You were ready enough to see us killed. Here you go, Anna Griss.” I tilted the chair far forward, so that all that held her from the vat were her bonds. “This is what people get who mess around with me. You’re dead.”
I put my face close to hers. She was too frightened for tears, but her staring eyes were watering in the poisonous fumes.
“Say your prayers,” I whispered. “Say goodbye.”
“No. Oh, please.” She was straining back, away from the deadly vat. “Don’t. I’ll do anything. Anything!”
“Jeanie!” cried McAndrew.
“Shut up, Mac. This is between me and her.”
I moved the chair back a couple of feet and walked around in front of it to gaze into her eyes. “Look at me, Anna Griss. I’m not going to kill you — this time. But one more problem with you and you’re dead. Do you understand? If the sight or sound or smell of you crosses my path again, ever, I’ll come after you. And I’ll get you. Don’t ever doubt that. I’ll get you.”
She did not speak, but she nodded. I turned to McAndrew.
“I think she has the message. If she annoys either of us again, she’ll be pig feed. Come on, Mac.”
“You can’t just leave her! She might go over the edge.”
“If she goes, she goes.” I grabbed his arm. “No big loss. But you and I are leaving. Come on.”
He kept turning to look at her, but he allowed me to lead him away. I did not look back.
“You wouldn’t have, would you?” he said at last, when we had walked through half a dozen chambers. “You wouldn’t have killed her, no matter what she did.”
It was obvious what he wanted to hear. “No. I wouldn’t have killed her.”
“Then why did you do all that, threatening her?”
“Because I had to. I might as well ask, why did you push Van Lyle over.”
“But he was going to kill you! I didn’t think — I just did it. Like you when you were screaming, going toward the pit. You just did it. What a bit of luck that was, Lyle leaving your mouth untaped! Otherwise you’d not have been able to scream, and when I ran at him he would have heard me coming.”
I don’t usually care what credit I get. But that was a bit too much.
“Mac,” I said. “Listen to me. I’m going to tell you something about the invariants of nature. You have yours for physics and mathematics, determinants and momentum and conserved vector currents. And I have mine — the invariants of human nature: Love, and jealousy, and fear, and hate. Van Lyle was a cruel, sadistic bastard. He was like that when we first met him, he was like that out in the Oort cloud, and he was still like that until the moment he died. He couldn’t change his nature. I deliberately told him that I wouldn’t be able to beg and scream and grovel with my mouth taped. After that there was absolutely no way he’d muzzle me — no matter what Anna Griss told him to do. He wanted to see my terror, and hear my screams. And so I had the chance to free you.”