I turned back to Gus. “OK. I'm going to climb over there and get the Piece. You're not going to shoot me while I do that. Agreed?"
Gus scrunched what was left of his face as he sorted out my terms, then finally nodded. “Get the Piece!"
“Right," I muttered to myself.
“Be careful, Zacky!"
I smiled at my sweet little dead friend. “I will," I promised.
I'm not a big rock climber, but the wall was really bumpy, like maybe whoever had designed this thing had meant for us to climb over to the pedestal this way. Hand over hand, foot over foot. I made darned sure that my holds were secure before moving on to the next handhold or foothold. It was slow going, mainly because I made the mistake of looking down when I was about five feet across.
Below me was absolute darkness, and I've already men
