YOU WOULDN’T think that maggots squirming on your body were something a person could get used to, but I was so focused on the task at hand that it wasn’t long before I didn’t even notice them. With a twist of the corpse’s rib, the wood began to break away. I was moving the bone slowly, deliberately, but the sound of wood splintering was enough to make me want to giggle with maniacal glee.

Then a small chunk of the wood broke, and I felt some dirt trickle in and pour on my waist. I set the rib aside and fingered the gap. It was about an inch square. I dug my thumbs into the dirt on the edge and tried to pry it apart even further.

MY THUMBS were raw and bloody, and I’d gone through three more ribs, but more bits of wood had broken away. Now the gap was large enough that I could fit all of my fingers into it.

As I struggled with it, there was another cracking sound. I slid my hand along the lid, and realized that a foot-long split had appeared, stretching from the square gap in a straight line toward my face.

I continued pulling on the edge of the wood.

IT FELT LIKE it took forever, but I don’t think it was more than a few minutes before I managed to break away a long strip of the wood. More dirt poured onto my chest.

At this point, I had to start being really careful. I wasn’t sure how deep I’d been buried, and if too much dirt came crashing down the coffin lid might cave in and squash me like a…well, like a maggot.

Slow and steady.

My arms were agonizingly sore, forcing me to take a break. I rested them at my sides, closed my eyes, and tried to breathe easy.

I imagined Wesley snarling at me. “ Get a move on, ya slacker! ”

After a few minutes, I managed to break off another chunk of wood, and then began to vigorously scoop out handfuls of the exposed dirt and toss them to the foot of the coffin. Dirt was raining down on my face in small quantities, and I spit it out to the side.

I HAD DUG as high as my arms would reach. The digging part was pretty easy, since the grave had just been filled in and the dirt hadn’t had time to pack itself down.

Now I had more room to maneuver, and I set about breaking away more of the coffin lid.

THOUGH IT was hard to breathe, my spirits were high as I sat up, scraping my already-injured shoulder badly against a jutting portion of the lid, but certain that I was home free.

Sticky flesh clung to my back. I ignored it.

I’M GOING to make it!

I was filled with hope and energy. Despite this horrific ordeal, despite the fact that my chances of survival once I reached the surface might be slim, despite the fact that I might never see Helen, Theresa, or Kyle again, I felt recharged. I was getting out of here.

Sitting up straight, I dug with an incredible fervor. My arms could stretch almost to their full length over my head, so I had to be getting close.

I wondered if anybody was waiting above.

Would they bother to have somebody guard a grave?

There was only one way to find out.

MY HAND burst through to the surface. The cold air felt absolutely fantastic.

My other hand broke through, and I clutched the smooth ground above. It took several tries to work up the strength, but finally, I pulled myself out of the grave.

After being in complete darkness for so long, my eyes burned in the light. I just lay there, panting, completely exhausted.

I’d made it!

Then I heard somebody applaud.

“Now that was impressive. Nice work!”

Roger! It was Roger! But had he escaped, or was he still a prisoner?

I shielded my eyes from the light and turned around. “Rog!” I gasped.

“Ummm, nope, not Roger. Your traumatic experience has left you a bit delirious. This is your good friend Curtwood Foster.”

And it was. Foster sat on a folding chair, a paperback novel in one hand, and a martini in the other.

I just collapsed to the ground.

“Aw…is the poor guy tired?”

Foster set his book and drink aside, and then stood up and began to walk toward me. He cracked his knuckles. “You are so, so, so very dead.”

“You know, Foster,” I managed to say, “you were always my favorite of the group.”

“Isn’t that sweet? You know, I could take you into the operating room, but I’m really an old-fashioned kind of person at heart, so I’m going with the traditional beating to death.”

I pushed myself up. A violent kick to the side sent me right back down. I groaned in pain and rolled onto my back.

“No, no, don’t get up for me,” Foster said. “I have to say, the whole time I sat there I was hoping you’d make it out somehow. I almost dug you up myself. Because I really wanted to do this.” He kicked me in the side again. I wondered if my own ribs were going to look like Wesley’s by the time this was over.

Foster stepped away from me and raised his fists like a boxer. “Let’s make this fair. I’ll give you a couple of moments to get up. Maybe I’ll even give you a free punch. How’s that sound?”

“How about you…” I had to pause to take a breath, “…give me your gun?”

“I might, I just might. Get up. Fight like man.”

My muscles felt like they were being ripped from the bone as I got to my feet, but I couldn’t just lie there and let him kick me to death. I raised my fists, and then lost my balance and fell back to the ground.

“Now that’s just pathetic,” said Foster, taking out his gun. “Maybe I oughta blow off your kneecaps like I said, huh?”

I resumed my effort to get back to my feet. “Sure, if you want to bring the others here.”

“I don’t know, I think this place is pretty well soundproof. Should we test it?”

My legs buckled beneath me, but I kept from hitting the ground. “Sure…if you don’t think you can beat me.”

Foster extended the gun toward my face, and then strode over to me, keeping it pointed between my eyes the entire time. Right before the barrel connected with my face, he smacked the barrel of the gun against the side of my head, hard. I accidentally bit the side of my mouth and dropped to the ground yet again.

“Having a bit of trouble with your balance, aren’t you?” Foster asked. “Could be an inner ear problem.”

I wiped a trickle of blood from the corner of my mouth and made another effort to get up. Though in my current condition, even if I could get a punch in it probably wouldn’t be enough to knock a bird off its perch.

“You do have willpower, I’ll give you that,” said Foster. “Make you a deal. I’ll end this. One shot to the gut, one shot to each leg, one shot to each arm, and then I’ll put the barrel in your mouth and put you out of your misery? How’s that sound?”

I forced myself to shrug. “Will Daniel…reimburse you for the…extra bullets?”

“Probably not, but in this case, it’s my pleasure.”

I stood up as straight as possible. “I don’t mean to be rude, but…”

“But what?”

I motioned for him to wait while I caught my breath. “But why do you need a gun to fight me? Isn’t that kind of sad?”

“Now, see, you’re trying to convince me to throw away the gun to make this more of a challenge, but what you’re not realizing is that I’m the type of person who’s happy to torture and kill a helpless person strapped to an operating table. So while I appreciate your attempt, it’s not going to work.”

He lowered the gun so it was pointing at my belly.

“I wish you wouldn’t do that,” I said. “I’ve always been kind of proud that I have an outtie instead of an innie.”

“Well, now, you’ll just have to learn to be proud of your brand new, amazingly deep innie.”

“Nah.” I took a step to the side, and fell back into the open grave. My bare feet slammed down upon Wesley’s jaw, but I withheld the scream as I pushed myself down as far as I could go while I hurriedly searched through the coffin.