Earthcore

Chapter Forty-three

Angus washed up on a sharp bend deep inside the ship, a wall made of finely fitted limestone blocks. The wall redirected the river back down the bend. Some of the blocks looked badly eroded, while others looked new, as if they were replaced when the water did too much damage. A light coating of platinum dust covered the blocks, sparkling lightly.

As he looked about, he wondered when the nightmare would end. Light from far above filtered past the edge of the thousand-foot-high cracked hull. River mist filled the air, freezing the light in a perpetual, wafting fog.

He didn't care about the platinum dust. All he cared about were the silverbugs.

Thousands of them.

Clinging to the walls and wriggling on the floor, like the inside of a beehive or an anthill. Angus noted with relief that these silverbugs were all a little scratched, a little beat-up, a little dingy. No new ones here.

He sat at the edge of a dome-shaped, cathedral-like structure complete with its own softly glowing light. Erosion had long ago collapsed the dome's outside edge, exposing the interior view to the river. That same erosion had probably forced the rocktopi — or more likely, the silverbugs — to build the breakwater. A level stone floor reached away from the wall and into the dome.

In the dome's center, fifty feet from the breakwater and dangling like a low-hanging chandelier, hung a large, polished orb, about ten feet in diameter and poised over a large hole. Angus remembered his map and the strange line that ran from the ship's center deep into the Earth, far deeper than his sensitive instruments could read. Puzzle pieces clicked in his brain, clicked home with force. The orb could only be one thing, really.

A nuke.

And it looked like a big one at that. A nuke, of course, was his best guess. The rocktopi technology could have anything hanging there, but logic dictated it to be a bomb of some sort. Another mile down and the temperature would exceed the boiling point — no life could exist there.

Movement on the orb caught his eye. A silverbug scurried across its curved reflective surface. The silverbug stopped and opened a panel, revealing a small chamber. Even from this distance, Angus could see the silverbug's “head” wasn't the familiar wedge-shape, but a trio of tiny cable-arms, waving like grass in the wind. It instantly reminded him of the three-fingered rocktopi tentacle tips. The cables dipped into the chamber, moved about, then pulled out as the silverbug shut the panel and crawled out of sight around the orb's far side.

"Maintenance,” Angus said in awe. “That's what these fucking things did originally — maintenance."

A small click-click of metal on stone interrupted his observations. He turned his head slowly to the right; a pair of silverbugs with wiggling tentacle heads sat less than ten feet away. They just perched there, observing, probably communicating with others. Angus sat stock-still, suddenly realizing that he'd left the jammer back on the beach, back by O'Doyle.

Tiny splashing sounds came from his left.

He turned, horrified to see another pair of silverbugs moving swiftly through the shallows toward him. Their round bodies, while heavy, were apparently airtight. The silverbugs floated like bobbers while their legs moved stiff and steady like oars on a slave galleon.

Angus pushed off the wall, holding the flotation device to his chest as he back-kicked into the current. The silverbugs followed, moving with surprising swiftness through the water. Angus kicked harder, the silverbugs closed in like slow-motion piranha. Finally they turned back, just as the river's strong current began to pull at him and drag him away, out of the ship.

The rest of the ship whizzed by, blurred by water splashing up from barely submerged chunks of hull. The dimness of the canyon-like breach suddenly gave way to the full blinding light of the artificial suns. Angus kicked desperately, fighting for the far shore. He fought against the tugging current and soon waded into the shallows, exhausted, drained, but smiling with success. On the far side of the ship the sparkling platinum dust was so thick it was like mud — his feet sank in up to his ankles as he victoriously walked out of the water.

There it was. Clear as day the entrance to the Linus Highway sat invitingly only twenty yards from where he stood. He tossed the flotation device aside and stumbled forward.

Almost home — only a little climb now stood between him and the likelihood of a massive rescue team. Angus Kool sprinted to the Linus Highway and ascended, headed for the surface.

The Marco/Polo unit beeped softly. The green, illuminated display's black letters clearly spelled the approach of an EarthCore employee.

Angus Kool.

Fifty yards away.

Kayla smiled.

Angus heard movement up ahead. He stopped, frozen like a terrified rabbit. He listened for the rustling of dead leaves, but heard none. Nor did he hear the click-click of silverbug feet. He'd left the party far behind, so who could be in front of him?

A rescue party.

A woman's voice called out. “Doctor Kool? Doctor Kool, are you there?"

"I'm here!"

The woman's footsteps came faster, closer.

"Hold on, Doctor,” the woman's voice called. “I'm coming for you."

Seconds later the light of her headlamp filled the tunnel. She strode into view, a nasty-looking machine gun held in front of her.

Web gear covered a yellow EarthCore KoolSuit smeared with dirt and soot. Dirty blond hair spilled out from beneath an EarthCore mining helmet. A pair of night-vision goggles hung around her neck.

"Doctor Kool, are you all right?"

"Yes, I'm fine,” Angus said. Rescuers — he felt immensely relieved. He was going to make it out after all. “Who are you?"

"EarthCore sent me,” the woman said with a smile. “We're here to get you all out. Where are the others?"

"The rocktopi killed them. We have to get out of here right away.” Angus didn't care if his lie was soon discovered, as long as he made it to the surface before O'Doyle came hopping up the Linus Highway.

"Rocktopi? You mean those tentacled monsters?"

Angus nodded impatiently. “Yes, and there's more back there, now let's go."

"Hold on,” Kayla said, yanking on his arm to keep him from running up the tunnel. “I'm here to get everyone out. Don't you want to get the others?"

"Are you fucking deaf?” Angus said. He needed to get out. He could almost feel O'Doyle lumbering up the tunnel toward him. “I said they are dead. Now you obviously know who I am and my position with EarthCore, so I am ordering you to take me to the surface right now!"

Kayla cocked her head slightly to the side, irritation clear on her face.

She was so fast Angus never saw the butt end of the Galil before it smashed into his mouth, knocking his left incisor across the tunnel floor, fracturing his cheekbone, and dropping him unconscious to the ground.

The party prepared to tackle the river, hoping to take it through the ship to the Linus Highway waiting beyond. Lybrand's condition grew steadily worse. Connell watched O'Doyle — the big man still looked like death warmed over, but he called forth some reserve of strength and took charge.

Randy's pack bore a flotation device identical to Angus's. O'Doyle pulled the tab and lashed the swelling floater to Lybrand's chest, just under her chin, so she'd stay afloat even if she passed out. When he finished, O'Doyle tied everyone together with long pieces of rope.

"What if I get tangled up in this?” Veronica asked, her voice thick with tension as she stared at the monstrous river.

"That's a chance we have to take,” O'Doyle said. “The water's rough and we don't have much time. If you're not tied, and you can't get to the bank after we pass through the ship, the river will carry you away and we'll have no way of going after you."

Veronica nodded glumly. Connell couldn't blame her. He didn't much like the idea of a nylon rope around his chest while fighting that demonic, black river. They had plenty of slack, about twenty feet between each person.

The big man gave instructions, pointing to the rough map Mack once used to guide them through the tunnels. Angus's magic computer map was either with the cowardly little genius or clutched in the dead hands of Randy, somewhere deep inside the ship. Either way, they weren't getting it back.

"The river takes a sharp bend in the middle of the ship,” he said. “We'll stay on the near side in the shallows until we get there, then when we come off the bend we'll start kicking hard for the far shore."

The sound of a hundred simultaneous screeches tore at the air like the battle-cry of a demon army. All heads snapped toward the distant fissure. Even from far off, they could make out a wave of rocktopi, a flashing blitzkrieg of alien anger chewing up the distance at a frightful pace. The rocktopi charged with singleminded abandon. Light from their flashing bodies looked dim under the artificial suns’ glare, but the meaning of the murderous oranges and reds was all too evident.

The party erupted in rushed activity as hands raced to tie off ropes. Connell stuffed the scrambler into his waterproof beltpack. He cinched the knot around his chest and stepped out into the shallows, looking with trepidation at the river's billowing current.

O'Doyle quickly checked the rope holding the floatation device on Lybrand's chest, then pulled her into the water.

They were tied in a chain, Connell to Veronica, Veronica to Lybrand, Lybrand to O'Doyle and O'Doyle to Sanji. Veronica splashed into the water, panic etched on her face as the rocktopi closed to within a hundred yards. Their screeching filled the air, fighting for auditory dominance against the river's ceaseless growl and the steady plinking of current-driven rocks smashing against the ancient platinum hull.

Some of the rocktopi stopped and scooped at the ground. Heavy, thunking splashes plunked on the river's surface as the limestone aerial assault began.

Sanji cinched off his rope and dashed for the river. O'Doyle and the others swam out toward the current, feeling it pull and suck at their bodies. Sanji's feet splashed through the shallows.

He almost made it.

A lucky, arcing shot caught him: a softball-sized rock slammed into the side of his head. He teetered like a wobbling bowling pin, then fell face-first into the river with a heavy splash.

The rocktopi warriors, more than two hundred strong, moved to within sixty yards.

"Sanji!” Veronica screamed. She fought the current's edge, swimming toward him. Connell stopped her, pulling back until the current took them both. The rope went taught, Connell and Veronica's weight pulling Lybrand's floating body further into the water. The three of them dangled like dead branches at a river's edge, the swift water kicking up about their faces. Rock peppered the surface as the sprinting rocktopi closed to within fifty yards.

O'Doyle pulled against the rope and the river's current, fighting to reach Sanji, who lay face down in the water, his fat body floating limply in the shallows. A fist-sized rock smashed into O'Doyle's right arm, spinning him around. He lost his one-legged balance and fell into the water. The swift current pulled him ten feet downstream until the rope that connected he and Sanji snapped taut.

Sanji remained face-down in the water, unmoving.

Connell stared at the onrushing mass of screeching rocktopi, now within twenty-five yards and moving impossibly fast. “O'Doyle, let's go!” He kicked hard, pulling Veronica farther into the current.

"We can't leave him!” she screamed at Connell.

O'Doyle looked up at the rocktopi, his face filled with anguish, then back at Lybrand and Connell and the hysterical Veronica. Another rock thudded off his broad chest. The crew dangled at the rope's edge, held in place as if Sanji were a human anchor. The first of the rocktopi splashed into the shallows, moving forward with lightning quickness. Rocks splashed about O'Doyle like machine-gun fire.

He pulled his knife.

"No!” Veronica screamed, trying to pull away from Connell.

Connell pulled hard on the rope, yanking her back. “He has to — or we all die!"

O'Doyle cut Sanji's rope.

The current seemed to rejoice in the sudden freedom from the anchor, catapulting them downstream. Rocks ripped the water like stone rain. Connell chanced one look back as he fought the raging current, and recoiled in horror.

Sanji's head lifted, and he took a deep, gasping breath.

It was his last.

The rocktopi swarmed on Sanji's body, platinum knives flying through the air along with his blood.

The greedy river sucked Connell and the others into the ship's shadows, and within seconds the butchers were left behind, out of sight.

Chapter Forty-four

Hands roughly shook his body. Angus slowly opened his eyes. Shooting pains bounced through his head, a pinball game of agony. He wasn't sure if he had any teeth left. His face felt numb and swollen. He couldn't feel his tongue. He lay facedown. He tried to rise, but his hands wouldn't move from behind his back. The digging sting of thin wire held his arms in place.

"Mphmh,” Angus said. He couldn't see what she'd stuffed in his mouth, but whatever it was made it nearly impossible to breathe. It tasted like rubber.

"Well, the little fucking prick is awake,” the woman said. “Now we can get cracking."

"Mpphhm.” His eyes were now wide open, watching her open and close a rust-speckled pair of pliers.

"Hush, darling,” she said, a loving smile on her face. “Don't bother talking till I take the ball-gag out of your mouth."

Open and close.

Angus watched the pliers carefully, noting the wear on the stainless steel handle, the nutcracker-like notches just inside the business end.

"Now I'm going to remove the ball and ask you a few questions,” she said sweetly, brushing a wild lock of bright red hair away from Angus's sweaty, dirty face. “You're not going to make a sound, except to quietly answer those questions. Nod if you understand."

Open and close.

Angus nodded once, eyes never leaving the pliers.

"Good. Now we're going to make this quick. Unfortunately, I don't have the proper amount of time to spend with you. I'd love to get to know you better, buddy boy, believe me. You've caused me a lot of grief in the past few days. Do you know what I used to do for a living?"

Open and close.

Angus shook his head no.

"I used to torture people.” Her tone remained soft, almost loving. “I did a few other things, too, but my main job was interrogation. And I'm good at it, buddy boy. Believe me. So if you make any noise, it's going to get rough on you. Understand?"

Open and close.

Angus nodded violently.

"Good.” She stroked his hair. “You're a smart man, Angus Kool, the smartest I've ever met. However, as smart as you are, I want to make sure you've got all the data you need to make a decision. That's what you scientists need, isn't it? Lots and lots of data?"

Open and close.

Angus picked up her gist immediately and shook his head violently no.

"Oh, sure you do.” She stood and walked behind him, out of his line of sight. He pulled against the bonds with a desperate panic, but the wire only dug deeper into his wrists. He tried kicking, but found his feet bound firmly as well.

He felt a knee on his back, pressing into his spine.

"You need lots of data, buddy boy. Enough data to keep me out of the NSA. That's what you want, isn't it? You want to keep me out of the NSA? Isn't that right, you little fucking prick?"

Angus felt her hands on his gloved fingers. He tried to fight, to make a fist, but it was too late. She cranked hard on his index finger, straightening it toward the back of his hand, almost breaking it.

He felt the cool steel of the pliers close around the first knuckle of his finger.

"Mpphh! Mmmhph!"

The pliers crunched down. He screamed and screamed, but little could be heard around the ball-gag.

The party clung to the breakwater at the river's bend. All of them stared into the dome, stared at the large, reflective orb hanging from the center.

"Oh my God,” Connell said. “It's still here."

Veronica floated in the water at the wall's edge, clinging to her silverbug bobber. Fatigue sapped her, both physically and mentally, the strain of sleepless hours and the anguish of Sanji's brutal death filling her with a dark spirit. She'd raged against Connell and O'Doyle as she floated down the churning, pounding river, so weak she could barely keep her head above water. They'd cut Sanji loose, left him to die. Her mind churned with pumping thoughts of violent revenge against the two, how she could get them for their cowardice.

But those thoughts faded before she'd even reached the river's bend. If O'Doyle hadn't cut the rope, they'd all be dead, not just Sanji. Victims of the bloodthirsty aliens who'd long since outlived any purpose in the cosmos. Thoughts of revenge against Connell and O'Doyle quickly faded. They weren't to blame anyway.

The rocktopi were.

And the silverbugs.

She floated weakly in the water, her hair hanging limp and wet around her face, staring at the instrument of revenge dangling like a giant Christmas ornament over a shaft that ran straight to the depths of hell. Hell. That was where she'd send the rocktopi and their vicious little machines. Straight to hell.

"Connell, there're silverbugs all over the place,” O'Doyle said. “Get the damn scrambler out."

"Screw that,” Connell said. “Let's just go! Let's get the hell out of here."

"I need a rest, Connell,” O'Doyle said gravely.

Veronica tore her eyes away from the orb and looked at O'Doyle. One thick arm held Lybrand's head, making sure her face stayed above the surface. She hung limply; the float tied to her chest the only thing keeping her from sinking.

"Yeah, Connell,” Veronica said quietly, just loud enough to be heard over the river's metallic, plinking echo. “I need a rest too."

Connell swam to the wall and pulled himself up. Platinum flakes clung to his hands and his body, to any part of him that touched the dust-covered wall. Silverbugs converged toward him, coming across the damp ground, scrambling down from their perches inside the arced roof above the giant orb. Veronica heard small splashes, and was stunned to see silverbugs skittering like water beetles across the surface at the river's edge. An angry chorus of clicks and whirs filled the air.

Connell fumbled with his beltpack, pulled out the scrambler and snapped it on.

Almost instantly, the silverbugs’ coordinated movement collapsed into a jumble of wandering confusion. The current caught one and sent it washing downstream, lost in the frothy rapids.

Veronica swam to the wall and pulled herself up. She and Connell helped pull Lybrand up onto the wall, then helped O'Doyle. Veronica looked at her companions, all exhausted, all wounded, all doomed. She knew, now, that none of them would make it out alive. Too many rocktopi, too many injuries, too far to travel. They were all going to die.

Just like Sanji.

Just like Randy.

Just like Mack.

Just like Jansson.

Just like Fritz.

Just like Lashon.

Veronica wouldn't let it be for nothing. She stood and walked into the chamber toward the dangling orb, eyes focused and blazing with hatred. She absently tried to untie her rope as she walked.

Connell rushed toward her. “Veronica, I don't think we should move away from the water.” He grabbed her shoulder. She shrugged his hand away.

"It doesn't matter, Connell,” she said, her eyes scanning the chamber, looking for what she knew had to be waiting. There. She saw the control panel, the same one illustrated on the alcove carving.

"Why doesn't it matter, Veronica?” Connell asked gently. He obviously didn't have the faintest idea of how his voice sounded odd, as if he were patiently talking to a child.

"It doesn't matter because I'm not going in the water again,” Veronica said without looking at him. “I'm staying here."

"What do you mean you're staying here?” Connell matched her steps toward the large, spotless control panel. The rope that tied them together dragged limply behind. “We're almost out of here."

She stopped, turned, and looked into his eyes.

"I've got to do it,” she said. “I've got to destroy them. Them and all of this. It doesn't belong here, can't you understand that? They're not a part of this reality."

"You're upset,” he said. “And understandably so. But Sanji's gone, and you can't sacrifice yourself. It won't bring him back. Besides, how could you figure all of this out?"

"I'm smart, remember? Cover of National Geographic and all that. Little ol’ thing like a ten-thousand-year-old alien bomb shouldn't faze me a bit."

Connell grabbed her fiercely by the shoulders. “No! No way! I've had enough people die in this godforsaken place, and I won't allow another to be killed. You're coming with us!"

His fingers dug painfully into her shoulders. She knew he meant it. He would take her by force, if necessary, back into the river. He was injured, but still much stronger than her. There was no way she could stop him from dragging her into the water.

"Okay,” she said quietly, hanging her head. “I… I don't know what I was saying. I don't want to stay here."

"Goddamn right you don't!” Connell said, pulling her back toward the water by one arm. “O'Doyle, your rest is over, we've got to go."

"Yes sir, boss,” O'Doyle said, gently slipping Lybrand back into the water and following her in. “Check your ropes — this is where the river gets rough and we have to swim across."

Connell firmly pushed Veronica toward the water. She bent down at the wall's edge and slipped in with a small splash. He switched off the scrambler and stuffed it into his beltpack, then jumped in. The silverbugs suffered a collective shiver, then returned to their coordinated activity.

"Ready?” Connell asked. Veronica and O'Doyle nodded.

They pushed toward the river's center.

Veronica chanced a look back over her shoulder. The silverbugs wandered across the orb's polished surface, keeping it perpetually prepared to fulfill its role. Over ten thousand years they'd been down here, under this mountain, older than any human civilization, older than any human religion. How long would they continue to exist? A poisoned, dying race, barely hanging on to intelligence, barely above the level of animals, kept alive only by their caring machines.

How long?

Weakness filled Veronica — it was all just too much. The current started to tug at her exhausted body.

"Connell,” she said softly, then closed her eyes and stopped moving. She slipped below the surface.

Chapter Forty-five

Veronica!” Connell thrashed about madly, searching for any sign of her. He couldn't see her under the murky black water.

"Pull on your rope!” O'Doyle yelled. “The rope!"

Connell suddenly remembered the rope tied about his chest, the other end tied around Veronica. He pulled it while fighting to stay afloat. Like reeling in a dead fish, her motionless body broke the surface once and then again sank below. Connell dove toward her.

The current's edge tugged at both of them, sending them gently downstream. He swam with powerful strokes, ignoring his body's pain and fatigue. He reached her sinking body in seconds, grabbed her limp form and started pulling her toward the surface.

Suddenly she came alive with violent motion, pulling him under. Instinct kicked in and Connell pumped toward the surface, momentarily forgetting that he'd been trying to save her. She grabbed at his waist, pulling him down again. Air bubbles escaped his lips. His eyes widened with panic.

He felt a hand at the small of his back as his head broke the surface. The current tugged firmly at him, pulling him toward the center of the river. He felt his rope snap tight, then relax slightly as his weight pulled Veronica downstream. Where was she? He felt the rope start to bob tight again, then suddenly all tension disappeared. The rope floated limply to the surface.

Veronica's head surfaced upstream and she loudly gasped for air. She swam clumsily toward the shore, his knife in one of her hands, his beltpack in the other.

"Veronica, come back!” Connell struggled with all his might against the current, which hungrily tried to suck him downstream. He kept pumping, kept kicking, and felt the current ease up as he closed on the shallows.

A sudden jerk around his waist yanked him back. His muscles screamed in exhaustion as O'Doyle and Lybrand's weight pulled him downstream.

"O'Doyle, help me!"

"I can't! The current's got us!"

Connell fought to reach Veronica, who stumbled onto the shallows one hundred yards downstream from the orb. It was a battle he couldn't win. O'Doyle's weight pulled him into the current's strength, and they shot downstream like a speedboat. He managed one last look back before he turned his attention to surviving the deadly river.

Already tiny and far away, Veronica waved good-bye.

"Well, buddy boy, I think we're finished,” Kayla said with an air of satisfaction. There were only five people left, they had no guns, and they were coming her way. Angus had told her everything.

The Dense Mass was an alien ship. The aliens? They were the monsters that had attacked the camp and slaughtered the EarthCore people. The monsters, he called them “rocktopi,” were in the tunnels, but they wouldn't go near the ship, and they wouldn't go into the Dense Mass cavern. She knew he was telling the truth — when Kayla Meyers finished her work, they all told the truth.

Tears streaked Angus's face and snot bubbled out his nose. Quiet whimpers revealed the shearing pain of his broken knuckles. He still lay on his stomach, hands and feet tied behind him, eyes and cheeks shimmering with wetness.

Kayla stooped and kissed his forehead, then fastened the ball-gag straps around his head. The dirty rubber filled his mouth with an acrid taste, covering his tongue with sandy grit. He coughed violently, desperately trying to clear his nose, splattering snot on the cave floor. He sucked in a ragged breath, eyes wide with panic.

"I'll be back soon,” Kayla said hooking the Galil strap over her shoulder like any other woman would sling a purse. “I need to get all the information I can about this place, and you're so damn smart, I think you're just the man to help me. You and I can have a nice long talk as soon as I nail the others."

Kayla switched off her headlamp and walked down the tunnel, leaving him in the pitch-black darkness. Helpless and terrified. Shuddering, he listened for the click click of a knife-wielding silverbug — he knew it couldn't be far away.

Connell dragged his weary body onto the rocks and fell flat, the river's ripples licking his prone form. O'Doyle and Lybrand lay immobile, half in and half out of the water. They'd made it across. He had to go back for Veronica; she was crazy and needed help. But first he had to rest, just for a moment. His heaving chest was the only body part that moved. He'd never been this tired. Never. If he made it to the surface he'd sleep for a month.

Centuries of erosion had exposed a small, bubble-shaped room just at the hull's far edge, probably only a few feet from the Linus Highway. Changes in the river's course had filled the room with sand and rocks. The ground shimmered with platinum dust so thick it might have been freshly fallen snow.

Deep footprints in that platinum dust showed where someone had come ashore.

Angus.

Ignoring the pain, the all-powerful fatigue, Connell struggled to his feet and stumbled toward O'Doyle.

"Get up,” Connell said between gasps of air. “Let's get her in that little room, then we can catch our breath."

O'Doyle nodded. The two of them barely managed to drag Lybrand the fifteen feet into the small spherical room's shadows before they collapsed.

"I'm sorry about Dr. Reeves,” O'Doyle said, compassion clear in his eyes. “Sometimes people just crack under pressure. There's nothing you can do about it."

"She may be nuts, but she knows what she wants to do, and that's what's got me scared,” Connell said. “Remember that big dangling orb we saw at the breakwater?” O'Doyle nodded. “Well, that's some kind of massive self-destruct mechanism. I think she's planning on blowing the whole place up. If it's still working, it will wipe out the whole mountain."

O'Doyle stared back with eyes that could no longer be surprised by bad news. “Fuck a duck,” he said, then dropped his head to the ground.

They lay still for several minutes, then Connell lifted his heavy head and looked at O'Doyle and Lybrand. Lybrand was still alive. For how much longer, Connell didn't know. She probably should have died in the river. It seemed unfair, somehow, that O'Doyle bring her this far only to see her die so close to the surface. There was no way she could make it; her KoolSuit was out of coolant; the greedy water had washed away the last traces of the life-insuring fluid.

He felt deeply for O'Doyle. Memories of Cori's sudden, horrid death in the car accident filtered into his brain. He missed her, wished she was there now, wished he could just give up, roll over and die and be with her again. But he couldn't give up — lives still depended on him. O'Doyle. Lybrand. Veronica.

Veronica.

She was back there, in the belly of this incomprehensible ship, this ancient relic of a dead race. She was back there, trying to blow it all up. She was crazy, perhaps pushed over the edge by Sanji's death — she needed his help.

Connell gazed upstream, back into the ship's deep, misty, jungle-esque shadows. He'd have to walk upstream to reach her. Walk upstream, way past the cathedral room, then try and cross the savage river again, cross to her side, to the orb. Had she started the detonation process yet? Was she smart enough to figure it out, if it even worked at all? Crazy or no, Connell had no doubt Dr. Veronica Reeves could activate the device. He had to get to her, and fast.

What he had to do, and what reality would allow, however, were two different things. He'd barely survived crossing the river this time; he had doubts he'd live through another attempt. The rocktopi were back there, and the silverbugs. Veronica had the scrambler — without it, the silverbugs would track Connell down and the rocktopi would come a-running. A heroic picture of him traveling back into the dangerous ship and rescuing Veronica was farcical. Reality? Reality painted a different picture. If he went in there to get her, to try and bring her out, he was as good as dead.

He sat up and looked over at O'Doyle and Lybrand. They were both so brave, so strong. They'd fought hard to protect everybody. They were warriors — if someone chose to stay behind, that wasn't their concern. Both of them would continue pushing for the surface.

But there was really only one way Lybrand could survive.

Connell fingered the collar of his KoolSuit. It was tattered and cut in places, but it still worked. It would be enough to get Lybrand to the surface, maybe enough to save her life.

If anyone could make it out, it was O'Doyle and Lybrand. In spite of their injuries, they had something to live for. Connell didn't. Not really. Only an empty career. Useless money that bought him nothing. He'd never even bothered with a will. His time had come and gone; O'Doyle and Lybrand's time was only beginning.

He was going back, going after Veronica, but he was doing it without a KoolSuit. He silently started to pull the form-fitting material from his body.

Beeeeep.

Connell's eyes snapped up and looked around, wondering if he'd imagined the noise. Then he heard it again, a faint beep. O'Doyle pulled his knife and hobbled to his feet. Connell waved him back into the small bubble-shaped room. Connell moved toward the edge of the ship-canyon. He lowered himself to the ground and peered around the edge of the exterior hull.

Less than seventy-five yards away, standing as casual as you please and fiddling with the controls of what looked like a Marco/Polo unit, stood Kayla Meyers.

Kayla watched the Marco Polo receiver. Three signals, flickering on and off, just as she'd seen with Angus's signal before it finally gave a strong reading.

Connell Kirkland. Patrick O'Doyle. Bertha Lybrand.

The big ship had to cause some interference — as soon as those three came out of the ship, she'd have a strong lock. She needed to kill Lybrand and O'Doyle right off the bat. O'Doyle was the clear threat, but Lybrand was also dangerous.

Connell was nothing to worry about — he would be the one to give Kayla more information. She'd always wondered how he would handle the pliers. If she played her cards right, she'd get a chance to find out.

Kayla stood quietly, and waited for the signals to clear.

Veronica clutched the scrambler tightly, its static resonating off the orb room's cathedralesque ceiling. Her body ached. She felt as if she'd dragged the weight of the world a thousand miles. Confused silverbugs fell from the orb's curved, polished shell. Some hit the ground while others dropped noiselessly into the shaft. The jittering machines wandered aimlessly, their minds scrambled by Angus's hotwired radio.

The domed room was immaculate. Her eyes struggled to find a single speck of sand or dirt other than what she herself had tracked in. Every piece of machinery gleamed with newness, as if it hadn't seen a day of the eleven thousand years it sat waiting for the rocktopi's genocidal enemy, waiting for doomsday. That enemy was nowhere to be seen, but she was ready to usher doomsday in with a warm welcome.

None of this belonged here. Not the rocktopi, not the silverbugs, not the ship. These tunnels and all they contained were nothing but death. The rocktopi race truly died out countless millennia ago in a planetary holocaust, unknown light-years away. This group, this Wah Wah Tribe, escaped that holocaust, but such escape was fleeting. They couldn't survive. Not enough material in the gene pool. Sanji had said so, or said something like that, anyway. Now it was time for the Wah Wah Tribe to join their ancestors. She was promoting the species from the endangered list straight through to extinction. Do not pass Go, do not collect $200.

She reached the control panel, recognizing it from the alcove carvings. Doubts filled her — it looked menacingly complex, but how complex could it be? The Old Rocktopi had set up everything so their descendants could survive in simplicity: the silverbugs did all the farming and all the maintenance; laws and religions were carved into the walls; pictoglyphs were prepared in case the written language faded away among a shrinking, diseased gene pool.

She imagined how it happened. The first thousand years probably went by fine, the rocktopi living happily in their new home, teaching their children history, language, technology, possibly even the arts. Perhaps the second and possibly third millennia slipped by in peace and comfort. Then things — inevitably — broke down.

Any technology, no matter how advanced, couldn't last forever. Slowly stockpiles of parts eroded into nothing, until finally pieces of complex machines couldn't be replaced. To be sure the advanced rocktopi found ways around the problem, but more millennia passed and machines simply stopped working. Only a handful in the beginning, a few minor systems here and there, but enough to start a cascading effect, a chain reaction that over thousands of years shut down their entire system.

Rocktopi children grew up knowing of nothing but the caverns. Stories of spacefaring and a distant home planet faded into legend as computers and educational tools broke down into useless junk. Much of the Earth's history was already forgotten, after all; even large amounts of American history had slipped through time's cracks. America was a mere 235 years old. How much could be remembered after eleven thousand years?

The Old Rocktopi must have seen their society's gradual erosion; perhaps they even predicted it. The last of the technological knowledge may have poured into converting the silverbugs, making slave machines that could farm, that could dig underground cities, that could scout, that could maintain simple programs in their memory and keep the rocktopi alive.

At one time the silverbugs were no more than servant machines catering to the rocktopi's every need. Thousands of years passed, countless generations, and gradually the silverbugs became part of the environment, as common as air or the stone walls of the rocktopi's tiny universe. Eventually, perhaps hundreds of generations after the plague, the rocktopi's intellect faded away. Wracked by ignorance and genetic deterioration, they regressed to little more than savages, kept alive only by the silverbugs.

The servants became the keepers.

She looked at the control panel in a new light: it was the only piece of machinery they'd seen since arriving, except for the artificial suns. Priorities. The silverbugs were programmed with priorities, instructed to keep the most important machines functioning at the expense of all else. How important was an educational computer if the artificial suns ceased functioning and no food could be grown? The suns were an obvious first priority, and by appearances the doomsday device ran a close second. Whatever that mysterious enemy was capable of, death was far more desirable.

And if such a death was an ultimate priority for the race, then the Old Rocktopi must have provided for its use. She doubted the silverbugs were programmed to destroy their masters, no matter what the situation. Most likely, the orb had to be set off by a rocktopi.

If death was preferable to the enemy and if the orb had been kept functional for this long, than the Old Rocktopi intended its eventual use — which meant there had to be simple instructions. It was only logical. The Old Rocktopi had, after all, predicted the collapse of language, which explained the simplistic messages carved in the Picture Cavern and throughout the tunnel complex. That meant that the orb's instructions were likely as simple.

She looked over the control panel. Several glassy squares sat blank; she assumed them to be video screens of some sort. It was doubtful they could still function. The control panel's polished surface gleamed at her with its hidden knowledge.

The answer had to be here, but where?

Chapter Forty-six

Connell sat motionless in his hiding place. He stared out at Kayla Meyers, trying to figure out just what the hell she was doing there. Logic checked his initial urge to call out to her; she shouldn't be in the tunnels at all. He was the only one from EarthCore who had worked with Kayla. No one else in the company even knew of her, and he'd never informed her of the Wah Wah location.

He knew better than anyone that she was capable of anything. Suspicion filled him, as did fear. She was wearing a KoolSuit. He wondered if she'd stolen it, or killed someone to get it. Web gear thick with ammo magazines and equipment covered her chest. She held a machine gun he didn't recognize. A frown crossed Kayla's face as she fiddled with the Marco/Polo controls. She turned slightly, sweeping the area in front of her with the device. Connell realized that she was either using that device to rescue people — or using it to hunt them down. She shook the device, then looked around at the massive ship, at the cavern walls, at the ceiling, her frown turning to tangible anger. She stuffed the Marco/Polo unit in her belt and pulled out another gadget. Connell squinted, trying to see what she was doing. After a few seconds, he recognized the device; a chill went through his body.

She held Angus's map screen.

There was only one way she could possess the map computer — by forcibly taking it from Angus. The little bastard would never give it to her, except, perhaps, at gunpoint. Kayla was here on business, business of her own making, business definitely not in the best interest of EarthCore or its surviving employees.

He quietly slipped his head back into the bubble-room, indicating with a finger to his lips for O'Doyle to stay quiet.

"More rocktopi out there?” Lybrand asked wearily, her voice a husky whisper.

Connell was surprised to see her conscious. She looked weak and pale, like cooked spaghetti left lying in the sink. “Worse,” Connell said in a hushed voice. “An ex-NSA agent named Kayla Meyers. I think she may have killed Angus."

"I like her already,” O'Doyle said.

"I don't know what she's doing here, but she's very dangerous. If she killed Angus, she'd kill all of us in a heartbeat."

"Why would she want to kill us?” O'Doyle asked.

"I have no idea.” Connell didn't know what she wanted, but he did know one thing — whatever her game, Kayla Meyers played for keeps.

It was almost like looking at one of those three-dimensional pictures, the kind with the wavy lines and seemingly abstract patterns, and suddenly seeing the image magically appear on the page.

"I'll say this for them,” Veronica said quietly. “At least they're consistent."

Pictures etched right into the platinum blanketed the cathedral room's walls. She immediately recognized an etching of the control panel, and what appeared to be instructions for lowering the orb. Even for the self-destruction of an entire race, the Old Rocktopi relied on simple pictures.

She didn't know much about rocktopi communication, but she knew that of her own species. Without some central cultural reference, such as television or radio, human languages fractured, split and mutated into countless regional dialects. Language dilution could happen so quickly that over only a century someone who spoke the original language couldn't understand the new form.

Veronica could only imagine how much a language could change over the course of eleven thousand years. Even if the rocktopi only changed a single word every century, by now 110 words would have changed, perhaps even making the original instructions completely unworkable. After all, blowing up the entire mountain wasn't exactly something they could practice to stay sharp.

The logical answer to this likely problem? Put the instructions in picture form. Simple pictures could provide the rocktopi with a method for self-destruction should their enemy finally arrive. That concept explained the Picture Cavern. The carvings there were instructional, filled with the one message the rocktopi understood all too well — if it comes from the surface, kill it.

Now it was their turn to die.

She looked up at the walls, scanning the instructions. At the top were images of the spiky, wasp-like enemy ships, as well as pictures of some new form she'd never seen before. She didn't recognize it, but it appeared to be a bipedal creature covered with spines. It was long and slender, not even remotely humanoid, with one very long arm that reached forward, ending with what could only be a gun of some sort. She couldn't make out anything resembling a head.

She knew she was looking at the rocktopi's ancient enemy.

Below those pictures were images of the enemy moving into the tunnels. Below that — step-by-step picture instructions for detonating the doomsday device.

The etching's message made perfect sense — if the enemy enters the tunnels, blow up everything. She suddenly admired the rocktopi culture; warriors to the last, so intent on avoiding capture they would bring about their own extinction, practice the ultimate form of euthanasia. But it was the Old Rocktopi she admired, not the current bastardized genetic rejects that mindlessly slaughtered everything in sight.

It was funny to think that this race that once traveled amongst the stars and had the power to move mountains now communicated at a level of primitive humans. She wondered if the same fate lay in store for her own race. Perhaps in the end, the very end, mankind would be left with nothing more than crude pictures.

Taking a deep breath, she examined the instructions.

Chapter Forty-seven

Connell reached behind O'Doyle's neck and pried away his Marco/Polo sounder. He did the same with Lybrand. It was like picking a small scab.

O'Doyle reached up to remove Connell's, but Connell pushed the gnarled hand away. “No,” he said in a hushed voice. There was no way Kayla could hear his voice over the river's roar, yet he still spoke quietly.

"I'm going to lead her away,” Connell said. “You get Lybrand to the surface."

"You said she's dangerous. I should take her out, then we can all escape."

Connell shook his head. “Look at yourself, O'Doyle. You won't stand a chance. Trust me on this. I'll talk to her and see what she's up to. At the very least, Kayla will come after me — you can get Lybrand out."

O'Doyle stared at Connell, and Connell stared back. Both men knew the score. O'Doyle wanted to protect Connell, but he wanted to save Lybrand even more. O'Doyle handed Connell his knife. Connell took it, his eyes sending O'Doyle a message of respect, of friendship. In the space of a day they'd become comrades, brothers in arms, the violence and struggle for life forming an unbreakable bond.

O'Doyle's eyes spoke of gratitude, of a debt that could never be repaid.

Connell nodded and stood. “Stay back in the shadows. Without the Marco/Polo dots, she won't see you. Don't try and take her, O'Doyle, or you and Lybrand will both be dead in seconds. Trust me. Once she's moved past, you go for the Linus Highway and get out."

Without another word, Connell tucked the knife into the back of his belt, then walked around the corner of the ship canyon.

On the Marco/Polo unit's controls, the names of Bertha Lybrand, Patrick O'Doyle, and Connell Kirkland changed from the flashing yellow of a splintered signal to the steady green of a clear contact. Kayla looked up and saw Connell standing at the edge of the ship canyon, a mere fifty yards away. She immediately turned off the Marco/Polo unit and stuffed it in her belt, leaving both hands free. The Galil hung in front of her.

"Connell!” She walked briskly forward. “Are you all right?"

"Stop right there, Kayla."

Kayla stopped

"What's the matter?” she asked innocently.

"What are you doing here?"

She saw the tension in his body, his readiness to spring away at a moment's notice. His hand rested on the ship's hull, ready to pull him behind the edge, out of her line of sight.

"I'm here to rescue you."

"How did you know I needed rescuing? I never told you about the camp."

She didn't answer. His body moved slightly, his chest leaning back just a hair. He was getting ready to bolt. She snapped-grabbed for her Galil ARM, bringing it up and firing a spray of bullets, but Connell was too quick, ducking behind the ship hull just as the bullets splattered loudly against rocks and clanged off platinum.

She sprinted after him and entered the ship canyon's steamy shadows.

O'Doyle only saw her in a flash as she raced by the ship's corner, tearing after Connell with the Marco/Polo in one hand and a Galil ARM in the other. Connell had a 20-second head start, but how long would that last him before she caught up?

O'Doyle waited ten seconds, then rose and pulled Lybrand to her feet. He wished Connell well, but he couldn't help the man anymore. He threw Lybrand over his shoulder and limped out of the bubble room, moving toward the Linus Highway. He had an impossible sprint ahead of him, and even if he escaped the rocktopi, the silverbugs, and Kayla Meyers, Veronica could bring the world crashing down around him at any moment.

Jaw clenched with sheer determination, his good leg pumped under him, carrying them both onto the Linus Highway. It was steeper than he expected, but he never slowed an ounce. O'Doyle attacked the tunnel's rise, pushing his way up, pushing for the surface.

He'd get her out alive. He'd find a way.

It was easy.

Veronica ran through the sequence in her mind, fingers gracing the buttons and levers instead of pressing and turning. She mentally practiced. The only question was when? How much time should she give Connell, O'Doyle, and Lybrand? Veronica ran her fingers over the controls, which now looked very simple. So simple even a child could perform the sequence. Anyone — or anything — with eyes and a modicum of intelligence could do it.

The air was full of the river's roar and the clicks of wandering silverbugs drunk on static. Veronica didn't hear a trio of shiny new silverbugs crawl menacingly from the water's edge and onto the wall.

Kayla barely saw Connell through the mist. She was gaining on him — time to try for a shot. She raised the Galil ARM and fired a volley at his legs. As she brought the gun down, her right foot slid in the deep mud. Kayla lurched forward, landed on her left knee, then skidded on her face.

She was on her feet quickly, still running after him. The slip had lost her another five seconds, and the knee hurt like a bitch — she couldn't go top speed. But he was also limping, she'd still catch him.

Her face-first slide had covered her with wet, clinging platinum dust. Kayla chased after her prey, unaware that she now looked metallic, like the killing machine that she truly was.

Chapter Forty-eight

Angus heard the click of silverbug feet somewhere above him and madness started to creep over his brain. They were here. Here in the darkness. Closing in on him. Preparing to jump on his body and cut him to shreds.

Was that a light? He thought he imagined it at first. A light. Coming up the tunnel. A light bouncing with the regularity of someone running. God had heard his call! God had answered him! Rescue was at hand!

The light moved forward. He peered closer, fighting down hysterical laughter. He didn't know who it was, but it didn't look like Kayla. The light filled the tunnel, and suddenly Angus saw his savior.

His heart and soul shrank to a useless little puddle.

O'Doyle stood tall, smiling down, Lybrand draped over his shoulders like a dead deer.

"Hello, coward,” O'Doyle said. “I was hoping I'd run into you again."

Connell dashed down the riverbank, skirting rocks, boulders, silverbugs and useless chunks of hull that had fallen away from the towering alien ruin. The misty air caught beams of artificial blue sun pouring down from above, separating light and shadow with clearly definable boundaries. He had a good head start, but she'd catch him soon unless he could slip into the ship's depths and possibly lose her there.

A large passage into the ship's interior opened up chasm-like on his left, no doubt once serving a major thoroughfare for the vessel's internal traffic. He turned sharply and dove for the entrance just as ricocheting bullets erupted in a spray behind him, ringing off the rocks and platinum walls and filling the area with unpredictable, bouncing death. Connell screamed involuntarily as he hit the ground, fear churning in his stomach.

He scrambled to his feet, ready to rush headlong into the dark recesses of the dungeon-like ship. It was his only chance to survive for a few minutes longer. He placed all his weight on his left leg as he rose — and finally the ravaged knee gave out with a snap and a blaring spark of pain.

Connell fell to his back, face twisted into a grimace not only of agony, but also defeat, frustration, and fear. He clutched his knee with both hands. He felt the K-Bar knife handle digging into his back as he tried to rise.

Veronica reread the instruction pictures for the tenth time. After the sequence was completed, all she had to do was push one last button. One last button to start the orb's long trip to the shaft bottom. Veronica estimated the orb's descent would over an hour. Once at the bottom, the orb would detonate and rip the mountain to pieces.

If she could make it across the river and move quickly enough up the Linus Highway, she could make it out alive. But that was a big “if.” If she dropped the orb, her chances for survival were slim indeed. That didn't matter — she knew what she had to do.

Her blood chilled in her body; she shivered despite the heat as she started the sequence. With smooth, confident movements, she finished the process in less than a minute. Breath came slowly, the pit of her stomach tightened as she held her finger over the final button. One push to lower the reflective orb. One push.

Veronica's mind heard a noise behind her, the ring of spring-loaded metal. She turned quickly. Three silverbugs — long, evil blades sticking from their wedge-shaped heads — slowly closed in on her with the jittery movements of a spider moving toward a web-ensnared victim.

They were between her and the river. She'd seen no other exits in the cathedralesque room. They moved in, their spindly legs and split-clawed feet clicking menacingly on the stone floor.

Chapter Forty-nine

O'Doyle whistled in amazement when he unwrapped the wire from Angus's wrists. The little man's right hand was mangled, each knuckle hugely swollen and bloody. Angus cried out each time O'Doyle brushed the knuckles. He brushed them a few more times than necessary.

Once unwrapped, Angus scooted to the wall, his back against the stone, his ass on the dirt, looking up at O'Doyle. “Are you going to kill me?"

"That's up to you,” O'Doyle said. “I need your KoolSuit. I can either take it off your dead body or you can take it off for me."

"You can't take my suit… I'll die."

"Maybe, maybe not,” O'Doyle said calmly. “You'll probably reach the surface if you're tough enough. Anyway, I don't care if you make it or not. You have twenty seconds to take that suit off or I kill you right now."

"But you can't leave me naked down here—"

"Twenty… nineteen… eighteen…"

Angus's eyes flared with renewed panic and he raced to remove the suit with his good hand. He had it off before O'Doyle reached five.

"Now turn around,” O'Doyle said.

Angus started to whimper and cry, his voice a high-pitched whine. “You can't kill me now!” Sweat was already pouring out of his body. “I did what you said."

"Turn the fuck around!"

Angus instantly turned and faced the wall, waiting for a knife to punch into his skull or heart or throat.

"You stay there,” O'Doyle said. “Don't turn around until I tell you to.” He grabbed the limp KoolSuit and walked over to Lybrand. He started to remove her shredded suit, then simply ripped it off of her.

"It isn't really a good time for that, is it?” Lybrand said weakly. Open blisters covered her face. She smiled through dry, deeply cracked lips, her eyes half-lidded with delirium.

"Hold on, baby,” O'Doyle said as he tossed away the scraps of her ravaged KoolSuit. “Just hold on a few minutes longer."

Kayla turned the corner, a glittering shape of doom silhouetted by the canyon's misty light, the Galil clutched in her hand. Connell watched in helpless fear as she approached. Without a word, she lowered her weapon and squeezed off a single round into his upraised shin. The bullet shattered his fibia, ricocheted off the tibia and erupted out the backside of his leg, taking much of his calf muscle with it in a cloud of chunky red.

Pain like nothing he'd ever experienced filled his mind. He shrieked in agony — his hands moving from the knee to the already blood-soaked leg.

"The old bum-knee trick?” Kayla asked as she took a few more limping steps forward, gun still leveled at Connell. “Or is that old car-accident injury flaring up again? Either way, Connell, I'm not falling for it. We can do this two ways. Are you listening?"

Connell stifled his scream and blinked back the tears pouring from his eyes. He looked up at Kayla. His hands still squeezed tightly around the bullet wound — both front and back — trying to stop the torrent of blood that dripped from the raised leg down his thigh and onto his groin. He managed a nod.

"Good, good,” Kayla said, her voice ringing with admiration. “Takes a bullet in the leg and can still listen. You're tougher than I thought, Connell. I'll give you that much."

"Fuck you,” Connell said through a clenched-tooth sneer. “Let's get this over with."

"In a hurry to die, Connell?” She kept a good six feet of distance between them, the gun lowered at his chest, her finger firmly on the trigger. The canyon's half-light barely filtered into the huge hallway, casting the scene in a surreal twilight. “Don't be in such a rush."

"Why are you here?"

"I'm afraid you're not my only client. I thought I could sell the info about your platinum mine for a tidy sum. But since I saw the attack on the camp, all of this—” she waved her free hand around and behind her to indicate the ship, “—all of this is going to get me back in the NSA."

"They attacked the camp?"

"Wiped it out,” Kayla said. “Killed everyone."

Connell's head fell back on the platinum grating. The metal burned his head, making him lift it up again. Pain, both physical and emotional, squeezed his eyes tightly shut.

"You're too late, Kayla."

"Why's that?"

"Because Dr. Reeves is blowing the whole place up.” the pain made Connell grunt his words out in short chunks. “I'd say you've got… about twenty-five minutes to live… but that's just a guess."

Kayla took a quick step forward and kicked Connell in his shattered shin. His hands still covered the wound — he felt one of the fingers in his right hand snap. Agonizing, shearing pain erupted from both wounds. He howled out in rage and protest.

"Shut the fuck up, Connell! don't have time for this melodramatic Hollywood bullshit! You can't think I'm that stupid, buddy boy, you just can't."

Connell didn't answer; he couldn't speak, he could barely hear her words through the tidal-wave of pain. Kayla pulled the Marco/Polo unit from her belt and stared at the screen. A shrilling beep faintly sifted from the unit.

Her face grew tight and wrinkled with rage. “Where are the others? Where are Lybrand and O'Doyle? I need all of you. How did you trick this machine?"

Connell stared at her through eyes slitted with hate. He said nothing. He had to buy time, give O'Doyle a chance to reach the surface.

"Oh I see,” Kayla said with a nod. Her eyes and teeth looked a devilish, glowing white in the half-darkness. “This toughness thing is going to your head, is it?” She set the Galil beside her, reached into a webbing pocket and removed a pair of pliers. She opened them and closed them slowly, letting Connell see every detail.

"I usually start with the knuckles, break every one on both hands, but I'm running out of time.” Kayla knelt down next to Connell's head. “So I'm going to start with your testicles. I'm going to crush the left one, unless you tell me what I want to know, and you do it quickly."

Connell's eyes jumped from slits to saucers.

"You don't like the sound of that, do you buddy boy? Well, although I don't actually have nuts myself, I've done it before and it looks pretty darn painful."

Connell lunged for her throat. She swatted his hand away as if he were a clumsy child, and with the same movement smashed his nose with her left fist. Spots swam behind Connell's closed eyelids. He again rolled to his back, hands moving from his leg to his nose, smearing his own blood across his face.

"Well, like my Daddy always used to say, soonest started, soonest done.” Kayla pulled a thin loop of copper wire from her webbing.

The countless spots of pain blaring through his body distracted him, but not enough to miss a sudden and repetitive click-click that echoed through the arched hallway. Kayla's head snapped around, her hands grabbing the Galil and pointing it toward the threat. Connell opened his eyes, knowing what he'd see.

A dense line of silverbugs bobbed and jerked with snappy movements. In the back of his mind he remembered that Veronica had the scrambler — he wondered if it was destroyed, and her along with it.

"What is this shit?” Kayla asked, a tremor of fear creeping into her voice.

"It means the monsters are coming,” Connell said as he quietly rolled to one side, reached behind his back and grabbed O'Doyle's knife. “They follow the lines of silverbugs… we've only got a few seconds before they attack."

"Attack? Do they have weapons?"

"They have knives,” Connell said. “A lot like this one."

He swung his body and drove the knife deep into Kayla's thigh. Even as the knife sank to the hilt, she turned her gun toward Connell, her face fused into an animalistic mask of fury. His mind swam with panicked disbelief as the barrel angled toward his face. He pushed himself closer and twisted the knife with all his strength.

Kayla threw her head back in a short grimace of pain, but it was all the time Connell needed. He smashed her face with a vicious, overhanded right, forgetting that she'd broken his index finger until her head rocked back from the blow and pain blasted through his hand. He ignored it.

Kayla fell to her ass, left hand scrambling behind her to slow her fall, right hand still trying to bring the Galil to bear. Connell dove on her, his battle cry a shout of agonizing pain that seemed to erupt from his leg, course up his body, and spill out of his mouth. He landed on her chest, the barrel of her weapon pointing up and past his side. The gun erupted on full automatic; spark-flashes of bullets briefly lit the hallway in a deadly strobe light. Connell knocked the gun away.

She reached for her belt. Connell grabbed at her hand in a panic, knowing she sought a knife. Now on top of her, he drew his head back and brought it forward with all his might, slamming it into her face. Kayla's nose burst in a gush of blood. Her head fell limply back and her body went slack.

Connell cocked back his left fist and blasted her in the face five more times for good measure, snarling and growling with each satisfying punch.

Veronica tried to breathe. Panic filled her soul like an inflating balloon. Her hands fumbled with the scrambler. Why wasn't it working? Its static-screech still filled the dome, but the knife-wielding silverbugs ignored it. They moved steadily toward her, stalking her, now only a few feet away.

Tears of terror filled her eyes. She twisted the volume knob, the frequency knob, anything she could find on the scrambler, fingers racing in a panic.

It made no difference.

The first silverbug sprang at her face. She brought her hands up instinctively. The leaping silverbug crashed into the hot-wired walkie-talkie, smashing it to pieces and scattering the now-useless components on the stone floor. The attacker fell to the ground, but before she could move the second silverbug sprang from her right, its sharp claws fixing fast on her hips and ribs.

The silverbug drove its jagged blade deep into her stomach.

Her throaty cry of agony seemed to awaken the countless maintenance silverbugs, now free of the scrambler's influence. Hundreds of them dove for the river and followed the current downstream, answering some unseen call.

She screamed in pain and terror, smashing down on the silverbug with fists that split open against the round, polished shell. It clutched tightly to her body. She couldn't shake it off. Its jagged blade pulled out and viciously plunged in again just as the last silverbug sprang for her head.

Veronica managed one last terrified, powerful scream before the silverbug's blade slashed through her throat, splattering her blood on its reflective shell, down her chest and on the floor. She fell back heavily against the console, still struggling against the slashing, cutting, stabbing silverbugs even as her life spilled away.

She turned with the last of her waning strength — as she fell to the ground under the weight of the attack, her fingers reached for the final button.

She clicked it home.

Above her prone body, ancient but well-cared-for machinery started to move. The dome trembled as mechanisms unused for eleven thousand years finally rumbled to life. Metallic groans, grinds, and squeaks filled the air. Gears turned in complaint, engines hummed to life.

Somewhere up in the ceiling, somewhere out of sight, the ancient machinery rotated. After the long wait, it finally turned. A massive spool started rolling out its miles-long cable. The orb lowered three feet and then stopped, bobbing ever so slightly from the sudden movement. There it dangled pendulously as the machinery's cries shrieked louder and more insistent.

And then it dropped.

Chapter Fifty

Angus's canteen held a tiny bit of water, which O'Doyle poured into Lybrand's dry mouth. She swallowed weakly. She didn't look any better, but O'Doyle could already feel her temperature drop to normal levels. His heart surged with hope.

"Please,” Angus said. “Please let me go.” He was still sitting cross-legged and facing the tunnel wall. Acrid sweat covered his naked body. The smell of his fear filled the cavern.

"Shut up,” O'Doyle said over his shoulder. He looked down warmly at Lybrand. “How do you feel?” She blinked a few times and looked up at him, her eyes clear for the first time since they'd entered the river.

Her voice was a thin whisper. “Like crap — but better."

O'Doyle lifted her up and again threw her over his shoulder. He glared doleful at Angus.

"Turn around,” O'Doyle said. Naked, Angus turned slowly, looking terrified, as if he expected to be stabbed at any moment. “You wait here, count to three hundred, and then come up the tunnel. I don't want you getting in my way. If I see you again, I'll kill you, do you understand?"

Angus nodded softly, eyes already weak with heat exhaustion.

click-click, click

O'Doyle turned and looked back down the tunnel. A single silverbug crouched motionless on the wall. Only one, but more weren't far behind. Without another word he turned and moved quickly up the Linus Highway, struggling with Lybrand's weight and his own tortured body.

Angus sat on his ass, transfixed by the silverbug, a look of horror frozen on his face. Caught between two evils, he slowly started counting. He made it as far as 263 before he stood and sprinted, screaming with madness, into a side tunnel.

Ignoring the pain, or at least pretending to, Connell ripped away Kayla's equipment and weapons and tossed them in a pile. He clutched her machine gun tightly. It surprised him how good the weapon felt in his hands. He pulled three full magazines from her web gear, stuffing two in his belt and popping the third into the gun.

He knew he had only a few seconds to act.

Keeping one eye on Kayla's prone body, he hobbled to the hallway's edge and looked down the line of silverbugs.

The rocktopi splashed down the narrow riverbank on both sides, flashing brilliantly in the cavern's misty light, waving knives and tentacles, screeching their bloodlust — they'd reach him in only a few minutes. Connell tried testing his weight on the ravaged leg; pain blasted through him. He couldn't walk on it at all. He'd never outrun them.

He looked back to Kayla. She rolled slightly to her left, slowly regaining consciousness. Connell grabbed her knife and handgun. He threw the weapons to the river's edge, just a few feet shy of the water. The silverbug line continued to jerk and click with sickening repetition.

"Kayla, wake up!” He watched her hands instinctively flash first to her shoulder holster, then to the sheath at her waist. Finding both empty, Kayla grabbed the first rock that presented itself and tried to sit up.

"Don't move!"

She looked up, eyes glazed over with pure hatred. “You'd better shoot me now.” One hand clutched the rock, the other jammed against the gushing knife wound in her leg. “If you don't, I'm gonna cut your balls off and stuff them down your throat."

Connell wanted to flash a glance down the riverbank, check the rocktopi's progress, but he didn't dare take his eyes off her. She could probably throw that rock like Nolan Ryan.

"I've left your handgun and knife at the river's edge behind me. The monsters are coming. If you come out of there before I'm out of sight, I'll kill you."

Connell left the hallway behind and hopped into the water. The river would take him away. He was on the Linus Highway side, so he didn't have to fight the full current — it wouldn't take much strength to get to the shore.

It was crazy to not only leave Kayla alive, but leave her with a weapon. He knew this, but she was his only chance.

Rocktopi swarmed out of the river, over the wall and onto the orb platform. They moved tentatively and stayed close together, looking around in awe and fear at every inch of the ship. They were filled with reverent wonder at this place they'd heard of only in legend. One of the horrible, murderous yellow-skinned monsters was there, already cut to properly sized pieces, its red blood smeared and steaming on the stone floor.

A few rocktopi wandered to the control panel, a few skirted the edges of the room and a few more peered down the shaft. The orb dropped steadily downward. As it descended, ancient lights surged to life, or at least tried to. Most of them flickered uselessly or simply didn't turn on at all, long since claimed by the persistent fingers of time. A few managed to sputter fully awake. They cast dim reflections on the orb's polished surface.

A silverbug crawled from the river and perched on the stone breakwater. With water still beading on its shell, it began jerking convulsively. One of the rocktopi screeched loudly and pulsed a dim green before leaping over the wall and back into the river. The other rocktopi quickly followed, leaving behind the shaft and the distant, shiny object falling into its depths.

They never knew its purpose.

Chapter Fifty-one

She'd waited long enough.

Kayla struggled to rise to her feet. Her head throbbed with sunbursts of pain. She hadn't been hit that hard in a long time. Connell proved to be much more of a man than she'd given him credit for. She wanted to kick herself — she'd known enough not to underestimate his mind, but hadn't thought his lanky frame capable of such lightning speed.

She kept her fist jammed into the knife wound as she struggled to rise. Why Connell let her live, she had no idea, but it would be his last mistake. She no longer gave a shit about the others, about the NSA, about anything. All she cared about was gutting Connell Kirkland. She limped down the hall, toward the river and her weapons. The silverbug line clicked and bobbed, scattering away from her and re-forming as she passed.

Her instincts loudly sounded an alarm. Screeches, just like the ones she'd heard during the camp attack, filled her ears along with the river's insistent pounding. The monsters had to be close, she had to move despite the pain. Why would Connell leave her a weapon? It didn't make any sense. She struggled to reach the riverbank and the safety of her Steyr GB-80, which sat a few feet shy of the water's edge.

She moved out of the hall and looked downstream. A wall of glowing monsters poured down the riverbank toward her, the mist magnifying their flashing red and orange bursts like stoplights illuminating the morning fog. Recoiling in horror, she grabbed her weapon and started firing.

She suddenly realized Connell's intent as the Steyr's deafening thunder briefly drowned out the hunting screeches.

She was a diversion. Something to slow the rocktopi while he got away. Even wounded, her expert aim blasted into the oncoming wave, dropping them like big, wet blankets. But there were too many.

Her subconscious counted off nineteen shots — she scrambled for another magazine, but the lead rocktopi dove for her, its wicked crescent knife flashing in the misty air. Snarling, she ducked and snatched her own knife from the ground.

The swirling mass of colors and tentacles closed in around her.

Connell crawled to shore at the ship's edge just as he heard Kayla's weapon cap off a dozen quick shots. He wondered if she'd have time to reload as he hobbled toward the Linus Highway entrance, dragging his flopping, useless leg behind him.

A woman's agonizing scream echoed high off the cavern walls and ceiling. Yet another of his employees had met death at the hands of the rocktopi; only this time he didn't mind at all.

He limped into the Linus Highway and started up the steep slope.

A few more faint lights flickered to life, illuminating the orb's descent. The lights’ reflections followed the curved surface, starting out at the bottom, gradually arcing around the side and then sliding to the top as the orb fell down and down and down.

Reflections of massive, rough-hewn pillars, each larger than the Eiffel tower, thicker than a skyscraper, each a monument of engineering and long-dead technological prowess, glided over the polished platinum. For several minutes the pillars’ images alone covered the orb's sides, until a new reflection arced across the metallic surface, gradually growing larger and more defined.

Clearly lit, a fish-eye reflection of the cave floor swelled on the orb's bottom.

"Put me down,” Lybrand said. “I can walk."

"You can't walk,” O'Doyle said through tortured breaths as he stumbled up the tunnel. “You're hurt."

"Put me down, dammit!"

O'Doyle leaned against the stone wall and gently lowered her to the ground. Sweat covered his ashen face. He struggled to remain standing.

"I'm hurt, but I can make it,” Lybrand said. “The KoolSuit helped. I can walk, can you?"

"I'll damn well find the strength to walk out of here,” O'Doyle said. “Let's go, the rocktopi are coming."

They struggled on, holding each other up, knowing full well that the silverbugs were behind them, that the rocktopi couldn't be far off. They dashed up the steep tunnel, beaten and battered, pushed far beyond the point of exhaustive collapse.

Connell's vision blurred and he fell heavily to his side. It was blood loss, not heat, that finally dragged him down. He knew he lay dying. He peered up the Linus Highway. How much farther to go? He couldn't do it. He just couldn't.

The distant screeches of the rocktopi suddenly grew louder, cacophonous in the narrow tunnel. They were coming. Connell rolled to his back and shook his head, trying to clear his vision. He blinked a few times, then sat up. He couldn't pass out now. He had to go on, kill as many of them as he could, give O'Doyle and Lybrand a chance.

Connell unhooked the gun's black nylon strap and tied it around his leg, just below the knee. He pulled it tight with a vicious snap and swallowed the scream that tried to erupt from his lungs. He snarled, looped the strap again, and pulled even tighter. He had to stop the bleeding, or at least slow it enough to stay conscious for a little while longer.

Too weak to stand, Connell clutched the gun in one hand, pushing it in front of him as he crawled on hands and knees up the Linus Highway.

Twenty miles below Connell's feet, the orb finished its descent, landing lightly on the shaft floor. The heat raged at just over 1,900 degrees Fahrenheit. An internal computer quickly processed data on air pressure, heat, and distance traveled. Finding those readings suitable, the computer triggered the detonator.

Chapter Fifty-two

The orb shuddered once, then disappeared in a nova of light brighter than the sun. Impossibly powerful shockwaves lashed out at supersonic speeds, disintegrating the countless support pillars in a billowing burst of evaporated stone. A great rumbling and shaking began as millions of tons of rock, now without support from below, began to settle into the newly created void.

Devastating heat from the blast raced up the deep shaft, melting rock along the way. Within seconds the blast erupted into the Dense Mass cavern, spurting upward like a geyser in an expanding cloud of destruction. The orb's cathedral room, which sat in the center of the immortal metal hull, sagged like cheap wax and collapsed in on itself, in seconds going from a magnificent technological monument to a white-hot sea of molten metal. Silverbugs erupted like popcorn, then quickly dissolved into the boiling pool of metal. Like a ring rippling from a pebble in a pond, the explosive heat reached out from the ship's center, melting the timeless vessel in a quickly expanding wave.

The shockwaves also traveled straight downward, winning the battle between the irresistible force and immovable object. Rock simply ceased to exist as star-like temperatures evaporated everything within reach, creating a huge bubble of superheated gas.

The orb didn't punch a hole through the Earth's mantle. It didn't have to. The cold, calculated, precise science that had carved out the pillars had placed the shaft's bottom a geological hair's width from the swirling mantle. For millennia, the Earth's internal pressure pushed against the shaft floor, obeying the laws of physics and seeking the easiest way out. But the shaft floor's precise design held just enough strength to keep that incalculable force at bay, just enough to keep things as they were meant to be.

The orb, however, melted another half mile worth of crust, a calculation as fixed and precise as a surgeon's stroke. At the bottom of that newly created bubble of plasma, the Earth's pressure — so long held in check by the thinnest of margins — finally broke free.

Magma rocketed upward with tidal-wave force, pushed ever higher by the liquid core's grinding, pulsating pressures. It quickly filled the new pocket and continued up the shaft, pushing the 10,000-degree gas bubble before it, racing toward the ravaged ship and the Dense Mass cavern.

O'Doyle and Lybrand crawled on their bellies, urged on by the unmistakable smell of fresh, outside air. The ground shuddered beneath them, pouring fuel on their desperate effort to escape the mountain.

The low rock ceiling scrapped at O'Doyle's back. He grunted as he worked his thick trunk through the narrow opening, the rock tearing away his KoolSuit with long rips and shreds. The suit no longer mattered this close to the surface.

The ground beneath Connell shook and lurched like a bucking bronco, knocking him about so violently that he couldn't even stay on his hands and knees. He fell to his chest. The grinding sound of mammoth boulders breaking free of the mountain's motionless grasp filled his ears. Cracks raced up the tunnel walls like bolts of splitting lightning. Thick, swirling storm clouds of dust seeped into the air.

Connell looked up to see a fist-sized piece of rock fall from the tunnel ceiling, dust trailing behind it like a comet's tail. The rock bounced off the wildly shaking floor and settled against the tunnel wall — then the entire ceiling gave way in an avalanche of bellowing, angry rock.

Connell barely had time to raise his arms over his head before the boulders crushed down on him.

Magma exploded out of the shaft floor, a great gushing pillar of molten rock jetting against the tunnel ceiling more than two thousand feet above. There it licked against an artificial sun, which sputtered once and then fell dark. A great rain of magma splashed off the ceiling, across the cavern, and fell into the hellish pool of bubbling, liquefied hull.

Confused silverbugs scattered everywhere, rushing pell-mell in all directions. Some rushed headlong into the boiling pools and melted in a fraction of a second. Some scattered up the walls, only to be peeled off by the torrential cascade of scorching lava. Some fell motionless where they stood, baked to death in heat rivaling that at the Earth's center.

Rocktopi dropped dead by the hundreds, instantly cooked in the expanding heat and sulfurous fumes that filled the massive cavern. Swirling magma covered the floor, forming a hell-spawned lake that rose slowly up the cavern walls. Boiling rock poured like water, flowing into the countless tunnels connected to the cavern, splashing orange-hot and destroying everything in its path.

The constant shaking finally claimed the Dense Mass cavern. The floor cracked and jumped, ripped apart by billions of tons of settling rock. The ceiling collapsed, dropping boulders the size of city blocks into the soupy mix of melted ship and liquid rock.

The orb's burst of energy created a void that nature had to fill. The mountain slowly fell in on itself as magma continued to stream upward toward the sky like blood hosing from some giant's severed jugular.

The Land Rover rocked wildly on its shocks, bouncing like some child's toy as the ground shook and rumbled. Sonny kept both hands firmly on the hood, trying to keep his balance.

"Sonofabitch!” His voice rang with amazement and joy. He couldn't take his eyes off Funeral Mountain's death-throes. “Sonofabitch that's somethin’ to see!"

The peak seemed to fold in on itself, like a massive parody of a circus tent with the center stake kicked out. Unfathomable mounds of rock dropped backwards out of sight, and the mountain itself simply fell. The ground shook with an angry wrath. Sonny held on against the shockwaves, transfixed as the cursed place tore itself apart.

He screamed with laughter and shook his fist at the dying mountain. Sonny hoped Kayla was in there somewhere. He had to get out of there and very soon, but he kept scanning the mountain with his binoculars, looking to see if any of them had made it out.

Lybrand saw it first. She screamed with the victorious joy of a winning gladiator. “Sunlight! We're almost there!"

O'Doyle could barely hear her above the rumbling din that filled the tunnels with deafening, demanding insistence. The ground jolted unpredictably under his chest — it felt like trying to crawl across a giant trampoline while a thousand children bounced to their hyper hearts’ content. He feared that at any moment the narrow ceiling would give way and smash him like a human sandwich.

They heard a massive tunnel section give way somewhere behind them. The patch of jostling sunlight grew brighter, and then they were out, trying to stand on the wildly shaking plateau. O'Doyle grabbed Lybrand's hand, his eyes searching for the best way down the dancing mountain.

"Well I'll be dipped in pig shit,” Sonny said as he stared through the binoculars. Two people on the little plateau where he'd crawled into the tunnels only days before. O'Doyle and Lybrand — even at this distance he could see they were in bad shape and in deep trouble.

"Well, you only live once,” Sonny said as he stumbled into the driver's seat. He gunned the Land Rover's engine and shot toward the mountain.

The rumbling eased as Lybrand and O'Doyle raced down the slope, falling more often than running. Nothing short of a decapitation could stop them now. She didn't turn around to look, but she could feel the ground giving way behind them, falling away into some bottomless chasm inside the mountain.

They moved forward with all their strength, all their determination. They would not stop, no matter what the injury. Suddenly a new, deeper roar filled the air, like the sound of a mountain-sized panther. They felt a wave of blistering heat across their backs.

"Sonofabitch!” Sonny screamed, his laughter now long gone. “Sonofabitch!” He had to get to those people. Sonny fought the urge to turn the Rover around and head out — despite the horror he saw before him.

A billowing geyser of molten rock erupted from the center of the former mountain, spraying high into the air with grace and power. The Rover grazed a boulder and bounced harshly to the right. Sonny forced himself to look at the path, tearing his eyes away from the pillar of fire.

A giant boulder rolled toward him, bouncing like a rubber ball. He swerved to the left, narrowly avoiding it.

He spotted O'Doyle and Lybrand. Sonny slammed the brakes, bringing the Rover to a sliding halt. He hopped out and ran to them. They looked as if every part of their bodies was damaged, cut, bleeding or broken. Only their eyes looked strong, determination fixed in them as if they were chiseled from stone.

"I don't believe it,” O'Doyle said, never slowing his forward progress. “Sonny McGuiness to the rescue.” His arm around Lybrand's shoulder, they raced for the Land Rover.

The mountain shook with landlocked thunder as the magma plume sputtered once, then roared ever higher. Burning ash splashed down all around them, searing their skin and melting their KoolSuits. Chunks of smoking rock crashed everywhere. O'Doyle had to wonder if they were hurled by ghosts of the recently cooked rocktopi, lashing out from their new home in hell.

Sonny slid under O'Doyle's arm and pulled him roughly toward the Rover. He shoved O'Doyle and Lybrand into the back seat. Burning rocks and barely cooled airborne lava peppered the car like deadly hail. Black paint bubbled and peeled as Sonny gunned the engine and drove headlong back down the two-track path. Within seconds, they drove free of the aerial assault.

O'Doyle and Lybrand never looked back — they both passed out in the back seat, laying on top of each other, moving only when the Rover turned sharply or careened off a rock.

Behind them all, the new volcano continued to rage into the darkening sky. Most of its magma fell within a half mile of the plume, and slowly but surely, the cone of a new peak started to reach away from the sunken grave of Funeral Mountain.

The intense heat no longer affected Connell. His hands and feet grew numb with chill. He coughed once, spitting blood all over his chin and onto the rock that pinned him motionless. Pain covered every part of his ravaged body, but it didn't bother him — it felt distant, as if it were a picture, a memory.

He opened his eyes but could see nothing. Darkness covered him. He struggled for air, managing only short breaths, fighting the pain of broken ribs and the confining weight of the boulder on his chest.

Motionless. Trapped. Even if he had a part of his body that wasn't broken, ripped or pulverized, he couldn't move it due to the boulder-tomb that held him still. Only one hand lay free — he could have wiggled it had it not already been smashed to bloody paste.

He tried another breath and coughed up more blood. Agony splashed through his lungs. The fear of death washed over him, crowding out everything else. In a haze of pain and half consciousness, Connell waited to die.

A faint light flashed through the cracks between the boulders. A warm light, a joyous light. Connell tried to look toward it, but could not move his fractured head. The light seemed to penetrate his body, wash through him, ease the pain. A voice called out from the light.

His favorite voice. Cori's voice.

"Pea,” he said. “Oh, Pea…"

"I'm here with you, love. Don't be afraid."

Connell's mind faded in and out, not knowing if she was real or just a vision of his fading brain. He didn't care. She was with him again. Her light filled him, erasing his agony, relaxing his devastated body.

He felt something warm and tender gently lift his crushed hand. He instantly recognized her touch. He didn't mind the pain, as long as he could feel her again.

Connell's hand slowly grew cold in hers, and with a tiny smile on his face, his half-lidded eyes faded away into a blank stare of stillness and peace.