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trigger. Its head jerked back, and for a split second Snow had the image of an impossibly wrinkled and
knobby face, features hidden within great folds of skin. Then there was another roar, and the horror
disap-peared in the flame and smoke of Donovan s grenade.
His gun was firing on an empty clip. Snow released his finger, ejected the clip, dug into his pocket for
another, and slammed it home. They waited, poised to fire again, as the echoes gradually faded. No
more figures came loping out of the smoke and the darkness.
Donovan took a deep breath. Back to the rally point, he said.
They turned back down the tunnel, Donovan reaching up to snap on his flashlight. A thin red beam shot
into the murk ahead of them. Snow followed, breathing hard. Ahead lay Three Points, and their gear, and
the way out. He found he was thinking from moment to moment now, concentrating only on getting out,
getting to the surface, because anything else would mean thinking of the horrors that had scuttled out
toward them, and to think of those would mean ...
He suddenly ploughed into Donovan s back. Staggering for a moment, he glanced around, trying to
determine what had caused the SEAL to stop so suddenly.
Then he saw, in the beam of Donovan s light, a group of the creaturesahead of them: ten, perhaps a
dozen, standing motionless in the thick atmosphere of the outflow tunnel. Sev-eral of them were holding
things, things that dangled by what looked to Snow like dense threads. He peered more closely, in
mingled fascination and horror. Then he looked away quickly.
Mother of God, he breathed. What do we do now?
We blow our way out, Donovan said quietly, raising his weapon.
= 59 =
Margotook a deep drag from the oxygen mask, then passed it toSmithback. The oxygen cleared her
head immediately, and she glanced around. At the head of the group, Pendergast was placing bricks of
plastic explosive around the base of an open hatchway. Each time he pulled another charge from his pack
and dropped it in place, clouds of dust and fungus spore billowed up from the ground, obscuring his face
momentarily. Behind her stood D Agosta,weapon at the ready.Mephisto stood to one side, silent and
motionless, his eyes red embers in the dark.
Pendergast shoved the detonators into the C-4, then set the time carefully, checking it against his own
Patek Philippe. Then he retrieved his pack and rose silently, signaling it was time to move on to the next
position. From the circles of his night-vision goggles to the base of his chin, Pendergast was a mask of
light gray dust. His normally immaculate black suit was torn and muddied. Under other circumstances, he
would have looked ridiculous. ButMargo was in no mood to laugh.
The air was so bad she realized she had placed a hand protectively over her nose and mouth. She gave
up and took an-other pull from the mask.
Don tBogart that oxygen, Smithback whispered. He smiled weakly, but his eyes remained grim and
distant.
They moved down the narrow corridor,Margo now helpingSmithback through the darkness. Huge iron
rivets, spaced about ten feet apart, hung from the ceiling. After a couple of minutes, they stopped again
while Pendergast consulted his plans, then took the charges fromMargo s pack and placed them in a
niche near the roof.
Very good, he said. One more series and we can head for the surface. We ll need to move quickly.
He started down the passage, then stopped abruptly.
What is it? Margo whispered, but Pendergast held up his hand for silence.
Do you hear that? he asked at last in a low tone.
Margolistened, but could hear nothing. The close, fetid atmosphere was like cotton wool, muffling all
sound. But now she heard something: a dull thump, then another, like rolling thunder far beneath their
feet.
What is that? she asked.
I m not sure, Pendergast murmured.
It s not the SEALs, setting off their explosions?
Pendergast shook his head. Doesn t sound powerful enough to beplastique. Besides, it s too early. He
listened a moment, frowning, then motioned them forward again.Margo followed close behind, leading
Smithback as the passage rose, then fell, tracing a crazy course through the bedrock. She found herself
wondering who could have constructed this pas-sage, perhaps three dozen stories beneath the streets of
Man-hattan. She saw herself as in a vision, walking along Park Avenue, but the road appeared as just a
thin skin of asphalt, covering a vast network of shafts, tunnels, galleries, and cor-ridors, plunging deep
into the earth, crawling like a wasp s nest with the activity of ...
She gave her head a vicious shake and took another hit of the oxygen. As her thoughts cleared again,
she realized that the muffled sound was still coming from somewhere beneath her feet. Now, however, it
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