"What the fuck is this place?” Angus whispered.
Randy didn't answer. He stared out at the gargantuan cavern's honeycombed walls, his mind frantically trying to put the pieces together. According to the map, this place was one of the biggest spaces in the complex, second only to the cavern surrounding the Dense Mass. He hadn't known what he'd find, but impossibly strange creatures and echoing reports of gunfire wasn't what he'd expected, to say the least.
"Angus, Check your Marco/Polo unit. That gunfire had to be from EarthCore personnel."
Angus pulled the small unit from his belt and slid to the sandy ground, his back against the boulder, completely out of sight from anyone — or anything — inside the cavern. The Marco-unit beeped softly with a low-pitched sound, then again with six high-pitched beeps. His eyes narrowed with anger.
"Dammit,” Angus said. “I can't believe it."
"What? Who is it?"
"I'm picking up signals from Mack, Dr. Reeves, Dr. Haak, Lybrand, O'Doyle, and Mr. Big Shit Connell Kirkland himself,” Angus said. “What the hell is going on?"
"We heard gunfire, so something must be very wrong.” Randy said. “Where are they?"
"About two hundred feet up the side at ten o'clock if you face the little village."
"How's everyone's vitals?"
Angus tweaked the knobs, switching quickly through readings for each person. “Everyone's pulse is absolutely racing, except for O'Doyle, he looks normal. Temperature is okay, alpha waves are through the roof, but they appear to be coming down. Hold on… Mack doesn't look good at all. His Alpha waves are down and his blood pressure is low. I'd guess he needs a doctor and soon."
"High Alphas and fast pulse; sounds like they were in a fight."
Angus looked up at Randy. As if the same thought simultaneously flashed through their minds, they slowly peeked over the boulder and into the cavern. Although almost four hundred yards away, they saw hundreds of ALs forming a long, distinct line. One end of the line ended inside the village. The line's other end stretched off into a tunnel entrance at the cavern's edge. Speck-small at this distance, the ALs’ reflections flashed in a rhythmic, repetitive pattern.
Randy pulled his pocket binoculars from his belt and stared at the scene. “The ALs are doing that jerking thing we saw earlier. I wish I knew what the hell that meant."
As if to answer his question, a mass of orange-flashing bodies and angrily waving tentacles emerged from the crumbling stone buildings. Moving quickly, the aggressive-looking creatures followed the bobbing AL line. Halfway to the cavern's edge, they stopped.
He focused in, staring at the metal objects clutched in the creature's tentacles. He felt a spike of fear drill though his chest — the metal objects were long, curved knives.
He looked to the right. His stomach churned with revulsion at the sight; a swarm of ALs, perhaps a thousand strong, moved across the ground like a pile of living, squirming, twitching metal balls. Like an army of cartoon ants pilfering a picnic basket, they carried what looked to be sheets of steel. The ALs delivered their strange cargo to the glowing, waving creatures, which quickly formed orderly lines and moved toward the cavern's edge.
"We need to get the fuck out of here and back to the surface,” Angus said. “And I mean pronto."
Randy nodded his head in zombie-like fashion, clinging to Angus's words. Angus would get them out. Angus ate danger for lunch. Angus would know what to do.
"It's 11:21,” Angus said. “The thumper should be updating. We can send out a message."
Angus handed Randy the Marco unit and pulled out his hand-held computer. “Okay. We've got five minutes until the thumpers turn off,” he said. “I'll tell the thumpers to stay on for the next six hours and broadcast a constant SOS."
"Which one?"
"Well, I didn't happen to program a message for Hostile Tentacle-Creatures, but situation number fourteen seems to be the best. Situation fourteen is that we've encountered armed and dangerous claim jumpers. That will get the authorities out here on the double. The surface should be crawling with SWAT teams and Utah State Troopers inside thirty minutes."
Randy busied himself setting up the portable thumper used to send the message to the surface units. He wondered just what the State Police could do about a race of aggressive subterranean creatures.
Angus pulled the small receiver unit from his belt, pushed the collapsible stand into a crack in the rock, then plugged the whole unit into his handheld computer. A blank bar appeared on the screen. He watched the bar fill up, indicating the receiver unit's progress in processing seismic information sent from the thumpers up on the surface.
Randy finished setting up the small, portable thumper and set it to broadcast situation number fourteen. The unit's small hammer pounded into the ground with a rapid, complex dance. The two scientists winced with every thud. Randy knew it only sounded loud because he was right on top of it, but thoughts of AL hordes and knife-wielding creatures hung foremost in their minds. After only a few seconds, the thumper fell quiet. Randy quickly broke it down and stashed it back in his pack.
Randy paused, an idea filtering through his jumbled emotions. He grabbed the handheld monitor from Angus and called up the tunnel map, studying it carefully. An orange dot marked the position of the other EarthCore personnel.
"That tunnel the glowing creatures went into. It's part of a series that may lead to Connell and the others. The creatures might be going after them. We have to do something.” Randy looked at Angus, hoping he would know the best way to help the others.
"Screw that,” Angus said in a hiss. “We need to hightail it out of here. Let them fend for themselves!"
Randy stared at his friend. He knew Angus was selfish and self-centered, sure, but this was too much. There were people in danger, lives at stake, for goodness sake.
"Come on, Angus,” Randy said, not sure if his friend was serious. “We can't leave them to die. We'll be as careful as we can, but we have to go after them."
Angus's face clouded with anger. The look took Randy aback. For the first time, he felt afraid of his friend, felt like something dark and dangerous lurked inside Angus's talented brain. Randy waited as Angus seemed to turn the situation over in his mind.
"All right,” Angus said finally. “We'll go after them and help if we can, but if we can't then we take care of Numero Uno and get the fuck out of Dodge, understand?"
Randy nodded. They quietly finished packing up and slid back into the tunnel, using the map to find an alternate route to Connell and the others.
On the surface, the thumpers’ sensitive seismic sensors picked up the tiny repetitive throbbing from below. All six of the thumpers processed the message, read the instructions contained within, and accessed their data banks for the proper action.
As a unit, they beamed a synch signal to cue up their efforts, and began broadcasting the preprogrammed Situation Report No. 14 on all radio frequencies.
After three rings, a groggy-voiced André Vogel answered the phone.
"Hello?"
"André, did I wake you?"
"Who the hell is this?"
"Come on, you don't recognize my voice?"
There was a brief pause. Kayla smiled maliciously, trying to picture the look on his face.
"Kayla Meyers. I don't believe it. Using restricted access codes is a federal offense, Meyers."
Kayla's anger bubbled just from the sound of his voice, but she stayed calm. “I know that,” she said. “I've got a matter of national importance, so please, hear me out. I only need two minutes.” Kayla paused, waiting for André to make his decision.