“How far of a swim is it?” Jen asked. “I don’t know how long I can hold my breath.”
“Me, either,” Marla said. Her face was pale. “I’m not that great a swimmer.”
Aston thought for a moment, then, “Okay, it’s about twenty feet down in this pool. Then you go through the door, along a short passage that then curves back up to the new cave. You’d be under a minute, tops. Sol, you had ropes in your pack, right?”
“I have one. It’s thin rappelling rope, one hundred and fifty feet.”
“I think that’ll be enough. Quickly, pack up only the essentials, whatever each of you can carry in a small pack. Make sure most of it is food. I’ll dive first and take Sol’s rope through. You guys just have to pull yourselves hand over hand along the rope. It’ll lead you down and back up.” He looked at Marla. “Easy, right?”
She gave a weak smile and nodded.
“Okay, let’s go.”
Sol threw the rope to Aston while everyone else busied themselves organizing essentials to take through. Aston realized his hands were shaking as he tied one end of the rope around a sturdy stalagmite at the lake’s edge. Was he leading them all to their deaths? Perhaps it would be better to die violently but quickly, swarmed by the mantics here, than risk a slow, miserable death of starvation elsewhere. But he couldn’t think that way. He had to believe there was another way out, a better option than starving or becoming something else’s food. He put the coil of rope over his shoulder and slipped into the strangely lukewarm water of the pool. Taking three long deep breaths, he held the last and dove. The door was still there, not the figment of his imagination he had briefly feared. He pulled himself through, feeding out the rope as he went, then up the short passage. His heart hammered as he surfaced in the pool on the other side, eyes scanning left and right in the soft green glow, expecting a swarm of mantics to descend on him. But the cave was empty, silent and calm, gloomier than the larger cave with the halogens. Easier for mantics to enter, but he decided to let that thought go for now.
He pulled himself from the water, secured the rope to the nearest strong-looking stalagmite, then dove back in. In moments he was back on the other side with the team, thankful to see the mantics hadn’t braved the bright cavern yet.
“Okay, let’s go. Just follow the rope.”
Marla stepped quickly forward. “Can I go first? Or I’ll lose my nerve.”
Aston nodded and she threw herself in, face scrunched up like she was about to cry. Aston had to admire her. After all, real courage wasn’t a lack of fear. Real courage was being terrified, but doing the thing anyway. “I’ll help Jen through,” he said. “The rest of you, go.”
They found a natural order. Slater followed Marla, then Syed. Sol went next.
“Me and Tate will come last,” Reid said. “You go. I’ll bring the rope in case we need it again.”
Aston nodded, turned to Jen Galicia. “Are you ready?”
“I guess so.”
“Okay. I’m going to free dive with you. This is my job, okay? So don’t worry.” He slipped back into the pool. “Hold me around the neck like you’re riding piggyback, hook your feet around my waist.”
She did as he asked, breathing short, nervous gasps. Her body trembled against him.
He swam into the middle of the pool. “Okay, really deep breath, trust me, and try to relax. Just don’t let go.”
“Okay.”
He felt her lungs fill against him. “Here we go.”
He sucked in a breath of his own and dived down. He went as quick as he safely could, careful to get low enough that he didn’t scrape her on the door or the roof of the short passage. She gasped as they surfaced in the new cave, the others watching anxiously from the edge. By the time Aston had carried Jen to the solid ground, both Tate and Reid had come through, the latter coiling the rope as he went. He untied the other end and Sol put it in his pack.
“Everybody okay?” Aston asked.
“Considering the circumstances, yeah.” Slater smiled, but her eyes were pained.
He couldn’t blame her. He figured everyone else must be feeling something akin to his own fears, the foremost among those a sense of crushing claustrophobia. Had they just trapped themselves in a deep and twisting underground tomb?
“Let’s just take an inventory of weapons and ammo,” Reid said. “We need to start being a lot more frugal with our usage.”
“I’ve got Gates’s assault rifle with a nearly empty clip,” Aston said.
Reid nodded. “Tate and I have what’s left in the clip and one more each. We both have a sidearm, two clips for each.”
“I’ve got Gates’s pistol,” Slater said. “But it’s empty.”
Reid handed over one spare clip for her. He patted the pistol at his hip. “I’m keeping what’s in here.”
“Fair enough.”
“That it?” Reid asked.
Sol held up his own two pistols. “I switched out clips when we got to the green cavern. These are both full, but that’s all I have.”
“Jesus.” Reid pursed his lips. “We’re not in a good way here.”
“But there’s nothing we can do about it,” Sol said. “Okay. Let’s move on.”
Only one passage led from the cave, and they headed for it, big Terry Reid up front. The rest followed, with Ronda Tate covering their six. The passage curved gently left and right a couple of times, then quickly opened out into a huge space. They all stopped dead in stunned surprise.
“Oh, my God,” Aston said.
28
Digby O’Donnell worked his way deeper into the realms of the persistent voice. He knew he was descending, and cared little for how far he might be led, as long as the mystery of the voice revealed itself in the end. He held the glowing idol close to his chest, hugged against him like he protected it, and followed its insistent pull. The skin of his hands blistered and peeled, but he paid no mind to the pain.
The whispering cajoled him, sometimes muttering his name, sometimes words of a language mysterious and barbed. He longed to understand the things that sounded like gibberish, he knew great knowledge lay in those entreaties, but they meant nothing to him. His frustration grew.
Tiredness dogged every step, sleep tugging at the edges of his consciousness. He should stop, rest. When was the last time he slept? No matter, there were more important things than sleep, even if exhaustion did make his vision blur. He staggered, tripping on the uneven ground, and went heavily onto one knee. Pain barked up his leg from the impact, but he held the idol tight. As he sucked in a breath and stood again, his mind seemed to shatter and escape his body. He cried out, sudden disorientation making him nauseated, then he saw another passage, as though looking through someone else’s eyes. Or something else. The vision was clearer than any snippet he had sensed before, then it fractured into dozens of repeats, a kaleidoscopic view of swirling imagery. He drew in breath again, tried to process what he saw, and the pictures in his mind changed, then changed again, rapid variations. He saw dark tunnels, scant bits of green light, barely noticeable to human eyes, but painful to this view. More than enough for him to scurry along, trying to find the peace and comfort of darkness. He hated the light, no matter how faint, every striation of bright green like a tiny pinprick to his eyes.
Dig realized he now saw through the eyes of the creatures. The mantics. He leaped from one to the next to the next, seeing what they saw, feeling their stresses, their drives. As the realization dawned the process increased, clearer than ever, like flipping from one television channel to another, ever more rapidly. Through the eyes of one, then another, and then another, he traveled at great speed along the tunnels, even as his body stumbled and staggered along, as if of its own accord.