Byrne glanced down at the water, then back at the magnetometer readout.
It made total sense.
A crackling sound above him.
The branches along the edge of the pit shook. Byrne caught a blur of motion directly overhead. Leaves and blossoms fell from the trees like snow.
“I found a way out—” Byrne started, but Richards shushed him.
Byrne switched on his night vision apparatus and lowered it over his eyes. He could see the shapes in the bushes and the trees, but none of them clearly enough to tell what they were. They were obviously well adapted to hunting under the cover of darkness.
The crackling sounds faded and a preternatural silence once more descended upon them.
Byrne scooted to the edge and stared down into the water. There were bodies upon bodies beneath the living skein of insects.
“Listen to me,” Byrne whispered. “There’s a way out—”
A shrill cry shattered the stillness. Others joined it as the night came to life. Shadows burst from the undergrowth and exploded from the branches. They hit the ground and poured over the edge of the pit in a tidal wave of animalian ferocity.
Warren shouted and gunfire erupted all around Byrne. The report near his ear was deafening and made everything sound tinny and hollow, as though he were trapped inside an air duct. Discharge flared from barrels. Byrne caught glimpses of bared teeth as muscular forms scurried down the dirt walls and leaped from the spiral ramp. Long brownish-red fur flowed from their bodies like flames.
A spatter of blood struck his face shield a heartbeat before a simian shape plummeted past him toward the water. It hit one of the corpses and drove it under.
Anthony screamed from Byrne’s right. The soldier toppled backward as he fired, his bullets chewing up the earthen wall. Slender arms slashed at his head and chest while jaws snapped at his throat. His isolation suit tore. He struggled and stumbled. Dropped his rifle. Lost his footing. Fell a half-dozen feet to the walkway below him. Before he could get back to his feet, they were upon him. His horrible cries echoed over the ruckus.
Something heavy struck Byrne between his shoulders. Drove him to his knees. He felt claws in his back. Scratching against his hood. He reached behind him, grabbed a handful of fur, and flung the beast over the edge. What almost looked like an orangutan crossed with a chimpanzee streaked toward the bottom of the pit.
Byrne climbed to his feet and grabbed Richards, who bellowed as he fired into the masses of creatures streaming from the jungle.
“There’s only one way out of here!” Byrne shouted.
If Richards had heard him over the shrieking and gunfire, he didn’t acknowledge him.
“Listen to me, goddammit! Either we get out of here now or we’re all dead!”
“We’re all dead regardless!”
“Not if you follow me!”
Byrne turned toward the water, took two running strides, and jumped out over the nothingness.
Byrne’s stomach fluttered and he heard himself shout.
He hit the water feet first. Felt something squish beneath his heels. And then he was immersed in the cool fluid.
He flailed and struggled through the tangle of arms and legs. His exertions caused the flesh of the bodies trapped beneath the surface to dissociate from the bones. Even with the night vision goggles, he could barely see a thing as he fought his way down through the corpses, crawling between and over and around them. He worked his way deeper and deeper until there became more space between the remains and he was able to see the rocky bottom.
Water trickled into his isolation suit from the punctures in the back, but fortunately his respirator was still patent and the seal around his hood remained intact.
He envisioned the magnetic signal on the map that had reminded him of a snake, how it had appeared to branch from the eastern side of the mine and turned—
There!
The hole was nearly concealed by the corpse wedged into it. The woman’s hair wavered like seaweed. Her rear end had entered the tunnel first, folding her forehead to her knees. Chunks of flesh and detritus sluiced past her on the subtle current. He grabbed her leg and pulled, but merely felt the bones in her knee dislocate.
Something brushed his side.
Byrne whirled to see Richards pass to his right and grip the woman by the shoulder. Together they leveraged her from the hole and sent her drifting back to join the others.
Byrne didn’t waste any time. He slithered through the orifice and into a chute so narrow he had to use his hands to pull himself deeper into the earth.
The ground beneath him slowly metamorphosed from coarse rock to stone that had been smoothed by time and running water. The walls withdrew enough for him to swim and he took full advantage. He banged his elbows and knees, hit his head and jammed his fingers. Squeezed past rotting remains and did everything in his power to restrain the growing panic inside of him.
What if he was wrong? What if they were swimming into a dead end, or worse? The air supply in his respirator wouldn’t last forever, nor would his suit hold up to another attack.
The tunnel constricted once more. The walls were sharp with broken rocks, the ground littered with fragments that threatened to cut through his gloves. Diamonds glimmered from the rubble. He got a grip on the walls and propelled himself from the end of the tunnel into a larger pool. The moment he felt the ceiling lift, he pushed himself to his hands and knees and raised his head out of the water.
There were maybe a dozen corpses in the murky pool, one of them partially ensnared by the cords of a parachute.
Byrne shouted and climbed to his feet. Looked straight up and turned in a circle. There was no sign of movement from the trees, no shadows scurrying over the edge of the pit.
Richards burst from the surface and splashed in Byrne’s direction.
“Go, go, go!”
He shoved Byrne ahead of him.
Warren emerged from the water and slogged toward where Byrne and Richards started up the ramp. Graves was right behind him.
“Jesus,” Warren said. “They were coming from everywhere!”
“They took down Anthony like he was nothing,” Graves said. “Just swarmed over him.”
Richards grabbed Byrne by the shoulder and turned him around.
“Can they swim?”
Byrne shrugged from the man’s grasp and tried to recall what had happened after the one he threw hit the water, but couldn’t remember anything beyond it landing on one of the corpses.
“I don’t know. Maybe. Primates don’t instinctively swim. Rivers generally serve as geographic barriers for zoonotic diseases. At least until they spread to man.”
“What the hell are they?” Graves asked.
Byrne had no answer. Primates like the chimpanzee – if that was even what these things were – were notoriously aggressive and thus a threat for spreading contagions, but he’d never heard of them attacked as a pack.
“It doesn’t matter what they are,” Richards said. “Right now we need to find a defensible position and call for retrieval.”
“No chopper’s going to be able to get to us through these trees,” Warren said.
“Then we’re going to have to get to town.”
Richards pushed past Byrne and jogged up the spiral ramp toward the jungle. The others hurried to catch up. The rain had made the ramp muddy and treacherous, slowing their pace to a maddening extent. The forest was little better. Any trail they might have left that morning was concealed by heavy branches bowing beneath the weight of the accumulated water. This time they made no effort at stealth. Richards took the lead and ran with his rifle at port arms, using it to clear his way. Graves brought up the rear. He jogged backward whenever the foliage granted enough space and then sprinted through the underbrush to catch back up with the rest of them.