"That's the way we want it."
The river bottom was dark, and cold, and somewhere down there was what
Cadmann wanted. "You're mine," he whispered.
"What was that, amigo?"
"Amigo." Cadmann looked at him in disgust. "I said I knew it was too good to last."
Chapter 18
DESCENT INTO HELL
One of the greatest blessings of virtue is the contempt of death. He who has learned how to die has unlearned how to serve. To be ready to die frees us from all bondage and thralldom.
MONTAIGNE, Essays
Cadmann wiped at his faceplate twice before he realized that the stain was on the inside. He waved to one of the waiting spearmen, got a nod and surfaced. Fresh air tasted good. He removed the faceplate and spat into it, rubbed out the fog and rinsed it. Better.
The Miskatonic churned around him. Even with weight belt and tether line, the current threw his balance off, increased irritability, drained his strength. The wet suit slowed his every motion. And well worth it! Many a man had survived a shark attack because of his wet suit. A wet suit didn't taste like blood; and if something tore into him anyway, it could hold him together like a body bandage until a doctor could reach him.
But he felt slow. He dared not hurry. Methodically he prepared himself for war, knowing that the enemy would interrupt him when it chose.
Anchoring the net had been nightmarish: two men hammering and screwing meter-long barbed steel stakes into the mud and rock around the cave, a third man hovering back, underwater lamp and spear gun at the ready. The net itself was stronger than steel cable and as thin as spider silk, a synthetic organic polymer that was predicted to last for hundreds of years of ordinary use. No lesser durability would have been approved for shipment aboard Geographic.
Ordinary use. Cadmann smiled thinly into his faceplate. This evening's exercise would hardly be considered that.
He reached back over his shoulder to adjust the re-breather apparatus. Very light, very compact, intended for underwater repairs on a docked Minerva. It was certified for an hour of swimming, half that of "vigorous activity." It'll do. Half an hour fighting that thing and one or the other of us won't need oxygen any more. Okay, down we go—
"Cadmann, this is Sylvia."
"Go." It was impossible to speak distinctly into the throat microphone.
"I've analyzed the photos. Cadmann, that thing has to be amphibious.
It may spend more time underwater than on land."
"Uh-huh." I already thought of that one. And they're hard enough to kill on land... "Thanks. More?"
"No—except, be careful."
"Uh-huh." He stretched and dove down to join the others at their work at the net. He felt the reassuring pressure of Zack's "monster killer" spear gun against his thigh.
Moscowitz had promised them a stopper. Joe Sikes's machine shop had delivered it. The device looked like a pistol with a webbed black plastic grip. Immediately in front of the handpiece was an ammunition clip that looked as if it were constructed for shotgun shells. This was almost true: special cartridges drove carbon-steel-tipped spears carrying enough high explosive to blow the engine out of a Skeeter.
This should stop them, and the net should hold them. Hah. The net had better stop them. This island is starting to look infested with the bastards.
He swam to the cave mouth and waved to the spear gunners watching the work. One waved back and went to join Carlos on the other side of the cave.
Carlos had opened his wet suit down the front. One of the spear guns was strapped to his leg. He worked methodically, carefully, but he never stopped. He'd done that all day, driving Cadmann on with his example, working through exhaustion, through fear... as if the devil was on his tail.
Welcome to hell, Carlos.
A silver trail of bubbles hobbled from the side of Carlos's mouth, and he gave Cadmann a "thumbs up." Cadmann wiggled the meter-long barbed-steel pinions holding down his corners of the net. No give to them at all. If the rock held, the net would.
A catfish and a samlon swam by almost in tandem, the samlon close behind, chasing playfully. Cadmann allowed himself a twinge of hunger. The fish were getting big and fat, especially the samlon. If he'd had time, he would have snatched that one from the water.
They began to ascend. Cadmann's aching muscles sighed relief.
Their heads broke the surface. Both scrambled out in almost comic haste, sucking air. The sun had dipped below the west wall and there were only a few minutes of light left.
Armed men and women surrounded the temporary camp. Packing and crating from boxes of hastily shipped equipment were piled randomly into a central area; no one had taken the time to collect or remove them, but they were out of the way, no shelter for monsters to hide behind. Two machine guns occupied the top of an empty crate.
A faint burning smell hung in the air. The low steady vibration of a flare drill tickled Cadmann's feet. An electric generator hummed near the shelter. A series of cables linked it to batteries of portable lights set up on every side, giving the entire area a bright greenish-yellow glow.
Cadmann and Carlos stripped off their mouthpieces and gloves. Cadmann opened the zipper on his wet suit.
Skeeters glided across the river. Their searchlights danced yellow ovals on the rushing water. Guards carrying explosive and incendiary rounds patrolled in tight shifts while the technicians erected their tents and tested their equipment. The canyon thrummed with the sound of a Skeeter bringing in a second generator.
Carlos pointed to the machine guns and patrols. "They take you seriously, amigo."
Sure. Now. "Good."
A tent flap raised, and Jerry waved a thin arm at them. "Over here."
"Join you in dos minutos, Cad. Want to get a gel on my face cut."
Cad nodded, then crossed to the tent. He had to duck going in. A small gas heater burned in the corner, and the air was toasty. "What do we have, Jer?"
"Everything you wanted," Jerry answered. He held up a plastic pouch. Its contents seemed darkly purple in the artificial light. "This should do it."
"Great. How are the other preparations going? Andy?"
The big engineer spread out a sheet of color-coded graph sheeting on the table. "Deep radar shows a network of caves going back into the mountains for at least a kilometer. It would be death to go in there and take it on its own terms."
"There's no way in hell to kill it and be sure it's dead unless we go in. You know that."
"Swell. Shit, man. I don't like it at all."
"Have to burn the egg sac," Cadmann said.
Jerry grinned. "I've read Red Planet too." His look became serious.
"All right, I grant you that. There may be young. Or eggs. And right now it's wounded. There isn't a better time, but I still don't like it."
"No more do I, but you just do the best you can up here. Do it right, and we won't have anything to do but collect a corpse."
"Corpses, if it has young. All right. Come on."
He led the way out and behind the tent where a tripod-mounted laser drill burned into the ground. The men working the drill were shielded and wore goggles against the glare and the fat sparks that popped and flew like flaming moths. Sizzling melted rock bubbled up out of the cavity, flowed a few inches, then turned sluggish and puddled.
Thirty meters away, a second drill was searing into the rock, and just beyond a rise Cadmann could see the sharp, flickering lights of yet another.
The laser shut down abruptly, and someone yelled, "We're through!"
"Lay the pipe through." Twelve meters of flexible metal piping was run through while the rock was still hot. The top end was fastened to a pump and a twenty-gallon drum.