“No. If you try, they’ll fire. They have to be deactivated at the control source.”
“How do we do that?”
“Smash the comp. If there’s no link with satellite, there’s no way to trigger the cuffs.”
“Sounds easy enough.”
“There’s another possibility, of course. There could be a fail-safe measure in place.”
“What would that be?”
“When the satellite signal is broken, all the cuffs activate.”
J.B. caught the boy staring at the dull silver bands around his wrists. He put his hand on Dean’s shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze. “Nothing for you to worry about now,” he said. “We’re a long way from making that move. But if it turns out that’s our only chance to get free, we’ve got to take it. We’ve got to find a way to get back there and pull the plug.”
“My mouth is so dry, my tongue’s split,” Gabhart said. Then he suddenly doubled over, wrapping his arms around his stomach. “My guts hurt,” he moaned. “Feels like they’re on fire.”
“Hang on, Colonel,” J.B. said, kneeling beside him. “Try to hang on. We need to know about the battlesuits. Do they have a weak point?”
Gabhart sagged over onto his side.
“Colonel? Colonel?”
Gabhart couldn’t hear J.B. He had passed out again.
PUFFING, DOC TRIED to stay close to Jak’s heels as he scrambled through the maze of side tunnels and man-size crevices. In the light of Doc’s rad badge, the albino’s long hair reflected back a shocking green, and he moved with an economy of motion and a split-second decisiveness that the old man couldn’t hope to match. It was more a glide than a trot. Effortless. Silky smooth.
They had already dumped off one load of ore. About 150 pounds of it. By Doc’s estimate, it was going to take thirty more trips to fill up the cart. At fifteen to twenty minutes per trip, it would be eight to ten hours before they’d have more water.
Not something to dwell upon.
Doc was relieved when Jak slowed his breakneck pace down the tunnel. They began looking into the intersecting crevices and holes for a likely place to collect more superhot ore.
As Doc glanced down one of the narrow side seams, a set of eyes flashed back in his badge’s light. It was so startlingly close that he jumped back a step. There was a rustling noise, then the eyes were gone.
“What in Hades was that?” he cried.
“Stickie,” Jak said. “Crawling through the cracks. From inside walls up into ceiling. He’s over there now. Hear him?”
Doc had to admit that he couldn’t hear anything except the sighing of the nukeglass, but he took the youth’s word for it. He felt damnably naked without his LeMat. The pickax he’d been issued was no substitute for nine .44-caliber lead balls.
The corridor they were following zigzagged back and forth before it opened onto the high domed expanse of a partially collapsed bubble. A huge interior space, it was too broad for their badge lights to reach the other side. They could see the ceiling, though. To Doc it looked like a vast, curved mirror, blurred by swirls and ripples.
Jak found the place unattractive, for strategic reasons. “Too big, too dark,” he said. “Can’t stay here.”
Then they heard a cry from the far side of the bubble.
“Help me. Help me.”
A man’s voice, certainly, Doc thought. But where exactly was it coming from? “I can’t see where he is,” he said to Jak.
“Me, neither. Mebbe a trap. Could be stickies.”
“Most stickies cannot form words.”
“Could have a prisoner, use him as bait. Making him talk.”
“Shall we not inquire further?” Doc said. He didn’t wait for Jak’s reply. He cupped his hand in front of his mouth and shouted through it into the darkness, “What is your situation?”
“I’m caught in a cave-in,” the voice said. “My legs are pinned and there’s a block edge against the inside of my groin. It’s too heavy to move. If I try, it will sever my femoral artery. Please help me…”
“Whoever he is, he has some knowledge of anatomy,” Doc said. “An educated man, perhaps. A rarity in these wild parts and unhappy times. Shall we take a closer look?”