“Go join ’em, Doc. And tell her I’m really sorry about hitting her.”
“I accept that you were correct in your course of action, Mr. Cawdor, but you can scarcely expect me to relish it.”
Hat jammed on his head, one hand steadying it, Doc Tanner vanished from their sight. Ryan, J.B. and Krysty waited for a few moments. The water at their feet swelled and surged, lapping at the toes of Ryan’s combat boots.
“Fireblast!”
“What’s ?” Krysty began, looking down. “It’s rising. It’s getting”
“See you the other side,” the little Armorer said, tucking his beloved fedora into the front of his coat as he jumped feet first into the pool. A trail of bubbles indicated his progress under the ledge of rock.
“The rain,” Krysty said. “I can hear it. Hear it louder. Ryan it’s like thunder on”
There wasn’t time for her to finish the sentence. The pool began to foam and froth, a reddish scum appearing on its surface. Where it had begun to rise slowly, inching up the slight slope toward them, it now swelled wolfishly, clawing at their boots, forcing them back up the tunnel into the blackness behind them.
They hesitated. Already the water had risen at least two feet, pushing along a dozen feet or more. The power of the surge was frightening, bubbling like a monstrous cauldron.
“What d’you think, Lover?” Krysty asked. “Be difficult to swim through that now.”
Ryan bit his lip in anger. Another half minute and they’d all have been through safely. It crossed his mind to wonder how the other five were on the far side of the pool. If the flash flood had this kind of awesome power, then what would it be like in the chamber beyond?
“Got to move back. No knowing how long this’ll go on ‘fore it subsides again. Could be a couple of hours. Come on.”
He led the way. Now the light had virtually disappeared, and he felt his way along the slippery walls, hearing the thunder of the water behind them, imagining it pursuing them. The passage rose and fell, and Ryan wondered if the flood had sought out a lower level ahead of them where it would trap them.
He felt the tension of panic rising in his chest as his pulse and respiration thundered. His good eye probed the blackness ahead as he tried to remember the way the tunnel had gone and wondered whether there was any side trails to confuse them. Water lapped around his ankles, cold and glutinous, like the embrace of a dying sticky.
“You there, lover?” he called, shouting at the top of his voice against the rising roar of the torrent.
“Yeah, keep moving. Getting deeper.”
The passage sloped down, and for a few moments the water was up to his waist, chilling his groin, making him gasp in shock. Then the passage jerked up again, so that the water only slurped at his boots. The floor was streaming, slippery and infinitely treacherous. The current was so fast that to fall would mean death in the shrinking darkness.
When the passage narrowed, he banged his head hard on the ceiling, stunning himself. “Watch your head,” he screamed, hearing fear ride his voice.
Then the ceiling caved in, and someone fell on his shoulders. Fire lanced across his ribs from a knife or spear, as fingers clawed at his windpipe. The extra weight was enough to knock him off balance, and he slipped over, head plunging into the cold mud.
Chapter Six
THE HECKLER amp; KOCH went clattering into the water. Ryan couldn’t breathe. Something held his head under the slime, as a knife or spear sliced across his stomach and cruel fingers tried to rip out his throat. Feeling skins with his hands, he guessed it was an ambush from the stunted muties who had been trailing them since they had arrived in the complex. It had crossed his mind that the muties had probably built the maze of tunnels scaled down to their dwarfish bodies. This one had been hiding in a dugout in the celling when it had heard them back away from the rising flood.
Ryan’s only edged weapon was the long cleaver that was sheathed at his belt, useless for such close combat. He half rolled, kicking out to try to gain a footing. Pushing against the walls of the tunnel, he threw himself back, feeling the satisfying crunch as he smashed his opponent into the jagged stone.