And then, as suddenly as it had started, it ceased. Ryan stood silent and still, straining every nerve to detect any further movement. By the fading light, he could see Krysty, propped against the near wall of the shaft.
She caught his glance and briefly shook her head. With her razor-sharp mutie sense, she was the likeliest to detect any further danger in the depths of the earth.
Doc looked up, not yet daring to clamber to his feet.
“Safe?” he whispered. It seemed uncannily loud in the silence following the miniquake.
Ryan nodded, moving slowly to pick up the spluttering and dying flare, and moving with an infinite care back to where Krysty stood.
“Go back and check,” he said quietly. Krysty assented, and they both crept back to Jak, who was standing perfectly still, feeling for the slightest movement through the balls of his feet. As they approached, the albino looked at them, the flare illuminating his red eyes so that they glowed like coals.
“We move, not it adjust us,” he murmured, indicating that the resettled earth should be still for some time. The three of them went back to Doc, who was gingerly picking himself up and dusting himself down. Without a word, Doc fell in behind them and muttered an oath to himself when he saw that a wall of concrete, earth and rock cut them off from the others.
“Hope they behind, not in,” Jak said simply.
It was pitch-black, and Mildred clung to the concrete floor, aware that she was at some crazy angle where her feet were above her head and her hands were pressing against the angle where the floor and wall now met.
The dust and dirt that filled the air clogged her nose and mouth. “John,” she spluttered through a mouthful of earth, “are you okay?”
“In one piece,” the Armorer replied quietly. “How about you?”
“Everything works and nothing hurts…much,” she replied with a smile no one could see. “Damned quake’s got me almost upside down, but other than that…”
“I’m coming forward,” J.B. replied. And then there was silence for a short while, broken only by the distant shuffle of earth on concrete. J.B.’s voice broke again. “I must be near you. Things seem to have died down, and it’s all pretty solid. There’s a ten-foot raise in front of me, but enough of a gap to get through.”
While Mildred tentatively picked her way around the steeply angled shaft until she was once again upright, she could hear J.B. ascend to the top of the platform and the scrape of his boots against the concrete as he felt his way down to floor level.
“Millie, where are you?” he whispered, only feet from her. She reached out to embrace him, and they silently thanked fate that each was, so far, okay. Finally, he said, “We need to get forward, find the others. Think we can risk a flare?”
“Uh-uh…too risky until we know how much air we’ve got. If we’re in a pocket, then the flare could use it too quickly.”
“Okay, let’s find out,” J.B. said simply, passing her and tentatively moving forward. He went only a few yards before reaching a wall of rock and earth.
“Shit, we’re cut off back here.”
“And no way of knowing how deep that wall of rock is,” Mildred added, almost to herself.
DEAN KNEW that he had been unconscious, but had no idea for how long. He only knew that his mouth tasted bitter, and his head was ringing as he raised it.
Slowly, allowing himself time to adjust to the crazy angle of the floor and for his balance to assert itself over the waves of nausea that washed past him as he sat upright, he took in his surroundings. There was no light, and he waited in silence for his eyes to adjust to the residual light.
But there was no residual light.
Dean fought back the sudden surprise and panic, and tried to think logically. He was still alive, and although the fall and subsequent unconsciousness had left his body aching, there was no damage that would impair him. On his hands and knees, moving slowly to keep any disturbance to a minimum, Dean explored the limits of his enclosed world. It was only a couple of yards each way around, and the roof was too low to enable him to stand straight when he attempted to rise to his feet.