“What do we do now, sir?”
“We leave someone to get into the computers and then we head to the sub as planned.” Damien stepped into the hangar and scanned all the equipment that had been stored there. Chess Team were planning to use the base for themselves. Cocky bastards.
Jameson looked nervous, the square cut of his jaw almost pouting. “And the explosive device sir?”
“O’Brian will have taken care of that, don’t you worry. He stayed behind to get it into the cavern when the time is right.” Damien looked the man in the face and noted that he had trouble looking at Damien’s scar. “Don’t worry, I won’t make you go back through all those salamanders just to leave the bomb.”
Jameson sighed audibly; his relief was palpable.
“Oh, no, my little shite-eel. I’ll need you to come with me to the submarine dock to fight off hundreds of the buggers and get our sample.”
All the blood drained from Jameson’s face.
14.
En Route to Section Central, Former Manifold Alpha Facility, White Mountains, NH
Tom Duncan saw a piercing light. He had, of course, heard all the stereotypical hackneyed clichés about death and seeing a light before you die. But he didn’t think they were usually talking about the sparkling orange brilliance of a road flare. And this sizzling light was coming right at him.
At the last second, Duncan dodged to the side and the light sailed past him and smacked hard into the plastic and Plexiglas of the bio door that had been at his back. There was a loud thwacking noise then the projectile fell to the tunnel floor and Duncan saw that it was indeed a road flare.
He quickly turned his attention upward again, but all the shifting salamander shapes he had seen in the darkness of the tunnel were gone now. There was a hard blue-white light ahead of him, facing away down the tunnel, and then it turned to him briefly before turning away.
“You okay, Boss?”
Anna Beck stepped into the glare of the flare and was illuminated for Duncan to see. Her black uniform was a bit disheveled, but otherwise she seemed fine.
“Anna, am I glad to see you. I thought I was done for,” Duncan let out a sigh.
“They don’t like light and they really don’t like heat and fire. The cavern was filled with them. Also, as we suspected, several crevices and passages lead from the cavern up to these rail tunnels,” all business, Beck had stepped up to Duncan and was attaching a glowing LED lamp to his shirt, and handing him a spotlight and some flares.
As they started walking toward the HDT dirt bike, Duncan thought of something.
“What the hell were you doing with flares down in the cavern? You knew it was filled with gas.”
“I like to be prepared for anything, Boss.”
Duncan smiled. He’d told her she didn’t need to call him ‘Boss’ several times now, but she insisted on doing it. He quickly briefed her on what he knew of the situation, and they got onto the HDT. He let her drive. As he was swinging his leg over the bike, he saw some shifting in the shadows ahead, despite the glow from the headlamp on the bike, and the spotlight he now held in his hand.
“They’re still up ahead in the shadows,” he told Beck.
“Yeah, the light won’t make them go away, but it will keep them at bay a little,” she replied.
“Hold on a second,” Duncan made her get off the bike and he opened the storage compartment under the seat. He removed a small cutting torch. “This might not be much, but if they don’t like heat and fire, it might be better than the spotlight.”
“Great idea.”
They got back on the bike and Black Zero turned her head back to him. “Are you ready? This is likely to be one hell of a ride.”
“Let’s get it done.”
Beck gunned the throttle and the dirt bike took off down the tunnel. Almost immediately, Duncan could tell things weren’t going to go well. The walls shifted and slid with the concentration of Salamanders he knew were there, despite the fact that he couldn’t see them. The headlamp from the dirt bike kept the path in front of them clear, but he could tell they were on the walls around the bike, and soon the first one leapt at the riders.