He turned away to avoid the effects of the shock grenade. As soon as it went off, he and Troy darted through the doors with assault rifles at the ready. Peri stepped through behind them and dropped to one knee, her pistol in the two-handed grip Troy had shown her. She looked all round, her gun muzzle tracking her view. She could now see that the cave was almost black, with a tiny sliver of light at its far end. Both Steve and Troy were using their night-vision monoculars, and moving steadily forward, one to her left and the other to her right, looking for their target. She began moving cautiously forward up the middle of the cave. She heard Gus enter behind her, and called out to him.
“Hang back by the door, Gus. If it doubles back past us, do not, whatever you do, let it get out of this cave. If you need to shut us in, just do it.”
“Hey,” came Troy’s voice. “Do we get a vote in this?”
“No, mate, we don’t,” said Steve. “Peri, why don’t you give Gus some back up?”
“Tired of my company already, boys?”
“I take it that’s no.” said Troy.
“Movement,” said Peri. “Dead ahead. It crossed that little light, my right to left.” It dawned on her now that the distant gleam must be a small hole in the cave wall, leading out to the cliff face where Chen had fallen. The creature must have been feeding tentacle tips – chain snakes – out through that hole for days.
“I see it,” said Steve. “I can’t see Maxwell though.”
“Oh fuck,” came Troy’s voice, from off to the right. “I just stepped in something squishy. I think it’s part of Maxwell, but there’s not a lot of him here.”
“Assume he’s gone,” said Peri in a cold voice. “See if we can hurt this fucking thing.”
“I have him,” said Steve calmly, “Directly to my front, about ten o’clock from you, Peri.”
“Got him,” she replied.
The two marines opened fire with controlled, carefully aimed three-round bursts. The creature hissed and they could hear it moving in the darkness. Steve and Troy kept up a steady fire, but Peri had fewer bullets available to her, so she waited until the faint light was obscured by the beast’s bulk, and emptied her pistol at it. When the light stayed obscured, she realised that meant it was moving straight down the middle of the cave, and started back-pedalling quickly, calling out, “It’s in front of me and closing fast.”
Peri ejected the magazine from the pistol but fumbled the replacement, and heard it skittering across the cave. “I’ve dropped the fucking reload,” she shouted. “I’m getting out.” She turned and started running.
Steve called out, “Flash bang. One away.”
A couple of seconds later came the loud crack and bright light. The creature hissed and growled, and they caught a glimpse of something big retreating back up the cave. They ducked out through the doors and slammed them shut.
“I need a reload,” said Peri. She accepted two spare pistol magazines and loaded one of them.
“I don’t think we were hurting it,” Steve said.
“Just annoying it,” added Troy.
“It didn’t like the flash-bang,” observed Peri. “I think it was the light that bothered it. So come on, boys, let’s take stock. What resources have we got?”
“Bullets,” said Steve. “I’ve got three full rifle mags plus what’s loaded, call it one hundred rounds.”
“Same.” said Troy.
“Nine mil rounds, call it sixty apiece and Peri has thirty,” Steve said. “Gus, what about you?”
“Twenty,” said the Swede.
“None of which seem to bother the beast,” said Peri. “What about things that go bang?”
“Between us, me and Troy have one frag and three flash-bang grenades.”
“And let’s consider what we’ve learned,” said Peri. “Bullets, at least in the quantities we’ve got, only irritate it.”
“Chop the end off a tentacle all you have is a chain snake plus an annoyed beastie,” said Steve.
“It doesn’t like flash bangs.”
“We haven’t tried a frag on it yet,” said Troy. “Would it do enough damage to kill the main creature without just throwing out a load of snakes?”
“And that’s the big question,” said Peri. “Do we have anything big enough to really hurt it?”
There was an ominous sound of hissing and scraping at the door.
“Well,” started Gus, but he was interrupted by a resounding crash against the door.
“Did that just move?” asked Amanda.
“That just moved,” confirmed Peri. “Come on, hold the door!”
“Well,” Gus said again. “I believe this type of creature can regenerate itself from large enough parts, as we saw with the tentacle tip. So a large explosion risks just scattering parts that will grow into several more creatures. All weaker, but all capable of killing and growing.”
“Fuck, Gus, how long have you known that?” asked Peri with anger in her voice. “It didn’t occur to you to maybe let us know what you know about the fucker, like, hours ago?”
“Peri, I have only seen it just now. It is only now that I recognise it. I am not holding back information, I assure you.”
“Okay, sorry, Gus, I’m just a bit – how I can put it best? – a bit shit-scared. I’m not at my best when I’m a bit shit-scared. Now that you have seen it, how do we kill it?”
“It is similar to creatures that manifested in Japan, in Nagasaki, and the USA, at Mount Saint Helens.”
“How were they dealt with?” asked Steve.
“Nukes,” was Peri’s terse reply.
“Yes,” said Gus. “I believe the only solution the authorities could come up with was vaporisation.”
“So, Steve,” said Peri conversationally. “I don’t suppose that’s a nuke in your pocket?”
Troy answered for him. “No. He’s just that happy to see you.”
“Hilarious,” Peri replied with a note of irritation. “So, Gus, let’s think about this. What we need is something that delivers a really high temperature, such as burning very intensely and energetically. Am I right?”
“I think so. But it needs to be intense enough to vaporise its tissues, not just scatter them.”
Steve was nodding his head. “Sounds like we need a fuel-air bomb, or a shed load of white phosphorus.”
But Peri was shaking her head at the same time. “They use atmospheric oxygen, and loads of it. I suspect we couldn’t get the effect we need down here because there isn’t enough oxygen. That was why the Yanks had to nuke Mount – no, forget I said that, or I’ll have to kill you all. Guys, where my head is at, is that we have two options here. One is a complex mission to use bunker-busters to open up the cave system and let in air, quickly followed by intense incendiary action. The other is simpler: programme a Trident to just nuke the fucker. No doubt the top brass can think of other options besides. Steve, can you get up to ground level and update Captain Mike?”
Steve nodded and made for the stairs.
Peri continued, “The rest of us, we’ll try to secure the door again. Then it’s mission accomplished and over to the Ministry to arrange a big bang, and we can all Foxtrot Oscar out of here before the shit hits the monster. Grab the iron bar, people.”
Peri moved to the left end of the bar, Troy went to the right, and Gus and Amanda spaced themselves in the middle. They squatted to take hold of it. Troy counted down, and on ‘go’ they heaved it up to waist height and shuffled a few paces closer to the door before letting the bar drop.
“God, that’s heavy!” complained Peri. “How the hell did Bandra manage to chuck it on her own? Come on, let’s get this done. Ready? Count us in, Troy.”
This time, though, before they managed to get it to waist height, there was another crash against the doors. They flew apart, striking the iron bar a double blow that pushed it back, bowling over Amanda and Troy. Peri and Gus both managed to hop backwards out of its way.