O’Reilly prodded a small keypad on the side of the cylindrical device. He nodded. The company wasted no time in starting back along the wide spoke. As they all broke into a steady trot, their nerves were tormented by the fear of what they had seen, as if by its very nature it would realize what had happened and accelerate the process of completing the cycle. Around them the air quivered with a new energy, suggesting whatever spirits and demons infested these huge hallways had come to life, enraged and engorged with the desire for retribution. Climbing back on to the wide stairway, the company made its way upwards, knowing instinctively that something pursued it. Twisted sounds came up from below, sounds that grated along the very bones of the puny humans, in a realm where gods must once have walked.
Almost exhausted to a man, they came again to the apex of the spiral stairway, to the ruins of the citadel near to the mouth of the cleft leading back out into the desert. They paused briefly, Mamoudou warning them against rushing outside. Although something was rising from the deeps, and other, strange sounds welled up from the meandering streets around them, he had sensed further perils outside. One of the Arabs spoke to him and he nodded.
“What is it?” said Phillips.
“One of my men, Razak, will scout ahead. There are but two hours before dawn. Razak will find the two men we left behind with the camels and bring them close to the exit. Then we can ride like the wind.”
It took all Mamoudou’s persuasive powers to keep his men here in the street, knowing that something came ever closer from below. They could hear a huge, ponderous thudding and the cracking of stone, as though a colossal worm thrust itself upwards on that wide stair. In the buildings, shadows shifted as something else woke from an age-old sleep.
Mamoudou’s man had come back to them and waved them forward. Relieved, the Arabs dashed past the last buildings to the high cleft, Phillips and the engineers bringing up the rear. Phillips trained both his flashlight and his weapon on the darkness behind him. He had an impression of something huge and slick. Gunfire ahead snapped his head round.
O’Reilly and Garner were both swearing, urging Phillips to take cover. They ducked behind a low wall. Mamoudou appeared, holding his arm to his side. He was leaking blood, his teeth clamped against the pain.
“A trap!” he snarled. “And my men were caught in it, like rats.”
“Al-Qaeda?” said Phillips.
Mamoudou nodded. “Razak was the spy I feared. He has led them to us. They have killed the men we left behind and scattered the camels. The devils are coming for us. The last of my men will fight them off, but there are too many of them. It is only a matter of time before they are killed.”
Phillips cursed. “Even if we can hold them off, whatever is behind us will be here soon. We’ll be lucky to see this out to daylight.”
“They have come for the weapon,” said Mamoudou. “Razak must have told them of it. He must have a cell phone. Can the bomb be stopped?”
O’Reilly grunted. “It’s a simple enough device. Easily deactivated. Can we hold them off for twenty-four hours? If it is Al-Qaeda, we can’t let them get their hands on that bomb.”
“I’m more concerned about whatever is back in the passageway,” said Phillips.
“There is said to be another passage, leading upwards to an old observation tower,” said Mamoudou. “You must go through these ruins and climb it, up to the crest of the escarpment. I will provide cover.”
Phillips and the others knew their guide would not survive.
“Whatever is coming,” he said, “whatever these unspeakable gods have unleashed — it will feed on these devils. It will be worth giving up my life to see this!” He gasped out instructions as to where the second passageway would be.
The gunfire beyond intensified. Phillips led the engineers through the maze of collapsed buildings. From all sides they could hear things rising up from the debris, creatures roused by the noise of gunfire and the scent of human intrusion. The men all loosed off bursts of fire at the darkness, barely one step ahead of terror, but they made it to the secondary passage Mamoudou had spoken of. Its stair was cluttered and choked with rubble, but they managed to climb upwards. Below, beyond the buildings on the wide stair to the deeps, something broke from the darkness and Phillips caught a glimpse of numerous shapes, the size of large dogs. Barrel-like, their numerous legs writhed like the cilia of centipedes, their front ends a wide mouth like that of a lamprey. Behind them the larger creature clawed at the stone, bringing down low stone buildings in its enraged determination to break upward.
Mamoudou flattened himself against the stone wall, allowing the gunmen from outside to push forward, their own submachine guns blazing. In moments they came racing along the main route and met unexpectedly head-on with the first of the things from below. A dreadful conflict ensued as those terrible lamprey mouths fixed on the leading gunmen, shredding them in a bloody cloud. They seemed impervious to bullets and crushed the weapons to useless, mangled metal. Mamoudou watched in horror as the old city spewed forth even more creatures, their attention snared now by the noise of battle. They poured and slid from every crevice, things whose genera had been hidden by the darkness of centuries. For each of them ripped apart by gunfire, another dozen emerged. It was an impossibly unequal conflict and there could be no retreat. Every man from outside was slaughtered. When it was over, the creatures turned to Mamoudou, but his eyes had already closed for the last time.
Phillips moved as swiftly as he could in the confined space of the higher cleft, at last reaching a point where it debouched on to a small plateau of flat rock outside, under the stars. Ancient bricks ringed it, a former tower and a high place affording a unique view of the surrounding desert. Phillips wondered what long-dead tribe had built and used it. He and the engineers wriggled out, the last hour of darkness greeting them with its eerie desert silence. Cautiously the three men wriggled across the rock to a point where they could look down to the foot of the escarpment. Moonlight flooded the valley floor and among the broken rocks and scree they saw the dunes rising up gently beyond. On the nearest of them a great black shape sat in the sands.
“That’s how they got here,” said O’Reilly. It was a helicopter. “It’s a Lynx, Mark 9. The Brits recently de-commissioned them. Looks like Al-Qaeda have done some deals on the black market.”
Garner trained a small pair of binoculars on it. “Two guards,” he said. “Can’t see any others.”
“Any sign of the camels?” said Phillips.
Garner swept the immediate terrain below. “No. There are bodies down there. Our own Arab guards. I reckon the camels were chased off.”
“What about the bird?” O’Reilly asked him. “I’m a bit rusty.”
Garner smiled. “I can fly it. But you’ll need to get shot of the two guards. We don’t have a lot of time.”
“I’ll take them from here,” said O’Reilly. “You guys go and flush ’em out into the moonlight.” He lifted his weapon and settled it gently on a natural vee in the rocks in front of him, fitting and adjusting a telescopic sight.
Garner gripped Phillips’s arm and led him to the edge of the escarpment. Together they wound their way downward, slowly and mindful not to disturb anything loose. In the deep silence they could hear voices below, amplified by the rocks. Phillips glanced toward the shadows under the edge of the dune and saw cigarette smoke. The two guards were relaxing, oblivious to the chaos within the tunnel.
At the foot of the escarpment, some distance from the helicopter, Garner dropped into a low crouch and motioned Phillips to follow him. They got to within fifty feet of the two guards and saw them, stretched out casually on the sand as if they were loafing on a beach. Garner took a small rock and tossed it among bigger rocks at the bottom of the dune. It clattered noisily and the two guards sat up, grabbing their weapons. One of the men rolled over and pointed his gun down at the rocks. The other got to his feet, ducked down and scrambled forward like a spider across the sand. He went from shadow to moonlight, studying the rocks, ready to fire at anything that moved. Several minutes passed. The silence was absolute.