She stepped forward, saw the light where it had been placed atop an inverted bucket to shine onto the slanting spill of rock that poured down from the cave-in. Splintered and broken timbers jutted out from the chaos of angular yellow-brown stone. The broken shoring, now-jagged wood, shone pale in the light with toothpick-thin splinters protruding.

And there, a lone figure worked, tossing one chunk of stone after another as he labored futilely to remove the pile. The man wore grubby overalls, his feet clad in quetzal-hide boots. Black collar-length hair swayed as he reached out with muck-covered-and-bleeding fingers and tried to wrestle a trapezoidal block of stone from the fall.

“What are you doing?” Kalico demanded.

The man froze, startled. Then he wheeled around, the loose stone shifting under his feet. He windmilled his arms for balance, slid a couple of feet lower on the unstable slope.

Tadeki Ozawa shot her stricken look, blinded by the light. He raised a hand, tried to shield his eyes. Squinting. “Who’s there?”

“Supervisor Aguila, Tadeki. I said, what are you doing?”

He sniffed, rubbed a damp and grit-cover sleeve under his flat nose. “No one else is trying. That’s my Stana in there. She’s back there. I know it. She called to me.”

“Tadeki, I’m so sorry. Listen, we’re doing everything we can. We’re—”

“Then why aren’t you digging Stana out! She’s alive. Can’t you hear her?”

Kalico stepped forward, keeping her light on him. “You need to get off that rubble. It’s loose, unstable. You pull out the wrong piece, and it’s all going to come cascading down. You’ll be as buried and crushed as Stana and Alia are.”

“No! I tell you, she’s alive back there.”

“Damn it, Tadeki! You fucking listen to me. You keep up this insanity, you’re going to pull the whole mountain down on top of you. There are tons of loose rock piled up, and all it will take is pulling the wrong stone loose. You do that, and you’ll end up just as dead as Stana.”

Madness in his eyes, lips twitching, he glared into the light. Said, “She’s carrying our baby. Three months now. She needs me. More than she’s ever needed me. She’s my life. I have to get her out.”

“Yeah, okay.”

“Why aren’t you digging? Why isn’t the whole crew digging? We need everyone. All of us. We have to get to her!”

“Tadeki, come down from there. I don’t want to lose you, too.”

He seemed to struggle, as if having trouble understanding what she was saying.

“Tadeki, that’s an order. Climb down now . . . and do it carefully.” When he still didn’t move, she snapped, “Now!”