Chapters (42)
- BENEATH THE DARK ICE
- Table of Contents
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Acknowledgements
- Prologue
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-one
- Twenty-two
- Twenty-three
- Twenty-four
- Twenty-five
- Twenty-six
- Twenty-seven
- Twenty-eight
- Twenty-nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-one
- Thirty-two
- Epilogue
- One
- Two
- Three
Alex nodded slowly, “That it is, Aimee, and speaking of adapting, you said that thing could regenerate in a few months—what about days? Do you remember in the upper caves we severed one of those long tentacles it’s using to try to lure us closer to it? This thing had two fully functioning clubs. I’ve got to assume it’s not the only one of its kind down here. One was a big enough problem; more than one and we might not be leaving.”
Alex also didn’t think that they had seen everything that made up the food chain, but kept that to himself as he needed everyone to stay positive about their chances of escape to the surface. Alex looked across at Tank and realised that the big soldier was still going strong with a 10,000-year-old knife sticking out of his neck.
“All right, big fella, time for some minor surgery on that neck. And no tears, OK?”
After Alex closed the last stitch in Tank’s neck, he called them all together to repack and continue on to their destination cave. No one believed that they had seen the last of the giant beast and they remembered what Aimee said about it learning from its mistakes—next time they might not be so lucky.
The rest of the trek across the wide dark beach was slow and made in either rapid sprints between potential defendable positions, hunkering down to check for sudden movement from any direction, before sprinting off once again. It took them well over an hour to reach the mouth of the large cave that was set back from the shore line in what looked to be the widest part of the beach. The mouth was paved with a floor of crushed debris, giving it the look of a gravel driveway with pieces of quartz reflecting the blue glow from the ceiling far above them. Even though the cave was dark and its size meant that they could be followed by any number of large creatures, the slight breeze rushing past their faces filled them with hope.
Monica stood in the huge opening and inhaled deeply. The cave was enormous and made the giant Deer Cave in Borneo look like a mousehole. Most importantly, it tilted upwards at a fifteen-degree angle—not much, but at least it was heading in the right direction. The faint breeze blowing past meant no smells could be detected and small sounds hidden in the darkness were muffled or disguised in the updraught—however, the very movement of air meant that the warmth was being dragged towards a cooler air pocket. It was as good as they hoped to find.