With his HAWCs spread around the scientists, Alex should have felt a degree of security for his charges. However, his earlier unsettled feeling hadn’t abated and in fact was growing stronger. He also couldn’t shake the sensation that they were being watched, or somehow followed.

Moving away from the column of light the team now entered complete dark and from over Alex’s shoulders the scientists’ torch beams created pipes of light that waved in all directions. It gave him a chance to scrutinise his surroundings; for the most part the massive tunnel they were in was featureless, with few of the formations you would expect in a large, ancient cave system. The walls, floor and ceilings were smoothed, perhaps as Monica said by ice or water, but it still looked unnatural. Even Alex could feel the weight of the silence; if not for the multiple footfalls you might have heard your own heartbeat. Alex could hear that no one was breathing particularly hard as the clear slope was angling downward. The major surprise for Alex was the temperature—the more they trekked, the warmer it became.

After hiking steadily for sixty minutes, Alex called a ten-minute rest break. He ordered Johnson to scout ahead for five minutes and then report back in. Johnson acknowledged the order with a brief “affirmative,” switched to night scope vision, and disappeared into the still darkness.

From behind Alex, Adrian Silex said in his whining, nasal tone, “I don’t get it, one moment it seems we have air pockets under us, the next we have water. I can’t understand how Dr. Hendsen ever received a positive reading unless it was somewhere much deeper than here. If we don’t find a testing base site that is on geologically stable ground I won’t be able to receive a clear reading and we will have wasted our time. Captain, can you please organise for us to continue onward a bit more quickly?”

Borshov spent time going over Benson’s equipment and caving suit. He needed to know what the American HAWCs had brought with them and what he would be dealing with. He held up Benson’s M98 and sighted along the barrel. He secreted it among some rocks—a little insurance was a good thing, he thought. The other two Russian assassins wasted little time in destroying communications equipment and anything else that could aid the American team. They looked like three large alien insects in their black head-to-toe infiltration suits. Down in the darkened cave, even their faces were covered with the single lens of the Generation-III cyclops night vision scope extending outwards from their brows. They moved quickly but surely to catch up with the American team.

Borshov looked forward to meeting his old friend again, and seeing if this time his thick American head could hold one of the exploding bullets he was saving.