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
There was a faint double phutt sound and Zegarelli dropped to the cave floor with two small holes above his left eye. In her panic, Margaret wasn’t aware that her colleague now lay dead behind her and she simply thought one of the HAWCs had managed to get in front of her when a darkened shape stepped into her wavering torch light. She didn’t have time to realise her mistake and her last conscious sensation was an explosion of pain as Borshov smashed his massive fist into her face.
Fourteen
Takeda was seconds too late, arriving only in time to see Zegarelli’s fallen body and Margaret knocked down by the Russian’s punch. He lifted his gun and fired twice before vanishing behind a small stand of stalagmites. Takeda’s compressed air blasts took the basin floor Krofskoya agent in the eye and the neck. The second shot was unnecessary, as his first pencil-thin blast of super-compressed air cut a hole from the eye, tore through the skull and exited out the back of his head as a stream of liquefied brain matter and cranial fluid.
Takeda pinged Alex and whispered, “Hostiles have arrived and been engaged. Zegarelli is dead and Anderson now an enemy asset.”
Alex ordered everyone to take cover beside the cave wall and for Mike and Tank to take a defensive position against whatever was rushing up from behind to meet them. He hated leaving them here as he was sure, given the choice, all of them would have taken their chances at being shot over being snared and dragged off into the dark by some sort of weird cave creature. He had no alternative, he had a definite threat in front and a potential threat from behind—the definite threat took precedence. He looked quickly at Aimee then vanished into the dark.
Takeda gave a small start when he felt Alex’s hand fall lightly on his shoulder. He was always surprised at how quietly and fast Alex could move for a man of his size. Takeda lifted two fingers, indicating number of known hostiles. He then pointed from his eyes to their positions; one on the cave floor and one up high at the drop-off point to the basin.
Alex assessed the situation instantly; he had strength of numbers, but whoever the hostiles were, they held the high ground and a hostage.