“Thank God you're here.”

Austin put his arm around her shoulders. “We don't plan to stay. We've got a taxi sitting under this thing. Can we offer you a lift?”

Francesca said, “There is one more thing I have to do.” She went over to the control panel and punched a series of numbers into the computer keyboard. She watched the digital gauges for a moment. Satisfied all was going as planned, she turned and said, “I'm ready.”

Zavala had been keeping the Gogstad people cowed with his weapon in the event someone had an unexpected attack of courage. Austin inspected the board of directors with curiosity. They returned his gaze with glares of pure hatred. At one point the Englishman named Grimley stepped forward. He stuck his nose in Austin's face and said, “We demand that you tell us who you are and what you want here.”

Austin laughed unpleasantly, put his hand on the man's bony chest, and shoved him back with the others. “Who is this clown?” he asked Francesca.

“He and his friends are a symbol of all that is wrong with the world.”

As an amateur philosopher Austin had long been intrigued by questions of good and evil, but metaphysical discussions would have to wait. He ignored the Englishman and took Francesca's arm, guiding her toward the exit that would take them down to the air lock and the submersible. Gamay followed, then Zavala, who covered their rear.

They had taken only a few steps when the freight elevator doors flew open and about twenty guards spilled out into the lab. They quickly surrounded the fugitives and relieved Zavala of his gun.

Brynhild strode from the elevator, and the guards stepped aside to let her through. Her blond hair was disheveled as a result of the encounter with Gamay's shield, and her pale face was smudged with soot. But her disarray didn't diminish her imposing physique and the malevolence in her pale blue eyes. Quivering with rage, she pointed to the NUMA crew as if she were about to unleash a bolt of lightning.

“Kill them,” she ordered.

The Gogstad directors murmured with pleasure at the turn of events, and their eyes glittered in anticipation of the slaughter of the upstarts. But as the guards raised their weapons and pre pared to unleash a lethal volley, Francesca stepped in front of her battered friends. In a voice whose strength and tenor evoked her reign as a white goddess, she shouted, “Stop!”

“Get out of the way, or they'll kill you as well,” Brynhild ordered.

Francesca thrust her chin out. “I don't think so.”

Brynhild seemed to grow another foot. “Who are you to defy me?” she snarled.

In reply, Francesca walked over and stood before the controls. The panel was lighting up like a pinball machine. Numerical phalanxes marched across the computer screen. There was no mistaking the fact that something was dreadfully out of kilter.

Brynhild swooped down on Francesca like an avenging angel. “What have you done?”