It starts to go pear-shaped. A bark from a shotgun blows the gas tank on the gobbo’s back. Liquid flame sweeps over five, six of the creatures, thrashing and crackling like logs in a fire as they burn. A newly one-eyed Sandhog runs at the gobbos one by one, poor depth perception not preventing him from bringing a sledge against their heads, wham, wham, wham. Pistol fire. A swung axe.

But then Sorago and the Vollrath step into the fray.

Sorago doesn’t bother with the dance. He walks – nay, strolls – among the fracas, as casual as an old man in Central Park. Any who come at him are dispatched with teeth, pistol, or blade. Legs cut out from under men. Holes punched through hardhats by a four-barrel derringer, splashing brains down the backs of necks. Venom spat in open mouths.

The Vollrath do their jobs. They move to the end of the tunnel, to the massive wall ahead of them that, were it laid on its side, would look like a mountain range but is instead the barrier of schist and granite that prevents this tunnel from moving forward. The tunnel is peppered with holes in a specific pattern – a pattern designed by Davey Morgan to create the most efficient blast. In each hole sits a stick of dynamite like a nesting bird, and from each stick is a braid of det-cord, and each cord winds together into one. The Vollrath know their targets. They pick the explosive experts. They pick the drillers. They leap upon them as a blanket, covering them, ethereal fingers like ice picks caring little for the corporeal barriers of hard hats, skin, or bone. They take control of them, riding them like men ride horses, marshaling them forward as puppets.

They begin to work with great efficiency.

The remaining goblins – two dozen left chanting and screaming their crass gobbo vulgarities – gather to watch the men work. The men wheel over long bore-drills, press the spinning bits (each as thick as a child’s wrist) into the stone. A spray of bits. The men would normally wear face protection but that would cause a delay. Here the flung scree chews into their faces, stone shrapnel biting skin. Their faces are soon a mask of red. It doesn’t matter. They don’t need to see. Only their minds are necessary. And their hands.

As they drill one hole, they move to the next.

And the other two men gingerly take dynamite out of existing holes, and slide them into the freshly bored pockets. One by one, a new pattern of dots emerges. A new blast pattern. One plucked from the wealth of knowledge stolen from Davey Morgan’s head.

It is an unstable pattern that will end it all. It will drown the tunnels. It will dry up the city.