Dark Passage

Planet G889 was not an average dumping ground. Certainly the expense of transporting waste 22 light years from The Stations could not be justified in any of the numerous bureaucratic accounting ledgers unless it bordered on desperation and no one in government would dare be labeled with a such a word. That would signify a loss of control to the general populace.

Therefore, some enlightened member of The Council had to come up a code name for the pilot program. He called it E2 - The Sanitation Project. On paper, its function would be to jettison the most virulent products of society, those which posed the greatest threat to the ordered structure of man's last refuge, into space.

For decades, Earth's pustules had been leaking radioactive waste, toxic chemicals and nerve gas -- all deadly biological time bombs. In ignorance born of greed, mankind had blatantly planted the seeds of its own extinction. The results were catastrophic.

Generations of inhabitants were forced to flee, trading the fading blue planet for the cold, dark, hostile world of space. They lived on stations with exotic names, but their homes were nothing more then revolving, over-packed tin cans which would breed their own form of poison.

Government evolved through trial and error. Eventually, a para military force was formed and paid for by the wealthy to control the masses and protect the status quo. Part CIA, part secret police, they served the elite while slowly gathering power and pushing their own agendas. The brains behind this bruin was a shadowy group called The Council.

At the bottom of the social ladder were the immigrant workers, the drones, the nameless, faceless people of the quadrants, indentured with lifetimes of inherited debt in exchange for passage up. A new feudal system had been born. Earth's history hadn't progressed, it was just repeating itself, having learned nothing from the lessons of the past. While it was true that wars were no longer fought on a global scale, each day brought its own battle for survival. Still, life went on. People learned to adjusted even as they walked a fine line, balanced on the razor's edge of existence.

Desperate times have a way of bringing out the best and worst of human nature. Brilliant minds played God, substituting artificial worlds and genetically creating the ideal human. Without a God-like understanding, there were flaws, mutations, occasional monsters. These mistakes were quietly swept into the sanitation project. There simply was no space on The Stations for anything nonessential. Some criminals were exiled to Earth. The worst of this lot, those beyond redemption, were secretly jettisoned toward any one of five distant planets. They would become the lab rats, the means to the end which was based on hope for mankind's future.

If the experiment failed, there was still something to be learned. Those behind the project thought it a wonderful solution -- no evidence and the stations cleared of a dangerous threat. Occasionally, there was corruption of power, mistakes were made, but these were far and few between. It wasn't a perfect world, but the Council was convinced they had come pretty damn close. Until the day Devon Adair, one of their best and brightest, broke all the rules and threatened to undo The Council's carefully thought out plans of settlement.

As Eden Colony's ship slipped by security, as the first of the fail-safe methods blew up harmlessly in space, only a few stood watching, secretly cheering the Roanoke on, knowing a far less kindly fate awaited the colonists. Unknown to the expedition's leader, their destination was one of the experimental penal colonies. G889 was the final stop for the scum of mankind, the criminally insane, the mass murderers, heretics and rapists. They wandered the planets surface like rats in a maze. The Council had tried in subtle ways to stop Devon Adair but she chose to disregard their warnings. Now she and her followers would pay the price for their folly. While those in power would never see the result, they knew in the end, twenty-two light years from The Stations and into the future, the Council's form of justice would ultimately prevail.

xxx

John Danziger, head of OPS and mechanic to Eden Advance, scanned the horizon. High clouds dimmed the sun, turning it into a glowing orange ball. The world below dissolved into an amber coloring. He glanced back at the petite blond woman who was busily scanning the surrounding flora. Dr. Julia Heller was oblivious to the changing conditions until the wind rudely whipped sand in her face. In an added insult, it lifted her hair into a tangled mass before spreading it across her face.

"You almost done? I think we should head back, I don't like the look of this sky."

The young woman pushed back a wave of silken hair which seemed intent on blocking her vision and turned pale blue eyes toward an ominous sky. "Has Yale issued any warning of approaching storms?"

Danziger glanced toward the rail where he left his gear. "I don't know, I haven't been listening."

Julia sighed and switched her record log into the save mode, then began packing up her equipment. She should have known better. Danziger was notorious for ignoring his communication gear. She couldn't fault him. A brief stop to stretch their legs had turned into a much longer interruption when Julia spotted something which caught her interest. She had no idea how long she had kept him waiting.

The gusts became stronger, raking their skin with a stinging bite of tiny wind-blown pellets. Danziger reached out to grip the doctor's arm as she was almost blown off her feet. He hustled her into the waiting Rail, then jumped into the driver's side. All around them the air billowed upon itself. Like a living creature, the strange yellow smoke rolled toward them. The Rail's ignition caught, then sputtered, its intake clogged with grit.

While Danziger worked the starter, Julia reset her gear and attempted to reach their camp. Static crackled, overriding both audio and visual. Occasionally, she caught bits of an anxious male voice on the other end.

"It's no good. The storm is cutting off the transmission," she yelled.

Danziger could barely hear her above the howl of the wind. The storm was blowing out of the desert, a blizzard of sand that beat down and obscured all in its path.

"I'm going back the way we came. Maybe we can find shelter in the rocks we passed. Come on, come on." Danziger worked the ignition, coaxing, pleading and swearing at his beloved machine until something caught.

The Rail lurched forward, and almost stalled. Danziger knew this pile of metal, grease and gears like the muscle, bone and ligaments of his own body. He knew what each sound, rattle and click meant because it was his job to give them life and keep them living. He made things run when they shouldn't. The Rail bucked, protesting his sharp spin of the wheel. Spinning in the loose sand, he turned the car back in what he hoped was the correct direction. Visibility was almost gone.

The mechanic drove blindly forward. Their surrounding had all but vanished in the swirling dust of the sudden storm, Suddenly, a dark shape loomed directly in front of the vehicle.

Blinded by flying grit and the tears of irritation it generated, Danziger had to spin the wheel to avoid a large boulder which suddenly materialized. The rear passenger side clipped the stone surface throwing Julia against the mechanic. Distracted, he momentarily lost control and collided head on with a rock the size of the TransRover. The momentum of the impact flung both occupants forward. Danziger felt the crush of the steering wheel into his rib cage while Julia ended up flattened against the front panel.

There was silence in the following fog of shock and pain until Julia gathered enough of her senses to manage, "Are you all right?"

Danziger answered through gritted teeth. "Wheel......."

Julia reached under Danziger's legs and sprung the seat lever. The driver's seat fell back a few notches. It was enough to relieve the pressure of the crumpled wheel. The big mechanic rolled out of the vehicle onto the ground. Gasping for air, he held his throbbing chest.

The doctor rummaged for her first aid pack, then dropped it beside him. "There's an opening ahead, maybe a Grendler Cave. I saw it just before we hit."

"I hope it doesn't mind company." Danziger flinched as the doctor helped him up.

Julia staggered under the mechanic's weight as she helped him to his feet. They stumbled forward, tripping over obstacles as they tried to shield their eyes. They literally fell into the shaft they were hunting for by accident. Their drop of 6 ft to a uneven stone floor was accompanied by a rain of sand which had been gathering at the entrance. The two crew members crawled away from the cascading flow. They found themselves in a tunnel which burrowed deep into the ground. To escape the storm's fury, they crawled forward, following a twisting passage which eventually cut off the wind and light.

"Wait. I can't see where I'm going." Danziger called a halt and leaned against the cave wall before sliding down into a sitting position.

Julia knelt at his side and fumbled in darkness for the lumalight in her belt pouch. Its small shaft of light explored their surroundings. An unpleasant odor was growing stronger the deeper they advanced into the cave.

The mechanic began to feel sick as he watched the darting beam of the lumalight so he reached out and caught it in Julia's hand. "Stop shining it around like that. What the hell is that smell?" he asked, annoyed.

"I was trying to pinpoint the source."

"That's what I'm afraid of. I don't know which is worse, choking to death on sand or Grendler odor."

"Grendler odor won't kill you. However, I don't think that's what we're dealing with here."

She had his attention

"What?" He asked her. "Some kind of fumes?"

Julia rose to her feet and started down the passage way. "More like the formation of amines such as putrescence and cadaverine."

"What?" He pulled himself up and hurried after the doctor.

"Something is decomposing."

Danziger had a flashback to a similar cave with a dead Grendler. Julia had taken charge that time, too. The smell was overpowering and he found himself gagging.

The big man tried holding his nose and breathing through his mouth. He swore he could taste the smell. "Look, we just crashed this place to get out of the storm. I don't think we need to know what kind of housekeeper this Grendler is. Let's go back. The air might be dirty but it's whole lot fresher."

Julia's light caught a shape on the ground ahead. The beam traced what was left of a human body. Just at the range of visibility were assorted limbs attached to various parts all in different stages of putrefaction.

"Oh, man. This is not good." Danziger swallowed back the bile that rose to his throat and turned away while Julia walked around the corpse.

Stepping over the remains, the doctor leaned forward for a better view under her light.

"Are they human?" He tried to occupy his mind with other thoughts.

"Penal colonist from the look of it. No, wait, there may be more then one There's part of a uniform here, too. Does it look like anything you're familiar with?"

Reluctant curiosity drew Danziger over. He tried to focus only on the timeworn material and avoid the corpse under it.

Julia turned and watched his face. "Do you recognize it?"

"Some kind of Special Forces, I think. What's he doing here?"

"Here in this cave or here on G889?"

"Well, both I guess. I thought the Council only dumped penal colonists on G889."

"Maybe he was one of Reilly's. He mentioned the Z.E.D.s had taken weapons away from his men."

"You still don't believe Reilly was just a part of EVE's program?"

"I'd like to think so. That way, I wouldn't have to keep looking over my shoulder but no, I think Reilly is, or once was, a very real person."

"Wonder what this guy's story is? How did these people wind up here?"

"I can't determine that unless I can find another body that isn't in such a decomposed state.

If they died here, they didn't all die at the same time. There are different degrees of decay, years apart."

Julia's light blinked and dimmed.

"We need light. I don't believe I'm doing this." Danziger looked around in the limited light and finally pulled a femur loose. He wrapped the torn garments around it and lit the mass of rags.

The makeshift torch flared brightly, driving back the darkness. The sight around them was gruesome.

"Check this out." Danziger walked to the back of the vault. The far wall was stacked with supplies. He pulled out one of a number of lumalights and lit it before the torch burnt out.

Julia appeared at his side. "Our stuff? Were there any pods that could have landed nearby?"

"I don't think so. Where did they get this stuff? They must be a hell of a group of traders. Guess we found the warehouse. "

Julia found a box in the medical supplies." I may have just found their bargaining chip." She told Danziger, pointing to the side of the case.

MEDICAL SUPPLIES /FRAGILE/ HUMAN BLOOD

The doctor knelt and rummaged through the containers. "The containers that are left are all empty."

"Must have drank it or traded it away." Danziger commented

"The Grendlers from the Time Fold seemed to prize blood above everything, even food. If they traded vials of blood for this stuff, either they didn't have the same tastes or they were sure of replacing it."

Danziger caught her meaning. "You think they killed these people for their blood."

"If the smitten Grendler hadn't appeared when he did, I might have been killed for mine. If you could have seen the look on the other one's face when he saw my arm scraped raw..." Julia shivered thinking of that struggle, the huge jaws snapping at her bloodied forearm and didn't finish her thought.

"I think we'd better get out of here before they come back."

"I agree. Hopefully, the storm is keeping them from returning. We should warn the others too, as soon as the interference stops. Are you coming?"

Danziger was shining the light over the Grendler's stash. "I just wish there was a weapon in all this. I can't believe you left the MagPro."

"At the time, I was more concerned with hauling your ...you to safety."

"Safety, huh? I just hope we didn't go from the frying pan into the fire."

With a new sense of urgency, they traced their path back toward the opening. The passageway was just starting to brighten when they heard the explosive grunts of Grendlers ahead.

Danziger shut off his beam and backed into Julia. His hand caught her tightly by the arm as he whispered in her ear. "Go back. They've got us cut-off."

Julia felt her heart quicken in fear. There was no way out. If the Grendlers caught them, they would end up like the others. There was no way to avoid detection. Their footsteps echoed down the tunnel alerting the returning occupants. The beasts' snorting was echoed and magnified by the surrounding walls as they hurried in pursuit of the crewmen.

They were back in the dead end vault shining their lights in desperation, backing against the wall. Four large Grendlers entered. Two blocked the entrance, while the other two advanced toward the crewmen. Danziger knelt and pulled another femur loose to use as a club.

"That won't do much. It will probably splinter with the first blow."

"You got a better idea?" The mechanic asked.

Julia ripped her sleeves off her shirt. "Fire. We might keep them away with a torch like the one you made before. At least we'll see them better."

She found a long bone, tied the cloth and lit it. In the flare of light, Danziger swung his club at the two advancing beasts. They spread out so he had trouble keeping them in sight. The flame wavered as Julia hunted for more material. She jabbed as the animal lunged for her. It yelped as the fire licked its outstretched hand and backed away.

"I think he got the message." Julia sounded almost cocky.

"Yea? What happens when we run out of flammable material?" Danziger eyed the flickering light.

"There's an air current in here. Maybe a way out."

He swung the bone with one hand while shining his light around. He spotted an area where the wall didn't meet the ground. "There! Work you're way over to the spot where I have the light."

Julia did as he instructed. She dipped the torch and saw the air current catch the flame. "You're right. Here, take the torch and keep them back. I'll see if we can fit under the ledge."

After they made the exchange, Julia shone the light into the cleft. The passageway was very narrow. She should fit but Danziger would be a tight squeeze.

"I think we can make it. You go first."

"Why me?"

"Because of your size it will take you longer to crawl beyond their reach. I'll keep them away until you are far enough back. I'm much smaller. I can scoot in quickly."

Danziger hesitated, not liking the arrangement.

Julia snapped at him. "What are you waiting for? We don't have all day to discuss this."

"I don't like it." Still he handed her the torch after clearing the Grendlers back in a final swing.

He dropped to the ground, belly down and pushed with his feet, reminded of the army field exercises where he and his buddies were required to crawl under barbed wire. No one used it anymore but it was a good incentive to keep the troops low to the ground. He hurried, knowing Julia's danger grew with every second. He felt the rough surface of the ceiling catch him in the back, holding him from advancing. He fought down a feeling of panic, of being trapped under tons of rock.

"Danziger! Are you in far enough?"

"How the hell do I know." He clawed at the dirt with his hands, his large feet digging for leverage. The back of his shirt ripped and he moved forward again. "I think I'm clear." He crabbed sideways and shone his light back. He could only see the back of Julia's boots shifting nervously. "Yea, I'm in far enough to give you room."

Julia had her hands full. The Grendlers saw their meal tickets slipping away and were furious. A few burned hands didn't help their disposition any either. Julia knew she would have to be very fast to beat them.

She went over a plan in her mind, rehearsing the timing. When Danziger said he was clear, she lunged at the Grendlers' faces with the torch, swinging the bright flame close to their eyes before throwing it at them as she dove for the opening. It took a few seconds for the creatures' eyes to adjust to the sudden shift in light. They adapted more readily than humans, having spent a great deal of their time underground and so were after the woman faster then she expected.

The doctor crawled toward Danziger's light. While she was quick into the hole, she was awkward and slow in its passage having never had any experience in close quarters.

Danziger coached her. "Push with your feet. Stop trying to lift your head." He reached to pull her toward him.

She stopped and reached out.

"Don't stop!" He yelled.

Suddenly, she was jerked backwards. He say the fear in her eyes, saw them pleading with his.

"John! Help me."

Their hands reached for each other and missed by inches before she was jerked backwards again. He was losing her. Danziger had to swing around to start back for her. He felt the rock cut into his skin but he ignored the pain in the urgency of the situation.

Julia felt a huge hand brush, then close around her right ankle before the first tug. The Grendler was too large to fit but its hand had searched the fissure until it caught her in its grip. She twisted and jammed her left leg into the wall to brace herself.

The ugly beast twisted the woman's leg and heard her cry out in pain as it tried to work her out of the opening. It grew excited as it felt her give and pulled harder. A boot popped into view. There was only a limited amount of space as the Grendlers jostled for position. The larger of the other three won an opposite angle and reached in and caught Julia's calf. Unfortunately, they both wanted her for themselves and started to work against each other, pulling in opposite directions.

Julia sobbed. "Oh God, John, they've got my leg."

He saw her twist to relieve the stress. She gave up trying to wedge her other leg which now slipped toward the opening.

"Julia, hang on. I'm coming." He pushed his way forward then reached out and grabbed under her shoulder. He tried to pull her back but she lurched again and he was pulled with her.

Julia had a death grip on the mechanic. She knew these Grendlers had a blood lust and would tear her apart once they had her. She had seen what they had done to Commander O'Neal when she autopsied him. She had never told the others that Gaal's Grendlers had sucked every drop of blood from his body through the large crescent shaped holes they left in his chest.

Danziger was tiring like a fish on the line. For every inch he pulled her toward him, the combined strength of the creatures won triple that back.

One beast had Julia's right thigh, while the other still tugged on her ankle. Sharp claws ripped the material to shreds, cutting into her flesh. Their noses caught the scent, their eyes widened as the pale skin opened beneath their talons, allowing small scarlet ribbons of the precious red liquid to flow freely. They slobbered thick rubbery drool in anticipation and pulled harder.

Julia was in agony as they tore at her limb. Hope dimmed. Through a haze of pain, she saw the frantic look on Danziger's face. If she held on, they might get him, too. There was no sense to both of them dying. Perhaps he could get away to warn the others, if the Grendlers were occupied with her. She let go of him and prayed for a quick end.

"What are you doing? Julia, hold on to me." He pulled at her with all his strength. It was a tug of war he couldn't afford to lose.

The Grendlers were growing agitated. They had no patience for delays. The larger one decided enough was enough, the sight before him was just too tempting, so he bit into his captured portion.

Grendlers had short stubby teeth, good for gnawing and grinding but not for severing anything so large as a human leg. Still, it inflicted enough damage to allow a decent flow of the tasty fluid. Its huge sticky maw draped over the woman's thigh and it began to suck eagerly like a hungry baby. Its cow like eyes closed contentedly as the wonderful red liquid washed over its palate, creating a state of euphoria.

Danziger could tell something was very wrong. Julia's mouth opened in a scream. Her back arched and twisted before she struck her head on the low ceiling and collapsed with an audible thud on the hard stone surface. Danziger felt her grow limp in his arms.

"No. NO!" He yanked her hard and fell back as she came with his tug. He was terrified, fearful of what the Grendlers had done.

What he didn't know was that while one Grendler feasted, the others grew crazed at the overpowering smell of fresh blood. The one let go of Julia's ankle and attacked the feeding Grendler, pushing it aside to get at his share.

The feeding Grendler's mouth dripped crimson drool on to his ample chest as he rolled back, stunned into a rude awakening as he was set upon by one of his fellows. A battle erupted between the other two. Danziger's sudden pull met no resistance. While the Grendlers attacked each other, he pulled Julia out of their reach before they were aware of their loss.

Blood curdling howls echoed through the cave and reached into the fog that clouded the mechanic's brain. He became aware of his own labored breathing as his lungs burned with oxygen debt. He began crawling, pushing deeply into a space that barely allowed passage of his body.

Danziger hated tight places. The cramped maintenance tubes at the station had given him the first hint that claustrophobia was rearing its ugly head. Because he needed the job, he worked through feelings of trapped suffocation. The Time Fold had been a bad experience, dumping him in an adjacent corridor, alone and cut-off from the rest. A tomb that went on forever, full of ensnaring webs and biting insects. It had been a piece of cake compared to this ordeal.

He stopped and laid his head against the cool stone surface. He was soaked in sweat, a result of fear and labor. A hammering heart beat a pulsating rhythm against his ear drums. His hand burned with skin rubbed raw from pushing and clawing his way over the abrasive surface. The other, which held Julia's shirt, was numb. Only the drag of her weight told him that he still maintained a hold.

"Julia? Can you hear me? I got you out of there. I told you I would." He reached back and touched her face, feeling her breath against his fingers.

She was alive.

"We're going to get out of this, so hang on. Okay? It's got to open up soon. It can't go on this way forever."
His voice sounded vulnerable, lost and alone in the area barely higher then his shoe size. He pushed the lumalight ahead, the small beam of hope in world of eternal darkness.

xxx

The same storm that drove Danziger and Julia to seek shelter also hit their camp with equal surprise and fury. Caught in the open, there were few places to hide.

Earlier that day, the mechanic and the doctor had gone ahead to scout for a campsite that offered some shelter against the oppressive heat of the sun. Reflected by the endless rolling sand dunes over which they traveled, the situation was growing unbearable. The first change in the horizon in days had been a few small patches of vegetation scattered among large rock formations in the distance. It was this site that Julia and Danziger had left to investigate.

Yale was the first to recognize the danger. A quick scan through his files had him alerting the others of the approaching sandstorm. "Quickly, we must create some type of shelter for everyone."

With no real experience, they did the best they could. Devon, Magus, and the two children huddled in the TransRover's cabin. Alonzo used the ATV to block some of the sand's assault on the open space between the wheels. The rest of the crew crawled under the big mining vehicle and covered themselves with tent material.

Yale held a portion open and yelled for the pilot to join them. Alonzo was in the open, fumbling with his gear as he tried to raise Julia. The wind caught the set and ripped it off his head.

"Alonzo!" Yale yelled urgently. "Hurry!"

The good-looking pilot was stunned by the power of the wind. He could barely stand much less walk against it. His face stung from the impact of millions of tiny projectiles. He dropped to his knees and blindly crawled the remaining distance. The tutor grabbed him and pulled him under the tarp. Small groups of his crewmen wrapped themselves in tight canvas cocoons. They used their hands and the weight of their bodies to stake their shelters against a wind which seemed bent on stealing it. Alonzo felt Yale's solid presence beside him. He heard the hiss of driven sand raging against the other side of the tent material. Isolated, he could do nothing but hold on and worry about Julia and Danziger.

xxx

A few miles away, while safe from the storm, Danziger was holding on to Julia and worrying about the narrowing crevasse of their escape route. The doctor had begun to whimper whenever he pulled her. It occurred to the mechanic that, in his desperation to break out of this god-forsaken hole, he might be doing the woman more harm than good in dragging her along. From the look of things ahead, there might not be room for her to fit by his side.

He shimmied backward and found his shirt rode up and bunched around his neck. The abrasive stone surface added a few crimson scratches to the spreading purple and blues bruises from the crash. His angry swearing echoed back at him, full of frustration.

"Julia?" He touched her face, gently turning it toward him. His hand was torn, covered with grit and shook from the effort of their journey.

Her facial muscles twitched and she groaned in answer.

He brought the light up. "Julia, try to listen to what I'm saying. We've got a problem. The way out is getting tighter. We won't fit side by side much longer."

Danziger's only response was Julia rolling of her head away from the glare of the light.

"Come on. I don't want to leave you." He tapped the side of her cheek a little more forcefully.

This time, there was a sharp intake of breath as she tried to roll away from her tormentor.

"You hit your head. It knocked you out for awhile." He explained as his hand cushioned movement between her head and the wall.

Her hand rose, forgot its purpose, and drooped weakly at her side.

"Look we can't stay here. We need water. We have to warn the others. What if they come looking for us?" He leaned closer to her. "What if Alonzo comes looking for us. He doesn't know these Grendlers have a thirst for blood."

"Can't...leg....go." Her hand tried to brush him away before it fell against his chest.

"What?" He remembered something had caused her to jerk and hit her head. "Something's wrong with your leg? Okay, let me check it out."

He worked his hips, worming his way backward. The light beam bounced across the walls, catching the disturbed scurrying of small transparent insects. There were other sounds behind them. 'Things going bump in the night.' He tried not to think about it. After all, he and Julia were the invaders.

How brilliant and disturbing the light from his small torch must seem to these weird cave creatures. Maybe they couldn't see but they felt or heard the huge, unknown, destructive presence causing chaos though their world.

Julia lay on her back, having twisted that way after she hit her head. Danziger faced her left side and could see nothing wrong with her leg. In the limited space, he had to hold his hand at an awkward angle to squeeze her ankle and calf and feel for swelling.

"Does that hurt?"

She mumbled something he couldn't catch.

"What? I can't hear you." He heard her moan.

The doctor's leg shifted toward him suddenly, her knee catching him in the throat.

"Looks like it works fine." He patted the limb in approval and tried pushing it back. His eyes shifted to her other leg, lost in the shadows. He squinted, puzzled by its stillness. "Is it the other one?"

"Yea."

He saw her try to move it. "Wait. Give me a minute. Ahh..can you move your other leg back a bit. There's not much room." He felt her tense as his hand the other leg. Repeating the same procedure, he started at the ankle and worked up.

She flinched as he moved above her knee.

"Did they knock something out of place when they were pulling on you back there?" He kneaded the quadriceps, waiting for a reaction to pain. "Nothing there. He grunted as he adjusted his position, then shoved a hand under her leg to check the hamstring.

Julia reacted instantly, with a sharp intake of breath, she jerked upward.

"Easy, easy!"

Her pants were shredded just above the knee. The material saturated.

A brief touch was all he needed. He swallowed with a dawning realization the light only confirmed. His hand, covered in bright red blood, shook under the beam.

"Jesus!" The mechanic was overwhelmed. What the hell was he going to do now? He counted on Julia pulling her own weight to get out of here. There wasn't enough room to continue towing her and he couldn't just leave her. "Shit!"

"Bad?"

"I can't tell. I can't see. There's no room, not enough light. Damn it, Julia, I probably made it worse by dragging you through this shit hole."

"Sorry."

"Well, it's not like we had a lot of options. Look, I'm going to try and wrap your leg with my shirt. It's not that clean but it's better than nothing."

The shirt wasn't that difficult to remove since it was half off anyway. He used his teeth to rip it into strips. The real task was in trying to tie it around her leg with one hand.

Finally, he gave up. "I can't do it."

"I'll try." The doctor volunteered. With her face almost brushing the ceiling, she just managed to reach the strips. "How much blood?"

"Huh?"

"A lot of blood..I need pressure."

"Ahh, good idea. Make it tight."

Danziger was getting an odd feeling. She had been bleeding the whole time he had been dragging her.

Dots were swimming inside Julia's closed eyes as she strained to tighten the bandage. "How long?"

Danziger had squirmed away from the doctor, opening a trough of about 6 inches between them.

"How long have we been in here? It seems like hours." He answered, cocking his head to the left and looking back in the direction they had come from.

The light in his hand was still focused on Julia.

He waited until she was done and settled back down. "How do you feel?"

"Weak. Better. Give me a minute?"

"Sure. Whenever you're ready." Danziger waited till she closed her eyes. The big mechanic swallowed, trying to decided if it was just nerves or fear playing tricks on his mind. Either way, he had to know. Swinging the light around to shine down the narrow corridor behind them, he looked back.

Firey orbits, glowing like some hellish vision were caught reflecting the beam's light just beyond his feet.

For someone so close to the edge, it was a sight that evoked pure terror. He must have moved or made some type of noise, maybe some remnant of fear that froze him to the spot, leaving just a gasp or choked cry in its passing. Whatever the cause, the vision was gone in a blink of an eye. Only a whisper of small feet or rustle of wings touched his ear. A noise he had been hearing for awhile, only it could no longer be rationalized as just the spill of loose dirt.

Something touched him. Danziger bolted, head-butting the low ceiling before an undignified crash landing sent him bouncing into the doctor, the wall and anything else his big sprawling body could cover in the limited space.

Julia's hand had pushed the fight or flight button without realizing it.

The Lumalight flew from his hand, bouncing and landing a distance ahead. The impact broke the lens and it blinked a few times, threatening to leave them in pitch darkness.

Danziger panicked and began crawling forward. "No!! No!! Don't go out"

"John! Julia weakly grabbed at his pant's leg.

"Let me go! The light..." He pulled free, his mind crowded with only one thought.

The light was life, a shield against what waited in the darkness.

He crashed ahead with little regard for obstacles. The warm trickle of blood snaked across his forehead and dripped into his eye. An annoyance which was brushed away with a dirty backhand, smearing crimson across his face. Finally, the prize lay within his grasp. While cracked, the beam still shone brightly ahead.

Danziger reached out, past the light. Trembling fingers touched a nightmare -- a solid rock wall, a dead end.

xxx