Alien: Enemy of My Enemy by Mary SanGiovanni;

Author:Mary SanGiovanni;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags:  
Publisher: Lightning Source Inc. (Tier 1)

17

Dr. Fowler led them through the front entrance and into the lobby. The force of the falling rocks outside had cracked the walls down to the foundation. As they stood in the empty room, the building creaked around them. Siobhan suspected that at any time, a piece of ceiling could collapse or a room cave in.

Despite Fowler’s assurances, she couldn’t help but wonder what shape the tunnels would be in, after months of tremors and moonquakes. Given his tendency to lie or gloss over what he didn’t want to admit, she didn’t feel particularly confident in his assessment.

“Just as cozy as I remember it,” Roots said flatly, righting a fallen potted plant on the front desk counter. Then he followed as Fowler led them through the lobby and a doorway that opened into the gray hall beyond. Many of the pipes had cracked, the wires looping down. It made the hallway look like segmented tails and exoskeleton ribs.

The ceiling lights that had offered just enough glow to see by during their first incursion had since nearly gone out. What little light was left created shadows that looked distorted, flickering just on the periphery of vision.

At one of the locked doors, Dr. Fowler stopped, pulling a small ring of key cards from his pocket. He sorted through them until he found one with a light blue band across an edge, and he slipped it into the lock’s card reader.

Nothing happened.

He pulled it out and slid it in again, and this time, a green light on the top of the lock flickered for a moment, then came on. Fowler pushed open the door and led them into a stairwell. Metallic rails lined a concrete-alloy set of steps that ran down to a landing, with another set descending beyond that.

“This way,” he said.

Elkins and Roots descended the stairs, guns pointed ahead. For the moment they didn’t need flashlights. At the landing they swung their weapons toward the darkened stairs that continued down to the tunnels. After a moment, Elkins waved the others down, and they joined the marines on the landing. Behind them, Alec dragged the door shut, leaving them in darkness.

“Give it a moment,” Dr. Fowler said, “and the backup lights should go on down there.”

For several seconds, nothing happened. Then there was a series of clicks, followed by a flickering of light, and faint overheads came on in a wave along the length of the tunnel. Siobhan could see branching offshoots on both the left and right sides of the main corridor.

“You know which way you’re going?” Elkins asked Fowler. “Looks like a maze down there.”

“I know the way,” Fowler said. “It’s mostly just a straight shot forward.”

Elkins and Roots, with the scientist close behind, led the others down the steps and into the tunnel. The walls were rounded and looked, for the most part, intact. They had been painted gray-green and were lined with thin pipes of a darker shade. Much like the hallways upstairs, they looked to Siobhan like long ribs in the body cavity of some great animal.

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