CHAPTER 15
As Tash made this frightening discovery, Zak and Deevee continued to climb down the side of the ziggurat on which the landing bay sat. The stairs that had been carved into the giant pyramid reached from its highest level to its lowest depth. After 231 steps, they had sunk down into a gray-green haze of steam that rose up from the hot jungle floor. After 463 steps, Deevee stopped counting.
The steps were damp and covered with slime. The people of Mah Dala did not go down to the jungle, and no one had walked on the stairs for years. Moss, growing quickly in the humid air, covered most of the great stones that made up the structure.
At long last they reached the bottom. The jungle floor was soft and wet, and covered with a layer of rotting leaves and branches. Through the mist the trunks of enormous trees loomed like shadowy giants. The ground beneath them was covered with a layer of mud.
“I don’t believe it,” Zak said, pulling at his shirt collar. “It’s even hotter down here.”
“And far more unpredictable,” Deevee added. “Dr. Kavafi said that the original Gobindi built the ziggurats so that they could avoid the jungle.”
Zak looked up. The top of the ziggurat towered three hundred meters above them. “I can’t believe the Gobindi just vanished,” Zak commented. “You’d think a culture that could build that would be able to survive anything.”
The droid wiped a thin layer of moisture from his photoreceptors. “Something obviously destroyed them. With our luck, we’ll find that it was something in this jungle.”
“That’s why we should find Tash and leave as soon as possible,” Zak replied.
Deevee pointed to the soft, squishy ground. The slime track that Zak had followed on the hard stones above was now lost in layers of rotting leaves. “And just how do you intend to find her, or the blobs?”
But Zak didn’t look where Deevee had pointed. He was staring at a nearby tree. “I think they found us!”
The branches of the tree were alive with fat, wriggling shapes that had begun to slide down the branches. A dozen blobs had already reached the jungle floor and were oozing toward Zak and Deevee.
“Zak, I insist we turn back,” Deevee commanded.
“No argument here,” Zak replied. They both turned but found the stairs blocked. Blobs had crept up the sides of the ziggurat and covered the stairs. They were trapped.
“Go!” Zak shouted. “We can outrun them! We’ll find another ziggurat and climb that one.”
He and Deevee hurried from the spot just as the blobs closed in. Zak and Deevee were faster than the blobs, but the soggy jungle floor slowed them down.
Out of the corner of his eye, Zak could see more of the creatures dropping from the trees on either side of them.
“There’s got to be another ziggurat around here somewhere!” Zak yelled, ducking beneath a low-hanging branch:
“There!” Deevee replied, pointing. His photoreceptors picked out a thick wall looming out of the haze. “It appears to be a large one.”
Zak and Deevee reached the wall of the ziggurat ahead of the blobs. But they could hear the shrubs rustling, and the wet, smacking sound of the creatures wriggling along the tree branches and the ground.
“Judging from the design and size,” Deevee noted, “I’d say we are at the base of the main ziggurat. The Infirmary must be somewhere above us.”
“Great,” Zak said. “So where are the stairs?” He could see nothing but a flat wall ten meters high.
“Perhaps around the other side,” Deevee suggested.
They never got to find out. A horde of blobs oozed from the steamy shadows on every side. They were trapped.
Zak and Deevee turned to face the approaching line of slime. One of the blobs lunged forward.
But it stopped in midstretch and recoiled as a shrill sound filled the air. A bright streak of energy shot out of the gloom and struck the blob head-on. The blob scurried backward in surprise.
Someone had fired a blaster bolt.
On the blob’s skin, a small black hole smoked for a moment, then oozed over and disappeared. The blob shuffled forward once more.
More energy beams followed, a barrage of blaster bolts that cut a pathway through the line of slime creatures. Through the hole stepped a human and a Bothan-Wedge and his Rebel ally. In moments they had fought their way to the ziggurat.
“You!” Deevee blurted as he saw Wedge. “But you are an outlaw!”
Wedge managed a grin. “I guess that depends on which side you’re on.”
He fired again and again, sending blaster bolts streaking toward the blobs. The energy weapons did not kill the creatures, but seemed to slow them down.
“How did you know we were here?” Zak asked.