They went far down the corridor, moving randomly up a bisecting corridor to decide it was fruitless only to quickly retrace their steps. Connor lost track of time, though he knew it was long, long, too long. Finally he felt someone grabbing him. With a snarl he spun back.
It was Frank.
“Connor!” he screamed. “Listen to me! We've only got an hour to defuse the bomb! We've got to get to the Computer Cavern! I can find the way by myself, but Beth has to come with me or I won't be able to reach the Logic Core!”
Connor shouted, livid with rage. “Go and defuse the thing! I'm going to find Jordan!”
“Connor ...” Beth protested.
“Go on!” Connor said sternly, holding her passionate gaze. “Go with him, Beth! I'll find Jordan! I promise!”
Staggering, she hesitated, and Connor saw a mother's frantic love in her eyes. He paused, concentrating. Then he grabbed her face and kissed her close, hard, releasing her quickly. His scream slashed through the flame.
“Go, Beth! I promise you! I'll find him!”
She swayed, crying.
“We've got to hurry!” Frank screamed, grabbing Beth's arm, pulling.
Connor grimaced in pain. “Go, Beth! Go! He's going to need you to beat the fail-safe! If we can't beat that thing we're all dead anyway!”
Without waiting for her agreement Connor turned and was gone, heading straight into the dark smoke, knowing that for every moment he waited he allowed Jordan to get farther away. He passed a shattered vault, the remnants of melted steel and slashed titanium littering the corridor walkway. He went deeper and deeper, passing thick smoke, choosing corridors at random, not knowing a better means of deciding.
“Jordan!” he cried again and again. “I'm right here! I'm right here!”
A hate-filled reptilian roar thundered over him and Connor whirled, glaring, teeth clenched in wild hate. The scream was so close that it could have come from the wall itself. And though Connor couldn't see it, he knew that the beast was close beside him, that he was trapped.
He was alone in the lair of Leviathan.
* * *
“Beth! Come on! We're out of time!”
Frank's cry almost didn't register in Beth's mind. She was overloaded, wild and frantic with pain and love. She followed his steps in a daze, obeying with some superior reasoning ability that overruled her instinct to find her child. On and on they went, and she heard the bestial roar that thundered in the darkness behind them. It was vengeful and hate-filled, the cry of a hunter determined to kill the prey that had wounded it. Stunned, she turned, back-stepping, lost in it until she felt Frank's hand gripping her arm.
“Come on, Beth!” he shouted. “Concentrate! We've got to reach the computer cavern before we run out of time! If we don't defuse the bomb none of us are going to survive!”
Beth turned to him and began running, following him with a force that flowed from her love into duty. And she became more determined and frantic as she moved, turning her terrible pain into action, strength. All at once Frank couldn't move fast enough for her. She heard herself screaming.
“Come on! Go! Let's get it over with!”
Connor snarled as he unslung the M-203, checking to see if a grenade was locked in the launcher. It was. He frowned grimly as he moved forward, hoping that he could at least take the beast with him if it came suddenly out of the smoke-filled chaos. He was aware that he had entered some kind of cavern, but he didn't know which one it was. He only knew that it was burning and that he had not yet heard or seen Jordan.
Despite the fear that his shouts would draw the attention of the beast, Connor shouted again. His voice reached into the hissing smoke around him, searching. From a distance to the front, from somewhere in the infinite gray space, he heard an answering cry.
“Jordan!” he cried, moving quick. “Son! I'm right here! Daddy's right here! Call out to me! Please!”
Then an utterly terrified child-cry came from the distance, but closer, and Connor ran forward, striking something hard that he didn't see. He rose and screamed, knowing somehow that his leg was severely injured. He ignored the crippling pain that caused his knee to convulse, giving beneath his weight.
Falling to the floor again, he hesitated, grimacing in pain, fists clenching. A scream came from inside him, a howl of pain and rage and determination that overcame everything but itself and the pain within him faded, lost beneath the spiraling violence of his soul. He smashed a fist hard against the floor, clutching the rifle, rising.
Leviathan roared.
Close ...
Too close.
Connor screamed and whirled, firing the grenade launcher into the darkness. The explosion was closer than he expected and for a staggering moment the entire cavern before him was alive with light, flame, roaring before an empty, cathedral-echoing boom descended over him.