“Yes sir!” Barley replied, was gone.
A ponderous pause, with Chesterton staring at the vault. For a long time no one cared to speak.
“What does any of this mean, Frank?” he asked finally. He shook his head, looking down at the floor. “What does any of this really mean?”
Frank focused on him.
“It means we're not in control, Chesterton. It means we never were.”
* * *
Roaring as his fingers were torn from the rock, Thor saw the metallic gleam to his left and decided ...
Use the elevator cables!
In the, frantic moment as his fingers tore from the rock, Thor slammed his boots forcefully against the wall and launched his titanic form through the air, sailing through darkness. And in the next second he crashed against the serpentine black cables to grasp wildly at the thinly-oiled, slick steel as he rebounded out and down.
Instantly in the rushing, formless moment, Thor's hand flashed out to strike a steel girder with bruising force, all his strength centered in the fingers of his hand.
Bellowing in pain, Thor dug his fingers in the steel, trying to find a solid grip in the heavily greased elevator frame. But his great weight dragged him backward, his grip sliding on the thin oil. And yet for a herculean moment he held, his entire arm trembling with the strain while his other hand reached wildly at the cable, the steel, flashing down the rock for a wild swipe at an unseen crevice as vivid thoughts blasted his mind ...
Innocent lives lost ... Evil eyes glowing ... Innocence consumed ... Evil devouring ... Darkness rising ...
Thor snarled, scrambling savagely for a hold, but against his will he felt his grip slipping. Knowing he could not hold, he tried a sliding descent; but as he released the slightest pressure, he knew he had lost it all to darkness rising, rising, rising...
Thor roared back into ...
Black, rushing wind ...
Falling...
* * *
Chapter 17
Leaving Jordan in the sleep of exhaustion, Beth walked into the Conference Room of the Housing Cavern. It was only a couple rooms away, and she knew that she could hear Jordan if he awoke crying.
The computers were still secretly working to break the encryption, and there was nothing else she could do on that level. So she had locked the door and, to release a measure of anger, ventured out to confront the men responsible for this tragedy.
She stalked coldly into a conference room to find Hoffman engaged in angry debate with an Army colonel, Blake, the one who had come to the surface and taken her into the cavern. And then there was Adler, the tall, mysterious figure who had arrived at the island three months ago. He stood beside the Russian named Tolvanos. Beth felt a grim pleasure at seeing the Russian's nose and upper cheek swollen, badly bruised from where she had smashed the keyboard over his face.
She glanced around the cavern, saw that all the overhead lights were working. But the big vaults that sealed the exits were still locked, shut solid. So she walked forward, eyes narrowing. She noticed distinctly that no one else in the room seemed willing to join the debate.
“No!” Hoffman shouted, pointing his pipe at Adler. “You are the one responsible for this atrocity, Mr. Adler! It is not this incompetent Russian scientist that I have for so long despised!”
“Likewise, Dr. Hoffman,’' the Russian smiled.
“I believe that the military has jurisdiction, here,” Adler replied, gesturing patiently to Blake. “So if you have any complaints I suggest you level them at those who—”
“I do not lodge complaints with fools,” Hoffman said wearily. “Yes, Blake is an incompetent bootlicker who should have known better. But he is not ultimately responsible for this carnage because he did not replace Dr. Frank, a very capable scientist who knew quite well what this creature might do. It was you, Mr. Adler! It was you who called for an across-the-board replacement of this facility's personnel so that you could complete unsafe testing to meet your schedule. And I know the reason.” Hoffman stepped forward. “Yes, I know that this has become a CIA Black Operation that will ultimately be used to destroy whatever enemies it is designated to destroy, military or civilian.”
His condemnation was complete.
“Yes, Mr. Adler, I am not so old that I cannot recognize the signs of covert subterfuge. But that does not excuse what you have done. Blake is a fool, yes. And Tolvanos is a monster, a merchant of death. But it is your personal ambition that has brought us to this regrettable hour. In your stupidity you challenged the higher reason of men who knew far better than yourself. You challenged, even, a force of nature and delivered us all to this peril.”
Beth saw that Adler was unconcerned with what Hoffman thought of him. He seemed to be a man who held his own opinion as the only meaningful standard for measuring anything at all.