Horror settled into the pit of her stomach.
“So . . . so you’ve tested this on people before?” Jenna asked, expecting him to try to justify his heinous acts.
Instead he answered calmly, “Thoroughly, my dear. Most thoroughly.”
Kendall touched Jenna’s hand. “I’m sorry.”
Cutter turned to Rahei. “Take Ms. Beck to one of our test cages. Down on Level Black.”
Upon hearing this, the native woman’s lips pulled into a smile of dark delight. It was the first strong emotion Rahei had shown.
That scared Jenna more than anything else.
Rahei grabbed her upper arm and led her off, collecting another native near the door, who carried a rifle over one shoulder. Jenna noted the weapon was fitted with a U-shaped yellow rod sticking past the muzzle like a bayonet, with exposed copper contact points at the tips.
She recognized the design.
Electric cattle prod.
She kept well away from that weapon as Rahei led her out of the lab. She was marched down a long tunnel that seemed to cross through the stone heart of the mountain. After stepping through a heavily bolted door at the end, she found herself outside again.
She shaded her eyes against the sun, which blazed directly overhead, shining brightly down the throat of what appeared to be a sinkhole. Someone had converted it into a series of tiered gardens, festooned all around with orchids, bromeliads, and flowering vines. Down at the bottom, the green canopy of a forest reflected the sunlight. Each level from there to here appeared to be broken into fenced-off tiers, connected by a corkscrewing stone ramp carved from the walls.
Rahei pushed her toward a ladder that led off the steel apron and down to that winding road. An enclosed golf cart waited below. She was forced to sit in the back with Rahei while her armed guard joined the driver up front.
Once everyone was seated, the golf cart rolled down the ramp, its electric motor purring. It passed through a series of gates, which magically opened in front of them, possibly responding to some RFID chip embedded in the cart.
At first nothing seemed out of the ordinary about these gardens, but after passing through a few levels, she started to notice oddities. While she wasn’t intimately familiar with all rain forest life, some of the plants and animals appeared otherworldly. At first the signs were subtle: bees the size of walnuts, a wall of black orchids whose petals opened and closed on their own, a dwarf boa that slithered into a clear pond, revealing a series of gills along its flanks.
But the deeper they traversed, larger creatures appeared, more boldly abnormal. From a slim branch over the road, a row of zebra-striped rats hung from prehensile tails, similar to those found on an opossum. While they waited for a gate to fully open, a thick vine shot thorns at them, peppering the sides of the cart. Around another turn, a flock of oversized Amazon parrots took flight at their passage, revealing a riot of plumage in every shade, a kaleidoscope of feathers that dazzled the eye.
One of these last flew too high—then suddenly seized up and tumbled several yards before regaining its senses and winging away to join its flock.
Jenna stared upward. Was Cutter utilizing electronic tags or chips to keep each creature restricted to its own tier? She pondered this possibility—anything to occupy her mind and stave off the terror inside her.
All the while, the cart continued to wind down through the levels, the air growing ever warmer and more humid. Sweat beaded on her forehead and rolled down the small of her back.
She searched longingly up at the distant mouth of the sinkhole, estimating they were a mile down by now.
I’ll never get out of here.
Despair dampened her attention—until finally they reached forest growing at the bottom of the sinkhole. She estimated it was over twenty acres in size.
Crossing a final gate, they dropped through the canopy.
Welcome to Level Black, she thought grimly.
But what was down here?
Their descent along the ramp grew progressively darker. The blaze of sunlight filtered down to a dull green glow. As her eyes adjusted, she spotted shelves of fungi, softly aglow, sprouting along the trunks of trees. Across the floor, tiny ponds and thin streams reflected that meager light, while stands of heavy-leafed ferns towered all around, densely packed along the lone gravel road into the forest.
The cart reached that road and headed off into the jungle.
Their head lamps finally clicked on.
Using that brighter light, Jenna tried to peer through the thick walls of undergrowth, but she could not see very far. Occasionally the cart’s bumper would brush a fern and its leaves and rubbery stems would retract and curl up, opening a wider view into the jungle.
But it was only more of the same.
Giving up, she turned her attention forward, wondering where she was being taken. Gnats buzzed thickly in the beams of their headlamps. Everywhere, water dripped from leaves, and flower petals gently drifted down.
The chatter between the driver and guard had died away upon reaching this level. Their fear was palpable, which set her heart to pounding harder.
Then thirty yards ahead, something large dropped from above and splattered onto the road. When they reached the site, the cart edged past what lay broken in the gravel.
Jenna stared down at the bloody skeleton of a goat or deer. Some flesh still clung to the carcass, including one eye that stared forlornly back at her as the cart passed by.
Leaning against the window, she searched the tangle of thick branches overhead and the leafy bower of the dark canopy.
She spotted nothing.
Who or what had—
A tremendous roar shattered the heavy silence, full of territorial anger and hunger. It was answered by cries deeper in the forest, echoing all around.
Horrified, Jenna turned toward Rahei.
The woman was smiling again.
26
April 30, 5:00 P.M. GMT
Queen Maud Land, Antarctica
“Is everyone okay?” Gray hollered. “Call out!”
He climbed off the floor of the snow cruiser’s cab and took personal inventory, fingering a scalp wound where his head had clipped a stanchion. A glance forward showed the river flowing past the vehicle’s cracked windshield. A moment ago, the cruiser had toppled off the blasted bridge, crashed through the trestles below, and struck the river flat-bellied.
So why hadn’t they plunged fully underwater?
Kowalski helped Harrington out of the footwell in front of the passenger seat. The professor had a wicked knot on his forehead, and his eyes looked glassy and dazed.
Jason called up from the main cabin in back. “Need help down here!”
Gray responded to the panic in his voice and shoved over to the ladder that led down from the cab. He found the lower level roiling with water, the river flowing in through the open back hatch. A huge black spike pierced up from the floor to the roof. Gray remembered spotting the fang-like stalagmites rising from the river. The cruiser must have impaled itself onto one of them as it fell, piercing its underbelly.