"Alby!" a voice called.
He turned, and saw Wizard standing at the bottom of a flight of stone steps that burrowed down into the floor to his right. Lily was with him.
But then Alby heard more voices, and he looked out at the Pillar just in time to see, appearing inside the templefortress beyond it, some heavily armed Congolese Army men led by an AsianAmerican US Marine.
The Pillar lay exactly halfway between them and Alby.
A pained shout from Zoe made Alby spin on his knees. He saw her fingers at the top of the halfraised drawbridge. Saw them slipping slowly out of view...
This is all happening too fast,his mind screamed.Too many choices, too many variables.
Escape with Lily, grab the Pillar, or help Zoe ...
And suddenly everything went silent and time slowed for Alby Calvin.
In the silence of his mind, Alby faced his choice.
Of his three options, he could do two.
He could make it to the Pillar and get back to Wizard and Lily in the tower-but he couldn"t do thatand help Zoe. If he took this option, Zoe would drop into the crocfilled lake and die.
Or he could help Zoe and, with her, join Wizard and Lily-but that would mean leaving the Pillar to these intruders. And that could haveglobal ramifications.
Global ramifications,he thought.
The Pillar or Zoe.
One choice could potentially save the world. The other would save a single life: the life of a woman who was dear to him and to those he cared about, Lily, Wizard and Jack West.
It"s not fair!he thought angrily.This is not a choice a kid should have to make! It"s too big.
Too important.
And so Alby made his choice.
A choice that would have farreaching consequences.
Time sped up again and Alby leaped to his feet and ranback toward the halfraised drawbridge, toward Zoe.
He scrambled up the sloping wooden bridge, clawing at it with his fingernails. He came to Zoe"s fingers, hooked over the edge, just as they slipped a final time- -and he caught one of her hands with both of his, leaning back with all his strength to hold her.
Below him, Zoe snapped to look up, a new look of hope leaping across her face. Then, knowing that one of her hands was secure, she used her other hand to loosen the grip of the warriormonk hanging from her belt and wrenched him free of her.
The warriormonk screamed as he fell away from her, landing with a splash in the water below before several large reptilian shapes converged on him and took him under.
Then with Alby"s help, Zoe hauled herself up and over the edge of the drawbridge.
"Thanks, kid."
"We really have to go," he said.
They slid together on their b.u.t.ts down the sloping drawbridge, landing on their feet inside the tower-just in time to see the Congolese Army men reach the Pillar on the other drawbridge and bring it to the attention of Switchblade.
"d.a.m.n. The Second Pillar..." Zoe breathed.
Alby swore under his breath, but he"d made his choice.
"This way," he said firmly, pushing Zoe down the stone steps inside the tower, to the spot where Wizard and Lily waited with Ono and Diane Ca.s.sidy.
Lily called, "Quickly! There"s an escape tunnel down here. Come on!"
Alby made to follow Zoe down the steps, but it was right then that the most unexpected thing of all happened.
He got shot.
HE"D BEEN about to follow Zoe down the stairs when suddenly somethingslammed into his left shoulder, spinning him, hurling him three feet backward, into the nearby wall.
Alby slumped to the base of the wall, dazed, in shock, his left shoulder burning in a way that he"d never felt before. He looked down at it to discover that the entire shoulder was awash with blood.
His blood!
He saw Zoe down at the base of the stairs, saw her try to come for him, but it was too late-the Congolese Army men and the AsianAmerican Marine were now entering the tower-and Wizard had to pull Zoe back down the stairs and into the escape tunnel down there.
Leaving Alby just sitting there against the stone wall, dumbstruck, bloodied, and horrified, and now at the mercy of the US Marine coming toward him.
DARK, WET, and narrow, the escape tunnel led northward.
Through its tight confines they ran, Ono leading the way, holding a flaming torch above his head. He was followed by Lily and Diane Ca.s.sidy, with Wizard and Zoe bringing up the rear.
"Oh, G.o.d! Alby!" Zoe cried as she ran.
"We had to leave him!" Wizard said with surprising firmness.
"I think he got hit-"
"Wolf can"t be so evil as to kill a small boy! And we had to get away! We have to protect Lily! What did you manage to get from the sacred island?"
"We grabbed the Orb and its sighting device, but we lost the Second Pillar!" Zoe said.
"Alby saved me instead! Wolf"s men got it before they got him!"
Wizard kept running hard. "After he"s done with the Neetha, Wolf and his rogue army will now have both Pillars, plus the Firestone and the Philosopher"s Stone! They"ll have everything they need to perform the ceremony at the Second Vertexand at every other vertex to come! This is a disaster!"
They dashed up a long flight of stone steps and came to a concealed stone doorway cut into a small cave, the end of the escape tunnel.
Emerging from the cave, they found themselves on the banks of the wide jungle river that fed the Neetha waterfall.
To the south, three volcanoes loomed over a seamless green valley-except for a newly opened hole in the canopy, the Neetha"s ravine was completely hidden by the jungle.
Shouts and gunfire made them whip around.
About a hundred yards from the cave, another battle was being waged on the riverbank.
Two Congolese Army pilots were desperately defending a large seaplane from about thirty Neetha warriormonks. The seaplane-or more correctly, "flying boat"-was a very old model, a Soviet ripoff of the cla.s.sic Boeing 314 "Clipper."
Big and bulky, with an upper flight deck and a lower pa.s.senger cabin, it had four wing mounted propeller engines and a huge bulbous belly that sat low in the river. Cheap and old, knockoff Clippers like this one were common in those parts of Africa where the only landing strips were rivers.
Right now this Clipper was literally crawling with Neetha warriors. They were scaling its flanks, jumping on its wings, standing on its nose, and hammering its c.o.c.kpit windshield with clubs.
Zoe stepped up alongside Wizard, seeing the activity going on all over the big seaplane.
Wizard saw her eyes narrow. "You"re not thinking..."
"You bet I am," she said, taking the chief"s shotgun from him.
Thus while the plane"s two Congolese pilots fired their guns wildly, defending their plane against the many Neetha attackers, five figures swam silently and unnoticed around the tail fin of the floating plane, around to its open side and to the entry door there.
Zoe led the way, climbing up out of the water and reaching for the door.
She pulled it open-only to be confronted by a yellowtoothed Neetha warriormonk, looming over her! He whipped up his bow...just as, onehanded, Zoe brought up the shotgun and blasted the monk out of the way.
A minute later, still brandishing the chief"s shotgun, she hustled into the upstairs c.o.c.kpit, just in time to see the plane"s Congolese copilot get yanked bodily out of the smashed forward windshield, screaming as he went.
Two Neetha monks hacked into the poor man right there on the nose of the plane. When they were done, the two murderers crouched to enter the c.o.c.kpit, only to find themselves looking straight down the barrel of Zoe"s gun.
Boom! Boom!
The two monks went flying off the nose of the plane, sailing down into the river.
Zoe slid into the pilot"s seat while the others piled in behind her. With Ono beside him, Wizard stood guard at the top of the spiral staircase that led down to the lower pa.s.senger deck, covering the stairs with an AK47 he"d picked up downstairs.
"Can you fly this thing?" Lily asked Zoe.
"Sky Monster"s been giving me lessons." Zoe scanned the dizzying array of dials in front of her. "It"s notthat much different from a helicopter...I think."
She punched the ignition switch.
The big seaplane"s four turboprop engines roared to life.
Its remaining pilot-firing vainly from the sh.o.r.eside doorway-was taken completely by surprise as the big Clipper"s propellers began to rotate and then blur with speed.
His surprise was his undoing.
For as he turned at the sound, he was struck by six arrows from his Neetha opponents and he fell from the doorway-and as the plane began to move away from the sh.o.r.e, the ten or so remaining Neetha warriormonks a.s.sailing it from the riverbank went rushing en ma.s.se up the gangway before the gangway itself fell away into the water behind the departing plane.
Wind blasted in through the shattered c.o.c.kpit windshield as Zoe jammed forward on the collective and felt the plane surge beneath her.
The waves of the river started to rush beneath the bow of the seaplane, getting faster and faster, until suddenly they fell away and Zoe had them airborne.
She smiled with relief. "Dear G.o.d, I think we made-"
Gunfire from the cabin made her turn.
Wizard was firing his AK47 at the Neetha warriormonks trying to enter the upper deck via the stairs.
They were practically suicidal in their a.s.sault-hurling themselves over their dead, shrieking and screaming, trying to fire arrows if they could.
If she could have seen her plane from the outside, Zoe would have been shocked: several Neetha men were still on its roof, clambering forward on their bellies toward the open c.o.c.kpit.
At the same time, two more warriors on one wing were preparing to-suicidally-throw a thick net into one of the propellers. They threw the net...and with a great mechanical jerk, the thick rope got hopelessly entangled in the propeller...and with a blast of black smoke, that engine seized completely!
The entire airplane banked wildly at the unexpected loss of power and the two Neetha men were thrown off the wing and went plummeting to their deaths.
Zoe spun in her seat just in time to see them flail off the wing. She wrestled the plane back level.
"What is wrong with these people!" she shouted.
Diane Ca.s.sidy answered: "They guard the location of their realm with rabid fanaticism. If, by his death, a Neetha warrior can prevent an intruder from escaping, then he is a.s.sured a place in heaven."
"So our escape plane is infested with suicidal fanatics," Zoe said. "Wonder-"
Gunfire cut her off. Oddly distant gunshots.
"Wizard!" she called.
"It"s not me!" Wizard shouted back from the stairs. "They"ve stopped trying to storm the upper deck. A moment ago they all just went downstairs."
More distant gunshots.
And suddenly Zoe saw another of her wingmounted engines explode with belching black smoke, its propellers stopping.
Then she realized what was going on.
"Oh,Jesus. They"re firing at the engines from the side doors. They"re going to bring us down that way."
"If they don"t ignite all the fuel in the wings beforehand!" Wizard called.
More distant gunfire.
"s.h.i.t, s.h.i.t, s.h.i.t..." Zoe said.
Gripping the pilot"s control yoke, she could feel the plane becoming less responsive.
There"s no way out of this,she thought.You can"t stop someone intent on bringing your plane down this way.
"We"re screwed," she said aloud.
As if in answer to her comment, her radio abruptly crackled.