“Good work, Lieutenant,” Iolanthe said, striding over to stand with the British frogmen. “West is down there with two others. The old man, whom we need, and the woman, whom we don’t.”
She handed Ashmont her headset mike, just as he switched off the jamming device on his hip.
He spoke into the mike. “Captain Jack West. This is the Royal Marines. You have no escape. You know it and we know it. Bring out the Pillar.”
“Go fuck yourself,”came the reply from the radio.
Ashmont smiled. Then he looked at Lily and Alby as he spoke again: “Bring out the Pillar, Captain, or I start killing the children. The boy first.”
“OK. We’re coming.”
Minutes later, Iolanthe, Ashmont, and three of his men stood inside the docking unit suctioned to the base of the rocky island, staring down the pipelike tunnel filled with Nile crocodiles.
At the other end of the tunnel stood Jack, Zoe, and Wizard.
“Send the old man out with the Pillar!” Ashmont called.
“What’s your name, soldier?” Jack said evenly.
“Ashmont. Lieutenant. Fifth Regiment, Her Majesty’s Marines.”
“You threatened my little girl and her friend, Lieutenant Ashmont. I’m gonna make sure you diehard for that.”
“You don’t scare me, Captain West,” Ashmont replied haughtily. “I’ve heard of you, and I know your kind. Some may think you’re good, but to me you’re loose, undisciplined, reckless. Just another wild animal from a colony that should be kept on a tighter leash. I’ve a mind to kill the boy just on principle. Now send the old man through with the Pillar or I give the order.”
Jack handed his rucksack to Wizard, who then proceeded to shimmy down the crocodile-infested tunnel for the second time that morning.
Again, the big crocs grunted in protest, but they did not attack.
As Wizard crawled down the tunnel, Jack called, “Iolanthe. I’m disappointed.”
“Sorry, Huntsman,” she replied. “Blood is thicker than water, especially royal blood.”
“I’ll remember that.”
At length, Wizard emerged from the hole at the end of the tunnel and stepped out in front of the three gun- toting Royal Marines.
Ashmont snatched the rucksack from him, saw the glowing Pillar within it, handed it to Iolanthe.
“Up, old man.” He jerked his chin at the ladder leading back up to the boats.
Wizard protested: “But—”
“Move!”
Reluctantly, Wizard ascended the ladder.
Standing at the tunnel’s entrance, Iolanthe gazed down it, seeing West and Zoe at the far end. She held the Pillar in her hands, brushing the new pyramid-shaped hollow in one end of it with her fingers.
“Enjoy your tomb, Captain,” she said.
Then she pressed the solid end of the glowing Pillar into the rolled-back symbol of the Machine at the entrance and immediately the manhole-sized symbol rolled back into place, sealing the ancient tunnel with a resoundingboom, locking Jack and Zoe inside.
IOLANTHE, Ashmont, and the other Royal Marines climbed back up into the Zodiacs.
Once they were all up, Ashmont broke the seal on the docking unit, and it instantly flooded, covering the entrance to the subterranean system with water again.
Then he pushed Lily and Wizard onto the first Zodiac, leaving Alby, Pooh Bear, and the American, Astro, on the second one.
The British lieutenant deferred to Iolanthe. “What about them?”
“We keep the girl and the old man. The others we don’t need.”
“So be it,” Ashmont growled. Then he promptly cuffed Pooh, Astro,and Alby to their Zodiac, cut the ropes anchoring their boat to his and to the island, and then—blam!-blam!-blam!—fired three shots into its rubber sides.
Lily screamed at the gunshots.
The second Zodiac instantly began to deflate…and sink…with Pooh Bear, Astro, and Alby handcuffed to it!
The many crocodiles that had lurked in wait in a wide circle around the two boats now began to stir. Unlike the ones inside the cool interior of the island, these crocs were alert, awake, and mobile.
“Perhaps you’ll be lucky and drown before the crocs take you,” Ashmont said. “Otherwise, I hope your death is not too frightening.”
“When it comes, I certainly hope yours is,” Pooh Bear retorted. “Bastard.”
“Alby!” Lily screamed, her eyes filling with tears.
Alby himself was petrified, turning this way and that, looking from his sinking boat to the wide circle of
