The Crucible of the Dragon God

circumstances they had no more chance of fleeing their now immediate pursuer than one of the Hells Bellies would have outrunning a shnarl.

'Kali!' Aldrededor said with uncharacteristic seriousness

'Aldrededor? You don't get out with me much, do you?'

'I do not.'

'You don't really know how I work, do you?'

'I have a feeling I am going to find out.'

'The fact is, Aldrededor,' Kali said, making a slight course correction and ramming levers forward, making The Mole lurch, 'I make things up as I go along.'

'Kali Hooper, you are heading straight for the tunnel wall.'

'Oh, yeah,' Kali said, nodding determinedly.

Kali aimed the Mole at the wall and then, at the very last second, swerved. Instead of hitting the wall head on, the vehicle careened against it along its side, stripping away weed and algae until metal grated hard against the stone beneath. Rather than pulling away, Kali teased the Mole even further to the left, again and again, as if she were trying to smash through the wall. In fact, wasn't her intention at all.

Inside the cabin, a rather confused Aldrededor steadied his insensible wife while The Mole vibrated so much it seemed in danger of coming apart. Kali, however, seemed little concerned. She rammed the vehicle again and again against the wall and, as there was a series of judders and snapping and clanking sounds from its lower regions, it at last clicked with the ex-pirate what it was Kali was trying to do. She was not trying to destroy the whole vehicle, but only part of it.

Aldrededor turned to look out of the rear observation slat, directing his gaze right and groundward, and sure enough the tracks on the vehicle's left hand side were breaking apart, its connecting links buckling and separating as the bolts holding them together sheared and loosened. As he watched, the individual plates of the tracks folded, piling up against the hatch, and then the whole lot came loose, flapping away behind the Mole like a discarded belt.

The Mole dropped onto its metal wheels on its left hand side and was in danger of going into a spin. However, Kali handled it expertly and instead quickly plunged the vehicle through the canal to a rise onto the opposite bank, where she began the same process again. A minute later, the tracks on the Mole's right hand side joined their discarded opposites. Dropping fully onto both sets of wheels now, the vehicle accelerated along the canal bank, spurting a shower of sparks and leaving a rather confused looking yhang-dor in its wake.

Both Kali and Aldrededor were flung back into their seats.

'Wahoooo!' Kali shouted.

Behind her, Dolorosa stirred slightly. 'My 'usband, what is 'appening?'

Aldrededor shrugged his arms helplessly and smiled. 'Kali Hooper, she is making it up as she goes along.'

The Mole continued its flight along the canal bank, three or four times its original speed now that its wheels had been freed of the constraining gears of the tracks. Kali smiled as the compass on the control panel informed her they were heading west, exactly the direction they needed to go. Her smile faded, however, as Aldrededor informed her that the yhang-dor was once more in pursuit. Now that it had a perfectly straight tunnel to traverse, it wasn't gaining on them as fast as it would had the tracks still been present, but it was still gaining.

'Okay, I've had enough of this overgrown toothbrush,' Kali declared. 'Aldrededor, take the levers.'

The ex-pirate scrambled back over the seat. 'Kali Hooper, what are you doing now?'

Kali flicked the hatch lever and grabbed the crackstaff she had stored beneath her seat, then climbed towards the opening, wind whipping at her hair.

'Just keep on in this direction, Reddy! Back in a mo …'

'You're the boss, Kali Hooper.'

Kali heaved herself out of the now opened hatch and steadied herself against the side of The Mole, its passage far from smooth now that it was running only on metal wheels. Nevertheless, she managed to lock herself into a secure position so that she was staring back along the side of The Mole, and raised the crackstaff. Some two hundred yards behind the vehicle, seemingly untroubled by the shower of sparks the Mole still trailed, the yhang-dor roared, its maw opening, displaying its countless razor teeth.

Somewhat hampered by the fact that she had to cling on for dear life with one hand, Kali steadied the crackstaff as best she could and fired, loosing a bolt of energy that ricocheted off the canal bank and into the ether, while simultaneously almost blowing her off the Mole with its recoil. She anchored herself and fired again. This time the bolt impacted with the weeds on the wall, frying them before again ricocheting back down the long, dark tunnel. Trying not to look at the tunnel floor, as it raced blurringly by immediately below her, Kali fired once more. The bolt careened off the tunnel roof and back down at forty-five degrees into the stagnant water, where the canal erupted with a sudden geyser of steam.

Dammit! she thought, this was going to be next to impossible unless she found a better position.

She looked up and, deciding, flung the crackstaff onto The Mole's roof with a grunt, then climbed up after it until she was scrambling on top of the vehicle as it swayed under her. There, lying flat and facing straight back, she lodged the crackstaff beneath her, took aim and fired. An energy bolt slammed into the canal bank directly in front of the yhang-dor, blowing shrapnel in its face.

Adjusting her aim slightly, she fired again, and then again, and the bolts scythed along the creature's side, burning a path through its layer of bristle. The creature roared and reared, momentarily slowed, but then continued coming on. Kali fired again, again and again, the energy discharges reverberating in the confines of the tunnel. The length of the yhang-dor flared with multiple hits. It launched itself up and around the tunnel walls.

Keep still, you slippery fark! Kali thought as it spiralled towards her.

But it did not stop her firing and this time all but one of her multiple shots found their target. Almost pulsating with the blue of the energy bolts now, and shedding sections of skin from where its bristles had fried away, the creature's roar had become one less of anger and more of pain. But still it came on. It was a tough bastard, without a doubt. However, Kali was certain that all it would take to finish it was a few more shots. Particularly if she could get one straight down its throat.

She was lining up just such a shot when her world suddenly span. The Mole was skidding, trying, for some reason, to come to an emergency stop. A moment later, it succeeded, and she found herself tumbling from the roof to land on the ground with an undignified oof.

Ahead of them, the roof of the tunnel had collapsed completely.

'I am sorry, Kali Hooper,' Aldrededor said from inside the cabin. 'There was nothing I could — '

Kali double-taked on the collapsed tunnel and then on the approaching yhang-dor, estimating they had perhaps thirty seconds before it caught up with them.

She leapt into the cabin, sealed the hatch behind her, and flicked the Mole's cannons on to full power. Through the forward observation slat she could see the sonic pulses staring to effect the fallen debris. A second later, she pulled back as a rain of pulverised stone and rock began to impact with the vehicle's front. But in her heart of hearts Kali knew that there was really no time, that the collapse looked far to thick to penetrate before the yhang-dor was on them. And sure enough, a second later, The Mole lurched horribly.

Suddenly all that Kali could see through the observation slat was a set of thousands of razor sharp teeth, then something horrible and squishy and, then, utter blackness.

In the darkness, Aldrededor swallowed so hard Kali could actually hear it. 'Did what I think just happened happen?'

'A-ha.'

On the back seat, no doubt disturbed by the impact, Dolorosa stirred. 'All is quiet. Have we stopped being chased by the theeng?'

'In a manner of speaking, my dearest.' Aldrededor said. 'Why don't you go back to sleep?'

'Bossa lady? What issa wrong?'

'Oh, I think we're in the shit,' Kali said, casually. And paused. 'Or will be soon, anyway.'

'Kali Hooper, I must ask you not to use such language in front on my delicate flower.'

'Aldrededor, it was your 'delicate flower' and her desire to flow that got us into this mess in the — '