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chamber and both men waited for a tense tick of time. Nothing happened, so
they cautiously eased through the doorway. Kane wasn't particularly surprised
by what he saw.
They were in a very long room, at least twenty yards. The wall on their left
was completely covered by armaglass, running the entire length of the room. On
the far side of it they saw a catwalk leading to a central control complex.
Instrument consoles with glass-covered gauges and computer terminals lined the
walls. Even at this distance they could hear the purposeful hum of drive units
and banks of computers chittering like a flock of startled birds.
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"This place look the slightest bit familiar?" Grant inquired in a husky
whisper.
"Onjy the slightest bit," Kane answered in the same subdued tone. "We're on
Thunder Isle... pretty much within spitting distance of New Edo and Shizuka."
Grant swiveled his head on his neck, anger glittering briefly in his dark
eyes. Kane met his gaze with no particular expression on his face. "That
couldn't be the reason you forbade Domi to come with us, could it?"
In a threatening rumble, Grant retorted, "You know better than that."
Kane didn't respond. In fact, he didn't know better than that, but it wasn't
the time or place to
interrogate Grant as to his motives for insisting Domi stay behind. His own
concern for Brigid rose with every passing second, considering the company she
was no doubt being forced to keep.
They walked onto the railed catwalk, listening to a low hum ahead of them,
almost like the vibrations of a gong that had been struck. The hum gradually
became a whine, and the air all around them seemed to shiver with the sound.
The catwalk overlooked a vast chamber shaped like a hexagon, and was far
larger than looked possible from the outside. A dim glow shone down from the
high, flat ceiling. Two faint columns of light beamed from twin fixtures, both
the size of wag tires. Massive wedge-shaped ribs of metal supported the roof.
The shafts of luminescence fell upon a huge forked pylon made of some
burnished metal that projected up from a sunken concave area in the center of
the chamber. The two horns of the pylon curved up and around, facing each
other. Mounted on the tips of each prong were spheres that looked as if they
had been sculpted from multifaceted quartz crystals. The pylon was at least
twenty feet tall, with ten feet separating the forked branches. Extending
outward from the base of the pylon at ever decreasing angles into the low
shadows was a taut network of fiber-optic filaments. They disappeared into
sleeve sockets that perforated the plates of dully gleaming alloy sheathing
the floor. Many of them were buckled here and there, bulging but not showing
splits. The faint odor of scorched rose blossoms tickled their nostrils.
They paused to look down at the pylon, recalling the last time they had seen
it. It had been encapsulated chaos, a cosmic madness. Sparks sizzled through
the facets of the prisms, crackling fingers of energy darted from one sphere
to the other and back again.
They remembered how the crystals spit arcs of energy in random, corkscrewing
patterns, and how the floor supporting the pylon suddenly heaved beneath their
feet, the metal plates squealing, rivets popping loose with the sound of
gunshots. Plasma had lanced from the prongs of the pylon, two coruscating
fountains of fiery sparks that shed glowing droplets of molten silver.
"I would have figured this place would have blown itself to hell within
minutes after we jumped out of here," Grant muttered.
"Me, too," Kane agreed. "But look around most of the damage has been
repaired."
Shiny new floor plates had been riveted down, replacing those that had
buckled. Even scorch marks left by the wild energy overspills were gone,
apparently scrubbed away.
"One thing you have to say about him," Kane commented, turning away from the
pylon, "he's neat."
As they strode down the catwalk, Grant inquired lowly, "So you're sure he's
behind this?"
"Who else has the technical expertise and the sheer gall to experiment with
Operation Chronos technology?"
"You said he was dead," Grant pointed out glumly.
"No, I said I
assumed he was. I also said I never saw his body."
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The catwalk terminated in a room packed with module after module, console upon
console of advanced computer equipment. Electronic instruments and machinery
rose from plinths and podia from all around.
Overhead lights gleamed on alloys, glass coverings, the CPUs. Ten chairs rose
from the floor before each console. Covering four walls were crystal-fronted
vid screens. Two of the screens were blank, while another showed only whorls
of color. Images slid across the fourth screen, attracting Grant's and
Kane's attention.
In grim silence they watched the vid record of the last few minutes of their
previous visit to the installation. The camera had apparently been focused on
the pylon. They had no problem remembering how the crackling display of energy
between the forks of the pylon increased until a virtual ribbon of blue
current seemed to stretch from one to the other.
The air between the prongs had wavered with a blurry shimmer like heat waves
rising off sunbaked asphalt, and tiny glittering specks, like motes of diamond
dust, swirled within the area of distortion. They spun, then whirled faster
and faster, turning into a funnel cloud, like a tornado made of
gold-and-silver confetti.
The funnel cloud seemed to peel back on itself, turning inside out amid vivid
bursts of color. The recording didn't have a sound track, but both men
remembered the deafening, cannonading blast that accompanied the pyrotechnics.
Waves of dazzling white flame and variegated lightning bolts streaked and
blazed. From the curving prongs spit sharp bolts of lightning, which whipped
and hissed along the network of wires like serpents made of blue plasma.
Crooked ringers of energy continued to stab between the prongs, forming a
cat's cradle of red lightning.
They watched, feeling the same awe and dread as they had on that day a few
months previous, when thousands of crackling threads of light coalesced in the
center of the forks.
Gushing lines of energy formed a luminous cloud between the prongs, and almost
faster than the eye could perceive, the cloud grew more dense and definite of
outline. The shimmer built to a blinding bo-realis.
Then a star seemed to go nova, bringing a millisecond of eye-searing
brilliance. The funnel cloud burst apart in fragments, as if a giant mirror
shattered, and the shards flew out in all directions.
Amid the flying, glittering splinters, a small body plummeted out of the heart
of darkness and fell heavily to the platform. The body wore a black, bulky
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