Operation: Amazon

- 9 -

Banks waited. He kept an eye on the steps and the shadows in the ruins, but the snakes had effectively disappeared. The only sound was the soft tumble of water from the cascade off to the side of the pyramid, and the only light showing was the yellow-gold flicker from the lamps that still burned in the chamber below him. He lay there feeling sweat cool on his body, noticing that the acrid oily odor was fading fast. After 10 minutes, he felt safe enough to creep to the lip of the roof. He lowered himself down to the top step of the pyramid to one side of the doorway so that he wouldn’t frame himself in the light from inside. He kept a close eye on the shadowed ruins below, ready to flee at the first hint of snake activity, and sidled sideward, backing into the altar room.

He’d already known he’d see it, but the sight of poor Wilkes splayed out, still wet, on the altar, dead eyes staring accusingly, shook Banks to the core. He averted his gaze and made a quick circuit of the room, looking for their kit and weapons. All he found was clothing and blades discarded in random piles on the floor by the natives.

Snakes have no need for clothes. Snakes have no hands to carry a knife in.

He laughed, then caught himself before any sound escaped. A manic madness fluttered in his head, a need to be off and away from this place where nothing made much of any sense.

He turned for one more look at the body on the altar, trying not to think about the blood trails that led off and away down the pyramid steps. Poor Wilkes was beyond any help.

But the squad needs me.

That single thought was enough to get him moving. He put on a kilt-like piece of cloth that he was able to tie at his waist, and although it barely covered the essentials, he felt somehow less vulnerable for wearing it. Another look round confirmed that their kit was nowhere in the room, so he gathered up as much loose clothing, and as many blades, as he could safely carry into a bundle under his left arm. With his free hand, he carefully took down one of the oil lamps and carried it ahead of him as he headed for the stairs.

Buller was still sitting cross-legged on the floor and looked up in astonishment when Banks entered the cell two minutes later.

“Are you ready to be rescued yet or are you still to feert to move?” Banks asked. Buller got, somewhat unsteadily, to his feet.

“I thought for sure you’d fallen. You’ve been gone for hours.”

Banks passed him a loincloth and left him to figure out how to put it on while he went and opened the other two doors. Hynd, McCally, and Wiggins were all up and awake. Wiggins had an egg-shaped bruise at his left temple, but seemed little the worse for the bump on the head earlier. Banks passed them each a cloth.

The other man they’d found earlier was slumped against a wall in the third cell, and McCally stopped Banks from stepping over to him.

“He died a couple of hours back, Cap,” the corporal said. “Went in his sleep with no pain, which I think must have been a blessing for him. Dehydration or starvation, it’s hard to tell what got him first. He was delirious for a wee bit before sleep got him. Some shite about snakes or something.”

Banks turned to Buller.

“Was he one of yours?”

The man didn’t seem particularly moved at the death.

“Aye. Poor bastard. He was taken a few days before me. Can we go?”

“I’m touched by your fucking concern,” McCally said.

Buller laughed bitterly.

“He got paid well enough.”

Banks held McCally back. For a moment, it looked like the corporal might hit the man. Wiggins took a long knife from the pile Banks had dropped on the floor.

“Here I was thinking this was an Indiana Jones story, but look at me now… I’m bloody Tarzan.”

“Nah,” Hynd said, taking a knife for himself. “I’m Tarzan. You’re the fucking chimpanzee.”

“Can it, lads,” Banks said, and turned to Buller who was still at the door of the cell where the dead man lay.

“I’m not keen on going back up top from here,” he said. “Can we go down the other way?”

Buller shrugged.

“I’ve not been that way. Your guess is as good as mine,” he said.

Hynd motioned at the knives and spears they were carrying.

“No sign of our gear, Cap?”

“Nope. And no time to go hunting around in the dark for it either. If we make it back to the dredger, there’s all the gear we left there, so that’s our priority. I’ve had enough of this place. We go down; if all else fails, at least we’ll have a shorter jump into the river.”

He passed the oil lamp to Buller.

“You stay in the middle of the group. And whatever the fuck you do, don’t drop this. I’ve done enough fucking about in the dark already tonight.”

“What’s the plan, Cap?” Hynd asked as Banks led them toward the downward steps.

“Get away clean, back to the dredger, and call for an evac so we can get rid of this arsehole here. That middle part might be a problem, depending on whether Giraldo’s still around or not.”

“And Wilkes,” Hynd replied, then went quiet when he saw the look on Banks’ face.

“Wilkes?” Buller said. “You didn’t bring that daft sod with you, did you?”

Banks kept walking and didn’t reply. The last thing that was needed now was any explanation of the carnage he’d seen upstairs, even if he felt like doing it if only to see if he could get any emotion at all out of the man they’d come to save.

He stepped to the top of the stairs, Hynd at his side, with Buller in the middle carrying the flickering oil lamp, and Wiggins and McCally bringing up the rear.

The oil lamp only gave out enough light to see a few yards ahead at a time, and even then both Hynd’s and Banks’ shadows loomed large in the dark, obscuring much of the view. Banks considered taking the lamp himself, but he needed his hands free in case it came to a sudden fight. They took the descent as fast as was practical under the circumstances.

The walls here were still worked stone, but their placement and build showed a more ancient origin even than the pyramid and altar room above. Age had eroded both the walls and the steps at their feet, the rock being cold and worn smooth underfoot. Banks wondered how many long ages that men — and other things — had been traveling up and down these same steps.

It was a steep descent, and a twisting one. Every so often, they’d pass another of the small-slit windows and hear the distant rush of the cascade. But apart from the fall of water, the only other sound was their own feet on the stone and the occasional spit and splutter from the oil lamp. The air got more damp and clammy the farther down they went, and after a time the stone ran wet, and it got slippery underfoot, so that they had to slow to avoid tumbling away into the dark.

“We’re running out of oil,” Buller whispered from behind Hynd.

“It can’t be too much farther now,” Banks said. He’d been counting steps, and trying to gauge distance from what he remembered of the drop from the nighttime climb.

We must be getting close, at least to the level of the canopy.

But still there were no windows accessible enough to give them a view as to their position, and they kept going down, following their own shifting shadows into the dark well below.

Then he smelled it, acrid, hot oil and vinegar. Somewhere below — and not too far below — something heavy moved, a darker shadow in the blackness. Banks knew that if they were caught in an open area by the mass of the snake things he’d seen on the pyramid steps, they’d be either caught again or, more likely, slaughtered within seconds. But having come this far, he was in no mood for retreat.

“Come on then, let’s see what you’ve got, you wanker,” he said and stepped forward with his knife held in front of him.