Operation: Sahara

-Banks-

Banks heard the distinctive crack of a grenade going off just as darkness was falling across the face of the cliff.

“He’s still alive,” Wilkins shouted.

“Of course he fucking is,” Wiggo said. “You think I’d climb this fucking hill for a dead man?”

The climb had been every bit as perilous and arduous as Banks had feared. They’d been on the narrow trail for two hours now, wending their slow way upward, on hands and knees in places where it got particularly steep. The sound of the blast lifted spirits that had been flagging and gave him a renewed burst of stamina; one of his men was up there, still fighting.

Banks had been in the lead for the whole climb to this point, the others taking their pace from him. When he put on a burst of speed, Wiggo was the first to complain.

“Steady on there, Cap. I’m no’ a fucking goat.”

“That’s no’ what the wifies of Lossiemouth say,” Banks replied, and only got a tired laugh in reply. The sound of the grenade had him wanting to press on, but his body, and his men, could only take so much punishment at a time. He forced himself to take a rest; he called it a smoke break for form’s sake but none of the three of them were fooled. They stood close together on a narrow ledge high above the desert. Off to the east, stars were appearing above the oasis, while the tops of the cliff, still some way above them, were fringed in red from the dying rays of the sun.

“It’s going to be dark the rest of the way,” he said.

“Have you no’ got any good news, Cap?” Wiggo asked.

“It’s not raining. And there’s nae beasties about.”

“Aye, thank fuck for small mercies. Maybe they’ve got better sense than to be climbing a bloody cliff at this time of night.”

While they smoked, Banks was listening for another grenade or gunfire, more evidence that Davies was still fighting, but there was no repeat of the earlier noise and ten minutes later he could stand no more waiting.

He turned back to the cliff and climbed.

The ascent went on for what seemed like forever. Banks was aware that he was getting slower but the lads behind him weren’t complaining so he guessed they were feeling it every bit as much as he was. It was almost a relief to come to what appeared to be an ancient rockfall area, a huge hollow area in the cliff that they’d have to skirt carefully around, but on a level section of track. It was only after they’d traversed a third of the rim of the hollow that Banks saw what filled it and that was only made possible by the light of a rising moon in the east.

He’d heard the stories of vast elephant’s graveyards in Kenya; this must be something similar was his first thought. The hollow area, almost a hundred yards wide and cut deep into the cliff, was full of empty carapaces of dead beetles, some whole, some broken, some still containing parts of limbs and pincers, others oozing sickly ichor that looked jet-black in the moonlight. The whole place stank like a charnel house. Looking up the slope he thought he could see more discarded shell fragments littering the cliff face, all the way down from the tops to the hollow.

“They came over the side from way up there?” Wilkins asked.

“Looks like it, lad,” Banks said. “Came, or were made to come.”

Wiggo pointed at a shell the size of a small bus.

“What could put a thing like yon over a mountain top?”

“A bigger thing like yon,” Banks said grimly. “But let’s hope that’s one wild guess I don’t get right. Come on, lads. These are dead. Davies isn’t.”

They walked quickly around the charnel pit and Banks was almost glad when the trail climbed away from it and a breeze from the east meant that not just the sight, but the smell of the dead things was behind them. A quiet had fallen over the mountain and all he heard was the men’s feet on the rock and his own breathing. Even Wiggo had fallen silent and they climbed that way for another half hour before Banks looked up to see the cliff top was definitely much closer; they were finally approaching their destination. He stopped the squad for another smoke break.

“Right, lads. We’re nearly there. We don’t ken what to expect once we get over the top, but Davies is up there somewhere, probably waiting for us, maybe in trouble. We find him, and we leg it out of here.”

“Now there’s a plan I can get behind,” Wiggo said. “And what about yon dead researchers?”

“As you say, they’re dead. It’s not as if we can take them with us. Their final rest lies in the hands of the diplomats but if you ask me, they’ll just quietly get forgotten. We were never here, nobody ever saw us, this place doesn’t exist.”

“Same as it ever was,” Wiggo said and flicked the glowing butt of his cigarette away over the cliff into the night as Banks turned for the final stage of the climb.

They came to the top with the rising moon at their back. He hadn’t known what to expect, but the sight surprised him nevertheless. They stood on a high ledge, looking west across what looked to be the vast crater of a long dead volcano. There was enough moonlight to see that the caldera had formed an oasis of foliage and glistening pools of water that danced in the moonlight. There were other shadows too, too dark to penetrate, but they looked to be natural rather than man-made. This spot was the very highest reach of the city.

Banks turned to look eastward. They stood thirty feet above a high wall that ran across to the other side of the valley. The wall was twenty feet thick and topped with a wide causeway that was cast deep in shadow. Turrets loomed even higher at regular intervals along the top, the highest points of each level with Banks’ eye line as he stood up on the ledge; they too would have a view in daylight over the massive crater beyond. He searched in vain for any glimmer of light at the dark windows. If Davies was in one of the turrets, he was keeping his head down.

“Right, lads. I have no intention of blundering around the city in the dark; that’s just asking for trouble we don’t need. But I told Davies to get high, and yonder turrets are the highest things here. I’d like to check them out. If he’s not there, we wait for him; if he is there, we secure a location and wait out the night. Either way, we get a rest.”

“That sounds like another fine plan to me, Cap,” Wiggo said. “What’s first?”

Banks risked using the night light on his gun to strafe the immediate area and found what he was looking for; another track, or rather, a flight of stairs, leading down from their position to the high concourse.

“Well, at least it’s not upward,” Wiggo said, and took the lead on the stairs.

They descended into darkness with only moonlight and stars to show the way but Banks was loath to switch on their gun lights.

“No sense in giving away our position unnecessarily,” he said quietly. “Easy does it, lads.”

As they approached the causeway, he saw that he’d been right to be so circumspect; the flat area between where they stood and the doorway to the first turret was full of domed, dark shadows, none of them moving. Scores of the beetles, all with their legs and heads tucked in, like limpets on seaside rocks. Wiggo stopped at the foot of the stairs. The nearest beast was only ten paces away, a large one some ten feet in length, its dome six feet tall.

“What now, Cap?” Wiggo whispered.

“The plan’s still the same,” Banks replied. “We need to check out these turrets. We know they are triggered by sound. Let’s make sure we don’t make any.”

He squeezed past Wiggo and took the lead again. They had good reason to be thankful for the moonlight; on a cloudy night they would have been forced into using their lights but as it was each of the black domes was clearly delineated against the lighter stone of the causeway. He went to the right of the first large beast and looked ahead, trying to see the easiest path they could take through the creatures. Wiggo and Wilkins came up behind him in single file, walking in his footsteps.

They inched forward, painfully slowly, carefully placing their feet on solid ground before attempting the next step. An acrid odor hung in the air and tickled Banks’ throat, threatening a cough that he had to stifle but even then the resultant chuff in his throat sounded far too loud in the deathly silence on the causeway. He stopped mid-step but none of the creatures stirred. They skirted another huge beast, so tall in the dome that Banks couldn’t see round it. Once clear of it he finally had a clear view of the turret doorway. The beasts were packed so tight around it there didn’t appear to be any way through them.

It became a moot point seconds later. Two gunshots cracked from the turret high above. The moment’s relief of the discovery that Davies was still alive was quickly forgotten as all around them the beasts stirred. Talons scraped on stone, domes rose off the ground, and heads emerged to investigate this latest noise. The high droning wail rose up all around the three men who were now trapped in the midst of the waking horde.

“Move!” Banks shouted. “Let’s plough the road.”