“What’s your name?”

“Pierce, sir,” said one of the men.

“How many more of you are down here?” I demanded.

“Twelve per floor, sir,” he replied. “Two man security teams.”

“And how many floors?”

“Four lab floors, the domestic floor, and then some areas we’re not permitted to go.”

The facility shook a little as some errant missiles exploded outside. “How secure are we from the defences in here?”

“Totally, sir. It’s designed to withstand direct bombardment.”

I wasn’t entirely sure how it would fare against some bunker-busters, but my concern shifted to the reptilian. Or whatever the things outside passed for. “What about the dinos?”

“Same, sir. It was built with an accidental release in mind.”

“Ok, good. You have radios?” I asked, nodding at the set hanging from his vest. “Tell everyone to get up here now. If I see any weapons, I’ll put you outside with the rest of the soldiers.”

“But they’re…” he stammered.

I rolled my eyes. “That’s kind of the point. Hurry it up!”

Sun had Fen sidle up to the men and sit down. Mouth lolling happily, he grinned, showing the rows of fangs. Not that the display was needed. Pierce relayed my order and edged away from the warg.

I waited for the other callsigns to agree and continued. “Talk me through the installation. I want to know everything about what’s done where.”

“The ground floor is all the electronics work. The wiring systems for the dinosaur’s control units. Floor two is cybernetics, where they do their experiments on the creatures. That’s how they made those things,” he spat the word, pointing at the wall, and the unseen dinosaurs beyond. “Floor three is genetics, and the fourth is where they work on the biological and chemical stuff. The pheromones and other concoctions. Highly restricted for obvious reasons.”

“You seem to know an awful lot for a guard,” I said.

He shrugged apologetically. “People talk, sir. And we’re well briefed on what we’re protecting.”

I walked over and snatched the keycard. “Will this get me into all the floors?”

He flinched back, eliciting a warning growl from Fen. “All the labs and sleeping areas, yes, sir. But you can’t get any deeper. None of us can.”

“Deeper? What are you talking about?” I asked, though I had my suspicions.

“Lake’s quarters. No one has ever seen them. One way in, one way out.”

That answered the question of where Lake was hiding. “Is it protected? Guns and stuff?”

“No, sir. Just an elevator that only he can control. I think he has a chip in his hand that he uses.”

“Fine. How many scientists do you have here under your care?” I sneered the last word.

“Four hundred and seven, sir,” answered Pierce, watching Fen cautiously. Our pup had picked up on my anger and was reacting in kind.

Cody had slowly approached us, the question trapped in his throat. I asked for him. “Where’s Dr Fisk?”

“Which one?” asked Pierce.

I was taken aback at his answer. “Huh? What do you mean?”

“Janice or Liza, sir? They’re on different floors.”

Cody reeled as the true implications of the guards words hit home. “Mom?”

I reached out and helped to steady him. “Which floors?”

“Janice is head of the cybernetic research team, she’s on two. Liza is on the third, working with the geneticists,” explained Pierce.

We’d not only completed the quest for finding Liza, but also the unsolved kidnapping of Cody’s mother from years before. Her snatching was such an obvious play that I can’t believe I’d not seen it when he explained it to us. I blamed the absolute bedlam of our situation.

“And the aliens didn’t give us any indicator that she was involved or important,” added Cris, picking up on my self-reproach.

“Is there anywhere we can gather them all together? And somewhere a little more private for my friend and his family to chat?”

“I can order the rest of the security detail to return to post and bring everyone down into the domestic area if you’d like, sir? There’s ample space and no experiments taking place, so no risk of a spill and people growing an extra arm,” he said, trying to be funny.

“Leave the stand-up to me, eh?” I replied, wiping the weak grin from his face. “Do it.”

Pierce hesitated, causing Fen to stand up and growl.

“What?”

He gingerly pointed at my hand. “I need my access card to get the people together.”

I tossed it over to him and he fumbled the catch. Fen did what all dogs do and went to sniff the item, causing the soldier to recoil. He let the warg do his thing and gave the order to the other guards to gather the scientists together on the domestic level. When Fen had grown bored of the card, he peed on it and moved back to our side.

Pierce picked it up by his fingertips and grimaced, shaking off as much moisture as he could. “Follow me, sir. I’ll call the elevator and get you down to the fifth. Then we can collect everyone else and bring them down too.”

We followed the guards down the passage. I was expecting to see movie-style labs, with floor to ceiling glass and white smocked scientists staring into liquid filled beakers. What I got was more bare walls and the occasional security-sealed door. A bank of elevator doors waited round the next corner. Two were standard versions, with twin sliding doors and a glowing number above. The third was smaller, with only a single panel and no numbers.

“Is that what I think it is?” I asked as Pierce called our ride.

“Lake’s personal elevator, sir. We don’t have access.”

“Try your card,” I ordered, and he complied with a sour pinch of his face. I’d known him for five minutes and he was upset I didn’t trust him? I never did understand some people too well.

The reader didn’t even register an attempt had been made. I grunted. That was a later problem. We still had our little box of tricks.

Our elevator pinged and the doors rolled open.

None of us moved.

“Sir?” asked Pierce, confused at our hesitation.

I looked at the empty space then turned to the guard. “Are there stairs?”

“I’m afraid not.”

“Shall we have the meeting up here instead?” suggested Cris.

“I think that might be safer,” I replied.

“Safer, sir?”

“We’re not stupid. We step inside, you press the button to take us down, the doors close and that fucknugget Lake drops us into a pit of spiked snakes.”

Pierce frowned. “Spiked snakes?”

“Snakes with spikes on them. Am I talking a different language here?”

“Gibberish,” said Sun.

“Someone’s going to have their coffee privileges taken away,” I fired back.

“Someone’s going to get pushed into the box and dropped into the snake pit,” she replied.

“With spikes,” added Cris, unhelpfully.

“I’m stealing your axe,” I muttered, taking Sun’s warcleaver from her pack. I moved to the edge of the cab and started to hack upwards through the roof. The enchanted blade severed cables and cut through the thin panelling with ease.

“What’s he doing?” asked Ramell as bulbs shattered and the gouges grew larger.

Cris gaped at me. “I have no idea.”

I kept going, little by little until I’d cut a square opening and exposed the cables. There was an access hatch at the back, but I didn’t trust setting one foot inside the cab. “Cody, you got any of your special bullets left? I don’t want to be inside when it drops.”

“Drops?” he asked.

I pulled him over and pointed. “Shoot them for me. And stay out of the doorway when you do.”

He looked at me as if I’d lost my marbles, then took a knee and sighted the target. We all covered our ears as he begun to fire. Eight rounds saw the final cable snap, whipping back up the shaft as the counterweight fell.

The cab dropped like a stone.

For a single floor, before it ground to a sudden halt.

“They have emergency brakes in case this happens,” explained Cris.

“I know that!” I replied, cautiously leaning out into the opening. The motor was about fifteen feet above our heads, but it was what lay to my left I was interested in. “There! A maintenance ladder. There’s no way he can have that boobytrapped, surely?”

Cris peeked past me. “I’m not so sure, and stop calling me Shirley.”

“Leslie Nielsen,” I gushed. “Nice!”

Pierce coughed to get my attention. “Sir, you do realise it’s going to take twice as long to bring everyone down now?”

I was going to hit him with a sarcastic reply, but I was tired. “It’s taken us a long while to get here. Another half hour won’t make much difference. Is there food and drink below?”

“Anything you could want, sir.”

“Good,” I replied, handing Sun her cleaver back. “We’ll try the same trick on Lake’s elevator once we’ve spoken to the scientists.”

I leaned around the opening, grasped the first rung, and swung my way out onto the ladder. Peering down the shaft, I whooped and high-fived the wall. “I fucking knew it!”

Cris appeared at the doorway. “What?”

“Come and look,” I said, offering her my hand.

She swung out and I gently placed her onto the rungs below me. She saw what I’d spied and sucked air through her teeth. “Ouch.” The base of the shafts were lined with spikes like something out of a Bond movie. “I’ll never question your strange destructive impulses again.”

“That’s comforting. I think we can assume that little prick has a few other tricks up his sleeve too,” I said, climbing down past Cris. “Oh! Pierce!”

His head poked around the wall. “Yes, sir?”

“I want Liza and Janice coming down this way too. Crank the doors and help them to climb down. I wouldn’t put it past Lake to drop them out of spite.”

He pointed at the seized elevator. “But can we be sure he won’t do something to the brakes and drop the cab as soon as they start climbing out, sir? The few seconds it takes to reach for the ladder could be enough.”

I looked around for cameras, then realised it wasn’t even worth taking the chance. “Good point. I might let you live yet, Pierce.”

He didn’t know if I was serious and hastily retreated. “Cris, can you climb back up a bit, please?”

She quickly scurried up the ladder and I moved past the damaged cab. It was purely for safety as I started to load chunks of stone inside. At first, nothing happened. The weight limit on the safety devices were sizeable.

“More?”

I dumped a few more lumps, and the brakes started to groan and creak.

“Just a little more,” I said, adding another pile.

The devices broke away, plunging the remains of our narrowly avoided coffin into the trap below. A cloud of dust washed up over us from the impact, triggering a simultaneous coughing and sneezing fit. I blinked away the grainy powder and started down.

“You know we could probably just blast through that wall and reach Lake’s elevator shaft,” said Cris as we descended.

“If he had these rigged, I’m one hundred percent sure he’ll have his own one rigged too. There’s bound to be another way down. Unless he’s learned how to not breathe, he’ll need ventilation. Power. Water. There’s bound to be ducting, or tunnels like Marnmouth.”

“Which he’ll also have rigged.”

“Probably, but it might give us a couple of options in how we’d rather die.”

“That’s comforting.”

We reached the domestic level without being crushed or gassed to death. Leaning across, I cranked the emergency release lever on the doors and pulled them open. The mangled cab was a few feet below the opening, so I stacked a few of the cathedral timbers on the damaged roof until it formed a passable bridge. I went first, testing the way. My construction skills held firm, and I stepped out into the scientist’s home. Or would prison have been a better term? The luxurious appointments couldn’t conceal the lack of windows and familiar feeling of crushing isolation afforded by the depth of their floor.

Sun marched past me. “Where’s the coffee?”