one wall, squeezed along
a narrow hallway and exited into an open space. They
packed up close, running and stumbling.

Drummer slowed next to a wall of composite blocks.
Several were missing, leaving a space through
which they squirmed. It was tighter than they had
experienced. In near darkness, they had reached
a dead end.

Ahead was loose rubble forming a heap about two
meters high. Drummer clawed his way around the
side. He motioned the others forward and slipped
out of sight.

Following one behind the other, they saw an opening
in the surface. Responding to Drummer's beckoning,
they dropped into its darkness. The fall was less
than a couple of meters. A light glowed from a wall
to just enough to illuminate Drummer.

They were in a small, roughly rounded chamber.
The walls were fused rubble, irregular and jagged.
The floor was a mixture of Plutonian detritus.

Drummer knelt beside a rock that protruded from
the wall. He twisted the rock, pulled, and pushed
it sideways. Reaching into the vacated space, he
placed his palm on a flat, smooth disk.

A low hum from the wall. A fissure formed where
the wall met the trash-laden floor. The breach
lengthened and curved, its ends meeting the wall.
The section dropped away into darkness.

"Move, move," Drummer snarled his impatience.
"Scarf has this entire sector blocked out by now.
He'll throw his gangs into the alleys and cover
every square meter. These subsurface crawl spaces
and links are our only way. Feel for the ladder."

He lowered himself through the opening and vanished.

Brad was committed. His glance ordered the others
to follow Drummer. Hodak passed his light to Brad
and dropped through first, then Zolan followed
Myra, Adari and Kumiko. Brad dropped through
and pushed the cover up until it snapped. Closed.
He felt vibrations above him, then, after several
seconds, silence.

"Must be spreading the dust of our tracks and the
outline of the cover," Zolan murmured, looking up
from immediately below.

The ladder was rickety, and the shaft narrow and
long. When Brad reached bottom, he was in a low
gallery, about two meters square, hacked out of the
rock. They were in the hub of a dozen passageways
that led off in as many directions from low entries.

Drummer bent and disappeared through one of
the entries. One after the other, they followed.

The entry led into a utility service tunnel, the
walls lined with scores of braided cables and banks
o