ds and knees he started into the narrow
passage.

* * *

The tunnel curved left, then right, dipped, then angled up. Brett
crawled steadily, the smooth stiff clay yielding and cold against his
hands and sodden knees. Another smaller tunnel joined from the left.
Another angled in from above. The tunnel widened to three feet, then
four. Brett got to his feet, walked in a crouch. Here and there, barely
visible in the near-darkness, objects lay imbedded in the mud: a
silver-plated spoon, its handle bent; the rusted engine of an electric
train; a portable radio, green with corrosion from burst batteries.

At a distance, Brett estimated, of a hundred yards from the pit, the
tunnel opened into a vast cave, green-lit from tiny discs of frosted
glass set in the ceiling far above. A row of discolored concrete piles,
the foundations of the building above, protruded against the near wall,
their surfaces nibbled and pitted. Between Brett and the concrete
columns the floor was littered with pale sticks and stones, gleaming
dully in the gloom.

Brett started across the floor. One of the sticks snapped underfoot. He
kicked a melon-sized stone. It rolled lightly, came to rest with hollow
eyes staring toward him. A human skull.

* * * * *

The floor of the cave covered an area the size of a city block. It was
blanketed with human bones, with here and there a small cat skeleton or
the fanged snout-bones of a dog. There was a constant rustling of rats
that played among the rib cages, sat atop crania, scuttled behind
shin-bones. Brett picked his way, stepping over imitation pearl
necklaces, zircon rings, plastic buttons, hearing aids, lipsticks,
compacts, corset stays, prosthetic devices, rubber heels, wrist watches,
lapel watches, pocket watches with corroded brass chains.

Ahead Brett saw a patch of color: a blur of pale yellow. He hurried,
stumbling over bone heaps, crunching eyeglasses underfoot. He reached
the still figure where it lay slackly, face down. Gingerly he squatted,
turned it on its back. It was Dhuva.

Brett slapped the cold wrists, rubbed the clammy hands. Dhuva stirred,
moaned weakly. Brett pulled him to a sitting position. "Wake up!" he
whispered. "Wake up!"

Dhuva's eyelids fluttered. He blinked dully at Brett.

"The Gels may turn up any minute," Brett hissed. "We have to get away
from here. Can you walk?"

"I saw it," said Dhuva faintly. "But it moved so f