Subterranean

She nodded. Turning to the rest of the team, she pointed a thumb at Ben. "Let's do it, then. Everyone pick a partner."

Ben stepped immediately toward her. "Howdy, partner."

"Whoa," Ashley said. "Did you happen to notice we have an odd number of people here? As leader, I'll join other pairs as the need arises."

By this time, Linda and Khalid had already matched up, and the two SEALs had their heads bowed together, whispering. The remaining teammates, Michaelson and Ben, stared at each other.

"Shit," the major mumbled.

"Me and my dumb ideas," Ben said with a shake of his head.

Ashley hid a grin as she adjusted her pack. "With that out of the way, let's head on. We've got a lot of ground to cover."

She nodded toward the pair of grumbling men. "Ben and Michaelson will take the point. Let's all pay strict attention to Ben for the next few miles. He's the most experienced in caving, and I want everyone to learn proper spelunking skills and safety precautions. Let's not end up like that other team."

The group shifted backpacks into place and excess hand lanterns were clicked off. The level of light, Ashley noted, did not diminish to any significant degree. She followed Ben and Michaelson. As she walked, she cast her lantern back and forth, the darkness sucking at her light.

Her mind turned to her mission-both missions. She imagined being stranded in this Stygian blackness, watching the last of her batteries drain away while the darkness enveloped her in a cold embrace. She shivered. And what about the cliff builders, those long-lost ancestors of man? How did they survive in this eternal darkness?

She shook herself from this reverie as the team arrived at the next wormhole entrance. She stepped to the front.

Ben had his notebook-sized compass open, a geopositional tool tuned to a radio transmitter at the base that allowed Ben to calibrate not only their precise position in relation to the points of the compass but also the team's depth.

"They call this a map?" Ben said. As guide, he was keeper of the sketchy diagram drawn by the previous searchers. "It's crap. Look." He shoved the paper toward her. "No compass points, no distinct cavern delineations, no depth markers… No wonder the other team got lost!"

"That's why you're here," Ashley said. "You just map our way back home. We're counting on you."

"Well…" he said, stumbling for words, the wind knocked out of his sails. "A child could have done a better job."

"Then that makes you right for the job."

He looked sharply at her, and she gave him her best innocent expression. Seemingly satisfied, he turned away, his compass in hand.

She shook her head. Sometimes he and Jason were frighteningly similar. "If everyone is ready," she said, "let's proceed. I want to be into the new territory by the time we set up camp tonight."

Ashley hesitated.

"Just a little farther," Ben called to her from below.

Sucking at her lower lip, she stared down the steep slope before her. It looked more like a mile. Greased with mud, the cliff was slick as ice. Her eyes snaked upward, following her rope. Michaelson was snugged into a crevice several yards above and secured in place with a safety rope. Above him, at the lip of the cliff, hung Villanueva, clinging to a spur of rock and secured with a safety line. It was these two men's jobs to ensure a safe descent for the other teammates.

Ashley took a deep breath and pushed away from the wall as she had been instructed, allowing the rope to brake in the carabiner bars to stop her descent. She scrabbled downward, the toe of her left boot balancing on a protruding stone. Just a little farther.

The stone that had been supporting her suddenly slipped loose and tumbled downward. She plummeted after it, the rope racing between her gloved hands. Ben had schooled them to yell, "Falling!" when this sort of thing happened, but with her breath caught in a fear-constricted grip, all she could do was let out a high-pitched whine.

After a heartbeat, the whistling rope snagged in her carabiner and her descent jerked to a halt. A grunt of protest echoed from above as Michaelson caught her weight.

"Hey, careful up there," Ben yelled. "You damn near gave me a rock facial."

"Sorry," she said to the muddy wall swinging inches from her nose, both hands clamped on the rope.

"C'mon, relax, kid," Ben said. "Just get those feet back on the wall and finish the descent. You're almost on solid ground."

It was the solidness of that ground that concerned her. She had pictured her head slamming into that solid ground as she was falling, but she wasn't about to remain hanging here. There was only one way out of this predicament. Pulling into a squatting position, she got her boots up on the wall and straightened her legs out, pushing from the wall. With a jump, she rappelled down two yards and caught the wall with her boots. Not hesitating this time, she shot outward again and dropped another couple of yards. After two more hops, she felt Ben's arms around her waist.

"There you go," he said in her ear. "Piece of cake."

She settled her legs on the rocky floor, her knees wobbling a bit. "Yeah, no problem."

"This is good practice. Luckily we came across this bunny slope the first day. I'm sure there's hairier cliffs ahead of us."

She craned her head back. Villanueva was just a blur of light at the edge of the cliff above. She suppressed a groan, leaning on a stalagmite. And this was only day one.

* * *

Ashley rubbed her back, lowering herself slowly onto her air mattress. She could hear Michaelson mumbling into the radio several yards away, giving his final report of the day. The team had discovered signs of the previous party's passage-discarded items, boot tracks in silt, scruffs on rock-and were sticking close to their trail.

She let out a long sigh, stretching. A sharp jab in her lower back protested the motion. Their progress today seemed more like a battle. Slippery mud covered most of the walkways; sharp gypsum crystals clung to her entire body like sand on a beach, and grew more abrasive with each step; steep slopes and sharp inclines impeded their forward movement, slowing them to a crawl.

Worst of all, though, was the heat. An omnipresent wet blanket that grew heavier as the day's journey wore on. She took off her headband and twisted it, wringing out a stream of sweat. She now understood how risky dehydration was in caving. She unscrewed the top of her canteen, almost empty now. Tipping it back, she swallowed the last warm drops.

"You'll have to watch your water," Ben warned. "We can't count on finding a water hole every day." He nodded toward the small lake pooled in the back half of the cavern, half hidden by an outcropping of rock.