The Devil Colony (Sigma Force 7)

“Unit’s evacuated the area,” Ryan said, glancing back to the open-air Jeep parked nearby. “We’ve pulled back to a base two miles down the mountain. Is that far enough?”

“Should be,” Chin said, distracted. “Come look at this.”

The geologist knelt beside a video monitor. It displayed footage from a remote camera left beside the pit. Chin pointed to a hellish glow radiating from the center of the old blast site, illuminating a dark column of ashy smoke rising into the air.

“The geyser hasn’t blown in over forty minutes,” the geologist said. “I think all the water from the hot spring got boiled away.”

“So what’s coming out now?”

“An outgassing. Hydrogen, carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide. Whatever process is going on here, it must have drilled beyond the spring and into the volcanic strata underpinning these mountains.”

As Ryan stared, a flash of fire shot through the dark column, then vanished. “What was that?”

Chin sat back, his face going pale.

“Doc?” Ryan pressed.

“I think . . . maybe a lava bomb . . .”

“What?” His voice rose to a girlish pitch. “Lava? Are you telling me that thing’s starting to erupt?”

As they watched, another two flashes streaked out of the column and struck the floor of the pit. A molten gobbet of rock rolled across the surface, leaving no doubt as to what was happening.

“Time to bug out of here,” Chin said, standing up. He ignored the equipment and began rapidly packing all the flash drives that held his data.

Ryan got in his face. After what had happened to Private Bellamy, he had questioned the geologist about this exact scenario. “I thought you said this wouldn’t happen. That even drilling into a volcano wouldn’t make it blow.”

“I said that usually doesn’t happen.” He spoke in a rush as he worked. “Occasionally deep-earth drilling has caused explosions when a borehole hits a superhot magma chamber, vaporizing drilling fluid and allowing lava to flow. Or take, for example, a case three years ago. In Indonesia, a drilling mishap gave birth to a massive mud volcano that continues to erupt today. So, no, it ordinarily doesn’t happen—but there’s nothing ordinary about what’s going on here.”

Ryan took a deep breath, remembering Bellamy’s leg. The geologist was right. What was going on here was off the map and into the weeds. He needed to get his team evacuated even farther back.

He lifted his radio but only got a squelch of static. He spun in a circle, got a brief snatch of words, then lifted the radio to his lips. “This is Major Ryan! Pull back! Pull back now! Get the hell off this mountain!”

A garbled response came through, but he didn’t know if it was acknowledgment or confusion. Did they hear me?

Chin straightened, snapping closed his metal briefcase. “Major, we must get clear of here. Now!”

Punctuating his words, the ground gave a violent shake. Ryan lost his footing and fell to one knee. They both turned to the video feed. On the chasm floor, the remote camera had been knocked over on its side, but the view remained on the pit.

The geyser had returned—but rather than steam and water, a jetting column of boiling mud and fiery rock now bubbled and splashed from the hole, heavily obscured by a churning cloud of smoke and ash.

Underfoot, the ground continued to shake, nonstop now, vibrating through the soles of Ryan’s boots.

“Move out!” Chin yelled.

Together, they fled to the Jeep. Ryan leaped behind the wheel. Chin crashed into the passenger seat. With the keys already in the ignition, Ryan roared the engine to life, tugged the stick into reverse, and pounded the accelerator. With a yank on the wheel, he spun the truck around, throwing Chin against his door.

“You okay?” Ryan asked.

“Go!”

Earlier in the evening, his team had cleared a rough, winding road down the mountainside, but it still required a rugged four-wheel drive to traverse it, and it was best traveled at a snail’s pace.

That wasn’t the case now.

Ryan didn’t slow, especially as the world exploded behind him. A glance at the rearview mirror revealed a brilliant fountain of lava dancing back there, shooting above the rim of the chasm. A glowing black column rose high into the sky, but the valley was not large enough to hold it. The fiery cloud spilled over the edge and rolled like an avalanche toward them.

That wasn’t the only danger.

Red-hot boulders the size of small cars struck the forest and slopes around them, bouncing away, setting fire to trees and shrubs. They hit with the force of mortar rounds. Ryan now understood why they were called lava bombs.

One sailed past overhead, raining flaming ash. Cinders burned his cheeks, his exposed arms, reminding Ryan all too well that his vehicle had no roof.

He ignored the pain and focused on the road ahead. The Jeep bucked and rocked down the steep, rocky trail. His left fender crumpled against an outcropping, shattering the headlamp on that side. The Jeep lifted. For a moment he swore he was driving on a single wheel, like a half-ton ballerina. Then the vehicle crashed back down.

“Hold on!”

“What do you think I’m doing?” Chin had turned around backward, one arm hugging his headrest. “The pyroclastic flow is moving too fast down the mountain. We’ll never make it!”

“I can’t get any more speed. Not in this terrain!”

“Then turn around.”

“What?” He risked taking his eyes off the road to glare at Chin. “Are you nuts?”

Chin pointed along a streambed that bisected their path. “Go that way. Upstream!”

Ryan again heard the raw command in the guy’s voice, confirming his suspicion that the geologist had spent some years in uniform. He responded to that authority.

“Fuck you!” Ryan shouted, furious at the lack of options—still he hauled on the wheel.

Defying every instinct for survival, he made a right turn into the streambed and gunned the engine. He sped uphill, casting a rooster tail of water behind his rear tires.

“I really mean it, Chin. Fuck you! What the hell are we doing?”

The geologist pointed to the right, upslope, toward the peak’s summit, where it overlooked the fiery chasm. “We have to skirt the cloud’s edge and get higher. Pyroclastic flows are fluidized clouds of rock fragments, lava, and gas. Much heavier than air. They’ll hug the mountainside and flow down.”

Despite his pounding heart, Ryan understood. “We have to get above it.”