_[21]_
Captain Davidson Greer sat in a chair before an array of TV screens, hisgray-green eyes watchful. In the center of one of the screens, theNipe's image sat immobile, surrounded by the paraphernalia in his hiddennest. Other screens showed various sections of the long tunnel that ledsouth from the opening in the northern end of the island. At thecaptain's fingertips was a bank of controls that would allow him toswitch from one pickup to another if necessary, so that he could seeanything anywhere in the tunnels. He hoped that wouldn't be necessary.He did not want any of the action to take place anywhere but in theplaces where it was expected--but he was prepared for alterations in theplan. In other rooms, nearly a hundred other men were linked into thespecial controls that allowed them to operate the little rat spies thatscuttled through the underground darkness, and the captain's systemwould allow him to see through the eyes of any one of those rats at aninstant's notice.
The screen which he was watching at the moment, however, was notconnected with an underground pickup. It was linked with a pickup in thebottom of a basketball-sized sphere driven by a small inertial enginethat held the sphere hovering in the air above the game sanctuary on thenorthern tip of Manhattan Island. In the screen, he had an aerial viewof the grassy, rocky mounds where the earth hid the shattered andpartially melted ruins of long-collapsed buildings. In the center of thescreen was a bird's-eye view of a man holding a rifle. He was walkingslowly, picking his way carefully along the bottom of the shallow gullythat had once been upper Broadway.
"Barbell," the captain said. A throat microphone picked up the words andtransmitted them to the ears of the man in the screen. "Barbell, this isBarhop. There are no wild animals within sight, but remember, we can'tsee everything from up here, so keep your eyes open."
"Right, Barhop," said a rather muffled voice in the captain's ear.
"Fine. And if you do meet up with anything, shoot to kill." There wereplenty of wild animals in the game sanctuary--some of them dangerous.Not all of the inhabitants of the Bronx Zoological Gardens had beenkilled on that day when the sun bomb fell. Being farther north, they hadhad better protection, and some of them, later, had wandered southwardto the island. Captain Greer knew perfectly well that Stanton,bare-handed, was more than a match for a leopard or a lion, but hedidn't want Stanton to tire himself fighting with an animal. The riflewould most likely never be used; it was merely another precaution.
It would have been possible, and perhaps simpler, to have taken Stantonto the opening by flyer, but that would have created othercomplications. Traffic rules forbade flyers to go over the gamesanctuary at any altitude less than one thousand feet. One flyer, goingin low, would have attracted the attention of the traffic police, andStanley Martin wanted no attention whatever drawn to this area. Even theprocedure of instructing the traffic officers to ignore one flyer wouldhave attracted more attention than he wanted. They would have rememberedthose instructions afterward.
Stanton walked.
Captain Greer's eye caught something at the edge of the screen. It movedtoward the center as the floating eye moved with Stanton.
"Barbell," the captain said, "there's a deer ahead of you. Just keepmoving."
Stanton rounded the corner of a pile of masonry. He could see the animalnow himself. The deer stared at the intruder for a few seconds, thenbounded away with long, graceful leaps.
"Magnificent animal." It was Stanton's voice, very low. The remarkwasn't directed toward anyone in particular. Captain Greer didn'tanswer.
The captain lit a cigarette and leaned back in his chair, his eyes onthe screens. The Nipe still sat, unmoving. He was apparently in one ofhis "sleep" states. The captain wasn't sure that that was the blessingthat it might have seemed. He had no way of knowing how much externaldisturbance it would take to "wake" the Nipe, and as long as he wassitting quietly, the chances were greater that he would hear movement inthe tunnel. If he were active, his senses might be more alert, but hewould also be distracted by his own actions and the noises he madehimself.
It didn't matter, the captain decided. One way was as good as another inthis case. The point was to get Stanton into an advantageous positionbefore the Nipe knew he was anywhere around.
He looked back at the image of Stanton, a black-clad figure in aflexible, tough, skin-tight suit. The Nipe would have a hard time bitingthrough that artificial hide, but it gave Stanton as much freedom as ifhe'd been naked.
Stanton knew where he was going. He had studied maps of the area, andhad been taken on a vicarious tour of the route by means of the veryflying eye that was watching him now. But things look different from theground than from the air, and no amount of map study will familiarize aperson with terrain as completely as an actual personal survey.
Stanton paused, and Captain Greer heard his voice. "Barhop, this isBarbell. Those are the cliffs up ahead, aren't they?"
"That's right, Barbell. You go up that slope to your left. The openingis in that pile of rock at the base of the cliff."
"They're higher than I'd thought," Stanton commented. Then he startedwalking again.
The tunnel entrance he was heading for had once been a wide opening,drilled laterally into the side of the cliff, and big enough to alloweasy access to the tunnels, so that the passengers of those oldunderground trains could get to the platforms where they stopped. Butthe sun bomb had changed all that. The concussion had shaken loose rockat the top of the cliff and a minor avalanche had obliterated allindications of the tunnel's existence, except for one small, narrowopening near the top of what had once been a wide hole in the face ofthe cliff.
Stanton walked slowly toward the spot until he was finally at the baseof the slope of rock created by that long-ago avalanche. "Up there?" heasked.
"That's right," said Captain Greer.
"I think I'll leave the rifle here, Barhop," Stanton said. "No point incarrying it up the slope."
"Right. Put it in those bushes to your left. They'll conceal it, won'tthey?"
"I think so. Yeah." Stanton hid the rifle and then began making his wayup the talus slope.
Captain Greer flipped a switch. "Team One! He's coming in. Are thosealarms deactivated?"
"All okay, Barhop," said a voice. "This is Leader One. I'll meet him atthe hole."
"Right." Captain Greer reversed the switch again. "Are you ready,Barbell?"
Stanton looked into the dark hole. It was hardly big enough to crawlthrough, and ended in a seeming infinity of blackness. He took thespecial goggles from the case at his belt and put them on. Inside thehole, he saw a single rat, staring at him with beady eyes.
"I'm ready to go in, Barhop," Stanton said.
He got down on his hands and knees and began to crawl through the narrowtunnel. Ahead of him, the rat turned and began to lead the way.