Read Online Exodus Code by John Barrowman, Carole E. Barrowman - Free Book Online

at him.
    Jack locked his fingers together into a double fist and swung at the monster’s head. The rock crumbled in front of him, sending pieces of smouldering rock and ash into the abyss below.
    Jack felt as if his skul was cracking. He stared at his hands, wil ing them to move again. He ripped the rest of the silver vines from his head, his chest, his arms, and his legs. The mountain screamed, the rock rumbled, a thunderous roar burst from the rings of fire, sending a flaming serpentine fissure up from below. The fissure shot along the lip, chasing Jack across the ledge. The chamber shook. Jack skidded, scrambling for a foothold. Hot bubbling lava began rising from the rings beneath him.
    ‘ Fall! ’
    ‘No!’
    The keening shriek whistled angrily from every crevice. ‘ This is how it must be .’
14
    JACK’S EYES FLEW open.
    ‘Jesus, amigo,’ said Renso, tossing a bloodied rock down into the dark abyss of the mountain. ‘How the hel did you get al the way down here?’
    Jack stared blankly at Renso. He felt as if he’d been in a bar brawl and he had not won. Every muscle ached, his head hurt and he smel ed of sex. A heavy gold blanket was draped across his waist. He kicked it away and stared, stunned, at a beautiful dark-skinned young woman curled next to him.
    Jack shook her. She was unconscious, a cut on her forehead bleeding onto Jack’s tunic.
    Confused, Jack looked up at Renso. ‘Where am I?’
    ‘You’re on some kind of altar,’ said Renso, helping Jack sit up. ‘Like a grotto that’s been carved into the inside of the mountain. There are three of them al round the perimeter down here. I think that’s what we were seeing from the Hornet jutting out from the inside the mountain’s basin.’
    ‘The what?’
    ‘My plane, which, by the way, is nothing but melted rubber and tinder now.
    You owe me so badly, amigo.’
    Jack wobbled to his knees. He felt Renso shaking him. Panic and bewilderment crashed Jack’s psyche. Renso wasn’t touching him.
    The ground was shaking.
    He was shaking.
    ‘Easy does it, my friend.’ With two good hands, Renso grabbed Jack’s arm.
    ‘It’s a long way down.’
    ‘When am I?’
    ‘What?’ asked Renso, not understanding Jack’s question.
    ‘Time?’ stuttered Jack. ‘When is this?’
    ‘Wel after midnight of the day we went flying, if that’s what you mean. I’ve been searching for you for hours.’ Renso handed Jack a canteen. Jack gulped and gulped until water was dripping down his chin.
    ‘My chute caught in the trees so I was out for a while too. But, Jesus, how on earth did you get down here?’
    Renso peered inside the grotto. The wal s were covered in rows of colourful glyphs and drawings. Renso waved his flashlight over one of them. It was a detailed drawing of a man riding across the stars on the back of what Renso thought looked like a mountain lion, a puma to be precise. Renso tilted the light up to a series of interlocking pointed circles carved across the grotto’s arch.
    ‘What is this place?’
    ‘Renso? Is that you?’ Jack grinned, as he final y grasped who was with him.
    ‘Renso, I’m so glad to see you. I thought you went down with your plane.’ Jack lifted his hand, caressing his friend’s rough beard.
    ‘I’m happy to see you too, Jack, and I did go down with my plane, only not al the way to the ground, thank God.’ Jack handed him back the canteen. ‘But we need to move, Jack. We’ve not got much time.’
    ‘Time for what?’ Jack stood up, instantly feeling dazed, confused and nauseated again. What the hel was he wearing? He held up the sleeves of an embroidered tunic, the wool itching his skin. His legs were covered in scratches, long sharp claw-like scratches, blood was dripping from a cut on his arm, and al the way from his ankles to his groin his skin was covered in thin red lines, like rope burns.
    Renso helped Jack to his feet, guiding him along a ledge towards the shortest section of the rock that he had climbed