David Golemon - Legend

"That's it, Jack, they're all down! The bad guys are down!" Sarah called out as she held one arm in the air.

Slowly the two men stepped from the shallows of the grotto. They had entered from the lagoon side right into the melee of the animal attack. They had watched the violence explode above them as the beast swiped and moved like greased lightning. They couldn't tell who was being attacked or who was inside the large chamber they had surfaced into. After the beast disappeared, they quickly assessed the situation and Jack communicated with hand gestures what the plan would be. The former Special Forces operative and ex-navy SEAL had understood exactly how to proceed. Now they stepped onto the hot floor and surveyed the devastation around them.

"Goddamn, Toad, it took you assholes long enough!" Jenks said, grimacing in anguish as Virginia again tried to straighten out the mangled broken right leg.

"Chief, we thought that fish man may have got you," Carl said as he examined the first mercenary Sarah had wrestled with. The man was surely dead.

The lieutenant commander stood as Jack and Sarah came back to the group. Carl safed his XM-8 and placed it on a snap hook on his weight belt. He unzipped the top half of his black wetsuit because of the extreme heat.

"I see you found some of the kids that we saw on the milk cartons, Chief," he said as he took in the haggard group before him.

"Jack, Helen's with them; she's in there." Sarah pointed.

Jack slowly removed his wetsuit hood, then went toward the small cave and bent down. He shined his light on the lone person inside. Helen Zachary moved, rolling her head toward him.

"Professor Zachary, I'm Major Jack Collins. Niles sends his regards and wants you to come home now," he said as he stepped into the enclosure. He kneeled down and took her hand. Jack immediately recognized the nature of the sickness afflicting Helen.

She attempted to smile but failed through her obvious pain. "Give Niles… my apologies, I… don't think I'll be able to… promise anything," she murmured and Jack squeezed her hand.

"I'll tell him that you did what you set out to do, Professor. You proved your theory about a species unknown to us."

This time she managed to smile, as Virginia entered the cave. The heat inside because of the lava vent made it almost unbearable, but still Helen shivered with cold.

"Don't harm the creatures…they are the last of their… kind, there are… no more… mysteries left… let them be."

Virginia quickly reached down and touched Helen's head. The sad, trembling smile remained as the professor felt her touch.

"Tell… Niles…I love him…and…I'm—"

Helen stopped breathing and lay still. The smile had left her face as her last thought had been to try to apologize to Niles Compton.

"She's gone," Virginia said as she released Helen's wrist. She took a deep breath and swiped angrily at a tear as it slid down her face.

Jack took Virginia's hand and held it for a brief moment.

"How many of these animals are we dealing with, Virginia? Carl and I think there was one in the lagoon; it couldn't have been two places at once."

"I don't know, maybe just two."

"There are two of them?" Jack said, releasing her hand.

"Helen believed one is wild, but the other one saved us and attacked those assholes. The professor discovered its ancestors had worked the mine as slaves; the Inca may have bred insanity along the way to increase the beasts' cruelty," Robby said as he and Kelly entered the enclosure. His eyes welled up when he saw that Helen was dead.

"Hang in there, kid, this isn't over yet," Jack said as he drew his nine-millimeter from inside his wetsuit and tossed it to Robby, who caught it and looked inquiringly at the major.

Carl withdrew his own handgun and gave it to Sarah. "Collect a couple of those Ingrams and a few magazines; those guys won't need them."

Jack stood and made his way out of the ancient slave quarters. He was followed by Robby and the others. The major looked at the face of each student; these kids had been through so much. His eyes locked on Kelly; clearly she was all right. He took a deep breath, relieved that was one major concern out of the way.

"The professor would want you to be tougher for just a little while longer," he said as he watched Sarah gather weapons from the dead men around them. "She died happy, so you remember what she did here in this place. Tell others about what she found, and make them believe with the same zeal and commitment she had. Make her proud. Now, before we attempt to get out of here, we need to know what's happening, I and Lieutenant Commander Everett here don't take kindly to surprises."

Robby fought back tears as he left the small cave. "This place, it's bad; no one can ever find this mine."

Jack's eyes went from Robby to Virginia, who moved to the master chief's side.

"This place is contaminated, Jack. Its walls are shot through with uranium that has been naturally enriched, tons and tons of it. It's very close to weapons grade," Virginia said as she gestured around her at the gleaming walls filled with tritium. "It's as if it came from a breeder reactor — impossible, I know, but Jack, it's here and it's starting to kill us all even as we speak."

Jack quickly pulled Carl aside and they took a few steps away from the group. He whispered, "If that bomb is inside this mine at the ore level and it goes off, it'll be the largest dirty bomb in the world. It would kill half of this hemisphere if it's ignited by a thermal nuclear device."

"And the hits just keep coming," Carl whispered back.

Jack turned and found the face he was looking for.

"You, your name is Robby, right?"

"Yes, sir," he said, stepping forward.

"Kennedy, the name rings a bell?

"Yes, sir. I think he knew about this place before we ever got here, don't ask me how, but somehow he knew."

"Son, did he have a case he brought along, about four feet long, three deep? It may have had a flotation device attached since you were going to be working near water. The case was more than likely yellow in color."

"Yeah, he practically killed us looking for it after the larger creature sank the boat and barge."

Jack reached into his wetsuit. He pulled out the release key that was attached to his dogtag, and showed Robby and the others. He didn't have to ask as Robby's eyes widened. Jack knew then that at least the professor's assistant had seen the key before.

"This is an arm key for a military weapon. I can tell it's been used because, once the key is turned in the device, a small, bulbous end breaks off and allows an electrical connection. Your Mr. Kennedy found the device and armed it. Now think, son. Do you or the others know where he did this?"

"We were separated; we never saw the case after the boat and barge were sunk." Robby was starting to look desperate as he stepped forward with Kelly in tow and whispered to the major. "Sir, this is Kelly." He looked around at the staring faces. "She's the presi—"

"The president's daughter; we know, son. Right now we have to get everyone out of here." Jack looked deeply into the boy's eyes. "Okay?"

"Yes, sir."

"Now we have—"

Jack's words were cut short as a loud cracking sound rumbled through the flooring of the enclosure.

The shrapnel from the grenade had penetrated the water-soaked limestone of the underwater opening and had created several faults that had slowly expanded over the last few minutes to the breaking point, until the pressure from the outside lagoon was too much for the ancient engineering to bear. The wall and arched opening gave way as one, and a torrent of water rushed into the quickly overwhelmed canal.

"Jack, that opening was engineered by the Inca to hold the lagoon at bay by a precise measuring of the opening against the pressure of the outside depth. The system has failed and can no longer hold the water back. Judging by the walls' thickness, we have about three minutes before there's no way out of here," Sarah said as she started to push everyone toward the same opening Farbeaux had vanished into.