CHAPTER 20:

EVACUATION

2,225 feet below the surface

Logan led the charge back to base camp, Charlie close behind, Isabelle trailing with the heavy camera equipment. Milo brought up the rear, helping her through the tightest passages. Would-be television host Charlie hadn’t had time to put more than his boots on; he’d hastily stuffed his clothes into Isabelle’s pack and stomped along wearing little more than improvised paint and flesh-colored briefs.

The party was bunched up enough to where Milo could catch glimpses of Logan’s clenched, scowling face at every bend. His frown deepened each passing second until the geologist could no longer contain himself.

“It’s—vandalism,” he finally spat. “It’s all just vandalism.”

“What?” demanded Charlie, wholly confused.

“It’s just a little decoration,” Isabelle said, defending her lipstick paintings. “In a thousand years, archaeologists will think it’s just as important as the paintings in the gallery.”

“In ten thousand years,” retorted Logan, “it’ll still be shit.”

Milo felt compelled to agree with Logan, sharing his irritation as the group burst out of the last stretch of passageway—and into a maelstrom.

They were too late. The booming waterfall had transformed into a howling, deafening barrage of water. Having already flooded most of the subterranean lake, the aqueduct crack was now a rooster-tail geyser of water, spray shooting out intermittently down the length of the base camp. Waters surged down into the main anthill passageway as growing rivulets escaped from the channel and lake, steadily encroaching the camp.

Milo, Logan, and the television duo were the last to arrive. Joanne and Duck were already leading efforts to save equipment. Duck had stopped trying to take down the tents, and was instead yanking them out entirely, aluminum pegs already lost to the first waves of encroaching water. Joanne grabbed at the ropes and carabiners, hurling them across the chamber with all her strength, desperately trying to get them to higher ground.

Logan sprinted into the chaos as Milo and the other cavers jogged toward the supply depot, grabbing and dragging plastic cases and aluminum crates through the now ankle-deep water. Behind him, Charlie slipped, landing in the shallow, rushing foam, but quickly rebounded to his feet. The small plastic crate he’d been carrying washed away, disappearing into the anthill.

Milo felt a tap on his shoulder and turned around to see Bridget. She shouted something at him from just inches away, but he couldn’t make it out over the roar of the flash flood. Frustrated, she just pointed toward the largest crate. Together they seized it by the handles, Milo barely able to keep pace with the doctor as she marched the equipment over toward the high ground that Dale had staked out.

Duck had secured a narrow shelf overlooking the illuminated chamber, safely above the gathering waters but up a steep slope. As Milo and Bridget struggled against the rocky incline, Milo noticed the shelf’s manhole-sized window in the rock wall behind it, a passageway to an unexplored chamber.

Sliding the large crate onto the shelf and into Dale’s hands, Bridget and Milo turned again and bolted toward the floodplain, passing the others as they struggled with as much gear as they could carry.

Milo instinctively knew there wouldn’t be enough time. The waters were rising too rapidly and they’d only moved a third of the supplies, maybe less. Both Milo and Dale watched in horror as the tripod-mounted laser scanner tilted and slammed into the froth, its still-attached cable yanking a laptop computer off the rocks and into the torrent. As the mists grew, it was becoming hard to see more than a few meters away. As Milo’s vision obscured, he began to lose his sense of orientation.

A snap echoed out from the shaft, loud enough to ring throughout the entire chamber. Milo looked up in horror as a truck-sized boulder swung like a clock pendulum in the shaft, colorful descent ropes tangled in its jagged teeth as it slammed against the walls. Another snap rang out and the hundred-ton rock tumbled into the froth, dragging with it thousands of feet of cascading rope, the fragile descent system all but destroyed.

Dale grabbed Milo’s shoulder for support as the two waded through the roiling, knee-deep flow, determined to save one last pack before they were washed away forever.

“Does this explain why we didn’t find DeWar’s camp?” shouted Milo, leaning toward Dale, his mouth inches from his ear.

“It just might,” responded Dale, his voice lost to the roar. Together, they reached a Pelican case far downstream of the now-obliterated supply depot. The rugged plastic box was snagged between two boulders along with a backpack, the currents bashing both ferociously into the rocks.

Milo heard shouting from the narrow ledge above—the guides were now pointing and yelling. He swiveled toward the waterfall. Even through the mist, he could see that the waters had gone from a clear, foamy white to a muddy brown. An earthen dam had burst far above, turning the downpour into a sediment-laden tsunami.

Dale dropped the Pelican case and began furiously wading back toward the ledge, the deluge around them turning swirling and dark. Milo reached back to grab the last pack and chased after him. He could feel rocks and debris churning in the current, ripping and bashing against his legs. The water was almost waist-deep by the time Milo reached the ledge. The men dragged themselves up the rocks. Charlie reached down from the ledge, using almost inhuman strength to pull Dale and Milo, soaked and exhausted, to safety.

Milo slumped to a sitting position as the guides shouted at each other. The muddy waters had cleared the mists, and the dull globes above still illuminated the entirety of the chamber. But something was desperately wrong—below and no more than thirty feet away, Isabelle clung to a partially submerged boulder as the raging dark surge swept by. Growing waves leapt ever higher, threatening to knock her from her fragile handhold. The boulder shifted, and Isabelle lost her grip, almost yanked downstream by the current before she caught hold of the rock again. Her sacrificed camera vanished into the muddy froth.

Dale swore and threw a rope across the chamber. Yellow-helmeted Isabelle grabbed onto it, holding tightly as the flood swept her underwater. Every person on the ledge grabbed onto the rope as it whipped and snapped under frenzied tension. Yanking hand over hand, they drew in the line—until it suddenly went slack.

Isabelle never surfaced.

Milo dropped the rope, looking at every member of the remaining party. Charlie was too shocked and battered to speak; Logan just buried his face in his hands. Dale and Joanne scanned the flood for another few moments before turning their attention to what little gear they’d rescued. Tears welled in Duck’s eyes. Milo felt Bridget’s hand slip into his, squeezing it. He couldn’t bear to look at her.

Still dressed in his comical tribal costume and smudged makeup, Charlie turned to Milo with bafflement. In the confusion, Charlie seemed to not fully grasp what had just happened.

“Why’d you save that?” asked Charlie, pointing to the pack Milo had nearly lost his life retrieving.

Confused, Milo opened the satchel’s top flap. Inside, he saw the soft, colorful fabric of Charlie’s parachute canopy.

“Can I have it back?” asked Charlie.

Milo stared down the bigger man for a full ten seconds before hurling the pack into the flood.