That same night, at the newly exposed narrow passage on the southern edge of the Sinkhole Rift.
The towering flames blazing behind him on Brood Pod Beach had yet to fade when [Tom Pie] crossed the weathered bone beam outside the cliff and silently slipped into the narrow blind passage exposed by the receding slurry and removal of the brood pods.
Falling rocks had battered his right shoulder during the fight, leaving it badly bruised. The slightest movement sent throbs of pain through it.
He stopped on a hard fragment of armor jutting from the cliff, tightened the compression strap biting into his shoulder with one hand, then used his teeth and his free hand to knot the broken helmet strap securely. Only then did he turn and wave at the two elite scouts in the distance, their tactical searchlights dimmed to the lowest setting:
"I'll take the bone beams along the outer cliff. You two stick to the inner wall. Watch your footing, and stay away from that rotten flesh smoking and leaking goo."
The two Hunters understood immediately and lowered their centers of gravity. They waited until he had put some distance between them along the outer beam before following against the inner wall.
By the faint, cold light of their glow sticks, the three quietly followed the winding contours downward along separate inner and outer routes. Behind them, the mechanical roar of the main force burning the charred egg beach gradually dwindled to barely audible thunder, muffled by layer upon layer of cliffs.
Countless thick biochemical pipes lay tangled across the cramped, weathered corridor.
Some had long since shriveled and dried out after their main roots were severed, resembling dead snakes hanging from the rock walls. But many still pulsed and twitched intermittently, frantically pumping streams of