The Chronicles of Riddick - Alan Dean Foster [69]
“Yeah,” he muttered. “Know how it feels.”
Outside the cascade, a sharp whistle sounded, piercing the unwholesome air of the cavern. At its sound, the hellhound dropped to all fours, backed off, and departed.
With reluctance.
As the lift touched bottom, the quartet of guards that was riding it jumped off. Adjusting breather units and checking weapons, they headed for the base of the lavafall. Periodically, it was necessary to perform a comprehensive sweep of each part of the prison. One never knew what kind of fiendish devil-try the prisoners might get up to if left too long to their own devices.
Today, it was the turn of the cavern bottom, the top of the volcanic plug that had choked off the flow of magma to the now empty core. There wasn’t much to it. Anything resembling a permanent, functional installation had been pretty much ruined by the surprise lava flow of decades before. But with convicts, you never knew. Better to regularly scan every centimeter of the prison than to wake up one morning to find out the system had overlooked something potentially dangerous.
The area around the base of the lavafall was exactly where one might expect to encounter such problems. Full of nooks and crannies of tormented stone mixed with the remnants of the prison installation that the lava had destroyed, it was the perfect place for a convict to dwell in self-imposed isolation, away from guards and prison routine. A place where plots might be hatched. While the handlers and their hellhounds cleared the tiers elsewhere, the four-man team began probing places where sedition might lurk.
What they found was Kyra. Light beams joined together to focus on the single figure, momentarily blinding her.
“And just when you thought the cull was over,” one of the guards commented as the shape of the prisoner was identified. A nice shape, too, he thought to himself. Of course, down here, you never knew whether a protrusion beneath prison clothes was part of the prisoner, or a portent of something potentially treacherous. So even though there were four of them and only one of her, the guards still advanced with caution.
“Runnin’ solo.” The nominal leader of the group let his light sweep their immediate surroundings, search for scat or urine. “Hounds ain’t been through here. Could be she’s trying to hide something. Which is why we’re here.” He used his light to gesture at the unmoving figure. “Check her out, make sure she’s clean.” Alongside him, his three colleagues hesitated, looking at each other, avoiding their superior’s gaze.
“C’mon,” the senior member of the foursome chided his comrades. “What’re you afraid of? What is she, fifty kilos? Search her.”
Taking the lead, one of the other guards warily entered the open cell where Kyra had retreated. Making himself as large as possible, he gestured with his maulstick.
“Let’s go, sweetheart. You know the routine.”
Without a word, she turned, placed her hands against the wall, palm forward, and spread her legs, assuming the classic, age-old search position. Her compliance was more than encouraging: it was stimulating. Thus motivated, the other guards edged forward to join their colleague.
“Too bad Pavlov couldn’t see this,” one of them murmured.
The guard who had been bold enough to approach moved closer. Close enough for her booted foot to rub up and down his lower leg. The action simultaneously calmed and encouraged him. This wasn’t going to be so difficult after all. Some of the female inmates, now, they made a habit of being troublesome. That was what the maulstick was for. But this one . . .
Eyes closed, Kyra was repeating some private mantra. “‘Sokay . . . it’s okay . . . it’s okay. . . .”
The guard thought she was murmuring to him: mistakenly so. But, momentarily mesmerized by the inviting sight spread out before him, that part of his brain that should have been on full alert had turned to tapioca. Advancing the rest of the way,