"This way!" called Bronstein, as they boiled out of the tunnel mouth. Fluttering ahead of them, she led them into another narrow opening off the main Maggot-way. This time there was no huge Maggot in it. An explosion behind them briefly hardened their slowshields.

"That was one smart bat-move, Bronstein," groused Chip, in the aftermath. The bat had dropped the archway of Magh' adobe behind them with a well-placed satchel-limpet mine. Chip looked around the tiny irregular-walled chamber that was left to them. "This is a goddamn dead end! We're trapped in here!"

The bat's huge leaf-ears twitched. She rumpled her gargoyle face at him, flashing white fangs. "If you were any more microcephalic we could use your head for a pin, Connolly. On the other side of that wall I can hear outside noises. Is it a lack of interest that you have in going there?"

For an answer the rats began digging. Digging like fury. Even the tubby Fal moved with the startling speed that made the rats such powerful, if reluctant, allies in this war.

"Be using your tiny heads," snapped one of the other bats. Behan, surly as always. "We need a shot pattern, not a rabbit warren."

On the other side of the fallen archway, Chip could hear the Maggots starting to dig too.

When they broke through and spilled into the sunlight, Chip practically whooped from sheer delight. Ha! Not even a whining Shareholder could moan about how wonderful the sun looked today. A beautiful blue pinpoint in the sky! Still, he was careful not to look at it directly.

There'd been a time, not ten minutes back, when Chip had thought he'd never see daylight again. The first Maggot claws had been pushing through the debris when the bats had pronounced the shot holes deep enough.