"Yeah. Turning off like that did it. Unless we can find that marked tunnel, we're sunk!"
Gray, silent in the shadows, laughed a bitter, ironic laugh.
They went on, stumbling down endless black halls, losing all track of branching corridors, straining to catch the first glint of saving light. Once or twice they caught the echoes of Dio's party, and knew that they, too, were lost and wandering.
Then, quite suddenly, they came out [p. 66] into a vast gallery, running like a subway tube straight to left and right. A wind tore down it, hot as a draught from the burning gates of Hell.
It was a moment before anyone grasped the significance of that wind. Then someone shouted,
"We're saved! All we have to do is walk against it!"
They turned left, almost running in the teeth of that searing blast. And Gray began to notice a peculiar thing.
The air was charged with electricity. His clothing stiffened and crackled. His hair crawled on his head. He could see the faint discharges of sparks from his companions.
Whether it was the effect of the charged air, or the reaction from the nervous strain of the past hours, Mel Gray began to be afraid.