“The subject left the hospital, sir,” he answered into a microphone that arched from the outer lobe of his ear to his mouth.

“The exits had been locked,” the sounds of papers flapping echoed in his head.

“He broke through the window, sir.”

A long, tense pause -- the officer in black stepped out of the shattered pane of glass and, treading noisily over the broken bits with rubber boots, he entered the empty streets.

“I haven’t lost him completely --“

“It is important that he be apprehended alive, corporal --“

“I understand my mission.”

The Amazonian soldier stalked close to the side of the building.An open, unblocked alley caught his eye, whisking shred of canvas was fluttering in a dying current.He crossed the narrow street and poked his head into the passage cautiously, his hand on his weapon.The corridor was littered with trash -- but no movement, no indication of covert activity was evident.

He brought the thin, wire microphone closer to his lips and covered the instrument with his hand:“He’s heading to hell.”

“Can you be sure?” the female voice asked.

“He’s using the trail we identified this morning.”

Again a pause.

“You are not authorized to enter the underworld.”

He rushed through the passage, careful to avoid the murky pools of sooty runoff.

“I repeat, you are not authorized --“

“If I act fast, I can catch him before he enters the manhole.”

He reached the edge of the portal and crouched low over its rim -- the mark of a fresh, wet footprint glimmered in the eerie, electric light.A breeze ruffled the branches of nearby trees, the shrill tune of the leafy instruments resonated in the silence of the night.He looked to the side, to the back façade of an abandoned building, in time to see a drawn-back window curtain fall to place and obstruct his view.

Sighing for a moment, unaware of the voice that called to him in his ear, he turned his head up, over the baseness of the world and stared in awe at the thousands of towers, cloud-topped structures and dreamy grandeur of the City of Metropolis.The lights of little, rectangular windows were bright and multicolored and could be seen for ever and ever that, coupled with the somber gray of concrete and steel, formed a vista of profound beauty.

It seemed so eternal -- he thought -- it could last for all time, the clockwork of the universe was eternal, it had to be, it was perfect.

In the depths of the vertical shaft, Kara remained still and quiet.His eyes roamed behind the veil of shadow that cloaked his face.The figure above had stopped, distracted for a moment and he took the opportunity work his way down the ladder.He was close, so close to the bottom that he could almost feel the ground beneath him.Every moment, every second counted, time was not on his side, he feared and he knew he would have to go slow for the water level below remained high.

At last his one foot reached the point where the iron-rungs ended and the underworld began.Nervously, tentatively, he let his other foot touch the ground -- the stone was wet with a slight, thin coat of moisture whose glimmer shone in his eyes like that of the moon on a clear night.Hovering above, the manhole’s opening was no larger than his fist and it appeared, too, that the stranger who had chased him from the hospital had vanished.

He thanked Jagga, clung unto the walls, away from the central tract of water and used the red-light posts to show him the way.