MICHAEL CRICHTON

e too particular about telling one gorilla from another. Explain to her that it mayget very noisy from the guns but she should not be frightened.”“Is it going to get very noisy?” Elliot said.“I imagine,” Munro said.He took Amy into his tent and put on the sturdy chain leash she often wore inCalifornia. He tied one end to his cot, but it was a symbolic gesture; Amy couldmove it easily if she chose to. He made her promise to stay in the tent.She promised. He stepped to the tent entrance, and she signed, Amy likePeter.“Peter like Amy,” he said, smiling. “Everything’s going to be fine.”He emerged into another world.The red night lights had been doused, but in the flickering glow of the campfirehe saw the goggle-eyed sentries in position around the compound. With the lowthrobbing pulse of the electrified fence, this sight created an unearthlyatmosphere. Peter Elliot suddenly sensed the precariousness of their position—ahandful of frightened people deep in the Congo rain forest, more than twohundred miles from the nearest human habitation.Waiting.He tripped over a black cable on the ground. Then he saw a network of cables,snaking over the compound, running to the guns of each sentry. He noticed thenthat the guns had an unfamiliar shape—they were somehow too slender, tooinsubstantial and that the black cables ran from the guns to squat, snub-nosedmechanisms mounted on short tripods at Intervals around the camp.He saw Ross near the fire, setting up the tape recorder.“What the hell is all this?” he whispered, pointing to the cables.“That’s a LATRAP. For laser-tracking projectile,” she whispered. “The LATRAPsystem consists of multiple LGSDs attached to sequential RFSDs.”She told him that the sentries held guns which were actually laser-guided sightdevices, linked to rapid-firing sensor devices on tripods. “They lock onto thetarget,” she said, “and do the actual shooting once the target is identified. It’s ajungle warfare system. The RFSDs have maclan-baffle silencers so the enemy198