Fast (74 page)

Here they come.

            In the antechamber, Harrison heard the alarm sounding. He wished he could hit the ‘snooze’ button and get ten more minutes respite.

            The containment door started opening.

            A two inch wide horizontal bar of light appeared under the door.

            Harrison’s hopes for a miracle disintegrated.
It’s really happening. They’re really coming in here.

            The growing bar of light shining under the containment door looked unbroken, and for a moment Harrison prayed the creatures had been distracted elsewhere.

            Then came movement. The bar of light broke into a thousand pieces, a broiling silhouette of random shapes trying to scramble under the door. But they weren’t random. They had a purpose, and Harrison stared with horrible fascination.

            The door kept rising, sending a steady mechanical whine down the corridor, and there was no mistaking what waited on the other side.

            The creatures came writhing under the door.

            This is like some kind of insane nightmare. They’re wall-to-wall. I can’t believe they’re coming in here.

            Harrison had prayed for one of two miracles. Either the door wouldn’t open, by some timely mechanical fault, or the number of creatures waiting outside would be few enough for himself and Sullivan to handle.

            The creatures reached halfway down the tunnel, just twenty-five meters away. The tide pouring under the door filled the corridor from one side to the other. There was no telling where one creature stopped and the next began.

            Harrison lifted his radio. ‘Sullivan. We got multiple incoming hostiles. What’s your status?’

            Sullivan slid into the antechamber, reporting on the run. ‘The children are all sealed up in the…oh, my God.’

            Sullivan’s eyes locked on the hypnotic spectacle careening down the corridor. The creatures were just ten meters away from the antechamber.

            In the space of two heartbeats the creatures slammed into the antechamber plexiglass.

            Sullivan jerked back, expecting the entire wall to crash down.

            The entire antechamber shook under the Marines’ boots. Looking through the plexiglass was a nightmare made real. The two Marines backed from the plexiglass, their eyes locked on the horror before them.

            Sullivan swallowed hard. ‘We can’t…I mean…we can’t….’ Sullivan just pointed wordlessly at the spectacle.

            ‘There might be reinforcements coming right behind them,’ prayed Harrison. ‘We need to hold these things back for as long as we can.’

            Sullivan raised his assault rifle. His eyes flicked to Harrison briefly. ‘What’s the plan?’

            CRACK!

            Harrison looked up and saw the plexiglass cracking. It began coming away from the ceiling. Fissures started radiating down the transparent wall like lightning strikes.

            CRACK! CRACK!

            Harrison’s last hope had been that the plexiglass barrier would keep the creatures out.

            ‘The plexiglass is cracking. Get back, get back,’ he yelled.

#

Vanessa’s hands moved with feverish intent down the wall. She flipped open lids as rapidly as she could pinch open the clasps.

            Pinch-yank, pinch-yank, pinch-yank.

            Butterflies poured from the open boxes in her wake.

            Before she was even halfway finished, the room was a brown storm of fluttering wings.

            Should I spend the extra time to open all the boxes? Is this enough already? Open them all!

            She had already spent valuable seconds dashing across the lab to seal the door.

            Now the pheromone lab was airtight. She had just six boxes left. She turned from the last plastic box, covering her face with one arm. Thousands of butterflies fluttered crazily in the confined chamber. They pelted into her face and hair and hands and everywhere.

            She groped half-blinded over to the pheromone synthesizer.

            Where is it?

            She hadn’t predicted it would be so hard to navigate in the lab with all the butterflies released, but there was no way she could have introduced the pheromone into the butterfly boxes individually.

            Instead, she transformed the lab into one big butterfly box.

            And now for the pheromone….

            She unscrewed the pressurized pheromone canister from the synthesizer. The canister started hissing out its contents immediately. The pheromone was colorless, odorless, and suspended in minute quantities in its gassy medium.

            But like grandma’s perfume, a little bit went a long way.

            Holding the canister, she cycled her arm through the butterfly cloud.

            That’s right, my little darlings. This is the good stuff.

            She counted down in her head from ten, not really knowing how long it would take for every butterfly in the lab to come into contact with the airborne pheromone molecules.

            The last four seconds felt like torture. Every second could be making the difference for David.
Four, three, two….

            Suddenly, from the four corners of the lab came the pheromone warning alarms. Sasha had set up four sensors in the labs to alert her of any leaks in her synthesizing equipment. The devices were sensitive pieces of equipment that Sasha kept precisely calibrated. The alarms meant the pheromone cloud had filled the room.

            All the butterflies were well and truly exposed.

            Vanessa ran for the door, still carrying the canister for good measure. Halfway across the lab, she heard her tablet on the workstation start beeping.

            It meant that the Quarantine Center’s containment door was lifting. Right now, the creatures were surging into the Quarantine Center.

            She groped at the wall beside the lab door and yanked up the locking mechanism.

‘This is for you, David.’

The door hissed open to one side.

            She halted as the butterflies surged through the doorway around her. The unthinkable had just occurred to her.

            What if I made a mistake? What if I’ve made some fundamental error in my rush? What if this doesn’t even work?

           
The butterflies were already away. More than half of them had pelted over her shoulders, under her arms, through her legs. It was too late to do anything now.

            ‘Fly fast, you magnificent little bastards,’ she yelled after the butterfly cloud. ‘Fly fast!’

#

Cairns charged at Coleman with the steel bar.

            Coleman realized this was no longer a civilized slugging match. With a steel bar involved, someone was going to get very hurt, very quickly.

            Unfortunately, he was on the wrong side of the steel bar equation. He had a slim window of opportunity to disable Cairns. Once Cairns placed a few solid hits with that bar, it was all-over red-rover.

            Coleman needed to get that steel bar out of play in the next few seconds.

            To think that I had him finished off in a choke hold and I had to let him go.

            Coleman feinted one way and then dodged in the opposite direction. The steel bar
whooshed
past. When the bar’s trajectory was safely passing his left shoulder, he dropped a quick right hand jab into Cairns’s jaw, catching Cairns on the way past. Cycling his fist, he slammed another hit into Cairns’s kidneys.

            Cairns reeled instinctively way from the painful blow. He hefted the steel bar around in a big sideways baseball swing.

            At the same time, Coleman followed through with a lightning-fast side kick.

            It was a dangerous ploy to stay within the bar’s range, but he needed to disable Cairns before the bar started breaking bones.

            And I need to hit Cairns hard to bleed the momentum off the bar. If that thing connects, I’m going to fold like a cardboard cut-out.

            Coleman prayed his kick landed before Cairns could get the steel bar into dangerous play again.

            The bar was only halfway through its swing when Coleman’s kick slammed squarely into Cairns’s taunt stomach. Cairns’s breath
whooshed
away.

            Dropping to the floor, Coleman swept his leg around in a wide arc. His boot caught the back of Cairns’s heels.

            Cairns feet shot forward. He seemed to hang in the air a second and then,
smack
, he landed flat on his back. His skull savagely whiplashed the floor.

           
Nicely done
, thought Coleman.

            He pinned the steel bar down with his left boot.

            Now the bar was out of play and he was going to kick the living crap out of Cameron Cairns. Cairns still gripped the pinned bar. He blinked up at the ceiling, looking dazed from the skull impact.

            Let’s see him swing a bar without any fingers.

            Coleman lifted his right boot, spun on his left heel, and stomped down with all his strength on Cairns’s hand.

            But the hand was gone. Cairns had let go of the bar.

            At the last second, Coleman realized his mistake. Cairns wasn’t as messed-up as he looked.

            And now it was Coleman’s turn to lose his footing.

            Instead of pulverizing Cairns’s fingers, Coleman found his legs swept out from under him. He had just fallen victim to the exact attack he’d launched on Cairns.

            In one smooth move, Cairns found his feet and snatched up the bar.

            Oh, crap!

            Now Coleman rolled for his life as Cairns brought down the steel bar like he was chopping wood balanced on Coleman’s head.

            The bar smacked into the floor.

            Coleman had
just
rolled out its path, but not fast enough to avoid a savage kick that followed through into his rib cage.

            With a series of fleshy cracks, Coleman felt his ribs fracture. Cairns’s steel cap boots had done almost as much damage as the steel bar.

            The kick flipped Coleman onto his back. Pain flared down his side. Cairns brought down the bar in another big chop.

           
There’s no avoiding this one
. One way or another, he was about to take a big hit from the bar before he could regain his footing.