Project 731 (12 page)

Nemesis
is
alive, and she’s pissed.

I turn toward the door and start to run—when Nemesis is waking up a few hundred feet away, it’s the only sensible action—but I spot Brice back at the keyboard. I raise my weapon, but he hits a final key, steps back and raises his hands. The asshole knows I won’t shoot him.

But he’s forgotten about Alessi. She fires twice, both shots striking the man’s chest and exiting through his back, spraying the white wall behind him with twin splotches of bright red. But the damage has already been done. From one side of the room to the other, the glass domes lift off the floor, unleashing their living weapons.

16

“Do we really have to do this now?” Lilly asked, hands on her hips, tail snapping back and forth, watching the scale’s digital display blink.

“You’re overdue,” Joliet replied, clipboard in hand. While she was giving Lilly her bi-annual physical, something she insisted on because Lilly had grown so quickly, she was dressed in cotton pajamas. Night was upon them, and after the day’s excitement and long drive, she felt like turning in early. But not until she finished Lilly’s exam. It was a miracle the girl agreed to it at all. The display showed Lilly’s weight: 242.

“Son-of-a-bitch,” Lilly grumbled.

“Hey,” Joliet said. “Language.”

“How would you feel if you weighed more than Dad? Look at you. You’re a waif. What do you weigh? One twenty? One thirty?”

Joliet sighed. This kind of conversation never went well with Lilly, because there was no standard for comparison. “You weigh more than us because your muscles are denser. It’s why you’re so strong. And why you can jump seventy five feet down from a tree without getting hurt.”

“I get it,” Lilly says. “I’m awesome. But I’m also...you know...”

“A cat woman,” Joliet says.

“Yeah, except that I’m more than that. You know that better than anyone. You’re the one that puts the—”

Joliet raised both hands. “I know what I do.”

“And you know that there are parts of me that aren’t human or cat. We don’t even know what else is in the mix. For all we know, I might end up like my mother. Not you. I mean—”

“I know what you mean, Lilly,” Joliet could practically read the girl’s mind at this point. Next would come the reminder that she had laid a clutch of eggs.

Lilly threw her arms out to her sides. “I laid eggs.
Eggs!
So you know what that means? I’m
asexual
.”

Joliet blinked.
Okay
, this
is new territory.

“And even if I got to meet a guy—which I won’t, because, you know—” Lilly looked around the interior of the cabin’s large bathroom and motioned all around, signifying that she was speaking about the cabin, and probably the reserve where she spent most of her time. “—who might actually be interested in me, he’s going to be a total freak. Probably one of those Furry pervs.”

Joliet wanted to comfort the girl. To tell her she’d find someone. That she’d find love. But she wasn’t so sure herself, and she thought any attempt to encourage Lilly would just sound hollow. So she just said, “You’ll always have us.” After an awkward silence, she took out her pen light and aimed it at Lilly’s yellow eyes. The pupils constricted into thin slits. “You know the drill. Follow the light.”

Lilly’s eyes remained locked in place while Joliet moved the light back and forth. “Lilly, this only works if—”

“Where’s Dad?” Lilly asked.

“Downstairs,” Joliet said, feeling frustrated. She had dissected countless sea creatures, including a sea turtle mutilated by a rubber band; she had survived the horrors of Island 731; but she had never raised a daughter, let alone a cat-daughter who was part
whoknowswhatelse
. As far as she knew, she was the first mother in the history of the world to have an adopted daughter like this. She managed by reminding herself that this girl, while strange and having the capacity to be frightening, was sweet and fiercely loyal. “But I thought you didn’t want him to—”

Lilly’s eyes snapped toward Joliet, the sudden intensity of them was startling. “How much
do
you weigh?”

“One ten, but that’s—whoa!” Joliet suddenly found herself lifted off the bathroom floor. Before she could complain about the rough treatment, she was shoved upwards through a hatch in the ceiling and deposited on a floor of pink insulation. “Lilly, what the hell do you think you’re doing?”

Lilly looked confused for a moment, but then she blinked and said, “Right. You can’t hear them. So, here’s the deal. We’re surrounded. Maybe twenty men, give or take.”

“What?” Joliet shifted back toward the open hatch. “If that’s true, I need to—”

“You need to stay here. And stay safe.” Lilly slid back out of the hole, clinging to the side with one hand and about to pull the hatch closed with the other. She was hanging in midair, making it look effortless.

Joliet was indignant. She didn’t let anyone boss her around, let alone the girl who called her ‘Mom.’

“Lilly, I survived the island, I think I can handle this, too.”

Lilly hung there for a moment, looking up at Joliet. “The problem is, you weren’t my mother then. Before you, my mother was a monster. You...you’re too important now.”

With that, Lilly dropped to the floor, pulling the hatch closed as she fell. Joliet, lit in the bright white light of her penlight, sighed and then remembered her phone. She pulled it from her back pocket, switched it on and tried to make a call to Cooper. They might be able to get help, or at the very least, let the others know what was happening. But the phone beeped at her. She looked at the screen.

No signal.

But that wasn’t possible, unless... The men outside had blocked the signal, which meant they had access to impressive technology, and that told her all she needed to know about who was outside.

Mark Hawkins hated
TV. He rarely ever watched cable. But right now all he really wanted to do was watch a mind-numbing SyFy movie, have a beer or two and chill out. Not because he was tired, but because he was agitated. Inaction didn’t suit him, especially when it came to DARPA. He’d rather take the fight to their doorstep than hide in the woods.

But right now, the TV wasn’t working. The satellite dish sometimes acted up during a storm or thick cloud cover, but the skies outside were clear, save for the stars and the moon. He knew nothing about fixing TVs or the satellite box connections, but like any true man, he pretended to and crouched down in front of the TV to check things out.

After pushing a series of buttons and seeing that everything was working right, he decided that something must have been wrong on the other end. The signal just wasn’t getting through.

A loud thud beside him sent him sprawling for cover, but when he rolled back to his feet, it was just Lilly standing in the living room.
Did she jump down from the second floor?
The central living area at the front of the large cabin was open concept, the ceiling peaking two stories up at a line of skylights. When Hawkins saw what Lilly held, he forgot all about how she’d entered the room.

“What are you doing with my shotgun?” he asked.

Without a word, Lilly tossed the weapon to him. He caught it, and then quickly caught the box of shells that followed.

“I already loaded it,” she said, looking around the room. “Shades are pulled, so let’s leave the lights on. Turning them off now will just let them know that we know they’re here.”

Hawkins quickly understood. They were under attack, or soon would be. “How many?”

“Twenty-ish.”

“Where is Maigo?”

Lilly shrugged. “Probably up in her room. I can’t hear her. But she’s safer there, so let’s leave her be. She’ll hide when the shooting starts.”

“Joliet?”

Lilly grinned. “I threw her in the attic.”

“You
what?
”

“Be glad I didn’t put you up there, too,” she says.

“Lilly,” Hawkins said, his voice stern. “You can lose.”

Her smile faded. “I know, I know, this isn’t capture the flag.”

As though to prove the point, every window on the first floor, and the skylights above, burst inward at once. A number of small devices rattled to the floor.

Hawkins caught sight of Lilly launching toward the roof and slipping out a skylight, while he dove to the floor, clutching his eyes shut, blocking his ears and opening his mouth.

The flash-bang grenades went off one by one, punching Hawkins’s body with stunning force, but not permanently injuring him.
They’re not here to kill us—not yet—they’re here to collect Lilly
. When the last flash-bang detonated, Hawkins opened his eyes to a spinning room. Despite his best efforts to shield himself from the stun weapons’ effect, he was still disoriented.

He raised the shotgun, knowing what would come next. Hordes of men would flow through the windows, aiming weapons, maybe firing, maybe shouting orders. The first one who entered would lose his head. The second, well, that would be a toss up. By the third, Hawkins would be screwed.

But that’s not what happened. Instead, Lilly fell back through the skylight, her body clutched in some sort of spasm. Hawkins stumbled to her and knelt down beside her, quickly seeing two large darts from an oversized stun gun in her chest. They guessed she’d exit. They were waiting for her.

“Here’s the deal,” a man said from behind Hawkins. “We can either leave with the girl, or we can kill you and then leave with the girl. The choice is yours, but I don’t give a damn, either way.”

17

“Back the way we came,” I shout, pointing to the far end as a pair of small goats, adorable as hell, hop toward a pig...with wings. I don’t think the large swine could possible fly. The wings look too small, and the pigs lack the chest muscles, but then I remember that genetically, pigs are very similar to humans. It makes a sick kind of sense that they’d try this kind of modification on a hog before moving to human trials.

But the goats... They look normal—until they reach the pig. The nearest goat bounds up and dives, its body going rigid. For a moment, I think the thing has passed out, that it’s one of those fainting goats, but then its mouth opens and
peels back
over its face. Two wide, hooked mandibles snap open and clamp shut on the pig’s pink skin, digging in deep.

The pig bucks and squeals, but the goat, now bleating savagely, remains locked in place while its counterpart trots around. The goat starts wrapping the pig in copious amounts of webbing that’s being excreted from
its udders!
What kind of freak show did Brice unleash?

The kind Hawkins warned me about
, I realize. This is what GOD is all about: developing genetic monsters used on the battlefield. It’s a few insane steps beyond strapping laser beams to the backs of dolphins. On the plus side, this whole facility is on the verge of being flattened by the third coming of the goddess of vengeance. On the downside, we’re stuck inside the building with a circus act of scientific horrors between us and the door.

Trying to erase the squealing, winged pig from my mind, I chase Collins and Alessi across the room. I move down the right side of the long room, running along the wall, weapon aimed to the left, but not firing. I nearly trip as I pass yet another freakish battle.

A komodo dragon covered in spines that makes it look absolutely undefeatable swats its tail at some kind of mutated skunk, which turns its ass around and farts out some kind of viscous brown gas. As I run past, skirting the cloud of mutated skunk stank, I see the dragon’s tail stab into the shrieking skunk, but then passing through the gas, the tail melts and falls away. The fight takes just three seconds and ends with both creatures dead.

Luckily, most of the creatures inside the domed containment units have attacked their neighbors.

Most.

At the end of the room, the tentacled crocodile twitches its head back, swallowing its neighbor—some kind of monkey I think. When it’s done, it lowers its head toward Alessi, the closest of us, and drops its jaws open. The two tentacles unravel as though in slow motion, but I think it’s just building pressure, because the two things suddenly spring out and wrap around Alessi’s feet. She shouts and falls back, striking her head and dropping her weapon.

Collins dives without missing a beat, catching hold of Alessi’s outstretched hands. But if the extra weight adds any strain to the tentacles, the croc doesn’t show it. The monster reels in both women, the pulsing tendrils bulging and pulling, bulging and pulling.

“Stay down!” I shout, taking aim. I slide to a stop, knowing that I’ll miss if I shoot while running. The room echoes with the sound of each shot. The croc gives a throaty growl and thrashes its head to the side with each hit, but it doesn’t release the women. If anything, it doubles its efforts. I unload the clip, walking slowly forward, closing the distance between me and Collins to twenty feet. The fleshy mouth is oozing blood, but the croc’s mind is intact, and whatever primal instincts it has tells it to not abandon its prey, no matter how much pain it endures.

I eject the magazine and slap in my only spare, taking aim again. As I pull the trigger, my arms are struck. The round hits the floor just beyond Collins’s head. But that’s all I see, because the world becomes a blur of movement and pain a moment later. I’m being assaulted.

But by what?

With my arms raised over my face in a classic boxer’s stance, I try to peek around my forearms and get a look at what I’m sure will be a hideous attacker. Instead, I see a small army of emperor tamarins with small black monkey bodies, large, white, old-timey mustaches and...talons. Large ones, like five oversized claws had been merged into one, ice-pick sized, curved claw, one in place of each hand and foot. Right now, they’re hurling themselves at me, curling into solid little balls. I can take the punishment, but if one hits my head, it could be sleepy time for Jon Hudson.

I try for my gun, hoping to shoot the croc while deflecting the monkey assault with my free hand. But the little jerks change tactics, opening up out of their balled forms and swinging those claws at me. The first connects with my shoulder, putting an inch-deep puncture wound in meat.

Instincts take over, and I forget all about the gun. I grab the monkey from my shoulder. It bites my hand, but it can’t stop me from flinging it across the room. I meant to throw it across the room and bash it against the wall, but an aggressive seagull swoops through the air and plucks it away. There are several more of them circling the battle, which will soon leave only the most badass genetic monsters. It’s like accelerated evolution. Survival of the fittest. The human race came out on top of the real deal, but in this mutated competition, I’m not so sure we’re going to pull through.

I reach down toward a stabbing pain in my thigh without looking, tear the monkey away and hurl it upwards. A seagull cries out and snatches its prize. A few of the others give chase, but then they seem to notice there are many more of the small meals on the floor, encircling me. They circle and dive. The monkeys, having met their match, forget about me and turn their attention to the dive-bombing seagulls, which I now see have mouths like piranhas.

“Jon!” Collins shouts.

I turn and see Alessi just feet from the croc’s mouth. Collins has gotten to her feet and is leaning back, playing tug-o-war with the monster.

A monkey and seagull thrash around atop my handgun on the floor, locked in mortal combat, where I’m happy to leave them. I jump over the pair, run to Collins’s side and draw her .50 caliber sidearm.

“I can’t...hold her...much longer,” Collins grunts. Alessi says nothing. Her eyes convey her message clearly enough:
please
.

The croc’s eyes track me as I run to the side, aiming the weapon at its head. I’m about to fire when one of the tentacles releases Alessi and snaps to the side, slapping against the small of my back and sticking.

Mother bitches, that hurts!

The tentacles aren’t simply suction cups, they’re covered in barbs!

Knowing I’m about to be yanked back and into the croc’s mouth, I dive forward, pulling the monster’s head into view. My dive is arrested for just a moment, as the tendrils pull taut. I squint, aim and pull the trigger.

The tentacle yanks me back, and I never see if my aim was true, but I find out a second later when I’m slapped down on the floor. I lean up and see the croc, a hole where its eye used to be, lying dead on the floor. Collins quickly peels the tentacle off Alessi, which elicits a shout of pain. I stand with a grunt, the weight of the tendril still pulling on my back. When Collins steps up next to me, I say, “Do it quick.”

“It’s like a wax,” she says. “Women do it all the time.”

She yanks, and I feel hundreds of tiny pops as the barbs tear out of my skin. I grind my teeth, thinking for a moment that I’ll manage to stifle my scream, but I fail when the air hits my back, bringing on a sharp stinging unlike anything I’ve ever felt. I’m going to bathe in antibiotics if we make it out of here.

Speaking of which, our path to the door is now clear. I hobble toward the door as quickly as I can, and I all but fall into the hallway. A lone African American scientist in some kind of clean-suit stands at the far end. His suit is covered in blood. Brice must have opened all the containment units in every lab. I limp down the hallway toward the man, keeping my gun low, trying not to spook him. He’s hammering the elevator’s call button like a manic woodpecker.

The elevator, still fifty feet away, dings. The doors slide open.

“Hold up,” I say to the man, like it’s just another casual day at the office.

The man steps inside, and when it’s clear he’s not going to hold the doors, I fire a few shots into it, just to vent my frustration. One of the rounds strikes the call button, which bursts with sparks.

The doors remain open. Well, that’s a stroke of good luck in an otherwise craptastic day.

“What did you do?” the man shouts from inside the elevator.

Or not...

I peek inside. The panicked man is jamming the ‘close door’ button, but the elevator isn’t responding. He looks up at me, incredulous. “You broke it!”

“Listen, buddy,” I say, aiming Collins’s big gun at his head, but I never get to finish. At the far end of the hallway, a door bursts open with enough force to send the door across the hall and through the window on the other side. The scientist all but squeals in fright.

And then I see why.

The wall around the doorframe cracks and then shatters, leaving a gaping hole. The biggest damn gorilla I’ve ever seen struts into the hallway, its skull cleaved cleanly off, brain exposed, snapped wires dangling freely from it. Blood drips from its arms, and I’m pretty sure it’s not the ape’s.

“Oh, god,” the scientist cries, going back to work on the button with no result. “Oh, god!

“Here!” Alessi says from the far side of the hallway. She’s standing in an open doorway, a stairwell behind her. Collins and I quickly join her.

“Up or down?” Collins asks, but a roar from below answers for her.

Up it is.

I tap my throat mic for the first time. “Woodstock, where are you?”

“En route,” he says, his voice clear through the perfectly disguised earbud in my ear. “Run into trouble?”

“You could say that. ETA?”

“Five minutes.”

“Doooctooor!” The shout shakes the air with reverberating bass so loud I’m sure it wasn’t human.

“Go!” I urge Alessi and Collins higher. I turn back to the hallway. The scientist across the corridor peeks out of the elevator, looking down the length of the hallway.

“The hell was that?” Woodstock asks.

I ignore him and look around the corner, to the gorilla. It points at the scientist again and hollers, “Doctor will die now!”

Holy planet of the fucking Kongs
, I think, and I wave the doctor across the hall, shouting, “Let’s go!”

The man wastes no time debating it. His choices are: stay and die horribly, or run with the man who might shoot him, and maybe live a few minutes longer. We take the stairs side by side, rounding the single flight toward the open roof doorway, where Collins waits.

Out of breath, I finally reply to Woodstock. “I don’t care what laws you break, or how dangerous you fly. I need you here in two minutes, tops.”

“Music to my ears, boss,” Woodstock says, followed by a “Whoop!” that is cut short, first by a second, angry roar from Nemesis, which seems much louder now that we’re outside (though it’s still muffled) and the resounding thunder of an over-sized, intelligent silverback making short work of the stairwell behind us.