fredbassett (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
fredbassett) wrote2012-08-01 04:18 pm
fredbassett) wrote2012-08-01 04:18 pm
Fic, Silk and Steel, Part 91
Title : Silk and Steel, Part 91
Authors : fredbassett & munchkinofdoom
Fandom : Primeval
Characters : Ditzy, Leek, Lyle, Connor, Helen, Stringer, Ryan, Lester, Nick, Stephen, Abby, Lacey
Rating : 18
Disclaimer : Not ours, no money made, don’t sue
Spoilers : None
Summary : Ditzy arrives at the ARC, as do Leek and Lyle.
Warning : Slave!fic.
A/N : The links to all previous parts can be found HERE. Captain Thomson appears by courtesy of![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
deinonychus_1 and Tanya Lacey by courtesy of reggietate.
9.01am. Checkpoint Outside the Anomaly Research Centre.
As Ditzy approached the main gates, he could see smoke arising from blown out windows on the ground floor of the ARC and realised with surprise that a fire engine was driving away from the scene rather than to it. He swung his car across the road, blocking their way, and jumped out to jog over to speak to the driver who was already glaring down at him.
“I work there,” he said. “What’s the problem and why are you going away when I can see smoke?”
“The guy on the gate told us we weren’t wanted,” the driver said, the expression on his face making it perfectly plain what he thought of that. “He had a bloody great big gun, so I wasn’t about to argue the toss.”
Ditzy pulled out his ID card and flashed it at the fire fighter. “Hang on a bit longer, will you, mate? I need to find out what’s going on.”
The driver shook his head. “No can do. Another shout’s already come in. A third bomb’s gone off. It’s bloody mayhem this morning already. You’ll just have to call this one in again if you need us. Now do us a favour and shift yourself.”
Ditzy got back in the car and reversed out of their way. From what he could see, Miller was on duty by the gate, cradling a rifle across his chest and staring out at the world with his usual truculent expression. He couldn’t understand what the man was doing there as gate duty wasn’t something the military contingent got involved with, although he wouldn’t put it past the sergeant to stick his nose in where it wasn’t wanted. When Miller showed no inclination to come over to check his car and made no move to raise the barrier, Ditzy got out again.
“What’s going on?” he asked, gesturing in the direction of the main building.
Miller simply gripped the M4 harder and stared over Ditzy’s shoulder. The sergeant was taciturn at the best of times but his failure to acknowledge a direct question from a ranking officer was unusual, to say the least.
“Sergeant, I asked you what the fuck is going on.” Ditzy would have preferred to be armed for a confrontation with Thomson’s trained attack dog, but if push came to shove, which it looked like it might, he was confident he could take the man, especially if the sergeant carried on refusing to make eye contact.
“Lockdown. No one goes in or out.” The words were delivered in a flat monotone.
“Bombs have been going off everywhere and it looks like at least one has detonated here. Step aside. I’m going in, lockdown or no lockdown.”
The sound of a motorbike engine being revved came from behind him, but Ditzy had other things on his mind at that moment. He’d just looked beyond Miller to the small guard post and had seen what looked like a booted foot just inside the open door. A foot that was attached to a leg clothed in the ubiquitous black uniform of the ARC’s security team. And for all their faults, Ditzy had never known one of the guards sleep on duty.
His fingers flexed and he had to stop himself reaching for the gun he wasn’t carrying.
As though sensing a threat, Miller made a move to bring the barrel of his rifle to bear on Ditzy, but before he could complete the manoeuvre, the roar of the motorcycle engine was drowned out by the sound of a gunshot.
Ditzy watched in amazement as Miller crumpled to the ground, half his head blown away.
The bike came to a halt next to him and a voice he was all too familiar with announced, “Two down, fuck knows how many to go.”
Ditzy turned around and stared into a pair of amused hazel eyes. “Jesus, Lyle, have you been practising dramatic entrances?”
“Natural talent,” Lyle said.
A quick look inside the guard post confirmed Ditzy’s suspicions. Both guards were dead, shot in the head at close range. He took a moment to strip the men of their weapons and came back out carrying two semi-automatic pistols and two M4 carbines. He slung one over his shoulder and handed the other to Lyle, who did the same and for good measure stripped Miller of his weapons as well.
“What the fuck’s going on, Jon?”
“At a guess, I’d say Helen Bloody Cutter is doing her best to fuck us over.”
Oliver Leek, looking like a man who wanted to be anywhere but on the back of a motorbike without a helmet, held one hand out to Ditzy. “I would prefer not to face whatever is in there unarmed, Lieutenant.”
Ditzy handed him one of the handguns without question. He knew that Lyle had been giving Leek lessons on the gun range. “You said two down…?” He had a feeling he knew what Lyle was going to say next, but wanted confirmation that Lyle was now aware of the clones.
“He’s not the first Miller I’ve killed today. Another one blew up Mr Leek’s house and then tried to take his car out with an RPG. We were in it at the time.”
The same RPG that was now strapped to the side of the motorbike. Lyle was obviously operating on a waste not, want not principle and had no doubt stripped the first body of weapons as well, judging by the fact that he had a Sig Sauer in a thigh holster, as well as his usual Glock in a shoulder-rig and a combat shotgun already slung over his back. In view of the number of bombs that had already done off, Ditzy was just surprised that Lyle had managed to reach the ARC without an Armed Response Vehicle on his tail.
Counting the version of Miller that Blade had killed in the bunker in the grounds and the dead cleaner that had vanished from the basement during the first attack on the ARC, that made at least four of them. And there were almost certainly more if the number of bomb blasts was anything to go by. Ditzy had a nasty feeling that Helen regarded the clones as disposable commodities.
“I can’t raise anyone in the ARC,” he said as he ejected the clip from the pistol and checked the mechanism before reloading and pumping a round into the breach. “Miller… it… sent the fire crew away and no bugger inside is answering their phone.”
“Then it’s time for the cavalry to pull their arses out of the fire,” Lyle said, looking a lot happier than Leek at the prospect of some action. “I presume I’ll be onto a loser asking you to stay out here, Mr Leek?”
“You presume correctly,” Leek replied, even though maintaining an impression of disdain was clearly taking some effort.
Lyle sighed theatrically. “Don’t say I didn’t give you the chance to bail.” He revved the engine and looked expectantly at Ditzy.
Ditzy nodded and went back into the guard house to operate the mechanism to raise the barrier. Lyle promptly roared off with Leek clinging to his waist as Ditzy legged it back to his car to follow them up the ramp into the underground garage. He just hoped that the dead body sprawled on the tarmac would serve as a Keep Out sign for any staff about to arrive for work.
9.08am. The Atrium. Anomaly Research Centre.
Connor stared in horror as Ali Khan writhed on the floor, clutching his shattered kneecap.
One of the clones stood over him, the gun that had done the damage still pointing down at the screaming technician.
“He has two knees, Connor, but not for much longer.” Helen’s voice was calm and measured, as though she was discussion the results of a laboratory experiment and hadn’t just given an order that had resulted in an innocent man being shot. “Now are you going to turn off your firewalls or are you going to be responsible for causing your colleague an awful lot more pain?” She stared down at the injured man for a moment, a slight smile playing over her lips before she turned the full force of her stare back on Connor. “I said turn off your firewalls. I want access to the system and I want it now.”
“Do it, Connor.” The order came from Stringer.
Connor looked over at the injured captain. Stringer held his gaze and nodded. A widening patch of blood was spreading across Stringer’s black shirt from the bullet wound in his shoulder and Connor could see pain from the injury deeply etched on the man’s face.
“Why are you doing this, Helen?” Connor asked, doing his best to meet her eyes. “You’re responsible for all those bombs, aren’t you? You’re targeting anywhere that you think might have data on the project.”
Helen rolled her eyes. “Someone give the boy a prize. Yes, Connor, I’m responsible for the bombs. Now stop playing for time, do as the captain says and turn off your firewalls. I won’t ask you again.” She turned to the clone at her side, nodded at Ali Khan whose cries had now turned to whimpers and said, “Count to three and then shoot his other kneecap.”
“One…” The clone spoke in a dull monotone, his dark eyes fixed on the already-injured man.
Ali Khan twisted on the blood-stained tiles, his face a contorted mask of agony.
Connor knew Helen wasn’t bluffing but he didn’t want to allow her access to the ARC’s systems. It was obvious she was intending to wipe all the data they had collected on the anomaly project, which was no doubt why she had blown up the Cavendish Labs, to destroy whatever Annie Morris had been processing through their super-computer.
“Two…”
Reluctantly, Connor turned back to the keyboard. He knew Helen couldn’t be trusted but he couldn’t just do nothing while her clones tortured his friend. He started to tap in the entry codes to the security settings…
A gunshot tore through the atrium but instead of being followed by another scream, Connor heard the thump of a body hitting the floor. He swivelled around in his chair to see the black-uniformed body of the clone that had shot his fellow technician lying in a widening poor of its own blood.
A second bullet dropped another clone.
Connor looked up and almost yelped in surprise when he saw a rifle in the hands of a dead man, pointing directly at Helen. He watched her look down to see a red dot from a laser site hovering directly over her heart. To his surprise, her lips quirked into a sneer and Connor knew perfectly well that was not a normal reaction for someone with a gun barrel trained on them. The sneer spread into a supercilious smile and he saw the fingers of her right hand start to flex.
A sudden grunt shattered the brittle silence that had suddenly enveloped the atrium. Helen’s confident look turned to one of shock and she staggered forward a step, twisting around to try to stare at her own back. Connor realised with satisfaction that a black knife hilt was protruding from the flashy part of her lower shoulder. Captain Stringer was on his knees, swaying slightly as he gripped the handgun that had fallen from the grip of the dead clone. He was breathing heavily and staring up at the man with a rifle on the first floor. Connor though for a moment that Stringer was about to fire, then Lester stepped up to the rail, a pistol held tightly in his hand.
A sudden shriek from Ali Khan took Connor wholly by surprise and shocked him into immobility.
Ryan – if it was Ryan and not another of Helen’s creations – made a sharp gesture with one hand, swung his weapon up to his shoulder and fired.
Stringer dropped to the floor.
9.10am. Internal Garage. Anomaly Research Centre.
Leek held tightly to Lyle’s waist as the motorbike tore up the ramp to the garage. A sudden flash of light in front of them caused Lyle to swear under his breath and swerve to the left, avoiding the concrete wall by no more than a couple of centimetres.
For a heart-lurching moment, Leek thought Lyle had lost control and was about to skid sideways into the anomaly that had appeared in the air in front of them, then with another curse, he heaved the motorbike back on track and shot past the anomaly into the cavernous garage.
Leek turned his head and saw something streak out of the anomaly next to them, keeping pace with the motorbike with an ease that shouldn’t have been possible. A huge, beaked head snapped sideways, and Leek felt the material of his jacket tear. Something that looked a giant, steroidal ostrich squawked loudly and lunged again. Lyle yanked the bike to one side in a tight spin and then accelerated again.
The sound of a gunshot came through the huge doors that led to the atrium. For a moment, Leek hoped that they might be about to get some help, then the realisation dawned that whoever was doing the shooting could easily be in the same sort of trouble that was besetting him and Lyle and that the anomaly that had opened in front of them might not be the only one in the building.
The creature that had just come too close to Leek for comfort wasn’t the only one to have come out of the anomaly. Other five or six were ranged around the swirling ball of light and another three appeared to be making their way into the atrium through the enormous open doors.
“Turkey for dinner?” Lyle enquired, taking the bike into another skid.
Leek had a feeling that if anything was likely to be on the menu it would be them, not the monstrous birds that were now flocking around them. But it wasn’t the first time Lyle had got them out of a difficult situation, so maybe the lieutenant’s luck would hold just a little while longer. The only problem was that while Lyle was in the driving seat, so to speak, he wasn’t in any position to bring any of the items in his considerable arsenal to bear on their pursuers.
Lyle brought the motorbike to an abrupt hall, kicked down the stand and was already swinging one of the rifles off his back while Leek was still doing his best to regain the use of legs that appeared to have turned to jelly, whilst at the same time fumbling for the gun he’d been given.
The pistol bucked in his hand and he was sure the shot had gone wide
The chatter of automatic weapons fire echoed around the garage.
9.15am. First Floor. Anomaly Research Centre.
Lester stared down with horror at the chaos that had overtaken the command centre.
One of the skeletal predators had Ali Khan by the foot and was dragging him inexorably towards the anomaly in the middle of the room, its longs claws wrapped around his ankle. The shot that Ryan had fired in the instant that he had signalled to Stringer to get out of his line of fire had grazed the creature’s hairless skull, but hadn’t killed it as it had moved just as Ryan had squeezed the trigger. Khan was screaming like a wild animal in pain.
Stringer rolled over, coating himself liberally in Khan’s blood in the process, and grabbed the terrified man by the hand, trying to stop him being hauled into the anomaly, then almost before Lester’s mind had processed the events unfolding in front of him, more of the hideously mutated predators poured through the anomaly, scurrying across the floor like cockroaches.
In the same moment, several of the giant birds that had created such havoc on the playing fields of Dulwich College burst through the open door to the garage from where Lester had hear the roar of a motorcycle engine and a volley of gunfire.
The sound of running footsteps caught Lester’s attention and he turned to see Stephen Hart and the female soldier, Tanya Lacey, running as fast as they could down the corridor, with Nick and Abby hard on their heels. A moment later, the boom of a combat shotgun below them told Lester that someone else – probably Captain Becker – had come to join the party.
Shoot first, ask questions later was clearly the order of the day. Like everyone else, Stephen was clearly trying to mask his shock at the sight of a man they’d all thought was dead, but his shock was secondary to the need to stay alive. Lester watched as Stephen took his place at Ryan’s side and started to use his marksmanship stills to target the creatures that were now swarming through the main room of the ARC.
Bullets were being fired from all sides. Lester saw the look of shock on Connor’s face as the young man did the sensible thing and crouched down in front of the ADD, doing his best to stay out of everyone’s line of fire.
The soldiers and Stephen were concentrating on killing as many of the invading creatures as they could as well as doing their best to take down any of Helen’s army of clones that came into their sights. Lester racked the slide on the Glock he was carrying and prepared to put his hours on the indoor range into practice. He didn’t have the same skills as the soldiers or Hart, but he knew enough to hold his own in a fight.
The heavy tread of booted feet approaching them made Lester turn around. Yet another of Helen’s clones was coming towards them holding a pistol at chest height, pointing at them. Lester drew in a sharp breath, then aimed and fired. The Glock bucked in his hands and he held it down hard, readying himself for the next shot. The man crumpled to the floor before he needed to fire again.
“Nice one,” Ryan commented.
“Their reactions are slow,” Lester said, trying to ignore the sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. It was the first time he had killed a man – if the clones were indeed human – but now wasn’t the time for that sort of concern.
“Those buggers down there aren’t slow,” Hart said, picking of one of the steroidal ostriches in a spray of blood and feathers.
Lester couldn’t recall their Latin name but he’d read the report of the attack on the school often enough to remember the wholly apt description Terror Birds. One of them bent to slash with its wicked beak at the bloodied form of Captain Stringer. The soldier kicked upwards with one booted foot and it squawked in outrage, ruffling up its black and white plumage and readying itself for another attack.
“Stringer, duck!” The voice was Thompson’s and was followed immediately by the blast of a shotgun.
The huge bird recoiled, slipping on the bloodied tiles, but didn’t go down. Hart and Ryan trained their weapons on it in the same instant and quite literally blew it apart.
In the midst of the biggest bloodbath Lester had ever witnessed, he saw Helen Cutter reach around with one hand and pull the knife blade free of her shoulder. Her face held a strange mix of pain and irritation as she stood there like a spider in the middle of its web.
A motorcycle skidded into the atrium, swerved to avoid one of the birds and then drove straight at one of the predators. Lester recognised the rider as Lyle, with a determined-looking Oliver Leek clinging to his waist with one arm while in his other hand he brandished a pistol. If the circumstances had been different, Lester would have been amused by the incongruity of the sight, but with the ARC overrun by murderous clones and creatures out of a nightmare, there wasn’t much room left for humour.
At his side, Nick Cutter drew in a sharp intake of breath, staring at the doors to the garage. Lester followed his line of sight to see someone entering on foot, dressed in a grey army jacket and a pair of old jeans, his blond hair looking like he’d been dragged through a hedge backwards. Proof had finally arrived – if any more had been needed – that the man who he’d worked with for the past six months wasn’t insane.
Lester stared down in amazement as the other Nick Cutter pulled a gun from the waistband of his jeans, levelled it at his wife and said calmly, “Hello, Helen.”
Authors : fredbassett & munchkinofdoom
Fandom : Primeval
Characters : Ditzy, Leek, Lyle, Connor, Helen, Stringer, Ryan, Lester, Nick, Stephen, Abby, Lacey
Rating : 18
Disclaimer : Not ours, no money made, don’t sue
Spoilers : None
Summary : Ditzy arrives at the ARC, as do Leek and Lyle.
Warning : Slave!fic.
A/N : The links to all previous parts can be found HERE. Captain Thomson appears by courtesy of
deinonychus_1 and Tanya Lacey by courtesy of reggietate. 9.01am. Checkpoint Outside the Anomaly Research Centre.
As Ditzy approached the main gates, he could see smoke arising from blown out windows on the ground floor of the ARC and realised with surprise that a fire engine was driving away from the scene rather than to it. He swung his car across the road, blocking their way, and jumped out to jog over to speak to the driver who was already glaring down at him.
“I work there,” he said. “What’s the problem and why are you going away when I can see smoke?”
“The guy on the gate told us we weren’t wanted,” the driver said, the expression on his face making it perfectly plain what he thought of that. “He had a bloody great big gun, so I wasn’t about to argue the toss.”
Ditzy pulled out his ID card and flashed it at the fire fighter. “Hang on a bit longer, will you, mate? I need to find out what’s going on.”
The driver shook his head. “No can do. Another shout’s already come in. A third bomb’s gone off. It’s bloody mayhem this morning already. You’ll just have to call this one in again if you need us. Now do us a favour and shift yourself.”
Ditzy got back in the car and reversed out of their way. From what he could see, Miller was on duty by the gate, cradling a rifle across his chest and staring out at the world with his usual truculent expression. He couldn’t understand what the man was doing there as gate duty wasn’t something the military contingent got involved with, although he wouldn’t put it past the sergeant to stick his nose in where it wasn’t wanted. When Miller showed no inclination to come over to check his car and made no move to raise the barrier, Ditzy got out again.
“What’s going on?” he asked, gesturing in the direction of the main building.
Miller simply gripped the M4 harder and stared over Ditzy’s shoulder. The sergeant was taciturn at the best of times but his failure to acknowledge a direct question from a ranking officer was unusual, to say the least.
“Sergeant, I asked you what the fuck is going on.” Ditzy would have preferred to be armed for a confrontation with Thomson’s trained attack dog, but if push came to shove, which it looked like it might, he was confident he could take the man, especially if the sergeant carried on refusing to make eye contact.
“Lockdown. No one goes in or out.” The words were delivered in a flat monotone.
“Bombs have been going off everywhere and it looks like at least one has detonated here. Step aside. I’m going in, lockdown or no lockdown.”
The sound of a motorbike engine being revved came from behind him, but Ditzy had other things on his mind at that moment. He’d just looked beyond Miller to the small guard post and had seen what looked like a booted foot just inside the open door. A foot that was attached to a leg clothed in the ubiquitous black uniform of the ARC’s security team. And for all their faults, Ditzy had never known one of the guards sleep on duty.
His fingers flexed and he had to stop himself reaching for the gun he wasn’t carrying.
As though sensing a threat, Miller made a move to bring the barrel of his rifle to bear on Ditzy, but before he could complete the manoeuvre, the roar of the motorcycle engine was drowned out by the sound of a gunshot.
Ditzy watched in amazement as Miller crumpled to the ground, half his head blown away.
The bike came to a halt next to him and a voice he was all too familiar with announced, “Two down, fuck knows how many to go.”
Ditzy turned around and stared into a pair of amused hazel eyes. “Jesus, Lyle, have you been practising dramatic entrances?”
“Natural talent,” Lyle said.
A quick look inside the guard post confirmed Ditzy’s suspicions. Both guards were dead, shot in the head at close range. He took a moment to strip the men of their weapons and came back out carrying two semi-automatic pistols and two M4 carbines. He slung one over his shoulder and handed the other to Lyle, who did the same and for good measure stripped Miller of his weapons as well.
“What the fuck’s going on, Jon?”
“At a guess, I’d say Helen Bloody Cutter is doing her best to fuck us over.”
Oliver Leek, looking like a man who wanted to be anywhere but on the back of a motorbike without a helmet, held one hand out to Ditzy. “I would prefer not to face whatever is in there unarmed, Lieutenant.”
Ditzy handed him one of the handguns without question. He knew that Lyle had been giving Leek lessons on the gun range. “You said two down…?” He had a feeling he knew what Lyle was going to say next, but wanted confirmation that Lyle was now aware of the clones.
“He’s not the first Miller I’ve killed today. Another one blew up Mr Leek’s house and then tried to take his car out with an RPG. We were in it at the time.”
The same RPG that was now strapped to the side of the motorbike. Lyle was obviously operating on a waste not, want not principle and had no doubt stripped the first body of weapons as well, judging by the fact that he had a Sig Sauer in a thigh holster, as well as his usual Glock in a shoulder-rig and a combat shotgun already slung over his back. In view of the number of bombs that had already done off, Ditzy was just surprised that Lyle had managed to reach the ARC without an Armed Response Vehicle on his tail.
Counting the version of Miller that Blade had killed in the bunker in the grounds and the dead cleaner that had vanished from the basement during the first attack on the ARC, that made at least four of them. And there were almost certainly more if the number of bomb blasts was anything to go by. Ditzy had a nasty feeling that Helen regarded the clones as disposable commodities.
“I can’t raise anyone in the ARC,” he said as he ejected the clip from the pistol and checked the mechanism before reloading and pumping a round into the breach. “Miller… it… sent the fire crew away and no bugger inside is answering their phone.”
“Then it’s time for the cavalry to pull their arses out of the fire,” Lyle said, looking a lot happier than Leek at the prospect of some action. “I presume I’ll be onto a loser asking you to stay out here, Mr Leek?”
“You presume correctly,” Leek replied, even though maintaining an impression of disdain was clearly taking some effort.
Lyle sighed theatrically. “Don’t say I didn’t give you the chance to bail.” He revved the engine and looked expectantly at Ditzy.
Ditzy nodded and went back into the guard house to operate the mechanism to raise the barrier. Lyle promptly roared off with Leek clinging to his waist as Ditzy legged it back to his car to follow them up the ramp into the underground garage. He just hoped that the dead body sprawled on the tarmac would serve as a Keep Out sign for any staff about to arrive for work.
9.08am. The Atrium. Anomaly Research Centre.
Connor stared in horror as Ali Khan writhed on the floor, clutching his shattered kneecap.
One of the clones stood over him, the gun that had done the damage still pointing down at the screaming technician.
“He has two knees, Connor, but not for much longer.” Helen’s voice was calm and measured, as though she was discussion the results of a laboratory experiment and hadn’t just given an order that had resulted in an innocent man being shot. “Now are you going to turn off your firewalls or are you going to be responsible for causing your colleague an awful lot more pain?” She stared down at the injured man for a moment, a slight smile playing over her lips before she turned the full force of her stare back on Connor. “I said turn off your firewalls. I want access to the system and I want it now.”
“Do it, Connor.” The order came from Stringer.
Connor looked over at the injured captain. Stringer held his gaze and nodded. A widening patch of blood was spreading across Stringer’s black shirt from the bullet wound in his shoulder and Connor could see pain from the injury deeply etched on the man’s face.
“Why are you doing this, Helen?” Connor asked, doing his best to meet her eyes. “You’re responsible for all those bombs, aren’t you? You’re targeting anywhere that you think might have data on the project.”
Helen rolled her eyes. “Someone give the boy a prize. Yes, Connor, I’m responsible for the bombs. Now stop playing for time, do as the captain says and turn off your firewalls. I won’t ask you again.” She turned to the clone at her side, nodded at Ali Khan whose cries had now turned to whimpers and said, “Count to three and then shoot his other kneecap.”
“One…” The clone spoke in a dull monotone, his dark eyes fixed on the already-injured man.
Ali Khan twisted on the blood-stained tiles, his face a contorted mask of agony.
Connor knew Helen wasn’t bluffing but he didn’t want to allow her access to the ARC’s systems. It was obvious she was intending to wipe all the data they had collected on the anomaly project, which was no doubt why she had blown up the Cavendish Labs, to destroy whatever Annie Morris had been processing through their super-computer.
“Two…”
Reluctantly, Connor turned back to the keyboard. He knew Helen couldn’t be trusted but he couldn’t just do nothing while her clones tortured his friend. He started to tap in the entry codes to the security settings…
A gunshot tore through the atrium but instead of being followed by another scream, Connor heard the thump of a body hitting the floor. He swivelled around in his chair to see the black-uniformed body of the clone that had shot his fellow technician lying in a widening poor of its own blood.
A second bullet dropped another clone.
Connor looked up and almost yelped in surprise when he saw a rifle in the hands of a dead man, pointing directly at Helen. He watched her look down to see a red dot from a laser site hovering directly over her heart. To his surprise, her lips quirked into a sneer and Connor knew perfectly well that was not a normal reaction for someone with a gun barrel trained on them. The sneer spread into a supercilious smile and he saw the fingers of her right hand start to flex.
A sudden grunt shattered the brittle silence that had suddenly enveloped the atrium. Helen’s confident look turned to one of shock and she staggered forward a step, twisting around to try to stare at her own back. Connor realised with satisfaction that a black knife hilt was protruding from the flashy part of her lower shoulder. Captain Stringer was on his knees, swaying slightly as he gripped the handgun that had fallen from the grip of the dead clone. He was breathing heavily and staring up at the man with a rifle on the first floor. Connor though for a moment that Stringer was about to fire, then Lester stepped up to the rail, a pistol held tightly in his hand.
A sudden shriek from Ali Khan took Connor wholly by surprise and shocked him into immobility.
Ryan – if it was Ryan and not another of Helen’s creations – made a sharp gesture with one hand, swung his weapon up to his shoulder and fired.
Stringer dropped to the floor.
9.10am. Internal Garage. Anomaly Research Centre.
Leek held tightly to Lyle’s waist as the motorbike tore up the ramp to the garage. A sudden flash of light in front of them caused Lyle to swear under his breath and swerve to the left, avoiding the concrete wall by no more than a couple of centimetres.
For a heart-lurching moment, Leek thought Lyle had lost control and was about to skid sideways into the anomaly that had appeared in the air in front of them, then with another curse, he heaved the motorbike back on track and shot past the anomaly into the cavernous garage.
Leek turned his head and saw something streak out of the anomaly next to them, keeping pace with the motorbike with an ease that shouldn’t have been possible. A huge, beaked head snapped sideways, and Leek felt the material of his jacket tear. Something that looked a giant, steroidal ostrich squawked loudly and lunged again. Lyle yanked the bike to one side in a tight spin and then accelerated again.
The sound of a gunshot came through the huge doors that led to the atrium. For a moment, Leek hoped that they might be about to get some help, then the realisation dawned that whoever was doing the shooting could easily be in the same sort of trouble that was besetting him and Lyle and that the anomaly that had opened in front of them might not be the only one in the building.
The creature that had just come too close to Leek for comfort wasn’t the only one to have come out of the anomaly. Other five or six were ranged around the swirling ball of light and another three appeared to be making their way into the atrium through the enormous open doors.
“Turkey for dinner?” Lyle enquired, taking the bike into another skid.
Leek had a feeling that if anything was likely to be on the menu it would be them, not the monstrous birds that were now flocking around them. But it wasn’t the first time Lyle had got them out of a difficult situation, so maybe the lieutenant’s luck would hold just a little while longer. The only problem was that while Lyle was in the driving seat, so to speak, he wasn’t in any position to bring any of the items in his considerable arsenal to bear on their pursuers.
Lyle brought the motorbike to an abrupt hall, kicked down the stand and was already swinging one of the rifles off his back while Leek was still doing his best to regain the use of legs that appeared to have turned to jelly, whilst at the same time fumbling for the gun he’d been given.
The pistol bucked in his hand and he was sure the shot had gone wide
The chatter of automatic weapons fire echoed around the garage.
9.15am. First Floor. Anomaly Research Centre.
Lester stared down with horror at the chaos that had overtaken the command centre.
One of the skeletal predators had Ali Khan by the foot and was dragging him inexorably towards the anomaly in the middle of the room, its longs claws wrapped around his ankle. The shot that Ryan had fired in the instant that he had signalled to Stringer to get out of his line of fire had grazed the creature’s hairless skull, but hadn’t killed it as it had moved just as Ryan had squeezed the trigger. Khan was screaming like a wild animal in pain.
Stringer rolled over, coating himself liberally in Khan’s blood in the process, and grabbed the terrified man by the hand, trying to stop him being hauled into the anomaly, then almost before Lester’s mind had processed the events unfolding in front of him, more of the hideously mutated predators poured through the anomaly, scurrying across the floor like cockroaches.
In the same moment, several of the giant birds that had created such havoc on the playing fields of Dulwich College burst through the open door to the garage from where Lester had hear the roar of a motorcycle engine and a volley of gunfire.
The sound of running footsteps caught Lester’s attention and he turned to see Stephen Hart and the female soldier, Tanya Lacey, running as fast as they could down the corridor, with Nick and Abby hard on their heels. A moment later, the boom of a combat shotgun below them told Lester that someone else – probably Captain Becker – had come to join the party.
Shoot first, ask questions later was clearly the order of the day. Like everyone else, Stephen was clearly trying to mask his shock at the sight of a man they’d all thought was dead, but his shock was secondary to the need to stay alive. Lester watched as Stephen took his place at Ryan’s side and started to use his marksmanship stills to target the creatures that were now swarming through the main room of the ARC.
Bullets were being fired from all sides. Lester saw the look of shock on Connor’s face as the young man did the sensible thing and crouched down in front of the ADD, doing his best to stay out of everyone’s line of fire.
The soldiers and Stephen were concentrating on killing as many of the invading creatures as they could as well as doing their best to take down any of Helen’s army of clones that came into their sights. Lester racked the slide on the Glock he was carrying and prepared to put his hours on the indoor range into practice. He didn’t have the same skills as the soldiers or Hart, but he knew enough to hold his own in a fight.
The heavy tread of booted feet approaching them made Lester turn around. Yet another of Helen’s clones was coming towards them holding a pistol at chest height, pointing at them. Lester drew in a sharp breath, then aimed and fired. The Glock bucked in his hands and he held it down hard, readying himself for the next shot. The man crumpled to the floor before he needed to fire again.
“Nice one,” Ryan commented.
“Their reactions are slow,” Lester said, trying to ignore the sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. It was the first time he had killed a man – if the clones were indeed human – but now wasn’t the time for that sort of concern.
“Those buggers down there aren’t slow,” Hart said, picking of one of the steroidal ostriches in a spray of blood and feathers.
Lester couldn’t recall their Latin name but he’d read the report of the attack on the school often enough to remember the wholly apt description Terror Birds. One of them bent to slash with its wicked beak at the bloodied form of Captain Stringer. The soldier kicked upwards with one booted foot and it squawked in outrage, ruffling up its black and white plumage and readying itself for another attack.
“Stringer, duck!” The voice was Thompson’s and was followed immediately by the blast of a shotgun.
The huge bird recoiled, slipping on the bloodied tiles, but didn’t go down. Hart and Ryan trained their weapons on it in the same instant and quite literally blew it apart.
In the midst of the biggest bloodbath Lester had ever witnessed, he saw Helen Cutter reach around with one hand and pull the knife blade free of her shoulder. Her face held a strange mix of pain and irritation as she stood there like a spider in the middle of its web.
A motorcycle skidded into the atrium, swerved to avoid one of the birds and then drove straight at one of the predators. Lester recognised the rider as Lyle, with a determined-looking Oliver Leek clinging to his waist with one arm while in his other hand he brandished a pistol. If the circumstances had been different, Lester would have been amused by the incongruity of the sight, but with the ARC overrun by murderous clones and creatures out of a nightmare, there wasn’t much room left for humour.
At his side, Nick Cutter drew in a sharp intake of breath, staring at the doors to the garage. Lester followed his line of sight to see someone entering on foot, dressed in a grey army jacket and a pair of old jeans, his blond hair looking like he’d been dragged through a hedge backwards. Proof had finally arrived – if any more had been needed – that the man who he’d worked with for the past six months wasn’t insane.
Lester stared down in amazement as the other Nick Cutter pulled a gun from the waistband of his jeans, levelled it at his wife and said calmly, “Hello, Helen.”