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"Don't know," the Armorer said. "Wasn't here when we got here."
"Who's in the tunnel?"
Jak was still trading lead with someone, though the forays weren't very
industrious.
"Those White Sands soldiers," J.B. replied.
"They are a tenacious lot, Ryan," Doc commented. "Filled with vim and vigor."
Across the room the plant-thing showed signs of regaining its strength. Ryan
watched it, his stomach cold and hard. A glance at Krysty at his side showed
that she was pale, covered with perspiration that ran in large drops.
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"It wants me to help it," Krysty said. "Wants me to kill you." Her pistol
trembled in her hands. "Gaia, help me, Ryan, but I don't think I can hold it
off much longer." A fine trickle of blood ran down her upper lip from her
nose.
Ryan saw the sheen suddenly dilate inside the red-haired woman's eyes. Without
warning, Krysty brought the gun around toward him.
"I'm sorry, lover," she said in a barely audible whisper.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Reacting instantly, Ryan slapped the woman with the back of his fist, catching
her flush on the jawline.
Krysty dropped, unconscious.
"Take her, Doc."
"Of course." Doc knelt and took up the woman, struggling with her weight and
dragging her to safety as much as carrying her.
"Fools," the plant-thing said. "She will be mine. She has an affinity for me
and my kind that you will never understand." It approached but seemed leery,
as if afraid of the burning flares that could possibly still strike it.
"Can't stay here," J.B. said.
"I know." Ryan swiveled his head, looking for options.
The LED continued without falter despite the ruin scattered around the
room 2:20.
Ryan took Krysty by one arm, leaving Doc the other. "Fall back while it's
scared." He started forward, heading farther back into the room.
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The plant-thing gathered its strength, getting more confident.
Ryan concentrated on the cryo chambers. So far they seemed still operational.
He didn't much figure they would hold the plant-thing off, but they could give
the group a more defensible position.
"No closer!" a voice roared.
Ryan froze in his tracks, barely able to make out Victor Boldt's features in
the shadows.
Blood traced the patrician looks, and his hair was plastered to his head.
Madness gleamed in his eyes above the sights of the pistol he held. "You
people have destroyed everything," he snarled. "Do you realize what you've
done?"
"I reckon we've stopped you from killing some folks," Ryan said grimly.
"You haven't stopped anything, you pathetic moron. As long as my father is
alive, that plague is going to be released anyway. You've only succeeded in
killing me along with you."
"Somehow," Ryan said, "I can't rightly say I feel too bad about that.
Mildred."
"Say when," the woman replied.
"Stop it!" Boldt roared. "Or I'll shoot you right where "
"When," Ryan said.
Boldt got off one round, which cut through the loose material of Doc's frock
coat. Then a single round from Mildred's pistol punched a hole through the
man's forehead. Only a small amount of blood appeared as the slack body
dropped into the foot-deep, swirling water.
"No!" The ululating cry echoed within the vault, cracking some of the speakers
used to translate whatever means the plant-thing had to communicate. The
emotion was raw, blistering in its intensity.
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"Move," Ryan ordered. There were no more rounds left in the flare gun to hold
it at bay.
The water level in the room had stopped gaining, and now swirled around their
legs just below the knees. Machinery and computer components continued
shorting out, unleashing myriad bright sparks that soared like streaking
comets.
"Door," Jak said, indicating the steel door that almost blended into the wall
at the side of the cryo chambers. It was partially open, water lapping at the
dark interior.
"Check it out," Ryan replied. He left Krysty in Doc's care.
The clock read 1:53.
They were all running out of time. He glanced at the freezing reservoirs.
"Those are full of liquid nitrogen."
J.B. nodded.
"I'm figuring that bastard plant won't like the cold any more than it liked
fire."
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