The Chosen

She wondered, briefly, what was really going on. What did "containment breach" actually mean? But she took Bergstrom at his word. She had little choice.

"All right," she said. "Action I can do. What now?"

"Around this corner is the entrance to a control station. It will likely be guarded inside and out. You must get me inside at all costs."

"And then?"

"You must get out of this facility," he said, "and as far away as you can, as fast as you can."

She drew the sword to her. Bergstrom took a step back.

"Marvelous," he breathed. "What a terrible shame I shall never get to study the means whereby you do that!"

She put the back of her shoulders to the wall. It felt cold and hard through the fabric of her shirt and jacket. She took a deep breath and spun into the cross corridor.

A score of people occupied the passage. They moved in both directions in clumps. She had no idea where they were going or what they were doing.

A pair of men in black stood thirty yards down from her. They had MP-5s in their gloved hands. Their body language suggested they were distrustful of the technicians leavened with lab-coated scientists.

The one farthest from A

They didn't move quickly enough. He opened fire. The sound suppressor kept the burst from being intolerably loud in the confines of the corridor. But it still sounded, like an unmuffled motorcycle engine.

Some of the screams went up in timbre – or stopped. The guard was spraying bullets toward A

She was ru

On impulse she jumped. She straightened her body so that, just for an instant, she flew nearly horizontal. She lunged with the sword. She felt the blade bite deep, heard a hoarse cry of pain.

She landed heavily, pulling the sword with her as she fell.

The man had collapsed, his weapon stilled. She wheeled to find the other shooter, hunched in pain, the victim of a ricocheted bullet.

She swung her right foot and kicked away his weapon. He didn't attempt to stop her.

Some of the fleeing perso

Through the wounded people Dr. Bergstrom made his way. He was walking bent over, clutching the right side of his substantial belly with his hand. The shirt beneath was dyed bright pink.

"You're hit," A

"I'll live," he replied conversationally enough, although his hairline was beaded with sweat. "Long enough at least."

She found herself standing outside a sealed door. There was a keypad with a slot mounted next to it. It offered nothing she could use.

"What now?" she asked as Bergstrom limped up.

He raised a hand holding a plastic card toward the pad.

"No biometrics?" she asked as he swiped its magnetic strip down the slot.

"No money," he said. "Our budget was far from unlimited. Our security was assumed."

He punched a quick five-number combination. "Get ready," he said, through now gritted teeth.

The door slid open. A guard stood there with a Beretta in his hand.

A

A technician in powder blue rose from a swivel chair in front of a bank of monitors. He stared in horror at A

"Dr. Bergstrom!" he exclaimed.

"Get out, Yee," Bergstrom said. His teeth were individually outlined in scarlet. The technician paled as he saw this, then darted past him and out into the corridor. As he did, a fresh spate of screams wafted in past him.

"It has begun," Bergstrom said, leaning with a hand on the table in front of the console and frowning at the monitors. Whether he referred to what he saw or the terrified cries from outside the small room A

He looked at her. His features were rigidly held against the pain of his wound. She guessed the anesthetic effects of wound shock were already begi

"You must go now, as well," he said. "Turn right, down the corridor for forty yards. Left into the stairwell. Go up two flights. It will put you in a truck tu

Chapter 28

A black thing flew level, straight for her eyes. Black wings seemed to span the corridor. All she could make out of the head were the two huge red eyes that shone upon her like malevolent lamps.

A

She ran, vaulting writhing black ruin. Before her a creature the size and shape of a natural wolf, but with a coat of that light-sucking black, looked up from the torn-out throat of the hapless Yee with red, glowing eyes. She raised her sword. But a second creature, longer and leaner and feline in outline and sinuous motion, attacked the wolf from behind. Squalling and snarling, they turned into a furious ball of fangs and claws. She ran past them.

Without looking back she sprinted to the door to the stairs, yanked it open and went rabbiting up.

The truck tu

A

There was just one thing wrong with the tu

The battle lines were anything but clear-cut. The black monsters seemed as ferociously – or desperately – eager to battle one another as the black-clad humans. The humans, meanwhile, seemed almost as inclined to turn their guns, knives and fists on one another as on the animal horrors.

Guns flashed and roared. Men howled as their flesh was torn by great taloned paws. Empty cartridge cases crashed on fused stone, adding a madly whimsical wind-chime effect to the aural horror show.

A

With a shrill scream something glided toward her from the ceiling. She ducked out of its way. It wheeled, buffeted her with its wings. She took a stu