David Golemon - Ripper

Behind them two of Smith’s men, their teeth elongated and with both drooling spittle, started convulsing as even more of Perdition’s Fire was inhaled. Then as one they started bashing their ham-sized fists into the walls, creating giant holes with each blow. Farther down the hallway as Smith once more rose from the fog laced with Perdition’s Fire, he saw what the two men were doing and nodded his massive head and laughed as he and the other two started to repeat what the first men were doing. They needed to get into the walls and the spaces behind them so they could control the complex from directions its defenders would never believe possible. The first two broke through to the empty and nonfunctioning elevator shaft at the far end of the hallway, even as Smith started laughing uncontrollably as his men were tearing into the walls like they were papier-mâché.

The Security Department had lost the first round with Lawrence Ambrose’s chemically improved soldiers, with four security personnel dead and level seventeen lost.

On level eight, Niles stopped to get some air into his lungs. It was right about then that he regretted excusing all officers and supervisors from the intramural activities such as the football game they watched just three days ago. As he sat down on one of the steel risers to catch his breath, he was soon joined by the other two scientists that could have used a prescription for exercise as both Pete and Charlie virtually collapsed on the steps just below him.

“Did you hear that gunfire a minute ago?” Charlie asked as he leaned against the sealed elevator tube that ran along the stairwell. “That was a serious firefight.”

“I wouldn’t know a serious one from two gang members banging it out on a street corner,” Pete said as he reached up on his chest and felt his racing heart.

“Pete, why is Europa off-line? The warning lights have stopped and she hasn’t made any announcements about the evacuation since we started back up the stairs.”

Pete managed to look up at the director. They were all soaked with sweat because one of Europa’s last commands was to shut down the air conditioning systems because of the threat of spreading the contaminate to other levels.

“When the intruder alarm was sounded, Europa had programming instructions to shut down everything so she cannot be compromised by the intruders. A serious programming error by yours truly I’m afraid. I just couldn’t fathom any scenario where I could not override any of her protocols.” Pete looked away. “I’m sorry.”

Niles reached down and patted Pete on the back as he rose from the stair he had been resting on.

“Well, that’s another reason for returning to the office level. You can get her going once you reach the computer center, right?”

“You bet I can, as long as nothing interferes once we get there.”

The white-haired Charlie Ellenshaw was still leaning against the steel and plastic tube of one of the eighteen different elevator shafts when he thought he felt something inside of the sealed tube the elevators rode on with compressed air. He removed his glasses and tried not to breathe for a moment as he listened. He shushed Niles and Pete as he placed his ear closer to the tube.

“Pete, Europa shut down everything you said?”

Pete saw what Ellenshaw was doing and nodded his head. “The elevators were the first thing cut off after the intruder alarm sounded, Charlie.”

Ellenshaw leaned back onto the stairwell. “Uh, maybe we better get to the next level because something seems to be coming this way — it’s noisy and very much in a hurry.”

Pete placed his ear to the tube and listened as Charlie shot up a few steps, took Niles by the arm, and started pushing him up the remaining stairs. As Golding listened he could hear grunting coming through the round tube that activated the elevator system just like an everyday drive-through bank deposit tube. His eyes widened when he heard the impact of something as it traveled upward. Pete wondered if something was in the tube but didn’t wait for an answer as his frightened imagination produced any number of possibilities after Captain Everett’s description of the nightmare in Mexico. He started running after Niles and Charlie.

“Oh, this is bad,” Pete said as he tried to catch up with the suddenly fast-moving director and cryptozoologist.

Virginia, Mendenhall, Gloria, and Sarah were having the same problems getting down to level thirty-four where they could evacuate. Sarah was just now getting her senses back and refused to slow the others down. She leaned against the stairwell wall and wiped the last of her bleeding wound to the top of her head away. Virginia again ripped part of her lab coat to dab at the large cut in Sarah’s scalp.

“Girl, you’re not doing too well the last few days, are you?” Virginia said, trying not to hurt the small geologist anymore than needed.

Sarah looked up with her swollen and blackened eyes and touched the large gash on her cheek. “I have had far better weeks.”

“Sarah, is what you said about the colonel true?” Will asked as he placed an arm around the still-sobbing Gloria Bannister.

“I don’t know Will. When I was taken Jack was still alive, but these men are ruthless.”

“Do you think you can get to level thirty-four from here?” Mendenhall asked as he pulled Gloria’s arms from around him where she had been holding on to him with a death grip.

Sarah and Virginia looked at him at the same time. Sarah removed the blood-stained rag from Virginia’s hand and glared at Will.

“We’ve already been separated from everyone else, and in case you didn’t hear what I heard, Carl has his hands full up on seventeen. So consider that if you want to get yourself into the fight, because we’re going to go with you if you attempt to leave. We follow orders remember?”

From somewhere high above them they heard a crash and a moment later several large chunks of plastic and concrete flew past them on the stairwell. Each person standing on the stairs ventured to look up into the darkness over their heads. That was when they heard loud, very heavy footsteps on the steel steps several levels up.

“What in the hell is that?” Virginia asked out loud.

“I don’t know, but it doesn’t sound like kids playing on the stairs,” Sarah said as she tried to penetrate the darkness with her damaged eyes.

Suddenly the stairwell was filled with an animalistic roar that reverberated off the concrete walls. The sound vibrated the steel stairs beneath their feet and shook the handrails.

“Oh, shit,” Will hissed as he started pushing the women before him down the stairs. “I’ve heard that before and I didn’t like it much then either!”

The four people started their flight down the stairs and just hoped beyond reason that unlike the regular elevators, the cargo elevator was up and working.

That was when the lights went out.

As Everett and nine men ran upward after being cut off by two of Smith’s enraged giants, he heard something breaking into the elevator tube on seventeen that was even more terrifying than the roars, laughter, and screams of the transformed men. He called a halt to their flight so he could listen more clearly. His men came to a stop and immediately went into a defensive position with weapons aimed up and down the semidark stairwell. Everett leaned over and placed a hand on the steel tube, feeling the shocks from the blows and then something else — the steady thump of something that sounded as if it were running, or worse, climbing or descending the tube itself. He leaned back and looked at a marine gunnery sergeant who had just spent two full tours overseas, one in Iraq and the other in Afghanistan.