James Rollins - Altar Of Eden

He covered his eyes as if that would shut out the truth.

God, no…

A part of him wanted to run out toward the road, calling his brother’s name. But that would only get him killed, too. Burt slunk next to him, belly to the ground, his tail’s tip tentatively wagging, a submissive posture, asking for forgiveness, for reassurance.

Jack reached a hand and rested it on Burt’s flank. “Good boy,” he mouthed quietly.

He had to get moving now-or he never would.

With his heart weighted like a stone, he climbed to his feet and used a key to open the security shell in back. There was no overhead lamp to alert anyone equipped with night vision. He climbed into the back, reached the weapons locker, and fumbled in the dark with another key to unlatch and pull the lid open.

Inside, the lockbox held his service weapon, a Heckler & Koch P2000 double-action pistol, along with his Remington 870 shotgun. He strapped on the pistol but ignored the shotgun. Instead, he reached for the third weapon inside. He’d confiscated it from Garland Chase: an AA-12 combat auto-assault shotgun. Set on auto, shooting three hundred shells per minute, it could shred his truck to shrapnel.

As his brother would describe it, it was one mean-ass motherfucker.

Jack remembered the explosion. He grabbed the weapon. The bastard running this assault might be ruthless, but he never met a Cajun with his blood up. Jack would teach the bastard what it meant to be hunted.

He hopped out of the truck, careful of the gravel, and patted his thigh, a silent command for Burt to follow. Out in the fields and bayous, he and Burt had always made a mean-ass team-and now they had the proper firepower to match.

“C’mon, boy. Let’s go hunting…”

With her hands in the air, Lorna faced the gunman as he came forward. He wore a heavy set of goggles over his eyes, obscuring most of his face. The lack of human features made him all the more menacing. Even more than the assault rifle pointed at her chest.

He waved her to the side with the tip of his weapon. “Get back from the window!”

She obeyed and retreated to the side, bumping against a bench. He kept his weapon pointed at her and lowered himself to one knee beside the two plastic crates on the floor. He quickly peered into each one, then stood up.

He touched two fingers to his throat and spoke in a clipped, military cadence. “Alpha One. I’ve secured one of the scientists. A woman. She has the animals. Two of them. She tossed another out a window on the west side.”

Lorna silently cursed. So he’d witnessed that.

There was a pause, then he spoke again. “The bird. That’s right. I’ll check.”

He flipped up his goggles and touched a switch on his helmet. A lamp flared above his forehead. The brightness blinded her. With the rifle still pointed at her chest, he ducked his head out the window and quickly scanned the lawn and bushes outside the window.

Lorna held her breath.

He pulled his head back and stared back at her. With his goggles off, he looked no more human. Under the helmet lamp, his face was all shadows and stubble, but his eyes shone at her, cold and merciless. She kept perfectly still under that predatory gaze.

But he ignored her and continued his radio communication. “No sign of the parrot.” Another pause as he listened to orders. “Yes, sir. Decapitate the specimens here. Collect the heads. Understood.”

Lorna went cold as he dropped his free hand to his belt and unsheathed a vicious-looking steel dagger. He lowered to a knee, but he kept those dead eyes on her.

He continued to speak into the radio. “I’ll wait for Takeo before moving the woman.”

The soldier-and there was no doubt he was a mercenary commando of some sort-ducked and pointed his helmet lamp into one of the crates. His dagger flashed menacingly in the sharp light.

As if sensing the threat, a frightened chitter rose from the capuchins.

Even past the thunder of her heart, a maternal surge of fury flooded Lorna. She rode that wave and burst forward. In her hands was a steel thermos. When the soldier had searched out the window, she had grabbed the bottle from the bench at her elbow and twisted the cap off one-handed behind her back.

She hurled the contents into the face of the soldier. Caught by surprise, he widened his eyes. The splash of liquid nitrogen struck him across the bridge of his nose. She twisted to the side as his gun reflexively fired. A flurry of rounds blasted past her. Glass shattered from shelves; plaster exploded.

Then gun and dagger toppled from his fingers. Both hands flew to his face. His corneas had been flash-frozen on contact. His eyeballs burst and wept down his face. Blind and in agony, he fell to his back, a scream strangled in his throat. She watched him gasp out a mist of condensation. He must have inhaled some of the liquid nitrogen as it splashed, sucked it into his nose and mouth and down into his throat and lungs.

He writhed and clawed at his face and neck, struggling against the pain, fighting to breathe with frozen lungs.

Lorna held back her own stunned horror before it paralyzed her. She’d never killed a person before-and though the soldier still fought, she knew he was a dead man, a living corpse.

She stumbled on numbed legs past his agonized form and reached the two crates. She knew she didn’t have much time. Others were on their way. She lifted one crate to the window, opened the gate, and upended the carrier. The two capuchins clung inside, scared and confused. She shook the cage, trying to dislodge them. One lost its grip and pulled its conjoined twin with it. The stunned pair tumbled into the dark.

Sorry, little ones.

She hated to abandon them, but their best chance of survival was away from here. She returned to the second crate and hauled it to the open window. Spooked by the gunfire, the frightened cub leaped out as soon as the gate was open.

She dropped the crate and retrieved her rifle. She considered going for the assault rifle, but the soldier writhed on top of it. She couldn’t get any closer-both guilt and terror kept her back.

But there was one thing she still wanted. During his violent struggles, the soldier had knocked the goggles off his helmet. She picked them up off the floor and pulled them over her eyes. The dark room suddenly snapped into a green-phosphorus clarity.

Able to see in the dark, she considered hopping out the same window, fleeing after the animals, but she’d be exposed out in the open. The intruders were well equipped and likely had the grounds under surveillance. The small animals might escape that net. She would not. Her best chance of survival still lay inside, to keep hidden for as long as possible. With the animals free, her only responsibility was to herself-and the others still trapped below.

She fled her lab and headed toward the rear of the facility. Now able to see, she moved swiftly, with more confidence. She needed to reach the veterinary clinic, her domain.

If she could reach there, she had a plan.

OUT FRONT, DUNCAN listened to the garbled moans die over the radio. He had no idea what had happened to his man, the one who had found the woman and the animals, but he’d clearly been incapacitated in some manner.

Another of Korey’s team came on the radio. His voice was raspy with static, but the anger came through clear. “Fielding is down. Dead. No sign of the woman. Crates are empty.”

Duncan touched his throat mike. “Find her.”

He closed his eyes for a moment and sucked on a lime-flavored Life Savers. If the crates were empty, she must have tossed the others out with the bird. The specimens were loose on the grounds.

Opening his eyes, he turned to his second-in-command, Connor Reed. He knew the man had been listening to the radio chatter. Connor’s face was a hard mask. He ran a hand over the stubble of his red hair. The younger man had been with Duncan’s unit going back to boot camp. He’d been the one who led the charge and blew away the mutated chimp that had mauled him in Baghdad.