David Robbins - Houston Run

But out in the “real world,” where the law of the jungle prevailed, where survival of the fittest was the standard, sharp senses were critical. They could mean the difference between life and death.

Lynx glanced at Gremlin. “Gremlin, keep your ears peeled. You’ve got the best hearing, so we’ll rely on you to warn us if someone comes our way.”

“Gremlin will not let you down, yes!” Gremlin vowed.

Lynx grinned. “Then let’s go save Blade and Hickok, and whip some ass in the bargain.” He moved along the passage to the door, then paused, listening. “I don’t hear nothin’,” he said. “Do you?” he asked Gremlin.

Gremlin shook his head. “Gremlin not hear any noise, any voices outside, no,” he replied.

Lynx nodded, and slowly twisted the latch. The door opened with a faint snap. He carefully eased the door outward and peered around the edge. “Wow!” he exclaimed.

“What do you see?” Ferret asked.

Lynx glanced over his left shoulder. “It’s incredible! I thought the Doc had a fancy setup. Take a gander at this.” He moved aside.

Ferret stepped to the doorway and peeked past the door. His brown eyes widened in amazement.

The aircraft was parked in a hangar, as Ferret had earlier speculated, but the size, the sheer scope of the facility, was beyond his wildest imagining. The building was immense. The ceiling alone was 300 feet above the cement floor. Lengthwise, the structure covered 500 yards, and its width was half again as great. The aircraft was situated in one of the corners, its tail extended toward the middle of the hangar, according them an unobstructed view of the interior.

“Gremlin wants to take a look, yes?” Gremlin said.

Ferret retreated and stood next to Lynx. “What sort of technology are we dealing with here?” he asked in an awed voice.

“Even the Doc’s lab, the Biological Center, was puny compared to this,” Lynx commented.

“Where do we begin to search for Blade and Hickok?” Ferret inquired.

“We’ve got a problem there,” Lynx conceded. “I can’t pick up much of their scent.”

“The Warriors were being carried,” Ferret said. “Their feet weren’t touching the ground.”

“We’ll find a way,” Lynx predicted confidently.

Gremlin suddenly ducked from the doorway. “Someone is coming, yes!” he cried.

“Who is it?” Lynx asked.

“Another man dressed in silver, yes!” Gremlin told them.

“Did he see you?” Lynx asked.

Gremlin shook his head. “Gremlin doesn’t think so, no!”

Lynx nodded at the row of doors lining the left side of the passage.

“Quick! Each of us in a closet!”

The three genetic deviates hurried into hiding.

Not a moment too soon.

The outer door was abruptly wrenched all the way open, and a giant silver man entered the aircraft.

Lynx, his closet door deliberately left slightly ajar, saw the giant enter.

The silver man was holding a clipboard in his left hand and he passed once inside and gazed at the doorway, as if perplexed at finding the door partially open. He turned and moved past the row of closets. Lynx could hear the giant’s firm tread, and guessed the silver man had turned right at the junction and gone to the cockpit. What was the giant doing? Lynx wondered. Checking the aircraft after its flight? He slid from the closet and padded to the junction, then looked around the corner. Sure enough, the giant was in the cockpit, standing in front of the computer, studying a digital display and writing on a white pad affixed to the clipboard.

The giant’s broad back was to the doorway.

Lynx padded down the corridor to the cockpit door, calculating his next move. Finding Blade and Hickok would be an easy task if they knew where to look, and it was possible the giant in the cockpit knew where the two Warriors were being held. Lynx resolved to force the giant to talk using whatever means were necessary. His feline instincts were warning him to vacate this place—wherever it might be—as quickly as feasible, and he wasn’t one to argue with his instincts. But how, he asked himself, was he going to force the seven-foot giant to spill the beans? Walk on over and say, “Pretty please?”

The silver man leaned forward, examining a readout in the center of the console. He was at the foot of the middle chair.

Lynx, pondering his options, abruptly perceived a risky gambit, a way of giving himself the advantage, and he uttered a trilling sound deep in his throat as he launched his diminutive body forward, bounding across the cockpit. He reached the back of the middle chair in two leaps, his claws digging into the top of the chair as he vaulted upward, his sinewy arms coiling and surging his body up and over the chair. He came over the top like a furry arrow, his fingers extended, his tapered claws grasping for his prey.

The silver man heard a soft noise behind him and started to straighten and turn. He was not anticipating an attack, and he moved slowly.

Which suited Lynx’s plans perfectly. He reached the giant just as the silver man completed turning, and his nails ripped into the blond man’s uniform at the crotch, shredding the material like so much paper, tearing the silver fabric in a single swift swipe, then spearing inward, aiming at the giant’s privates. Lynx intended to slice the blond man’s gonads from his body.

But there weren’t any.

Lynx’s mouth dropped in astonishment as his raking claws closed on empty space where the penis should have been. His feet alighted on the chair, and he crouched, preparing to pounce on the silver man’s face.

Only the giant was faster. The blond man’s initial surprise was fleeting.

He twisted to the right as the cat-man tore open his pants, and he swung the clipboard in a brutal arc, backhanding his assailant across the mouth.

Lynx, about to spring, felt the clipboard smash into his lips and teeth.

Blood spurted from his mouth as he was knocked onto his back, onto the chair, dazed and vulnerable.

The silver man, the clipboard clutched in his left hand, reached down with his right and clamped his hand on the cat-man’s neck. “What have we here?” he asked. “How did you escape your cage?”

Lynx thrashed and pounded at the hand restraining him, to no avail.

“You are wasting your energy,” the giant informed the cat-man. “There is no sense in resisting.”

Lynx attempted to bite the hand on his neck.

“Feisty mutant, aren’t you?” the giant queried.

Lynx pulled out all the stops. He raked his claws along the silver man’s right arm, from elbow to wrist, his nails gouging inch-deep furrows in the flesh. A colorless liquid sprayed from the arm, spattering his face. Lynx snarled.

“Cease this foolish resistance this second!” the giant ordered. He raised his left hand above his head, the clipboard poised for another strike.

It never landed.

Ferret flashed from nowhere, his bony fingers rigid, and plunged his fingernails into the giant’s eyes, ramming them in and squeezing.

The silver man stiffened, releasing his hold on Lynx, and grabbed at his eyes.

Ferret was clinging to the giant’s face, his knees on the blond man’s massive chest.

Lynx came up off the chair in a rush, enraged, forgetting his goal, forgetting about Blade and Hickok, thirsting to exact his retribution on the giant. He sprang at the silver man’s stomach, his arms slashing in vicious blow after blow, his razor claws rending the silver material and splitting the blond man’s abdomen wide open, disgorging a flood of liquid and internal organs. In his rabid frenzy, Lynx concentrated on his attack to the exclusion of all else. His arms flailed again and again, turning the giant’s stomach into a stringy, pulpy mess.