Стефани Перри: Zero Hour

“Hey!” Billy screamed, no time to reload the Magnum, had to get her attention fast—

—and he leaped into the nearest wave of leech bodies, jumping up and down, kicking and stomping as hard as he could. They burst by the dozen, spilled ichorous blood and goop across the floor, drenching his boots. He danced on their dying bodies, feeling a fierce, uninhibited satisfaction as the leech queen spun again, howling in distress.

He saw Rebecca make it through the door, had a half second to be glad about it—and then the monster was snatching him up again, throwing him across the giant room in a blind rage.

Billy slammed into the back wall. He felt a rib crack, then he was falling, landing heavily on the cement floor. It drove the wind out of him, but he was on his feet again in a second, running for the south door, leeches popping underfoot as he struggled to breathe.

The monster was about the same distance from the door as he was. Billy saw that he wouldn't make it, that she would get there before him, and sent a silent plea to Whoever might be listening, that Rebecca make it out alive—

—and then he saw her, not behind the south door at all, but half across the room, her shotgun trained on the leech queen, her back to the central incinerator. Billy realized that she must have run out again while the monster had been busy throwing him against the wall.

He screamed for her to get back to the door, but she ignored him, firing at the queen as she charged toward Billy. With each shot, handfuls of leeches flew from the massive body, but for every one lost, a half dozen more were clambering on. On the fourth shot, the queen turned toward her, hesitating, as if unable to decide who to go after.

“Get in!” she shouted. “I'm on my way!”

Billy ran for the door, hoping to God she had a plan. She continued to fire at the creature, pump and shoot, pump, shoot—and then there was nothing but a dry click that Billy could hear across the room, the sound of inevitable defeat.

The leech queen heard it, too, and started for her, her body continuing to grow, to pick up mass as she lurched wetly forward. Billy had reached the south door and stood there, adrenaline pouring through his body, fumbling through his pack for the last two Magnum rounds.

“Run!” he shouted, but Rebecca ignored him, not moving at all. She wasn't reloading, wasn't even reaching for the handgun as the queen approached. Instead, she hefted the shotgun by its barrel, stepped back so that she was touching the incinerator wall— and drove the heavy stock through the sheet metal of a heat duct, popping one of the panels out with an aluminum crunch. Burning matter spilled out across the floor. Rebecca jumped into the midst of it, kicking wildly, driving lumps of flaming synthetics and rubbish into the nearest wave of leech bodies.

The queen shrieked, ceased its advance, still well away from the sudden fire. Scorched leeches scurried to their father-queen, tried to climb the towering body, to find solace there, but brought pain with them as they flocked together, attaching to the mobile hive. The queen's shriek grew in intensity as smoking, burning leeches joined her, damaging her, making her writhe in what Billy hoped was insufferable agony.

Rebecca saw her chance and took it, running for the south wall as the queen tore at herself, screaming. Billy emptied the revolver on the floor, dropped the last two rounds into the chamber and snapped it closed, holding it on the queen as Rebecca ran past her—but the queen was beyond caring, at least for the moment, parts of her insane body turning black, melting, running like molasses to pool on the smoldering floor.

Billy kept the Magnum trained on the contorting queen until Rebecca was past him and through the door. He quickly backed in after her, and she slammed the door closed.

He took a deep breath, felt the pain in his ribs, in his arms and legs, his head, a dull agony in every pore of his body—until he turned around, and saw what Rebecca was pointing at, a smile of surprised delight on her shocked, smudged face. His pain dropped away, became nothing but a nagging background to his own sudden relief.

They'd shut themselves into a platform elevator shaft. One that went up—and from the depth of the wide tunnel that stretched away from them at a diagonal, leading toward a circle of light far, far above, the platform appeared to go all the way to the surface.

They grinned at each other like children, too dumb with happiness to speak, but only for a few seconds. Their smiles broke as the dying queen roared, her horrible voice carrying from the next room, reminding them how close they still were to dying themselves.

Without saying a word, they ran to the platform, ran to the standing console that controlled the elevator. Billy studied the switches for a beat, then, with a silent prayer for deliverance, snapped the power on.

The platform started to climb, carrying them up and away from the nightmare. Or so they believed.

The agony was magnificent in its measure, killing her with an intensity beyond any she'd ever known. The burning children clung to her, starved for release, and as they touched her, touched their siblings, they passed their pain on in a wave that would not cease. It went on and on until parts of the collective gathered and fell away, dying, melting, her children sacrificing themselves so that she might live. Slowly, slowly, the agony receded, trained away from the physical, became the suffering of loss, of infinite sorrow.

As the injured pulled away, left her enveloping arms to die alone, the rest of the children came forward, singing, crooning to her, easing her torment as best they could. They engulfed her, soothed her with their liquid kisses—and by their sheer numbers, they overtook her. It only took a moment. The queen lost her identity as Marcus had lost his, giving over to the hive, becoming more. Becoming all.

The allness of the new creature was whole and healthy, a giant, different than before. Stronger. It heard mechanical sounds nearby. It reached inside itself, accessed the mind for information, understood—the murderers were trying to flee.

They would not escape. The hive gathered itself on a thousand supple limbs and went after them.

Neither of them wanted to think about running into any further trouble, but they had to assume the worst. Rebecca checked the handguns while Billy loaded the shotgun, the two of them calling out the dismal numbers—fifteen nine-millimeter rounds left, all total. Four shotgun shells. Two Magnum rounds.

“We probably won't need them anyway,” Rebecca said hopefully, staring up at the growing circle of light. The elevator was slow but steady; they were already halfway to the surface, would be there in just another minute or two.

Billy nodded, holding his left side with one dirty hand. “Think that bitch cracked one of my ribs,” he said, but smiled a little, also looking up at the light.

Rebecca stepped toward him, concerned, reaching out to touch his side—but before she could, an alarm started to blare down the shaft. Each door they slipped past now had a red light flashing over it, casting crimson splotches of color over the rising platform.

“What—“ Billy started, but was interrupted by the calm, feminine voice of a recorded loop.

“The self-destruct system has been activated. All personnel must evacuate immediately. Repeat. The self-destruct system—“

“Activated by who?” Rebecca asked. Billy shushed her, holding up one hand, listening.

“... immediately. Sequence will commence in—ten minutes.”

The lights kept flashing, the siren blatting, but the voice stopped. Billy and Rebecca exchanged a worried look, but there wasn't much they could do . . . And they'd be long gone in ten minutes, God willing.