At that moment, four things happened:
—the alarm stopped sounding.
—the pseudo-man 's left arm morphed, stabbing out as a long swordlike shaft, three inches thick, and pierced straight through Selena's chest, then out her back.
—its shot-off right hand liquefied and scurried back to the pseudo-man in a mouse-shaped puddle.
—"More company!'" Danny said, as a dozen well-armed military guards broke in from two directions—a rapid-response team armed with assault rifles.
The guards took in what they saw—the T-XA holding up Selena like a gaffed fish—and did a double take, lowering their weapons.
"What the hell is that?" one of them said, a stocky Asian guy.
From the stump of the pseudo-man's right wrist, another blade stabbed out, filament-thin, penetrating Selena's skull.
"No!" Jade shouted
Anton opened fire with the laser rifle, drilling a red-glowing hole in the pseudo-man's chest. For several seconds, it didn't respond, then it withdrew the blades from Selena, letting her drop. It stood motionless, unfathomable.
"Out of here-now!" Danny said, pulling on Anton's arm. "There's nothing we can do for Selena. It's too late."
"My God," Sarah said. "We can't leave her." Anton fired again, steadily, training the laser rifle over the pseudo-man's surface, trying to burn it away.
"Come on," Danny said. "Everybody out!" He ran past the guards, who made no attempt to stop him. "That means everyone," he said to them. "Get out of here if you want to live." He headed to the nearest set of the glass doors that surrounded the elevator lobby.
"Wait," Monk said.
"What?" Sarah said. "Not you, Dr. Strangelove?"
"Where's the AI lab, then?" Danny said shaking her by the shoulders. "Or wherever you've got the nanoware?"
Monk shook her head, distraught. "I can't tell you that."
"Well, what use are you?"
Monk seemed to be seething with rage, but she said nothing. There was something she wanted to say, but couldn't get out.
No time to worry about that, she'd have to work it out for herself. John grabbed the guard who'd spoken. "Do you know where it is?"
"Twelfth floor."
"Come on!" Danny manhandled Monk ahead of him. "Run!" As they reached the lobby, the pseudo-man finally moved, coming after them. It lashed out with sword-blades growing all over its body, cutting down the guards. One blade slashed across Anton's chest, opening him to the bone, but John got another clear shot with the 12-gauge. The pseudo-man staggered back with a big crater wound. Hurt or not, Anton opened up again with the laser rifle, drilling it between the eyes. Sarah had pressed the button for the elevator, and the doors opened a second later. Most of them got in there and the door started to shut-not quickly enough!
As the pseudo-man forced its way after them, Anton fired again, and it backed off under the heat. The doors shut at last, and John swiped Monk's keycard against a wall-mounted security unit. He stabbed the button for the twelfth floor, then reloaded as the elevator moved.
"Everyone here okay?" Danny said. John nodded. They had two of the rapid-response security guards, plus Jade. Anton, Sarah, John, and Dr. Monk.
"I'll live," Anton said.
No one replied except the Asian guard. "What is that thing?" At the same time, John sensed that the Specialists were planning silently among themselves, using their throat mikes.
"It's from the future," Monk said, her voice full of venom. "One of our mind children."
"What?"
"Forget it, Tony. I'll explain later."
"You'd better believe her," John said.
Both guards nodded. "I believe it from Dr. Monk," said Tony.
Monk gave a bitter smile, then rolled her eyes. "Thanks."
"If anyone else said it—"
"-you'd say they were crazy," Sarah finished for him. "Forget about what it is—we've got to find a way to destroy it. It wants to kill us all. Everyone, everywhere."
"Give me the keycard," Anton said to John.
"Why?"
"Please," Jade said. "Anton knows what he's doing."
He shrugged. "You guys keep saying that." Still, he passed it over-just as they reached the twelfth floor.
The doors opened. Immediately, the pseudo-woman and -dog rushed at them from the lobby. Anton caught the dog in mid-leap with the laser beam, and John blasted the pseudo-woman right in the head, splashing it open and knocking it back six feet.
Jade got both hands free, strapping her grenade launcher on her shoulder, and tossed the dog out of there. The skin of her hands sizzled where she touched its heated surface, but she showed no pain. "Where?" she said to the security guards, as she stepped out.
Tony said, "I don't know that detail. It's not my job." But the other guy said, "I know this floor." He pointed "That way."
Anton fired at the pseudo-woman. And kept firing. The laser was effective, but it couldn't finish the Terminator components. They needed something more.
"You've got to help us, Rosanna," John said. "We need to destroy everything."
"Leave me alone. I despise you all."
"If you're still on its side, what are you doing on our team?" Sarah said.
"I'm not on anybody's team. I don't even know who I am anymore. My mind's not my own—I realize that. Just because I hate you doesn't mean I have to like Skynet. It wants to kill me, too."
Danny ran for the nearest set of doors, pulling at them with all his strength and breaking the lock. Jade powered past him, not worrying about lights this time. She ran through the area like a cyclone, faster than John could follow in the near-darkness. Anton was in the rear, still firing with the laser rifle. The pseudo-woman and dog merged to form the clawed and fanged werecat they'd fought at Monk's house. As Anton played the beam over it, it shot out an arm, twenty feet long, with claws like scimitars, lashing at the laser rifle. A powerful blow sent Anton staggering, and he fell to his knees, but kept a grip on the weapon.
A dent appeared in a pair of elevator doors-not the one they'd used. The dent expanded, and the doors wrenched open.
The pseudo-man stepped out.
Charles Layton arrived at the scene in a hire car. It was chaos. Everywhere were men, and some women, in uniforms. Military helicopters flew above. There were spotlights and endless rows of vehicles. None of it looked effective.
A uniformed officer met him. "What's going on?" Lay-ton said. Humans really were despicable-an incompetent, vicious, good-for-nothing lot. He'd always seen it that way, now it was very clear. What a pity he'd been born as one.
"We're tracing their movements, sir. There's activity on the twelfth floor-''
The nanoprocessor! The T-XA Terminator would know what to do. How fortunate they were to have met it!
"Don't worry about that," he said quietly. "It'll take care of itself."
John groped near the door for a light switch as Danny passed his bag to Sarah. Anton fired the laser rifle from one knee, while Danny stood against the half-open door, leveled his grenade launcher, and fired into the pseudo-man. John crouched and covered his ears. The 40mm. grenade penetrated, and the Terminator splashed out, going amoeba-shaped. It made strange, muffled noises as it tried to reform.
John found the lights, then reloaded the 12-gauge. Monk pointed to a room in one of the floor's corners, thirty yards down the corridor. It was locked with a metal door. "There, dammit. That's the AI Operations Center. Tony will tell you if I don't. Now you can go to hell, and Skynet with you. I don't care what happens. I never asked for this." A look of naked malice crossed her face. "From now on, I do whatever I like."