Her body began to shake, and her breath became a constricted, terrified pant.
Brighton pulled her back from the swinging doors. His voice was harsh, conflicting with his grip on her chin. He tipped her face up so she had no choice but to look at him.
“I’m getting you out of here,” he told her. “You clearly can’t handle this.”
Simone dug deep, using her pride to fuel her recovery. She forced her lungs to relax, taking slow, even breaths. After a couple, she felt stronger, steadier. “I’m fine.”
“You’re not even close.”
“Go back if you want, but I’m finishing the job.”
His mouth went hard, but he gave a tight nod. “One more freak-out and I’m tossing you over my shoulder and carrying you out.”
She ignored his threat and slipped a knife from the purse. The reassuring weight of the weapon comforted her and gave her the confidence she needed to push the swinging door open again.
This time, she let the assault of sounds and smells hit her and pass right by. She focused on what she saw, forcing herself to think only of tactics. All that mattered was finding that hammer and getting the hell out. Simple. Easy.
The room on the other side of the doors was large, with high ceilings and exposed metal beams. Red light pooled in the center of the space, leaving the edges cloaked in murky darkness. A small number of shells wandered around a raised platform. Some worked to assemble scaffolding while others ran thick lengths of translucent rope along the floor.
In the center of the platform was an oddly shaped ring about twenty feet high. It was held upright by steel beams and heavy wires. A single section of the ring was missing, as if it had yet to be put in place.
On either side of the platform were two more of those oddly misshapen rings about seven feet in diameter. They stood upright, suspended by thick cables. Clear wires bristled from the outside edge of the ring, feeding into a heavy translucent rope that snaked up onto the platform. That rope pulsed with light at about the same pace as her heartbeat.
Inside each ring was a human, held in place by wide metal bands around the wrists, ankles, and waist. With every pulse of light in that rope, both bodies jerked as if hit by an electrical current.
Simone knew what that felt like—having her will ripped from her, bit by bit. Thoughts were stripped away. Pieces of her life taken. Second by second, the machine stole all the parts of her that made her who she was.
She had no idea what the Fractogasts wanted with those stolen pieces, but the second the machine she was in broke down, everything had snapped back into place, restoring her.
Not everyone was so lucky. Those who stayed strapped inside the machine until the process was complete came out as the empty shells surrounding this building, doing the bidding of the ’Gasts.
The same thing was going to happen to the two people only a few feet away.
The woman on the left was older, pudgy, with thin white hair. Her head was slumped forward, giving Simone no way to accurately judge her age. From the awkward angle of her neck, there was a good chance she wasn’t even conscious anymore—a small blessing.
The guy on the right was just a kid—maybe nineteen at most. His lean frame was tense as he fought against his bonds. His mouth was open as if he were trying to scream, but no sound came out—only a furious hiss of air, as if he’d lost his voice.
Simone knew there was no chance in hell of him breaking free, no matter how strong he was. Judging by the steady pulses of light flowing through the tubes coming from his ring, he hadn’t been there long. There was still a lot of fight left in him. For now.
The horror of what she witnessed sank into her, making her sick. These people were dying, and there wasn’t a thing she could do to help them. Not unless she wanted to be right where they were.
Again.
Escaping once had been enough of a miracle for her to know it wouldn’t happen a second time. And she’d rather slit her own throat than let those creatures use her again.
Brighton shifted his weight toward the Fractogasts’ victims. His body quivered with rage, and she knew that she had to stop him before he did something stupid.
With a rough pull on his hand, she got his attention, forcing him to look at her. Her voice was quiet, but hard. “No. They’ll kill you.”
Anger twisted his lips. Hot color flushed across his cheeks, and he seemed to grow bigger in his fury. “We have to save them.”
Her hold on his hand tightened. “All we can do is get ourselves killed.”
He looked over his shoulder, back at the victims. The light pulsing out from the woman’s ring was fading visibly as they stood there.
Once again Brighton surged forward, so she slipped in front of him and put her knife to his chest. “No. I won’t let you end up in one of those machines.”
Before he could respond, swinging doors on the far side of the room opened, and two Fractogasts lumbered in. They headed straight for the raised platform without even glancing at their victims, as if those humans were of no more importance than the walls or the floor.
They were easily nine feet tall. Spindly, with thin, reflective skin that showed off the structure of bones and tendons beneath. Their arms and legs were long, even for their frames, giving them a dangerous reach and leverage.
As she watched, one of them grabbed a piece of metal on a table six feet away without even having to lean. He fit that piece into the opening of the ring, completing it. The second one picked up two paddles connected to the translucent ropes and pressed them to either side of that metal plate until it began to glow, and white-hot sparks radiated from the structure.
As the light from the sparks hit the Fractogasts’ bodies, rainbows bounced off the tiny prisms that coated their skin. The effect was beautiful. Almost hypnotic.
The spiky, glasslike hair on their narrow heads picked up the light and transmitted it to the ends until they glowed with an array of colors. Like fiber-optic filaments, each strand captured a tiny glow at the tip, giving them each a mane of rainbows.
The deadliest creatures were often the most beautiful, and that certainly held true in this case.
As the heat built, a Fractogast lifted his arm and slammed a tool on the glowing metal. More sparks sprayed out, and beside her, Brighton shifted in agitation.
“That’s the hammer,” he whispered.
Simone looked closer and sure enough, in the fist of the ’Gast was a sturdy hammer. It looked more like a child’s toy in such a giant grip, but with each pounding strike, the metal section being added to the ring bent easily under the hammer’s force.
After only a few seconds, the hammering stopped, leaving the final section of the ring in place.
One of the shells picked up an armful of discarded, tangled wire and headed their way.
Simone pushed Brighton back, out of the way of the swinging doors. As soon as the shell passed, she darted forward, slipping through the door on the backswing.
They both made it through, but the disruption of the motion of the door was obvious.
One of the ’Gasts tilted its head to the side. Its tiny black eyes focused in their direction.
Simone held her breath, willing the gaze of the ’Gast to pass over them. Brighton’s thumb stroked across the back of her hand, silently offering her reassurance.
She knew they couldn’t see her, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t figure out she was there.
She checked the ground at their feet, searching for anything that might give away their presence. The dirt on the floor was too scuffed and smeared for her to make out any one distinct set of prints. If she and Brighton veered off into the dusty, unused areas, that might give them away, but as long as they stayed in the well-traveled areas, they would be fine.