“The sc—scrambler,” said Stone. “Last one. My desk drawer.” Stone stared at him, but his eyes were still, dead. Jon opened his hand to reveal a key. Shaw screamed again, a terrifying yell of something unheard on Earth before. The flamethrower shot fire, a burning arc of liquid flame that doused Shaw, and it was working. Shaw regenerated, but he couldn’t regrow tissue faster than it burned. Shaw had retreated back near the massive nutrient tub. He leaned into it, ripping open the hole he had pierced earlier, and pushed his way inside, diving into the bottom of the container.
“We need to go, now!” said Jon, pulling Mel to her feet, sprinting. The flamethrower still shot, but Shaw was underneath the surface of the liquid, bubbles coming up. Jon stumbled to his feet, Mel beside him, and he turned to see Shaw emerge soaked in the nutrient bath, flying through the hole, straight through the gout of flames, and mounting the body of the guard who wielded the flamethrower. The flames stopped, and Shaw had healed, the milky white liquid putting out the fire and giving him food, and now the guard gave him more, Shaw’s torso absorbing the man, both his arms extending out, giant masses of flesh whipping into two of the three remaining guards and pulling them in.
Jon sprinted, with Mel beside him, out of the operating room, into the pre-op room, and then out the door. The fourth guard ran beside them, directly into a squad of twelve guards, armed with shotguns and two more flamethrowers.
“It’s another one of those things!” yelled the guard. Jon pointed inside, and the dozen men lined up outside, giving them a choke point.
A massive roar erupted from inside, a thudding bass note.
“Was that a word?” asked Mel.
“Yeah. He said my name,” said Jon. “We need to get to Stone’s office.” They ran, as Shaw emerged from the operating theater, bursting out into the corridor, and the squad opened fire, shotgun blasts and two flamethrowers, on full blast. Jon didn’t turn to see the results, but heard the chaos behind him. Ultimately, he heard death.
Shaw had learned from his experience with the first flamethrowers, and Jon didn’t need to look to hear the sound of first, and then the second weapon extinguish, the familiar whoosh disappearing, men screaming as Shaw engulfed them. They ran, turning the corner, with the sounds of shotguns still filling the level. But they quieted, one by one.
“JON,” shouted the Shaw creature, and there were no more sounds of shotgun blasts, and Jon looked now as they sprinted toward Stone’s office. The Shaw creature loped after them. It still grew, absorbing the squad that had attacked it. Parts of it burned, but soon the mass of flesh engulfed the flame. Jon saw the arms and legs of guards sticking out from the mass, now on all fours, running like a gorilla, its flesh skidding along the ground, the only thing slowing it.
Jon sprinted hard, turning a corner, and then another, Mel beside him.
“Go, find Tabby,” said Jon. She nodded and split off. The creature only wanted him, the fragment of mind that was still Shaw knowing deep down that Jon had done this to him. Jon heard crashing behind him, and he glanced to see the great behemoth smash through the black glass walls of the different labs, not bothering to take corners anymore, following Jon, dead set to kill him, to absorb him, to make him one with the mass.
Jon felt something whip by him, and a glass tile flew by his head, smashing into pieces on the ground. He looked and the Shaw creature grabbed them as it ran, flinging them like a lacrosse player at Jon. He ducked, a massive tile flying by him, fast enough to decapitate.
“JON,” yelled the thing, now ten feet tall and just as wide, Jon only barely able to recognize limbs and torso. Any remnants of the guards were visible only by the remains of their uniforms, pieces of black cloth and kevlar dotting the outside of the creature. Still, it grew. He could see its flesh bubbling up, expanding. Its great blubber bounced off the ground, and soon it wasn’t running, but more rolling, moving like a worm, pushing itself in massive leaps. Jon ran. There was nothing left that could stop it now, except for the scrambler.
He hoped. It had worked on the mutated chimp, but the Shaw thing was now over twice the size of that, and still growing. Would it have an effect? Jon didn’t know, but he hoped it would. He didn’t know how else to stop whatever Shaw had become.
It only wanted to feed and grow. That’s what they had programmed it to do, to only generate, to make more of itself, more flesh, more mass. Driven by Shaw’s instincts, it chased after Jon.
And it was gaining. Jon sprinted as hard as he could, and Stone’s office was near, less than a minute away. But he didn’t know if he’d make it that far. He didn’t dare look, not now, but he felt the thing behind him, glass crashing and whizzing by him, a buzz saw of flesh and bone ready to eat him alive.
Then he saw the lab, their old lab, attached to the smaller operating theater, rebuilt after the chimp, and Jon found a reserve he didn’t know he had, running harder. He was going to make it. He was going to stop this thing and kill Shaw for good.
But then his feet were taken out from underneath him, and he flew, tumbling as he hit the ground, sliding along the glass, a sharp pain in his shoulder, and he grunted as he rolled along. He slammed into a glass wall. The creature had swiped out and caught a foot, and he had tumbled ass over teakettle.
He couldn’t move his left arm. It was dislocated.
“JON,” said the thing again, and it was right there, almost on top of him. It had slowed, and it was just a worm now, its legs and arms only small tendrils, four of dozens extending out from its mass. Jon didn’t know what Shaw would become, given enough time, but it leaked blood and bile from dozens of orifices, opening and closing as the creature burst from the pressure within. Shaw’s eyes stared out from the middle of it, his head gone, the only thing left that was still him. Maybe Shaw still thought, maybe his mind and self were still contained within, but the eyes were the only evidence, dark amber, looking. They studied him, tendrils of red, beige, and white flesh reaching toward him.
Jon held his breath, waiting for the end.
“Jon, close your eyes!” yelled Tabby, and Jon did.
There was a click, and a bright flash, and a sudden splash.
Jon opened his eyes, and a third of the creature had been turned into liquid gore, splattering the walls and floor, a puddle of the Shaw abomination.
It emitted a great noise of pain and turned toward Tabby.
29
Tabby, flanked by Tommy and Mel, carried the energy weapon in her arms. It was small, smaller than the assault rifles the guards carried, a contoured rectangle of metal with a stock and trigger attached. A narrow aperture on its face shot out plasma death.
The creature screamed, a third of its mass now liquid on the floor. It surged toward her, recognizing the threat.
“Get the shot!” yelled Tabby, and fired again. Jon averted his eyes with the click, and light filled the room, and more of the mass disappeared, destroyed by the powerful energy weapon. But it still was huge, dwarfing all of them. The carved paths where the weapon had hit it had cauterized, scorched black and smoking. The smell hit Jon, and he held back vomit.
But Shaw wasn’t healing where the weapon hit it. The mass still bubbled up from inside, expanding and growing elsewhere, but not where the weapon scorched it. Jon scrambled to his feet, his left arm dangling uselessly, and he sprinted away from the creature back toward the lab.
The creature was torn, but moved quickly toward Tabby, only thirty feet away from her. She fired again, the loud CLICK filling the room, and Jon wasn’t looking now. He saw the light in front of him and heard the weapon discharge, like the sound of a Polaroid camera.