John locked gazes with Leon, who nodded reluc-tantly. He didn't want to cause Cole any more pain, but he didn't want to refuse him; he was dying, they should give him anything they could.
Carefully, slowly, John lifted Cole and turned him. Cole moaned when his back touched the floor, his eyes wide and rolling, but seemed to feel some relief after a moment. Maybe the cold… or maybe he was past the point of pain, going numb. "Thanks," he whispered, a blood bubble popping on his pale lips. "Henry, try to rest now," Leon said softly, wanting to cry. The man had tried so hard to be brave, to keep up with them… "Fossil," Cole said, his gaze fixing on Leon's. "In, tube. Guys said… if it got, out, it'd… destroy every. Thing. In the… lab room. West. Understand?"Leon nodded, understanding perfectly. "An Um-brella creature in the lab room. Fossil. You want us to let it out."
Cole closed his eyes, his waxy face so still that Leon thought it might be over, but he spoke again, quietlyenough that they had to lean in to hear him. "Yeah," he breathed. "Good."Cole took one last breath, letting it out – and his chest didn't rise again. Within minutes of Cole's death, the two men fig– ured out how to escape from the Hunter cage. Reston stared at the screen, feeling nothing, determined not to be surprised. They simply weren't human, that was all; once he'd accepted that, there was nothing to be surprised at any longer. The feeding troughs had been wedged firmly into long, narrow gaps in the steel mesh so that the handlers could feed the specimens without entering the cage; enough of the trough was outside so that one could simply drop food in, the animals taking it fromtheir side. That the 3Ks might try to pull the feeding containers inside or push them out wasn't a concern, since the gaps were much too narrow for their bodies.
But not for human bodies… or for theirs, whatever they are.
John and Red both started to kick at the trough, and as it started to edge out, Reston picked up his revolver and stood, turning away from the screens. There was no point in watching. He'd failed, the Planet's tests had proved too easy and he would be severely disciplined for what he'd done, perhaps killed. But he wasn't ready to die, not yet – and not at their hands.
But the elevator, the surface people…
It wasn't safe to go up, either. The compound was probably overrun with these S.T.A.R.S. soldiers by now, they'd cut him off and now were just waiting for their two boys to drive him out…
Can't go up, can't kill them, not enough time… the cafeteria!
His employees would help him. Once he freed them, once he explained things, they'd rally around him, protect him from harm. The specifics would have to be edited, of course, but he could work that out on his way.
Have to go now, they'll be out soon, out and looking for me. Looking to avenge Cole, perhaps. Looking to make me sorry, when I only did my job, what any man would do…
Somehow, he doubted they'd understand. Reston walked out, already working through his story, won– dering how things had gone so terribly awry.
NINETEEN
FROM THE KENNEL, THEY STEPPED OUT IN-to a clean and sterile hallway and turned left – west -
– moving quickly through the deserted corridor. Neither of them spoke; there was nothing to say until they found what Cole had called Fossil, until they could decide if he'd had the right idea. For the first time since they'd come to the Planet, John didn't feel like making any jokes. Cole had been a good guy, he'd done his best to make up for luring them into the test program, he'd done what they told him to do – and now he was gone, brutally savaged, dying in blood and pain on the floor of a cage. Reston. Reston would pay for it, and if the best way to get to him was to unleash some Umbrella monster, so be it. A fitting justice.
Screw the code book. If Fossil's as badass as Cole seemed to think, we release it and let the workers go and get out. Let it tear this place apart. Let it have Reston…
The hall curved right, then straightened out, con-tinuing west. When they turned the corner, they saw the door on the right – and somehow, John just knew that it was Cole's lab room. He felt it. He was right, after a fashion. The metal door opened – after they'd used a nine-millimeter key -
– into a small laboratory with counters and computers, which then opened into a surgical theater, all gleam– ing steel and porcelain. The door set into the back wall of the operating room was the one Cole had meant for them to find – and when they saw the creature, John could see why he'd insisted on telling them about it, even with his last gasping breaths. If it was even half as vicious as it looked, the Planet was history.
"Christ," Leon said, and John couldn't think of anything to add to that. They moved slowly toward the giant cylinder that sat in the corner of the large room, past the steel autopsy table and trays of shining equipment, finally stopping in front of the tube. The lights in the room were off, but there was a directional light aimed at the container from the ceiling, illumi– nating the thing. The Fossil. The tube was fifteen feet high and at least ten in diameter, filled with a clear red liquid – and envel– oped in the fluid, attached to tubes and wires that ran through the top, was a monster. A nightmare. John imagined that it was called Fossil because of what it looked like, at least partly some kind of a dinosaur, though not one that had ever walked the Earth. The ten-foot-tall creature was some pale color, its pebbled flesh a glowing pink because of the red liquid that surrounded it. There was no tail, but it had the thick skin and powerful legs of a dino. It was obviously built to walk upright, and though it had the small eyes and heavy, rounded snout of a carnivorous dinosaur, a T-Rex or velociraptor, it also had long, thickly muscled arms and hands with slender, grasp– ing fingers. As impossible as it was, it looked like the mutant offspring of a man and a dinosaur.
What were they thinking? Why – why make some-thing like this?
It was asleep, or in some kind of coma, but it was definitely alive. Connected to a thin hose was a small, clear mask that covered its nostril slits, and a band of plastic was tied around its thick snout to hold the giant jaws closed. John couldn't see them, but he had no doubt that there were rows of pointed teeth in the creature's wide and curving mouth. Its beady eyes were covered by some inner eyelid, a thin layer of purpled skin, and they could actually see the slow rise of its thick chest, the gently bobbing motions of its massive body in the red goo. There was a clipboard hanging on the wall next to the Fossil, above a small monitor screen where thin green lines blipped silently across in fading pulses. Leon picked the clipboard up, flipping through the pages as John just stared, awed and disgusted. One of its spidery hands twitched, the eight-inch fingers curling into a loose fist.
"Says here that it's slated for autopsy in three and a half weeks," Leon said, scanning. " 'Specimen will remain in stasis,' blah blah blah… 'when it will be injected with a lethal dose of Hyptheion prior to dissection.'"