The smug expression returned to Polanitis’ face. “Stop breaking my men’s arms, or worse, damn it. We have results we need to send in to my bosses but you’re causing me headaches. It’s a major security risk when I have to hire unknowns to replace them and we have to pay out hush money to their families. I’ll have to kill every damn animal in here if it looks like one of them might get us busted. Am I making myself clear? You’ll be responsible for the deaths of every damn one of your kind. The only reason you’re still breathing is because you’re leverage for something I want.”
“Yes,” 710 snarled, not sure what “busted” or “leverage” meant but he got the context of the threat.
“Then we have a deal?”
It went against everything he believed in to willingly agree to do anything the humans demanded. He had no other options though. The threat wasn’t an empty one. He refused to be responsible for the female being harmed. “Yes.”
Polanitis stomped to the door. “Good.”
710 said nothing. The door locked and he walked to his mat on the floor. He sat and closed his eyes. Pain hit. Technician Shiver had found a soft spot in his heart but no longer. He had cared for the female, yet she didn’t deserve anything but his disgust and contempt.
Chapter One
South Dakota, the following year
Cornas Research facility
Jeanie had been given orders to call in sick to work but hadn’t done it. She jogged to another door, peered up at the small video monitor to see what was on the other side of the thick metal and used the stun gun on the electronic lock. The clicking sound it made was louder than she’d like as volts of electricity hit the reading device. The smell of frying wires was faint and almost instant. She turned off the stun gun and waited a few seconds to make sure the lights on the lock remained off. It didn’t power back up.
She glanced at her watch, seeing there was only five minutes left. Time was running out. She hurried down the hallway and fried another sensor reader. She was terrified about being caught but she didn’t give a damn what they did to her. She had to protect the men and women locked inside those rooms.
Her stun gun shorted out the readers to prevent Security from entering the cells. She’d already disabled the building’s main computer. Another employee might punch in codes to send gas throughout the cells but the command wouldn’t make it to the main computer. It was offline for good, thanks to a pot of hot coffee she’d poured inside the tower housing it. Sparks had shot out of it, there were some loud popping noises, and she’d feared it might catch fire. It had shut down and refused to power on again when she’d tried, just to make sure it wasn’t a temporary breakdown. The thing was toast.
An alarm blared from speakers located near the elevator. Red emergency lights flashed as the scream of it rose in pitch. Damn. She glanced at her watch. The attack had started two minutes early and she still had one more floor to go. She zapped another sensor reader, spun and darted back to the elevator to call it to her floor. Her hand shook as she swiped her employee badge to gain access and shoved the stun gun deep inside her lab coat pocket.
Two security guards were already inside the lift when it opened. They looked pissed off and worse—desperate. She stepped inside the confined space with them.
“We’re going down,” one of them stated. “What are you doing? You know protocol. You’re supposed to hit the emergency exits, head to the tunnels.”
She shook her head. “I have to destroy blood samples in a storage room first. Dr. Meckler was extremely clear about making sure it was my duty to do that if those alarms ever went off. What is going on?”
“We’re being breached,” the second one grunted. “I hate fucking cops. Get it done fast while we kill the experiments. The backup system failed so we have to shoot them one by one. Hit those hidden stairs afterward. Don’t get caught. You know it’s a death sentence.”
She nodded but inwardly cursed. The elevator dinged open on the bottom floor. One of the guards hit the button to keep them open, a feature they used often to move drugged test subjects on gurneys. He glanced at the other man.
“It will warn us if someone calls the damn thing to another floor. I plan to use the hidden stairwell and be gone before the cops find us.”
The second man glanced at the fake wall near the end of the hall. All the employees knew where the emergency exits were. The stairwells would lead to an old, unused sewer system that dumped out somewhere far from the building.
She turned. “Let me help. Give me a gun. The ones down here are the most dangerous and they’ve seen most employees’ faces. They could identify all of us.”
One of the guards hesitated.
“There are fifteen of them down here. The door keypads are all slow to open,” Jeanie lied. “Come on. How long will it take for the cops to override the elevator keycard locks? We can’t let these test subjects live. Do you want your face splashed across the evening news until all your family and friends know you worked here? We’ll be screwed seven ways to Sunday with every police enforcement agency hunting for us too. There’s no point in escaping if we’re going to get caught in the long run.”
The guard on her left passed over one of his handguns. “Take head shots.”
“I know the drill.” Her stomach still turned, remembering the lecture from the person who’d trained her on the most effective way to murder an innocent human being, as if they were moths or other creatures that were mere annoyances. “Use two shots to make sure they die.”
“We don’t have time for that shit or enough spare clips. Just don’t miss what you aim at.”
The guards moved in front of her. One of them pulled his keycard out and buzzed it through the sensor reader. The door beeped and the man reached for the door handle. He intended to kill all the test subjects. He lifted his gun to shoot the helpless woman chained against the far wall.
Bile rose in Jeanie’s throat as she raised her weapon. Not firing wasn’t an option. He was going to murder someone she considered a friend. He never even glanced back at her. She gripped the metal with both hands to steady her aim and pulled the trigger. She cried out in horror as blood and gore splattered the doorframe. Killing someone was ten times worse than anything she’d ever imagined. Distress almost paralyzed her but movement in the corner of her vision drew her attention. The second guard spun around, his gaze dropping to his fallen coworker.
He paled, his eyes opening wide as he jerked his chin up. Pure rage twisted his features as they stared at each other. He uttered a word she couldn’t understand in her emotionally overwhelmed state. He raised his arm. He was going to shoot her.
She aimed the gun but her hands shook worse than before and she missed his head when she fired but the bullet struck his shoulder. He fell back with a shout of pain and landed on his ass. The wall he slammed into kept him sitting upright though. The look on his face promised death as he lifted his bleeding arm to shoot at her again. She fired twice. One bullet tore into his throat and the other one appeared to hit his heart.
The deafening sounds ceased but Jeanie’s ears rang. The alarms were still going off. Blood spilled down the man’s chest, his eyes remained open, but he didn’t blink. His focus wasn’t on her anymore despite the eerie stare. She knew without needing to check for a pulse that he no longer had one.
She swayed on her feet, not sure if she was going to puke or faint. Both seemed options as the reality of what she’d done hit home. Numbness settled into her mind. Probably shock, she rationalized. She lowered her arms but managed to keep hold of the gun despite the urge to toss it away.
Pure agony shot through her midsection at the movement. She looked down. Her white coat had turned red just above her hip and it spread lower as she watched. It took a few seconds for it to sink in that she’d been shot. The guard had managed to hit her in the side before she’d killed him. She released the gun with one hand and flattened her palm over the wound. The pain grew worse but she needed to apply pressure.