by James Somers
Jay couldn’t believe he intended to stay and fight this thing Trenton Hallowed had now become. “Are you crazy? That shotgun isn’t going to help us! He just slaughtered a bunch of thugs with assault weapons. None of that stuff did any good before you gave him your drugs and it sure isn’t going to help now!”
Doug continued loading the weapon. “Don’t you think I know that? We just have to hold on until the National Guard investigates the alarms and take the building.”
“The alarms are telling them this building is now a hot zone. They’re not going to infiltrate, believing a deadly germ is on the loose in here,” Jay reasoned.
“I’m hoping they’ll figure out this is all about Trenton Hallowed and come in anyway.”
•••
Jonathan prayed as he sat on the curb outside of Ming’s business building. He still didn’t know what sort of business the gangster had running out of it, but most likely those days were over. It seemed an eternity since this had all started. In truth, only days ago he had been normal, without a real problem in the world. He prayed for guidance, for patience, and most of all for Jay’s safety. They had heard nothing all night.
Michael talked with other officers, now on the scene, concerning the night’s events and Ming’s involvement. The man himself had been treated by an ambulance and then placed in the back of one of the squad cars. A police van had taken custody of the other living members of Ming’s crew left in the building. Most of his enforcers had been sent with Trenton to break into Police Precinct # 7 and remained with him even now.
“Thank you, Lord. Amen.” Jonathan stretched his aching muscles. The early morning sun warmed him, while the flashing blue strobes of fifteen police cars bathed the plaza in azure. His body had taken the ultimate beating over the past few days, beginning with a shower of lead slugs from an assassin’s machine gun inside Trenton’s laboratory.
Despite his new healing ability and increased strength, Jonathan felt like he’d been hit by a train. On top of all the abuse of the past forty-eight hours, he’d gotten no sleep and barely enough food to keep going. Somehow, he always felt hungry. He had seen a television special once on moles, of all things, and remembered how their metabolism was so high that they constantly fed, or else starved to death. He felt that way now. His body was running on overdrive with not enough fuel in the tank.
Jonathan watched Michael finish up his report with the uniformed officer. Another approached him. Michael’s eyes popped open at whatever news he had just received. He sprang over to Jonathan. “Let’s roll!”
Jonathan jumped to his feet. “Did they find Trenton?”
Michael commandeered a police cruiser, with the officer’s permission, and got behind the wheel. “The National Guard is moving on one of your other companies—Halo Tech. Apparently, a containment alarm has been triggered. Employees trying to get into the building found themselves locked out this morning. There was also a report of an armored truck found in the underground parking garage.”
“Let me guess. It’s black?” Jonathan asked.
Michael started the cruiser’s engine and slammed it into gear. “Bingo!”
27 CONTAINMENT BREACH
Jay searched the laboratory with his eyes, hoping to find something that might aid them. The pounding continued from within the main vault, but Jay had little doubt Trenton would eventually free himself. They would be at his mercy.
Doug picked up the phone receiver and dialed out. “I’m going to notify the mayor of the situation and give him access to the emergency codes. They’ll know it’s not a microorganism.”
Jay smiled slightly through his throbbing pain. “That should save some time on them getting to us.” He had seen enough movies to realize only a hazmat team would enter the building under a real containment breach. All that would take too long. Even cutting the red tape would likely do no good.
Jay heard a massive pop and the sound of metal twisting. “He’s getting through the vault door!”
Doug watched the security door, finishing his phone call to the mayor. He hugged the Mossberg shotgun, his finger quivering over the trigger.
“Can’t you just open these other security doors and get us out of here?” Jay asked, watching the steel partition—likely the only thing still separating them from whatever Trenton Hallowed had become.
“I don’t have the access. They’re purposely locked so that only a cleanup team can get in here. If someone trapped in here with a lethal bug could just walk out, then the whole city would be infected.”
Doug’s explanation made perfect sense, so Jay dropped it. They had to wait and hope. He heard several heavy footfalls beyond the remaining barrier. Then it buckled, as Trenton smashed into it. “He’s coming!” Jay screamed.
The steel barrier resembled a wide flexible garage door—the kind used by some businesses to lock up their storefronts. Trenton hit the barrier again. Each time he left a large indention in the metal. A split appeared. Trenton pushed his fingers through, widening the hole until both of his hands fit inside.
He used his leverage to push the split even wider, until his head became fully visible to Jay and Doug in the other portion of the laboratory. Jay got a first look at what Trenton had done to himself. “Hello, boys,” Trenton said.
His skin was blotched and deep red, as though he had severe sunburn. His body had bulged through his clothing. He wore only shredded rags now. Trenton made a large professional wrestler seem small in comparison. The Enhancement Serum had pushed him to the very limit.
His muscles bulged, and his veins pulsed through his skin. Jay wondered how his skin could even contain the grotesque mass of muscle that had developed in just a few minutes. Trenton’s face was contorted and vile—his once fine looks now only a horrible mask.
Only the blood made him even more terrifying to look upon. He had managed to cover most of his body in crimson, through his attacks on Ming’s mercenaries. Some of the blood had to be Trenton’s, as well. Bullet holes had almost completely healed already, after the shootout in the vault. Trenton carried no weapons, but he had been the only survivor.
Doug raised the shotgun, took aim, and gave a final warning. “Dr. Hallowed, please don’t come any closer. I don’t want to harm you.”
The beastly man laughed at the threat. “My dear, plump, Dr. Tanner, Trenton Hallowed is no longer in. Nemesis is in control now.”
Nemesis lunged at Doug. He fired the shotgun over and over again at the approaching juggernaut. Jay watched each slug hit this new Nemesis creature in the chest, but he kept on coming.
An indicator light on the security door behind them changed from red to green. The door had been unlocked. Someone had arrived to rescue them.
Nemesis charged Dr. Tanner and his shotgun like a rabid silverback gorilla. He hammered a swollen fist into the doctor, sending Doug flying over one of the lab workstations and his gun skidding across the tiled floor.
Nemesis shifted his attention to Jay and came at him. The steel security door opened, and National guardsmen in gas masks entered the room behind Jay. When they saw Nemesis charging at them, they raised their submachine guns and opened fire.
One of the guardsmen grabbed Jay around the waist and hoisted him out of the office chair. Nemesis reacted to the onslaught of gunfire as though swatting at bees. He leaped sideways toward the laboratory wall, then sprang back toward the guardsmen.
They spilled out of his way like pins smashed by a bowling ball. Their line of fire now completely disrupted, Nemesis grabbed them and hurled them around the room like rag dolls. Some of them opened fire again, terror written on their faces.
The soldier carrying Jay rounded a corner with him, as another symphony of pain issued down the hall after them. Screams of men resounded with accents of machine gun fire until—once again—silence reigned supreme.
•••
Jonathan and Michael tried to make sense of the chaotic chatter playing out over the squad car radio. Rather than reports of Ming’s men, o
r even sightings of Trenton Hallowed, the topic concerned only a crazed beast that had been unleashed at the Halo Tech facility.
“I don’t understand,” Michael said. “Where’s Trenton?”
They listened further and made out the phrases: monster, beast, shredded clothing, and blood everywhere.
“I have a very bad feeling,” Jonathan said.
“What is it?”
“I’m not sure what Trenton would have gone after at Halo Tech, but they do research into biological warfare for the government.”
“And?”
“I think Trenton may be the monster their talking about,” Jonathan said. His complexion had gone pale.
Michael looked at him, considering, then back to the road. He punched the gas pedal even harder. “We’ll be there in less than a minute.”
•••
Jay hung in the arms of the soldier who had rescued him. At least, he hoped it would end up as a completed rescue. Nemesis had done away with the soldiers who had come into the laboratory and apparently Dr. Tanner, as well. The beast now chased them through the hallways.
“He’s coming,” Jay said urgently.
The soldier tried to pick up his pace, but it wasn’t easy with a fifteen-year-old boy in his arms. Angry howls followed them through the halls, reverberating around so that it became difficult to know which direction they had come from. Jay spotted a hulking shadow dash along a wall behind them, then disappear just before the creature itself came into view. Nemesis charged around the corner like a bull in a china shop. His bloody, bare feet slid on the tile floor, leaving scarlet skid marks. He slammed into the wall, out of control, and caved in the sheet rock. Ceiling tiles fell around him as he tried to get his body under control.
“Hurry!” Jay shouted, even though he knew the soldier was doing all he could.
Nemesis launched out of the destroyed wall, sending sheetrock, two-by-fours, and a cloud of dust in all directions. He emerged madder than ever, slinging slobber as he ran toward them.
More soldiers ran past Jay to intercept the monster Trenton had become. They opened fire as he and his rescuer crashed through the front doors. Jay saw National Guardsmen attack, but Nemesis did not stop. He plowed right through the soldiers and kept coming.
Jay’s rescuer slowed down when they emerged outside. Military vehicles had formed a semicircular perimeter around the front of the Halo Tech building. “Don’t stop, he’s still coming!” Jay shouted.
The soldier turned in time to see Nemesis explode through the glass facade of the Halo Tech building. The soldiers in the parking lot opened fire with machine guns. It only seemed to make the creature angrier.
Jay noticed Jonathan and Detective Stamos come screeching to a halt in the parking lot, driving a typical black and white police cruiser. They both got out of the car and ran toward the firing line to get a look at the new Trenton Hallowed. “Take me over there,” Jay said, pointing to Jonathan. The soldier complied.
•••
Jonathan spotted Jay in the arms of a soldier who was carrying him through the crowd. He ran to him, keeping an eye on the monster in front of the Halo Tech entrance. Jay’s leg appeared to be broken, but otherwise, he was in good shape.
Jonathan took the boy from the soldier and carried him back to the police car they had arrived in. Michael joined him. “How is he?”
“He broke my ankle,” Jay said. “I’ll be all right.” He turned to Jonathan. “I knew you wouldn’t run out on me.”
Jonathan held up a hand, and Jonathan clasped it. “Never.”
Nemesis wailed under the gunfire, but he only became more enraged. He leaped into the crowd of National Guardsmen. They tried to get out of the way, but some were crushed under him, while he swatted others, ferociously knocking them into the air over cars and into trucks.
One soldier mounted an M60 machine gun turret, set up on the back of a jeep, and opened fire. Nemesis took several hits, hissed at the man, then leaped behind a squad car. He then lifted the entire car off the ground and hurled it thirty feet, into the soldier and jeep, crushing them both in an explosion of glass and metal.
Jonathan stood up. “I’ve got to stop him.”
Jay’s mouth dropped open. “Are you crazy? You can’t stop that thing! Did you see what he just did? Nothing stops him!”
Jonathan turned on his friend. “Somebody’s got to try, Jay!”
Just then, Douglas Tanner emerged from the building by a side exit. Jonathan ran to intercept him, before he wandered into the fray with Trenton and the guardsmen.
“Jonathan, thank Heaven you’re still alive!” Doug said, stumbling.
Jonathan caught and steadied the man. “I was just thinking the same about you, Doug. What’s happened to Trenton?”
Nemesis smashed shoulder first into one of the National Guard trucks, heaving the big vehicle out of his way. He took off down the street away from the fight.
“Where’s he going?” Michael shouted.
Doug walked back to the police car with Jonathan. “He’s attempting to reach Genetic Corp and his mutagen,” Doug said.
“But why? What’s transformed him into this monster?” Jonathan asked again.
Doug bit his lip. “Trenton has had me working, for some time, on an enhancement to his mutagen. I took on the project personally and was glad to do it. Trenton’s work was very exciting—the things he hoped to accomplish—very revolutionary.”
“Yes, I know what he hoped to accomplish,” Jonathan said. “Anyway, what happened?”
“Well, he arrived this morning and was waiting for me in my office with the boy and a bunch of thugs. Trenton forced me to give him the Enhancement Serum. He injected it and started reacting violently to it. I don’t understand what happened. The lab animals never reacted that way.”
“All right, but why is he trying to get back to Genetic Corp now?” Michael asked.
Doug continued. “The Enhancement Serum will not bring about any permanent changes in anatomy, or physiology, unless the mutagen is present in his blood. He has to dose himself up within six hours or the enhancement will revert back to normal—at least as normal as he was before taking it.”
Jonathan and Michael shared a hopeful glance. “He’s on foot—we could catch him easy enough,” Michael said. “It’s a good ten miles to Genetic Corp from here.”
Jonathan considered it. “Yeah, but what would we do when we caught him? I’m beginning to wonder if Jay isn’t right. I don’t know how we can stop him. He’s too tough to get anywhere with bullets. We’d have to have a tank.”
They both examined the mess Nemesis had already made of the National Guardsmen and their equipment. “I don’t see any tanks,” Jonathan said.
Michael paced back and forth next to the squad car. Some of the soldiers tended to their wounded and dead. Others had already mobilized and were about to take up the chase. Some radioed ahead, expecting to get reinforcements to intercept the creature before he harmed anyone else.
“I’ve got an idea,” Michael said.
28 DECOY
“Demolitions?” Jay asked.
“Yeah,” Michael nodded. “I specialized in it during my time in the army.”
Jay looked at Jonathan. “Whoa, he’s cooler than I thought.”
“Will it work?” Jonathan asked.
They all three looked at Doug. He sat on the curb, surveying the destroyed front of the Halo Tech building. He realized they had gone silent. “What?”
“If we drop the building on him, will it stop him?” Jonathan asked.
Doug scratched his double chin. “Difficult to say. I’ve never seen anything like this. Trenton picked up a car, for Heaven’s sake. Still, if you dropped a building on him, I don’t imagine he would survive. It all depends on how potent the mutagen is and if he is able to dose himself again while the Enhancement Serum is in his system.
“I don’t think we have any choice,” Jonathan said.
“The only thing is, I’ll need some time
to get the charges placed,” Michael said.
“How much time?”
“Better than an hour for a building that size, and that’s moving along at a good clip, and zero safety precautions,” Michael explained. “We can stop at Stonewall Demolition on the way and commandeer the charges I’ll need.”
“Before you do that, I’ve got to get to Trenton,” Jonathan said.
Jay perked up in his seat in the front of the squad car. “What for?”
“Someone has to put some time between Trenton and Genetic Corp.”
“You’ll be killed,” Jay said.
Michael walked over to some of the soldiers who were preparing to depart in a jeep, going after Trenton. Jonathan smiled and knelt down to Jay’s level. “Sometimes we have to make sacrifices to help others.”
Jay came unglued. A tear streaked through the dust on his dark skin.
“Do you remember how I told you about the Lord’s sacrifice for all mankind?”
Jay nodded, but the lump in his throat kept him from speaking.
“I’m the only one who can do this. Somehow, some way, this is where the Lord has brought us. I’m the only one who has any hope of standing against that thing Trenton has become. Do you understand?”
Jay’s face hardened. “I’ll say I understand it, if that’s what you want to hear, but I don’t like it a bit.”
