hand on the roof, the digger bouncing almost as much as
their plane had right before it crashed. Their view was
mostly blocked by the giant twisting screw-thing, but it
was obvious when they hit the end of the tunnel, big-
time.
The noise was incredible, deafening, like rocks in a
blender times a hundred. There was a burning steam
smell, and as they inched forward through total black-
ness, she could hear the thaw even over the digging, as
torrents of water rushed past the cab.
The grinding, waterfall noises seemed to go on for-
ever as they continued to climb - and then the machine
stuttered, jerking, and the treads were straining - and
sudden light flooded into the cab, gray and shadowy and
beautiful.
The digger crawled out of its brand-new hole near a
standing tower, Claire recognizing it as a helipad even
as Steve pointed out the snow-cats parked near the base.
It was snowing, fat wet flakes spinning down from a
slate sky, the humid cold seeping into the cab before
they'd been on the surface a minute. There was a wind
blowing, the snow angled slightly - not a big wind, but
steady.
" 'Copter or 'cat?" Steve asked lightly, but she could see that he was starting to shiver. So was she.
"Your call, fly boy," she said. A helicopter would be faster, but staying on the ground seemed safer. "Can we even take off in this?"
"As long as it doesn't get any worse," he said, looking up at the tower, but he didn't seem sure. She was about
to recommend one of the 'cats when he shrugged, push-
ing his door open and sliding out, calling back over his
shoulder.
"I say we hit the tower, fly girl," he said. "We can at least see if there's actually a choice."
She got out, too, craning her neck back, but she couldn't see the top of the tower, either. And it was cold,
frostbite cold.
"Whatever, let's just hurry," Claire said, slinging the rifle over her shoulder.
Steve jogged for the stairs, Claire following, freezing
but exhilarated, suddenly totally high on being free to
choose, to decide what they wanted to do, how they
wanted to do it. And either way, they'd be at the Aus-
tralian station in an hour or so, wrapped in blankets and
drinking something hot and telling their story.
Well, at least the more believable parts, she thought, climbing the recently sanded stairs after him. Even the
most open-minded people in the world wouldn't believe
half of what they'd been through.
Her happiness was wearing thin as they neared the
top, three stories later, her teeth chattering it away - and
when Steve turned around, frowning, she no longer
cared about much of anything beyond getting warm.
"There's no helicopter," he said, snow starting to stick to his hair. "I guess we'll..."
He saw something behind her and his face suddenly
contorted with horror and surprise. He reached out to
pull her up but she was already moving.
"Go!" she said, and he turned and bolted up the stairs, Claire barely a half step behind him. She didn't know
what he'd seen -
- yes you do -
- but from the look on his face, she knew she didn't
want it behind her.
It's the thing, the monster, it was loose and now it's
coming for you, her fear helpfully provided, and then Steve was grabbing her arm and jerking her up the last
few steps. She stumbled onto a giant, empty, square
platform, the landing lines mostly obscured by fresh
snow, a gray haze of anomalous fog making it hard to
see clearly.
"Give me the rifle," he breathed, and she ignored him, turned to see if it was true, if she would recognize
the awful pain of the thing that had screamed so horri-
bly - and as it gained the platform, she saw that it was
true, and she recognized it with no trouble at all. She un-
slung the rifle and backed away, motioning for Steve to
stay behind her.
Alfred woke up in a world of pain. He could barely
breathe, and there was blood on his face and in his nose
and mouth, and when he tried to move, the agony was
instant and overwhelming. Every inch of bone was bro-
ken, cut or smashed or punctured, and he knew he was
going to die. All that was left was his surrender to the
dark. He was very afraid, but he ached so badly that per- haps sleep would be best...
... Alexia...
He couldn't give up, not when he'd been so close,
not when he was still so close. He forced his eyes to
open, and saw through a thin red haze that he was on
one of the lower level platforms that jutted out into the
mining pit. He'd fallen at least three levels, perhaps as
many as five.
"Aa...lexi...iaa," he whispered, and felt blood bubbling up from his chest, felt bones grinding as he shifted, felt
afraid of the pain he'd have to endure - but he would go
to her, because she was his heart, his great love, and he
would be sustained by his name on her lips.
"Give me the rifle," Steve said again, watching the thing take its first stumbling step in their direction, but
Claire wasn't listening. She had her eye to the scope,
was seeing what he saw but under magnification - and
what he saw was an abomination.
Blindfolded, its hands tied behind its back, wearing
only a shapeless and stained cut of leather knotted
around its waist, the thing had suffered horribly, that
much was clear; he could see the raised scars, the an-
cient welts, bloody shackle marks around its ankles. It
looked almost human, but for its oversized body and
strange flesh - gray and mottled, sitting over lean mus-
cles that had ruptured through in places, exposing raw
tissue. Its torso was bare, and he could see a kind of
pulsing redness in the center of its chest, a clear target,
and for a few seconds, Steve thought they were safe
after all, it doesn 't have any weapons...
... and there was a splintering, cracking sound, and
four asymmetrical appendages, like the jointed legs of
an insect, unfolded from its back and upper body, the
longest easily ten feet, curling from its right shoulder
like a scorpion's tail. It reeled forward another step
and some dark liquid was spraying from its body, from
its chest or back. As the droplets struck the frozen ce-
ment, a thick, purplish-green gas began to hiss upward
from where they landed, blown by the snowy wind first
one direction, then another.
It rumbled out some heavy, wordless sound and
took another step toward them, the new arms whip-
ping around its hairless head, making it weave from
side to side. It could barely keep its balance, and as
the thought occurred to him, Steve was already run-
ning.
Go in low, head down, knock it off while it's still at
the edge...
"Steve!" Claire screamed fearfully, but he was almost there, close enough for the acrid tinge of its self-pro- duced gas to sear his nostrils, has to be poison, gotta keep it away from her...
... and just before he rammed into it, something vi-
ciously shoved him, slammed into his back and pushed,
sending him flying to the ground.
"Steve!" Claire screamed again, this time in absolute horror, because he was skidding across the icy cement
on his side, and though he tried to stop himself, scrab-
bling at the frozen platform with frozen fingers, there
was suddenly no platform left.
Steve was only a few feet from the monster when its
strange arm whipped down over them both, hitting
Steve in the back and hurtling him to the side.
"Steve!"
Steve skipped across the frozen platform like a flat
stone on water and disappeared over the edge.
Oh, my God, no!
Claire doubled over, the emotional pain hitting her
like a physical blow, sharp and hard in her gut. He'd
been trying to protect her, and it had cost him his life.
For a second, she couldn't move or breathe, couldn't
feel the cold, didn't care about the monster.
But only for a second.
She looked at the stumbling, tortured animal stagger-
ing toward her, knew without doubt that the fury they'd
heard came from long, hard years of abuse, of experi-
mentation, and felt nothing. Her heart had sealed itself
up, her mind suddenly colder than her body. She
straightened, jacking a round into the chamber of the
rifle, appraising the situation with a clear eye.
Obviously, she could outrun it, leave it on the plat-
form and be a mile away before it found its way back
down - but that wasn't an option, not anymore. Its death
would be a mercy, but that didn't figure in to her calcu-
lations, either.
It killed Steve, and now I'm going to kill it, she thought coolly, and walked to the northwest corner of the plat-
form, the farthest from the stairs. Its appendages flailing
over its head, the monster wove around in a painfully slow
half circle, its blind face finally turned in her direction.
It let out another deep, gasping, mindless sound and
its body vomited out more of that smoking liquid, some
kind of acid or poison, probably. She wondered who had
created such a thing, and how - this was no T-virus
zombie, and from its abused and tormented state, it
wasn't a BOW, either. She supposed she'd never know.
Claire raised the rifle and looked through the scope,
focusing in on the pulsating tissue in the center of its
chest, then raising to target its blank gray face. She
didn't know about the tissue mass at its heart, but she
was sure it wouldn't survive a head shot by a 30.06. She didn't want to waste time stalking it, or inflicting unnec-
essary pain; she just wanted it dead.
She aimed at the center of its forehead. It had a strong
jaw and fine, straight nose beneath the puckered flesh,
as though it had once been handsome, even aristocratic.
Maybe it's another Ashford, she thought mockingly, and fired.
The monster's head split apart, almost seemed to
shatter as the round found its mark. Shards of bone and
brain matter flew, all of it as gray as the gray sky, steam
rising up from the broken bowl of its skull as it fell -
- first to its knees, the mutant arms spasming in the snowy
air, then onto its ruined face.
Claire felt nothing, no pleasure, no dismay, not even
pity. It was dead, that was all, and it was time for her to
go. She still didn't feel the cold, but her body was shak-
ing violently, her teeth rattling, and she knew she had to
get warm...
"Claire?"
The voice was weak and shuddering and unmistak-
ably Steve's, coming from the platform's east edge.
Claire stared at the empty space for a split second, en-
tirely dumbfounded - and then ran, dropping to her
hands and knees beneath the soft patter of snow, leaning
out to see him awkwardly wrapped around a support
post, clinging to the frozen metal with both arms and
one leg.
His face was almost blue with cold, but when he saw
her, his eyes lit up, a look of incredible relief crossing
his pale features.
"You're alive," he said.
"That's my line," she answered, dropping the rifle and bracing herself against the edge, leaning down to
grab his arm. It was a struggle, but in another moment,
Steve was back on the platform, and then they were on
their knees, embracing, too cold to do anything but
hang on.
"I'm so sorry, Claire," he said miserably, his face buried in her shoulder. "I couldn't stop it."
Her heart had unsealed when she'd seen him alive,
and now tightened painfully. He was all of seventeen
years old, his whole life ripped apart by Umbrella, and
he'd just very nearly died trying to save her life. Again.
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