Origin in Death (In Death #21)(108)

She sprang up, ran out of the nightmare, and into hell. Diana struggled to her feet under the weight of the child. She had the laser still, she thought, and would use it again if she had to.

Chapter Eighteen

THEY SHOULD SPLIT UP. TIME-SAVING, MORE efficient, but the risks were too many. Her hip was a low, continual scream, but Eve kept moving, kept moving.

At every fork, every turn, every doorway, she braced for the next assault.

"There may be little else in direct defense. You'd assume with the level of security above, and the defense here, no one would get through."

Rather than finesse, he blasted the locks on a door marked EXPERIMENTAL STUDIES.

"Mother of Christ," he whispered as they saw what was in the room.

Medical trays, preservation drawers, tanks filled with clear liquid. In them were fetuses at various stages of development. All were deformed.

"Defects," Eve managed while her blood ran cold. "Failures or defective results, stopped when defects were observed." She studied the electronic charts. Something worse than sickness was clogged in her throat.

"Or they were allowed to develop further, even created this way, so they could be studied. Experimented on," she said, swallowing bile. "Kept viable until they were no longer useful."

There was nothing viable there now. No hearts beat in the room but hers and Roarke's.

"Someone's turned off the life systems here, all of them."

"There have to be more."

"Eve." Roarke kept his back turned to what couldn't be changed, couldn't be saved, and studied the equipment. "They haven't just been turned off. It's on a Yellow Alert."

"Meaning?"

"Might be a level for the security breach, automated as you suggested. Or it could be a holding pattern before Red, and self-destruct."

She spun back. "Deena couldn't have gotten that far ahead of us. She's not that damn good. If... Someone else set it."

"Bury it," Roarke said. "Bury all this and everything in it rather than have it taken."

"Can you abort?"

He was working, manually, through his scanner. And shook his head. "Not from here at any rate. This isn't the source."

"Then we find it, and whoever's running this show, before it goes to Red."

She turned, pushed through the doors.

In the white tunnel outside, she saw Diana standing with her hand gripped on a younger, smaller version of herself. In her other hand was a laser scalpel.

"I know how to use it," Diana said.

"Bet." And Eve knew exactly what it felt like to have the beam slice through flesh. "But that would be pretty damn stupid as we've come to get you the hell out of here. Where's Deena? Has she set for self-destruct?"

"He did. She went after him. He had a baby." She glanced at the sniffling toddler. "Our baby sister."

"Who did she go after?"

"Wilson. He had her." She lifted the toddler's hand a fraction. "Her name's Darby. I killed him, one of him, with this. I set it on full and aimed at his eyes. I killed him."

"Good for you. Show me where they went."

"She's tired." Diana looked down at Darby. "I think they gave her something to make her sleepy. She can't run."

"Here." Roarke stepped forward. "I'll take her. I won't hurt her."

Diana studied his face. "I'll have to kill you if you try."

"That's a deal. More help's coming." He hoisted the child.

"They better get here soon. This way. Hurry."

She went off in a sprint.

Eve loped behind her, shoving her back at splits and turns until she'd checked for the all-clear.

The Gestation area was still unsecured. Diana bounded right in, and for the second time Eve had shock slap her back.

The room was full of chambers, interlocked and stacked like the inside of a hive. In each chamber a fetus floated, in thick, clear liquid. A tube-she supposed to replicate an umbilical cord-attached each one to a mass she assumed was artificial placenta. Each chamber held an electronic chart and monitor, recording respiration, heartbeat, brain waves, listing the date of conception, the donor, and the date listed for Quiet Birth.

She jolted back when one of the occupants turned, like an alien fish swimming in strange waters.

There was a record as well of stimuli. Music played, voices, languages, and the continual beat of a heart.

There were dozens of them.

"He killed Icove." Diana gestured to the bodies on the floor. "This Icove anyway. He's going to destroy it."

"What?"

"He's going to take what he wants, the ones he's picked, and destroy everything else. Deena was going to destroy it, but she couldn't." Diana looked around. "We came in here, and we knew she couldn't. She went that way, after him. One of them. There may be more than two."

"Get them out of here." She swung to Roarke. "Get them up and out."

"Eve."

"I can't do both. I need you to do this. I need you to get them to safety. Fast."

"Don't ask me to leave you here."

"You're the only one I can ask." She gave him a long last look. Then she rushed in the direction Deena had taken.