It was Lauren's head and naked torso but with six giant scuttling legs, armoured like a crab's, ending in hooks that latched onto the ceiling. Lauren's face was vacant, her eyes filmy like a fish's. Her jaw had broken completely away, leaving the skin a mess of torn flesh crusted with blood. Her head twitched side to side and she started to make an eerie clicking noise. Chloe gasped as four fangs protruded from Lauren's mouth, flexing menacingly.
Chloe's chest heaved up and down as she struggled to breathe, panic clenching around her throat.
"Ryder," Chloe's voice came out as a strangled whisper, "wake up!" She aimed her gun at the Lauren-monster, her hands trembling. "P-please..." She stared up at the friend, her mouth going dry with fear.
Lauren scurried toward her, dust and plaster raining down as her hooks tore at the ceiling. The sound of breaking glass from above made Lauren stop and turn sharply, investigating the source of the sound with jerky head movements. Chloe didn't hesitate. Ducking down, she rolled across the floor – keeping out of Lauren's reach and narrowly making it to exit. She scrambled to her feet, pulling herself using the door frame, and broke into a sprint down the corridor.
Chloe skidded on the floor as she turned abruptly to bolt into the gent's toilets. She pulled the door shut behind her, gripping onto the door handle – her ear against the grain. She listened hard. The lights flickered overhead before spluttering out once more. A heavy silence followed and Chloe realised that the generators had stopped. Power had been shut off to Gemini.
Chloe was breathing heavily. She let go of the handle and leant back against the door. Yanking off her hood, she found it easier to breathe without the heavy material covering her mouth. She flung the mask aside, putting her hand over her chest in an attempt to quiet her thudding heart. If your times up, it's up. With this, only half, reassuring thought – she reopened the door.
Ducking her head through the doorway, Chloe looked up and down corridor. No sign of Lauren. Keeping low, Chloe hurried down the tiled flooring, her gaze scanning the ceiling. Large chunks of plaster were missing and blood smears skirted around the light fittings. A rattling breath from up ahead made Chloe quickly duck into an interrogation room. She got under the narrow central table just as the door was thrust off its hinges.
The hefty door smacked against the table, causing the wood to tremble. Chloe had her knees pulled up tightly to her chest, in an attempt to make herself as small as possible. She held incredibly still. Listening with every highly-strung fibre of her being, Chloe heard Lauren scuttle into the room. The two-way glass trembled as Lauren clacked across the ceiling, breathing in deeply. Chloe clasped a hand over her mouth.
Lauren's fangs clicked, tasting the air. The ground trembled as she landed suddenly on the floor. Chloe's eyes widened in fear, her face only inches from one of Lauren's legs. This close, Chloe saw the tiny hairs – like cactus spines- covering the crustaceous extremities. Lauren's hooks struck into the ground, screeching piercingly as they sliced through the tiles. The legs started moving, creeping slowly, breaking up the ground in a semi-circle around Chloe.
Lauren breathed in another deep rasping breath and Chloe had to repress the urge to gag. The air around her was turning foul, putrid with the stench of death that clung to Lauren's monstrous mouth. Chloe's eyes watered but she gritted her teeth, forcing herself not to make a sound. Panic... familiar – an old friend she'd never quite shaken since Irrenhaus - rose to the surface.
"I whispered surrender..."
She could hear the words, murmured over and over but knew that they were in her head only. They were a memory, they weren't real. But if she lost it now, she'd die. Defying every instinct, Chloe closed her eyes – fighting for control in her own mind. Conquer fear, conquer life.
Lauren left, climbing up the wall as she headed out of the room. Chloe listened to the sounds of her retreat, struggling to suppress a relieved sob. Arms and legs trembling, she scrambled out from under the table and rose shakily to her feet. Sweat shone on her forehead and for a moment, she swayed unsteadily.
Leaving through the hole in the doorway, Chloe hurried down the corridor. She made it to the foyer and hastily dropped to her knees next to the dead jailors side. She searched his uniform, her clammy fingers securing a set of keys. They jangled as she raised them up and Chloe stiffened, her heart about ready to leap into her throat. She looked longingly in the direction of the exit. She was so incredibly close...
Chloe clenched tightly onto the keys, their teeth biting into her slick palm. But Ryder... She glanced down at the branding on her arm. He'd been a slave owner once, perhaps his crimes were too much for her to have any right to forgive them – but... He was a changed man. And that was enough for her. Chloe turned her back on the exit, and on her best chance of survival, facing instead her blood chilling task.
She crept back down the passage she'd just come down. From above, she heard crashing noises that made her flinch and cower. The noises were following her route but from the next floor up. She can hear me, but she's not sure what level I'm on – Chloe realised. How long before Lauren searched this floor again? Losing her nerve, Chloe broke into a run. The ceiling trembled above her as Lauren charged also, her hooks pounding the building.
Chloe made it, out of breath, to Ryder's cell. She fumbled with the keys, trying them one by one as fast as she could. She heard Lauren circling the room above, her claws tearing up the place. At last, Chloe found the right key. She flung open the door and the hinges creaked noisily. Lauren dropped from the second floor ceiling and landed with a thud on the carpet, positioned directly above Chloe's head. Plaster danced down from the groaning ceiling as Lauren began ripping up the flooring, burrowing down to them.
"Ryder!" Chloe rolled him onto his back. He was out cold, his mouth slack and his eyes peacefully shut. Touching his face though, Chloe realised that he had a fever. His damp forehead was burning up and sweat was seeping into his hairline and sliding down his jaw and neck. A large ceiling panel crashed to the ground behind them.
Gripping Ryder under the arms, Chloe attempted to drag him but the clanking of chains alerted her to the manacles secured around his ankle. She could have wept. Lauren was still ferociously tearing up the ceiling and Chloe could, once again, hear the clicking of Lauren's monster fangs. Picking up the keys, Chloe set about unlocking the manacles. They mercifully clicked open on her first attempt.
Pulling his foot roughly free, Chloe hoisted him into an upright position. His head lolled back against her, his damp skin sticking to hers. From there, Chloe heaved him up onto her shoulders. He was a hefty dead weight and Chloe's back protested, her spine jarring painfully. Staggering with his weight, she vacated the cell – slamming the door shut behind her.
Chloe's breathing was heavy and laboured before she was halfway down the corridor. Behind her, she heard the crash as Lauren landed inside Ryder's cell. Chloe wondered how long they had, before Lauren tore her way through those prison bars. Groaning, Chloe readjusted Ryder across her back and pushed her legs to lumber as fast as they could. She made it to the jailors body, his disfigured face a stark message of what was going to happen to them should they fail to escape, before Ryder began to stir.
He moaned, his nose nuzzling her hair.
"Ryder," she called urgently. Lauren screeched behind them, the piercing cry causing Chloe to shudder. She felt her knees begin to buckle beneath Ryder's weight. "Ryder, do magic. You need to do magic," she pleaded breathlessly. Ryder's eyelids fluttered closed once more. Chloe lost her grip on him and fell to her knees in a stumbling effort to keep him slung across her shoulders.
Lauren burst from the cells, her hooks on the wall of the long corridor – giving her a sideways angle. The brickwork chipped away in flakes as Lauren scuttled across the wall, her quarry in sight. Bellowing a battle cry, in a last determined push, Chloe rose to her feet and staggered toward the exit. She had one foot over the exit's threshold when Ryder slipped from her shoulders, landing in a heap on the ground. Kicking the dead doorman out of her way, Chloe twisted around and put her arms around Ryder's torso, heaving him out onto the street.
She tripped, falling backwards – her back smacking against the curb. Ryder landed heavily on top of her and Chloe wheezed, the breath knocked from her lungs. The sound of Lauren's dry, suctioning breaths was close at hand. Chloe crawled backwards, awkwardly dragging Ryder with her – her terrified gaze fixed on the prison's busted door. Lauren swiftly emerged, scuttling out into the night – her hooks causing ripples to crack across the pavement slabs.
Lauren turned her head this way and that, sniffing deeply.
"Who goes there?!" A watchman bellowed. Chloe craned her neck, horrified to see a human male flashing a torch light in their direction.
"RUN!" She screamed – but too late. Lauren sprang forward, leaping atop the man.
Chloe got to her feet, the man's screams seeming to careen and crash around her skull. She wasted no time. Seizing Ryder by the ankles, she dragged him over the ground – heaving his bulk with all her remaining strength. Looking up, she saw the watchman's hands twitching as Lauren sucked ravenously on his face.