SEVENTEEN
CHRIS RAN, KNOWING THAT THEIR TIME WAS
short as long as Alexia Ashford was alive, afraid that she
might already have gotten to Claire.
"Claire!" he shouted, banging his fist on every door
he passed. It didn't matter, his shouting; if Alexia was
even half as powerful as he suspected, she already knew
where he was ... and where Claire was.
Please, please don't hurt her, he thought, the thought
repeating itself as he ran down another hall, through a
door, another hall, and another. He didn't know if anything
could stop Alexia, but if he could find Claire and
get them to the evac elevator, he meant to try and trigger
the self-destruct system before leaving. Alexia was
halfway to omnipotence and purely evil, she was an
apocalypse waiting to happen, and she had to be stopped.
"Claire!"
Through a familiar hallway, another Spencer estate
copy, through a door that opened into some kind of shadowy
prison, holding cells lining the walls. He had to find
her, if he couldn't, he couldn't leave. He wanted Alexia
dead, but he wouldn't endanger Claire's life, not for anything,
and getting her out took absolute priority -
- and somebody was crying behind one of the closed
doors. Chris stopped running and listened, trying not to
breathe, tuning out the relentless banging of a virus carrier
locked in another cell. Another gasping wail...
Claire, oh, thank God you're alive!
He ripped open the door, ready to hurt anything even
close to her - and saw her sitting on the floor, sobbing,
her arms wrapped around a young man, his naked body
bruised and pitiful. He was dead.
Ah, shit.
It could only be Steve, Claire's friend, and though he
was sorry for the boy he'd never met, Chris's heart was
breaking for her. She looked so fragile, so alone...
... something else to lay at Alexia's doorstep. Chris had no
doubt that Steve had died because of that crazy bitch.
But as much as he wanted to sit down and comfort
Claire, to hold her hand and let her grieve, he knew they
had to get out.
"We have to go now, Claire," he said, as gently as possible
and was relieved when she nodded, carefully laying
her friend down, closing his eyes with one trembling
hand. She kissed him on the forehead and then stood up.
"Okay," she said, nodding again. "I'm ready."
She didn't look back, and in spite of everything, he
was proud of her. She was strong, stronger than he
would have been if he'd been asked to leave someone
he'd cared about.
Together, they ran back into the hall, Chris figuring
that they had to be close to the southwest corner of the
building, where he'd landed the jet and seen the emergency
evacuation elevator. The self-destruct system was
presumably close enough to the elevator to make a fast
escape possible; if they could just get to that elevator,
he'd check every floor on the way up.
There were stairs at the south end of the hall, and Chris
ran for them, Claire at his side. He could feel the seconds
ticking past as they hurried up the steps, felt like time
was closing in on them, that Alexia was finished playing.
Through the door at the top of the stairs, running out
onto a giant metal grid platform - and Chris laughed out
loud when he looked behind them, saw the nondescript
doors of the emergency elevator.
"What?" Claire asked.
He motioned at the doors, grinning. "That'll take us
straight to the jet."
Claire nodded, not smiling but she looked relieved.
"Good. Let's go."
Chris had turned back to look at the wall across from
the hit. "I've got to check something first," he said,
wanting to take a closer look at the corner door, it
looked Like a security door. "You go, I'll be right there."
"Forget it," Claire said firmly. She walked after him,
her eyes red from crying but her chin set and determined.
"No way we're splitting up again."
Chris leaned down to look at the door's locking
mechanism and sighed, standing back up. They were
probably at the self-destruct system already; the lock
was complicated and unique, requiring a key he didn't
have. Besides which, to the right of the door was a
locked-down grenade launcher of some kind, one he
didn't recognize, the bar holding it down labeled emergency
release only.
Just as well, we should get out while we still can, he
thought, but wasn't happy about it. How much more
powerful would Alexia become before another chance
like this one?
"Hey, hey, wait a sec," Claire said, and began rummaging
through the small pack around her waist. Before
he could ask, she was holding up a slender metal key,
shaped like a dragonfly. There was no question that it
would fit the lock.
"I found it back at Rockfort," she said, bending over
and pressing it into the indentation. It fit perfectly, the
lock releasing with a solid metallic clink.
"You're going to set off the self-destruct, aren't you,"
Claire said, not really a question. "Do you have the
code?"
Chris didn't really answer, thinking that there were an
amazing number of coincidences in life, and sometimes,
they worked to one's advantage.
"Code Veronica," he said softly, and pulled the door
open, ready to take it all down, understanding that it was
meant to be.
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