“Ranger,” Bray said as Hawkins turned around. He handed the machete and captive bolt stunner to Hawkins. “At least he left us with an arsenal.”
Hawkins looked at the pegboard holding an array of surgical tools. Bray had taken a knife that looked like a long fish filleting blade and a frightening thick-toothed bone saw. Hawkins was satisfied with the machete and attached it to his belt before motioning to the tools. “Blok, grab something to use as a weapon.”
“Are we going to have to kill something?” Blok asked with a shaky voice.
Jones’s desperate voice filled the room. “What’s happening to her!”
“Probably,” Hawkins said and then turned to DeWinter for the first time since escaping his cell. Jones leaned over her, blocking most of his view, but what little he could see of her belly was severely distended.
And moving.
He stepped closer and got a better look. Her whole body twitched and her light brown skin looked washed-out. “Harry,” he said, his tone half-apologetic, half-warning.
Hawkins placed a hand on Jones’s shoulder and tried to pull him back, but the man shrugged away. “No!”
Bray stepped over and put his fingers on her neck, searching for a pulse. “Jones, she’s gone.”
“She’s still moving!” Jones said, clinging to DeWinter’s shoulders.
“That’s not her,” Hawkins said, stepping back. The convulsions grew more violent. “It’s what’s inside her.”
“Shut up!” Jones screamed, waving them all back. “She’s my daughter.”
Hawkins drew the machete.
Bray stood ready with the bone saw.
Blok backed into his cell, unarmed, and slowly pulled the door closed.
Hawkins raised the machete. He could end this now. It would feel wrong—awful—but he could stop whatever was about to happen with one swing. “Jones, step back.”
“Stay away!” Jones said, eyeing the machete. “Don’t touch her! She’s—”
The convulsions stopped. But DeWinter’s torso was swollen to the point where light-colored stretch marks had streaked across her flesh. Jones moved toward her head, cradling her cheeks in his hands. “Open your eyes, baby. I’m here.”
Her belly shifted in response to Jones’s voice.
“Jones,” Bray whispered. “Back the hell up.”
Jones clenched his eyes shut, squeezing tears onto his face. “Bray, I swear to God, if you—”
Hawkins had only just registered the tearing sound when an explosion of movement burst from DeWinter’s belly. Long black limbs, coated with thick, pointy hairs and dollops of flesh, reached out and locked on to Jones’s upper body and face.
Jones let out a shriek and reeled back, pulling the creature free. The thing had the head and limbs of a giant spider, the spiky protective carapace of a snapping turtle, and a long, black prehensile tail, which had already wrapped around Jones’s waist. Hawkins had only just begun to recover from his surprise when a stinger emerged from between the tail and shell and jabbed Jones three times in the gut.
Jones shouted in pain and fell to the floor. The creature’s tail unwrapped and it jumped away, landing on the operating table. The entire attack had taken just seconds. Jones convulsed. His eyes rolled back. And his belly began to expand.
The time between DeWinter drinking the water offered by Bennett and the emergence of this fully formed monster was just over a minute.
“It must be genetically engineered to crank out growth hormones,” Bray said. His eyes were locked on the creature, and the bone saw was raised to strike. “I think it ate DeWinter from the inside, metabolized her flesh, and grew fast. Really fast.”
The creature studied them, shifting its four eyes from one man to the next.
“But here’s the thing about animals that grow too fast,” Bray said. “They’re fragile. I doubt that shell is even solid yet.”
That’s all Hawkins needed to hear. When the creature turned back to Bray, Hawkins charged and swung with the machete. The spider eyes turned back toward him with impossible speed, but the monster couldn’t avoid the descending blade. In fact, it didn’t even try to.
The eight long legs and head snapped back inside the body just as the blade struck the carapace and deflected away. The blade struck the table hard, sending a painful vibration up Hawkins’s arm.
Just as quickly as the head and legs disappeared, they shot back out and took action.
Bray charged, but was too slow. The creature leapt at Hawkins, eight arms splayed wide. Hawkins dropped the machete and caught the thing on the underside of its carapace. He tried to fling it away, but the tail had already wrapped around his waist. When the weight of it struck him, he fell back and stumbled into a glass cabinet. Shattered glass rained down as Hawkins and the monster fell to the floor.
“Bray!” Hawkins shouted, but his voice was barely audible over Jones’s rising shrieks. Unlike DeWinter, Jones was fully conscious when the parasitical spider thing started to eat him from the inside out.