Cam and Tilly started to rush over then stopped dead in their tracks.
There was definitely someone sitting behind the wheel in the cart because they could see the legs twitching. The rest of the person was inside what looked to be a giant sock puppet but in reality was a gluttonous Mongolian death worm gorging down its meal.
***
Nick was surprised to see other guests in the lobby demanding to know what the disturbance was outside the hotel even though the annoying siren had turned off.
He counted around fifteen, some of them still in their pajamas and robes, others looking like they had hastily thrown on some clothes. Everyone seemed to be talking at once. An irate man leaned on the front counter giving the hotel clerk a piece of his mind.
“What’s with all the people?” Gabe asked.
“Jesus, Nick it’s a damn mob,” Meg said.
“Let’s hang back, see if the manager or somebody shows that can tell us what’s going on.” Nick pointed to a loveseat and a chair on the far side of the lobby away from the fracas.
They stayed clear of the boisterous crowd and were almost to the sitting area when Nick heard shattering glass. He turned and saw a bili ape had smashed through a dining room window.
The primate knocked aside tables and upended chairs as it charged through the room, drawn to the noisy group of people. It moved with athletic agility, thrusting both arms out and landing on its knuckles, rump and bent hind legs tucking between its elbows with each bound.
“Oh my God,” Meg yelled when another ape jumped through the empty window frame.
“Holy shit!” Gabe gasped.
Nick steered Meg and Gabe behind one of the giant palms. They crouched behind the massive ceramic pot and poked their heads up.
The two bili apes charged into the crowd like a couple of deranged lunatics causing everyone to scream and flee to get out of their way. The primates were relentlessly brutal, attacking one person then another, striking them down with their powerful fists, shattering bones and ripping off limbs.
Nick cringed when a blonde woman trying to get away was snatched by her long hair and with one swift jerk, her scalp was ripped from her skull.
He watched as a young boy was picked up and flung across the lobby floor, screaming, until he struck the wall.
When a man fell to the floor, his right leg was seized and yanked clear out of the socket, tearing off his pant leg, and showering the bili ape with spurting blood.
Nick couldn’t believe the amount of blood pooled on the granite floor as the bodies continued to fall.
The agonizing cries soon died away as the last victim was silenced.
The massacre left dismembered corpses in the middle of the lobby; the front desk and surrounding walls covered with crimson splatter and gore.
The apes stood fully erect, raised their blood-drenched hands in the air and screeched, baring their red-stained teeth in a victorious display of savagery.
Nick ducked down and looked at Meg and Gabe. They were scared out of their minds. He wondered if they were even too frightened to move, especially after what they had just witnessed.
He glanced over his shoulder and spotted a fire door maybe twenty feet away. If they could reach it, they could run up the stairs and lock themselves in a room until help came. It was their only chance.
“We need to get out of here,” Nick whispered to Meg.
“But where?” Meg asked.
Nick directed her and Gabe’s attention to the fire door.
“But they’ll see us.”
Nick raised his head to take a peek at the apes and saw they were squatting in the middle of the pile of bodies, hunched over, relishing their first taste of human flesh.
“Dad?” Gabe whispered.
“What, son?”
“Weren’t there four on the tour?”
Nick saw one of the apes raise its head and look directly at him. “We need to go! Now!” He grabbed Meg by the hand and yanked her to her feet. He pulled her along and ran as fast as he could for the fire door. He glanced back for a split second. Gabe was right on their heels.
And so was a giant ape, its face and chest caked with blood.
Nick reached the fire door and flipped down the handle. He pushed the door open enough for Meg and Gabe to slip through then followed them into the stairwell.
The bili ape flung its body against the other side of the door then shoved its face against the small eight by ten inch window, and snarled, leaving a blood smear on the glass.
“Hurry, up the stairs,” Nick shouted.
Meg rushed up first, then Gabe.
Nick grabbed the banister and scampered up the stairs after them.
They had just reached the third floor landing when Nick heard a tremendous bang down below.
He stopped, leaned over the railing, and peered down.
The ape was clambering up the stairwell.
25
CHAOS
As soon as they left the security building, Jack and Miguel followed the two-man team down the pathway to the front entrance of the hotel. The guard with the shotgun put up his hand upon reaching the glass door, signaling everyone to stop.
Jack could see bodies lying on the lobby floor.
“It’s a damn slaughterfest in there,” Miguel said.
The other guard caught Jack’s attention and pointed to a bili ape pulling a long strand of tendon out of a dead person’s arm with its teeth.
“I’ve got this,” the guard with the tranquilizer gun said.
“No, wait,” Jack objected but it was too late, the guard had already opened the door and charged in.
Eager to subdue the animal, the guard dashed across the floor. With the stock of the non-lethal air gun pressed against his shoulder, he took quick aim, and fired a projectile.
The dart struck the ape in the nape of the neck. There was enough immobilizing sedative in the hypodermic dispenser to bring down a horse.
The bili ape yanked the dart out of its fur just as the guard shot it again, hitting it between the shoulder blades.
“Get back you idiot!” Jack shouted, storming in after the guard.
The ape reached over its shoulder to extract the second dart but it couldn’t quite reach it. It stood and turned around. Once it saw the guard rushing towards it, the infuriated ape roared and charged its assailant.
Before the guard knew what was happening, the ape grabbed the man’s helmet by the grill and gave it a fierce shake.
Jack heard the guard’s neck crack.
The ape held onto the helmet and dragged the limp body along the floor like a toddler would a rag doll.
Jack took a bead on the ape with his high-power rifle and fired a single shot.
The slug punched a hole in the ape’s forehead just above its right eye and exited out the back of its skull in an explosive pink mist of fragmented bone and minced brain.
The ape toppled backward onto the pile of dead bodies.
“Nice shot,” said the guard with the shotgun.
Jack turned on the guard. “Didn’t anyone tell you guys that tranquilizer darts don’t work on bili apes?”
The guard was taken aback and could see Jack was angry. “Miller got excited and must have forgotten,” the guard replied in his defense.
“The last thing you want to do, is underestimate these creatures,” Miguel said. “That is, if you want to stay alive.”
“Miguel’s right. You better pass the word to your boss. Make sure nobody else makes the same mistake.”
“Yes, sir.” The guard stepped away and got on his two-way radio to call his boss.
Jack looked around at the mutilated bodies. “What a goddamn mess.”
“Don’t these apes travel in troops?” Miguel said.
“They do.”
“Then where’re the rest of them?”
***
Nick held the fire door open for Meg and Gabe as they rushed into the third floor hallway. He could hear the ape bounding up the
stairwell a floor below.
He tried pulling on the door but the attached door closer over the jam wouldn’t allow him to slam it shut. He backed away from the door and turned.
Meg and Gabe were working their way down, dodging into the small alcoves outside each suite, trying the doors to see if someone had propped one open.
“Hey, what the hell’s going on?” yelled a baritone voice.
Nick saw a man standing outside one of the closed doors further down the hall.
“Thank God!” Nick yelled, “Let us inside your room.”
“What for?”
“There’s an ape coming up the stairs.”
“A what?”
“AN APE!” Meg and Gabe yelled at him.
Just then the bili ape ripped the fire door off its hinges and stomped through the doorway.
“Jesus, you weren’t kidding,” the man yelled. He turned to his door and grabbed the handle. “Damn thing won’t open. I’m locked out!”
“That’s cause there’s no power,” Nick said. “They only open from the inside.”
“So what the—”
The bili ape charged down the hall on all fours.
“Run!” Nick yelled at the man and took off down the hall after Meg and Gabe who were already running away.
Nick heard the man scream but didn’t look back. The ape howled and then there was a loud crash of splintering wood, which probably meant the primate had flung the man through his suite door.
Some of the emergency lights had not activated, so the far hallway was extremely dark. Nick could just make out Meg and Gabe’s silhouettes. He could hear the ape stampeding down the hall.
He felt a sudden pressure and cupped his hand over his forehead. It was like a wedge was being forced between his skull and the front of his brain.
And with it, came a vision.
Don’t go in!
“Meg! Gabe! Wait!” He ran as fast as he could and reached his wife and son just as they were about to step between the opened doors of an elevator car. He grabbed them both by the arms, pulled them back, and pushed them aside to the carpet.
Nick spun around and hit the floor, just as the ape dove over him into the black void, smashing into the metal wall of the elevator shaft.
***
Jack turned when he heard a muffled impact behind the closed doors of the lobby elevator. “What the hell was that?” he asked Miguel.
“I don’t know.”
They stepped around the bodies to the elevator. The guard pulled his combat knife from the sheath on his utility belt and used the tip to pry open the doors. Jack and Miguel each grabbed the edge of a door with their fingertips and together yanked them apart.
“Holy shit!” Jack said when he saw the crumpled body of the bili ape with its feet in the air inside the car, covered with ceiling tiles and debris. The ape was clearly dead having crashed through the roof and landing on its head.
The guard wasn’t taking any chances after seeing his friend brutally killed and vindictively fired his shotgun, turning the ape’s head into an unsavory bowl of crimson mush.
Jack stepped inside the car. He shined his flashlight up the elevator shaft and saw a man, woman, and a teenage boy staring down at him from three flights up.
“You okay up there?” he yelled.
“We are now,” the man answered.
***
Cam and Tilly were sickened by the sight of their coworker being swallowed alive by the Mongolian death worm and made their way around the circular foundation with their backs pressed against the wall, afraid they might be next.
“Did maintenance ever repair that hydraulic service elevator that connects between the lab and the workshop?” Cam asked.
“I’m not sure,” Tilly said. “But even if they have, doesn’t it run on electricity?”
“It has its own auxiliary power. For emergencies, like this.”
“It’s worth a look.”
They continued to skirt around the foundation until they reached the wide elevator doors with a control box on the wall. Two dust-covered vehicles were parked in the small lot: a black sedan and a large moving van.
Cam opened the cover on the panel. “We’re in luck. They must have fixed it because the auxiliary switch is on.” He pushed the button to open the elevator doors and heard Tilly gasp.
“What’s wrong?” he said and turned.
A tzuchinoko had crept up and was only ten feet away. The upper part of its body rose in the air. The Japanese snake looked like an obese cobra. It opened its mouth and hissed, baring its venomous fangs.
“Don’t make any sudden moves,” Tilly said.
“You mean like run?” Cam said, doing his best to remain calm. He glanced over his shoulder and saw that the doors had opened on the elevator.
“What do we do?”
Cam saw something moving out in the murky underground structure. “Step back into the elevator.”
“Are you crazy? We’ll be trapped.”
“Trust me,” Cam said and pulled the crescent wrench out of his back pocket. He waited until Tilly was in the elevator then slowly stepped in, never once taking his eyes off the snake’s evil glare.
The snake tensed, ready to strike.
Cam struck the elevator door repeatedly with the end of the crescent wrench.
The clanging startled the snake momentarily.
Cam and Tilly stood apprehensively as the elevator doors slowly closed but then were quickly elated when a Mongolian death worm—drawn by the sound—loomed out of the darkness over the fat serpent and plunged downward, swallowing the snake.
26
RAMPAGE
Ivan had no idea what to expect when he went outside and dispersed his security teams throughout the grounds. The interior of the dome was like being in a massive subterranean cavern illuminated by only a few torches—in this case sparse emergency lighting—forcing them to have to use their flashlights. He could just make out the silhouettes of some of the buildings in the near pitch black. So many shadows and dark niches for the creatures to hide and lay in wait.
He could hear mighty roars booming from Mammoth Arena on the opposite side of the dome. It was the enormous bear and the giant ground sloth. By the sound of things, the two were either having an altercation or were just pissed off from being cooped up.
They were not a priority as long as they remained in their enclosures, giving him more time to contend with the lesser threats.
He had assigned a two-man team to accompany him. All three of them were armed with Heckler & Koch MP7 submachine guns with 40-round clips, ample firepower to bring down any of the cryptids in the zoo.
They were somewhere near the laboratory and workshop complex when he heard what sounded like heavy wings flapping overhead. “Guns up!” he hollered and crouched down, aiming his weapon in the air.
Ivan heard a whoosh then a man screamed. He directed the beam of his flashlight and saw one of his security guards being hoisted in the air, his body clutched in the talons of a gigantic thunderbird. The man continued to scream and kicked his legs like a little kid having a tantrum.
“Do we fire?” yelled the other guard.
If they did, they might get lucky and hit the bird of prey but most likely the bullets would kill the guard first.
The giant bird soared straight up and was quickly beyond the reach of Ivan’s flashlight. “Jesus, he’s gone.”
Ten seconds later, Ivan heard a wet splat on the flagstone path. He trained the beam on the source of the sound. It was the guard that had just been scooped up or so he believed.
“Son of a bitch,” the one guard said when he saw the man’s splattered body on the paving stones.
“It must have taken him all the way up to the top and dropped him,” Ivan said, wondering why it would do such a thing. It was unbelievable the destruction a 25-story fall could do to a human body.
He heard someone yell not too far away. “Come on,” Ivan said to the guard and they scurried down th
e pathway, following the beams of their flashlights.
Ivan saw another one of his teams standing near the gap between the lab and workshop complex and the Biped Habitat. The men were twenty feet apart with their backs turned, looking in opposite directions.
“What’s going on?” Ivan asked.
“I saw a blue tiger,” one of the men said. “It’s over there!” He trained the muzzle of his shotgun at the side of the building.
“No, it’s over here,” shouted the other man, pointing his assault rifle in the other direction. “It doubled back around the building. Damn thing’s stalking us.”
Ivan and his guard stepped back not knowing which man to believe.
“There it is!” one man yelled. The other man turned and rushed over to his teammate.
Ivan gazed in the same direction but didn’t see anything. He figured they were probably spooked and were seeing things. The last thing he needed was for his men to get trigger-happy and start shooting each other.
Suddenly, two blue tigers appeared out of the darkness and pounced on the two men from behind, pinning them to the ground with their long, sharp claws.
Ivan and the guard standing next to him hesitated, afraid if they fired, they’d hit the guards. But when Ivan heard the tigers cracking open the men’s skulls with their powerful jaws, he knew they were already dead. “Take ‘em down!”
Both Ivan and the guard opened up on the closest tiger, riddling its body with bullets and emptying their clips. Ivan was about to train his weapon on the other big cat when it ran off, dragging the dead guard by the head, and disappeared into the dark.
***
When Jack called up and told them to come down to the lobby, Nick, Meg, and Gabe rushed through the hallway and hurried down the stairwell.
When they stepped out through the fire door they saw the bodies and all the blood. Meg had gotten weak-kneed and would have collapsed on the floor if Nick hadn’t caught her. Gabe’s face had become ashen and he averted his eyes from looking directly at the mutilated guests.
Guiding them over to where they had been sitting before, Nick told Meg and Gabe to hang tight while he conferred with the others to see what was going on.
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