Imperfect

by Tina Chan

  “Will all unarmed persons take cover under a desk,” a soldier bellowed through his portable speakers.

  A stream of devil-dogs flooded the room. The guards surrounding Kristi, Troop and Chelsa dropped onto their knees and began firing at the creatures. The bullets seemed to do little, other than to annoy the devil-dogs though. Kristi watched a bullet lodge itself firmly into the shoulder of a devil-dog, yet the devil-dog only gave a yip and nothing more.

  “Let’s run for the emergency exit,” she said to Troop and Chelsa.

  A devil-dog landed between the three of them, causing Kristi to jump sideways. The guard to her right immediately shot the devil-dog, which caused it to stumble for a second, giving her the chance to dodge out of the circle of soldiers guarding them.

  “Meet you outside,” Chelsa said and dashed away amidst the commotion.

  Kristi rapidly lost sight of Chelsa and Troop in the turmoil. It’s every woman for herself, she thought. Although the scientists were instructed to stay beneath their desks, several were attempting to escape the building through the emergency exits as well.

  “The Accidents! Don’t let them escape!” someone hollered. “Vincent, the boy’s behind you!”

  Kristi caught a glimpse of Troop sidestepping a guard trying to grab him; then he disappeared from her view once more. She threaded her way towards the exit, trying her best to avoid attention.

  “Hey, where do you think you’re going?” asked the soldier who had slapped her for sneezing earlier. He moved in to block her way.

  Kristi didn’t waste her breath with an answer and side-stepped to the left. He side-stepped along with her and lunged forwards. Luckily, Kristi accidently tripped over a briefcase and stumbled backwards, out of the man’s reach. She leapt to her right, recovering from his swipe for her.

  “Grr.”

  Both girl and guard froze at the growl. Kristi took a peek behind her and saw a devil-dog come flying towards them. The guard rolled to one side just in time; the devil-dog’s powerful jaws snapped around empty space where the guard’s head had just been a split second ago.

  The devil-dog twisted around to face Kristi with its fangs bared and nose quivering with excitement. She danced backwards, the devil-dog snapping at her limbs. They continued this perverted version of a waltz: Kristi stepping just out of reach of the monster’s teeth with every step she took backwards.

  The devil-dog grew bored with her and fixed its attention back onto the guard. During the few seconds the devil-dog was occupied with Kristi, the guard had managed to get back on his feet and grab his gun.

  The devil-dog took a flying leap at the guard. The guard fired a quick shot at the creature’s chest and sprung aside. The wound only angered the devil-dog without causing any damage that would hinder its movement.

  “You distract the devil-dog while I shoot him,” the guard yelled. “If we don’t work together, we’ll both get killed.”

  Kristi knew what the guard said was true; the devil-dog was bound to kill one of them sooner or later, and once that happened, the devil-dog would go after the remaining person. As much as she loathed working with an ally of Zala, she replied, “Okay. But the bullets don’t seem to be effective against the devil-dogs.”

  The devil-dog spun towards the sound of her voice and let loose a bark. It advanced towards Kristi and she evaded its venomous saliva by sprinting to the opposite side of the hall.

  The guard answered her, “I’m sure the devil-dog won’t be able to survive a bullet to the heart.”

  The devil-dog momentarily forgot about Kristi and settled its gaze back onto the guard.

  “Hey, you fluff-of-fur!” Kristi yelled at the dog, successfully diverting the devil-dog’s focus back onto her.

  The guard fired another round of bullets into the devil-dog’s hide. After about ten shots, Kristi noticed the movements of the devil-dog were getting just the tiniest bit slower. Sure, the creature was still fast enough to maul her if she wasn’t careful, but at least its reaction time was slowing down.

  “Watch out!” the guard warned her just before he slammed the butt of his gun into the snout of the devil-dog.

  Kristi jerked her hand back as saliva spewed from its muzzle; a few drops of drool splattered onto her arms, making the skin hiss when the acid burned through her shirt.

  “What are you doing?” she screamed. “Are you trying to kill both of us?”

  “No,” the guard answered in a strained voice. “I figured it’s time to try another method to kill the devil-dog since bullets obviously aren’t working—that and the fact that I ran out of bullets.”

  The devil-dog swayed onto its feet. Surprisingly, being whacked by a rifle seemed to have the greatest effect on the devil-dog so far. The guard accidently stepped into a pool of devil-dog slobber and the rubber soles of his boots dissolved into putty.

  “Crud,” he said.

  The devil-dog twitched its ears towards the sound of the guard and pounced onto him. The guard was knocked backwards with enough force to break a brick wall. Fortunately or unfortunately, the guard slammed into a second devil-dog instead of the wall. If the other devil-dog hadn’t been around to cushion the guard’s impact, he would’ve died for sure. On the other hand, he now had another problem to deal with, leaving Kristi to face the first devil-dog on her own.

  Kristi slipped on the floor now slick with blood, letting out a yell before she landed hard on her butt. Both of the devil-dogs cast their gaze onto her. Then realization hit her: devil-dogs were attracted to noise. She spotted the guard crawling towards his gun and did her best to keep the attention of the two devil-dogs on her without actually getting herself killed because, well, being slayed by devil-dogs wasn’t very high on her to-do-list.

  “Yeah, you’re just a little puppy,” Kristi taunted the devil-dogs.

  Whether they understood the words or not, she couldn’t say, but they definitely comprehended the tone of her voice since both of them raised their hackles and began to circle Kristi.

  She looked around for anything that could be used as a weapon. Except for a smoke alarm hanging by a few threads of wire on the wall, a heap of broken tiles, an overturned cart and some scattered paper reports, the hallway contained nothing helpful.

  Kristi rolled off to one side just in time. The larger devil-dog sprang towards her.

  “Fire!” she yelled. “Water!”

  “Is that supposed to mean something?” the guard asked.

  “Can you start a fire?”

  She shoved some paper towards him to use as tinder. “The smoke alarm will activate the sprinklers if we can set it off,” she explained, dodging a swipe made by a devil-dog and throwing a broken tile towards the dog at the same time.

  “And devil-dogs are afraid of water,” the guard finished her thoughts.

  “Exactly.”

  “Here—use this to keep the devil-dogs busy while I make a fire.” He threw his rifle to her and pulled out a small lighter from his pocket.

  Kristi caught the rifle and used it to poke at the devil-dogs, keeping them at a safe distance away. She snatched up more tiles off the ground and aimed them between the eyes of the devil-dogs. She didn’t pay attention to her footing though, and backed into the upturned cart. The smaller devil-dog was upon her in an instant.

  The rifle clattered out of Kristi’s hands and skidded out of reach. She held her breath and tried not to gag on the rank breath wafting off the devil-dog. A giant, gooey, glob of slobber plopped onto her sternum. Tears welled up in her eyes from the burning sensation.

  Kristi struggled to wiggle out from beneath the devil-dog, but the dog placed one heavy paw on her chest, stilling all movements.

  “Help!” she yelped.

  Naturally, her voice attracted the attention of the other devil-dog. Why am I so stupid? Of course I had to forget devil-dogs are attracted to noise!

  The devil-dog pinning her to the ground stuck its face near hers. More droplets of acidic saliva s
plattered on Kristi’s bare skin, causing tears to flow freely and run rivets down the side of her face. The muzzle of the devil-dog rubbed against her tearstained cheeks.

  Hiss.

  The devil-dog jumped backwards, allowing Kristi to get back onto her feet. The fur near the nose and mouth of the devil-dog was gone, and the exposed skin appeared to be red and raw. Kristi realized her tears—which contained water—must’ve eaten away the devil-dog’s fur.

  Both of the devil-dogs were more cautious now, knowing she had the potential to harm them. For once in her life, Kristi wished she would cry more tears. She wiped the tears from the corner of her eyes and flicked the droplets at the devil-dogs. The dogs skittered backwards when the teardrops rained down upon them; but Kristi knew eventually they would overcome the fear of her tears. Although the droplets did indeed blister their pelts, the injuries were only superficial.

  She risked a glance to see how the guard was faring with making a fire. He had managed to light the pieces of paper she had given him by rolling the paper in a torch-like fashion.

  “Do you think you can distract the devil-dogs while I try to set off the smoke detector?” Kristi asked.

  “Yes.” He passed the smoking bundle of paper to her and then grabbed the fallen rifle from the ground.

  The sprinklers better work, Kristi thought. She held up the makeshift torch to the smoke alarm, hoping it would still detect the smoke since several of the wires were ripped. The little green light on the alarm was still blinking, so she had hope.

  “Umph!” the guard grunted.

  He had taken off his shoes and thrown them at the devil-dogs; his shoes were basically useless at this point as the acid had melted most of the rubber soles. The devil-dogs were momentarily distracted by the objects being chucked at their heads. However, the price for a few seconds of distraction was high. The guard had to be extra careful as to where his feet touched the ground—one step in a pool of devil-dog slobber and he was a goner.

  Kristi squeaked and turned her attention back to the improvised torch she held. Her fingers were slightly singed.

  “Come on,” she whispered partly to herself and partly to the smoke alarm. “Please let this work.”

  There was little more than two inches of paper between the flames and her hand now. She would be forced to put out the fire soon if she didn’t want to burn herself.

  THUD!

  The sound of a heavy body hitting the ground made Kristi lurch in surprise.

  “One down, one more to go,” the guard announced.

  The dead body of the smaller devil-dog slid towards Kristi along the slippery floor. She stuck her foot out to stop the body from colliding into her. The devil-dog had been clubbed to death, from the looks of the wounds on its body.

  The blank eyes of the animal stared unfocusedly back at Kristi and its large, slimy tongue drooped out from the corner of its mouth. Blood crusted its mouth along with bullet wounds. She shuddered and averted her gaze from the corpse.

  THUD!

  Kristi looked back towards the direction of the guard and the devil-dog, expecting to see a second dead devil-dog come sliding towards her. Instead, she saw the devil-dog slamming the guard into the ground.

  The guard let out a bloodcurdling howl that was quickly cut off when the devil-dog killed him with a bite to the throat. The body of the guard lay in a limp and crooked position. The devil-dog sniffed over the guard to make sure its prey was dead then started trotting towards Kristi.

  She dropped the torch and grinded out the fire with her boots (the torch wouldn’t have lasted another ten seconds anyways—there was less than half an inch of paper left to burn). Her chances of making it out of the building alive were growing slimmer by every second. She needed a miracle.

  Whoop! Whoop! Whoop!

  “Thank heavens!” she exclaimed.

  The sprinklers sprang into action at last. Lifesaving water drizzled down onto the devil-dog. The devil-dog stopped in its steps, confused by the sudden change in the environment. Kristi prayed the devil-dog would retreat and leave her alone.

  It didn’t.

  Undeterred by the fact it was steaming water from its pelt, the devil-dog still stumbled towards Kristi, albeit its steps were shakier and slower. The nearest emergency exit was two hundred meters down the hall. There was no way she would be able to make it there before the devil-dog was on her.

  Kristi fake lunged towards the left to evade the dog by dodging to the right. Too slow. The left paw of the devil-dog hooked around her legs and she tumbled to the ground.

  Her head cracked against the marble floor and silvery stars exploded across her visions. I refuse for my life to end like this, Kristi thought. Oh yeah? Well, it sure seems like your life is about to end soon, a little voice whispered in the back of her mind. SHUT UP! She ignored the pessimistic voice and focused on getting her head together.

  The devil-dog leaned closer, ready to tear through her throat. Her hands blindly swept the area round her. Her fingers wrapped around something small and slim. It was the tranquilizer the guard had threatened to use on Troop and her earlier. The small dart must’ve slipped out of his pockets.

  The devil-dog’s teeth flashed dangerously close to Kristi’s face. With all her strength, she thrust the dart into its gaping maw. In its weakened state, the highly concentrated sedative knocked out the devil-dog within a few seconds. She barely had enough time to roll out of the way before the devil-dog dropped down cold onto the space where she had just been lying.

  Kristi permitted herself a few seconds to catch her breath. Then she dusted some debris off of herself and took off running out of New Genes Lab without a second look back, leaving the pandemonium occurring in the South Wing far behind.

  chapter forty-five

  [ Troop ]