I know Pete breathed a sigh of relief as we escaped out. Michael yelled something I didn’t catch, and then he got to his feet and charged forward – by vampire standards, it was more of a lumbering stumble than a charge, because he wasn’t moving any faster than the rest of us. But he took down a guy aiming at Eve, tackled him to the floor, and his vampire instincts finally kicked in. I heard the low-in-the-throat snarl, saw the flash of fangs coming down, and I felt a sudden answering burn inside. It came from my arm first; I’d almost forgotten the bite I’d gotten there before I left Morganville, but this reminded me, hard enough to make me stagger and catch myself against the wall. The pain crawled up to my shoulder, and spread like fire over the network of my bones, and I didn’t know what the hell was happening to me. I sagged, coughing, and heard Pete demanding to know if I’d been hit. I shook my head.
I wasn’t wounded, but I felt sick, really sick, and I knew it was Michael going vamp that had triggered it. Something was wrong with me. Very wrong. It was as if I was reacting to him.
Liz was confused and scared, and she bolted forward, trying to get free of all of us crazy people; I couldn’t say I blamed her. We weren’t exactly the world’s most credible rescue crew ever, what with all the blood, Michael burying his fangs in a guy’s throat, Eve ignoring it to scoop up his fallen weapon, and me trying to puke against the wall.
She didn’t make it far.
Dr Davis stepped out of the kitchen. He was holding a gun of his own, and he pointed it at Liz; she skidded, arms windmilling wildly as she tried to check her forward momentum. She didn’t manage it, and crashed against him. He grabbed her, put an arm around her neck and hugged her to him as a human shield as Pete and Eve both focused their guns on him.
Michael finished with his dinner – I wish I could say that was a joke – and looked up at Davis, eyes glowing a shade of red that ought to exist only in horror movies. He licked his lips, but he didn’t move from the crouch he was in. Somehow, that was more frightening.
And I was feeling something new now. Not better, exactly, but stronger. Faster. And with it, I felt a nearly uncontrollable need to rip Michael’s head clean off his body. As if he was the only real enemy in the room.
I was pretty sure that last part was wrong.
I shook my head to try to clear it, and blood drops flew like sweat after a good workout. The cut in my head was still bleeding freely. I saw Michael sense it, felt him sense it, and something inside me grinned in anticipation, and roared for him to try it.
Michael didn’t come at me, and somehow, I managed to stuff down that impulse to go at him. Liz, I reminded myself. The girl was clueless and in danger, and neither one of us needed the distraction right now of whatever weird thing was going on inside me.
‘I’ll kill her,’ Dr Davis said, and backed up toward the door; he was dragging her with him. I realised that we were in a bottleneck, and his guys would come boiling out of the clean-room behind us any second; I backed up, grabbed the steel door and muscled it shut. No way to lock it now that Michael had busted us out, but at least it would slow them down. Not for long, though. I heard them sliding metal tables out of the way.
Eve stepped forward toward Dr Douche Bag, and she looked like an ice cold warrior princess, if warrior princesses came armed with semi-autos this season. ‘Go ahead,’ she said. ‘As soon as you do, you’re dead.’
He licked his lips, and I saw the doubt in his face. I didn’t think Eve would pull the trigger in cold blood, but I wasn’t really sure, either.
Neither was he. Stand-off. It couldn’t last, because his reinforcements were coming at speed, and ours – well. We didn’t actually have any that I knew about. Our only chance was to make it outside to the van, hope the car keys were on the ring Eve had appropriated, and drive like holy hell.
That also meant leaving Claire behind, though.