Soul of Eon (Eon Warriors #8) - Anna Hackett Page 0,38
courage and darted forward. It hit the melted hole and several of its legs fell through it. It thrashed and the web bounced crazily.
“Kaira!”
“Hang on.”
Thane felt heat singe close to his side. Then the web below him was gone.
They fell downward.
And landed in a pile of brown eggs.
“Ugh.” Kaira sat up.
Above them, the spider was tangled in its own web. Below them, the floor was covered in eggs the size of his head.
Nearby, the top of one of the eggs unfurled.
“Oh, fuck.” Kaira scrambled to him, her face frantic. “We need to go. Now!”
He watched a small spider climb out of the egg. Several more eggs started to open.
Kaira yanked on his arm. He leaped up, and together they ran.
Chapter Fifteen
Kaira’s chest heaved as she sprinted as fast as she could.
She and Thane powered through an arched doorway.
“That way.” Thane pointed.
They skidded around the corner and into a curved corridor. Kaira didn’t want to face a horde of small, ravenous spiders.
“Sabin and I fought a group of these spiders on Earth.” She shuddered. “We can’t let them catch up.”
The corridor opened into a large space, filled with people-sized cocoons.
Oh, shit. “What now?”
Thane slowed. “Most are empty. The rest seem to have hibernating creatures in them.” Then his head whipped around.
She saw a mass of small spiders fill the end of the corridor. They were on the floor, the walls, clinging to the ceiling. They were coming like a giant wave.
Her lungs locked. “Thane.”
“Come on.” He tugged her deeper into the maze of cocoons.
Then he stopped and touched one. The top of it opened.
The cocoon was empty, except for a few inches of brown liquid that lay, fetid, along the bottom. It smelled like a clogged drain.
“Get in,” he said.
She jerked her head around and stared at him. “What?”
“We’re going to hide in here.” His jaw was tight.
Kaira grimaced. “Hell.” She threw her leg over the edge and climbed in. The liquid clung to her armor.
“So gross.”
“Gross is better than dead.”
She lay down, trying not to imagine what the goop was made out of.
Thane shifted in beside her. He lay down, and the top closed over them. She breathed shallowly, trying not to panic. Thane lay beside her, the steady beat of his heart under her ear.
If those spiders found them…
“The smell should mask our scent,” he murmured, running a hand up her back.
She nodded. “I hope you’re right.” She wondered if Nisid was okay.
A noise.
She froze.
A second later, a small shadow jumped onto the top of the cocoon.
She watched the spider skitter across the top, then pause.
Another leaped on. Then another. She held her breath. Nothing to see here.
It felt like forever, but finally the spiders moved off.
“Keep still,” he murmured. “We need to wait long enough to ensure they’re gone.”
“The Kantos would know we got a message out by now. The soldiers will be searching for us.”
“Yes, but they’d expect us to get out, not head into the heart of the base.” He cocked his head. “I think it should be safe now.”
He pushed the top of the cocoon open a few inches, and they cautiously looked around.
There were no hungry, alien spiders waiting for them.
They climbed out, the brown liquid clung to them. She wrinkled her nose. Ew.
Thane touched her jaw. “Despite the smell, you’re still the most beautiful thing I’ve seen.”
She shook her head at him, but smiled.
The pair of them cautiously moved out of the cocoon room.
“The lab should be up ahead,” he said.
She followed immediately behind him. He stopped at another arched doorway, and they looked in.
A Kantos lab. Similar to the one on the battlecruiser, but far larger.
“No scientists.” Thane moved inside. “Come on.”
They passed several workbenches, some large tanks, and a table topped with gelatinous blobs sitting on trays.
She scanned the room, and suddenly went still. “Thane.”
The wall was filled with long, glass tubes, containing similar helian experiments as they’d seen on the Kantos ship.
A muscle ticked in Thane’s jaw as he took in the dying helians.
Then she spotted a holder with several vials of a multicolored liquid in it. “Is this it?”
They moved closer. It was milky-white liquid, shot through with blue, green, purple and gold.
“That’s it,” Thane breathed. “The pathogen.”
“There are nine vials.”
He took one and held it up. “We’ll keep one and destroy the others.”
“How?”
He slid the vial into a pouch on his belt. Then he held up his arm and morphed his flamethrower. “Like this.”
Kaira stepped back and watched the stream of fire engulf the pathogen vials.
The glass melted