They’d just started moving to the other side of the dune when the dark object appeared above them. There was so much smoke, and so much tracer fire going over their heads, it was hard to see exactly what it was.
“Son of a bitch,” Nolan whispered, trying to make it out through the smoke and gunfire. This was the last thing they needed.
Actually, the second last thing.
Because at that moment Emma Simms decided to freak out for real.
She managed to scramble away from the Senegals, then stand up and whip off her battle helmet. Throwing the helmet away and with her blond hair wild and flying, she began screaming at Nolan and the others, demanding they get the gunfire to stop, demanding they get her away from the awful Black Hole, demanding the people living there, just down the dune, stop looking at her.…
She was hysterical—and if Nolan had been within reach of her, he would have slapped her back to reality. But she was about twenty feet from him, fists clenched, feet stomping like a child throwing a tantrum.
She was going to get them all killed …
But at that moment, with the object hovering not fifty feet above them, and with the violent downwash and smoke covering them all, one of the strangest things Nolan had ever seen happened.
A shaft of blinding light exploded out of the sky. At first Nolan thought someone on the mystery craft had turned on an extremely powerful searchlight. But whatever it was, it hit Emma Simms square in the face and knocked her off her feet.
Nolan couldn’t believe it. The light was so intense, she’d dropped like she’d been shot.
At first it seemed like the weight of the battle suit prevented Emma from getting up. But actually she lay there for a long time, the bright light burning into her eyes, she looking up at it, paralyzed.
Finally Gunner lifted his huge weapon and fired at the light. There was a loud explosion—and suddenly the light went out, and the helicopter, if that’s what it was, disappeared into the smoke again.
Only then were Nolan and Gunner finally able to scramble over to Emma Simms, retrieving her discarded battle helmet along the way.
She was not moving. She was on her back—eyes wide open, but lying completely still. Neither was she breathing.
“Jessuz, we killed her…” Gunner cried.
He peeled off his helmet and started giving her mouth-to-mouth.
But nothing happened.
He tried again, checking for a pulse.
Still nothing.
Nolan took off his battle glove and banged her hard, once in the chest.
No response.
Gunner tried mouth-to-mouth again. Nothing …
Nolan banged her chest a second time. She did not move.
For about ten seconds.
Then suddenly … she roared back to life.
She sat up and began shaking and gasping, like someone who’d been drowning suddenly coming up for air.
Nolan and Gunner couldn’t believe it. It was like she’d come back from the dead.
They tried to lift her up, tried to put the helmet back on her, tried to drag her toward the water, but she immediately started fighting with them.
“C’mon—we have to get out of here!” Nolan screamed at her.
But five sharp fingernails were suddenly piercing their way through his thick combat suit and into his skin. She had grabbed on to him and would not let go.
He tried to shake her, tried to tear her hand away. She was looking all around her, her expression confused and horrified. It was as if she didn’t know where she was, or even who she was.
Then her eyes fell on the Black Hole—and she screamed: “We can’t leave!”
“We have to leave!” Nolan yelled back. “Those goons are right on our asses…”
“We’re not leaving,” she insisted, her voice sounding different than before. “Not without those people…”
Nolan just stared back at her. She looked different, too.
“What people? What are you talking about?”
“Those people,” she said, pointing at the pitiful collection of humans huddled in the Black Hole below. “We have to save them. We have to get them out of here!”
“I don’t think any of them will be buying your latest DVD anytime soon,” he yelled at her.
She took a swing at him, missing widely, but causing all three of them to tumble to the ground. It was a good thing, too, as another stream of gunfire went over their heads a moment later.