Invasion

A pall of acrid smoke hung over the room.

Everyone was momentarily dazed.

"Is everyone okay?" Harlan asked.

"My watch exploded," Sheila said.

"So did the wall clock," Harlan said. He pointed up to the institutional clock on the wall. Its glass had been shattered, and its hands were nowhere to be seen.

"That was a miniature black hole," Harlan said.

A loud thump out in the lab shocked everybody back to reality.

"Obviously they've gotten through the air lock," Harlan said. "Come on!" He took the gun away from Jonathan and gave him a tissue culture flask to carry instead. Cassy and Pitt picked up the rest of the flasks. Harlan led everyone from behind the distorted shield toward the door.

"Don't touch anything," he warned. "There still might be some radiation."

It took all three men to get the twisted door open. Harlan leaned out. He could see down to the double doors leading to the lab. There was a small scorched hole in the right one. He looked the other way. It was clear.

"To the left," he barked. "Down through the door at the end and across into the living room. Got it?"

Everyone nodded.

"Go!" Harlan said. He kept his eye on the double doors until the last person had cleared the corridor. He was about to follow them when one of the double doors opened in the opposite direction.

Harlan fired one shot from the huge Peacemaker. The noise was deafening in the hallway. The bullet hit the closed double door and shattered its porthole-like window. The door that had been opened swung shut.

Harlan raced out into the hall and ran its length on legs that had suddenly gone rubbery. He staggered into the living room.

"Harlan?" Sheila questioned. "Have you been shot?" They had all heard the gun go off.

Harlan shook his head. A small amount of foam bubbled out of his mouth and oozed from his eyes. "I think it's the rhinovirus kicking out the alien virus," he managed. He steadied himself against the wall. "It's happening. Unfortunately it's a rather inconvenient time."

Pitt rushed to Harlan's side and draped Harlan's arm over his shoulder. He took the gun from Harlan's limp hand.

"Give me the gun," Sheila commanded. Pitt handed it over.

"How are we going to get out of here?" Sheila asked Harlan.

The sound of breaking glass drifted back from the lab.

"We'll use the main entrance," Harlan said. "My Range Rover should be there. I'd been afraid to go out that way for fear of discovery. Now it doesn't make any difference."

"All right," Sheila said. "How do we get there?"

"We go out in the main hall and turn right," Harlan said. "We pass the storerooms and there'll be another air lock. Then there is a long corridor with electric carts. The exit comes up inside a building that looks like a farmhouse."

Sheila cracked the door to the hall and began slowly to lean her head out to look back toward the lab rooms. She felt the bullet before she heard a distant gun go off. The slug had come so close to her that it had singed some of her hair before burrowing into the partially open door.

She pulled back inside the living room.

"Obviously they know where we are," she said. She wiped her forehead with her hand and examined it. She wouldn't have been surprised to see blood. "Is there another way to get to the exit? We're surely not going to be able to use the hall."

"We have to use the hall," Harlan said.

"Oh screw!" Sheila mumbled. She looked at the gun in her hand, wondering whom she thought she was kidding. She'd never even fired a gun in practice much less gotten into a battle with one.

"We can use the fire system," Harlan said. He pointed toward the security panel on the living-room wall. "If you pull the fire lever, the whole place fills up with fire retardant. The intruders won't be able to breathe very well, if at all."

"Oh that's clever," Sheila said sarcastically. "And, of course, we just walk out holding our breaths."

"No, no," Harlan said. "In the cabinet below the panel are rebreathers that are good for a least a half hour."

Sheila went over to the cabinet and pulled it open. It was filled with gas mask-like apparatuses. She took out five and handed them around. The directions on the long, tubular proboscis were to break the seal, shake, and then don.

"Everybody okay with this?" Sheila asked.

"It's not as if we have a lot of choice," Pitt said.

They all activated their units and then strapped them on. When everyone gave a thumbs-up sign, Sheila yanked down on the fire lever.

An immediate clanging was heard followed by an automated voice that repeated "Fire in the facility" over and over again. A minute later the sprinkler system was activated, sending out billows of fluid that rapidly vaporized. The room filled up with a smoglike haze.

"We have to stick together," Sheila yelled. It was hard to talk in the gas mask, and it was getting hard to see as well. Sheila opened the door to the hall and was pleased to see the hall was as hazy as the living room. She leaned out and looked toward the labs. She couldn't see for more than four or five feet.