Deathstalker 02 - Deathstalker Rebellion

though a strong wind would blow him away, but his confidence was returning. And then they turned a comer, and Skye stopped dead in his tracks, his head cocked slightly to one side, as though listening.
    Finlay looked quickly about him, but the corridor was deserted.
    "Talk to me, Skye. What is it?"
    "We're in trouble."
    "I guessed that. Be specific."
    "When we were all held in Silo Nine, Wormboy allowed mind techs and other scientists to experiment on the inmates. Most died. They were the lucky ones.
    The survivors were monsters, changed in body and mind, no longer human. A few escaped during the underground assault, but most were too securely confined.
    After Wormboy was killed during the assault, the monsters were transferred here, in the hope of finding some new way of controlling them. The authorities must really not want us escaping. They've released a dozen of the monsters into the corridors. They're insane with rage and pain. They'll attack anything that moves. And they're heading right for us."
    Finlay looked quickly around him again, but all seemed quiet for the moment.
    "How's your esp? Is it back yet?"
    "Some. But even a full psistorm wouldn't stop minds like these."
    "Any chance you could contact the underground and get us a teleport out of here?"
    "No. This whole place is surrounded by esp-blockers. You got in only because they let you in. We either find our own way out, or the monsters will be picking
    what's left of us out of their back teeth."
    Finlay thought hard. "What about maintenance tunnels, air ducts, that sort of thing?"
    "All securely locked off and guarded. This is a prison, remember? Brace yourself. They're coming."
    Finlay took up a stance between Skye and the direction he'd indicated, sword in one hand, gun in the other. The first sounds of approaching feet reached him, loud and uneven. He could hear roars and howls and sounds that had no place in a human throat. The sounds drew nearer, and Finlay took aim with his disrupter.
    And then the monsters surged around the corner at the end of the corridor, and all Finlay could do was stare. Some had bulging brains that had broken apart their skulls from the inside and thrust out through the cracks. Some had bony thorns thrusting out through their flesh. Others had white, livid flesh, already rotting away from their bones. High tech had been grafted onto and into that flesh, replacing body parts with augmentations until hardly any of their humanity was left. Just flesh in metal cages. Some still looked mostly human, but rippled the walls of the corridor as they passed, as though reality itself was shifting around them, disturbed by their inhuman and uncontrolled esp.
    Finlay breathed heavily. There were bad odds, and then there were bad odds, and this was both. He switched his gun from one target to another, but whichever he took out, the others would get him long before the gun could recharge for another shot. And for once it didn't matter a damn how good a swordsman he was.
    Cold steel was no match for esp. He looked at Skye.
    "You know these things better than I do. Is there any way we can reach them?
    You're an esper, damn it, you must still have something in common with them!"
    "I'll try," said Skye. "But they're not really espers anymore. They've moved
    beyond that."
    He reached out with his esp, but it was like looking at flaring lights in the night, all color and brightness and fury, without meaning or content. If they had thoughts, he couldn't understand them. All he could share was the rage and horror and suffering that filled their lives. So he did the only thing he could.
    He gathered up the fury in their minds, threw it back at them, and made each of them think it came from the others around them. The monsters screamed and fell upon each other, rending and tearing, and blood that was not always red flew on the air. Esp clashed with esp till the air shimmered and sparkled and the steel walls ran like water from the strength of it. Skye stepped backward, his hands to his head, trying to block it out. Finlay holstered his gun and dragged him away from the carnage in the corridor.
    "Don't lose it, Skye! There must be another way out of here. We'll find it!"'
    They ran down the corridor together, Skye shaking his head over and over again.
    He tried to say something to Finlay, but couldn't get it out. Finlay understood.
    Some of the monsters could have been people the esper knew before they ended up in Silo Nine. Some might even have been