The double crack of the big Magnum drowned out their chuckles.

One bullet went through the neck of Dr. Angie Pflaug, sending a torrent of blood gouting from the burst artery, patterning the ceiling in cherry-red splashes.

One bullet went through the open, laughing mouth of Dr. Louella Hall, exiting at an angle three fingers above her right ear and tearing away a clump of summer-wheat hair and a chunk of bone the size of a man's fist. The force of the impact sucked out most of the woman's diseased, distorted brain.

"It's a good beginning," Doc Tanner said quietly.

The sirens started up again, wailing and shrieking, the pitch rising and falling.

And rising and falling once more.

Ryan was beginning to think it was almost like some lunatic dream. They were moving through this redoubt, buried deep under the waters of Crater Lake, in what had once been the beautiful state of Oregon. They were killing security men in handfuls, even wiping out the protected scientists.

And there was no comeback.

Only one sec man guarded the main entrance as the seven friends came within sight of it. His back was turned, a laser rifle slung across his black-clad shoulder. The dark mirrored visor stared blankly away from them, toward a moving pattern of colored lights that danced over the top of the door. Near him was a sign that read, Absolutely No Admittance Without Authorization and Accreditation.

"That one's fucking mine," Finnegan hissed, baring his teeth delightedly at such an easy target.

At that moment the speakers around them clicked to life. "All security operatives go to condition red. Repeat condition red. Weapons into full termination mode. Repeat condition red. Any person without clearance to be eradicated without warning. Condition red."

Ryan glanced at the others. "Got to be a quick decision."

"What?" Krysty asked.

"We can run for the elevator. Mebbe steal one of those boat wags. Doubt they'll come after us."

"But we must destroy this nest of evil and corruption," Doc Tanner protested.

"Sure," Ryan agreed. "But it's not up to me to order everyone to risk their lives. Chances are we can get away free if we run now."

"I never run from fucking nobody," Finnegan said. "And you don't get better chances than this, since it's a hundred to one their fucking blasters don't work."

"We go in and try to blow the complex. Or we get out now. Who stays?"

The only one to hesitate was Jak; the others immediately raised their hands. The albino sniffed. "Sure. Why not?" And he also lifted his hand.

"You don't have to, kid," Ryan said. "This isn't your fight."

Jak shook his head. "Wrong. If it's your fight, then it's mine."

"Then we go. Finn?"

"Sure," he said, hefting his Heckler & Koch submachine gun. "I'll take him out on triple-shot."

"Don't take any risks," Ryan warned.

The blaster's chubby face creased into a broad grin. "That's way weird, old friend. Have you ever known Thomas O'Flaherty Fingal Finnegan ever do anything as fucking stupid as take a fucking risk?"

"Yeah," Ryan said, grinning back. "Too many fucking times, Finn."

He watched the man move out around the corner, pausing to flatten the smooth black fur collar of his gray leather coat. The sec man turned to face Finnegan, leveling the stubby laser-blaster on him.

"Identification or termination now," the mutie's voice box croaked.

"This here SMG's all the fucking identification I need, you mutie bastard," Finnegan growled.

"Chill him now, Finn," Ryan called urgently.

"Now," Krysty cried, her voice edged with sudden panic.

Finn half turned to reassure them, just as the sec guard fired his blaster. There was a piercing hum, and a dazzling streak of amethyst light hit Finn squarely in the chest.

He screamed, something that sounded, through the shock and agony, like "Hundred to fucking one, Ma!"

Chapter Twenty-Two

It was a hideous passing.

Over the bloody years Ryan Cawdor had seen many men and women meet their Maker. Few of them had gone peacefully into that long night. But he had never seen anyone chilled in such an appalling way as his friend Finnegan.

The blind perversity of the fates had dictated that the laser rifle of the sec man functioned perfectly — for just long enough.

Unlike a single bullet, the beam of light from a high-power military laser acts more like a directional, narrow strip of extreme heat. A bullet drills a hole through flesh, the exit hole generally markedly bigger than the entrance wound. Not so with a laser. It is precisely the same size as it exits the human body as when it entered.

Also, light has no mass, so there is no impact. As the laser struck Finnegan, it didn't lift him off his feet, or throw him backward, nothing initially as dramatic as that.

But the power was so awesome that in the instant the blaster came to life its vivid blue beam had penetrated clean through the helpless Finn, hitting the wall only a couple of paces to the left of J.B., who immediately threw himself flat on the floor, hands over his head as chunks of liquid concrete and charred wood fell from the side of the corridor.

Along one wall, Ryan watched the termination in impotent horror, seeing that nothing could be done for the doomed man.

Stinking smoke erupted from the front and back of Finn's coat, tiny flames flaring red and yellow. Every staggering movement of the dying man only increased his horrific suffering. His skin was scorched black, the flesh broiled by the immense power of the blaster. The heat was so intense that the wretch's intestines began to explode and melt, and his blood boiled instantly where the laser had touched him.

As Finn dropped, his own blaster clattering on the tiles, the sec man kept the trigger down, almost slicing the beefy man into segments with the blaster's ferocity.

"Oh, no, no, no, no..." Krysty moaned softly, one hand resting lightly on Ryan's arm.

As the body lay smoldering on the floor, the blue light stopped as suddenly as it had started. The sec mutie looked down at the blaster and banged his fist on the control dial, frustrated that the weapon had ceased functioning.

"Mine," Ryan said. He stooped and put his G-12 caseless down, placing the SIG-Sauer 9 mm pistol alongside it. Then he moved out of cover, and walked toward the helmeted guard, loosening the white silk scarf from around his neck.

"Don't, lover," Krysty said, trying to pull him back around the corner.

"I'll chill him from here," J.B. said.

"No," Ryan said very quietly. "This is what the good Dr. Tardy might call a hands-on termination, revengewise. Got to be."

He shrugged off their warnings and stepped toward the sentry.

Closing in on the mutie, Ryan carefully avoided the stinking corpse, where bodily fluids still bubbled and seeped. The guard backed clumsily away until his helmet rang against the door.

Ryan looped the silken scarf in his hands carefully, his eyes locked on the reflective visor of the sec man's black carapace. The lower edge of the mutie's helmet didn't quite settle on his squat, muscular neck, leaving a couple of inches of pallid flesh exposed.

The muzzle of the blaster rose to cover Ryan's groin and lower belly. Despite his limitless courage, the one-eyed man winced. Having seen the shambles that Finnegan had become would have been enough to make any normal man fall to his knees and bury his head in his hands, weeping.

Not Ryan Cawdor.

"You just chilled one of the best, bravest men I ever knew," he said in a normal, conversational voice. "Friends are rare. Good friends rarer. And you chilled him, you heartless mutie bastard!" he shouted in sudden anger as he stepped closer.