Haymaker: Part 1 of the Hayflick Series

Chapter 25

Ripley came back with a start.

Fuck, was the only thing she could think, as she placed a hand on her chest. It came away wet with blood, but the wound had mostly closed up, and when she lifted her head, she could see three bullets on the floor beside her.

"Fuck," she said aloud this time. She got to her feet and brushed off her uniform. Ripley hated dying. Although it should seem obvious; nobody liked to die.

But she hated it.

Oblivion was the closest thing she could compare it to. Being moving, thinking, and breathing one second, and then thrust into non-existence the next. And when she returned, it was like waking up from a bad nightmare, the type that ruined your day and kept you up till the next.

Her head snapped towards the steel door at the end of the room. The banging hadn't subsided, but it was certainly weaker. Who could be in there?

But the question was a rhetorical one, most likely. An immortal probably occupied the cell. And of course, she'd considered that it might be Darragh. But the gunshots above begged to differ, as Cruz would have little reason to start a firefight if he hadn't found the man. Not to mention she didn't know who was behind this door, and whether they'd simply kill her again as soon as she opened it up. A gamble, and certainly one she didn't plan to make.

Ripley touched lightly at the healed wound once again. She'd promised Cruz she'd hurt him if she got shot. And she'd make good on it, too.

But she had to find him. And also Isaac, and hopefully Darragh.

And that fucking kid.

"Fuck!" This time, she shouted it. Where'd he gone? Where'd everyone gone?

Ripley ran through the course of events that had transpired. She'd wrestled with that bitch Yeong, and in the process, the pistol had slid over to Luc. She'd called for Luc to pass it to her, but he just stood there... trembling.

Oh. She understood now. Poor kid. Maybe she'd berate him a little less when she found him.

No time to waste, though. The red lights were still on, and the earth's shaking had calmed down; however, she could hear the sounds of combat nearby. Naturally, that was where she'd be needed.

She collected the extra pistol on the floor and spared one final glance at the steel door before jogging out of the room, towards the action.

People had mostly stopped running around, and were now taking shelter wherever they could: under desks, away from windows, and deep inside suspiciously empty rooms. But it seemed like the blasts had subsided by now; better safe than sorry, though. And it meant they wouldn't get in Ripley's way.

Of course, the debris would. She had to hop over toppled metal shelves, duck under hanging light fixtures, and of course, a ventilation grate fell and missed her by a hair. She didn't know whether she should count herself lucky or unlucky.

Ripley had taken note of which twists and turns led where, so she was back at the basement staircase fairly quickly. Bounding up the steps two at a time, she headed to the floor above, and made her way through similar hallways until she found a large laboratory. The glass doors of the entrance were shattered, lab equipment was everywhere, and the place was chock-full of scientists crouched about. They were also making sure to keep far away from the stream of guards entering a smaller room to the right, where gunshots emanated from.

Out of the corner of her eye, Ripley spotted Luc hanging onto a cubicle wall as Gio and Yeong tugged his feet in the other direction. She had half a mind to storm over there, but stopped herself, not wanting to repeat the series of events from minutes earlier.