The Hispanic was unable to fall correctly from this hold, and his shoulder jarred painfully as he hit the mat.
“Shit, the mutie bitch is hot to trot,” said an unidentified voice in the gathering crowd.
“Fuck it, can’t trust them,” breathed another.
Ryan had stayed up on the rope, believing it best to stay well away and let Krysty win this one on her own—as he was sure she could. But he scanned the crowd gathered around the mat, trying to identify who had uttered the last sentences. The last thing he wanted was for there to be problems because the Hellbenders were suspicious of Krysty’s mutie genes.
Krysty, for her part, heard the comments and saw red. Mebbe that was Juan’s problem. The Hispanic was trying desperately to scramble to his feet, but he was badly winded, and his wrist let him down when he tried to put weight on it, causing him to collapse again.
She took another step over to him and lifted him by the hair, slamming her fist into his cheekbone as she did so, then letting him fall before he had a chance to flail back at her. He slammed back onto the gym mat, blood pouring from the shattered inside of his mouth.
“Is that it?” she asked, breathing heavily and yet speaking with an ominous calm. “Is that why you felt the need to prove yourself? Because I’m just a mutie to you and therefore inferior? You stupe bastard, we’re all the same here, even those of us who’ve just joined you. We are one because we have one target. It’s Charity that’s the enemy, not me. I ought to really finish you off, in case you get any bright ideas about settling scores later.”
Juan had struggled onto his elbows while she said this, and she took advantage of that to take a kick at him, placing her foot under his rising body so that her toes connected with his breastbone, jolting his heart and making him yelp with intense pain. The momentum of her kick drove him farther upward, and she grabbed him by the hair, pulling him to his feet with one hand while she drove a succession of jabs into his face with the other. By the time she stopped, he was nearly unconscious, and his face was a mess of bruised and swollen flesh.
She let him fall to the mat and then looked at the gathered Hellbenders, her eyes flashing defiance.
“He’s not worth chilling. Neither am I. Save that for the attack. Nothing is stronger than a blaster at a distance, but remember I know that, too, if you think about settling his score for him.”
With which she pushed her way through the crowd and stormed out of the gym room.
Ryan slid down the rope. He observed the stunned crowd and smiled with a vulpine lack of humor.
“Think about what she said…and just be glad she’s on your side when the attack comes.”
Chapter Eight
“By the Three Kennedys!” Doc breathed, “surely not…”
The old man lay a few feet from the giant wormhole, gathering his thoughts and regaining what breath he could. Dean was on his haunches, breathing heavily, while Jak still lay facedown, frozen by his close attention to the rumbling, which grew louder by the second.
Mik, Danny, Lonnie and Tilly stood close by, also frozen as they listened.
“What…is that?” Danny asked slowly, in the tones of one who actually knew the answer but didn’t wish to make an acknowledgment of that knowledge.
“Mutie worm,” Jak barked, jumping to his feet. “Disturbed burrow, made fear danger.”
“So it’s coming to investigate?” Mik yelled in disbelief. “Why doesn’t the stupe fucker just run away, like any other intelligent dumb creature would?”
“Apart from the inherent contradiction in that last statement, I would say it was a pointless question. Better just to get the hell away from here ourselves,” Doc answered him, scrambling to his feet and making tracks to run away from the hole.
“Doc’s right,” Dean cried. “That thing’s going to make a bigger hole when it comes out than when it went in, and what’s more it has all that disturbed cast to push out of the way.”