Ch.58: Mother's Fury

Thorne lurched toward the bassinet, the diamond-edged scalpel glinting like a needle of ice in the red emergency strobe. I didn't scream. I didn't hesitate. I threw myself across the laboratory floor, my body becoming a projectile of pure, desperate instinct. I collided with his knees, my shoulder digging into his rotting thigh with a force that sent us both sprawling across the sterile epoxy.

We skidded into the secondary centrifuge, the impact rattling the vials of stolen blood. Thorne let out a wet, guttural roar, his movements a terrifying blur of jerky, unnatural speed. He wasn't just a man anymore; he was a biological engine running on the high-octane fumes of my daughter's life force.

I scrambled to get on top of him, my fingers clawing for the hand holding the blade. But as I pinned his wrist, Thorne’s other hand shot up, his fingers—cold, slimy, and impossibly strong—closing around my throat.

The strength in his grip was monstrous. He wasn't just stronger than a normal man; he was chemically reinforced, his muscles twitching with the over-voltage of the donor serum. I gasped for air, my vision tunneling into a kaleidoscope of red and black as he began to hoist me off the floor.

"You... insignificant... flea," he rasped, the necrotic tissue of his jaw flapping with every word.

I couldn't breathe. I couldn't pull his hand away. My fingers fumbled blindly across the surgical crash cart we had knocked over in the struggle. My hand closed around a heavy, plastic handle.

A portable defibrillator.

I didn't think about the voltage. I didn't think about the risk. I snatched one of the paddles, the coiled cord snapping taut as I lunged forward. I jammed the cold metal surface directly against the exposed, weeping nerves of his ruined neck.

Thorne’s milky eye went wide. For a microsecond, the world went silent. I slammed my thumb onto the discharge button.

*K-CHOW.*

Thousands of volts of raw electricity tore through his nervous system, igniting the conductive proteins in the serum saturating his tissues. His entire frame arched into a bridge of agonizing light. His grip on my throat shattered as his muscles underwent a violent, total tetanic contraction.

His body was a circuit, and I was the ground. I felt the aftershock rattle my own bones, but I didn't let go. I pressed the paddle harder into the rot, the smell of ozone and burning flesh filling the air.

CLEAR!