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"Oh, fuck you," I said "I’round, pulled open the box of bullets and tried to put one in the pistol It fit Hey, why the hell not I started pushing rounds into the pistol o find the door"

A metallic thunder filled the hall

We all flew into action, bullets spilling offhuge dropped fro roar finally ended in a crash that uns drawn It was one of those enor ti door There’s a keyhole at the botto "All right Big door Sooner than I expected, but whatever Now, that uy"

He focused on Krissy "I want you to be prepared for this This evil that has Wexler, it’s iine what form it’s taken with him Expect tentacles And a whole bunch of eyes Or just one eye I don’t knohat exactly to expect but I know it’ll be a way bigger asshole than we faced out here--"

"Krissy!"

From behind us We spun on the voice and I involuntarily squeezed the trigger The gun clicked I hadn’t cha up in the shadows behind us He looked pale but perfectly huun, so as not to be too blatant about the fact that I had almost killed him with it just now

Krissy moved toward him

"Don’t," he said "Stay away from me He’ll be back Any second now, he’ll be back"

He bent over and broke down in a coughing fit Blood splattered the floor

"Dude," said John, "let’s get you to a hospital, we’ll protect you and--"

"No Listen I’ apart inside When he comes back, I won’t hold up Noabout this town in general," John said, "don’t even get us started We’re the experts"

"No No I’ fit

"--the doors, under it, or so and others, I think"

"We can go over all that later," I said "Where’s the shadowyou? Where is he now? Is he behind that gate?"

"He’ll come back here Let him Let him enter me Then kill me--"

Krissy screamed, "No! Danny!"

"--Kill me and burn my body Then burn this place down on top of me Find the other doors if there are more, and burn them down, too In fact, just burn the whole town Just to be safe"

"Doors? I don’t get--"

Danny coughed, spat, then coughed and coughed so until he finally passed out

Krissy ran to hi, though, so we dragged hiainst it

John and I trained our guns on him, and waited

Krissy looked back and forth at us and said, "What are you guys doing?"

John and I glanced at each other

"Wellyou know," I saidto co that"

To s anyway, so this really did see eaten by whatever ate Shouldn’t we honor his final wishes?

We were unable to convince Krissy of this She took the key and started working at the lock of the huge gate

I sighed and went to her, the pistol clasped in both hands John nudged her aside and knelt with his hand on the gate handle

Krissy pulled the Taser froether Look for a weak spot, like an eye or so If there are crates around the room, cover me and I’ll open the in one of thereen, polka-dotted mushroo throughlike the inside of a seashell I blinked hard to try to clear the spots pulsing in front ofto do, but every fiber screaain some other day, e had more on our side, when I wasn’t so tired, or so nervous, or so fat I struggled for so to, the way soldiers in foxholes picture their faht crazily This fucker crashed the Wongmobile And for that, he must taste death

It would have to do I re it up on its tracks with a sound like tank treads

We entered a huge octagon of a rooo There was soround, where one of the panes in the overhead skylight had broken out