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Her thick right forelimb came crashing down on Quaid's right arm -- his gun arm -- and Swain heard the nauseating crunch of breaking bone.

The gun stopped firing instantly, and as Quaid's arm broke horribly in two, the M-16 flew from his grasp, skittling across the water-covered floor of the parking lot, landing a few feet away from Swain's Civic.

His face covered with saliva, Quaid screamed madly as blood streamed out from his cracked right elbow.' With his other arm he tried pathetically to hold Reese at bay.

And then Swain saw Reese's tail arch.

Smoothly and gracefully, behind her flailing antennae. Out of Quaid's sight.

Swain didn't have time to move.

The tail came down hard.

Viciously hard.

The pointed tip penetrated Quaid's head in an explosion of red, shooting straight through the skull, emerging on the other side. Quaid's body spasmed violently with the impact, his feet lifting off the ground, and then abruptly his body went completely limp.

Swain watched in horror as Reese coldly withdrew her tail from the dead man's skull. Her tail came clear and the bloodstained head dropped to the floor with a soft splash.

Then she looked up at Swain.

And hissed at him fiercely.

Your turn.

Reese stepped clear of Quaid's body, her whole body coiled, tensed, invigorated by the scent of battle.

Sprinkler rain hammered down on her pebbled dinosaurian back.

Swain stepped off the little Honda, eyeing her cautiously, wondering what the hell he was going to do now. And then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw it.

Quaid's M-16.

Lying in the water to his right, five yards away. Lifeless. Abandoned.

Swain didn't waste a second. He dived for the gun.

Reese leapt forward.

Swain's fingers slapped hard against the water as he grabbed the gun, lifted it clear of the pool and whirled it around to face the charging Reese.

He jammed down on the trigger.

Click!

No bullets! Quaid must have run it dry.

Not fair!

Reese was close now. She leapt at him in the driving rain, flying through the air, forelimbs raised, jaws bared -- a giant attacking alligator.

Swain somersaulted left, just as Reese came crashing down on the spot he had just occupied, landing in the shallow water with a massive splash.

Swain got to his feet, turned to see where Reese was--

Thwack!

An immense weight crunched into his chest, driving him backwards. It was Reese's shoulder, slamming into him.

Swain was lifted fully off the ground by the impact and then suddenly -- whump -- he landed with a thud on the bonnet of the parked Honda.

The car beneath him shuddered violently on its suspension and then before he knew it his ears were filled with the most terrifying sound he had ever heard in his life and he opened his eyes to find that he was looking into Reese's wide-open jaws from a distance of six inches.

It made for a very peculiar sight: Swain -- on his back, on the bonnet of the Civic, his arms splayed wide, dangling over its sides -- with Reese, standing upright, her hind legs resting on the parking lot floor, her stubby forelimbs planted firmly on the bonnet of the car on either side of him.

She lowered her snout over his chest, as if sniffing him, smelling him, savouring her victory over him.

Swain kept his eyes averted -- not daring to look at her antennae -- while also keeping them clear of the torrent of saliva that now splattered down onto his chest.

Through the sprinkler rain, he could see their combined shadows on the wall nearby -- her body bent over his -- resting on the shadow of the car.

She had him.

Reese hissed fiercely.

And at that moment, on the wall, Swain saw the shadow of her tail rise behind her back.

This was it.

This was the end.

Reese knew it. Swain did, too.

And then suddenly he felt it -- somehow it was still in his hand, hanging over the edge of the bonnet -- and like the dawn of a new day, a new realisation hit him and Swain looked up into Reese's eyeless face and said, 'I'm sorry.'

And with that Swain jammed down on the second trigger of the M-16 he was still holding -- the trigger that was attached to the gun's barrel-mounted Taser -- and fired it into the pool of water beneath the car.

A bolt of electricity flashed out from the prongs of the Bayonet and slammed into the water at the base of the Honda.

Instantly, a blinding flare of light illuminated the parking lot as a thousand branches of jagged white lightning snaked out across the surface of the water at astonishing speed.

Reese shrieked in agony as the electricity from the M-16's underslung Taser shot through the water and up into her body -- via her hind legs which were still planted in the shallow pool.

She shuddered violently, her whole lizard-like frame convulsing and spasming, causing the Honda beneath her to rock.

Swain just tried to keep himself clear of her body as it absorbed the stunning surge of electricity.

And then, in a final, lurching fit of electrocution, Reese vomited all over his chest -- a disgusting greeny- brown slime -- before she reared up on her hind legs and fell to the ground, splashing into the pool of water.

Dead.

For its part, the little Honda Civic -- with Swain still on it -- stood its ground as the electricity from the Bayonet hit its tyres but proceeded no further, its attempts to climb the car frustrated by the rubber.

Moments later, the sprinklers stopped.

The parking lot was silent once more.

Flat on the bonnet of the Civic, Swain breathed again. The initial flare of white light was gone and now only weak glints of electricity flickered up from the water.

The surge of power from the M-16's Bayonet had dissipated. The water was back to normal. The Bayonet itself was spent, sizzling, shorted out by the water contact. Swain let the gun splash to the ground.

He looked down at Reese. Strangely, in death her bulky dinosaurian body seemed even larger than it had in life. He also saw the bodies of the NSA agents, Quaid and Martinez, lying motionless on the watery floor.

He shook his head in astonishment, wondering how the hell he had managed to survive this confrontation.

And then his wristband beeped.

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