HAD THE NAZI GUARD—IN spite of the ensuing chaos—not stayed at his post by the service elevator’s interior control panel, Charlotte would have made a go at it (with her head, if need be) and lowered them into the Shambhala. As it was she could only look on in horror as the new species of carnosaur—three of them, she was pretty sure there were three of them—waded into the crowd, their tails held aloft like cats and their teeth and foreclaws (invisible amidst the crush of people) undoubtedly tearing through flesh.
And yet, so desensitized to violence and mayhem had she become since the outset of the Flashback, she found it almost comical when the bodies started to fly, flipping like ragdolls into the air or even dummies in a low-budget movie, many missing arms and legs, even heads, as they
