by Ethan Proud
She drifted back towards her rover, not looking over her shoulder when she heard the groan of metal and the hiss of sand. As heavy as the vehicles were, many hands made for light work. Inversely, they also ruined soup. But the only soup she could think of currently was the three Family Members who hadn’t stepped from the safety of their militaristic palanquin. She stepped back into the rover. “Crisis averted.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
Rhea sat in the passenger seat, while Gana drove. A strange dynamic shift, but after the first two hours it was clear that Rhea lacked the stamina. The bags beneath her eyes had an oily sheen and her skin was yellow. Just a little exertion had her looking like a corpse. In the back, Lago, Utria and four other soldiers rode in relative silence.
“What do the other chieftains think of this?” Gana asked after several minutes stretched nigh an hour.
“If I had asked, then perhaps I would know. But since the other chieftains answer to me, I did not,” Rhea answered darkly.
Gana chuckled. His counterpart smirked slightly.
“So are you two, like, t-together?” Lago asked, his gaze shifting from one to the other. His good eye settled on Gana’s mutilated ear and he pensively touched his now blind eye.
Rhea and Gana laughed and bit their tongues to ignore the stutter.
“Not a chance,” Gana said easily, and Rhea managed to stop laughing.
“Harsh,” Lago said as he watched for Rhea’s reaction.
“He doesn’t have the right hardware for the job,” Rhea chuckled. It took Lago a moment to catch on, but when he did, he simply said “Oh”.
“Anyhow, back to the subject at hand. The chieftains will follow whatever orders I give them. And for now, this sojourn is our peoples only hope,” Rhea stated.
“And if it wasn’t?” Gana pried.
“Then we never would have left.” Rhea had resumed all seriousness after the banter.
“Do Jorgen, Dmetri, and Jana know that you talk like this?” Gana laughed. Being a member of the scouts, he felt comfortable joking with his superior about the heads of the other branches.
“If you were privy to our meetings, then you too would know who runs the Shrike. Ran, I guess,” Rhea corrected.
“I think everyone knows who thinks they run it though,” Gana said, before both he and Rhea said, “Fleet.”
“The old windbag will realize soon enough. Now that the structure of The Wreckage has crumbled and the system that has stood in place for a millennium will no longer work, real leaders will have to step up to ensure our survival.”
“Are you talking about another rebellion?” Lago asked incredulously.
“No, I’m talking about the natural order taking over. We are about to go to war with a species we know nothing about. Not everyone has the strength to lead in war,” Rhea explained, and Gana nodded.
Around them, droves of shuffling commoners walked. Dust and grit kicked into the air behind them leaving a wake that reached all the way back to their abandoned ship. It had been the only existence they had ever known, and now they would have to fight for the chance to live long enough to escape the dead planet.
“And you think you’re the one to do it?” One of the other soldiers joined the conversation.
“Nobody ever accomplishes anything alone,” Gana snapped, illustrating his point perfectly.
“I think we will be surprised when we discover who speaks for the Shrikers when the Second Earthling ship arrives,” Utria said.
Rhea twisted and pointed at the woman with her right index finger. “That is the attitude that is going to keep us alive.”
Another rover pulled up along their right. Jana, the Captain of the Police, honked brazenly on the horn twice before speeding by to the front of the column.
“And that’s the attitude that is going to get us killed,” Gana mused.
“She is a glorified bully,” Utria sniffed. “All she does is catch petty criminals.”
“Excuse me?” Gana said, twisting around to look at Utria.
The woman looked terrified. “Did I say something wrong?”
Rhea scoffed at her boldness. She clearly didn’t see the familial relationship between her second and the Police Chieftain. Both had strong noses and jawlines. Nor did Utria note the careful consideration of the spelling of the names Gana and Jana. Gana turned so he was facing forward again, but didn’t grace Utria with an answer.
“They’re s-siblings, you idiot,” Lago whispered, and Utria blanched.
“Your apology is unnecessary,” Gana said with a smug look.
The rover erupted in laughter, though it would be the last time any Shriker had a reason to laugh in a long time. With the loss of most of their clean water, there were very few reasons for mirth at the current moment. Rhea’s throat was dry and felt parched no matter how much of the liquid she consumed. Now that her only option was to continue to poison her already weakened body, her chances for survival were slim unless they managed to take The Source quickly. There had never been a true war waged by the Exos though, and the Council of Warchiefs had never put their theories into practice. Laying siege to a species of cave-dwellers on their own turf was surely a recipe for a disaster.
Rhea pulled a small bag of molla caps and dipped a finger into the blackened spores. Generously, she passed them around the car and held out a gob on her fingertip so Gana didn’t have to take his hands off the wheel. Their collective spirits rose, though it was only short-lived. The fight of their lives was coming whether they were ready or not.
Chapter Thirty-Four
They had to be getting closer to the surface, Taiga speculated. She couldn’t voice her concerns aloud, as the sound of wing beats and suction cups were heavy in the air. The gonis were close. The three Exos were hidden away in a field of stalactites and stalagmites. Taiga couldn’t remember the last time she breathed easily. Or had heard her companions exhale. She could, however, hear her pulse surge through her veins laced with adrenaline. Her palms sweated, and her clothes stuck to her body. She saw a trace of light as a goni floated nearer their hiding place.
On all fours she began to creep away. Lepiro noticed first and was right on her heels. Literally, for twice he accidentally grabbed her Achilles tendon instead of a rock. Jarrod shuffled along behind them. He had never needed to be quiet or work his muscles quite like the nomads had, and as such he was feeling the strain now. He felt gritty dirt covering his hands and neck, under his nails and in every crevice. He was beginning to wonder if they would survive their flight from the Greyling City. Or whether it had been worth it. They hadn’t been certain they would be the next sacrifices, or when the next sacrifice would be…but now they were certain the gonis would devour them as soon as they caught them. At least they had the illusion of safety with the Greylings.
The squelch of goni suckers scuttled across the cavern ceiling above them, heralding yet another hunter closing in. Qech, qech, qech. Qech, qech, qech. Lepiro turned his eyes slowly skyward and saw the creature sinuously carve a path around rock formations without paying them heed. Suddenly it dropped from the ceiling, the wind whistling past its wings masking the sharp inhales of the Exos. They were not the intended prey however, and the beast collided with an airborne goni and ripped it from flight. The two creatures struggled on the ground, snapping at each other’s soft bodies, tearing away crescent shaped pieces of flesh. More gonis flocked to the cannibalism, leaving the Exos with a route for escape. They wasted no time leaping to their feet and sprinting to the tunnel that they were sure led to their salvation.
They turned the corner and heard the flapping of demon wings in their wakes. Escaping the gonis seemed impossible now, but then a sliver of light appeared.
X
After the sojourn across the desert, tensions were high. No one could explain the pain in their bellies other than blaming it on hunger, but they had plenty of food. None but the Commanding Family and the soldiers knew they were all being methodically poisoned.
�
�That’s it,” Rhea said and pointed to a scar in the surface of AE625.
“The fissure?” Lago asked uncertainly as Gana slammed on the brakes.
The Commanding Family’s rover pulled forward closer to the entrance to Hades.
Mertensia was the first to leap from the vehicle. She spread her arms wide like a biblical prophet and exclaimed, “This is our salvation!” Her eyes, hair, and grin were wild.
From the depths of the earth, a high pitched keening from many mouths erupted as three figures burst from the fissure, tripping over themselves and the sand.
Within the rover, Yuto and Deirde recognized the two hunters and Jarrod immediately. Rio’s absence was not missed by either of them, and their expressions darkened. Behind the Exos, gonis ranging from six feet to fifteen feet long flew from the mouth of the cave. Four of them landed on Mertensia, each gripping a limb betwixt their jaws. With hardly an effort, their ropey necks flexed and the woman was shorn into quarters. As her head and left arm flailed through the air, the onlookers could see that her jubilant expression had not left her face.
The soldiers leapt from their vehicles and began peppering the air with bullets as the monstrous goni plucked civilian after civilian up in their jaws. It was over as soon as it had begun. Twenty or so gonis littered the ground, heaving their last breaths.
Aqi, Fleet, and Kilo all exchanged a concerned glance before stepping from the rover. Perhaps Mertensia’s dismemberment was an omen regarding their fates as well. The Source would be more challenging to take than previously expected. But now they had plenty of food for several days. The commoners began skinning the gonis and quartering them. Jorgen, the Chief of the Palace Guard, stood between the Commanding Family and the new Hydras. Taiga, Lepiro, and Jarrod stood uneasily. None more so than Jarrod. He was sure their retribution would be swift.
“You must be from Hydra Seven,” Aqi said graciously. “And welcome back, Jarrod.”
She smiled warmly, but Jarrod still did not trust her.
“Jorgen, take these two to the rover and reacquaint them with their friends. See to it that they get water and food first,” Fleet said, and Jorgen nodded and led them away.
The other Warchief, Dmetri, was shouting orders to his infantrymen. They were setting up a camp. Food and resources in the middle, while barricades were erected at the mouth of the cave. The barriers were pitiful, upturned carts mainly, but also anything else that could be repurposed for protection. The empty water drums went into the completion of the wall as well.
“We need to send a recon mission to determine the lay of the land,” Kilo suggested.
Rhea, Gana, Lago, and Utria ghosted up as if summoned.
“Not you, Rhea,” Aqi ordered. “You need to rest up. The rest of you will go team up with Jana and six of her police.”
Rhea glowered but did not protest. The anger emanating from her chilled the very air around them, though. The three scouts made themselves scarce as they began their preparations.
“We need to interrogate the Hydras before we let any of our people go underground,” Kilo offered sagaciously.
The remaining Family Members turned back to look at their rover as a loud clang echoed from within it.
X
Jarrod’s head was slammed into a quarter panel before he was roughly shoved inside the rover with his hands cuffed behind his back. Lepiro and Taiga went much more gently, surprised when they recognized the two Exos already occupying it. Their hearts sank when they realized they would have to break the news of Rio’s death.
“Where is he?” Deirde seethed.
No one answered right away.
Finally Taiga began, “He was sacrificed-”
“You son of a bitch!” Yuto said and lunged at Jarrod, though he didn’t make it very far.
Deirde, however, was much more flexible and resourceful. Her heel flashed out and caught Jarrod in the jaw squarely. The sound of tooth chipping on tooth sounded several times as she kicked twice more. Blood dribbled from his jaw as he made to argue his innocence.
He never got a single word out. Deirde’s thighs wrapped around his head like pythons and with two sharp twists of her hips, his neck cracked. She gracefully moved her weight underneath her and sat back in her seat as if nothing had happened. Jarrod’s lifeless eyes stared right at her. Her chest heaved with either grief or rage but she did not cry. She steeled her jaw and looked over at Yuto in disgust.
“I’m sorry,” Yuto answered as tears glimmered in his eyes.
“Me too.”
Then the door clicked as Fleet pulled it open. Jarrod’s corpse rolled from the vehicle onto the sand. Looking over his shoulder, Fleet addressed his fellow commanders. “You can’t say he didn’t have it coming.”
“We all have it coming,” Aqi said with a sigh and ran her hand over her close-cropped hair. “Call Jorgen and have him uncuff them.”
Kilo barked an order over his shoulder and moments later the four Hydras were free. In a sense. The Commanding Family stepped into the rover and shut the door behind them for privacy. Whatever information the Hydras had, they would decide how to disseminate it.
“We need to know what you know about The Source,” Fleet said. It sounded friendly, but his eyes were not.
“We don’t know much,” Taiga offered. “The creatures below the surface seem civilized and initially helped us.”
Fleet’s eyebrows arched.
“But they offered one of ours as a sacrifice to a massive goni in a lake,” Lepiro jumped in sourly. “Along with many of their own. It was barbaric.”
“The meaning of barbarisms shifts between cultures,” Kilo said reflectively.
“I suppose you would say we are barbarians,” Yuto growled sharply.
“Indubitably,” Fleet said flatly. “But we are not asking you questions at the moment. What can our soldiers expect to encounter below the surface?”
“Violence,” Taiga said simply.
“Perhaps some landmarks that would help?” Kilo asked politely.
“They’ll have to cross fields of molla and a lake,” Taiga said and shrugged. “It’s dark, we couldn’t see much. If it weren’t for Icharus, we would have been blind.”
“Our scouts will have flashlights,” Aqi said and opened the door to exit the vehicle. She offered a bowl of molla spores to the Exos. “I understand you have a certain affinity for this. And please, mingle with the Shrikers and introduce yourselves. I think you will find we are not so different.”
Deirde accepted the bowl first and dipped her fingers into the basin. She smeared the spores around her eye sockets, and dragged her fingers vertically across her lips, giving the impression of a skull.
“A flair for the dramatic,” Fleet noted as he too exited the rover, followed by Kilo.
Once the Shrikers had left, Deirde passed the spores to Yuto. He too painted his face and passed the proverbial olive branch. Lepiro and Taiga did not immediately follow suit.
“We are the last of our people. We might as well be already dead. Why not let them know they are facing ghosts?” Yuto snarled and the other two Hydras assented.
“Do you want to know how Rio passed?” Taiga asked softly.
“He is dead. That is enough.” Deirde sniffed. Then she stepped through the open door and into the blazing heat.
The whispers began immediately. Most of the Shrikers hadn’t seen a Hydra until recently. Their only impression of them was that of vicious nomads who had destroyed their homes. Now four of the demons stepped from the Commanding Family’s transport with terrifying face masks. Their eyes were dark and shifted constantly as if assessing threats. These were truly beings to be afraid of. Children shuffled behind their mothers, while the women stared in horror as the strangers made their way to the water station. Even the men scattered, with good reason. Even the weakest of Hydras had faced more perils than the Shriker Warchiefs. And here, four stood in the midst of an uprooted Shriker city.
Chapter Thirty-Five
The flashlig
ht beams led the way for the Shriker recon mission. Ahead of them, the sound of chattering and footfalls alerted them to another presence. Many presences. Then came the whirling claws, red eyes, and gnashing teeth. A spray of bullets dropped the first charge when a glowing figure glided into view and tackled one of the police. The gonis mouth closed around the man’s face and shattered his skull. After centuries of eating gonis, the gonis were eating them back. The triumphant creature let loose a shriek which was answered over and over and over. The recon team of ten was surely not enough to face the onslaught.
Lago squeezed the trigger again as more Greylings rounded the corner. Three dropped, then four more came, then six more, then, too many to count. None of them bore any weapon, but they were just as deadly. They avoided the light and Lago had to constantly scan for approaching enemies. His flashlight would land on one and like static it would dance out of the light as another entered the beam. He missed more times than he connected. The policeman next to him collapsed on the ground underneath a flurry of teeth and claws. He peppered the assailants with rounds, but the man beneath the Greylings was dead. Gana and Utria stood next to him, their faces almost serene despite the chaos around them. The only way to survive in battle was to remain calm. Utria stopped a charging Greyling with her foot and forced it onto its back before placing a bullet between its eyes.
A quick scan by Gana revealed that his sister was nowhere to be seen. The sea of Greylings was receding, and Gana could only deduce that his sister and her men were their new focus. He barreled after the Greylings as they dipped into an accessory shaft. A moment later he ducked as a spray of gunfire dropped the creatures. Jana was the last of the police still on her feet, though it looked like at least two were still alive. Lago and Utria appeared behind Gana, and the sound of chaos stopped as abruptly as it had begun.
“Take up a defensive position at the mouth of this tunnel,” Gana ordered and the other two scouts obeyed. Gana looked Jana over. Her hair was swept across her face, most of it drenched in blood. None of it was hers, though. Her dying men gasped where they lay. But none of them moved more than a spasm. Most of them were eviscerated or were missing parts of their throats. Jana wasted no time and eased their pain.
