by Gary Gibson
Then the figure paused and looked up at the underside of the lander’s belly, almost as if they knew they were being watched. Then they darted away and out of range of the lens.
Adrenaline brought a sudden, startling clarity to Sam’s senses. He made his way as quickly as he could back down to the lower cargo bay, where he stood at the top of the ramp, looking around the glade and listening.
He heard and saw nothing.
He made his way cautiously down the ramp, instinctively forming his body into a low crouch. Then he jogged over to one of the lander’s legs, hoping to conceal himself in its shadows.
He nearly shouted out loud when he saw a figure sitting with its back against the leg. Their head drooped down against their chest as if they were asleep.
Sam shuffled closer, breath ratcheting in his throat, and saw that it was Joshua. A third of his head was missing: there was a crater where the left side of his face should have been. Sam realised he must have walked right past his body when he arrived and entirely failed to see it.
Joshua had died of a gunshot wound. The only question was, where could Traynor or DeWitt possibly have got hold of a…?
‘Fuck,’ he said quietly under his breath, glancing back over at the ramp. He should have grabbed a rifle and some ammunition of his own while he had the chance. But then again, how could he possibly have expected there’d be someone else out here with him?
Sam heard a sudden movement from behind him and, in response to some nameless instinct, threw himself flat on the ground.
A gunshot echoed through the clearing, dazzling him with its thunder.
He pushed himself upright and ran as fast as he could, legs working like pistons as he made for the nearest trees.
‘Newman!’ someone shouted from behind him. ‘Wait!’
Another shot, sounding closer this time. Sam leapt over gnarled roots and came to a halt against the far side of a tree, the thunder of his heartbeat seeming to fill the surrounding air.
‘Where the fuck are you?’ the voice shouted. Sam recognised it as Karl’s. ‘Come out!’
Karl’s footsteps crunched through the undergrowth. Sam couldn’t see him from where he was, but he crouched lower before scuttling further away from the vicinity of the lander.
Something caught his foot, and he stumbled, losing his balance. He hit the ground hard and cursed under his breath when he saw that his foot had become tangled in a vine. He worked himself free and tried to stand again.
‘Don’t move.’
Sam twisted to one side and saw Karl standing over him, a rifle in both hands aimed at his head. Karl’s eyes darted from side to side, as if looking for something.
‘Jesus Christ,’ Sam shouted at him, ‘what the hell are you doing?’
‘Shut up,’ Karl snapped, his attention returning to Sam. The barrel of the rifle loomed in Sam’s vision like the yawning mouth of a cavern.
Something—some animal or rodent, perhaps—darted through the undergrowth, and Karl twisted around, staring into the shadows.
Stand up, thought Sam. If ever he had a chance to take the rifle from Karl, it was now. He started to push himself upright, but then Karl turned back towards him and it was too late.
‘Get the fuck back down,’ Karl snapped, gesturing with his rifle.
‘Why?’ Sam demanded, certain he was about to die. ‘Why should I make it easy for you to kill me?’
Karl’s nostrils flared, and for the first time, Sam had a hint of the other man’s panic. ‘For fuck’s sake,’ he shouted, ‘I just need you to—!’
Sam heard a sound like a hammer hitting a watermelon. Karl staggered slightly, a look of surprise on his face.
‘Goddammit,’ he said, his voice thick. His grasp on the rifle loosened until it had almost slid from his fingers. He reached behind himself with one hand, like he was trying to scratch an itch between his shoulder blades.
Then the rifle tumbled from Karl’s grasp and he sank to his knees, still fumbling around behind his back like he was trying to get hold of something.
‘Goddammit,’ he said a second time, then slumped face-first into the mulch and leaves and stopped moving.
Sam stared at the arrow protruding from between Karl’s shoulder blades, tipped with fine, feather-like fletching. Then he looked up in time to see a figure step out from the dappled shadows of a tree, a crossbow held in its hands. It moved towards Sam in a low crouch, sweeping the bow this way and that, a second arrow nocked and ready.
The figure stood straight and shouldered the crossbow as if satisfied they were alone. At first, Sam thought it might be Irish. Instead, he found himself confronted by an elderly man dressed in ragged-looking clothes the same colour as the surrounding trees.
‘Hey,’ said the man, coming closer again. His skin was dark brown, his face scored with lines. His eyes had the deep, steady gaze of someone who had survived much. And even though Sam thought he must be at least in his seventies, his forearms and neck were lined with sinewy muscles that suggested great strength.
‘Anyone else with you?’ asked the man, stepping closer.
Sam shook his head. ‘No.’
The man nodded. ‘Figured.’
There was something familiar about him. Sam’s lips moved, finding a name. But it couldn’t be…
The old man nodded, as if he could read Sam’s thoughts.
‘Amit?’ Sam asked at last.
24
THE OLD MAN
The old man with Amit’s face came closer, dropping onto one knee next to Karl and pressing two fingers against his neck. He nodded to himself, then looked up at Sam.
‘Dead. Looked like he was about to…’ the old man paused, like he couldn’t find the words. ‘Kill you,’ he finished at last.
He spoke, thought Sam, like someone unused to speaking.
‘I think he was,’ said Sam. ‘Although I’m still trying to figure out exactly why.’
Old Amit grinned at him. ‘Lots of questions, huh?’
Sam gave him a look, and the old man nodded. ‘It’s good to…to see you, Sam,’ he said. ‘It’s been a…a long time.’
The old man worked the arrow out of Karl’s back, then snatched up the dropped rifle, cracking it open and quickly checking the chambers.
The only plausible reason Sam could think of for Karl to be here was that Traynor had sent him. He’d killed Joshua because of what he’d seen in the video. And he’d seen through Kevin’s story, which had only ever been a delaying tactic, anyway. And once he’d realised where Sam had gone, he’d sent Karl after him to kill him…
‘Guess what,’ said the old man, snapping the rifle shut again. ‘Empty.’ He pushed his hands through the dead man’s pockets. ‘Wasn’t carrying extra ammunition either.’ He shook his head and chuckled to himself. ‘Weird.’
‘What is?’
The old man waved one hand in small, tight circles. ‘This. Talking. Too long since I had anyone else to talk to.’
He got back up and helped Sam to stand as well. Sam watched, dazed, as the old man slung Karl’s rifle over one shoulder, his crossbow over his other.
‘Amit,’ Sam asked hesitantly, ‘is it really you?’
The old man put a hand to his lips and nodded upwards. ‘Getting late.’
Sam saw that the sky was rapidly darkening. There was no way he’d get back to his own lander in time.
‘Those things in the forest,’ asked Sam. ‘The Howlers—’
The old man squinted at him. ‘The what?’
‘Howlers. They have spears and they’ve been trying to kill us and they only come out at night. You know what I’m talking about, right?’
Comprehension dawned on the older Amit’s face. ‘We called them indigenes.’
‘“We”?’
‘The previous expedition,’ said the old man, scratching one grizzled cheek. ‘How many of you are there left alive?’
He spoke as if it were a given that some of them would be dead by now. ‘Ten.’
&nb
sp; ‘But there were fifteen of you, right?’
‘Sure.’ Sam nodded. ‘How did you know?’
‘There were fifteen of us, too.’ Amit surveyed their surroundings. ‘You understand, right? The previous expedition—we were all the same people. Same as you, I mean.’
Sam remembered the crosses and the names on them. ‘Clones? Is that what you mean?’
The old man made a face. ‘Close enough.’
Even with the evidence of the graveyard, it was difficult to accept what the old man was telling him. ‘And you’ve been living here all this time, inside this lander?’
‘No. Somewhere else. I haven’t been back this way in…’ He paused for some seconds. ‘A long time, put it that way.’ He glanced past him through the trees, and Sam knew he was looking towards the makeshift graveyard with its metal crosses. ‘Too many bad memories.’
‘So where have you been all this time?’
‘Somewhere safer than here.’
‘I…’ Sam pressed a hand against his temple. ‘I don’t understand any of this.’ He looked again at the old man, his face so familiar and yet so different. ‘How the fuck,’ he asked at last, ‘can there be two expeditions?’
‘I’ve been waiting over fifty years to see you again,’ Amit replied. The more he spoke, the more his confidence in his own words seemed to grow. ‘I wondered if I might die without ever seeing another human being again. There were times I got to thinking about…’ the lines on his forehead deepened. ‘Ending things.’
‘You need to come back with me,’ said Sam, ‘to my lander. Tomorrow, when it’s safe. The others need to see you.’ God only knew what that other, younger Amit would make of this ancient spirit of the forest that shared his face and name.
‘No.’ The old man shook his head abruptly. ‘This is the eighth day—they’ll all be dead by the time we get there.’
Sam stiffened, staring at the old man. ‘What the hell are you talking about?’
‘The—what did you call them?—Howlers.’ He nodded to himself. ‘They always attack in the greatest numbers by the eighth night. And this is the eighth night since you got here.’
Always? What the hell, Sam wondered, did he mean by always? ‘They’ve been attacking nearly every night since we woke up!’ he shouted, grabbing the old man by the arm. He felt hard muscles beneath the rags. ‘We hid in the lander, and the damn things tried to burn us out.’
‘There’s more coming—far, far more,’ the old man assured him. ‘You know they’re much more than just animals, right? They’re intelligent, adaptable.’
‘But—!’
‘I’ve been out here a long time, Sam. I’ve watched them for many, many years. They have rituals, and beliefs—the same as we do. At first, they attack only at night—but only at first.’ He shook his head. ‘More are on their way—thousands of them. And when they get there, all your friends will die.’
‘Then I need to go back.’
The old man laughed. ‘Go back? You’d only die with the rest of them.’
‘How the fuck,’ Sam demanded, ‘could you even know how long we’ve been here?’
‘I saw you, blazing across the sky eight days ago. All that time I’ve been making my way to you, but I’m too late.’ He shook his head. ‘I had to come so far, you understand. I only stopped here because I have supplies stashed inside the lander. It’s just luck that I found you when I did.’
The old man took a sudden step back and raised his head as if scenting the air. ‘Can you hear them?’
‘Hear what?’
The old man put a finger to his lips. ‘Listen.’
At first, all Sam heard were the sounds of forest creatures—sounds that were already becoming deeply familiar to him. But soon he heard something else, approaching through the dusk: the cry of Howlers.
A lot of them.
Terror wrapped icy tendrils around Sam’s ribs. ‘We need to find somewhere to hide, or we’ll never survive the night.’ He nodded towards the lander. ‘That’s our only chance.’
‘Hide in there if you like,’ said the old man, ‘but you’ll die if you do.’ He raised one hand to the forest canopy above them. ‘The safest place is up there.’
He produced a hunting knife from out of his rags. Like his bow, the knife looked identical to those Kevin had printed back at the other lander just days before. Sam stepped back, alarmed, afraid the old man had found a reason to kill him the way he’d killed Karl: instead he knelt by Karl’s body, forcing the dead man’s jaws open and pushing the blade between them.
Sam watched with rising horror and disgust as the old man sawed away at Karl’s tongue until the dead man’s blood coated his wrinkled fingers. He kept working, his face a mask of quiet concentration. Sam put a hand over his mouth and took another step back as Amit stood up with his prize held in one red-streaked hand. Karl’s blood dripped from it, staining the forest floor.
Old Amit grinned broadly at his discomfort. Sam noticed that those few teeth remaining in his mouth were stained a deep oak-brown.
‘This,’ said the old man, holding up the severed tongue, ‘is our ticket up. Now come on.’
Sam didn’t move. ‘But—!’
‘Listen,’ the old man said more sharply, his grin fading. ‘The indigenes will be here soon. No time to waste.’
He was right, of course. The old man turned and ran off without warning, back into the deep shadows of the forest.
Sam ran after him, terrified at the thought of being left behind. The old man darted his head here and there as if searching for something.
For one heart-stopping moment, Sam thought he might have lost him, and opened his mouth to shout; then he saw the old man had come to a halt before a tree, blue flowers pushing up through the loam between its roots.
‘Here,’ said the old man, reaching out to Sam with his free hand and waggling his fingers. ‘I need you to come closer.’
Sam edged closer, despite his growing certainty that this other Amit might have lost his mind after too many years alone. Then he heard howls from back the way they had come and reached out to take the old man’s hand.
Amit threw Karl’s tongue down on top of the patch of blue flowers and stamped hard on the ground. Next he grabbed hold of Sam’s shoulder and pulled him back half a pace, meanwhile craning his neck up at the distant heights of the forest canopy.
Sam looked up too, in time to witness the dark silhouette of a bungee-bug dropping towards them with terrifying speed, its tentacles writhing like a black nightmare. Sam took another step backwards, but the old man’s grip was like like steel.
‘Do as I do,’ the old man shouted.
‘Wait—!’
The bungee-bug slammed down onto the ground directly in front of them, its tentacles writhing as it snatched up the still-warm morsel of flesh. Then, just as abruptly, the old man leapt forward and onto the creature’s back, grabbing hold of its umbilical and dragging Sam after him.
Sam yelled in terror, for one terrible moment imagining that he was about to be sacrificed to the bug. Only then did he realise the creature’s tentacles couldn’t reach up behind its own back.
Amit let go of Sam’s shoulder and grabbed hold of his hand, pressing Sam’s fingers around the thick flesh of the creature’s umbilical.
‘Grab hold with both hands!’ shouted the old man, before wrapping his own fists tight around the thick, fleshy cord.
Sam was too terrified to even think about disobeying. The bungee-bug twisted and shuddered beneath them, clearly desperate to be free of its unexpected burden. Then it let out a shrill cry and suddenly shot upwards, lurching violently from side to side as it rose.
‘They’re strong fuckers,’ Amit shouted in Sam’s ear. ‘This is a lot easier than trying to climb these damn trees.’
Cold sweat bathed Sam’s skin, and he tried not to think about what would happen if the bug, still twisting and twitching beneath them, managed to shake them loose. He wrapped both fists around the umbilical in a death
grip and experienced an urgent and almost overwhelming desire to urinate.
The bungee-bug rose yet higher—far higher than Sam would have believed possible. Suddenly the canopy was all around them, a thick tangle of branches, vines and leaves that in parts seemed almost to form a second forest floor high above the soil.
‘Get ready,’ shouted the old man, grabbing Sam by one elbow. ‘Time to get off.’
The bug was still ascending, but much more slowly than before. Sam glanced up and saw they were rushing towards the underside of a thickset branch, around which the bug’s umbilical wrapped itself in a tight knot.
‘Now,’ said the old man, before nimbly stepping off the creature’s back and dropping onto another branch just as the bug rose past it.
Sam saw that the branch onto which the old man had alighted was huge, extending almost horizontally out from the trunk of its parent tree. It looked wide and flat enough to park the lander’s truck on top of it.
He hurried to follow the old man, afraid that if he hesitated, he might be crushed against the underside of the branch from which the bug hung. He leapt off the creature’s back and, for one terrible moment, there was nothing but air between him and the forest floor far below.
Sam landed hard enough to knock the air out of his lungs, his hands scrabbling at bark that felt slippery with moss and fungus. He started to slide, his feet kicking at air, pulled towards the edge of the branch by his own weight. He opened his mouth to scream, but there was no air left in his lungs.
Amit hurried towards him, grabbing him by a shoulder and lifting him bodily up and back on top of the branch in what, under any other circumstances, would have been a demonstration of prodigious strength and balance. Sam felt like his arm might become separated from its socket.
When Amit let go of him, Sam pressed himself close against the mossy bark, letting out small, panicky gasps. Amit, meanwhile, stood poised and balanced further along the branch. Small creatures flitted through the surrounding canopy, jumping from dense thickets of leaves to branches and back again.
When Sam next raised his eyes, he saw the dark shape of the bungee-bug pressed up tight against a branch of a neighbouring tree. It was now still, its tentacles pulled in close against its body.
