Containment

by Caryn Lix

  I ran through a list of my friends’ powers, but it seemed like they had to be close enough for me to use them, and I didn’t know where anyone was. I didn’t even know my own range. As a test, I stared at my own hand and willed it invisible. It remained stubbornly perceptible. I had opened doors without Liam around, though. Why? Because he’d been closer than I realized, or because something about his power specifically connected to me? I chewed on my lip as I considered that, but in the end, I dismissed the idea. For one, I didn’t see why Liam’s ability should be different from anyone else’s, which meant he’d probably been closer than I’d realized when I used his abilities before. Why, I didn’t know. I didn’t understand anything about the guy and wasn’t likely to start now.

  But I had another reason not to start throwing portals around the spaceship: I didn’t dare open a door if I didn’t know where I was going. On Obsidian, I’d started to suspect my portals did more than reach through walls, that they crossed space. But anytime I’d opened one before, I’d visualized where I was going. I couldn’t do that on this ship, and I didn’t want to risk winding up inside the engine or something, so I stepped into engineering the old-fashioned way and took in the lay of the room. It was a typical engineering department for an Omnistellar ship. I’d spent a bit of time in them before, not enough to learn much, but enough to know how things were arranged. If I was right, the computer core should be in the opposite corner.

  Sure enough, I found it, an unassuming small box that definitely didn’t look like it should run the entire ship. I called up an interface, but I was scared to mess with it too much. If I accidentally deactivated life support or something, we’d have a much bigger problem than aliens. And I wasn’t sure how far the system would let me go without a biometric scan, anyway.

  Still, I found a rough map of the ship. It wasn’t as big as I’d suspected, and the layout was pretty standard Omnistellar. The command center was fore. Unlike Sanctuary, this ship had two command centers, the main one upstairs for command and security, and a secondary center for navigation below. Was the lower level a monsters’ killing field too? Shoving the thought aside, I scanned for the holding cells and found them aft, one level below. At least I had a destination.

  Still, it took a few minutes to convince myself to leave engineering. It was quiet and reassuring in there, between the hum of the engine, the computer whirring to itself, and the total absence of dead bodies. I suddenly realized this was the first time I’d been alone, really alone, in weeks. Before Sanctuary, I’d considered myself a solitary, introverted person. I’d never had many close friends. My parents were busy with work. I’d been okay with that. Sure, I went out now and then, and I played on local basketball teams whenever the opportunity presented itself. But I was just as happy curled up in bed with the latest issue of Robo Mecha Dream Girl 5 and a cup of chai as I was surrounded by other kids.

  But the last week or two, almost without knowing it, I’d come to depend on my friends. Cage, always ready with a grin and a quip. Imani, her quiet strength and intelligence. Rune, her gentle kindness, yet with a core of fierce determination. Even Mia. She might be a powder keg, but I knew that whatever happened, she’d have my back. It felt like years since I’d faced anything alone, not a matter of weeks.

  You don’t have a choice, I reminded myself. I clenched my hands into fists, wishing for a weapon, even if it wouldn’t do much good. Something to hold on to. My thumb brushed the ring on my right hand, a sixteenth-birthday present from my parents, and Dad’s face flashed through my mind, bloody and yet somehow tranquil as he lay on the office floor.

  Somehow, that calmed me, strengthening my resolve. With steady hands, I scanned Dad’s omnicard to leave engineering. Mom might have given up on me. Dad might have let Omnistellar suck him into their plan. But what set me apart from them was my choices, and I chose to save my dad, to go after my friends.

  The hall remained eerily empty and silent. How many people staffed this ship? Where were they? Was the entire crew dead in the command center? I cast a quick glance toward the conference room where I’d left Dad, reassuring myself it remained safe and secure, resisting the urge to check on him again. Staring at his limp body wouldn’t help him. But finding my friends, especially the ones with the power to heal, might.

  According to my map, the lift to the lower level was on my right. I crept that way, ears perked for any sound of movement. I saw nothing. I heard nothing. It was driving me up the wall. I would have almost preferred a glimpse of the aliens at this point. The constant waiting, the fear, the gnawing panic in my heart: none of them offered anything to grab on to, only a constant gaping void of terror.

  I reached the lift without incident: a large black circle on the floor. I stepped onto it and passed Dad’s omnicard by the screen on the wall. The circle descended, another instantly sliding into place above my head. I plummeted through a solid tube, track lighting crossing the walls, clear plexiglass preventing me from touching anything on my sides. I closed my eyes against a burst of claustrophobia. I used to like tube lifts. Now they felt like a prison.

  The ride wasn’t long, though, and a moment later, a rush of cool air told me I’d left the tube behind. I opened my eyes as the disc lowered into place on the floor below. When I was a kid, my parents were stationed on a prison with a tube lift, and two other girls and I used to make a game of jumping off the disc at increasing heights, until we got caught and grounded. Now I found myself afraid to leave the disc at all.

  The computer chimed, and its pleasant androgynous voice advised me to vacate the space. I leaped into action, my heart thrumming. Stupid, stupid, stupid. I waited with bated breath for a shrill alien scream to respond to the computer.

  Nothing.

  I stood in another empty, sterile hallway. Medical was ahead on my left, the command center’s lower domain on my right. According to the map, most of this level contained dormitories and living quarters, but I was willing to bet my friends were here too, in the holding cells at the rear of the ship.

  Assuming they still lived.

  I took three steps toward the stern of the ship, and the emergency lights vanished, plunging me into darkness.

  Half a scream escaped me before I clamped my lips together. Sheer terror overwhelmed me. I scrambled in the blackness until my hand reached the wall. I clung to it like a lifeline, cringing, making myself as small as possible. My heart drummed in my ears, impossibly loud, as I waited for sight to return the way it does when the lights go out.

  But that was on Earth, where your eyes only needed to adjust to a lower level of illumination. This was space. There was not even a glimmer or gleam, and my eyes had no way to adjust. I was completely blind.

  The reassuring thrum of the ship’s systems continued in the background, telling me the life support still functioned. But why had the lights gone off? And how?

  Did I dare risk reconnecting my wrist comm, or would the command to trigger its luminous function send agony tearing through my brain? I’d definitely used it after leaving Liam’s hideout, but he could have triggered a virus remotely. Either way, I didn’t want to try it. The pain had been worse the second time I’d triggered my comms. If I activated it a third time, it might very well knock me out, leaving me lying unconscious on the floor for whoever—or whatever—happened along.

  Medical always stored emergency flashlights. I groped along the wall the way I’d come, reaching the corner. I was glad I’d taken the time to examine the map, to note my surroundings. This would have been a lot harder if I’d been blind and lost. As it was, every step sent panic racing through me. At least I didn’t have to leave the wall. I clutched it, letting it lead me on until my fingers brushed the edge of the door.

  I wasn’t a hundred percent sure Dad’s omnicard still worked given the power outage, but when my outstretched grip found the scanner, I swiped it anyway. Sure enough, a soft whoosh and the scent of astringent and cleanser indicated the doors opening. I slid my hand over the entrance, unwilli
ng to lose the edge of the space, and entered.

  As the door slid shut behind me, I realized things had gotten a lot dicier. In the halls I’d known that as long as I stuck to the walls, I’d have a clear path to retreat. But I’d never seen these med facilities before. They could, and probably did, have items around the perimeter. So where would the flashlights be? With the emergency supplies, obviously, but where were they? I had no choice but to delve around in the dark until I found them.

  I took a hesitant step forward, my left hand glued to the wall, my right waving gently in front of me. When I didn’t encounter anything, I took another step, and another. My fingers brushed something. I risked running my hands over it. A medical scanner, by the shape of it. I kept contact, easing myself around its edge and back to the wall, where I resumed my agonizing progress.

  It seemed to take forever to cover the maybe twenty feet from the door to the corner. I encountered a cupboard along the way and carefully slid it open, rummaging through it as silently and carefully as I dared, but I didn’t feel anything like an emergency supply box. On Sanctuary, on every Omnistellar facility I’d ever seen, we stored the emergency supplies in command centers, medical, and engineering in a large plastic crate with the word EMERGENCY stamped on all sides. I was pretty sure I’d know it when I found it.

  I resumed my careful trek on the long second wall. I encountered more obstacles now: a bed, a desk, another cupboard. I checked under the bed and desk and in the cupboard but found them all empty save for the standard medical supplies. For a moment my hand ghosted over something in the desk that felt like a tablet, and hope soared. Even a glimmer of light would be welcome. But when I punched the keys, nothing happened. Someone had let their battery run down to nothing.

  My knees gave way, and I knelt there in the black, my hand pressed over my own mouth. The darkness, the silence, were getting to me. I was imagining sounds. Imagining the sensation of ghostly hands brushing my face. I reached out, trying for Rune’s powers, searching for a connection with the computer. Nothing. Either I couldn’t access her powers at all, or I was still out of range. Regardless, I was on my own.

  You’re probably a quarter of the way through the room, Kenzie. You can do it. Come on.

  I forced myself to my feet. Once I’d done that, it became easier to keep moving. I really hoped to find the emergency supplies along a wall. But if I reached the exit without finding them, I’d have to face the possibility that they were somewhere in the middle of the room. That meant stumbling through the dark without even the wall to guide me. Panic threatened to choke me, and I forced it down resolutely. One problem at a time.

  I reached the med facility’s alternate entrance on the far wall. My heart beating a little faster, I pressed on. A few minutes later, I found a whole row of cupboards. I pulled the first one open and rummaged through it. Bandages. Small containers of medication. Sealed plastic crates, but none of them big enough to hold emergency supplies. At least, I didn’t think they were, and I didn’t want to mess with them in the darkness. What if they contained syringes or scalpels?

  The second cupboard held more of the same, but in the third I found a large plastic crate on the bottom shelf. I eased the lid open and searched inside, my body sagging with relief as my fingers closed over exactly what I wanted: a light box with an elastic strap to fit over my wrist or skull.

  But as I went to turn it on, a sound I hadn’t imagined reached my ears: the long, slow drag of something over the floor, followed by an extended hiss.

  I wasn’t alone in this room.

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  I FROZE, CLUTCHING THE FLASHLIGHT, my heart seeming to stop altogether. Maybe the sound wouldn’t come again. But it did: the unmistakable drag of a tail over the floor.

  My fingers fumbled on the flashlight. I pressed the button and light flooded the cupboard in front of me, so bright it stung my eyes and set my teeth on edge. Slowly, I released the button, not allowing it to make even the hint of a click. Just as slowly, I maneuvered into a kneeling position and turned around.

  The creature stood on the other side of the med facility. It resembled the ones I’d seen on Obsidian, bigger and more menacing than the aliens we’d encountered on Sanctuary. Had they sent something stronger, darker, to hunt the monsters who stole their ship and killed the harvesters? The possibility sent chills down my spine.

  Fortunately, it seemed as blind as the monsters on Sanctuary, shifting from side to side. Did it hear me? Just in case, I slid farther along the wall, away from the cupboard I’d pulled open in the dark.

  As I moved, something caught my peripheral vision. I angled the flashlight to my right in time to see another of the creatures stalk past the alternate exit. My blood ran cold. Mere minutes ago, I’d crept along that wall, using it as guidance in my progress around the room. How close had I come to touching one of those things? I hadn’t heard a sound from them, not a click of claws, nothing. Had they only recently arrived? How? From where? Did they open portals like me? Or were they hunting me, waiting, tracking my movements in complete and utter silence?

  I cast the light the way I’d come. I’d planned to leave through the far door, but that escape route was no longer an option. My only hope was to retreat and make my way to the holding cells in the corridor outside. I stayed low, crawling at a snail’s pace. The creatures didn’t do anything, simply hovering in what almost looked like suspended animation except for the occasional quirk of their heads. I was afraid to even breathe too deeply. Aside from the occasional flicker of my flashlight over my left shoulder to make sure there weren’t more of the things, I kept them in my spotlight.

  It was the closest I’d seen them. The bright light did nothing to make them less horrifying, bringing them into sharp relief: glistening skin, curved fangs, sinewed limbs. Every instinct screamed at me to run, but I didn’t dare. I moved as slowly as my racing heart allowed, my soft-soled shoes nearly noiseless against the floor. After every halting step, I paused, waiting to see if they’d noticed.

  I’d made it about halfway across the room when something changed. My heart stuttered as the alien by the far door jerked its chin up, sniffing the air. It tilted its head and screeched to its partner. The other creature slapped its tail against the wall and howled in response. I froze in utter terror. I’d understood just enough of those cries to catch the sense of prey, a call to hunt.

  A surge of adrenaline burned through my caution, and I bolted for the exit. The monster behind me screamed, and I barely had time to register surprise in its tone. They hadn’t been reacting to me after all.

  They were now, though.

  I was still ten feet from the door when one of the aliens vaulted into the air. Its mottled head grazed the ceiling panel, but it must have somehow sensed the proximity, controlling its height to land directly in front of me. It hunched on its hind legs, a long, pointed black tongue protruding from its mouth, tasting the air like a snake. I skidded to a halt. A clatter from behind warned me just in time, and I threw myself to the side as the other creature landed directly where I’d been standing.

  Forcing my heart to beat through my panic, I belly-crawled along the floor, the flashlight clutched in one hand. I dragged myself toward a nearby bed and wiggled into the space beneath it. The aliens screamed their horrible shrill cry. Hunt it. Contain it. Kill it.

  I was pretty sure I’d liked it better when I didn’t understand them at all.

  I sank my teeth into my lip and drew myself into a tight ball, folding my limbs in on each other, clutching the flashlight to my chest with trembling hands. I shook so hard the light cast the recesses of my hasty hiding place into sickly shadows, but I stayed completely still otherwise, even holding my breath as long as possible before drawing slow, silent gasps.

  A tail swished past me. Then one on the other side. Their cries grew more agitated. They knew where I’d been, where I’d vanished, but they couldn’t find me. Not yet.

  But they would. Sooner or later, I’d have to move, an
d these things were relentless. . . .

  There was a soft swish. It took me a moment to register it as the sound of the door sliding open. Both creatures froze, their muscles tensing in anticipation, and an even brighter light than my own cut through the darkness. “Hey!” a man called. “Over here!”

  The creatures screamed and leaped into the light. Gunfire ricocheted, so loud I dropped the flashlight and clamped my hands over my ears. That wasn’t a single gunshot. It was the sound of automatic fire, and maybe a laser blast mixed in for good measure.

  It lasted less than a minute. Everything went quiet, and the light flickered around the room. “Come on out,” he called. “They’re dead.”

  I closed my eyes. I recognized the voice now. My mind raced, searching for an alternative method of escape. I almost preferred the aliens.

  “Keeeenzieeeeee,” Hallam sang, his voice teasing. “I know it’s you. Come on, girl. You really want to face more of those things on your own?”

  “Don’t make us come after you.” That was Priya, clipped and tense.

  I hesitated another moment, then shrugged. I didn’t really have another exit. If they came in here, they’d find me and arrest me. “Okay,” I said, surprising myself with a reasonably solid voice. “I’m coming. Just don’t shoot me.”

  Hallam chortled. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”

  I didn’t take a lot of reassurance from that, but nonetheless, I rolled the flashlight onto the floor so I could keep my hands visible and crawled out after it. Arms spread, I picked up the flashlight and got to unsteady feet.

  Hallam and Priya stood shadowed in the doorway, both wearing bright lights clipped to their shoulders, almost blinding me until they angled them away. Hallam held the biggest gun I’d ever seen. It looked like a rocket launcher, but something resembling ammunition dangled below it. Priya held a laser rifle. That I did recognize. It was one of the newer and deadlier models. Two other people hovered behind them in the hall. Finn and Matt, I guessed.