by M. R. Forbes
The interior of the structure was more like a series of tunnels than a geometrically organized series of floors, corridors, and walled spaces. Caleb and Washington came off the final bridge and entered a winding tunnel that branched out in multiple directions, one of the excavations descending sharply and spiraling downward.
“That one,” Caleb said, motioning to it.
The area they wanted was at the base of the structure. A genetic testing lab of some kind. Arluthu had sent Riley there to study the Reaper mutation and to edit her DNA with Relyeh code, further mutating her and making her one of them.
They had made it.
Caleb felt a sudden pain in his arm, as Ishek clenched tightly against it, spiny feet pressing harder and deeper through his flesh. A wave of dizziness washed over him a moment later, the pressure in his head forcing him to the ground.
“Sarge?” Washington said, leaning down beside him.
Pain shot through Caleb’s body, setting it on fire. He opened his mouth, blood rising from his throat and dripping out onto the floor.
It subsided almost as quickly as it came, leaving Caleb heaving.
“Cal?” Washington said.
Caleb glanced over, eyes still watering from the pain. “We’re out of time. Arluthu knows what I did. He knows we’re here.”
Chapter 44
Washington helped Caleb to his feet. Without thinking, Caleb wiped his bleeding mouth on the Intellect Skin, causing the projection to lose fidelity across the area where the blood stained it. It didn’t matter anymore. Arluthu knew he was in the city.
Something was going to give. And fast.
“We need to find Valentine,” Caleb said.
“You sure you don’t want to try to get out?”
“If he gets the coordinates of the settlement on Proxima, all of the Relyeh will eventually have the coordinates.” He pointed at the descending tunnel. “That way.”
They ran, sprinting down the spiraling slope, not waiting to find out how Arluthu planned to deal with them. They didn’t hear or see anything out of the ordinary. The structure was nearly empty. Now that Caleb had spent a little more time in the city, he realized it was relatively empty too.
Then he remembered what Ishek had told him. The Relyeh sacrificed themselves to feed their lord and master until the Axon and the Inahri came. The ones in the city were all that remained.
They reached an intersecting cavern that led across the width of the building. Caleb glanced down on the way past, in time to see a squid-faced Relyeh turn to look at them. Its tentacle beard writhed in reaction. “The intruders are here!” it shouted in a guttural language he knew as Relyeh and understood through Ishek.
You’re going to die here, Caleb. Both of you.
“Then you’ll die too,” Caleb replied.
The Advocate didn’t like that idea.
They kept running, spiraling downward. The Intellect Skin’s HUD lit up, warning Caleb of the Relyeh giving chase, as well as a second group approaching from ahead. Was Arluthu still watching them, keeping an eye on them during the chase?
Lord Arluthu has more important matters to deal with. I told you, we aren’t getting out of here alive. You have ruined both of us, Caleb Card.
“At least there’s a silver lining,” Caleb said. He reached into Ishek’s memory, looking for the squid-face creatures’ weakness. They were called Norg, the most common of the Relyeh, made in the image of the ancient gods. “Wash, the norg’s hearts are in the center right below the neck. Hit them there.”
“Roger.”
He wasn’t as concerned with the Screamers. They seemed pretty frail. He had seen a few other different Relyeh on the way, but he had no idea what to call them or how dangerous they might be.
We’re all dangerous in our own way.
He had figured as much.
They kept going, closing in on the Relyeh ahead and staying ahead of the enemy behind. The Intellect Skin was able to mark the four targets in front of them—it couldn’t tell them much more—and the rounded tunnel made it impossible to see more than a few meters ahead.
“Wash, you were a linebacker in college. Try to bust through them. Don’t slow down.”
“Roger.”
They gained a little more speed, with Washington bursting ahead. He tucked his shoulder slightly as the enemy neared, ready to throw them all aside.
Caleb activated the Skin’s weapons, sending energy to his hands. Blue lightning arced across the surface, ready for use.
The Relyeh appeared ahead. All four were squid-faced soldiers, similar to the servants he had seen in the Kuu. They were bigger and heavier than Washington, linebackers in their own right, dressed in dark robes and carrying metal rods. They slowed as Caleb and Washington came into sight, raising the rods and activating them.
The two Marines slammed hard into a sudden invisible barrier, all of their momentum lost in an instant as they cracked against at what appeared to be thin air and were thrown back, off their feet. A wave of dizziness washed over Caleb before quickly fading.
Get up.
Ishek’s command was desperate. Caleb bounced back to his feet. The Norgs advanced slowly, keeping the barrier raised. Arluthu didn’t want him dead. It would be a waste of a different kind of resource.
Caleb swung his head back around. Another Norg and a large serpent-like creature with rough, dark scales and a gaping, toothy mouth ahead of beady, intelligent eyes were there. The Norg activated its rod, creating a wall on the opposite side of the tunnel.
They were trapped.
Washington rolled back to his feet. The two groups of Relyeh regarded the Earthers calmly, convinced they were contained.
“How do we get out of this one, Sarge?” Washington asked.
Caleb’s hands still crackled with unspent energy. They couldn’t get through the barriers. There was solid rock on both sides of them. Was there another way out?
You’ll only have a moment.
The Norg behind them dropped his stick, howling and grabbing for his head. Caleb spun, leaping at the Relyeh and getting his hand to the middle of its chest. He released the energy, sending a burst through the enemy and out the other side, the damage reducing its heart to ash and killing it instantly.
He ducked low as the serpent snapped out at him, its teeth nearly taking his entire arm. He grabbed the rod as he hopped back to his feet, swinging it hard into the side of the creature’s head. The weapon connected with a wet crack, the serpent collapsing to the floor.
“Up!” Caleb shouted, retreating from the Norgs.
They ran again, back the way they had come, back up the tunnel toward the top. They needed another way down, one without Norgs blocking the path.
I know the way. I took it from the Norg. I hunger, Caleb.
He felt Ishek pressing in on him, wanting to take control. He didn’t understand why the Advocate was suddenly so eager to help him, instead of letting him be captured.
Arluthu blames me for this failure. He promised to feed me to a slytep once we’re captured.
Caleb didn’t know what a slytep was, and he wasn’t going to look through Ishek’s memories for the answer right now. He had no choice but to trust the Advocate. “Wash, I’m giving Ishek the wheel. He does anything against us, knock me the hell out.”
“Roger that, Sarge.”
Caleb let Ishek take over. It was up to the Advocate to get them out of there.
Ishek kept them headed back up until they reached the next level of the structure. It turned and raced across the split. The Skin’s HUD showed a target nearby, coming for them from an adjacent corridor. It wasn’t clear which one of them would reach it first.
We will.
They did. Ishek slowed him as they came to the corner, clutching the rod and swinging it as they cleared the edge. It slammed into a Norg’s face, smashing the small nose and crushing its tentacled jaw. It howled as Ishek drew back and hit it again, and then again, still slamming the rod into it as it collapsed.
Ishek was enjoying the carnage almost too much. It only stopped when Caleb threatened to regain control.
“This way,” it verbalised aloud through Caleb, leading Washington down the passage. The other Norgs were still giving chase and again closing in on them.
They sprinted at full speed, nearing a solid wall at the end of another intersection.
“Don’t slow down,” Ishek said. “Activate the Skin’s shields. We’re going through.”
“Through?” Washington replied.
Ishek thrust the rod forward. A wave displaced the air ahead of it, hitting the stone wall and causing it to shake. It used the rod two more times, cracking the stone right before they reached it. Energy spread across the front of the Skin, leading the way as Ishek threw Caleb’s body against the rock. The stone offered some resistance but slowly broke away, finally shattering to allow them escape from the structure. A pull from the side sucked the pieces back, leaving only a hole where the rod had struck the wall.
The same gravity pulled Caleb and Washington back too, letting them fall a meter out of the hole before tumbling backward. Ishek flipped Caleb so he landed on his feet beside the new opening. Washington landed on his back, causing the Advocate to laugh.
They were facing the floor of the city, headed in the right direction on a direct line. It was a much easier path than the one he had originally selected.
“Hurry,” Ishek said.
They ran along the side of the structure toward the base. The Norgs reached the hole, climbing out behind them. Caleb heard more screeching up above them, but Ishek didn’t look back. Now that he knew where to go he pushed the Advocate out, regaining control of his body.
No. Not yet. Caleb, please. I hunger.
The building shook suddenly, the quaking enough to take both Caleb and Washington off their feet. They fell forward, sliding along the surface of the stone.
Something big moved out from the shadow of the building, easily the ugliest and most frightening thing Caleb had ever seen.
“What the hell?” Washington said beside him.
Knowledge flowed through Ishek into Caleb as the Advocate answered the question. Dark, terrifying understanding washed over him, turning Caleb’s blood cold.
The creature lifted its head, the remains of a human face nearly hidden within the gruesome features of the monstrous hellspawn facing them.
“We’re too late,” Caleb muttered. “That thing is Valentine.”
Chapter 45
The Relyeh mutations were worse than Caleb could have imagined, the changes to Valentine beyond understanding. In a matter of days, Arluthu had remade her into what Caleb could only see as the so-called ancient god’s own image.
The increase in mass had left her over twice Washington’s size, her limbs extending outward disproportionately to her torso. Her arms were lined with sharp, bony protrusions that reminded Caleb of Ishek’s spearing legs. Her lower half was slim and lithe, her feet narrow, her toes long and sharp. Her chest was thick and broad, her breasts hanging perversely over a caved-in stomach, which itself merged into what appeared to be the outside of her genitals.
It was disgusting, but still bore some human resemblance. What didn’t were the four extra arms emerging from each of her shoulders. Each one ended in a bony hand with four sharp claws. What didn’t resemble anything human was her head. As wide as her chest, it was puckered and twisted, with exposed muscle and veins running between her eyes. Fleshy tendrils sprouted from a gaping tooth-filled mouth, and a tentacle nearly as long as the rest of her body rose from the top of her head. It writhed back and forth, curling and uncurling, and wetly slapping the wall of the structure.
Caleb pulled himself back to his feet. Washington did the same, a look of disgust flashing across his face.
Arluthu has made a queen.
What Arluthu had done to Valentine was almost secondary to what her completed mutation meant. Her secrets, which seemed to be inexhaustible, were no longer secret. Not Proxima. Not the teleporters. Who knew what else? The keys to the CRISPR editing that had created David Nash. The splicing that had made the Reapers. The access codes to get anywhere on the Deliverance. All of it would flow into the Relyeh knowledge share. And then…
He couldn’t even comprehend what might happen then. Not here. Not now.
“Valentine!” Caleb shouted, hoping he could get her attention. “Wait!”
She continued looking up at them. There was no sign of recognition in her eyes. There was no sign of anything.
She let out a deep, guttural howl.
A screeching noise behind them stole Caleb’s attention, his eyes sweeping across a dozen Relyeh closing in on them from the top of the cavern on thick, bat-like wings. More hisses and cries sounded from the bridges and from the floor below. Even more winged creatures streamed onto the spike-like buttresses jutting out from the buildings on his left. At least fifty more of Arluthu’s loyal followers—aliens in an assortment of shapes and sizes created from the merged DNA of conquered races—added to the mob. They ran, slithered, crawled and flew toward the two Marines.
Caleb’s head whipped back around. They were about to be completely boxed in. How the hell were they going to get out of this mess?
We aren’t. You tried Earther. You failed. We’re all going to die because of you.
A sharp howl pierced the rest of the din.
“Sarge!” Washington shouted in warning.
Caleb’s HUD added two more marks. His eyes found them an instant later, two dark shapes rushing across the floor and bounding onto the wall. They were like trife, only larger and broader, as if they were a more compact version of a Reaper. They moved just as fast, scaling the side of the structure in an all-out charge.
Caleb and Washington set themselves against the demons, ready for the fight. The creatures launched from five meters away, large claws reaching out. Caleb took two quick steps forward before letting his legs go out from under him, falling onto his back and beneath the slashing daggers. He put his hand up to the uluth as it crossed over him, firing a blast of energy into its chest, It screamed, the force lifting it up, and over backwards. It landed on the other side of him, already dead.
Washington used his size to his advantage, standing his ground against the creature. He stayed low, waiting for it to arrive before grabbing its leading claw and rotating around it, twisting it up and behind its back, breaking it with a loud crack. Then he pushed the Relyeh, not into the wall but away, out of the artificial gravity and into the real gravity. It tumbled from the height, slamming into the ground below a second later.
The flying creatures were closing in, trying to get an angle to swoop down on he and Washington. The other Relyeh were getting closer too, including the four soldiers still chasing them. It was as though he and Washington had descended into hell, and all of the demons within were hungry for their flesh. And yet as horrific as they all seemed, they weren’t the biggest threat.
Caleb spun back toward Valentine. She was on the move, her tapered legs giving her a heaving gait. But Caleb was surprised to find she wasn’t coming up the side of the building. Instead, she charged to the fallen uluth, bending slightly as the long tendril on her head snapped down and wrapped around the creature, lifting it as it screamed. She brought it to her large face, the tendrils over her mouth stretching taut and stabbing into its chest. It shuddered momentarily and then froze, paralyzed as she took a deep bite into its flesh.
Caleb watched in fascination. Was it possible she was helping them?
There was no way for him to be sure. She was a Relyeh now, and not just any Relyeh. Arluthu had remade her to be his queen, as disgusting as that was. With her knowledge and help, he likely believed he could solve the teleportation problem and finally set himself free.
She was massive and powerful.
She would need to feed.
She took another massive bite of the uluth. Caleb looked past he
r, searching for a way out. He noticed an avenue of escape a few meters to her left—a dark, narrow alley between two structures. If he and Washington could get past her and make a run for it, they might be able to get ahead of the others. It wouldn’t necessarily get them anywhere close to safety, but it was a start.
“Wash, break on my mark,” Caleb said, passing the target to Washington. “Now!”
They dashed forward, sprinting down the building toward the ground. Valentine was a short distance away, in the middle of a third bite. The uluth was nearly torn in half, quickly devoured.
They couldn’t take on the entire city, and he had decided to enter unarmed—a decision he regretted now. Their only hope was to get out of the main scrum and find somewhere to hide. Maybe get a scan of another Relyeh and sneak back to the Arshugg tunnel.
Would that even be possible with Ishek clinging to his arm?
The ground was fast approaching. The winged Relyeh cried out to one another, organizing themselves in an attack pattern. The other Relyeh were closing the gap. They had slowed when they saw Valentine, and slowed even more when they witnessed her assault of the uluth. Like Caleb, they didn’t know whose side she was on, or if she were on any side at all. She was acting in her own self-interest.
What else was new?
Caleb took the ninety-degree angle by pushing off the side of the building and diving forward, rolling his shoulder against the ground and coming back to his feet. Washington did the same, staying right behind him as they changed directions to head for the alley. Valentine was a few meters ahead of them, more massive and more frightening from this vantage.
The remains of the uluth fell to the ground in front of her. She let out a low groaning noise that took on a very familiar sound.
“Card.”
“Don’t stop,” Caleb said, racing for the alley.
A winged Relyeh dropped right in front of him, taking a swipe at him with long claws. He ducked the blow, stretching out his hand and firing from the palm, the blast of energy tearing through the creature as he shouldered it aside. He heard another swoop at his back, only to have the creature screech and fall away as Washington blasted it with his Skin.
