That was better than nothing, still improving their arsenal.
While Jack had been considering the situation, the scientists had moved closer to the large mass in the center without him realizing it.
Goddamn it, thought Jack. He followed them over, typing rapidly into the communal chat.
Stay away from that thing, he said. We have no idea what it is.
He was completely ignored as Jeffs reached out to touched the mass, giving a sharp hiss, before withdrawing his hand.
It's freezing cold, Jeffs messaged to the group. He shined his flashlight onto his hand, checking for any damage. When the flashlight beam crossed his hand, the light bent towards the mass.
The hell? thought Jack. He walked forward and shined his helmet flashlight across the mass at an angle. As the light neared the mass, it began bending towards the mass, diffusing slightly. He looked at Caroline.
What the hell does that mean? he messaged.
It took her a moment to reply.
I don’t know, she said. But isn't it exciting?
Caroline’s excitement was almost overwhelming her now. It had been building ever since they stepped into the ritual room and she hadn’t felt this alive or invigorated in years.
She had suspected that the samples they’d found were Shiveen but had yet to commit to the idea until she’d had access to better facilities to prove it. But the ritual room above, this well room, and the fact the Shiveen had followed them down?
Not only was this ritual cave Shiveen it was also still in active use.
But what did they use it for?
In every single piece of research she’d found on the Shiveen, she’d never came across anything to show that they had planetary settlements or outposts. She’d done extensive searches through all the databases she could, including the many CivCom ones she had access to. Most reports were skirmishes between the Sphere and the Shiveen. Every encounter with the Shiveen had been in space, far from the center of panhumanic life, on the fringes of expanding Panhumanic Sphere territory.
Where did the Shiveen come from?
Was it another arm of the Milky Way or somewhere else?
There were billions of planets in the Milky Way and the Panhumanic Sphere was just stretching its legs as far as exploration grew. There were still untold star systems that they could call home.
How many more caves like this one would be found before a real Shiveen settlement was found? How many more caves like this existed? Was this the only one on this planet or were there more?
And what did MilCom really know?
Caroline knew for a fact that they were holding back information from the general population, from anyone not in the military. She didn’t have any science contacts in MilCom and had fostered none, not even over her many years in academia. A poor decision on her part and something she would need to revise going forward, especially if her hunch about the samples was correct.
Well, even if she didn’t trust the military wholly, at least she could use them. Assuming that she could get keep her research when they’d got off the planet.
She tapped a message to Jack via her alek.
I need the drone to record as much information on this mass as possible.
Jack read the message from Caroline.
Please, she added.
It wasn’t a terrible idea to Jack. He wasn’t a specialist in the Shiveen, but he’d read enough to know that every engagement they’d had with the Panhumanic Sphere had been more defensive than offensive, no matter what the official reports concluded. When the Shiveen had been in the position to destroy Sphere ships, they’d simply left them alone and disappeared to wherever they disappeared to. It was almost as if they were allowing the Sphere a chance to pick up their dead and wounded and go home.
Perhaps the Shiveen didn’t attack New Macedon to trigger a war. Perhaps they did it to protect something important to them.
Something of great significance.
Like this ritual cave.
Whatever that mass was in the center of the room, it had importance.
“Bandura,” he typed. “Scan that mass with everything we have, as fast as you can.”
Bandura released four more drones, which began zipping and zooming around the mass in the center of the room, recording in multiple different ways.
Jack pulled up the vidcast feed in his AHUD to see what the Shiveen above them were doing as the drones and the scientists looked over the mass.
Pairs of Shiveen were now walking solemnly into the ritual room, carrying what looked to be the slumped bodies of other Shiveen. That the Shiveen being carried had no light patterns showing on their bodies.
Which meant that they were dead.
Why were the Shiveen bringing their dead into the ritual room?
15 The Ritual
Light and sound abruptly filled the well room, blinding everyone momentarily. The central mass in the room was no longer dark, but contained concentric patterns of neon lights all across and around it, pulsing in color sequences. A loud and deep throbbing thrum emanated from the mass at a frequency so low that Jack felt in his bones as it passed through him. Lights appeared on the walls, floor, and ceiling, similar in patterns to those in the ritual room above, but much brighter. There was the smell of burning ozone and a hint of several other scents that Jack couldn’t quite place.
Jack pulled down his helmet visor quickly and activated the antiglare feature, instantly bringing relief to his painful eyes. Anderson and Bandura did the same.
“What the hell?” said Jeffs, barely audible over the deep throbbing noise, which was being joined now by other frequencies and an increase in volume. He and the other scientists were trying to cover their eyes with their hands and forearms.
Jack felt the hair on his body rise.
“Everybody out! Now!” he yelled, hoping that the noise from the mass would hide his voice. He ran to the tunnel they had used to descend into the well room.
Bandura and Anderson grabbed the arms of the scientists and helped them towards the tunnel. The rising pitch and volume of the sound that was reverberating around the well room softened as soon as the threshold of the tunnel was crossed. Jack stood in the doorway, grabbing everyone and pulling them into the protection of the tunnel. All the scientists clambered to stand next to him and get a better look at what was going on.
The pitch and cadence of the thrumming changed to a rising and cresting pulse of sound, which the patterns of lights on the mass began synchronizing with, switching on and off in partnership. The well itself slowly brightened, rings of colored light rising along the well shaft, each of them equidistant from each other.
As Jack watched, the mass itself began undulating, slowly at first at the top, but with every pulse of sound and light, the undulations began deeper and lower on the mass itself. Soon the whole thing was shivering and flowing, turning from a solid to an almost jelly-like consistency as each pulse struck it.
“Amazing,” said Caroline beside Jack, her hand shielding her eyes.
Jack quickly checked the vidcast feed from the drone in the ritual room. Light burst from the well, cascading around the ritual room. The embedded lights in the room had come to life, just like those in the well room. Jack could barely hear the large Shiveen continuing its chanting, but it was still doing it. It raised its four arms and stepped back from the edge of the well. Two of the Shiveen carrying one of their dead stepped towards the well and nuzzled it towards the light.
The light of the well grabbed it and gently raised it into the air, turning and rotating it in three dimensions. The body slowly began descending in the light towards the mouth of the well and then was swallowed by it.
“Boss,” yelled Bandura, shouting over the noise. “Getting a dangerous rise in electrical charge here.”
Jack heard her, but he couldn’t pull himself away from the scene unfolding in front of him. This place was not only Shiveen, but active!
Whatever was going on needed to be repo
rted back to MilCom.
“We stay and get as much data and footage as possible,” he said.
Moments passed and then the Shiveen body that Jack had seen through the drone’s camera appeared at the base of the well itself in the well room, still tumbling in free fall as it fell slowly and inexorably into the well room. Near the well opening, the well room drone recorded its descent.
“Look!” shouted Caroline, pointing to it.
As the body got closer, the top of the mass flattened and split open, peeling open from the center, opening like a flower does to welcome the sun. The thrumming and light intensified.
From inside the mass, four enormous large clawed hands — at least twenty times the length of any Shiveen arms that Jack had ever seen — reached up beyond the top of the mass to receive the body as it approached. The claws gently took hold of it, slowly drawing it down into the mass to where Jack couldn’t see.
Jack could hardly believe what he had just witnessed. Some Shiveen was inside the well room mass — the mass that had been solid a few minutes earlier — and was very much alive! Not only that, but it was huge, based on the size of those arms! Jack doubted the effectiveness of the weapons that he and his fireteam were carrying against such a creature. Did MilCom know or even suspect that Shiveen that size existed? The largest Shiveen that Jack had read of was three meters tall and was a larger version of the standard alien bombardier.
The low thrumming and flashing lights continued, ebbing and flowing. It was strangely hypnotic. The top of the mass stayed splayed open, although the humongous arms inside it were nowhere to be seen.
The lighting flickered and a second body followed the path of the first. Again, the giant Shiveen arms reached out to collect the descending body, drawing it down into the mass. What did those massive arms belong to, and why what was it doing with the Shiveen bodies? The Shiveen left none of their dead on the field if they could. Was this why? So they could bring them to places like his and feed things like this creature? Jack shuddered.
What if the creature inside the mass detected Jack and the others waiting in the tunnels? There was safety there, unless the creature alerted the other Shiveen up in the ritual room. In that case they were trapped with nowhere to go unless Bandura’s drones found an effective way out.
Fear suddenly gripped him, along with the realization that he felt very much out of his depth. When he had signed up for military service to get away from the farm, he had expected it to be like it had been in the advertisements: glorious and wonderful not terrifying and existential. In just a few days, Jack had gone from graduate to green marine and now leader of his fireteam. He wasn’t ready for this responsibility. He wanted to hand it to Anderson or Bandura, but he knew that the responsibility was his. Even though he hadn’t got his commission yet, was trained to think and act as an officer.
He needed to think that way. Stat.
That was the only way his fireteam, and the scientists were getting home safely.
The light in the well lessened and disappeared, leaving the well dark. There was a change of tone in the thrumming in the well room, and the top of the mass began closing, moving to seal in whatever was inside the mass. The lights throughout the room — the walls, ceiling, floor, and the mass itself — slowed their pulsing patterns.
Within less than a minute, the room was dark and silent again, as it had been before.
“Amazing,” said Caroline, who was now standing next to Jack at the tunnel entrance.
“You mean terrifying.”
“Jack, I need to go into the room again. I need to examine the mass again.”
“No way, Doc. Whatever’s in that thing may still be active.”
“I don’t believe it will be. I have a theory.”
“And I have to keep you all alive.”
“It’s important. Really.”
Jack knew he would regret this.
“Okay, Doc. But you follow me in. Anderson and Bandura, if things go south, bug out using the best map the drones have provided.
“I want to go in too!” said Jeffs, starting to move forward.
Anderson restrained the scientist with a large arm. “One at a time on the ride. Safety first.”
Jack stepped tentatively back into the now-silent well room, careful to land each footstep. He told Caroline to follow him, and he walked towards the mass, his rifle drawn with the safety off. He flicked the ammo selector to explosive rounds. If anything they were probably the only ammo he had that could do any damage to that thing inside the mass, even though Jack doubted that.
Jack and Caroline crossed the room together, the light from their flashlights tracking across the floor and the mass as they went. The static electricity that had been in the room was now gone, much to Jack’s relief.
Caroline reached a hand out to touch the mass. Jack grabbed it quickly. Caroline shook her head and Jack released his grip. She touched the mass then snapped her hand back quickly. She leaned into him. “It’s freezing cold still.”
“What does that mean?”
“Whatever is in there has gone back to sleep.”
Jack looked at the mass. Asleep or not, he wanted to put as much distance between whatever that was and his fireteam.
The only problem was the way out was blocked by Shiveen.
16 The Dauntless Returns
Back in the tunnel now with the others, Jack watched the vidcast feed from the drone in the room above. The Shiveen were still in the ritual room, all of them standing with their carapaced heads bowed towards the well, their arms moving swaying in synchronization together. The drone’s microphone picked up very low chanting coming from the entire group. The lead Shiveen recited phrases that the others in the room repeating.
I’ll be damned, thought Jack. I’m glad I’m recording this.
Polite arguing had broken out between Caroline and Jeffs about what had just happened. If you give a scientist a problem to solve they forget to be afraid. Jack wished it was that easy for everyone else, himself included.
“We need to get a sample,” said Jeffs. “It needs studied.”
“I agree,” said Caroline. “But now is not the time to get it. Once we’re safe, perhaps we can come back later, with the help and support of the military.”
“The military. Pah! They’ll want to keep it for themselves and weaponize it.”
Jack wanted to point out that whatever was in that mass was already weaponized. Except for heavy mechs or mobile assault platforms, there wasn’t much that the Sphere could throw at it to do any damage to it if it came out to play topside. It was a good thing that it was too large to make it up the well. Was there another way for it to exit or was it trapped in here?
This couldn’t be the only cave harboring something like this, could it? There had to be more of them, even if they weren’t any extra on this planet itself. Just how many planets did the Shiveen control and what other forces could they muster?
Did the Sphere know that places like this existed? If they didn’t, they needed to.
The parameters of the situation had shifted.
Survival of the data was more important now than survival of the fireteam and the scientists.
The Dauntless slipped back into realspace right in the middle of a group of three Shiveen heavy cruisers at the planet’s secondary jump point. As it did, it instantly began rotating on its central axis counter-clockwise and powered up its mass drivers. It main engines were on standby, and it hung stationary in space.
“Captain,” said Commander Nambo, looking at the colorful tactical holographic display muted by the dull red combat lighting in the CIC. “We have three targets within our firing arc. It looks as though there are several other Shiveen cruisers in planetary orbit too. More than were here before.”
“Well, Mister Nambo,” grinned Laroux. “They’re all in for a big surprise.”
At the tactical holographic desk, Laroux zoomed around the map that the ships sensors had created, identifying and marking every
Shiveen ship in local space, including cruisers, starfighers, and the huge warship sitting at the other jump point the Dauntless hadn’t used to return to Pallas IV. The Shiveen had called in the heavy guns it seemed. Laroux tapped each of the Shiveen icons in the holographic display, tagging them as enemy combatants. Their icons changed color to a vibrant neon green.
“Tactical, get a firing solution underway while we deal with these ships here. We need to clear the floor.”
One of the Shiveen cruisers was already turning towards the Dauntless, just at the dreadnought itself moved to point itself to the broadside of one of the other cruisers.
“Mass drivers, ready, Captain,” said Nambo.
Laroux pointed on the tactical map to Shiveen cruiser dead ahead of the Dauntless.
“That one, Mister Nambo,” said Laroux. “Let’s take it out.”
“Aye, sir,” said the first officer. “Open fire!”
The mass drivers whined as they prepared to fire and then three large shots flashed out of the front of the dreadnought, streaking towards the enemy ship. Too slow to react and turn out of the path of the shots, the Shiveen cruiser endured an all-out triple strike against its starboard side. Two of the shots ripped straight through the alien vessel, while the last impacted in the center of its mass, right where its main engine could be.
“Helm — turn, turn, turn!” shouted Nambo. The helm officer began turning the Dauntless, whipping it around on its axes to point its fore towards another cruiser.
“Incoming!” shouted the sensor operator. On the holographic display Laroux watched several dots being tracked from the Shiveen cruiser that had been rotating towards the Dauntless. “Point defense batteries are online.”
There was a shuddering from the port side of the dreadnought as multiple point defense cannons began firing chaff rounds towards the incoming Shiveen missiles. Several of the chaff rounds caught the missiles, which showed up in Laroux’s hologram as blooms of pixels that expanded in a sphere before disappearing from the display.
Emancipation Page 14
