by Michael Todd
They reached the site of their old camp, and aside from some displaced moss patterns, Sal couldn’t even tell that they’d been there at all.
He looked around and turned to Cortez, who grinned.
“Okay,” Sal growled. “Cortez Irwin, do you remember where it was that Lynch gunned the big insect down?”
“Cortez Irwin.” He grinned. “I like that. This way. My first name’s Jorge, though,” he said, pronouncing the ‘J’ and ‘G’ with an ‘H.’
“Jorge?” Sal raised an eyebrow. “Jorge Cortez? First generation American?”
Cortez nodded. “My folks were asylum seekers from El Salvador. They got citizenship in the nineties. I joined the army for the GI Bill, but I didn’t really want to walk away. Then I got assigned to this hellhole. Well, I complain, but I make more money here, plus my special forces’ salary. I’ll go home with a tidy little sum waiting for me in my bank account.”
“What happens if the worst happens?” Sal asked, only realizing how uncomfortably blunt that question had been a few seconds after he’d blurted it out. “Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that. Well, I…”
Cortez chuckled. “Don’t worry. It’s something that crosses everyone’s mind eventually, and it crossed my mind a long time before I ever got to the Zoo. I have a will that leaves all my earnings to my family. I don’t have a wife, but I’m sure my mom will know what to do with the cash.”
Sal nodded. “If I make it out of here alive this time, please remind me to make a will before I go back in.”
Cortez chuckled. “You got it, bro. On another topic, how does a fellow Latino end up with a name like Salinger Jacobs?”
“My mom is from Mexico and moved over legally. She met my dad when she was already in Cali. He played music in bars to pay for his business degree and was a huge fan of J. D. Salinger from Catcher in the Rye. Madre got in a middle name before my dad slapped me with his last name and they got married. My full name is Salinger Alfonso Jacobs.”
“Holy shit.” Cortez laughed. “What would you have done if you weren’t a genius biologist?”
“Porn actor,” Sal said without a pause, and Cortez laughed again and came to a stop.
“Back on track.” He looked around. “I’d say that this is where Lynch took that bug out. I’d bet on it.”
“Then where is it?” Sal asked. It had been dark, so he hadn’t made out any landmarks. All the trees, despite their uniqueness, looked annoyingly the same. He scowled. “There should be at least some blood stains. Viscera, even if some other critter ate it. Nothing’s that thorough.”
“Nothing we know about, anyways,” Cortez responded. “But this is it. Twenty paces southwest from our original campsite. I’m sure of it.”
Sal scowled. Why hadn’t he thought about counting the paces from the camp? Or made a note of the direction? Well, he’d been in a pants-soaking kind of terror, so there was that. He’d get used to it and start to mark stuff like this out in his head.
“Well, I hope you got enough samples the first time around,” Cortez finally said after they searched the area in case he’d misjudged the direction. Even if he had, there still was nothing left of the beastie. “Because it doesn’t look like you’ll get any others. Not unless we run into more of them and Lynch gets all trigger happy again.”
Sal turned. “How long has Lynch done this? Does he seem a bit—”
“Like he enjoys this a little too much?” Cortez finished for him. “Yeah, I worked with him before he came here. He’s not actually military anymore. He was in the SAS before he was kicked out for dishonorable behavior unbefitting a member of her Majesty’s special forces or something like that. Yeah, no, he’s one of those third-party consultants that I mentioned.”
Sal sighed. “Look, I know I’m new at this, and I still haven’t experienced the actual ugly parts of this job. Maybe I don’t have the full picture and maybe I overreacted last night, and I don’t want you guys to think I’m one of those people—”
Cortez cut him off. “Look, bro… Yeah, you’re green, but nobody will judge you for how you acted last night. Well, maybe Lynch will, but I don’t give a shit what that guy thinks. You care about stuff. That’s not a bad thing. Maybe your perspective will change after a couple of days in the Zoo, but for now, reacting to seeing something like that isn’t a bad thing. It’s life, man.”
Sal nodded. “Thanks. I appreciate it.”
“No problem. Now, I do think that we should get back to camp before Kennedy has a freak-out and guns down the foliage to look for us.”
He took a moment at the original campsite on their way back to collect another shot of the vine growth he’d noticed the day before. There was no apparent difference, but most changes would be invisible to the naked eye anyway. He wouldn’t think about it until he could have a proper look and make a real comparison between the first and the second shot.
As they headed back, they could see the camp was almost packed up with the shelters already down. Addams collected the perimeter sensors, and Lynch looked hungover. A light sheen of sweat coated his face as he ate something that looked like beef jerky.
“You okay, Lynch?” Sal asked.
“Why the fuck do you care?” the man snapped irritably.
“You look a little under the weather, is all,” Sal said and backed off quickly, but Lynch pushed to his feet and tucked his helmet under his arm.
“No, you asked. I feel like shit, egghead, since you have to know.” He sounded more annoyed as he moved closer to Sal, who instinctively backed away. “How are you feeling?”
“Uncomfortable,” Sal said, but before the man could get any closer, Cortez stepped between the two of them and faced Lynch.
“Hey, chill the fuck out,” Jorge growled. Lynch tried to push past, but the other man stood his ground firmly.
“I’m sorry, did I offend your sensibilities, Cortez?” Lynch asked. “I’m not allowed to have a bad day? We all had a rough night, what with having to move camp because little bitch over there has a bleeding heart for all the precious creatures in the Zoo.”
“He’s not the reason we had to move camp, Lynch, and you know that,” Cortez countered sharply and intercepted another attempt to move past him. “You and your itchy trigger finger is the reason why none of us got a full night’s sleep last night, so of all people, you don’t get to complain about it.”
“I’ll complain about whatever God damn thing I please.” Lynch looked angry and ready to throw punches before Kennedy stepped in.
“All of you shut the fuck up,” she snarled, gripped both men by the shoulders, and dragged them apart a few seconds before the violence started. When Lynch attempted to push past her, she stopped him by using the steel arm of her suit to shove him back a few steps. “Don’t you think we have enough problems? We have enough things trying to kill us without adding each other to the mix.”
Sal stood there, his eyes wide, and his fingers gripped the scalpel inside his collection satchel. It probably wouldn’t do much against Lynch’s armor, but at this point, it was better to be safe than to be sorry. He gritted his teeth and his body tensed as he watched the exchange, almost able to taste the testosterone in the air. Addams had collected the sensors and looked on with an amused expression.
Finally, both Cortez and Lynch cooled off, and the latter pushed Kennedy’s arm away from his chest.
“Look,” he growled, “I’m here for money, same as everyone else.” He pointed at Sal, who tried his best not to blanch. “But if that specialist has a heart-throb for each critter we run across, he might stop us from shooting the ones that’ll kill us in a heartbeat. You know that. And should that time come, it won’t be his fault or mine. It’ll be yours.” He pointed at Kennedy now, and she sneered at him.
Lynch yanked his helmet on and tapped it with his metal fingers. “Food for thought, egghead. Just because you love you some nature don’t mean that nature loves you back.”
Sal shook his head, picked up the pack with his ongoin
g experiments, and slung it over his back. He activated the HUD. Kennedy shrugged. She still looking disgusted but seemed willing to move past it.
“Let’s get moving, ladies,” she commanded, grabbed her pack, and connected it to her suit before strapping her rifle to the metal arm. “We have a lot of ground to make up.”
The group nodded, and they moved deeper into the Zoo.
Fifteen minutes in, Kennedy fell back from the vanguard to talk with Sal. “When you got to the dead critter, what did you find? Did you see anything left behind?”
Sal shook his head. “Not even the bloodstains from Lynch’s shot.”
She nodded. “Yeah. That’s happened before when we kill the critters. We turn our backs, and when we look again there’s nothing left. No blood, no bones, and no organs. Not even the bullets we used to kill them. Every specialist we’ve had with us has had theories about what happens, but nothing conclusive. Do you think you could keep your eyes open? I’m not sure you’ll actually find anything, but if you do, make sure to report it.”
Sal tilted his head and narrowed his eyes. “I think I can do that.”
She winked. “I appreciate it. It’s not really important, at least not compared to the three objectives of our mission, but it’s still something of an unanswered question that nags at me. Keep it on the QT. Thanks, Jacobs.”
“Will do, Sarge,” Sal said with a confused expression as he looked quickly through the database. There was no mention of what happened to the bodies after they were killed, and certainly, nothing about them disappearing. He made a mental note to ask someone about that when they got back.
If they got back.
Chapter Eleven
Sal knelt beside a creeping vine that spread over the jungle floor rather than climbing up the trees. In fact, it seemed determined to avoid any and all trees. A quick tug indicated that each of the pearl-white flower stems was rooted into the ground like it was an individual plant, even though they all were connected by an intricate vine system.
Sal was thorough and collected samples of the flowers, the stems, and the leaves for later analysis. They’d encountered a few of these that were either flora that branched off from a known species already documented or an entirely new kind altogether. It was fascinating work.
Unfortunately, the rest of the squad didn’t think so.
The sun hung directly above them and beamed nearly equatorial heat even through the leaves. It made each member miserable, especially through the suits. Sal could feel the sweat trickle down his back and between his shoulder blades to make his entire body itch.
But this location, above all others, was the one in which they needed to keep an eye open, Kennedy told him. They inched toward the center of the Zoo close to ground zero, and this was where the more dangerous animals were found.
“Wouldn’t the most dangerous animals live near the center?” he had asked as they continued their almost non-stop hike. “I mean, that’s where the critters at the top of the food chain would live, right?”
“Right,” Kennedy had answered. “Those guys are dangerous enough, but they aren’t too aggressive. They have as much food as they need and unless we come near their offspring or step too close to their nests or dens than they’d prefer, they’ll leave us alone. But the beasties living in the outskirts are a lot more desperate for food. They prowl around during the daytime, even though they might be nocturnal since they don’t have as much to choose from as the larger, more dominant species.”
He supposed that made sense. Hyenas were, to an extent, almost more dangerous than lions out in the savannas since they lived off the scraps left for them by the larger, more dominant predators.
Even so, he’d rather run into a pack of hungry hyenas than a pride of hungry lions. The former was easier to chase off. The latter were patient and more than willing to wait them out. They would allow their prey to relax and pounce at the first sign of weakness.
But he understood the point. There were certain rules regarding hunting in the wild, and the more desperate the animal was for sustenance, the less likely they were to abide by those rules.
Humans liked to think of themselves as above all that, but strip away the layers of civilization, and one would find all the same characteristics made up to look like morality and acceptable behavior.
It didn’t take a genius to see what was simply common sense.
Sal examined the plants and ran a few quick visual tests on the specimens he collected—pliability, liquid content, et cetera—and made sure not to spill a single drop before he vacuum-sealed them and added them to their specimens.
“Come on, Jacobs,” Addams said impatiently. “We don’t want to stick around any place for too long.”
He’d noticed that his squad grew more and more antsy. This was their second day in the Zoo, and he assumed that they were anxious to find the Pita flowers to get paid. While Davis had said that collecting specimens was also a priority, he began to see that it rated low on the list.
Sal nodded. “We haven’t been here for longer than five minutes. I’m simply collecting data so that we have less to do later.”
“You mean you have less to do later,” Lynch growled, and an uncomfortable silence ensued as Sal sealed his specimens in his bag and stood. He straightened his suit without looking at the other man. They still blamed Lynch for the troubles they’d faced the night before, and everyone was a little on edge around him after his display of anger in the morning.
“Yeah,” Sal agreed quietly, “so that I have less to do later. Sorry, I’ll try to keep my stops to a minimum for the rest of the trip.”
Lynch shook his head. He’d apparently expected to have another chance to teach Sal a lesson in manners, but the scientist had handled people like Lynch his whole life—bullies who excelled at manipulating events to make it seem like they had simply defended themselves. They were the most dangerous, the ones who knew that they were terrible people and didn’t care. Sal had learned sometime in the third grade that the only way to beat them was not to play their game. Avoid them, pull away, and never give them the opportunity to come at him. He’d come dangerously close that morning, but he wouldn’t do it again.
Kennedy smirked and checked her rifle. “Well, if we keep jawing around here, we might as well let the specialist work in peace, right, boys?” Addams and Cortez chuckled, but Lynch didn’t look amused. He shouldered his pack and moved forward, grumbling all the way.
The sergeant let Cortez take the vanguard as she dropped back to talk to Sal. “If you have any more trouble with Lynch, you let me know, okay?” she said after establishing a private line between them. “I don’t want there to be any trouble in my squad.”
Sal nodded. “Agreed. But I can handle Lynch.”
“No,” she responded implacably, “there’ll be no handling. If there are any more squabbles, I will sit the two of you down tonight for a nice long chat about the comradery shared by people with a common enemy in the field. Do we have an understanding here?”
Sal nodded. “Understood, Sarge.”
“Good.”
“So, Sarge,” he said before she could disconnect, “I can’t help but notice that we have a limited supply of water. A couple of canteens should last us another day, but after that, I don’t think we’ll have enough to go any deeper without having to think about it.”
“Don’t worry about it, rookie,” she said with a chuckle. “Well, worry a little. Our suits are equipped with a water recycling system. All your sweat and piss is processed, cleaned, and filtered. It’s still a worst-case scenario, but running only with the suits, folk have lasted at least a week. Maybe more, depending.”
“So, when you say worry about it a little…” Sal asked.
“Well, the filtering system is good, but I’m afraid that nothing mobile and small enough to fit into these suits will ever be that good for as long as we are alive.”
“Oh,” Sal pulled a horrified face. “That’s mildly disgusting.”
&n
bsp; She laughed. “You should see what the guys who end up out here for longer than a week have to do. When it comes to staying alive, disgust is very relative.”
“I really don’t think I should see,” Sal said and shook his head. He could imagine, though. Even though there were certain standards that he thought he could hold himself to, he had never been in a position where he was literally dying of hunger or thirst. Sure, he’d complained about the crappy cheap food back in Cali, but he’d never actually had nothing to eat at all.
For people who were out of regular options, creativity was generally rewarded with survival, like it had been for those rugby players stuck in the Andes in that movie. He’d seen that it was based on a true story, but he’d never thought it was likely to happen in a civilized world.
He narrowed his eyes. “Wait…wait. All these trees and plants and even animals need water to live. I don’t care what this goop is, it can’t make living things able to live without it. So, unless they take from a source that we can’t like tree sap, we should probably be able to find a water source.”
“You really don’t want to drink recycled water, do you?” she asked with a grin.
“I really, really don’t,” Sal agreed, “but that’s not the point. Finding sources of water would be a good idea since it would reduce the carrying load of all future missions into the Zoo. They won’t need to carry sufficient water for days.”
Kennedy looked thoughtful. “That’s a good point. We’ll look into it later, but for now, we’ve fallen behind. Let’s pick up the pace.”
Sal nodded, but he studied the trees. The larger ones would have roots deep enough to reach reservoirs of water situated underground, and the vines would leech water from those trees. But none had started as massive trees with deep-reaching roots and, considering that it probably wouldn’t rain regularly for at least another decade, there had to be some source of sustenance for the smaller, weaker, and younger plants out there.
