Colony

by Benjamin Cross

  Through his new delirium Koikov could feel a crushing pain in his chest. Perhaps it was the heart attack that would put him out of his misery. But as the cave swam back into focus, he could see that it was the creature’s hind foot stamped across his sternum. It was pinning him, helpless, onto his back; just as it had pinned Sharova as he and Yudina had watched on in stunned disbelief, unable to fire off a single shot before it was too late. It reared its head once again, this time opening its beak-like mouth to display its teeth.

  This is it, Koikov thought. My turn.

  He held his breath.

  As the creature brought its head back down, there was a loud bang and its bottom jaw exploded. It crowed out in surprise. Another bang sounded, and this time a large chunk of its neck disintegrated, throwing a shower of vermillion droplets up into the air and across Koikov’s face. The intermittent bangs then became a frenzy of rattling as the creature appeared to self-destruct before him.

  It staggered backwards. The feathers covering its body seemed to shimmer from white to black and back again, over and over. Its legs and torso were now riddled with holes oozing blood, and the eye that had stared so hard at Koikov had disappeared back into its skull.

  With a final screech, it slumped down onto the floor, hammering its tail at the rock.

  Koikov pulled himself to his feet, still disoriented, and felt hands reach out to steady him.

  “Are you okay, Starshyna?” It was Marchenko.

  “I’m fine,” Koikov replied, “but Private Yudina—”

  “He’s dead,” a different voice called out.

  Koikov looked over to see two medics and Lungkaju knelt down beside Yudina’s body. Yudina was on his back now, his face pale. His eyes closed.

  “I am sorry,” the older of the two medics said, “but there is nothing anybody can do for him.”

  “Starshyna Koikov, we are all in great danger,” Lungkaju said, rising to his feet. Trails of smoke spiralled from the barrels of the shotgun in his hands. “We should leave now.”

  “We’ll leave when I say we leave!” Koikov bellowed.

  “No, he’s right,” Marchenko said. “I don’t know how many more of those things there are in here and I’m fucked if we’re hanging around to find out!”

  “Look, Marchenko—”

  A loud screech emanated from deep within the cave. It was followed by another, then by several more in quick succession, until the interior of the cave was alive with screeches and other terrifying echoes.

  Koikov snatched up his rifle. “Okay, everybody back to the Kamov now!”

  As the team obeyed his order and fled, he unloaded a final magazine towards the back of the cave, then turned and raced after them.

  Chapter 7

  Sea Centaur

  1

  Callum awoke to find himself alone in the shelter. He checked his watch. It was mid-morning. Christ! By now Lungkaju would know that he was missing and may well have raised the alarm. If he had then Volkov would know that he had disobeyed the safety regs and that meant that he was in deep shit. If the guy was as bad as Darya suggested, he might even be kicked off the project. Then what about the ice mummy?

  The potential seriousness of the situation dawned suddenly, and he dropped his head into his hands. “Why do I drink that stuff?”

  Jonas. Jonas is dead, that’s why! And then Darya had set out to distract him, and man alive had she done a good job! So where the hell was she now?

  He crawled out of the hide and scanned around. The air was still and the temperature just above freezing. The mist had cleared and he could see the ledge on which the seal hide stood. It was nestled along the face of a low cliff overlooking the cove. From here he could make out the up-ended canoe, part-way up the beach. The view inland was blocked by the rising relief, but it was unbroken along the coast to the south and beyond to the Albanov. Suddenly the ship looked a hell of a long way away.

  “Callum!”

  He spun around.

  Darya looked weary and dishevelled, and there was an odd look on her face, somewhere between excitement and fear. “You must come and see this!” She grabbed him by the hand and went to take off again, but he pulled her back.

  “Are you crazy? We need to get back to the ship or they’ll be sending out a search party. We’ll be off the project.”

  Smiling, she squeezed his hand and replied, “Relax. We will go back to the ship and everything will be fine, but first you must see this. Trust me, you will not believe!”

  Ten minutes later, they were standing on top of a headland, looking north towards the heights of Svayataya in the distance. Callum recognised the beach immediately below the promontory. It was where they had landed the night before; there in the far corner was the polar bear carcass, unchanged from when he’d seen it last.

  Darya crouched behind a rock and pulled him down beside her.

  “What exactly am I looking at?”

  “Just wait, you will see.”

  Callum settled onto his stomach and watched. They passed a few minutes in silence before he said, “About last night—”

  “Yes, it was very good,” she replied, pecking him on the cheek, “but look.”

  His eyes wandered back towards the carcass. Its pose looked about as undignified as possible, splayed out on its back with its neck twisted around and one forearm draped across its chest. It looked drunk rather than dead. But today there was no riot of gulls fighting to get their beaks into it. Instead it lay eerily still and undisturbed and… Callum removed his sunglasses and blinked.

  Its paw had moved. He looked across at Darya. She was watching intently through her binoculars, wearing the same bemused smile. As he squinted back down, the paw seemed to move again. He was about to speak when he felt the binoculars tap against his cheek. He took them and looked back. No sooner had he refocussed than something appeared out of the bear’s armpit. It was a head, small and white, with an elongated snout and two large eyes. It was like no creature he had ever seen before. “What is it?”

  She shrugged. “I have been watching them for the last hour and I am starting to think that nobody would know.”

  The creature emerged fully from the carcass. It stood for a moment, perched on the side of the bear’s arm, a chunk of meat in its mouth. Then it bounded with great agility down onto the shingle, followed by another two identical animals. With the bear for scale, they only appeared to be half a metre or so in height, and their white coats were murky with dried blood.

  “They look like birds,” Callum said. “Ugly ones.”

  “This is what I thought,” Darya replied. “They are bipedal, two-legged, like birds. Their coats look more like feathers, though I cannot be sure of this from so far away, and their snouts are long like beaks, but…” She hesitated. “I do not think that they are birds. They do not behave like birds.”

  “And they have no wings,” Callum added. “They have little forearms.”

  “And the tail is actual tail and not just feathers.”

  “You think this might be a new species?”

  “I think yes,” she answered. “This might be true.”

  They watched as the little creatures leapt in and out of the hole that they had burrowed into the carcass, squabbling over morsels of flesh. Then one of them froze suddenly and sniffed at the air. Its body was held parallel to the ground, its neck and its tail both long and outstretched, its forearms bent at the elbows beneath its chest. It bobbed its head as it strutted a few paces on its muscular hind legs.

  “We must get closer,” Darya said suddenly, setting off back towards the hide.

  Callum went to argue, then closed his mouth and followed after her.

  2

  “We must be very quiet now,” Darya whispered, as the canoe approached the far end of the cove. “I do not want to scare them away or I will maybe not see them again.”r />
  Callum dug his paddle in and brought them to a stop twenty metres or so from shore. The current was weaker than it had been the day before, and he was able to keep the craft still while Darya attached a telephoto lens to her camera and began taking shots.

  Almost immediately, one of the creatures noticed them and scampered to the water’s edge to inspect. It was quickly joined by the others, and the three stood shoulder to shoulder, staring out towards the canoe.

  “I don’t think there’s much danger of them running away,” Callum said.

  “No, they seem to be very interested in us. It could be because they have never seen human beings before.”

  “Shouldn’t they be scared?”

  “Sometimes it is the other way. Some new species are completely unafraid of humans, because they had never seen one. Their ecosystem is isolated.”

  Callum nodded back towards the shore. “Do you think I should try and get closer?”

  “Yes, but not too close… and still be gentle.”

  He raised his paddle and manoeuvred them forward another few metres.

  The creatures remained as they were, silent, their eyes fixed on the canoe’s every movement. From this distance, it was clear that their coats were feathered. The hind feet were taloned, and the slender fore-fingers were tipped with claws.

  “Do you recognise them now?”

  “No,” Darya replied. “At first I think that they were rodents of some kind, but I can see now that they are very different.”

  Callum noted the streaks of dried blood on their chest plumage. “Whatever they are, they’re carnivorous.”

  “This could be island adaptation,” she replied, continuing to photograph.

  “Island adaptation?”

  “Because they are isolated population they may have developed different to the parent group because of very different environment.

  “Like the woolly mammoth on Wrangel Island,” Callum said. “They grew to be much smaller than the mainland group because of the limited food supply.”

  “This is true, and Franz Josef Land is maybe similar situation. Remote island with limited terrestrial food supply.”

  Time ticked over as they continued to observe. The creatures’ eyes were enormous, disproportionate against their tiny cocked heads. Their expressions made Callum uncomfortable; it was as if they were seeing something he wasn’t.

  The creature on the right broke its vigil suddenly and turned its head. In an instant it had launched forward and latched on to the side of its neighbour’s neck, causing it to squeal out. Now the third creature turned and joined in, grabbing onto the victim’s tail. The two attackers began a tug of war, before their prey struggled free and pounced on the original attacker, pinning it to the floor with its hind legs. Again the third creature joined in, barging indiscriminately into the scuffle and causing the others to leap to their feet and scatter. Moments later, having seemingly expended their burst of energy, the three were back shoulder to shoulder, peering across at Callum.

  There was something strange about this behaviour. It was boisterous and naïve. “Could they be youngsters?” Callum asked.

  Darya stopped photographing and turned to him. “You are very observant,” she said. “I cannot be certain, but yes, this is not typical adult behaviour. They act like juveniles.”

  Callum watched her raise the camera once again. But before she had taken any more photographs, she relowered it, a look of confusion spreading across her face.

  “What is it?”

  “Look at the water.”

  Several metres ahead of them, the surface had begun to foam.

  “It is a shoal of fish,” she said.

  “What are they doing?”

  She made no reply, watching as the shoal formed a frenzied arc around the prow.

  “They are panicking,” she said at last. “Something has scared them.”

  The words had barely left her lips when a large shadow darted through the centre of the shoal, causing it to splinter.

  “What was that?”

  She shook her head. “The narwhal would not come this close to shore.”

  “Then what?”

  “I do not know,” she replied. “It could be seals, but I do not like it. Something is wrong.”

  There was a sudden crash and the canoe rocked as something collided with the underside. Darya screamed, and they both grabbed tightly on to the gunwales. Gradually, the craft shook itself steady and the water stilled.

  Callum peered over into the calm grey-blue. The panicking fish had disappeared. All movement had stopped. Even the strands of kelp stood still and erect, barely rustling in the gentle current.

  His gaze came to rest on something only an inch or so below the surface. He couldn’t make it out. It was dark and circular and…

  …then it blinked.

  3

  The massive eye blinked again then disappeared into the shadows.

  Callum jerked his head back from the edge just as a mouthful of teeth exploded up out of the water. He toppled backwards into the body of the canoe. When he opened his eyes, he was looking up across Darya’s face towards the sky. Both were pale. Darya was screaming out in terror, and he followed her gaze towards the stern.

  Beside the aft seat, three clawed fingers were clamped over the side of the canoe like a grappling hook. They were followed by three more, and then by the unmistakable face of one of the creatures. It threw its head backwards and swallowed down the writhing fish that was speared onto its front teeth.

  This was no juvenile. The snout was weathered and scarred. The eyes were ten times larger than those of the scrappers on the beach, and the grey-blue feathers along the back of the neck were thick and full. There was no mistaking that this thing, whatever it was, was a fully grown adult.

  Callum grabbed the paddle and rammed it as hard as he could into the creature’s face. It screeched out as the wood splintered against its skull. Straight away Darya brought the other paddle down onto the back of its head, leaving it stunned, and Callum wasted no time landing a final blow to the side of its neck, sending it crashing backwards.

  “Start the motor up!” he yelled.

  Darya pushed past him, slung the outboard propeller over the stern and tore at the pull-cord. The engine spluttered then lapsed back into silence. She tugged at it again. This time the splutter was replaced by a low metallic whine.

  “Let me,” he said, taking the handle and yanking it as hard as he could. Nothing. He tried again and again. But it was no use.

  “Seawater must have mixed with the fuel,” Darya said.

  At that moment there was another crash and they were both thrown onto their backs.

  “Watch out!” Callum pulled Darya’s head out of the way just as a clawed foot shot over the side of the canoe and smashed into the inside of the prow. A sabre-like claw arced down and punctured deep into the timber, then the leg retracted and whipped over the gunwale a second time. The heel crashed down in between their heads. Callum watched as the calf tendon contracted and fired the toe claw down into the timber once again. This time it did not retract but remained lodged only inches from his face. He fumbled for what remained of the oar and speared it into the foot muscle. There was a loud screech and the leg disappeared once more.

  Callum and Darya lay still.

  “What the hell is that thing?” Callum whispered, barely daring to make a sound.

  “I do not know, but it does not want us here.”

  “You can say that again.”

  Callum began climbing to his feet.

  She grasped at his elbow. “What are you doing?”

  “I’ve got to try and start the engine. We’re sitting ducks.”

  “Yes, but be careful!”

  On his knees, Callum cast a glance around the canoe. The water was calm. Nothing stared
up at him from below the surface. He got to his feet and approached the motor. His face was soaked in sweat. At any moment that thing could reappear, burst up out of the water and into the canoe.

  He reached out and grasped the pull-cord toggle. “Please, for the love of God, please work,” he whispered to himself. Then he yanked at the cord. The engine spluttered. He tried it again, then again. “Come on, you rusty piece of shit!”

  Finally, the splutter deepened into a roar as the engine fired up.

  “Now get us out of here!” Darya shouted.

  Callum turned the craft around and steered it south towards the Albanov.

  “Here, let me,” she said, taking the rudder control back from him.

  As the canoe accelerated, Callum scanned the shoreline. The little creatures were still there. They were no longer still. Instead they appeared to be jumping up and down in agitation. As he looked on, something else, much closer, caught his eye.

  “Oh, shit!”

  “What is it?”

  He pointed behind her. Below the surface of the water, two dark shadows were following in the wake of the canoe.

  “Can this thing go any faster?”

  The two shadows coursed through the water. Propelled by their muscular tails, they burst forward, criss-crossing each other’s paths and easily outpacing the canoe.

  “They’re closing!” Callum shouted.

  “We are going top speed!” Darya yelled back. “It is not meant to be racing boat!”

  Searching desperately around, he grabbed her survival rucksack and spilt the contents out onto the deck. “There must be something…” He kicked her emergency tent out of the way and scooped up the bolt gun and a handful of bolts, before noticing the emergency flares. He stuffed the bolt gun into his pocket and snatched up a flare from the bundle. He held it at arm’s length, removed the safety guard and smashed his palm up into the base. It fizzed and spewed out a gust of smoke, but the charge failed to ignite.