Prey

by Jon F. Merz

Julia noticed something out of the corner of her eye. Another doorway.

  Close.

  "Mick."

  "Yeah. I see it."

  "You think?"

  "Not unless we're both extremely lucky."

  "You don't feel lucky?"

  "The way things are going? Not likely."

  "I guess not."

  He looked at her. "I never got the chance to tell you why I came on this mission."

  "Now's not the time."

  He smirked. "It might just be now or never. I want you to know I didn't want to lie to you. But these things killed every member of my old unit. I had to come on this trip, don't you see? I had to get them if I could. For my brothers-in-arms."

  Julia looked at him. "We're both going home, Mick."

  He shook his head. "I can hold them off while you make for the door."

  "Are you crazy? They'll shoot you!"

  He smiled. "Maybe."

  "I don't like this idea."

  "I won't let them do those things to you, Julia. Give me the laser rifle and let me do this."

  She looked at him. The determination in his eyes told her he wasn't going to argue anymore. She sighed. "I'll come back for you."

  "Go to the cache." Mick smiled. "There are some things there that might help you. The code is 6-4-1-9."

  "We should have brought more with us."

  Mick shook his head. "They would have taken everything and we'd be screwed worse than we are now. I knew Kendall was a tricky prick, but I never would have figured him for this." he eyed her. "Remember the code?"

  "I got it." Julia handed him her laser rifle. "Be careful."

  He nodded. "Once I start shooting, you'll have maybe two seconds before they can squeeze anything off. You've got to be that quick."

  "Okay."

  "You ready?"

  "Not yet."

  "Wha-?"

  Julia leaned forward and kissed him on the lips. Hard. She tasted him one last time and then pulled away, as much as she dearly did not want to. "Don't die on me, Mick. Not yet. Not ever."

  He stared at her and then brought the gun up into his shoulder. "You ready now?"

  "Yeah."

  "On three."

  She closed her eyes, took a deep breath and opened them again.

  "One," said Mick.

  Julia focused on the doorway.

  "Two."

  She could see the release button.

  "THREE!"

  She ran.

  Like she never had before.

  And hell opened up all around her.

  Chapter Thirty

  The gunfire and screeching suddenly stopped when Julia made it through the door. She took a deep breath and then realized where she was.

  Back in the jungle.

  She spotted a backpack and looked inside. Winter clothing. But whose? It didn’t matter. If Julia was going to head outside, she’d need it. She slung it over her shoulder and then surveyed the area.

  The dirt path led away from the cool metallic door in a winding fashion. She studied the ground and could see numerous tracks in the dirt. But she found it difficult to determine if there were human tracks or more of the dinocreatures.

  One set of tracks stood out from all the others, however. And that set looked like claws.

  She stood. Claws?

  She turned around.

  Was it better back inside? Was it better to be back there instead of out here in the jungle with God knew what?

  No.

  Mick was still inside. Nung was, too.

  And that bastard Kendall.

  She had to get out of here and head for the cache like Mick had told her. She had to get into the cache and find some more supplies she could use to come back here and rescue them.

  She heard something low and gravelly somewhere off to her left.

  Julia ducked under a nearby shrub, worming her way into the center of the mass and praying silently for whatever had produced that noise to go about its business in a direction far from where Julia sat.

  She waited.

  Was it moving closer to her? She closed her eyes and willed it to move further away, whatever it was. She didn't need an encounter with a dinosaur right now. She needed to get the hell out of there.

  Silence swept over the jungle. A balmy breeze blew in from her right side, making the leaves rustle against each other. Julia could easily imagine herself in some beautiful tropical resort sipping a fruity drink with a big umbrella poking out of it.

  But she wasn't there. She was down at the bottom of the world.

  And most of the people she'd been charged with leading were not going home from this trip.

  That fact smacked her hard across the face.

  Damn.

  But if she dawdled too much longer in the jungle, none of them would go home alive.

  She had to move.

  Julia poked her head out from the bush and looked around.

  She couldn't hear anything. Maybe the creature had vanished. Maybe it had gone someplace else.

  Maybe it was a plant eater.

  She hoped.

  She got out onto the trail and started walking down it. She didn't want to have to stick to the well-traveled path, but she didn't know her way back to the entrance of the tunnel if she bushwhacked her way there. Plus, there was a chance she'd make too much noise. At least if she stayed on the trail, she could stay reasonably quiet.

  Another breeze blew in. It smelled moldy. The way a trash can starts to stink in the hot humid air of summer. Julia blanched and kept moving ahead. One foot in front of the other.

  That was all she'd need to do.

  She kept looking back over her shoulder every few steps. She felt completely vulnerable without her rifle. The pistol she gripped in her hand felt so tiny.

  Ineffective.

  She wondered if she could even take out one of the dinocreatures with it, if she needed to.

  Maybe. Maybe not.

  The path curved again and she kept moving. She was sweating profusely. Her shirt stuck to her cracks and crevices, making it feel like she had another skin welded on to hers.

  It wasn't a pleasant feeling.

  She was actually looking forward to getting back into the tunnel and then back out in the snow and the ice. At least she'd be cooler.

  What had happened to Nung, she wanted to know. And what would happen to Mick? Despite what Kendall had said, Mick didn't have to do what he'd just done back there. He didn't have to sacrifice himself so Julia could escape. He didn't have to do any of it.

  Did that make the fact that he'd lied about his past acceptable?

  Julia thought it just might.

  Of course, unless she was successful at getting to the cache and coming back here to rescue them all, the argument would be over before it got started. No, the time for discussing Mick's relationship with the truth would come later.

  She wound her way down the path. Her lips were dry and she licked them, feeling the saliva go sticky and then evaporate quickly thereafter. Had the climate changed? It seemed truly hot now.

  She staggered a bit in the haze. It was almost as if she could see the moisture in the plants evaporating right out of their leaves and stems - a shimmering through which she walked.

  Her head hurt.

  She needed a drink of water.

  She would have broken the survival rules and eaten snow right then if she could have only gotten her hands on some.

  Her feet felt like hundred pound weights. She dragged them now as she struggled to get further down the trail.

  The air felt like she was pushing through a thick sea of molasses. It cloyed at her, tugging her back toward the ship itself. It dragged at her feet. It made her want to sit down and take a nice long rest.

  Maybe a little sleep.

  No!

  Julia's body tensed.

  Something was wrong.

  She looked at the plants close by. They seemed to lean in toward her.

  What the hell
was going on?

  Her mind swam.

  Drugs?

  No.

  But maybe...

  The plants. It had to be them.

  Had the aliens genetically altered them as well? Had they produced specimens capable of giving off a poisonous gas that could neutralize humans? Were these things planted elsewhere around the planet or just down here in their laboratory?

  Maybe the aliens just used them as a type of security system.

  Whatever they were for, their effect was fairly powerful. Even as Julia grasped the fact that the plants were making her feel this way, she could still feel the powerful airborne narcotic at work in her system. She'd breathed too much of it in. She had top somehow flush her system.

  Get clean air.

  She took off her shirt and wrapped it over her nose and mouth. She halfway doubted it would work, but she had to try. She breathed through the sweat-stained fabric. The air felt hot against her skin.

  But her head cleared somewhat.

  She smirked. That wouldn't last long. The carbon dioxide would build up and start to produce the same effect on her if she wasn't careful.

  She had to get the hell out of the jungle.

  She started to run a little bit. More of a jog, but it was the best she could manage. More sweat poured down her body, soaking her clothes.

  But she kept moving.

  One foot in front of the other.

  A sharp crack to her left made her stop.

  The noise was back.

  What the hell was it?

  She heard the growl now. Low. Sinister.

  Julia's mind was starting to shut off. If she stayed where she was, even though she might be able to hide from the creature making the noise, she'd either die or pass out from inhaling all the plant sedatives.

  No, she had to keep moving.

  She jogged some more down the path.

  Another crack.

  Another growl.

  Louder this time.

  Closer, too.

  Julia kept moving. The skin around her mouth burned from exhaling her heated breaths back against her skin. But she tried not to be bothered by it.

  Keep going!

  Now instead of a growl, she heard something else.

  A croak?

  No.

  It just sounded like that.

  It wasn't a frog, though, Julia felt very confident about that.

  A branch somewhere behind her cracked. But judging from the tone of the crack, it had been a thick branch. Which would mean whatever had broken it would be something heavy.

  And big.

  Big concerned her.

  The path wound around again. How much farther was it to the tunnel entrance? Julia kept panting, trying to keep her feet moving. Her hands gripped the pistol, but it felt slimy and slippery in her grasp.

  She rounded another corner.

  And saw the rock!

  Yes!

  She was close.

  That was when she felt the sudden thundering footfalls behind her.

  Julia didn't stop running.

  She just looked over her shoulder as she ran.

  Good God!

  It looked like something out of the Jurassic Park movies. It was almost entirely a dinosaur. But something was different.

  Weird.

  The hands?

  No.

  Oh God. She saw it then.

  Jutting out of the chest of the dinosaur.

  Nung's head.

  What had they done to him?

  And more importantly, what was the dinosaur about to do to Julia if she didn't make it to the tunnel entrance?

  She spun and brought the pistol up, aimed at the dinosaur's head and squeezed off two shots.

  The bullets exploded like cannon fire in the jungle air. Julia watched the rounds smack into the dinosaur's head. But its thick scaly skin merely bounced the tiny metal slugs away.

  Unharmed by it.

  It reared up now. It must have been almost twenty feet high. Its head almost brushed the top of the jungle cavern roof.

  It looked at Julia now, regarding her like she was some sort of tiny annoyance. Had the gun given it pause for thought?

  It roared.

  No.

  Julia kept backing herself up toward the rock. But she kept the gun trained on the dinosaur. She couldn't stop looking at Nung's face peering out of the dinosaur's chest. Why had they put it there?

  Nung didn't seem to have any expression on his face. Was he even coherent? Was he even Nung anymore?

  The dinosaur took another step toward her. With its stride, it could overtake her in two steps.

  Julia looked back. The rock was only twenty feet away.

  She could see the slit behind it. She could just fit if she ran for it.

  The dinosaur roared again.

  It's going to make a run at me, thought Julia.

  But what good was the gun?

  A thought popped into her head. She rejected it. No! She didn't want to do it.

  The dinosaur moved closer.

  Her fingers tightened reflexively and the gun barked twice more.

  This time, her rounds didn't impact the dinosaur's head, but rather right in Nung's face.

  The dinosaur reared back and screeched.

  The howls of pain made Julia wince.

  She turned and ran.

  She reached out for the rock.

  Her hands found it.

  She heaved.

  Pulled herself through.

  Only then did she look back.

  The dinosaur lay on the ground, writhing in agony. Blood streamed out of its chest. Julia couldn't see anything of Nung's face anymore.

  She collapsed back in the tunnel, feeling the cool air wash over her, drying her sweat. All she wanted to do was sleep.

  But she couldn't.

  Not yet.

  Not while Mick was still alive.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  She fumbled through most of the winter clothes the team had shed upon entering the humid jungle area and found her own coat and winter pants. She slid those on and found she was still out of breath.

  Exhausted.

  She pushed herself on. Back down the uneven and craggy floor of the tunnel that threatened to twist her ankles if she was inattentive to where she placed her feet.

  Her mind still swam but this time with the images of each of her teammates, starting first with Vikorsky and most recently ending with Nung and Wilkins. She saw their faces, heard their voices, felt their mirth, their excitement, and then their terror. Julia wondered if it would have been easier to just have been killed by the aliens than to have to endure a potential lifetime of knowing she'd led these people straight into hell.

  I'm in my own hell now, she thought.

  But so was Mick.

  His face came at her. His hardened jaw, set firm in that playful smirk of his that bordered somewhere between sarcasm and outright laughter. Her heart swelled thinking about him and it helped to push some of the regret she felt about the rest of the team out of her mind.

  The tunnel seemed less threatening now than it had earlier when they'd come in here. How long ago was that, she wondered? How long had they been inside for? She'd been anesthetized to make way for the impregnation. How long did that take? What about the procedure on Nung and Wilkins?

  Talk about missing time.

  The tunnel curved slightly and Julia recognized the area. She was coming back to where they'd entered the cave the first time seeking shelter from the approaching storms. The tunnel felt colder now. She could see her breath in front of her face.

  It felt good to be back in the cold.

  It would have felt even better to have everyone with her still.

  Well, maybe with the exception of Kendall.

  Damn him.

  She hoped Kendall would have a particularly nasty ending waiting for him at some point down the road. Perhaps the aliens would tire of him and use him for some type of heinous exper
iment. He deserved it, having killed as many people as he had.

  She reached the fissure and peered out.

  Bright sunshine made her wince and duck back inside the tunnel. Her eyes stung. She'd almost blinded herself. Without thinking, she'd gone outside. She slid a pair of eye goggles on over her face and looked out again.

  This time she could make out the snowfield below the cave entrance. She could just make out one of the Snowcats. It seemed partially buried by the recent blizzards.

  She squeezed back through the fissure and stood once again outside in the Antarctica landscape.

  And it felt good.

  But she had a mission to accomplish right now. There'd be time for appreciating the frigid cold later.

  After she'd rescued Mick.

  And destroyed the aliens.

  She climbed down from the cave opening and stepped down into about four feet of fresh snow. She slogged through the chest-high frozen morass and made it at last to the closest Snowcat.

  I hope to hell the damned thing turns over, she thought as she brushed snow off the window and found the door handle. She climbed inside and pressed the starter switch.

  The engine cranked but then died.

  Julia frowned. What was wrong?

  She shook her head. She had to clear the exhaust or she'd be breathing in carbon monoxide real quick. That would screw her up real bad if it didn't ruin the engine first.

  She fell back down into the snow and tried her best to dig out as much of the Snowcat as she could. She could feel herself rushing to get it done. She started sweating underneath her coat. Her breath came out hot in the air in front of her. Her sinuses dripped.

  Julia clawed a path out in front of the cat as well, shoving the snow as best she could out of the way. She felt like she was trying to bench press a house, but thought she'd done a pretty decent job.

  At last, she climbed back into the Snowcat and started it up.

  The engine turned over immediately and idled with a low growl that reminded Julia of the dinosaur with Nung's face back in the jungle. She wondered if she'd actually killed it or if it was just wounded.

  No time to think, she shoved the transmission into drive. The Snowcat jerked once as the caterpillar treads bit into the soft snow, finding purchase, and at last freeing itself from the snowy coffin it had been left in.

  Julia grabbed the wheel and steered the Cat around until she got it back on the proper heading for Mick's cache of weapons. She cast a wanton eye toward the horizon. The research station lay in that direction. She could just as easily go back there and ring the panic alarm for a rescue plane to come down.