Actually, from this angle it was quite an interesting face, after all, he thought.
And then, as something big, slimy, and unmistakably furious erupted from inside the Librarian’s body, he ran.
Seventeen
Cal hurtled along the passageway between two rows of shelves, the Symmorium Sentience under one arm, the book under the other, and Splurt clinging to his shoulder like a cowboy on a bucking bronco.
He was racing the collapsing shelves, which were in the process of toppling all around him. He was also, to a much greater extent, racing the bus-sized worm creature that was slithering along behind him, its bloated body shushing as it chased him down.
It was closing fast. He could hear it. Hell, he could smell it. It reminded him of bacon. But not good bacon. Old bacon. Bacon you shouldn’t eat but, in his case, inevitably always did. Bacon that made you suffer.
Running in the spacesuit was difficult, but fortunately, he knew a trick that would help. It involved swearing repeatedly in a high, shrill voice.
“Oh-shizz-oh-shizz-oh-shizz-oh-shizz!”
Yes, that worked. Powered by panic, his cumbersome feet drove him onward.
A few dozen feet ahead, the light became a blank wall of darkness. That wasn’t good. During the brief, horror-stricken glimpse he’d gotten of the worm, he’d noticed it didn’t have any eyes. Big weird spike-like teeth things? Yes. Eyes? No.
And yet, it was still following him. And if it was still following him, then it knew where he was. And if it knew where he was, then that meant it could find him in the dark just as easily as it could in the light. And if it could find him in the dark, then that meant…
He decided not to dwell on what that meant.
“Splurt, do something!” Cal yelped, weaving sideways as a set of shelves toppled towards him. He made it past a half-second before it thumped onto the carpet at his heels, blocking the path. The worm turned at a sudden right angle, avoiding the obstacle rather than crashing through it.
“Hey, we lost it!” Cal wheezed.
The smell of bacon came rushing up on his right.
“Shizz, shizz, shizz! Spoke too soon!”
The worm was still gaining, but there was a row of shelves between them now. These units hadn’t yet toppled over, and the worm seemed to have no desire to knock them over itself, so they acted as a barrier, keeping man and monster apart.
“Ha! Not so scary now, are you?” Cal lied. The shelves hadn’t really helped in that respect. The worm was still terrifying. “You’ll have to work a lot harder if you want to…”
The next few shelves were missing, creating a wide opening. Cal’s butt-cheeks tightened, giving him an extra burst of speed that propelled him across the gap before the worm swerved back into the aisle.
“Catch me! It’s going to catch me! Splurt, I need you, buddy!”
Splurt flopped across to Cal’s neck, then squeezed himself down through the neck of the suit.
“Wait, are you… Are you hiding?!” Cal yelped. “How is that helping me? Get back here, you little bamston!”
He gave an involuntary shudder as Splurt wriggled down his front. It was only when the movement stopped by his right hip that Cal realized what was about to happen. He simultaneously jumped, ducked, covered his head with a big book, and ejected the words, “No, God, don’t!” from his mouth and both nostrils.
His hip exploded. At least, that was his initial thought on the matter. The fabric of the suit erupted outward as a burst of laser fire punched from within.
“Ow, ow! Jesus!” Cal grimaced, throwing all his weight onto his left leg and hopping a few times before resuming his run. There was a hole in his suit’s pants, the material black and charred around the edges.
Cal glanced down in time to see the barrel of his blaster poke out and take aim at the monster slithering along behind them.
“OK, not what I was hoping for, but I guess it’ll have to do!” Cal wailed. “Shoot it!”
Two tiny green hands strained against the pistol’s trigger. Cal felt the gun kick against his thigh, and then a blaster bolt went screaming upward past his face.
“Jesus Christ, Splurt! Watch where you’re pointing that thing,” he yelped. He gestured backward with his head. “That way! Shoot that way! I shouldn’t have to explain this.”
Up ahead, the wall of darkness was almost upon him. His head snapped left and right, searching for another route that would let him stay in the light, but the way was blocked by shelves on all sides, and he couldn’t take the time to clamber over them.
He shrieked in panic as Splurt fired again. The shot hit the carpet immediately behind Cal’s feet.
“What are you even doing? Can’t you aim that thing?”
Splurt rippled.
“What do you mean you’ve never fired a gun before?” Cal cried.
The blaster went off again. Cal’s right buttock became blisteringly hot, and a bolt of fiery energy skimmed past above the worm’s head. The worm lurched to the side, collided with a set of shelves, then the shushing returned as it rejoined the chase.
Cal ran onward into the dark. It fell over him like a blanket, heavy and oppressive, slowing him down.
Splurt fired twice in rapid-succession, echoing a perfect pew-pew around the Library. There was a satisfying thack as one of the bolts slammed into the worm, and Cal felt a momentary surge of hope. Maybe that would stop it, or at least scare it off.
But, no. If anything, it just made the fonking thing angrier.
The shushing came faster. The smell of bad bacon filled Cal’s nostrils. He stumbled blindly on, his instincts screaming at him to hold a hand out as an early-warning system for anything solid that might be blocking the way ahead. Unfortunately, both his hands were currently occupied, and so he resigned himself to the fact that his face would just have to take the brunt of it.
He hit a shelving unit.
His face took the brunt of it.
Spinning, he guessed a direction and went that way, blood oozing from his nose. Tears blinded him. Given that he couldn’t see anything, anyway, this wasn’t as much of an inconvenience as it otherwise might have been.
He hit another set of shelves, shoulder-first this time. The Symmorium Sentience was jolted from his grip and thudded onto the floor. As it hit, the dim glow inside it stirred. Perhaps it was because they were now surrounded by darkness, but the green light of the Sentience seemed brighter now.
Not that Cal had time to admire it. He made a grab for it, but the ball rolled away from him, its glow flashing across the shelves on either side as it trundled across the carpet.
“What are you doing? Come back!” Cal called.
The worm shushed closer and Splurt fired a volley of shots from the blaster, none of which hit anything useful.
Cal threw himself into another lumbering run, chasing the Sentience as it rolled off. When it reached a junction in the aisles, it stopped, and he had almost caught up with it when it rolled off to the left, leading him in a different direction.
“Wait, do you know the way out?” Cal shouted after it. “Are you leading us out?”
A word rose in Cal’s head. It was weak and quiet, but he understood it, all the same.
“Follow.”
Mech stood back, admiring his handiwork. The Currently Untitled stood upright on its landing legs, gleaming in the light of the artificial sun. It looked good as new. Provided you ignored the dents and scuffed paintwork.
“Great job, Mech,” the voice spoke encouragingly in his ear. “You’ve done very well. We’re all really proud of you, mister.”
“Yeah, I turned the dial back,” Mech told her. “You don’t need to talk to me like I’m five.”
Loren exhaled. “Thank fonk for that.” Her tone switched from patronizing to concerned. “Any sign of Cal?”
“He’s not back yet?”
“No. When would he have come back? He’d have had to walk right past you.”
Mech shrugged. “With my dial cranked,
there’s no saying I’d have noticed.” He turned and surveyed the landscape around them. “I ain’t seeing him.”
“I’ve been trying to contact him, but the signal’s still blocked,” Loren said. “I’m worried, Mech. He could be in trouble.”
“This is Cal we’re talking about. Of course, he’s in trouble. The man’s like a fonking magnet for trouble. But he’ll be fine,” Mech insisted, although he sounded a little less sure than he had last time. “Like I said, he’s got Splurt and he’s got the Symmorium Sentience. That’s some pretty serious back-up.”
“I don’t know. Splurt’s been acting kind of strange,” Loren pointed out.
“Still. You know the weird fonked-up relationship they have. No way Splurt’s going to let him get hurt. And then, throw in the Sentience—a god. An actual god. And, well…”
He cast his eye across the empty horizon. “…what’s the worst that could happen?”
“This is the worst thing that could have happened,” Cal sobbed, staring up at the blank, featureless wall that completely blocked his path.
The Sentience had led him out of the main chamber and into a corridor like the one he’d first landed in. The worm had plunged in after them, it’s broad, gelatinous body a perfect fit for the curved walls. He could hear it shushing closer now, narrowing what little gap Cal had been able to create.
“OK, so what now?” he rasped, staring imploringly at the Sentience. It rolled back and forth for a moment, then sprang up against Cal’s chest, forcing him to grab it with his free arm.
The Symmorium Sentience nestled against him, its glow turning faint.
“Wait. What? What are you doing? Wake up!”
The blaster in his pants fired, sending a bolt streaking along the corridor. The shot missed the worm by several feet, but painted it briefly in a bright red wash, revealing its full terrifying length.
The smell of bad bacon was thick and choking. The worm’s spike-like teeth snapped together. Clack-clack.
Cal did the only thing he could think to do. The only weapon left in his arsenal.
He screamed.
It was not a scream he was particularly proud of. It was the screech of a horror starlet from the 1950s—shrill, piercing, and utterly devoid of hope. It depressed him that it would probably be the last sound he ever made. As final words went, “Yeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaeeeeeek!” wasn’t exactly up there with the greats.
The worm reared back from the sound as if wounded, its pronged head thrashing so violently it slapped against the tiled walls with a series of damp, thunderous thwacks.
The echo of the scream bounced back to Cal, and he winced with embarrassment. Jesus, that had been high. Still, at least the rest of the team hadn’t heard it. It was a small comfort, if he was going to die here, then at least that penetrating screech of terror wasn’t how the others would remember him. He’d have hated that.
“Cal? Is that you?”
Loren’s voice was a series of broken hisses in his ear.
Damn.
“Loren! Yes, it’s me!” he cried, ignoring the hot flush of shame that crept up his neck. “Get me out! Get me out!”
“Where are you?”
“I’m…”
Cal’s eyes darted pointlessly around the darkened dead end. “I’m here. I don’t know! Can’t you track me?”
“No. But you must be…” The line was filled with static. “…urface. Can you…?”
“Can I what?” Cal asked. He pressed his earpiece more firmly into his ear. “Loren? Loren, can you hear me? Can I what?”
The worm’s shaking stopped. It swayed woozily for a few seconds, then seemed to pull itself together.
“The scream. Sound,” Cal whispered. “Of course it hates sound. It’s a fonking librarian.”
He let out another scream, taking care not to make it sound quite as pathetic as the previous one, and swung with the book just as the worm reared back. The heavy hardback made a loud, echoing crack as the leather met the tiles. The worm twitched violently and slithered back a few feet.
Cal stopped screaming. No matter how manly he tried to make it, it just wasn’t cutting it. His mind raced to find an alternative. Something loud. Something impressive. Something that didn’t make him sound like Janet Leigh in the shower scene in Psycho.
Not entirely on purpose, Cal began to sing. Specifically, he sang the 1989 single, ‘Jesus is My Spaceship (Let’s Ride Him Through the Stars)’ by German Christian Rock act, Klaus Hugen.
He’d barely made it to the end of the first verse (‘He’ll take us all to Jupiter, He’ll take us all to Mars’) when the Sentience vibrated in his arms and the wall behind him slid away, letting a blazing artificial sunlight flood in and revealing a rocky incline leading to sweet, sweet freedom above.
“Yes, yes, yes!” Cal cried, turning and throwing himself up the climb.
“Cal? That you?” Mech grunted in his ear.
“Where are you?” Loren demanded.
“I’m coming!” Cal told them.
He was halfway up the incline when the headache kicked in. It stabbed through his brain like an icepick, knocking him back down into the mouth of the tunnel below. He cried out in pain, the sound temporarily keeping the worm at bay.
“What is it?” Loren asked. “What’s wrong?”
“Don’t know,” Cal hissed. His voice was a croak through the pea-sized gap that had, until a moment ago, been his throat.
“Wait. You still got your helmet on, right?” Mech asked him.
The helmet.
Shizz.
Gritting his teeth, Cal squeezed the Sentience and the book against his chest and powered up the slope. Every step sent another jarring jolt of pain through his skull, down his spine, and then out into the rest of his body.
His lungs burned. His eyes bled. His bowels opened.
Splurt hastily extricated himself from the leg of Cal’s pants, crawled up his side, then settled on his shoulder.
“S-sorry, buddy,” Cal slurred.
Kicking up the incline, he powered over a rocky ridge. As he did, the artificial gravity lost its grip on him and he rose in a great, leaping bound into the air.
“I see him!” Mech’s voice barked. “I see you.”
“Where?” Cal wheezed. He turned, blinking through the blood and the colors that swam before his eyes, until he finally saw the Untitled.
Fonk, that was far away.
He twisted in the air, alighted gently, then sprang off in the direction of the ship just as the worm-creature reared up through the hole behind him, propelling slow-moving rocks toward the sky.
“What the fonk is that thing?” Mech demanded.
“It’s the librarian,” Cal explained. His rapid healing ability was fighting back against the toxic atmosphere, but the bout could still go either way.
“What do you mean, ‘It’s the librarian’? How is that a librarian?”
“I mean it’s… Just shut the fonk up and shoot it!” Cal urged.
He hit the ground and bounded on, Hulk-style, toward the ship and the miniature metal figure he could just make out in front of it.
A light flared on Mech’s arm. The sound reached Cal a moment later, hot on the heels of the bolt itself. The ground erupted on his left, spinning debris into the air.
“What was that?” Cal wheezed. “Seriously, can none of you guys shoot straight?”
“Overcompensated for the gravity,” Mech said. “Hold on.”
Another flash. Another scream. Cal looked up to see the tumbling ball of fire go curving up above his head.
“Undercompensated,” Mech said.
“You think?”
He landed, crouched, then bounded on. Behind him, the worm was closing fast, its bloated body sticking to the ground, unaffected by the low gravity.
A halo of darkness was closing around Cal’s vision. He could taste his nostrils. His skin was alive with a thousand stabbing pains, and one of his lungs had gone on strike.
And the ship… The
ship was still so far away. Too far.
The worm shushed closer. Cal tried to scream, but every part of his body assured him this was no longer an option.
“Sound. It… it hates sound,” he managed to wheeze, his throat snapping shut on the last word, silencing him.
“Hold up. Hold up,” said Mech. “I got this.”
Cal watched in mute horror as Mech turned and launched himself toward the ship’s open airlock and vanished inside.
The ground came upon Cal unexpectedly. One second he’d been gliding through the air, the next he was stumbling across rocks, his eyes peeling open.
Shizz. He’d passed out.
He tried to kick off again, but his feet flailed uselessly against the loose gravel. He fell—slowly, and for quite some time—then bounced and rolled for several feet, the padded suit carving a trench through the sand.
Shush. Shush. Shush.
The worm was coming. There was nothing he could do. Nowhere he could go. Even through the choking atmosphere, he could smell its bacony stench growing like a cloud around him.
And then, there it was, rearing up, its pincer-teeth snapping at the air. This was it, then.
It was over.
The sound tore across the rocky desert floor like an inharmonious tidal wave. The volume and sheer unpleasantness of it struck the worm as a physical blow, bending its upper half backward and slamming it onto the sand.
Cal’s headache, which had been threatening to make his head implode, grew in intensity until his back arched and his limbs tightened, and the last of the air in his one working lung forced its way out through his throat as a bird-like cheep.
Splurt vibrated on Cal’s shoulder and squirmed down into the suit. Gasping and gagging, Cal managed to roll over, just as the sound came again. No, not sound. Sound was too nice a term. It was an affront to sound. A mockery of it. A din so awful, so nerve-janglingly terrible, that Cal almost found himself wishing the worm would deliver a killer blow and put him out of his misery.
Steeling himself, Cal raised his head a fraction off the sand. There, marching toward him, was Mech. He strode purposefully, his mouth twisted into one of the broadest, most joyous smiles Cal had ever seen on the cyborg’s face.
Space Team- The Collected Adventures 4 Page 47
