by Michael Todd
“Oh, shit!” Chris’s voice said below in the split second before the air cracked with a burst of rifle fire.
“Chris!” Wallace yelled, his stomach tight with sudden tension. He couldn’t see beyond the curtain of vegetation that shielded his companion from view.
He forced himself to remain calm and listened carefully. A slithering, scuttling sound confirmed his fears. The goddammed scorpions had found them again and probably burrowed up directly under the tree. Chris fired two more bursts from his rifle. “How many are there?” Wallace shouted. “Let me help—”
“Two, so far,” the scientist yelled and cut his offer off. The source of the man’s voice had moved. “Keep climbing. The wall is too important.” He switched to single and fired at his attackers with what Wallace prayed were well-placed and well-chosen individual shots. Although armored, the creatures were skittish and self-protective, so Chris might be able to hold them off until he could wear them down, kill them, or drive them off. Two at once, though, was a risky proposition. And if any more showed up, he’d be in real danger.
“Dammit,” the sergeant muttered. He rose cautiously to his feet and vaulted upward to the next limb. From there, he clambered up the trunk itself where he could with the aid of his suit and grabbed or stepped on branches as needed. While he knew he was much more likely to fall that way, he wanted to get high enough to send a message as quickly as possible. Chris was right, they had to warn the base. There was no reason to delay the warning and his friend was in trouble.
Wallace heaved himself up to a major fork in the trunk. Past this point, the two forks were thin enough that scaling any higher would be as risky as hell. He turned the walkie-talkie on. Distortion was heavy, but he could make out a few stray words and phrases—definitely someone talking rather than static.
“This is Sgt. Wallace in the Zoo,” he said. “There is a major surge coming. The Zoo is preparing to attack. Evacuate everyone from Wall One and pull back to Wall Two. Copy?” He doubted anyone heard or understood. There was still too much interference.
Down below, the single gunshots changed to a long blast on full auto. Something squealed in pain before both sounds ended almost at once.
“Chris!” The sergeant hooked the comm device back to his belt and peered down. From his new position, there were enough spaces between the leaves for him to see all the way to the ground. To his horror, the scientist struggled in the grasp of one of the scorpions. It had clamped his arm with one claw and entangled his legs with the loathsome array of tentacles that sprouted from its now unsheathed head.
Wallace balanced himself as best he could, unslung his rifle, and tried to aim, but both man and arachnid thrashed around so furiously that he couldn’t get a clear shot. He waited in an agony of apprehension for the inevitable, but it soon became apparent that the scorpion made no attempt to kill Chris outright. Instead, it latched on to drag him with it as it crawled in reverse into the sandy hole it had made in the earth near the big tree’s roots.
“Keep climbing!” the scientist bellowed at the top of his lungs. “You have to—” The words cut off as the dark glossy claws and slimy tendrils hauled him under the surface and all went quiet.
Wallace stared, frozen for a second before adrenaline kicked in and he turned and resumed his climb.
“He’s not dead yet,” he mumbled under his breath as he pulled himself higher and higher until he rose above the canopy of most of the other trees. “They’ve taken him to use as nutrients.” The scorpions had done that with Gunnar, he recalled, and with many other poor bastards. There might be time to save him later—there had to be. At the moment, though, he had a duty to fulfill.
The skittering sounds he’d heard a moment before resumed. They seemed to come from multiple directions but suddenly converged and grew louder. He glanced down. Dark, glossy forms—at least three—now ascended the tree. Their spiky legs allowed them to climb the trunk with disturbing speed.
“For fuck’s sake,” he grunted and pushed through the jungle canopy.
The blue sky and white sun were shockingly bright. Wallace was near the top of the sturdier fork of the tree, and most of the jungle sprawled below him. He could see for miles in every direction—all the way to Wall One which encircled the Zoo, oblivious to what was coming. Beyond it lay the base and all those people.
The first of the advancing scorpions emerged from the canopy and moved almost as fast vertically as he’d seen them move horizontally. Its pincers snapped menacingly and its barbed tail waved in the breeze. It would reach him before he could even switch the walkie-talkie on.
The creature’s tail lashed toward him. He pivoted to the side and allowed himself to fall from his perch and swing on it with his left hand. The stinger buried itself in the wood and stuck there. Wallace turned his swaying motion into a half-kick, half-stamp that severed the tail and the creature shrieked as ichor flowed from the stump. Making the most of the arachnid’s distraction, he kicked it in the face and grinned at the very satisfying crunch. It fell and disappeared beneath the leaves.
The powered gauntlet gave Wallace enough strength to hang where he was for a moment, although he knew more of the arachnids were in pursuit. He took the walkie-talkie in his right hand and tried again.
“This is Sergeant Wallace. Major surge-attack coming from the Zoo. Evacuate Wall One and fall back to Wall Two. Copy?”
To his surprise, someone answered. “Hello? Wallace?” It sounded like none other than Gunnar, but that might simply have been wishful thinking.
“Evacuate Wall One,” he said again, louder this time. “Major attack coming.”
A scorpion burst through the canopy with another immediately behind it. Wallace hung on grimly and kicked at the creature’s front claws and face until it released the trunk, but it seemed to catch hold again somewhere below the leaves because there was no sound of falling. The other one crawled closer.
“Evacuate, what?” the voice said. It was Gunnar, after all, Wallace decided.
“Evacuate Wall One!” he bellowed. “Major attack. The Zoo is—”
Three scorpions suddenly appeared on the trunk directly below him and at the same time, the tree itself began to sway and finally, to droop.
“Dammit!” The creatures had added too much weight. His stomach lurched as he struggled to hold on. A loud crack sounded somewhere below and the top half of the tree plummeted, taking Wallace with it. The limbs and leaves of the surrounding trees whipped and tore at his body as he fell.
The tree itself, rotten as it was, could not be relied upon to provide anything remotely like a cushion—not to mention that it might roll and crush him against either the earth or another tree. Cursing with words he’d forgotten he knew, he summoned what energy he could from his exoskeleton and jumped.
Chapter Sixteen
There were barely enough thin, springy branches and vines to slightly slow Wallace’s rapid descent. He grasped and snatched at anything within arm’s reach as he thumped into branches and twigs tore at his face. He relaxed his body and synched his physical will with the function of his suit so that he could land limber and ready to roll.
Everything trembled as he finally impacted the ground and immediately threw himself forward in a circular motion. He used his armored limbs as much as possible to shield the rest of his body but before he managed to stop his momentum, he slammed into a tree trunk.
“Ugh!” he groaned. The shock of the fall had rattled its way through his entire body and left him numb, dizzy, and disoriented. That particular set of conditions, he knew, often accompanied the body’s release of its natural painkillers, which masked the possibility of immediately recognizing serious injury. He might have broken bones and not even be aware of them.
He rolled over gently and pushed onto his hands and knees while he tried to stop the awful spinning of his field of vision. So far, there was no serious pain to indicate anything as terrible as a complex fracture or major sprain. He scrambled to his feet and willed his
body to allow the exoskeleton to do some of the work for him. With careful movements, he patted his left hand over his body and found no evidence of heavy bleeding. Also, by some miracle, he still had his rifle clutched in his right hand.
Satisfied that he’d escaped serious injury, he turned and stared into the face of an apparently stunned catshark. Its big, almond-shaped eyes blinked at him and the brownish-purple fur along its long, lean body bristled, but at this particular instant, it was frozen in shock.
“Fuck off!” Wallace snarled as a sudden volcano of rage seemed to erupt in him. His left fist rose and swung out and forward in a fast haymaker, seemingly independent of his conscious mind. The catshark’s head made a loud thwack sound as the metal gauntlet connected and knocked the creature off balance.
Today had simply been too long and too hard and too shitty a day, and he was utterly, utterly sick of the Zoo.
“What the fuck are you looking at? Huh?” He charged the staggering creature. It tried to bring up its clawed forelimbs but he kicked it in the chest, punched the top of its skull and the back of its neck, and kneed it in the stomach. Driven by rage, he twisted its neck, snapped its limbs, and kicked it again and again in the ribs, totally oblivious to the crack of bones and the blood. It probably died in the first few seconds of his all-out assault but he continued until he’d turned it into a hairy sack of jagged appendages and oozing pulp.
He gasped deep, ragged breaths as the worst of the red fog lifted from his brain, but the buzzing intensity—the need to kill—was still there. Grimly, he looked around.
Most of the scorpions that had climbed the tree after him had been reduced to flattened or shattered exoskeletons and now marinated in pools of their own disgusting bug juice. At least that meant he wouldn’t have to listen to that irksome chittering sound they made.
Two were alive but wounded and writhed feebly on the ground. Wallace strode over to them. The first didn’t even react to his presence as he grabbed its tail and buried the stinger in the nearest tree trunk before he proceeded to beat the shit out of it. He rained blows and kicks to its head and back and crushed the legs and twitching mandibles. The dirt beneath the creature turned to mud from the blood and bug guts.
The second was sufficiently conscious to hiss and make a weak jab at him with its stinger. He caught the tail easily, held it below the barb, and heaved with excessive strength to swing the scorpion into a tree. Still not satisfied, he yanked it in the other direction to bash it against a rock. Finally, his chest heaving and his body driven by almost superhuman strength, he rolled the rock over the creature for good measure.
The earth shuddered and penetrated the bloodlust with a sense of urgent warning. Dirt and mud and roots shifted and his instincts clicked in. He shook his head as he regained his self-control and retrieved his rifle, which he’d dropped—probably before he attacked the catshark. It took another moment before he realized that he’d lost the walkie-talkie during his tumble from the tree.
“Dammit,” he yelled, already furious again. Had Gunnar actually heard him? Why the hell couldn’t they even send a simple message in this godforsaken place?
A funnel opened rapidly in the ground a few feet away from him. He snatched a grenade off his belt, pulled the pin, and dropped it into the hole as two pincers emerged. Then, he turned and ran to take cover behind the thick horizontal trunk of the same tree he’d climbed before.
The blast rattled the ground, the trees, and the air, and he immediately smelled the ugly stench of burning and saw the flames and smoke. That had probably been stupid. Everything in the jungle would have heard it, and it could have caused a cave-in that might have endangered Chris or anyone else who might still be underground.
“Get it together, Erik,” he said aloud through gritted teeth.
God, he was so angry at this place and everything in it.
More funnels opened all around him. He aimed at the nearest one and fired. Sand and dirt sprayed out, along with scorpion-blood, and the funnel collapsed in on itself even before the creature could emerge. He aimed at the next one and the next as he proceeded to fire two bursts each into six holes before he switched his rifle to single-shot. He had to conserve ammo. Only three of the six holes had stilled and predictably, arachnids emerged from the others.
“You guys don’t know when to quit, do you? You’re like me, but stupider and uglier.” He aimed and fired one bullet at the nearest creature. It tensed for a second as the shot dented the hood of its cephalic armor but Wallace had already charged and kicked it in the face before it could respond. His foot stuck in the resulting mush as it was driven back and pulled him off-balance with it. He grabbed a tree branch as he fell and kicked out. His foot cracked through the remains of the scorpion’s head before he found his feet again.
Two more had closed the distance with frightening speed. The first bowled into him and simply used its mass and velocity to knock him on his ass before it even tried to attack with claw or stinger.
Wallace managed to take hold of one side of the beast’s right pincer with his left hand. He twisted it sharply as he toppled and it cracked off in his hand. The scorpion shuddered and squealed in pain. It lashed out with its other claw. He ducked under the swipe and drove the pointy end of the severed pincer into the creature’s drooling, tentacled mouth. It shook back and forth as blood poured from the wound. He kicked it in the face and managed to break its other arm before he used his enhanced gauntlet strength to deliver three deadly blows to its head.
He scrambled to his feet but the other monster tripped him before he could fully regain his balance. The air exploded from his lungs as he landed hard on his back, but he immediately raised his rifle and squeezed off the last three shots. One slug ricocheted off but the second seemed to crack the armor at the creature’s shoulder joint. The third struck home in one of the shining arachnoid eyes—or what he supposed were its eyes.
As it recoiled with a high-pitched shriek, he pushed to his feet, grabbed its claw, and wrenched the entire arm out. He tossed the limb away and kicked the creature in the side so it flipped over. While it was still partially airborne, he power-stepped toward it and drove his fist into its underbelly. The scorpion crunched against a tree but half of its innards stuck to his fist.
The earth around him writhed and twisted into the familiar funnel shapes. Still more of them were coming—far more than he could deal with.
Wallace turned and stumbled in the opposite direction. The adrenaline had begun to fade and he wondered if he might have a hairline fracture or two—probably in his left leg and left arm, judging by the pain that pushed through into his consciousness. Maybe even a slight hernia, he thought and placed his hand on the suddenly tender area.
A low hum swelled into a loud buzzing, accompanied by a sound like wind rushing through the leaves.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” he muttered. He ejected the empty magazine from his M-92 and popped in another one—the last one.
Two locusts burst out of the screen of foliage ahead. Their jaws hung open and they hissed as their wings beat against the air. Oddly enough, their claws were extended in what might resemble an open-palm gesture rather than with the business ends aimed at him.
He decided not to stop to contemplate this oddity and simply blasted both of them out of the sky with two well-placed shots each. Even the advanced locusts were highly vulnerable to bullets that penetrated their bulbous eyes into their tiny brains. Or down their throats, in the case of the second one. Both crashed and splatted but others immediately replaced them.
One struck Wallace in the chest and shoved him back. Its knife-like claws lacerated him in a couple of places, but it didn’t actually try to kill him. Instead, it drove him back toward the scorpions.
He jerked with his left arm and the rifle it held to break through the creature’s grip and ruin its momentum. With his heels dug into the earth for purchase, he slammed the locust sideways into a tree and followed with a roundhouse kick to the abdomen. A solid pu
nch to the head squished it like another of the goddamn fucking bugs it was.
The full swarm smashed into him and swept him along. The force hurled him back and threw him off balance, and he was fairly certain a couple of them even grabbed his arms and shoulders and tried to carry him. He raised his rifle, fumbled to switch it to full auto, and fired until it clicked empty. The air filled with blood and chunks of insect bodies. From behind, pincers gripped his waist and left leg and a blossom of mouth-tentacles entwined around his right foot. A quick jerk pulled him off his feet and locusts and scorpions alike seemed to mount his chest to prevent him from fighting back.
He would be dead already if that was their goal. While he could barely see amidst all the fucking bugs that swarmed over him and around him, he knew they dragged him back and probably down. Kemp obviously wanted him alive. It was, he thought stupidly, likely for the best that she hadn’t summoned some kangarats to help out. Those things stank.
Loose earth engulfed his lower body as his captors hauled him deeper, and the last thing he saw was a small object in the grass. It crackled and hissed and reminded him of his original purpose. Had Gunnar heard him? Would they take his warning seriously, or had they simply received a garbled and incoherent message that made no sense? It occurred to him that he would now never know whether he had failed to fulfil that single small mission or whether the warning would save lives after all.
At that moment, everything went black.
Chapter Seventeen
Wallace had lost consciousness at some point, but he drifted in and out as his brain seemed to turn off and on—almost as if it were in reboot or standby mode. His body ached and he was thirsty and weak. He had basically no idea what the hell was going on but registered vaguely that the creatures pulled him through dirt, over rocks, and mostly, through darkness. A terrible smell hung like a pall and he could hear the echoes of scrabbling, slithering arachnids all around him.
