by Caryn Lix
I shrugged. “It looks breathable.” But what if it was a trick? Or some sort of sensor malfunction? What if we removed our helmets and found ourselves in a totally toxic atmosphere? “Maybe we should . . .”
I cut myself off when Cage reached up and twisted his helmet. “Wait!” I cried, grabbing at his hands.
He lifted it off, then tilted his head and sniffed the air. “I don’t feel dead,” he announced.
I closed my eyes at a rush of relief. “I hate you,” I managed to say, and ignored his answering chuckle. I yanked off my gloves before going for my own helmet. A familiar rush of oxygenated air met my lungs. If there was a trick here, it was well hidden.
We stripped off our XE suits and were then faced with the somewhat problematic issue of what to do with them. If the aliens stumbled across them, they’d know we were here. Even if they didn’t find us, they could tear our suits to shreds, leaving us no way to get back to Sanctuary. This could very quickly turn into a suicide mission.
Panic hit me in a rush as the reality of the situation set in. I’d talked a good game back on Sanctuary, secure and safe in the bright lights of the command center. But now, in murky darkness with maybe hundreds of those creatures lurking around every corner?
Cage reached out, his touch steadying me. “You okay?”
I swallowed. “Yeah, I’m fine.” And more profoundly grateful than I could say to have him with me. I’d wanted to go alone. But it wouldn’t have protected Cage to leave him behind, and I wasn’t sure I could have managed this without him.
XE suits, I reminded myself. What to do with them? We lacked a lot of convenient hiding places. In the end, we shoved them into a corner where no one was likely to trip over them. I took the screwdriver, a backup—the flat-head from Cage’s tool belt—and a penlight, leaving the rest of my tools in a heap. I clutched the screwdriver in my left hand and settled the comforting weight of the stun gun in my right. It was an emergency measure only, since I was pretty sure the sound of it firing would alert any creatures on the ship. But I was glad to have it just the same.
I took a deep breath. “Into the belly of the beast,” I muttered.
Cage grinned. “God, I hope not.”
I laughed in spite of myself, a nervous giggle I quickly squelched. I reactivated my wrist comm. “Matt, it’s Kenzie. Do you read?”
His voice crackled to life in my ear. “I’m here. Rune’s online too.” Oh, great. Of course he’d told Rune. I just hoped she didn’t blame me. “Where are you? We lost sight of you a while ago.”
“We’re inside the ship.”
“No way.” That was Rune, disbelief and fear making her shriller than usual. “You’re seriously in the ship? How’d you do it?”
“How about later?” Cage asked gently. “We’re a bit busy right now.”
“You’re busy?” Her scream made me clap a hand to my ear; it was as if she’d flipped a switch, going from scientist to siren. “Are you kidding me, you’re busy? What were you thinking?”
I winced. “Rune, I know you’re worried. But if you keep shouting at us, I’ll have to mute you.”
There was a long silence while she mulled that over, and when she came back, she was more subdued. “You guys know you’re going to get yourself killed, right? And for what?”
“To save the planet,” I replied, more sarcastically than I’d intended. “Rune, we had to try. And for what it’s worth, we aren’t intending to die.”
She sighed heavily. “I know. I know. I know that. I just . . .”
“Love you too, meimei,” Cage said gently. “You okay over there?”
“We’re all right. I still have us on emergency lockdown. Mia hates it. She swears at me from the next room every few minutes.”
“She’ll do that. If you’re lucky, her voice will give out after a while.”
“I don’t really mind. Lets me know she’s alive, you know?” Rune hesitated. “Please be careful, gege. I get what you’re doing, but I want you to come back.”
“I know. We’ll do our best.”
I wonder what she’d say if she realized my secondary plan involved blowing us all to smithereens. “Keep us posted,” I said. “We’re going to go silent and have a look around.”
“Don’t stumble into an alien nest,” Matt replied.
“Copy that.” I cut the connection, leaving our comms connected on low volume in case they needed to contact us. I didn’t know how we’d help if they encountered trouble, but I couldn’t bring myself to mute Sanctuary entirely. “Okay. Where do we start?”
Cage shrugged. “This was your plan. You tell me.”
“With this door, I guess.” I knelt beside it and worked the screwdriver into the slot in the door. Once again, I hit the right spot and the door flowed open like liquid, reforming itself into a space big enough for us to walk through—more than big enough, reminding me once again we weren’t anyplace meant for humans.
We exited into a dark, curving corridor. Only my penlight illuminated the slick walls, everything as dark and still as space itself. We were at a serious disadvantage here, one only a good pair of night-vision goggles would have fixed. “I don’t suppose anyone on Sanctuary can see in the dark?”
“Not that I’m aware of,” Cage replied, his voice barely audible. “We should keep the noise to a minimum.”
I accepted the mild rebuke. I was mostly babbling to comfort myself. But a human voice on an alien ship could only lead to trouble. If the aliens heard us shuffling around, well, they might assume it was one of them. If they heard us whispering . . .
Speaking of aliens, though, I didn’t see any. I beamed my light around, reminding myself not to scream if I suddenly hit a pair of sightless eyes and angry teeth, but I found only a strange triangular crevice in the ground. I gestured to Cage, who knelt beside it. He glanced at me, shrugged, and slipped inside. The ground came to his shoulders, and I aimed the light at his feet. As near as I could tell, there was nothing there: just more black plastic. It wasn’t really plastic, of course—you couldn’t make a spaceship out of plastic—but I didn’t have a better word to describe it.
Cage gestured for the light. Reluctantly, I passed it over. While he explored the crevice, I crouched in the dark, gnawing on my fingernail until I realized what I was doing and folded my hands into fists, clutching the stun gun so tightly its edge dug into my palm.
A minute later he hoisted himself out of the hole. He shrugged, as mystified as me. “Let’s put the XE suits in here,” he suggested. “I’m not thrilled about keeping them in the airlock. They’ll be more out of the way, less chance of discovery.”
I nodded, and we retrieved the suits and stashed them in the crevice by the door. Then we followed the curving corridor.
About ten feet later, we discovered another hole. We continued along the corridor, seeing holes in the floor at regular intervals, until we found ourselves back at the airlock entrance. We’d gone in a complete circle without meeting a single alien or seeing anything of interest.
“This adventure sucks,” I muttered.
Cage laughed softly. “You’d prefer slavering beasts?”
I almost would. The constant tension was getting to me. “I’d prefer a big red button labeled ‘self-destruct’ and a twenty-minute countdown that gave us enough time to get off the ship.”
“Well, in the meantime, let’s circle again and check the outer wall,” he murmured. “Look for more doors.”
We set off, this time focusing the light on the walls. Sure enough, halfway around the circle I found another knob. Cage wedged the screwdriver into the slot while I held the light, and the door slid open. Emboldened by our success so far, we weren’t as quiet or careful entering the next area. I illuminated a room similar to the one we’d just left: rounded walls, shiny black surfaces. The only difference was that instead of crevices in the floor, raised black platforms dotted the area.
I approached one of them and gave it a once-over. The sides were made of familiar black pla
stic, but the top was clear. Inside, one of the creatures drifted an inch below the surface.
My scream rose unbidden in my throat. I jammed my forearm into my mouth, strangling the sound, and staggered back. The gun and light slipped from my hands and clattered across the floor, and my heart kicked off a rhythm to match. I cringed against the wall, tensed for a creature to explode to life at the commotion.
Nothing happened. After a moment Cage focused the penlight on me. I blinked against the illumination, and he aimed it down. “Kenz,” he whispered, barely audible. His fingers stroked my arm, pried it loose from my mouth. “You okay?”
I nodded, closing my eyes and forcing myself to breathe through my nose. How stupid can you get? I reproached myself sharply. “They’re in there,” I murmured, pointing.
Cage got to his feet. I grabbed his elbow and pull myself up along with him, careful about how I placed my feet. They can’t see. Stay quiet and you’re safe. Just the same, I paused to scoop my stun gun from the floor, then held it steady. Dropping it at the first sign of trouble had been a fantastic move—definitely what they taught us to do at camp when facing a dangerous opponent. I tightened my grip on the handle, determined not to lose it again no matter what jumped out at me.
Together, we peered over the . . . whatever it was. It came to Cage’s waist, a little higher on me. The creature continued to drift. I couldn’t tell if it was sleeping—its eyes were wide open, but it was immersed in some sort of liquid and didn’t respond to us or the noise we made.
We stared at it for a long time. It didn’t look even a bit less harmless in repose. Its claws glistened in the liquid, its jaws were drawn back, exposing razor-sharp teeth, and its milky-white eyes stared sightlessly into mine.
After an excruciating pause, we backed away. Cage’s hand trembled on the light and I steadied it with my own. Together, we angled it down the corridor, revealing an endless sea of the things—at least seven or eight were in sight, with more stretching around the curve. “Do you think they all . . . ?” he asked.
“Let’s find out.” I braced myself and peered into the next chamber. Sure enough, another alien reposed there, unmoving and unseeing. Same with the next chamber, and the next. “At least they seem to be sleeping,” I pointed out softly.
“Yeah, for how long?”
With that cheery thought, we pressed on. We had to walk halfway around the circle to find another door. This room seemed a lot larger than its predecessor. I was starting to get a sense the ship was arranged in a series of concentric circles.
Sure enough, when we finally found an exit, it led to a larger area—the walls hardly seemed to curve at all. In the first section we’d entered, it was obvious we were in a circular room; here, if I hadn’t known better I’d have thought the hall stretched straight in either direction.
This corridor held more chambers, and once again, each of them housed one of the sightless, staring aliens. “How many do you think there are?” I whispered, scrutinizing the sea of creatures.
“At least fifty, maybe a hundred,” Cage replied, his voice unsteady. “That’s just in these two areas. We might find more. And someone must be awake to run the ship.”
That was a thought I’d tried to avoid. Still, this was better than I had any right to hope for. If the creatures were all asleep, if the only ones awake were over on Sanctuary—plus maybe one or two here to keep the ship moving—well, then we had a chance. We could explore the ship and find a way to destroy it, or at least a way to contact Earth. It wasn’t much, but it was more than we’d had before.
We continued on, weaving through the monsters. Cage’s hand fumbled against mine and grabbed hold. I wasn’t sure if he wanted reassurance or if he was keeping me close in case he had to run; either way, I didn’t argue. I threaded my fingers through his and held tight.
This time we walked for what felt like forever before we found an exit, but I wasn’t sure if that was because there weren’t any or because pod after pod of alien creatures kept us distracted. At any rate, we’d almost returned to the beginning before Cage’s light glinted off a knob on the wall. I inserted the screwdriver and stepped back, stun gun raised and at the ready. We’d gotten more cautious with our advance since discovering the creatures.
Surprisingly, though, this doorway led into an apparent storage room: a small chamber lined with metal boxes. Each box had a series of raised figures—like braille? Did the aliens read? Did they even have a language? I traced my fingers over the characters. Something about them seemed familiar, but I couldn’t quite place it. “You ever seen anything like this?” I asked Cage.
He leaned closer but shook his head. My imagination, I supposed. It certainly had enough to work with in this house of horrors.
We found another door leading to another chamber. This time we progressed straight through, opening the door on the far wall.
And finally, we found ourselves somewhere useful.
Or at least, someplace different. We were in a large room, maybe double the size of Sanctuary’s command center. Blocky shapes lined the walls, emitting a very faint light, not even enough to see by without the penlight. We drew closer, poised at any moment for an attack.
More raised shapes lined the tops of the blocks. The glow came from beneath them, an almost incidental hint of illumination. Cage crept onward, but I stopped to examine the console. When I touched a screen, the whole thing went flat. The lights swirled beneath the black surface, then pressed against the screen, rising into a series of symbols. It was like self-forming braille letters in an alien language. We couldn’t communicate with them or even understand them, but these creatures were intelligent. They had purpose.
I sure wished I knew what it was.
“Cage,” I whispered. “Bring the light back here.”
He reappeared at my side, then directed the beam of light to follow my dancing fingers. “What is it?”
“I’m not sure, but I think . . .” I swallowed, taking in the general layout of the room. “I think these could be computers of some sort. Cage, this might be their command center.”
He leaned forward, interested. “Can you make anything of it?”
I squinted at the symbols and ran my fingers over them. They shifted, becoming something else, and after only a few seconds I gave it up. “No.”
“Well, let’s look around, anyway. Maybe we’ll find your big red self-destruct button.”
I snorted and set off in one direction, letting him take the light in the other. The console’s illumination didn’t provide enough light to see by, but it did break the utter darkness and let me explore the space. Predictably, I found nothing but more consoles.
A door slid open with a soft hiss, and I jogged to Cage’s side. He’d used the spare screwdriver to open an exit. “Don’t wander off by yourself,” I snapped, fear making me angry.
He turned on me, annoyance written plainly across his face, but caught himself before he spoke. “Sorry,” he murmured, running a hand through his hair in what I was coming to recognize as a nervous gesture. “I found a door and thought I’d try it. I wasn’t planning on leaving without you.”
I wanted to spend more time on the consoles, but they weren’t doing us much good at the moment. Better to explore the whole ship, see what we were up against, and return if need be. “I almost wish we’d run into one of the creatures just so we’d know where they are,” I whispered to Cage as we shone our light into the next area. After the brief repose, the pitch black seemed even darker. “They’re here somewhere. They can’t all be napping.”
“I know.” He stepped through the door, and I followed.
This was the first area we’d entered that wasn’t a smooth-walled circle. There were actual corners here—jagged black edges to the walls. It reminded me of the outside of the ship, and I suspected we’d reached the final layer, the outer edge. Cage aimed the penlight at the wall, and I frowned. Something hung near the top. “Are those . . . ?”
Cage stepped closer, his no
strils flaring in alarm. “They look like . . . manacles?”
They did look like manacles. A set of metal straps hanging from chains—adjustable, but even at their largest, far too small to hold the creatures.
“Don’t jump to conclusions,” I said, more to myself than him. “Let’s check things out.” We picked a direction at random and set off to our left, rounding a corner.
Cage illuminated something against the wall. It took me a second to figure out what I was looking at, but when I got it, I almost screamed. I jammed both hands over my mouth, stifling the sound, managing to keep a grip on the stun gun even as I pressed it against my cheek.
“Kenz!” Cage caught my arm. “What did you . . . ?”
His voice trailed off as his light caught a dangling foot—definitely human, wearing a heavy combat boot. Slowly, he raised the light, tracing a leg, a belt, the curve of a breast, until his light came to rest on her face.
Rita.
TWENTY-EIGHT
HER EYES WERE CLOSED, AND her arms were manacled above her head. She dangled from the ceiling, coated in some sort of clear, sticky liquid—was it the same junk the aliens slumbered in? “Rita?” I asked, my voice shaky. I reached a trembling hand for hers.
Cage’s hand clamped over my wrist, arresting my approach. “We don’t know what that liquid is or what it does.”
“I can’t just leave her here!” I cast my gaze around, searching for a solution. “Gloves. The gloves from the XE suits. We can go back for them.”
He hesitated. “All right. I’ll go. Wait here.”
I started to argue, but he vanished before I formed the words.
I advanced on Rita, fumbling in the darkness, tempted to ignore Cage’s directive. My fingers found the place where the manacles bit into her wrists, making my own arms swell in sympathy. Drawing closer, I strained to catch her breathing, but no sound penetrated the heavy haze of silence.
Cage was gone less than two minutes, more than long enough for the silence and creepiness of the ship to get to me. I jumped a mile at the blast of wind heralding his return and damn near shot him in my panic. “The suits were right where we left them,” he said, dropping both pairs of interior gloves—thin, cloth affairs—and one pair of bulky XE gloves at my feet. He didn’t seem to notice that I hastily holstered my weapon, blood surging to my cheeks at the thought of what I’d almost done. “Everything seems normal. I stopped to examine the cuffs we saw before. There’s a slot along the back that feels like the claw spaces on the doors. I think if I jam the screwdriver in there, the cuffs will release.”
