Night of Flames

by J. J. Green

  He’d been taken aback when he’d seen the ire on Dr. Crowley’s face as he joined her in the line to board the shuttle—Lauren and Belle had gone on ahead. The black-haired woman had been striding away from the doctor, so he’d only seen her from behind, but the stiffness of her back indicated that she was also raging.

  “Is something wrong?” Ethan asked.

  Dr. Crowley expelled a short huff of frustration. “You probably don’t want to open that can of worms, Ethan. Some people...” she said, her gaze on the retreating woman’s figure, “some people are just unable to let things go.”

  “Oh.” Ethan would have liked to know more, but Dr. Crowley’s stormy face prevented him from pushing her.

  “I mean,” she exclaimed, “it’s been nearly two centuries. It’s time to move on.”

  Ethan nodded sympathetically, though he still had no idea what the doctor was talking about. He didn’t think he’d ever seen her in such a passion. He wondered if she had some bad history with the other Woken woman from before the Nova Fortuna had left Earth.

  He must have been looking puzzled because Dr. Crowley eyed his expression before giving a short laugh. Her anger drained from her face. Passing a hand across her brow, she shook her head and sighed. “I’m sorry, Ethan. I shouldn’t have let her wind me up so badly. I’m a foolish old woman sometimes. My friend has her reasons for thinking as she does. She can’t help being paranoid. I just wish she could understand that we need to look to the future now. The Earth we knew is far away and long ago.”

  The line to board the shuttle had shuffled forward without them, and the person waiting behind told them to move up.

  Ethan’s skin prickled with excitement at the idea of going down to the surface. The Planet or the New Home was how everyone referred to it. The Manual stated that the world should not have a name until the first settlement was built. Then, the colonists would hold the Naming Ceremony where everyone could put their suggestions forward and vote on a final choice through several elimination rounds.

  Though he had no name for it, Ethan’s heart raced whenever he imagined what the planet was like. He could hardly imagine how it would feel to breathe a natural atmosphere, to look up into a sky or at a far horizon, and to walk on the ground rather than a starship’s deck. The Nova Fortuna’s circumference and spin created artificial gravity to match that of the new planet, but Ethan was sure that treading its surface would feel very different.

  They stepped aboard the shuttle, and Ethan’s excitement quickly drove thoughts of Dr. Crowley’s disagreement with the black-haired woman from his mind.

  TOGETHER, ETHAN AND the dark-haired Woken woman organized teams to search the compound for the creatures and kill them with fire. Gradually, the tide began to turn, and the colonists began to take control.

  As a patch of lightening sky and dimming of the stars signaled the rise of the new sun, the settlers began to slow down their sweeps of the encampment. Some had already stopped entirely and given themselves up to grieving over those who had died.

  Ethan and the Woken woman went to the barn. Ethan spread a blanket over Dr. Crowley’s remains after they’d set alight and driven off the creature that was still feeding on her.

  After covering up Dr. Crowley, Ethan sat on a cot. Something inside him broke, and he put his head in his hands and bawled like a baby. He could hardly believe he would never speak to the doctor again; that they would never have one of their long conversations about Earth, hope, and the meaning of life ever again; that he would never see the faraway look in her faded blue eyes when she talked of her past.

  And in the depths of his grief, he couldn’t even begin to think of Lauren.

  He became conscious of a hand on his shoulder. The Woken woman was sitting beside him.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said, silent tears streaming down her face. “Meredith was a wonderful woman.”

  Ethan realized she was referring to the doctor. He’d never even known her first name.

  “She was,” he said. “She was a good friend too.”

  The woman nodded. “I wish our last conversation hadn’t been an argument.”

  Ethan swallowed and wiped his face with the shirt still wrapped around his hand. His skin was still raw from touching the creature that had killed Lauren. “What was the argument about?”

  The woman glanced at the door of the barn before replying, “Did Meredith ever tell you that powerful anti-science factions on Earth protested the Nova Fortuna expedition?”

  “Dr. Crowley did say a lot of people had turned against things they’d decided weren’t natural.”

  “That’s right,” said the woman. “That was one of the reasons we decided to leave without waiting for the development of a Faster-Than-Light starship engine. We thought that if we waited much longer, the public sentiment against the project would become so strong that investment would be pulled and the whole thing would be canceled.”

  “But you made it, right?” Ethan said, wondering why these historical facts were still important enough to argue about.

  “Yes, we made it. We got away. But...” The woman paused. “Hey, I don’t know your name.”

  “Ethan.”

  “I’m Cariad,” the woman said. “You did some great things tonight, Ethan. When everything was in chaos and everyone else was panicking, you stayed in control. Without your help, more people would have died.”

  He was about to object to her assessment, but she held up a hand to silence him.

  “Whatever you think, what I said is true. I think I can trust you. I’m going to tell you something that I want you to keep secret until, and if, it becomes necessary that more people should know.” She got up and checked outside the barn before returning to the cot.

  “Before we departed Earth, I and some of the other founders suspected that one or more members of the Natural Movement had infiltrated the project and were planning to come with us, either as Gens or in suspended animation. We insisted that a cache of weapons be secreted aboard to fight them if necessary.”

  Ethan’s eyebrows rose. “Weapons? But the Mandate says—”

  “I know what the Mandate says. The new world is to be free of the scourge of human conflict. But we argued that if we were inadvertently bringing along factions who opposed our plan, we had to be able to defend ourselves against them.” Cariad sighed. For a moment the passing of the years she’d spent in a near-death state showed in her features.

  “It’s an old argument,” she went on, “but I believe weapons are a necessary evil. Sadly, most of those who agreed with me didn’t survive the Waking process. A few are still suspended. I was the only one around to argue that we should bring the weapons down to the planet surface. That was what I was talking to Meredith about while we were waiting to board the shuttle. I was hoping to persuade her at the last minute. The Nova Fortuna’s systems are heavily protected against sabotage. We made sure of that. If someone from the Natural Movement had wanted to jeopardize the settlement, the first opportunity would have been tonight.”

  “The electricity to the fence had been turned off,” Ethan said. “And the director said the comm module had been sabotaged.”

  “Exactly.”

  “But...that’s crazy. Whoever did those things would have been committing suicide.”

  “You have no idea how fanatical that Natural Movement was,” Cariad said. “Many of them didn’t hesitate to die for their cause.”

  “But...” Ethan’s mind was whirring. “Do you think they knew about the creatures?”

  “It’s possible. They’d had infiltrated most areas of government and the scientific community. Someone could have easily lost some data.”

  “They’re coming back,” screamed a voice outside. “They’re climbing the fence. Get the fire. We need more fire.”

  Ethan and Cariad raced out of the barn. While they’d been talking the sky had brightened, and the edge of the rising sun was cresting the waving fronds surrounding the camp. At the now-visible fence,
a patch of dark shapes moved.

  Ethan ran over to see what was happening. His heart froze. The creatures were climbing over the bodies of their fellows that still clung tenaciously to the electrified wires. Whether some had sacrificed themselves to create a safe path for the others was impossible to tell, but the bridge of corpses was effective. The creatures were swarming across, and beyond the fence, hundreds, perhaps thousands of their squat grayish-brown bodies swarmed among the vegetation.

  Cariad caught up to him. The color drained from her stricken face as she turned to Ethan and said, “I don’t think there’s anything left to burn.”

  The pile of dead vegetation that had fallen inside the fence had been almost entirely used up when they’d fought off the creatures’ first attack, and the materials they’d brought from the ship wouldn’t burn—deliberately so. But without fire, how could they kill the creatures?

  The first shriek came. All the horror of the previous night returned to Ethan. Unless they could find a way to fight off the wave of creatures, they were all going to die in agony.

  Cariad said, “What can we do?”

  Slowly, Ethan shook his head. He was out of ideas. The weapons Cariad had mentioned were kilometers above them aboard the Nova Fortuna. But then Ethan recalled his idea the previous night.

  “If we get everyone inside the barn...” he said.

  “...we might last out until the shuttle returns,” Cariad finished. “You take that half of the compound.” She gestured right.

  Another shriek resounded among the increasing screams, shouts, and cries.

  Ethan started to run. “Go to the barn,” he yelled at the colonists.

  Cariad went in the opposite direction.

  As Ethan ran and called out to the settlers, a terrifying thought occurred to him. What if everyone went to the barn and the creatures got inside too? They would be trapped, served up to the voracious organisms like dinner on a plate. But it was the only thing they could do.

  All around Ethan, men and women were heeding his instruction and streaming past him on their way to the barn, but shrieks still ripped the air. More people were dying. Everywhere he looked, the creatures’ low forms were roving the ground, looking for easy victims. It was only his speed as he ran that saved him from being targeted. He just hoped he could keep up his fast pace until he’d swept his half of the compound and returned to the barn. He hoped Cariad could too.

  The sun was above the vegetation now, but Ethan estimated they had an hour or longer until the shuttle was due from the ship. He wasn’t sure they could hold out that long from the sustained attack, nor how they could reach the safety of the shuttle when it finally arrived.

  He’d reached the far end of the compound. His throat ached from shouting, and his leg muscles trembled from the exertion of running all night and morning. Exhaustion was making him want to retch.

  A few of the creatures were motionless, hunched over on the ground, no doubt digesting the settlers they’d caught. More of them were roaming around, covering the distance between Ethan and the barn. To get to safety, he would have to run the gauntlet.

  He set off. Deprived of slower prey in the nearly empty compound, the organisms closest to Ethan ceased their aimless wandering and turned as he sped past. As they turned, others farther away followed their movement and converged on him. He dug deep into his depleted reserves and sped up.

  He was running for his life.

  The barn drew closer quickly, but not quickly enough. The creatures were nearly upon him. One reared up in front of him. Ethan kicked the middle of its scaly belly. As the thing toppled onto its back, its nearest fellows fell upon it, covering it with their bodies and sticky white digestive fluid.

  A creature ran across Ethan’s path. He leapt over it and landed heavily on the other side, almost overbalancing. Somehow, he stayed upright and continued running, through sharp stabs of pain pierced his ankle.

  The barn was only fifty meters or so distant. He just had to make it that far.

  He was approaching the side of the barn, and creatures were swarming toward him around it, which meant that no one else was available for them to chase. Which meant... A wave of horror washed over him. He rounded the side of the barn. The doors were closed.

  He was alone outside with the creatures.

  The organisms were drawing rapidly closer. Ethan spun around. A hum sounded above him, but he couldn’t take his eyes off the creatures that were surrounding him. They’d killed Dr. Crowley and Lauren and they were were going to kill him too. All his short life aboard the Nova Fortuna, all the learning and preparation he’d done had come to this: A lonely, grisly death.

  A squat, grayish-brown form made a run at him. He kicked the creature, lifting its edge, spinning it over and onto its back, where others quickly claimed it. Ethan’s shock and fear were turning to anger, then rage. He was determined to die fighting.

  Another creature approached and reared up. Ethan kicked that one too. He wondered how long he would last. Dimly, he heard the hum grow louder, but he couldn’t pay it any mind. He had maybe another few seconds of life.

  A shadow fell on his back, cooling the warmth of the morning sunlight. He turned. A massive creature, around three meters tall, was rearing up. Ethan ran directly at it, his head down, and butted it square in the middle.

  But as he turned again, another was already rearing, closer this time. He stepped backward and tripped over the one that he’d just butted, or rather another that had clamped down upon it. Before he could do anything to save himself, he was on the ground. He struggled to rise, but as he put weight on his injured ankle his leg bent beneath him and he fell again.

  This was it.

  Ethan looked up at a descending mass of scales. His heart seemed to seize up along with the rest of his muscles. He held his breath and closed his eyes, waiting for the inevitable agony.

  But nothing happened. He opened his eyes. Where the creature had been was the sky and a faint trail of vapor. The air was filled with fizzing sounds and the smell of burning. A brilliant light flashed. He covered his eyes with his arm. Too late. He was blinded. A green afterglow was all he could see.

  Ethan squeezed his eyes shut and futilely shook his head to clear his vision. A deep bass rumbling resounded and the ground vibrated. It was the shuttle. The shuttle had arrived. But it was early, and the people aboard it were shooting the creatures with weapons. That didn’t make sense. Cariad had said that the weapons cache had been a secret hardly anyone knew about.

  The fizzing noise was dying down. An acrid reek choked Ethan, and he coughed and retched. Slowly, his sight was beginning to return. Something dark approached. One of the creatures. He shuffled backward on all fours, his burned palms shooting out bolts of pain.

  “Whoa, take it easy,” came a man’s voice. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  Ethan stopped and blinked in the direction of the voice. The dark shape hadn’t been a rearing creature. It was a man. Someone had come out of the barn to help him.

  But as Ethan squinted up at the figure that was becoming more defined in his sight, his confusion increased. The man was wearing clothes of a type he’d never seen before. They were nothing like the clothes the Nova Fortuna colonists wore.

  Behind the man was another puzzle. Ethan saw what looked like a shuttle craft, but it was much smaller than the Nova Fortuna’s. The craft was also sleek and streamlined for speed.

  “Can you stand?” asked the man. “There’s nothing to be afraid of. We’re exterminating the rest of your little infestation.”

  Ethan nodded, surprise stilling his tongue. The man reached down and grabbed Ethan’s forearm, carefully avoiding his burnt hand, and pulled him to his feet. When Ethan wobbled on his sore ankle, the man pulled his arm across his shoulder for support.

  “Come with me,” he said. “I’ll fix you up. We have medical supplies on board the ship.” He began leading Ethan toward the shuttle.

  “What...” Ethan croaked. He swallowed an
d coughed. “What’s going on?”

  THE WOMAN WAS WHITE-faced and shaking as they led her out to the center of the compound three days later, but Ethan didn’t feel even a twinge of pity. She’d been a nursery worker, of all things. He hadn’t known her, and he was glad of it. He couldn’t imagine what it would feel like to be the friend of someone responsible for so many horrible deaths. He couldn’t imagine knowing someone closely and never guessing that they had been brought up from birth to ensure the failure of humankind’s first extrasolar colony.

  The sun was high and the day was warm. A steady wind stirred the fronds of vegetation around the camp as it had on that first, terrible night.

  As she was marched to the spot where she would die in front of those who had volunteered to bear witness, the woman stumbled. The guards flanking her pulled her up and forced her to walk on. Her sobs rose above the rush of the wind.

  Ethan’s rescuer sat next to him. He couldn’t help but think of the man and his shipmates as people from the future. Arriving at the last minute in humanity’s first FTL ship, it seemed to Ethan that they were almost superhuman. With their state-of-the-art technology and advanced knowledge, they were vastly superior to him, a lowly farmer.

  He wished that Lauren and Dr. Crowley were alive to meet the newcomers. His head sank low. He didn’t think he would ever forgive himself for not preventing the deaths of the two people who were most important to him.

  “You don’t feel sorry for her, do you?” the man asked, mistaking his glum look.

  Ethan shook his head. “So many people died. I wish I’d done more.”

  The man placed a friendly hand on his shoulder. “You were a hero. You turned on the electricity to the fence, and along with your friend you fought off the first wave of the creatures. You bought some time, long enough for us to arrive.”