Colony Lost

by Chris Philbrook

  “Top hatch is open.”

  “It’s suicide,” Waren said between gasps.

  “Fuck off, get in the tank,” Dustin said. “That’s an order.”

  “Tank’s not safe. Top hatch is broken. Bolts are loose.”

  Waren leapt over a pile of bodies and pulled even further away from Dustin. Dustin looked at the open hatch and saw no defects.

  “How the fuck do you know that? I said get in. Just do it, Waren,” Dustin said.

  Waren skidded to a stop and faced Dustin.

  “No,” Waren said with fierce defiance. The tall marine raised his rifle and fired once at Dustin.

  Rail guns had no muzzle flash when fired. No explosive propellant was needed, just the power of the weapon’s magnetic accelerators. Dustin’s faceplate flashed an emergency icon the instant Waren’s weapon fired.

  Before his nerves relayed the pain of the fléchette round piercing his flesh, the armor told him his leg systems were compromised. Before his brain could tell his body to stop trying to run, his leg gave way, and he collapsed on his face. His suit then had the audacity to tell him he had begun to bleed and that he needed immediate medical assistance. Assistance Waren should’ve provided.

  “Waren? What the… ?”

  ”It’s better this way. You don’t have anyone to go home to anyway,” Waren said and sprinted past the abandoned Armadillo personnel carrier and into the plains beyond. Dustin fumbled his rifle up but the man had disappeared into a depression.

  Dustin looked down to his right thigh where Waren’s round hit him and saw a tiny hole in the hard black composite. He felt the back of his hamstring and found a slick hole in the plating there, too. The round had passed through.

  “Did Waren just shoot you? Am I reading that right? Did that just fucking happen?”

  Dustin grunted and got to his feet. A rail spike of pain skewered his leg and he forced his teeth shut to let the wave of agony pass. Behind him he could hear the army of monsters getting closer. He took a stiff step toward the APC, then another. He had to cross twenty meters. Twenty meters to survive.

  “Dustin are you okay?” Steve asked.

  “Yeah he shot me. No I’m not okay. It’s just a flesh wound. Waren, why the fuck did you shoot me?” Dustin snarled. He saw Waren’s suit icon still active on his screen. The traitorous marine was alive, and listening. “Answer me you prick.”

  Ten meters left.

  Silence. They were almost at his feet. Five meters.

  Dustin hobbled hard on the damaged limb as the horrific sounds grew louder behind him. Slavering, hungry noises that smelled his blood running. He slung his rifle and used his good leg to climb the rungs on the rear of the tank. As he pulled his body on top of the flat roof he could feel the trampling feet of the creatures vibrating the hard ground and the tank chassis.

  Tiny pings of hard claws on metal told him the skitterers were scrambling up the side of the tank. With his good leg he propelled his whole body forward and into the round opening of the hatch. As he fell he twisted his body to grab the edge of the hatch cover and yank it down. He plunged into the hard darkness of the tank’s interior, clipping the back of his helmet on the hatch rim and only managing a single finger on the handle to the door. As he fell he watched the lid tip past ninety degrees, then slam downward. In the last moment of light he saw two of the mutated skitterers slip into the gap, and onto his upside-down body.

  The insects stabbed at him with their largest arms, sinking their bony weapons into the hard surface of his upended leg armor. The stabbing blows came so fast he imagined a forest of woodsman’s axes lodging in trees, then being pried out a hundred times over in the darkness. He punched at the manic shapes that were just out of reach.

  “Fuckers! Get off me!” he screamed, shattering the silence of the tomb he’d crawled into.

  He kicked out with his left leg and managed to catch an alien with his heel. He pinned the creature against the ceiling of the tank with his boot and he ground as hard as he could, pushing his shoulders into something hard. The other monster fell on his face and began to pick and stab at his faceplate, obscuring his already hampered vision in the dark.

  “Dammit!” He gripped the creature around the neck and squeezed. He put all the hate, rage, betrayal and confusion he’d just experienced and made the hardest fist he ever had.

  The bug flailed–stabbing at his gauntlets and hand–but he kept his vice grip. The creature’s shell cracked, and he felt something wet and thick run down his arm.toward He tossed the corpse aside and drew his sidearm. With a mouth prompt, he switched his vision to thermal. He sighted on the bug and pulled the trigger.

  The pistol bucked hard in his slick hand and the muzzle flash flooded the space. Wet chunks of exploded insect rained down on his face. His heart pounded, and his chest heaved. Under it all, his leg throbbed.

  Dustin forgot about the pain and holstered his pistol. He turned his body right-side-up with all the strength he could muster. He found the handle to lock the hatch and yanked down as something pulled upwards with titanic strength. His entire body came up from the floor as he fought against the monster trying to get inside. Dustin grunted and reached down with his free hand to a safety bar at waist height. He yanked down with the hand on the lid and up with the hand on the bar and won the battle as a long, sharp claw slid into the gap. He grunted and heaved his arms together, shutting the lid with a clang. The thick ceramic and steel lid sheared down hard, severing the alien’s weapon clean off.

  He twisted the locking handle, sealing the cover shut. Bangs and heavy impacts came as the confused animals tried to defeat the armored vehicle’s hull. He collapsed into the tank commander’s chair.

  “Dustin please tell me you’re okay in there,” Steve said.

  Dustin tapped the side of his helmet and a tiny light flared, illuminating the interior of the tank. He found the dimly lit control panel on the inner hull and switched on the interior lights. Other than the slicks of blood, and the twitching carcasses of the two skitterers, the tank’s interior was pristine. No one had died inside it during the lost battle for Stahl.

  “Dustin?”

  “I’m alive. I’m wounded but I’m good.”

  “That’s fortunate.”

  It was Waren. He sounded calm, and detached. Emotionless. Worst of all, he sounded safe.

  “Why the fuck did you shoot me?”

  “Because it helped me get away.”

  “What the fuck did you mean about me not having anyone to go back to?”

  “It’s not important. Big picture stuff, Vindicator One. Above your pay grade.”

  “What’s your game, asshole? Did you do something to Melody? To Beagle? Are they okay? Is she okay? Is my baby okay? Waren you better fucking answer me. I swear to God.”

  “Baby huh? Didn’t know that. Gonna go dark, boys. I wish I could say it’s been a pleasure. Maybe we’ll meet again, maybe we won’t. Best of luck.”

  “Waren–”

  Waren’s icon went dark. He’d turned off his suit’s communication. A moment later, Waren’s location disappeared. The traitor had become invisible.

  “That cunt,” Steve said. “He’s a fucking traitor, a terrorist, isn’t he? Right beside us the whole fucking time.”

  “Protect yourself. Don’t let him get up the tree to you. He shot me, he’ll shoot you too. If he gets the laser communication system he’ll be off to the races and can do whatever he wants. Fucking asshole.”

  “What next?”

  “Tell the science nerds about what happened. We can’t let them get ambushed by him. I’m going to figure out how fucked I am, then we’re going to make a plan to find that prick, and put ten of these holes his chest.”

  Dustin put his palm on the hole in his armor and felt the slickness of his blood ooze through. Pain welled and throbbed.

  He better not have hurt Melody.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Atop a mushroom tower, Dampier Peninsula forest, planet of Selva<
br />
  20 October 163 GA

  “Dustin?” Are you awake?”

  A hiss of static filled the void in Steve’s ear. His suit told him Dustin had life signs, but his condition - and the effects of the leg wound he had suffered at Waren’s hands- was still unknown.

  “Vindicator One, are you on the net?”

  Again, nothing.

  Steve had peered through his rifle’s powerful scope at different locations since Waren’s murderous attack, but he kept going back to the tank and the sealed hatch. Over the past six hours the creatures had abandoned their futile attempts to open the tank by brute force, or guile. Steve had taken down nine of the half-humans.

  The laser unit sprang to life and he heard the voice of Lima Rasima, the geologist.

  “Sergeant Ziu? How is Sergeant Cline?”

  “Still no word, Miss Rasima.”

  “You must be very worried,” she said.

  “Yes.”

  “How badly is he hurt?”

  “Before he went dark he had a through-and-through on his right thigh. He said the wound was bad but not life threatening. I’m concerned with infection now. He had his blowout kit for injuries, but we don’t carry antibiotics for the long term care an infection could require. There’s a chance the tank had a better medkit, but that’s a shot in the dark.”

  “What will happen to him if he doesn’t receive adequate medical care soon?”

  “He’ll get a fever. The wound will run with discharge, or fail to clot. He’ll pass out, stop drinking water, dehydrate and slip into a coma. I don’t know, maybe worse and maybe not in that order. We haven’t experienced what kinds of infections we can get on Selva yet. He could be turning into a turtle for all we know. Waren would be the source on this, seeing as how he’s a medic. Was a medic. Whatever. Maybe Dustin will wake up in two hours speaking fluent French and doing jumping jacks.”

  Lima laughed. The sound was welcome. “Sergeant Ziu, you can’t get to him, can you?”

  Steve sighed, but he did it before transmitting. His frustration was his alone. “Leaving the tree here with Waren still unaccounted for would be bad. I have the high ground and a lot of supplies here. Theoretically I could make it to Dustin, but alone there’s little I can do for him. We work best in pairs.”

  “Maybe it’s time someone helped the marines.”

  “What are you suggesting?” Steve asked.

  “Nothing yet. Allow me some time to chat with my colleagues about what we can muster, and someone will get back to you.”

  “Don’t do anything stupid. Dustin wouldn’t want anyone to make a rash decision on his behalf. Your lives are more important than his.”

  “It’s a shame he’s not here to tell us that himself. Maybe we’d listen. Perhaps after we help him we’ll ask for his forgiveness. Until then, let us smart ones do a stupid thing. I’ll be in touch, Sergeant Ping-Pong.”

  The laser unit went silent, and Steve looked back down the barrel of his scope at the distant tank. He stayed objective, and ignored the festering knot of anger in his own belly.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Just outside the medical habitat, town of Stahl, planet of Selva

  20 October 163 GA

  Phillip lifted the square hatch on the roof of the science lab just wide enough for him to look out into the Selvan night. With narrowed eyes he looked for skitterers moving about. He saw nothing and heard nothing. He lowered the door and looked down from his vantage point atop a counter to the scientists gathered below. They looked hopeful.

  “Clear enough,” he said, mindful of his volume with the hatch cracked open to the threats of the world right near his head. He lifted the hood of the decontamination suit he wore up from his shoulders and over his head, covering his entire body with protective plastic. “Hand me the tube.”

  Micah lifted a plastic cylinder a meter and a half in length and handed it to the former marine. Phillip checked the ends to ensure he pointed it properly out the ceiling escape, and then took a small lighter from Micah. Lima climbed up behind Phillip on the counter and crouched low. She and Phillip both wore the lab suits designed to protect scientists from pathogens and chemical splashes. These suits were customized with hastily applied black ink to be less visible outside the hab. Their armor.

  “I fire, and thirty seconds later one of you has to fire again. Then once again every sixty seconds until we return or you run out. Talk to Steve to get updates about where we are, and what we’re dealing with.”

  “Don’t worry. Go get the man,” Micah said.

  “Be careful,” Margaret said.

  “Margaret, if I wanted to be careful I wouldn’t be doing this,” Phillip said with a snort. “You ready, Lima?”

  The tiny scientist nodded emphatically while biting her lower lip.

  Phillip lifted the hatch open with his free hand and aimed the cylinder out at a forty-five degree angle toward the armored personnel carrier and the wounded marine. He flicked the lighter, and held it to a small hole drilled in the side of the tube. A moment later the tube made a muffled thump and tried to jump out of Phillip’s hand. The projectile had been launched. The weatherman dropped the lighter toward Margaret and the tube toward Micah then leapt up and through the hatch. Once he had his feet under him he reached down and grabbed Lima’s outstretched hand and pulled her up into the nightmarish world of Selva’s monsters.

  Far above, a plastic jar turned-projectile soared high in the sky. The clear container had been filled with a mixture of chemicals that began to agitate and react as it soared. Phillip and Lima saw it descend like a meteor and hit the ground out of view.

  The container blew apart, erupting with a voluminous, chemical roar.

  Phillip’s body stiffened as he heard the clacking of a thousand alien feet. The low, hard creatures swarmed up to, around and beyond the habitat, like poisonous water flowing past stones in its path. The two scientists stood still while the monsters poured past them, oblivious that what they wanted stood in their path.

  Phillip climbed down the tubular steel ladder as fast as he could, skipping over the last few steps and jumping free to the ground. Lima did the same.

  The two sprinted hand in hand, their bulky suits crinkling and tripping them up every few steps.

  “We don’t have far to go, stay close,” Phillip said.

  “This is like swimming in shark-infested waters,” Lima said, struggling to catch her breath. “Maybe we should’ve made a steel cage.”

  “We definitely should’ve made a steel cage. But we work with what we have.”

  Behind them Micah fired off another round from their makeshift artillery. A moment later the shell impacted and detonated with a flash.

  Lima and Phillip rounded the bend past a storage container and saw the Armadillo. Atop it Phillip saw the 12.7 millimeter heavy machine gun and felt a surge of relief. If he had to, he could defend them. He didn’t know for how long, or if it would even be worth it to try, but the weapon offered some semblance of safety.

  It didn’t matter. They weren’t doing this to fight. They had come to save Dustin. That didn’t mean he wouldn’t take every last one of the monsters out.

  Lima went straight to the tank’s rear and began to climb to the hatch. Both scientists saw the dark slicks of blood on the tank’s hull.

  Phillip went to the rear ramp door and assessed the control panel mounted to its side. The touch screen flared red, illuminating a series of text options. Phillip scrolled through the menu, trying to find the command prompt to lower the door. Above, Lima wrestled with the hatch lever, attempting to muscle it open.

  Micah fired off another round into the sky and Phillip paused to watch it soar through the air and explode. He turned back when he heard the cover of the hatch squeak open. A large bolt came loose and fell from the door hinge. The lid went askew with another grinding, metallic noise and then fell downward with an ear-rattling bang.

  Lima disappeared down into the dark tank interior. Phillip returned to th
e menu, making sure nothing hungry approached them from the ground.

  Seconds later he had the menu defeated and the ramp door lowered. The armored door came to a rest on the ground with a five hundred kilogram thud.

  Inside on the floor of the tank, Dustin lay on his back, arms and legs splayed. His weapon and helmet were discarded to the side. Wrappers for meal replacement bars were strewn about as well as empty water bottles. At some point Dustin had taken off the right legging of his suit to expose his wounded limb. Phillip saw the bloated thigh where Dustin had been shot. Swollen amoebic shapes of purple and yellow formed on the pale skin around the wound. Top and bottom,infection had torn through the man’s quadriceps and hamstring. His chest rose and fell in shallow, erratic fits as he fought the growing presence of poison in his leg.

  “He’s infected bad,” Phillip said. “Look at that leg. Look at him sweat. He doesn’t have long if we can’t get antibiotics into him.”

  “Can you carry him?” Lima asked.

  “Yeah. Grab his rifle and helmet. Legging too. Don’t forget that. His pistol is holstered to it. Ready?”

  Phillip grabbed Dustin’s wrists and with Lima’s help dragged him out of the tank until he slid off the lowered ramp and onto the trampled grass. He lifted the marine until his limp body was upright, then muscled him up and over his shoulder.

  The weatherman took off as fast as he could under the weight.

  Lima sprinted ahead to the habitat, passing debris and bodies. She ignored the potential dangers of the shadows better than he did, and she covered more ground as a result. When she was five meters from the door, a sliver of light appeared at its edge. Their friends inside were ready, and the door opened.

  She ran with arms awkwardly held, one hand carrying the compact rail gun, the other holding Dustin’s helmet and leg armor. She waved her arms in triumph as the door opened.