by J. N. Chaney
“That is precisely why I doubt your story, Captain,” said Dressler. “However, I’ll humor you on this. If what you’re saying is true and these people are telling you the whole truth and not a fabrication, then it changes everything, particularly about those animals.”
“How do you mean,” asked Freddie.
“Well, we’re talking about genetically engineered humans, correct?” she asked. “That implies they may retain some level of basic intelligence. More importantly, it raises the question of what the Union might do should they come into contact with these creatures.”
“Dissect them, I’d imagine,” I said.
She nodded. “There’s also the matter of there being an entire race of people on this planet who appear to hold a particular set of genes, the likes of which have only ever been seen in the DNA of a small girl.” She cleared her throat.
“I’m surprised, Doc,” I said, examining her. “You finally letting go of all that union brainwashing?”
She scoffed. “I’m not brainwashed, Captain. I’m simply aware enough to know how zealous the military is. They want better soldiers, more data, and bigger guns. They’ll do whatever it takes to make that happen, even if it means killing all of these people.”
I had to admit, Dressler’s sentiment caught me off guard. She seemed the cold, scientific type. Someone who wouldn’t have a problem experimenting on a living person if it meant more knowledge along the way.
“I know how desperate the government is to acquire additional resources. The Union is, like any other large government body, intent on securing its borders and protecting its citizens. Doing so requires them to seek out and acquire whatever tools they can.” She sighed. “I’m not particularly fond of the war machine, despite my role in it. Violence might be necessary sometimes, but if I can avoid it, then I’m happy to do so.”
I leaned back, crossing my arms. “What are you trying to say?”
“That sometimes soldiers get carried away,” she finally said. “They stop thinking about long-term consequences and focus on the present. But I’m in the business of objectivity, and right now I see a group of people who don’t deserve to have their bodies ripped apart and studied in a lab.”
I stared at her for a moment. Dressler wasn’t a fool, it seemed. Sure, she still couldn’t shake her union loyalties, but at least she had the intelligence to see the dangers here. She knew what powerful men would do with powerful things, and it scared the hell out of her.
“Are you saying you’ll help me?” I asked.
“If it means saving all of these people, then I’ll do my duty,” she answered. “Not for you, and not for the Union, but for them.”
“That’s good enough for me.”
* * *
I decided it would be a good idea for us to get Siggy patched into the network and download all the information we could find in the facility.
“That should not be a problem, sir,” said Sigmond. “I only require a series of repeater stations between The Renegade Star and the network interface.”
“How many do we have?” I asked.
“Approximately eight devices,” informed Sigmond.
I clasped my hands together. “I guess that’ll have to do.”
Freddie was standing right next to me, listening to the entire conversation and waiting for orders. “I’m surprised you have something like that on the ship,” he said, after a moment.
“You’d be surprised how many times I have to do shit like this in my line of work,” I explained. “Just five months ago, I stole some data from an arms dealer. It was a bit like this, with me running underground, carrying network repeaters and dropping them as I went. Of course, I didn’t have to deal with any fucked up animals or a bunch of albinos, but whatever. Close enough.”
“I’m just glad you know what you’re doing, Captain,” said Freddie.
“Me?” I balked, opening the locker and removing several of the repeaters. “You’re coming with me. Or did you really think you were going to get to sit all of this out?”
He looked startled. “I, uh, I guess I thought you didn’t want me getting in the way.”
“In the way?” I asked, stuffing the repeaters in a small bag and handing them to Freddie.
He took them, wrapping the bag around his belt.
“Someone has to carry all this shit. I wasn’t kidding with you about those Boneclaws, Fred. I need to keep my gun out.”
He swallowed. “O-Okay, then.”
I opened another locker and retrieved a rifle, handing it to him. “Just in case,” I told him.
“Right,” he said, strapping it to his back. “I’ll do my best.”
Ten
I had Abby and Karin gather everyone together on the upper level of the cargo bay after Freddie and I were done.
Naturally, I restocked my ammunition, since I used most of it in the last run. Once Abby showed up, she did the same, exchanging her magazines and even replacing her pistol with a rifle. We’d need all the firepower we could get if we ended up running into another Boneclaw.
“Are you certain you want to go down there again?” asked Karin. “My men might not be able to protect all of you.” She glanced at Freddie.
“We’ll be fine,” I told her. “Besides, Janus promised you’d look after my crew, so you’d best not fuck it up.”
“He mentioned saying that,” she said. “Along with the reason you need to go there.”
“Then, you know what’s at stake,” I said.
She nodded. “The safety of my people, which you’ve endangered by being here.”
“I can leave right now if you want. We’ll see who else shows up. Maybe they’ll be nice. Who knows?”
“Easy, Jace,” said Abigail, walking up beside me. “Just do the job and try not to be such an ass about it.”
“Mind who you’re calling an ass, lady?” I scoffed.
Dressler, Freddie, Abigail, and I joined the natives in the open field after a few moments. We were all geared and ready, each of us armed, with the exception of Dressler, who I still didn’t completely trust. I was pretty sure she understood. After all, she still didn’t trust me, either.
I ordered Siggy to close the gate and seal the ship behind us. If anything went wrong and we didn’t show back up in the next 24-hour period, Siggy had my permission to take off into space and wait for Athena to show up with Titan.
I hated making contingency plans. It always meant I had to think about the possibility that I might not come back. That shit was horrifying.
We stomped our way through the snow, one step at a time. The cold wind nipped at my cheeks, stinging harder than I liked.
Shortly after re-entering the cave, using the same entrance Abigail and I had first come through, I looked at Karin and asked, “How often do you people come here?”
“There’s not much reason to anymore,” she explained. “All the good resources have been taken out by now. We’ve had to expand our scavenging efforts to the outer compartments, although even those have yielded fewer results in recent years.”
“I guess that’s bound to happen after you spend hundreds of years trying to live on scraps,” I said.
“Believe it or not, there was a time that this facility was filled with highly advanced technology. Janus has shown me images and recordings that make it look unbelievable,” she said, her eyes drifting.
“Yeah, well, it’s all gone now,” I said, right as we entered the first warehouse.
Abigail climbed down the ladder, followed by Freddie and Dressler, and then me. Dressler seemed to want to explore, but I’d already been there and done that. “There’s nothing to see here,” I told her. “The good stuff is down that way.” I pointed to the gaping hole in the wall.
She stopped, her eyes widening at the destroyed brick and metal. “Did one of those creatures do that?”
“What do you think?” I asked, walking past her and into the tunnel.
I could almost feel the fear in the air, mostly fr
om Freddie and Dressler. They had to be concerned about what we might find, but with so many soldiers at our side, I was pretty sure there was nothing to worry about.
After a while, Karin informed me that we were drawing close to the nesting grounds of the Boneclaws. I noted that we were also near the weird little piles of bones that Abby and I had found. “Stay on alert,” she said, looking at her team. “Keep your ears and eyes open.”
We passed through the bones soon enough, but this time they were different. This time, several had been scattered, no longer neatly stacked.
I could see by Karin’s expression that this was unusual, possibly even bad. She didn’t say anything, so I left it alone, but I wasn’t an idiot. I knew this wasn’t normal.
Karin tightened her grip on the staff. We moved quickly, passing into the section with the lit-up consoles.
Freddie and I had placed five of the seven repeaters by this point, each one nestled between rocks or against the wall. I hoped that doing so would keep them hidden away from any of the animals that might pass through.
“Sending verification signal, sir,” said Sigmond. He’d been doing this regularly, every few minutes.
I said nothing, but felt relief to know the line was still working. Only a little further and we’d have this whole mess sorted out once and for all.
It was about this time that I felt a hand grab my shoulder. I turned to see Dressler staring up at me, a wide-eyed expression on her face. She had her mouth open, like she was about to say something, sweat dripping from her for forehead, despite the cold. She raised a finger to touch her lips, then to her ear.
I tried to listen, but couldn’t hear anything. Neither could anyone else. Not yet, anyway. I was about to ask her what her problem was when suddenly I heard a clank from somewhere down the tunnel.
Everyone stiffened, but quickly raised their weapons, pointing in the direction of the sound.
We each sat there, hardly breathing.
Another sound, similar to the first, echoed through the darkness.
That was when I felt the ground tremble, the way it did the last time I saw a Boneclaw. This is it, I thought, clutching my rifle.
I stared down the barrel, aiming at the edge of the wall, near the tunnel. A shadow appeared, moving gently against the farthest wall as the animal rounded the corner. I saw white fur and a black nose. It was a tiny animal with long ears and whiskers. It bounced from its hind legs, hopping forward before stopping to look at us.
I felt the tension in the air dissipate, and each of us breathed sighs of relief.
One of the soldiers let out a nervous laugh. “Only a synx,” he said.
The little creature hopped again, twitching its nose and whiskers.
I started to ask what the fuck a synx was, when I felt another tremor beneath my feet.
Ahead of us, I heard something grunt, there in the next room.
I turned, slowly, hoping I was wrong.
The dead eyes, or lack thereof, of another Boneclaw stared back at me. It was hunched over and standing in the doorway.
Staring at the monster, I reached over and touched Abigail’s shoulder. She turned, looking terrified. Everyone raised their weapons.
Karin held a fist up, and everyone waited.
The monster paused, twitching its ears.
She lowered her hand and the other soldiers fired, hitting the animal across its body.
The Boneclaw let loose another cry and came charging, sweeping its long claws against the metal floor.
The room filled with a loud grind, the noise piercing my ears and making me cringe.
I aimed my rifle and fired a spray of bullets. They hit the animal’s rough hide, but only a few shots pierced its skin.
The Boneclaw kept coming, despite all our firepower, snarling and spitting.
A sudden blast of blue energy split the animal’s side, spilling guts and blood onto the cold floor.
Drops of it hit me in the face, but I ignored it and focused instead on reloading. The animal wailed loudly, filling the entire facility with noise. Between that and the gunfire, I could only imagine how many of these things had heard the commotion.
The animal collapsed, holding itself up with one arm, digging its claws into the floor before swiping blindly to the side, no doubt in frustration. Its arm slammed into one of the consoles, ripping and tossing it several meters behind.
Lucia took a step forward, towards the beast, and fired her staff a final time. The blast struck the animal directly in the stomach, finally killing it.
The victory was short-lived. Several more screams echoed through the compound, coming from all directions.
“We need to move!” I snapped, knowing what was about to happen if we stayed here.
“Where?!” asked Freddie.
Karin pointed in the direction the animal had come. “Inside! Quickly!”
No one argued, and we all ran together into the next corridor. I heard stomping coming from behind us, and tremors ran through the floor like a stampede. I let the others go first and held the rear. As Lucia and Freddie passed me, I turned back to see several shadows appear in the same place the tiny animal had been. A second later, the first of them rounded the corner—another Boneclaw, followed by two others.
It clutched the bouncing creature in its jaw, biting down on it with a loud snap. Blood ran from its mouth and neck as it stood there, head tilting, a blank stare on its dead eyes.
I turned and ran further into the dark, away from the nightmare behind me.
They wailed, echoing cries filling the tunnels. The ground trembled as the creatures followed. It felt like the building might collapse in on itself, but I didn’t look back.
One of the soldiers tumbled forward, falling on the floor in his hurry to escape. I nearly ran right over him, but at the last second managed to leap out of the way. He struggled to get back up, so I grabbed him by the arm and pulled. “Get up! Get up!” I shouted. “Move!”
He scrambled onto his feet, joining the rest of our team as we piled into the next room. Karin already had her hands on the door, ready to close it the second we were inside.
She started to push, even before I was through. I turned around and grabbed the edge of the door, then pushed. On the other side, the animals were running our way, screaming their ear-splitting cries. Right before we shut it, I caught a glimpse of the Boneclaw’s face, close enough I could have reached out and touched him.
The door locked in place with a loud snap, and the light turned red. The animals slammed into it, pounding against the metal with their heavy fists.
“That isn’t going to hold!” shouted Lucia.
“What are you talking about?” asked Dressler. “Did you see how thick that door is?”
“Not thick enough!” snapped Abigail, who had already seen what these animals could do.
“Right!” said Karin. “Keep moving, all of you!”
We did as she said and fled further inside, leaving the creatures as far behind as we could. They’d eventually break through, but it would take time. Long enough for us to get to where we had to go, to put space between us.
Karin led us through a winding corridor and around to another large room, this one with dozens of active machines, consoles, and frozen equipment.
It had been a while since I dropped the last repeater, so I set one behind a nearby workstation, out of sight. “Sigmond, are you hearing me?”
“I read you, sir,” he answered in a slightly distorted voice.
“That’s no good,” I muttered, but I knew there was nothing I could do about it. We had gone so far down into this place that even the repeaters couldn’t keep the signal strong enough. I had to keep going and hope that the final repeater would be enough, once we reached the goal. “Karin, how much further?”
“Another hall or two,” she told me, waving for everyone to keep up.
We started to move, but a sudden pound shook the room, rattling my knees. I stopped, slowly looking back at the locke
d door.
Another thud, quickly followed by several more, and each was louder than the last. Each vibration stronger in my chest.
The door bent with the last hit.
Fuck.
The metal ripped from its hinges and fell against the floor, sending a hard gust of air and deafening noise throughout the room.
On the other side, four Boneclaws stood together, roaring spit and showing their teeth. They were bigger than the doorway, but I knew that wasn’t going to stop them.
I took a step back.
The beast snarled, digging claws into the doorway trying to squeeze through. The others screamed, pushing the first one so hard it began to whine from the pain.
I didn’t even bother to fire my weapon, but bolted in the opposite direction instead. I was a man possessed.
I entered the nearest hall, but heard metal straining behind me as the animals broke through the door. Several yelps came, followed by stomping feet.
“Move your fucking asses!” I yelled as I ran, spotting the rest of the team ahead of me. They seemed to be struggling with another door, trying to swipe the access pad without success.
“It won’t let us in!” said Freddie.
“Blast the damn thing open if you have to!” I shouted, still a few meters away.
Another hallway was connected to this one, nearby, branching to the left. “We can take this way,” insisted Dressler.
“Wrong way,” said one of the soldiers.
Before anyone could argue the point further, the access pad activated. “I have it!” Karin snapped.
The door slid open and the team began to run inside.
Before I could move, Lucia looked at me with horrified eyes. “Get down!” screamed the old woman, lifting her staff to the ceiling.
I didn’t have to look behind me to know what she was seeing.
Lucia released a single shot from her staff, just above the Boneclaws.
The rocks came tumbling down, along with metal support beams. Clouds of dust erupted from the blast, blowing towards us and filling my eyes and mouth.
The nearby door slammed itself shut, the access pad switching from green to red, although I lost sight of it in all the commotion. The air was too thick to see much of anything.
