by Greig Beck
“What the fuck was that!” yelled Tank as he lifted his brother away from the cave floor.
Mike was covered in a stinking jelly-like substance and had suffered deep lacerations and puncture wounds. The Johnson thing had released its sticky grip after being severed from the main creature and now lay deflating at their feet. In seconds it was nothing more than a six-foot long fleshy pad, almost colourless, with sucker protuberances. Lining the inside of the pad at the centre of the suckers were extendable tusks that accounted for Mike’s wounds. He hadn’t just been glued to the creature; he had been hooked to it as well.
Alex could feel his heart hammering in his chest; something horrendous lived in these caves and had been snatching people—the Hendsen party, Johnson, and it had tried to take Mike. He couldn’t imagine what the result would have been if it had attacked while everyone was here; he would have lost them all in a mad panic into half a dozen separate pitch-black caves. He sucked in a deep breath and helped the big HAWC pull his brother up off the cave floor.
“Tank, get him back to the medics, double time.”
It had not felt agony for countless generations. Its lifespan was measured in thousands of years, but it was not immortal; it could feel pain. Others of its kind had challenged it for dominance of its world and vicious fights were common. The deep cliffs and caves had echoed with the sound of the titans’ warring. Now its bleeding would attract the other giants; some creatures much like it, and some vastly different.
Its kind had encountered the warm bloods before and its deep racial memories had always shown them to be food; never had they been able to hurt it. There was no fear; it knew it would regenerate quickly in the warm, dark salty waters below the earth. However, its hunger was not yet sated, and now it felt something else it had not felt for centuries—anger.
Thirteen
Aimee was prodding the severed mass with one of Alex’s knives. “This is impossible; but I can see this is only a small piece of a much larger animal. There’s a terminal pad, dactylus and manus, carpal knobs and a partially severed stalk of a tentacle club. I think this is from a very large cephalopod-type creature.”
“Cephalopod? A squid? Is that what you’re telling us? We’re in a cave deep under the earth and we just got attacked by a freaking octopus! Dr. Weir, they don’t get that fucking big and they certainly don’t live on—or under—the land.”
Aimee looked up quickly at Silex, surprised by his fury and the way he had chosen to direct it at her. Before she could respond, Matt knelt down beside her and took the knife from her hand.
“I did my early thesis on aquatic deities and their influence on early cultures and you’d be amazed to know just how many races worshipped giant squid—or feared them. The Norse had their kraken, the Hawaiians their many-armed Kanaloa, the Babylonians had Dagon; there are dozens more. In their legends, they often came to shore and they were big. By the way, Dr. Silex, Babylon was hundreds of miles from any ocean.”
Aimee had kept her eyes on Silex who was flushed and breathing hard. She spoke directly to him as calmly as she could. “Adrian, I’m not sure it’s a cephalopod creature as we know it; but at least now the ammonium chloride makes sense—giant squid excrete the chemical and are literally filled with it.”
While Silex appeared to be on the verge of panic, Matt looked like a schoolboy who’d just been thrown a surprise party. “Hey, that’s right. I remember that from some of the cephalopod legends. The giant squid belongs to a group called ammoniacal squids. They have heavy concentrations of ammonia in their systems which gives them a few interesting little tricks. They can be neutrally buoyant and aren’t destroyed by the pressure depths. They also have a high resistance to freezing; and they are real smart . . . oh, and very aggressive. Ever seen that sketch of the French ship attacked by a kraken?”
“Oh, bullshit. It still doesn’t explain what it’s doing so far from the ocean.”
Aimee took the knife back from Matt’s hand and scraped the blade along the length of the pale mottled lump, collecting a jellied glob of its slime coating. She held the knife up for Silex to see. “I’ve been thinking about that; there is one little extra advantage of the ammonia chloride being suspended in a gel; it will stop this thing from drying out. I agree it needs water, but it looks to have adapted to be able to leave it when it wants.”
Alex took the knife back from Aimee, flicked the slime from the blade and resheathed it. “How was it able to copy us? That thing actually looked like Johnson before we severed it from the main creature.”
Aimee looked down again at the six-foot stump of flesh and shuddered. Though her scientific curiosity was aroused by the discovery, she felt uneasy and vulnerable at the thought that they had just rejoined a food chain that mankind hadn’t been part of for millions of years.
“This has got to be something that we’ve never seen before or at least has left no trace in the fossil record. I don’t know exactly how it can copy us, but I have an idea. This thing has been cut off for millions of years and has been free to follow a whole separate line of evolution, one that is limited by a vastly different environment. There are no dinosaurs or even whales to hunt it so its size would be unconstrained by predators. It may have needed to lay eggs or feed above the water, so it evolved an ability to hunt in these caves. And we know squid are intelligent; marine biologists have proved they’re at least as smart as dogs.” Aimee got slowly to her feet and looked at each member of the group; for different reasons, each one was now staring at her.
“But I think what is more relevant to what we have witnessed here is that some cephalopods actually have an ability to change colour and reproduce patterns and body shape to mimic other species. For instance, the sepioteuthis squid mimics parrot fish. It swims backwards and displays two false eye spots. The arms and tentacles are held together and waved from side to side like a fish’s fin. Because the parrot fish is herbivorous, mimicking them allows the squid to get closer to potential prey species that do not consider parrot fish to be their predators. I think this is exactly what is happening here. It’s just that we are the prey being mimicked.”
Margaret Anderson’s eyes were glistening with tears in the reflected light of the torches. Her face was white and she was visibly shaking. “You mean this giant thing is trying to catch us for food?”
Aimee had turned back to the large leaking mass of flesh before them and didn’t respond immediately. From this distance, the acrid smell was enough to make her eyes stream and replace her dispassionate scientific observations with an impression of cunning, sheer size and lethality. The thing was covered in serrated suckers the size of dinner plates and from the centre of each, in a retractable sheath, were curved tusks that had obviously been responsible for Mike’s deep wounds.
She shook her head; they should have been separated from this thing by millions of years and the thought of being anywhere near the entire creature made her stomach give a little shiver. She half-turned to Margaret and responded without looking at her.
“That would be my assumption, yes.”
With the help of the quiet medic Zegarelli, Mike sat up with a groan and gave a weary and very bloody thumbs-up. Alex could see the medic had done his job and the blood loss had been staunched by using a battlefield adhesive that glued the wound back together. The big medic was stabbing him with a hypodermic full of a universal antibiotic and adrenaline as Alex knelt down next to him. Zegarelli shone a small light into Mike’s eyes and asked, “What can I give you for the pain, Lieutenant? Morphine, Naloxone, whisky?”
“Give him some salt, he enjoys the pain.” Alex put his hand on Mike’s back to help him sit up straight.
Mike gave a small laugh which ended in a cough that coloured his lips red with blood. “Just the whisky, Bruno, and make it a double.”
By habit, Mike refused all painkillers as they were likely to deaden his reflexes. While he was looking down to fasten his suit Zegarelli caught Alex’s eyes. The medic made a small, flat wiping mot
ion with his hand and then pointed straight up. Alex understood; Mike needed to be topside.
Mike coughed again and spoke directly to Alex. “It came at me when I moved. It was so fast and strong; Johnson by himself wouldn’t have had a chance.”
Alex kept his hand on Mike’s shoulder to support him and nodded. All the evidence pointed to the Hendsen party encountering the same creature. If they had been lured into the deeper caves then surely they were all lost.
“Thank God you made it, Mike; we need to get you back to the surface to properly treat those wounds.” Alex stood and didn’t need to raise his voice in the cave, now silent as a tomb. “Party’s over, ladies and gentlemen. We need to evacuate this area immediately and re-establish contact with HQ. We are not equipped to deal with this type of biological threat.”
Matt stepped forward. “Captain Hunter, this is the most amazing find of the century. It makes the rediscovery of the coelacanth look like an old sardine sandwich. It could validate dozens of different cultural mythologies. If I can just get a few shots of the creature, and maybe a small sample we can at least give the next guys something to work with.”
Alex could understand Matt’s enthusiasm, but had no time for a debate. “Dr. Kerns, every time we have encountered this creature someone has died or been hurt. My priority now is to keep everyone safe and that means getting back to the surface, pronto. I’m sure you can request to return on any subsequent trip.”
“But . . . just two minutes.”
Alex thought of Johnson for a second and changed his mind. A sample would be needed, at least to develop a weapon for when he returned to kill it. “All right, you have one minute to take photographs of this mess and take a small sample. Everyone else we need to—”
Alex was interrupted by the sound of a sliding, liquid movement from deep within the cave. It gave the impression that something enormous was coming up fast. Alex looked at the group. Without being ordered, Tank and Takeda flattened against the walls and resumed their defensive positions; everyone else had their eyes on Alex. Most were frightened but still self-contained, only Margaret Anderson looked agitated. She had been standing to the rear looking ashen-faced ever since the tentacle club had been dropped in the middle of the group. She held her hands to her mouth and kept shaking her head as though to make the image of the giant unseen carnivore disappear. Alex could see her repeatedly swallowing and guessed she was going to be sick. She was like a deer on the verge of bolting. Before Alex could get around the group to her, she panicked and ran.
Zegarelli called her name and set off after her. Shit, thought Alex. He motioned to Takeda, pointed at the backs of the fleeing medics and made a chopping motion, indicating he stop them.
“This is a right mess, Captain.” Silex didn’t want to miss an opportunity to have a dig at Alex.
Alex ignored him and called to the group to shoulder their packs and follow at double time. Tank would bring up the rear. The last to leave was Matt, who was busy slicing off a sample of the tentacle. He tried to remove one of the tusks as well, but all he succeeded in doing was hurting his hand on the scythe-like edge.
Borshov had reached the basin floor with one of the Krofskoya assassins and was already unhooking himself from his ropes. The third assassin was preparing to climb down when the woman burst from the farthest cave, her cheeks covered in tears and her mouth stretched open in a silent “O” of fear. Just a few feet behind her was a man, his hand outstretched as if to catch hold of her. Borshov could tell just by the way they moved they were not HAWCs—good.
In the pitch-black of the caves, Borshov and his assassins were invisible to the newcomers. Borshov pointed with one hand at the man and made a throat-cutting signal to the nearest assassin. He moved quickly to intercept the woman.
There was a faint double phutt sound and Zegarelli dropped to the cave floor with two small holes above his left eye. In her panic, Margaret wasn’t aware that her colleague now lay dead behind her and she simply thought one of the HAWCs had managed to get in front of her when a darkened shape stepped into her wavering torch light. She didn’t have time to realise her mistake and her last conscious sensation was an explosion of pain as Borshov smashed his massive fist into her face.
Fourteen
Takeda was seconds too late, arriving only in time to see Zegarelli’s fallen body and Margaret knocked down by the Russian’s punch. He lifted his gun and fired twice before vanishing behind a small stand of stalagmites. Takeda’s compressed air blasts took the basin floor Krofskoya agent in the eye and the neck. The second shot was unnecessary, as his first pencil-thin blast of super-compressed air cut a hole from the eye, tore through the skull and exited out the back of his head as a stream of liquefied brain matter and cranial fluid.
Takeda pinged Alex and whispered, “Hostiles have arrived and been engaged. Zegarelli is dead and Anderson now an enemy asset.”
Alex ordered everyone to take cover beside the cave wall and for Mike and Tank to take a defensive position against whatever was rushing up from behind to meet them. He hated leaving them here as he was sure, given the choice, all of them would have taken their chances at being shot over being snared and dragged off into the dark by some sort of weird cave creature. He had no alternative, he had a definite threat in front and a potential threat from behind—the definite threat took precedence. He looked quickly at Aimee then vanished into the dark.
Takeda gave a small start when he felt Alex’s hand fall lightly on his shoulder. He was always surprised at how quietly and fast Alex could move for a man of his size. Takeda lifted two fingers, indicating number of known hostiles. He then pointed from his eyes to their positions; one on the cave floor and one up high at the drop-off point to the basin.
Alex assessed the situation instantly; he had strength of numbers, but whoever the hostiles were, they held the high ground and a hostage.
From a concealed position on the basin floor, Alex heard a familiar, heavily accented voice. “Privet kak Kanitah Hunter, ya soskucheelsya.” Though Alex could only understand a little Russian, the deep formal greeting and the “I’ve missed you” was unmistakable. He recognised the voice as belonging to Uli Borshov, Borshov the Beast; the deadly assassin who had put a bullet in Alex’s brain and left him for dead. This killer was not here by accident; he was used for extreme red-work, the bloodier the better. Alex felt a door crack open, a rage storm commence to build. A fury was trying to push through that door and explode out to consume the Russian. Alex couldn’t allow it; not while Margaret was held hostage and they were pinned down. He needed absolute clarity.
Borshov now switched to his heavily accented English. “I know why you are here, Captain Hunter. I just want your test results; that is my only orders. I hate the dark, Captain Hunter; I just wish to go home. Bring them to me yourself, unarmed, no tricks; you can have your woman back and we all go home, da?”
Alex pinged Tank and asked for the group to be brought up. He needed Silex and his data and the additional cover his HAWCs could provide—and he needed to keep his internal demons chained; already they strained and called for war. Alex closed his eyes for a few seconds and inhaled; green apples, but only faintly.
Tank brought the small group within twenty feet of Alex’s position, just out of view of the Russian assassination team with Mike remaining behind for rear cover. He joined Alex and Takeda, and handed Alex some of Silex’s papers. They were just handwritten notes scribbled on seismic print-outs. It didn’t matter; the material was just a smokescreen. Alex knew Borshov was here to kill.
“I’m coming out, unarmed as requested. Be advised, if anyone raises a weapon, my men will take them down.” Alex pointed at Takeda and up at the Krofskoya agent on high ground. He signalled Tank to cover him as he walked out to meet the giant Russian.
Alex removed his weapons and stood out from behind the stalagmite. Outwardly he appeared calm, but he knew Borshov’s presence meant Benson was dead. His heart rate was beginning to climb—not from fear or nerves,
but from his supercharged body gearing up for combat.
Alex knew from experience that Borshov the Beast did not negotiate; he traded in torture, brute force and violent death. Margaret Anderson was simply being used to draw Alex in closer so the Russian had a better chance for a certain kill. If he wasn’t careful, they would both be dead in the next few minutes.
Borshov smiled to himself when he saw the American captain step away from his concealment. Uli Borshov knew the odds were against him; his element of surprise had been lost. There was no way he was going to be able to scale the wall without being shot, even if he somehow managed to strap the unconscious woman to his back. He couldn’t hope to take down all the HAWCs; they were too good. Kill Captain Alex Hunter, and bury the rest, that would complete the mission.
Borshov spoke quietly into his comm unit—he ordered the concealed assassin to prepare explosive charges for sealing the cave, timed for ten minutes. He was further ordered to stay for nine minutes and fifty seconds to witness him crush Captain Hunter with his bare hands; others must know that Uli Borshov remained unbeaten. Destruction of the American team and crushing Captain Hunter’s skull with his fists—perhaps today was going to be a good day after all.
“We meet in interesting places, Comrade Hunter.” Borshov was smiling behind the semi-conscious body of the medic. He was holding her by the throat with one hand, his enormous club-like fingers wrapped all the way around her neck. In his other hand he had a wicked-looking black blade held up beside her face.
“Captain Hunter, you have something of mine, you give it back, please.”
Borshov was a head taller than most men, easily as big as Tank but with the menacing look of a criminal thug. In his black infiltration suit with just a single cyclops night vision lens pointing at Alex he was enough to make most men tremble at the thought of a direct confrontation, and with good reason.
