Dominant Species Volume Two -- Edge Effects (Dominant Species Series)

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Dominant Species Volume Two -- Edge Effects (Dominant Species Series) Page 2

by Coy, David


  “Carla . . .”

  He took a deep breath, steeled his spine, turned on the sight light and stepped into the chamber.

  He thought it was part of the chamber at first; the rifle’s light illuminated so little of it. As the light moved across it, he could make out regular bands of hard and shiny material, rolled like thick brown leather.

  He reached for the floodlight and unlooped it from his neck. Then, holding it high and keeping the rifle ready, he turned it on.

  The light flooded the entire chamber with white.

  The creature’s back was humped and armored like an armadillo’s, but there the similarity ended. It took him a moment before he could discern which end was which. The end with the bloody mass under it was the head.

  Her body had been reduced to pulp under that alien maw. It worked what was left of her with relentless violence, pulling off chunks at a time and masticating, the mandibles working sideways with machine-like precision and grinding power. Howard groaned and had the overwhelming urge to turn and run from the horror of it.

  The entire cave was strewn with the remains of other kills; tails, heads, bones and the thing’s own waste. The reek he’d been breathing was coming from this very chamber.

  The creature was huge and powerful. It seemed not to care that there was an alien prey-thing shining a light on it; it just continued to eat.

  He raised the rifle and put the bright spot of light on the creature’s head, right where he believed the brain to be.

  He fired.

  In a blinding flash, the rifle’s blast seemed to tear a hole in the very air of the chamber. He hadn’t fired a fifty-five-caliber rifle since the service. He’d forgotten how devastating a ball of lead alloy, moving at 4100 feet per second, could be. Tissue and bone exploded from the creature’s flat head as if a grenade had been inside it. The monster slumped to the floor as its short legs collapsed under it.

  Howard’s ears were ringing.

  “Die . . . you bastard.”

  He walked over to it, stepping over the alien body parts and shit. He made himself go to the head. He stood there for a moment; and when he got up the nerve, he looked down.

  Carla’s face was there, her eyes wide open. He looked away. He wondered for one grisly moment if she had mercifully been dead when the thing started to feed. He could only hope—but would never know for certain.

  He wanted to pick her up and carry her home, but there wasn’t much to carry except her head.

  He howled with rage.

  * * *

  He awoke late in the morning from a brief and shallow sleep. A puzzling sense of dread and loss clouded his mind and persisted for a while before he remembered it was Carla’s death that caused it. Then images of the night’s events came back one at a time like waking nightmares; disjointed, ugly and random. He looked over at her empty, unmade bunk and the sight of it filled him with blackness.

  Carla was gone.

  This had been their home; a metal and composite-bound space, filled with equipment, tools and their few personal possessions. She’d tried to make it a real home when the desire to nest struck some feminine chord in her. She had fashioned odd curtains for the shuttle’s bare ports on one occasion, and, on another, had placed her mother’s antique quilts on the bunks. The quilts were still there somewhere.

  He sat on the edge of the bunk for what seemed like hours, his head in his hands, letting the memories of her come and go, to wrench his guts or make him laugh, then weep, at something she’d done or said long ago.

  When he stepped out into the planet’s wet air, the scent wasn’t as sweet as it had been. It was still overcast, and a light fog in the air muddied the forms around him, turning the splashes of color to mere murky discolorations against the green and black background.

  He hated the planet and everything in it.

  This goddamned swamp killed her, he thought.

  He put about twenty charges in a satchel and walked back to the creature’s burrow, rifle at the ready. There was something to do before he left.

  He’d vacillated, trying to decide whether or not to retrieve her head and give it a proper burial or to leave it in place when he brought the burrow down on itself. He opted for the latter. The thought of carrying her disembodied head was just too much for him, plus he couldn’t think of what to put it in that would be appropriate.

  He placed the charges at the entrance to the feeding chamber, laying them out in a pattern he thought would create the right blast pattern. He didn’t look at her while he did it.

  Safely outside, he stood with the detonator in his hand and lowered his head. He took a deep breath and spoke quickly. He didn’t know exactly what to say, so he just started talking, his voice wooden.

  “Here lies a woman named Carla Verde, my wife. She was a woman who loved me and that I loved in turn and she was strong and kind and she loved her work and was not afraid of many things. She worked hard to bring down her debt and was respected by her colleagues and loved by her family.”

  That was all he could get out. The need to weep pushed aside his artificial resolve like a wave on sand. He fell to his knees, doubled over, and wept.

  “Carla . . .”

  When he gathered his composure some time later, he cleared his eyes and pointed the detonator in the direction of the burrow.

  “Damned rotten swamp.”

  The blast shook the burrow in a single rumble that knocked him down. The blast belched from the entrance and ripped the leaves from the branches, sending them fluttering to the ground in a confetti shower of green.

  He crawled in the burrow a ways to make sure it had completely caved in. He didn’t think a Demolition Specialist could have done better. He wished the act had given him more satisfaction.

  He walked numbly back to the shuttle.

  Much later, he slept a little more.

  He thought briefly about doing as Carla suggested and sending back fake survey data as a way to protect the planet. It would have been her final wish.

  He had a far better idea.

  What he wanted was to see the planet scraped and dragged and bulldozed and skinned until not one dram of copper or lead remained in its rotten soil. He wanted the burrows of those giant bugs mashed flat and the occupants gassed or irradiated by Bio-Control or crushed by the thousands under the tracks of heavy equipment. He wanted the very climate to change from the defoliation and to see huge sections of the shit ball laid to waste by drought and wind in the years to come. He wanted the ocean to heat and everything in it to die and sink belly up and rot to mud.

  He wanted the whole planet to die.

  He changed the data all right; he made the find look richer and more valuable than it was. He turned it into a bigger plum; a literal gold mine that would excite the ravenous greed of every money-grubbing opportunist in the Commonwealth.

  In short, he hoped and prayed that by the time year 3050 rolled around, the entire planet would be dead; its blood-sucked corpse infested with the absolute worst that Homo sapiens had to offer. He hoped the ball of shit would become some mining “Center of Excellence” where new and exciting ways of stripping and plundering and pillaging mineral wealth would be tested and perfected; where blasting and pulverizing rock would reach the level of art.

  Most of all, he wanted all life on the fetid ball to choke on the fumes of human waste and to see the dead and dried carcasses of everything that ever lived on it blown away on the wind.

  Before he sent the data up to the orbiter, he exercised his prerogative to name the shit hole. By law that right was reserved for those who first landed on it and surveyed it. However, it was considered bad form for someone who lacked real influence to name a planet, even if you had the right by law. Such rights were reserved for executives and other VIP’s to be used as political currency, not as perks for grunts like geologists.

  This time he would make an exception. He didn’t care about the consequences, and it was his right by law, goddamnit.

 
He looked at the field labeled “Object Name: WSXPSZ-56” and remembered how Carla had complained about the detached, cryptic and impersonal nature of the default planet names.

  Not this time.

  He pressed the edit key and typed VERDE’S REVENGE.

  4

  When he was just starting out, Mike Kominski’s father told him he should do his best and be thankful he had a job, no matter what. If a man does good work and works hard, then good things will come his way, he’d said. That simple idea was his father’s rock. Stay neat and clean and work hard. Be honest in your dealings and don’t lie. Show respect to your boss and don’t steal.

  When Mike came of age, his father helped him negotiate his contract with the IRSG. Mike’s first assignment was working as a Continuity Checker for a cable manufacturer in Cleveland. It was boring work, but his contract went down a little each day, so he stayed with it.

  His father got sick and died just two years before his own contract was paid off. The last thing he said to Mike was be glad he wasn’t working in one of the factories on the mainland. In order to get your contract paid down in one of those places, you’d have to work fourteen hours a day all your life in a hot, crowded place.

  When his father died, the debt he left still had to be paid off, and the remaining balance, fell on Mike, as the youngest son. His only brother, fifteen years older than Mike, would share the debt, only unofficially. Military duty, an official exemption from such indebtedness, his brother would credit the account when he could, but would never let Mike shoulder it alone. Together they could do it.

  Mike was uncertified, and it would take years to obtain certification in almost anything. He knew he would eventually earn one; anyone with any ambition could do it. His lack of a certification and the newly acquired debt of his inheritance made him an attractive commodity from an employer’s viewpoint. The reason was simple: the more you had to pay down, the weaker your bargaining position. Undaunted by that, and bored stiff by cable ends, he took his contract to Richthaus-Alvarez, and they bought it right up. He knew the contract wouldn’t be real good, but there were advantages to it. Because he was uncertified and carrying a millstone, they could do just about anything they wanted with him. He’d have to work hard, and there was no time off in the first five years, but that was okay. Everything worked out for the best. There would be opportunities ahead, and the chance to travel to distant worlds was a big plus.

  His first assignment with the company was as a Maintenance Specialist Grade IV on board one of the massive transports. It was filthy work, and Mike didn’t like working around toilets; but he did it better than anybody. His supervisor was a good guy and took notice of Mike’s hard work. As soon as he got the chance, he gave Mike a big reduction and got him transferred to Transportation as a Light Expeditor, the promotion confirming what Mike already knew: hard work always paid down.

  The transport’s destination was General Settlement’s new mining project on a planet called Verde. Mike had no idea where Verde was, but he knew it was exciting anyway. No one in his family had ever traveled off-world as far as he knew, not even his brother.

  His quarters onboard ship were cramped and grimy, but at least he didn’t have to share his sleeping quarters like he had back home. The air was stale, and he didn’t like that much. The walls felt damp when he touched them; and every morning when he woke up, the walls dripped water as if they’d collected dew. The bed itself had a musty smell, but it was still the best one he’d ever slept on.

  Mike pulled his clothes on, washed his face, combed his hair, brushed his teeth and headed for the commissary. The commissary provided three meals per day, free during the trip. Next to the bed, the commissary’s food was the best thing onboard ship. They had corn flakes.

  * * *

  Eddie Silk and a couple of other guys were already there leaning against the counter with their arms folded, waiting for Mario, the cook, to open up. Mario was always a little late; the guys were always a little early. Eddie, just three years older, was Mike’s lead. Mike was encouraged by the fact that you could get a leader’s contract at such a young age in Transportation.

  “Howdy, Mike.”

  “Howdy.”

  “I heard one of the riggers saying that Ed Smith’s a real penny-pincher,” Eddie was saying.

  “Yeah,” Nelson Santos threw in. “That’s what I heard.”

  “Yep. They say he’s a real hard-driving sonofabitch, too.”

  “I heard he cuts corners—doesn’t obey the law,” Nelson added.

  “Could be. Shit, you have to make the schedule,” Eddie added.

  “I also heard this was gonna be the biggest installation ever. Bigger than Fuji-3.”

  “I doubt that,” Eddie said.

  “That’s what Dintler said.”

  “Dintler’s an asshole. Fuji-3’s been going on for twenty years already.”

  “I’m just repeating what he said.”

  “He’s a bullshitter, too.”

  “They got cereal today?” Mike asked.

  “They always got cereal, Mike,” Eddie said.

  Mike leaned against the counter and folded his arms, too.

  “I heard there are man-eating plants on Verde,” Nelson said.

  “Who’d ya hear that bullshit from?” Eddie wanted to know.

  “I heard it from an Expeditor who knows one of the Defoliators who was on the orbiter.”

  Mike swallowed involuntarily.

  “Do you believe everything you hear?” Eddie asked.

  Eddie gave Mike a look like Santos was nuts. It put Mike at ease.

  “Besides,” Eddie went on. “What do you think the defoliators do? They defoliate. So if there were any man-eating plants, they’re dead now. Those defoliators kill everything. Plus, it would be illegal to send us down without clearing away any goddamned man-eating plants.”

  “Only if you obey the law,” Nelson persisted.

  “Man-eating plants my ass,” Eddie said in a huff.

  They heard the clasps unhinge on the big sliding door and turned around. The door rolled up noisily and slammed into the stops with a rattle. Peter Ho stiffened at the noise.

  “Who’s first?” Mario said, pointing a thin finger at no one in particular. His apron was streaked and smeared with foodstuff

  * * *

  They were scheduled to transfer to the orbiter the next morning; so after his shift, Mike packed his things into his bag and cleaned up his room as best he could. He didn’t want to leave it all messy for the next person.

  The transport docked with the orbiter, and Mike got a good look at the planet from the gangway going over. It was his first view of anything outside the ship in a month, and he spent a few minutes just staring at the sight. The planet looked smoother than he thought it would, and the silver band of ocean that wrapped around it made it look like a big, hard jewel floating in space. He had expected the planet to look brighter, friendlier than it was, not so spooky. It was dark green, almost black, with patches of heavy white clouds scattered over it. He’d heard it was hot on the surface. He didn’t like being too hot.

  * * *

  They spent the next day moving their equipment over to the orbiter and preparing all of it to go down to the planet’s surface. Eddie knew exactly what he was doing, and Mike and the guys were good at following orders so the operation went real smooth. They were the second team of Light Expeditors from Transportation to go to Verde. According to Eddie, as the project progressed and more and more contractors took up residence on the planet, the need for Light Expeditors increased, too. Eddie was taking the lead position on the planet itself but would report directly to Joan Thomas who’d be the boss of all the Light Expeditors. Mike, Bruce Smith and Peter Ho would join with Joan’s people for a full crew of seven for now. Their team would have the job of moving all light goods and materials on the planet—food, tools, clothing, toys—anything ordered through procurement that would fit in a Number 10 container—would wind up on Joan’s doc
k to be distributed by her department.

  Mike thought the whole thing was just glorious. Eddie told him the food would be great, but the best things of all were the shelters. Used but clean, the shelters had built-ins and running water. And the best part, the very best part, was that the law said only two people to an entire shelter. He’d have more room to himself than he’d ever dreamed, his own room and a shower.

  “Do we get to order our own food, Eddie?” Mike asked.

  “Order? What’d ya mean order? Shit, we get our pick of whatever we want. We don’t have to order nothin’.”

  This job was getting better and better.

  Except for the heat.

  Mike was prepared for hot weather, but not the oppressive, wet heat of Verde. He hoped he could get used to it. By the time he walked to the bottom of the shuttle’s ramp, he was sweating through his clothes. The air was so thick and wet it clogged his throat. He was glad there was plenty of water on the planet.

  The warehouse was cluttered and disorganized to Mike’s eye, but the others took no notice. Eddie introduced himself to a guy who was stacking containers with a forklift and asked him where he could find Joan Thomas. He pointed to an office attached to the dock a few hundred meters away. On the way, they walked past hundreds of coffin-sized Number 10 shipping containers packed with goods ready for distribution.

  The warehouse was open to the air on all sides and covered with a dense screen high above that let in plenty of light but kept most of the hot sun off the containers. There were big lights hanging down on conduits so the crews could work nights, too.

  “Jeez, there’s a lot of stuff here,” Mike said.

  “This ain’t nothin’,” Bruce said, spitting down through the grates. “This place can expand in all directions if it has to.”

  “Yeah, this dock is small,” Peter Ho added.

  “Wait ‘til they start bringing down the big stuff every day. All the pipe and building materials and shit. You ain’t seen nothin' yet.”

 

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