Dominant Species Omnibus Edition

by David Coy

  She had to find a way to get John and Rachel out of there. But there was only one way in or out now—through the big front door. But once the others found Jacob’s body, surely sometime in the next few hours, the whole complex would be on red alert. That one door would be so heavily guarded it would be impossible to get in or out.

  They had no weapons. They had no allies. They had no plan. They had no options.

  “I don’t know,” she said wearily. “I just don’t know.”

  “We could hide in containers and get carried in,” Habershaw said.

  “Oh, right,” she replied. “It’d just be our luck to get buried in a huge stack of containers and smother or starve. Besides, what are we supposed to do when we get inside anyway?”

  “Just a thought,” Habershaw said.

  They sat, not saying anything for some minutes. Insects bumped into the windscreen, making tapping sounds or zipped past, lit up momentarily by a beam of moonlight. An especially big one banged on the glass then hung there, drifting up and down and back and forth, its wings making muffled buzzing sounds.

  “Look at the size of that bastard,” Habershaw said idly. “You could make a meal out of the sonofabitch if you were real hungry.”

  Donna smiled her lopsided smile. Habershaw’s remark was kinda funny and kinda not. They might actually have to learn how to cook fat beetles like that very soon.

  Nurse to bug eater in one lifetime, she thought ruefully.

  Once, centuries ago, when her life was neatly planned and her course clear, the world had so much promise. She had just graduated from Stanford after ten long years of study and had been placed on her first contract in San Francisco.

  It wasn’t much, just an assistant’s deal, but her credit was good and her debt was coming down. She sat one night and wrote it out, put down all the steps she would take to move into a job that really paid down so she could use the credit deltas and start accumulating some stuff of her own. The list was two or three screens long; and when she was finished, her life seemed, if not perfect, at least planned and under her own stewardship for the first time. She would do better here, work harder there, and she would prosper. It had felt good to do that little bit of planning in an atmosphere of hope. At that time, she remembered clearly, the days seemed brighter and the crowds not so daunting. She’d furnished her tiny apartment with just a few items: a used chair and table; a small rug to go under it; a bed with legs and a dresser—just a few things to celebrate. What she really wanted was a stuffed sofa, but such a luxury would have to wait.

  As the weeks and months rolled by, her carefully crafted list of things to do began to look shallow, naive, even sophomoric as the first in a long list of card-carrying assholes began to tear it to pieces a little at a time.

  In those formative years, Donna Applegate wasn’t your perfect contractor—having a penchant to speak her mind perhaps too readily—but she was willing and eager to please, and she was prompt and conscientious.

  It was that willingness to please that allowed events to forge her particular world view.

  She discovered early on that those above you, those holding the reins, at least the ones in her profession, would exploit you in every way imaginable if you let them. They would put you on jobs with no future or give you things to do no one else would do. The wrong people would literally use your back as a stepping stone to their own destination. Some of them, the worst of them, would fool you and claim to make it all better by promising advancement in return for sexual favors. Some were so rotten you could smell them in their offices, souls made rancid by their own avarice.

  So, some months later, she re-wrote her list. The second time, it was quite different and the tone, when read aloud—which she did nightly for a week—produced within the thin walls of her paltry apartment a cynical resonance, uniquely her own.

  The list was shorter than it was before, too. It read: “1. Don’t trust anybody. 2. Keep your mouth shut. 3. If they fuck with you—fuck ‘em back worse. 4. Don’t volunteer for anything. 5. Find out who you’re dealing with. 6. She who cares the most loses.”

  That little list of maxims served her well and protected her from all but the most refined attacks on her good nature. There were still dangers, and the assaults that managed to breech her walls were especially stealthy and destructive. And many times, her older, better nature just opened up with a smile and brushed aside those pessimistic notions just for the sake of goodness, and in so doing, swept clean a walkway for the devil’s horny feet. But in those optimistic seasons, she was indomitable, and the devil be damned. She’d dealt with the bastard enough to know how; and in those bright, fearless times, she was well up to the task.

  She’d once heard someone say that every event in your life brings you to where you are. It was an obvious and an undeniable truism when you thought about it. What wasn’t so obvious to Donna Applegate at this moment, was the exact chain-like form of those particular, and now dreadful events.

  The beetle continued to clatter against the glass, spurred on by some unknown, insectoid lust to get through that transparent barrier.

  “I could eat that damned thing alive,” she said flatly.

  “I bet you could,” Habershaw said.

  The sound started as a low rumble, not unlike distant thunder but steady; a reverberation that buzzed in the head, just outside the range of audible perception.

  “Is this thing turned on?” Donna asked, referring to the shuttle.

  “No,” Habershaw replied. “It’s dead off.”

  The sound started and stopped, started and stopped as if coming from multiple sources some distance apart. As the moments passed, the sound grew in volume.

  “What is that?” Donna asked. “Is it coming from above?”

  “Beats the hell out of me,” Habershaw replied, puzzled.

  They looked out the sides and up through the window curving overhead. A break in the canopy revealed twin moons and an open sky. Donna pulled the hood up on her net suit, went to the cargo door and opened it.

  She stepped outside into air filled with insects and permeated with the distant, deep sound. Now she could tell that the sound was coming from more than one place, some closer, some farther. Then, she felt a tugging, a slight pulling on her net suit from above. When she looked up this time, she saw the shiny craft drifting slowly through the space in the trees. It was beetle-shaped but without legs, and the moonlight created bright highlights on its dark brown surface. It moved westward.

  It was huge, at least forty meters long.

  It flew without wings.

  “What the hell is that?” she whispered.

  The thing’s shape sunk deep in her psyche and came to rest in a hollow made just for it. As if seeing it made the memory of it manifest, she somehow knew it, had seen it before—perhaps dreamt it. From it came sound at a thousand decibels—a deep harmonic that rattled her teeth.

  She’d heard the deep sound before, too, somehow, somewhere. Her voice shuddered and she coughed up the words.

  “God help us.”

  16

  It wasn’t a good idea to walk through the jungle at night, Eddie thought. That had to be the stupidest thing someone could do.

  If you were outside, the idea was to stay out of sight—hide and not draw attention. Eddie’s favorite hiding places were barrels with lids that he could close if he wanted for a while or open a little to breathe. But that idea was out ‘cuz he didn’t have any barrels. So, he’d built one of those little shelters Donna told him about. The spot he picked to build it in was in a little thin spot because he figured the bugs might be less where there was less foliage. When the moons came up, the light would be right on the shelter and maybe it wouldn’t be quite so scary. He’d had to start on it early in the afternoon to get it good enough and was pretty satisfied, finally, after trying it three or four different ways. He was lying on a pad of thick spongy leaves with his clothes buttoned up tight like Donna told him. He could feel a few crawlers on his legs a
s they passed over on their way to somewhere else, but that was all. It wasn’t too bad, and he was sure the shelter was keeping out the worst of them. It wasn’t a steel barrel, but he felt fairly safe in his little cocoon of vines and leaves.

  He was hungry and thirsty, having walked most of the day with little to quench either desire. He’d tried not to stray too far from the road, and he’d taken a risk a few times and walked right on it when he felt it was safe, when he could see no trucks or transports in either direction. It was a relief from the constant abrasion of leaves and vines and branches to walk there, even for a little while.

  The night was louder than he’d ever heard it. It must have been the change in the weather that was causing it. The heat was probably making the bugs breed more.

  He hoped this was as hot as it would get. He’d been sweating buckets. The first order of business tomorrow would be to find more water. He’d come across a little stream at midday and drank from it until he couldn’t drink anymore. He’d hoped it would last, but he’d been thirsty again before nightfall.

  He let his eyes close and the jungle’s din eventually gave way to the relative silence of sleep.

  At first, the snuffling, sniffing sound outside was barely anything—just another faint something mixed with the other sounds on some unused channel in his sleeping mind. But it quickly took shape as something very different from the background noise and an alarm went off. His eyes popped open, and he listened as it moved around the shelter, mostly down where the leaves met the ground. It was big, whatever it was. He could hear its feet crunching on the foliage and sometimes popping a stalk as it moved around. He was tempted to burst out of the shelter with a big commotion and run like hell, but he decided it was best to stay still and hope it went away.

  The snuffling stopped for a moment and Eddie thought with relief that the thing had moved on. But it started again, this time nudging the shelter, first gently, then a little rougher until the entire structure was shaking as the thing bumped it.

  He hadn’t made any noise, but the thing knew he was in there. It must have smelled him. It was figuring how to get inside and pull him out, and Eddie felt a brief weakness in his limbs as that thought sank in. In his mind’s eye, the thing outside took shape as something fantastic and frightful—and the thought that on this planet it could be worse than he imagined made him stiff with fear.

  It's gonna eat me.

  Suddenly, his ears rang with the loudest whistle he’d ever heard. The sound seemed to warble up and down and was so loud it grated inside his head. It was high-pitched and of such

  an unbearable volume that he put his hands over his ears.

  When it stopped there was no more snuffling or nudging, just the sounds of the jungle, and again, Eddie thought the thing had gone away. Maybe it wasn’t so smart. Maybe the shelter confused it somehow. Maybe the whistle was the sound it made when it couldn’t do what it wanted.

  Then Eddie heard another sound, an angry running sound and breaking branches coming at the shelter. Then nothing.

  Suddenly, the whole side of the shelter flew off as if struck, sending leaves and pieces of vine flying. Eddie scooted away from the gaping hole as far as he could. Looking out through the ragged breach, he saw two things standing there—two impossible things—waiting to eat him. One of them had a thing that looked like a long tube. There was a sound like a pneumatic hose popping loose, and he felt something hit him. He looked down and saw a spiny ball stuck to his side. One of the impossible things had shot him with it.

  He wanted to cry out, but a flood of numbing warmth was radiating out from the ball so fast that he didn’t have a chance. When the rush got up to his head, he felt like he was sinking in warm water.

  * * *

  When he could open his eyes, he was surrounded by what he thought were the thick roots of plants that had been placed around him. But when he blinked, his vision clear, he saw that the roots were actually creatures, bent and twisted, with stick thin arms and pointed faces. They were covered with short spiny hair that pointed downward. One of them waddled closer and reached out and touched his arm with twig-like fingers.

  He could move his head a little; and when he looked down at himself, he saw that he was naked. He could barely feel the thing’s touch and wondered why the touch was so light. When he looked down at the spot where the creature had touched him, he saw that his skin was dented from a very strong grip—he just couldn’t feel much of it.

  There were at least four of the creatures around him that he could see. The one that had grabbed his arm was tugging on him, trying to turn him, to position him just right. He felt himself sliding across the table as the thing pulled, but he could barely feel his body.

  Then the thing reached up and opened a little door on what looked like a dark, round globe hanging from the ceiling. A swarm of shiny insects buzzed out of the globe, by one's and two's, then bunches, and flew around the dark room. Some of them came up close to his face and held still in the air and buzzed. Eddie had seen them before. They were the big black, white and yellow wasps he’d seen in the jungle a few times. They'd always left him alone. But this time, some of them started to dart down at him and bang into him. He could see tiny drops of blood forming where they hit him and soon he could feel nothing at all. Some of the wasps started to land on him, and, one at a time, began to stick their long tails down into him. Eddie didn’t feel anything, but he knew what they were doing. It was the thing most of the bugs on Verde did—lay eggs in you.

  The root creatures just watched and made little whistling or scratchy noises.

  With the odd creatures around him, Eddie lay in the dark place. He watched the wasps and knew he was going to die—he just hoped it wouldn’t hurt too much. He hoped his friends would be okay. He hadn’t minded being locked up with them all this time too bad. He had been with John and Donna and Rachel, and they were good to him.

  He’d miss Donna the most. She was a good lady.

  Eddie Silk closed his eyes and slept.

  17

  She was fully dressed but still a little groggy. That wasn’t surprising since she’d slept twelve hours that he knew for sure. When she bent down to tie her bootlace, she almost fell over. John went down on one knee and started to tie it for her.

  “I guess I’ve made a mess of things, huh?” she said. “Don’t be silly,” John said. “It’s not your fault.”

  “Somebody’s gotta take the blame.”

  “Not you. How are you feeling?”

  “Well enough to get outta here.”

  “That’s going to be tough,” he said.

  “No, it’s not.”

  “How do you figure? This place is a virtual maze. The only way out is back the way we came—right through the lab; and if we go that way, we’ll run right into the mercs.”

  She dismissed his concern. “I’ve got this whole section of the organism memorized. These tunnels radiate out in a series of concentric rings with the lab as the center. It is a maze, but there’s a logic to it. Here, look.” She squatted down and drew with finger and invisible ink a group of semi-circles, nested together. “They radiate outward like this. The ends of each one terminate in a big chamber. Sub-chambers like the one we’re in are dotted all along the arcs. There’s at least one connector from one arc to the next.” She dashed the connectors in with a finger. “Like here, here, here.”

  “So where’s the outside?” he wanted to know.

  “The last ring has connectors, too. But they dump right to the outside,” she said with a grin.

  “How do you know?”

  She looked askance at him. “Just what do you think I was doing in the months we lived here? I was studying the goddamned thing. That means learning about it—figuring it out.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Accepted. Let’s get outta here.”

  They moved cautiously to the tunnel, and Rachel led the way down it. They started the long trek to the outside by following the tube around until they caught
a connector. Moving to the next ring out, they followed it around until they came to the next connector then repeated the process. A half-hour later, they were in the last ring, and John could see daylight streaming in from one of the exit holes ahead. He put his arm around Rachel and tugged her in as they walked.

  “You really know your stuff,” he said, almost laughing. “What a sense of direction!”

  “Uncanny, isn’t it?” she replied, smiling back.

  The short connector met the outside almost at ground level. It was raining hard. They hopped down onto a spongy patch of ground and were instantly soaking wet. It didn’t seem to matter.

  “Where to?” she asked.

  “Habershaw’s bulldozer. We can hide out until they come back into radio range.”

  “I’m hungry,” she said. The way Rachel said it was different from the way other people said it. When Rachel said it she really meant it.

  “There’s food on the rig,” he promised. “Can you make it?”

  “I think so.”

  They made their way around the perimeter of the organism, pushing through the cool, wet leaves. Soon they had reached the shuttle area. While Rachel stayed well back out of sight, John peeked through the foliage and scoped it out. He could see the corner of the rig to the northwest, sitting like some mechanical apparition in the wet mist. A truck rumbled past, far out on the road.

  “How are we gonna make it across without being seen?” Rachel asked.

  It was a simple question. Waiting until nightfall was the logical answer, but nightfall brought the planet to life, and they only had the one net suit. Not only that, Rachel would be beside herself with hunger by then.