by Ray Garton
“General,” the squad leader said, “the house is all clean, sir.”
“Fine, thanks,” General Wilson said. He was frowning, preoccupied. He’d been talking to a tall black lieutenant when the squad leader approached.
David stepped forward to get the general’s attention. “General Wilson.”
Distracted, the general glanced down at him. “Yes, David?”
“General, what about my parents? Are we going to find them?”
“Well, David—”
“General,” the lieutenant interrupted, “about those winches . . .”
“Uh, yes, um—” To David, he said, “We’re doing our best, David, I promise you.” Turning his back to the boy, he followed the lieutenant. “Okay, Lieutenant Bryce, let’s have a look.”
David trailed after him.
“David,” Linda said, following, “will you stay in one place!”
At the edge of the sand pit, David and Linda watched as Lieutenant Bryce waved four Jeeps into position with winches and thick, heavy cables. Captain Rinaldi walked along the perimeter of the sand pit shouting orders.
David spotted several of the men standing on the sand cutting away brush at the edge to clear a field of fire. He pointed at them and tugged on Linda’s arm. “Look! They’re on the sand!”
Rinaldi saw them, too, and broke into a run. “Hey! Get outta there!” Flailing his arms, he herded them off the sand, stepping for just a moment—a very brief moment—off the embankment and into the pit.
It happened in a heartbeat. The sand spun beneath him, twirling him around like a nightmarish music-box dancer. Before he could make a sound, he was gone.
“General!” David screamed, running toward him. He pointed toward the sand pit.
“Rinaldi!” the general shouted, his jaw slack. “Holy Christ! Get away from there!” he ordered the other men around the pit. He turned to the lieutenant. “Get those damned winches ready!” Standing next to him, David heard the general mumble under his breath, “We’re gonna blow those bastards off the map.”
Curtis and his men had climbed down the hole, using the spiraled ridges as rungs. At the bottom, the hole intersected with a tunnel. With flashlight beams dancing on the curved walls, they proceeded cautiously. It was not terribly dark; light came from somewhere, but it was a strange light, a warm amber color.
Several yards ahead, the tunnel curved. Knowing that at any moment something could appear around the bend, Curtis pressed on slowly.
There was an instant of blinding light, there and gone in a flash, from beyond the curve.
“Hit the floor!” Curtis shouted.
The men dropped, their weapons ready.
Silence . . .
Then, approaching quickly from around the bend, footsteps . . .
Heavy and clumsy . . .
“Let’s see what we’ve got here,” Curtis whispered, aiming his pistol, readying himself for a fight.
Shadows appeared on the wall of the tunnel, enormous, hulking shadows bobbing over the ridges.
Curtis’s voice was hoarse when he muttered, “Son . . . of a . . . bitch!”
There were three of them and they were huge; folds of lizardlike skin drooped over their fat faces and around their enormous jaws. They sloshed as they hobbled down the tunnel toward them, stopping when they spotted the men. One of the creatures grunted.
Dr. Weinstein jumped to his feet and raised a hand. “Hold your fire!” he shouted at the men.
“Get down, God damn it!” Curtis growled.
Weinstein turned to Curtis and said pleadingly, “We can’t just blow away an opportunity like this. Look at these things! We don’t know what they hell they are!”
“Exactly . . .”
One of the creatures held an oval-shaped pod in its pincered hand and raised it a few inches from its side as all three of them stepped back pensively.
“Wait,” Weinstein whispered, approaching them cautiously. He smiled. “Take it easy . . .” Reaching into his coat, he removed the charred remains of one of the copper needles that had come from the necks of Hollis and Johnson. “This is yours . . . right? It is yours, isn’t it?”
The creature holding the pod stepped forward.
Dr. Weinstein stiffened nervously but held his ground. “That’s it,” he said. “I am Dr. Weinstein. Yes . . .” He beckoned the creature forward. “Come on . . .”
It took another step, its nostrils flaring as it sniffed wetly at the doctor’s hand. It looked into Weinstein’s eyes, blinking several times, a curious expression wrinkling its huge brow.
“I’m a scientist,” the doctor went on. “I’m from the Search . . . for Extraterrestrial . . . Intelligence. Do you understand me? I won’t hurt you. We just want to . . . understand you.”
With a moist, tearing sound, a seam split in the pod and it opened like an eye.
Weinstein froze, staring at it curiously.
A sliver-thin beam shot from the pod and the young doctor screamed in agony—a shrill, ragged scream that sounded as if it might tear out his throat—then burst into flames. In an instant, he was gone, leaving behind a few wisps of smoke.
Before Curtis could give the order, the men opened fire, blowing large chunks of the creatures onto the walls of the tunnel. Arms were torn from the beasts, fat eyes popped, long, glistening fangs chipped and shattered, and gaping wounds gushed a thick green fluid over the ground. The troops continued firing and the creatures sprayed through the tunnel like confetti.
When the echoes of the gunfire died down, Curtis stood and grimaced at the oozing remains scattered about them. Taking a deep, steadying breath, he waved for the men to follow him deeper into the long, twisting tunnel.
David felt as if he might explode. They were going to blow up the sand pit. They were trying to destroy the ship! He saw them preparing bricks of explosives and winches to pull the men to safety if the vortex should open up again. His breathing was fast; he was beginning to feel dizzy and panicky.
What if Mom and Dad are down there? a voice in his head screamed.
Linda put an arm around him, as if sensing his fear, and said, “They’re doing all they can, David.”
The general was giving more orders. Men were scurrying everywhere like ants. Engines rumbled and exhaust fumes dirtied the air. They were going to kill the martians . . . and perhaps kill his parents with them.
David broke away from Linda and dashed for the sand pit, his heart in his throat.
“David, nooo!” Linda screamed.
“Hey, kid!” one of the Marines shouted. “Come back here! You crazy?”
“David, please!”
He looked over his shoulder and saw Linda following him. He wanted her to stay—he wanted to do this alone!
“I have to find my mom and dad!” he called to her, hoping she’d stay. But she kept coming.
“Come back here now!” she snapped angrily.
“Hey, lady!” another Marine barked.
Others began shouting, telling them to turn back, to stay away from the sand.
David dove off the embankment, landed on his feet, then fell flat on his face. He scrambled up again and began running to the center of the pit.
“David, please stop!” Linda pleaded, closer now.
He glanced back to see her running over the sand beside him, gaining rapidly.
Linda threw herself on him and they both tumbled to the sand. She grabbed his arm and jerked him to his feet. He could hear her gasping with fright as she began dragging him back to the embankment.
They were only a few feet from the edge of the pit when the sand beneath them began to collapse, then swirl, pulling them down. David heard more shouts from the men and from General Wilson. He heard Linda scream as they were pulled into the pit.
In a moment, he heard nothing at all . . .
C H A P T E R
Twelve
The men around the pit froze and stared silently at the motionless sand. Several of them turned toward General Wilson.
“Sir,” Lieutenant Bryce said breathlessly, running to the general’s side, “we tried to stop them.”
“Damn!” General Wilson growled through clenched teeth. Frowning at the men around him, he shouted, “What the hell are you waiting for? Set those charges!”
“But sir, the boy and woman—”
General Wilson interrupted the lieutenant harshly, “We’re just going to have to take that risk! There’s no other way.”
He walked away from Lieutenant Bryce and circled the pit. Three of the men were putting on safety harnesses while other troops hooked the harnesses to the winches.
Problems within problems, the general thought, his head pounding with frustration. He understood the boy’s concern for his parents, his desperation to find them, but David didn’t seem to realize that they may be as good as dead already, that whatever the martians had done to them might be irreversible. Now the boy had only made things more complicated for him and his men.
General Wilson watched as the men walked to the center of the pit attached to the winches like puppets. They delicately set down brick after brick of explosives.
A tense silence settled around the pit as the men along the perimeter watched . . .
The general started back around the pit toward Lieutenant Bryce, never taking his eyes from the men on the sand.
Moving gingerly, they set the last of the charges and turned, heading for the embankment. The still space of sand between them and the perimeter began to churn. They all lurched backward and began scrambling over the sand as the vortex opened up and began spinning toward them.
General Wilson saw with alarm that the cables were about to tangle above the heads of the three scattering men.
“Start the winches!” the general shouted, hurrying along the edge of the pit.
The winches cranked into action, pulling the demolition men off the sand, their feet dangling as the vortex swept violently beneath them. They were reeled in from the sand pit like fish from a lake.
But General Wilson was not entirely relieved. The churning vortex continued swirling across the pit toward the explosives.
“Everybody back!” he called, waving an arm.
The troops scattered for safety as the hissing whirlpool of sand swallowed the explosives, then smoothed over and disappeared.
After a brief, still moment, a column of sand rose from the pit toward the sky with an explosion so loud and powerful that General Wilson, huddling behind one of the assault vehicles, felt it rattle his eyeballs in their sockets. An instant later, a dry, gritty rainstorm of sand and tiny pebbles showered over them.
The men came from their cover slowly, a few at a time. General Wilson was the first to reach the edge of what had been the sand pit.
It was at least fifteen feet deep. The inside of the crater looked like a magnified cross section of an anthill. The charge had blown through two levels of caverns and tunnels that seemed to twist and snake in all directions. The walls were ridged, spiraled, and from somewhere in the complex structure, General Wilson could see an amber glow.
“But . . . where’s the ship?” Lieutenant Bryce asked, confused, standing beside the general.
“Let’s go find out. Bring some ladders!” General Wilson shouted, grabbing one of the cables and giving it a hard tug. Holding tight, he stepped over the edge and rappelled into the crater.
David’s sleep was heavy, and rolled off him very . . . slowly. At first, he thought he was in a hospital; he thought he’d had his tonsils taken out again and was coming out of the anesthesia. But he was not on a hospital bed. He lay face down on a flat, hard, glasslike surface. Linda was lying beside him, unconscious.
David’s voice cracked when he said, “Linda?”
Pushing himself up on his hands, he looked around. They were on a roughly oval-shaped slab, lying on the middle of three roundish, flat surfaces. David recognized the smell instantly—he was in the ship. There was a sound . . . a deep, whirring hum . . .
Tugging on Linda’s arm, David said quietly, “Hey, Linda.”
Her arm was heavy; she was out cold.
The whirring grew louder.
David turned on his side, propped himself up on an elbow, and looked around. A few yards away on another table lay Captain Rinaldi, face down, motionless. Two bars of light hummed back and forth beneath him. They were bright and threw deep shadows of the captain all over the walls. Two drones flanked him, watching him carefully, waiting for a movement.
David looked up and held back a cry. Descending from a round orifice above was a long, needlelike device—it looked like a giant stinger! It slid from the aperture at a downward angle followed by a fat, lumpy base. It continued to descend until another fatter section was visible . . . then another . . . like a retractable telescope it continued to unfold from within itself. A pencil-thin beam of red light shined down on Captain Rinaldi’s neck, pinpointing the exact spot at which the tip would land. As it got longer, descended further, David saw a luminescent drop of green fluid trembling precariously on the very end of the stinger.
That’s where the cuts come from! David realized, standing.
Above the fleshy hypodermic device was the huge, shimmering membrane he’d first seen in the central chamber. Behind it, David could make out a figure. A familiar figure—watching . . .
Mrs. McKeltch.
David’s eyes swept back down to Rinaldi’s neck as the long, glistening spike punctured the skin, sliding deep into the base of his brain.
We’re next, he thought with a sickening lurch in his stomach.
“Linda!” David screamed, shaking her leg. “Linda, wake up!”
The drones turned their puffy eyes to him and rushed in his direction.
David darted around the operating table, still shouting, “Linda, please!” They were too close; he would have to run and leave her behind. He spun around and hurried through one of the wishbone-shaped archways. When he looked back, he saw one of them following him as the other turned back toward Linda. “Linda, wake up!” he screamed, his voice echoing hollowly through the passageway. “Run, Linda!”
He cut through a cloud of steam that had shot from one of the craters in the wall.
A drone lumbered out of one of the smaller side tunnels ahead and David found himself sandwiched between the two approaching creatures. He pressed on, trying to dodge the thing before him, but it reached out one of its long, powerful arms and grabbed him. Its flesh was thick and moist and the odor of it—a smell like rotting meat—clogged his nostrils as the creature pulled him into a deadly bear hug.
David opened his mouth to its limit and, with all his might, bit down on the creature’s arm. His teeth broke through the sturdy flesh and warm fluid, green and thick, squirted from the wound, splashing his face.
The drone snapped its arm away from David and let loose a deafening roar of pain, like metal being crushed.
David ran, trying to keep from wretching at the horrible fluid on his lips and face. He wiped it away frantically. He could hear them following him, their heavy feet plodding on the ground. Two more drones stepped before him, their arms outstretched. David whirled around and screamed at what he saw.
One of the drones behind him was standing with its arms stretched open, as if to embrace him. Sliding from its middle, speeding through the air straight for David, was a long, fat tentacle. It moved so fast, David didn’t have time to consider escape. It wrapped around his waist and squeezed tight. Lifting him off the ground a few feet, it began to retract, pulling David quickly toward the creature’s waiting arms.
General Wilson and his men stormed down one of the tunnels, leaving the ladders behind for their escape. The general was alert to everything around him—the strange odor, the screwlike spiral of the tunnel—waiting for the slightest sound or movement.
“Incredible!” a voice behind him gasped.
He turned to see Dr. Feighan, one of the NASA scientists, examining the tunnel wall.
“God damn it!” th
e general blurted. “Only my men are to be down here!”
“But look at this!” the doctor marveled. “It’s as if they . . . they screwed their way through the earth!”
“I don’t have to be a scientist to see that!” General Wilson snapped, stepping to the doctor’s side and grabbing his arm. “But you have to be a Marine to be down here!” He turned to one of his men. “You! Take this man back up and keep him out of here!”
The Marine escorted the doctor back to the hole.
“Okay,” the general called, “let’s go.”
They pressed on, guns at the ready. Their feet sounded like distant thunder.
At a bend in the tunnel ahead, General Wilson spotted a tall shadow approaching. He held up his hand. The men stopped and raised their guns.
Captain Rinaldi stepped around the corner and faced them.
“Rinaldi!” the general exclaimed. He smiled. At last, something good had happened. “We found you! What’s—”
“Stop,” Rinaldi said quietly. “Go back.”
General Wilson felt the muscles of his face relax, then felt his shoulders fall.
Rinaldi took another step toward them. Shadows played over his gaunt, queasy face.
He was not the Captain Rinaldi who had been pulled into the sand earlier.
“Rinaldi, are you—”
“Go . . . back . . .” He took a few more steps.
“Jesus,” the general sighed, waving for one of his men to step forward.
Rinaldi didn’t stop. He came closer and closer.
General Wilson nodded.
The man opened fire.
The bullets made Rinaldi dance and thrash. When he collapsed, lifeless, his uniform was darkening with blood.
General Wilson stepped forward and stood over his friend. A tendril of smoke rose from the dead man’s neck as a needle slid out and sizzled . . .
The drone lowered its tentacle, depositing David before the sluglike creature that rested on its throne. The drone had carried David high above its head through the tunnel and up a ramp. Its grip had been tight and when it let go, David took a deep, gasping breath of dank air.
