DS02 Night of the Dragonstar

by David Bischoff

  Corporal Potlack yelled something and reached out for her as she toppled outward. His hand locked upon her wrist and pulled her back as they both fell across the sharp edges of the steps. By now the stone foundation was actually heaving and shaking. All around them the air crackled with a high-pitched keening sound that continued to grow in intensity and power.

  “What’s happening?” Kate cried out as the noise grew almost unbearably loud.

  “I don’t know,” said the trooper, “but we’d better try to get back up.”

  “What?” Kate was confused and terrified. The steps were heaving so violently now that it seemed as if they would shake themselves to pieces at any instant.

  “C’mon!” Potlack screamed, pulling her back up the steps with surprising strength. She could feel her legs moving, even though she had lost all control and coordination.

  “Watch out!” Potlack yelled again as he yanked her from the path of a falling rock that was tumbling down the stairs at a high, rollicking speed. There was a terrible crunching sound as a great fracture appeared in the stone steps to their left. A huge fissure opened up like a jagged mouth and raced along a fault line in the stone. Potlack moved even more quickly now, and suddenly Kate was surrounded by other people as a crowd descended on them and carried them the rest of the way to the top.

  The keening had changed pitch and was now a great roaring sound. With a sudden, inertial pull, as though she were tied to the end of rope, she was pulled off her feet with the rest of the crowd, and everyone fell in a tangled mass of arms and legs. Something cataclysmic was happening, but she hadn’t the slightest idea what it might be—she only knew that it was very bad, and that she was probably going to die.

  She rolled over and tried to get to her feet, but the tremors were so powerful now that this was impossible. Behind her, the stone columns of the Saurian temple had begun to fracture and split. Despite the chaos going on around her, she watched the massive supports flake and crumble as the temple came crashing down. As the huge pieces of stone impacted, many of them exploded, sending out smaller, deadly missiles which laced through the crowd like grapeshot. Someone grabbed her and threw her to the ground on her belly as the first volley of lethal flying debris ripped over her head.

  She was shot through with pain from a hundred different cuts and bruises, but she was alive. Someone had saved her life, and she struggled to roll over against the weight of whoever was holding her down. Summoning up all her strength, she pushed up and to the left, heaving the dead weight of a body off her own. Looking at the person who had pulled her down, she recognized the face of Corporal Potlack, his open eyes already glazing over, a large sliver of stone embedded in his chest like an assassin’s knife.

  * * *

  The only thing he could see in the flashing light of Murphy’s flashlight was the cold, flat look of death in its eye. The carnivore had stumbled upon them quite by accident as it came crashing headlong through the forest chasing a smaller unseen prey.

  Jalecki had been the one unlucky enough to be stationed closest to its point of entry into the survey camp. It had been incredibly quick and agile for its five meters of height and seven thousand-plus kilograms. Although Ian had not gotten a good look at it, it was a typical theropod predator—huge, pile-driving hindlegs; thick, powerful tail; absurdly small fore claws on a tapering body that expanded into an oversized head that was three-quarters jaws and the rest eyes.

  Jalecki had managed to get off a single burst, a warning shot at best, before the monster’s tail lashed out and flicked him like a fly at the end of a snapping bath towel. The man was thrown headlong into the thick trunk of a ginkgo, striking it with bone-crushing impact.

  In an instant, the dinosaur leaped to the base of the tree and snapped up Jalecki’s broken body in its jaws. The only consolation was that he was already dead.

  By this time Murphy was firing at its thick hide, at the same time trying to get a light on it. Ian could see that this one had more subdued markings than some of the others—muted grays and greens—which tended to make the beast less visible, especially at night.

  Becky had picked up a flashlight and was shining it into the bastard’s big yellow eye, hoping to keep it blinded, even for a few moments. Ian had ripped a clip of slugs through its neck, and Murphy had come up from the rear and filled its flanks with dumdums. As it thrashed about on the edge of the forest, Ian could see glimpses of dark, syrupy blood glistening on its hide, and he knew that it was a goner.

  It was just a question of how long it would take to die.

  The carnivore emitted one last screeching, wailing song of pain and agony. It belched up gobbets of undigested flesh, mixed with a bubbling froth of its own blood, and tottered forward. When it fell, it barely missed the geodesic OTV hangar.

  “Son of a bitch!” yelled Murphy, who was running on all cylinders, fired by a maximum shot of adrenaline. “Jesus, did you see that bastard. Oh, John, John.”

  “Coopersmith moved over to the trooper and put a hand on the man’s shoulder. “I know how you feel, Murphy, but we’ve got to get out of here. Our shots and the blood are going to draw a crowd fast.”

  Murphy looked up and forced a panicky smile to his face. “I know, I know. But John was my buddy.”

  “He was dead as soon as he hit the tree,” Ian said. “Now let’s put a move on.”

  Becky had already alerted the four scientists in the hangar, and everyone was ready.

  “We’ve got to change positions fast,” Ian said. “I suggest we move to the building that’s farthest away from this point.”

  “That would be the physical plant,” said one of the paleontologists. “This way. Hurry!”

  As they followed him through the darkness, Ian could already hear the sounds of approaching scavengers and other predators. The foliage seemed alive with rustling motion as the hungry creatures careened in toward the camp. A chorus of screeching and roaring was building to a feverish level. What a place to raise a family, thought Ian. I’m sure glad I’m no dinosaur.

  Reaching the physical plant dome, Ian directed the four civilians inside, instructing them to take cover behind the heaviest machinery they could find. He gave John Jalecki’s automatic rifle to Becky and positioned her and Murphy at points equidistant around the dome.

  “That ’thopter should be back soon,” Becky said. “Yes, but I hope it doesn’t come down at the wrong moment.”

  Beyond them, back where the first attack had come, Ian could hear the first sounds of the scavengers’ feast. Low-pitched growling. The ripping and sucking of a carcass being pulled apart.

  “I don’t like this,” Becky said. “I feel like we’re too vulnerable.”

  “We can’t leave the camp,” Ian said. “The ’thopter would never find us in the dark. We’ve got to stay here.”

  “Maybe we should get into some trees,” she suggested.

  “Only if we could get everyone high enough,” Ian said. “Somehow, I can’t imagine our scientists being too good at shinnying up a ginkgo.”

  It was only a matter of time before another big predator was attracted by the scent of freshly killed meat. A young and feisty Tyrannosaurus lumbered into the camp clearing like the king that he was, calmly surveying his domain. Thankfully, it was a very young rex—only about half its eventual adult size—because a really big one could take a lot of slugs before you could bring him down.

  Even though the rex was closest to Ian and wasn’t acting like he was taking much notice of them, Murphy let go with a wild burst from his automatic rifle. He must have had it cranked up to the maximum, because four hundred rounds screamed from the barrel in two and a half seconds, missing the beast entirely but managing to neatly saw down a nearby redwood sapling about two meters from the earth.

  Even a beast with so dim a brain as the rex could not help but take notice of such a disturbance, and slowly its awareness and att
ention were shifted away from the pack of scavengers. It turned its ugly head like a gun turret and tilted down a cold, moonish eye at Murphy.

  Ian could hear his gunner fumbling for a new clip from his belt pack, and he wondered if Murphy wasn’t already too panicked to be any more good.

  “Ian, he’s coming this way,” Becky said.

  Looking up, Ian watched the rex flare his nostrils and get a good scent on them. It moved forward several steps, leaping from foot to foot with great ease and strength. The creature was apparently confused by the mixture of fresh raw meat and the strange, enticing smell of human flesh, because it suddenly stopped and raised its snout to get a second sniff.

  “Get ’im, Captain,” Murphy said. “My clip’s jammed.”

  “Take it easy, man.” Ian was trying to remain cool. The heavy, humid air was filled with the night cries of feeding and small skirmishes. The rex listened for another moment as it seemed to be watching Murphy, then it leapt forward with astonishing quickness.

  Ian had set his weapon on its slowest delivery so he could better lay in a volley of shots without having to stop to reclip. “Aim for the eyes!” he yelled to Becky as he himself drew a bead on the beast’s neck. A well-placed stream of slugs would sever the spinal cord, and that would be the end of the game.

  But just as he raised the gun sight to his eye, the earth heaved violently, almost dropping him to his knees. The entire forest seemed to be resonating like a struck tuning fork, and the Tyrannosaurus rocked back and forth as the earth vibrated beneath its splayed claws. It paused and looked dumbly about for the cause of the new disturbance.

  “Ian, what’s happening?” Becky ran to his side.

  The people in the geodesic dome came running to the entrance to see what was going on, and Ian waved them back inside. He was still watching the rex, which was beginning to lumber forward again, despite the tremors that were rocking the entire ship.

  “Ian!” cried Becky.

  “I don’t know for sure,” he shouted. “It sounds like the bloody engines.”

  “That’s impossible,” Becky shouted.

  “Watch out, Captain, here he comes!” Murphy ducked and ran behind the physical plant dome as the carnivore closed in.

  Ian tried to take aim and unleashed a volley at the beast’s neck. The slugs ripped into its belly and stitched a line up the side of its neck, staggering the creature, causing it to wobble and stumble backward. At the same instant, a tremendous burst of inertial motion ripped Ian and the others off their feet. It caused the ginkgoes to sway violently, and snapped some of the taller redwoods.

  Looking up, Ian was just able to see the Tyrannosaurus be ripped off its hindlegs and fall upon the naked, snapped-off trunk of one of the redwood trees. The trunk impaled the great beast like a pin through a butterfly, and although it struggled for an instant, bellowing out its final cries of agony, it was dead almost immediately.

  But the howling, roaring sound now seemed louder, and the scavenging creatures had panicked, running off into the forest in all directions. As Murphy and Becky moved closer to him, Ian could feel the great cylinder resonating under a steadily increasing acceleration.

  “What is it?” Murphy asked, trying to catch his breath.

  Ian looked at him as he climbed to his feet. “I’d say it was the sound of rocket motors.”

  “Oh my God, Ian!” Becky said. “It can’t be . . . can it?”

  Ian nodded slowly. “I’m afraid we’re being taken for a ride.”

  * * *

  His leg was bleeding slowly as he walked through the rubble. It was relatively quiet, and he had a moment to think about what had happened.

  In terms of actual time passing, the violent tremors and quakelike vibrations of the Dragonstar’s engines kicking in had not taken very long. Upon reflection, Colonel Phineas Kemp realized this. It only seemed to take an eternity for Becky and Corporal Potlack to race back up the temple steps; it only seemed as though it had taken forever for the masonry to fracture and the walls to come crashing down.

  As he stood there, dazed, the reality of everything that had happened began to sink in. In the relative calm of the moment, he found himself thinking of Mikaela, and more than anything in the world he wanted to be able to talk to her and know that she was all right, to hold her in his arms and bury his face in her sweet-smelling hair, to let his hands race over her firm body. He wanted to pull her close to him and forget about everything else in his crazy life.

  That was an unusual response for Phineas, he knew. But things were getting away from him, out of control, and although he was not accustomed to situations like this, he felt he could cope with it by withdrawing for a while. Just fall back, regroup, and then he could move forward again.

  He told himself he would attempt to locate Mikaela as soon as he had his leg looked at. And thinking of Mikaela almost naturally made him think of Becky Thalberg.

  Where was she? Where had she been before all this mess started? So much had happened so quickly that Phineas could not remember all the details without concentrating. Oh yes, that’s right. She’d stayed on at the paleo survey camp—she didn’t care to see old Neville and his show because he played a little grab-ass with her.

  Well, good for her, and too bad about Neville, he thought with a sad smile. Becky was probably safer than any of us, out there in the wilderness. When he called out to the survey camp after Mikaela he would ask for Becky too. After all, there was no reason they couldn’t remain friends. He was finally starting to realize now that he had been acting like an ass, and every time he recalled his confrontation with Ian Coopersmith he wanted to crawl into a hole and hide.

  Shaking his head, Phineas pulled back from his reflective thoughts and moved a bit closer to the first-aid station. Things had certainly been crazy and dangerous.

  But the great ship had now leveled out. The constant acceleration had ceased when the engines suddenly cut off. An odd, after-the-storm serenity pervaded the atmosphere, and it seemed deathly quiet after all that chaos. Phineas surveyed the latest body count and estimated that his party had lost perhaps another twenty people during the demolition of the temple, and about half of their salvaged equipment. The terrace in front of the fallen temple looked like a city plaza after a blitz. Masonry dust still powdered down in pockets as everyone sifted through the debris and helped the wounded to medical attention.

  Phineas had been cut across the thigh by a flying shard of stone, and as he stood in line to receive some attention from a hastily thrown up medic station he saw Kate Ennis walking toward him with Takamura and several others. Everyone appeared haggard and distressed, but there was a certain dignity in their faces that suggested to Phineas one of humankind’s more noble characteristics—their adaptability to almost any condition.

  His people had been through hell lately, he thought, but they still had that look of determination in their eyes.

  “Phineas, are you all right? You’re bleeding,” Kate said.

  “I know. A little freeze-pak and some tape and I’ll live, I think.” Phineas looked over at Takamura. “Glad to see that you made it, doctor.”

  “Thank you, Colonel.” The physicist looked extremely concerned and quite dour. He cleared his throat nervously. “Colonel, I’ve got to talk with you right away.”

  Phineas moved up in the line toward the medic staff and nodded curtly. Even though he had been angered by Dr. Takamura’s sarcasm, Phineas had to admit a grudging respect for the man. He was certainly a hard worker, and his own staff seemed to have nothing but respect for him. And of course, Phineas could remember Bob Jakes praising Takamura to the skies when they were engaged in the selection committee hearings for the Dragonstar project. It was just that there was something about Takamura . . .

  “Excuse me, Colonel, I was talking to you,” Takamura said once again. “Are you okay?”

  Phineas smiled. “Sorry, Do
ctor. I was woolgathering, I suppose. Please, you were saying something?”

  “Colonel, I’m sure you realize that this ship has accelerated under its own power, that it has vacated its Lagrange orbital position.”

  Phineas nodded. “Yes, Doctor, I’ve had my suspicions along those lines, although I have been consciously trying not to think about it. I’m sure you can understand what I’m saying. Have you confirmed this?”

  “Yes, we have. Unfortunately,” Takamura said. “Do you have any more concrete information?”

  Phineas asked, although he wasn’t sure he wanted to hear any more bad news at the moment.

  “Yes. We were able to get some of our instruments running, and I’ve got some information I think you should know about.”

  “All right, go on.”

  “Those engines are generating more thrust than our instruments can measure, Colonel. They have accelerated the ship to seventy-five kilometers per second at a little more than one-half gee. We suspect that after the initial shock wave some kind of internal acceleration compensation was put into effect.” Phineas said with a sincere, apologetic smile.

  “Could you please tell me what that means?”

  “Sorry.” Takamura seemed both surprised and pleased by Kemp’s show of humility. “It means that if we maintain our present rate of acceleration we will eventually reach escape velocity from the solar system.”

  Even in his dazed state of mind, Kemp was shocked by the pronouncement. “Is that possible?”

  “It is if it’s happening,” Takamura said. “Colonel, this ship is moving.”

  Phineas stared at the chief project assistant dumbly for a moment as he considered what this news really meant. How could this be happening?

  “Phineas, are you okay?” Kate asked, touching his arm softly.

  “Yes,” he said, almost in a whisper. “Just a little stunned, that’s all.” He looked back at Takamura and forced himself to smile. “Tell me, Doctor, do you have any idea yet where we’re going in such a big hurry?”