Best of Beyond the Stars
Page 6
His left hand hung in space, index finger extended to hook Roy’s collar. Those soft round eyes held him entranced...
The creature leaped up and bit off the end of Jensen’s finger.
No pain. No sensation at all. Not really teeth, but a beak-like thing behind those gray lips had nipped the end off his left index finger at the first knuckle.
The warm spatter of blood on his boot triggered a deep reflexive breath. Sudden adrenaline hammered Jensen’s brain and sparks flew in his vision. “Shit!”
He backpedaled, trying to line up a shot that wouldn’t hit Roy. The dog remained still as a statue.
“Roy, here. Damn it, wake—”
Ping-ping! The alarm stopped Jensen cold. From about ten feet out, a ripple began in the soil. The creature that bit him didn’t move. It just stared at him with cartoon character eyes as Jensen’s blood dripped down its hair/scales.
When the ripple in the dirt got close to it, the creature let out a sharp shriek. It started hopping toward Jensen on stumpy legs that reminded him of an armadillo. Then the dirt wave broke open and dozens of them came at him. Exact copies of the first one, all with cute, disarming eyes and razor sharp beaks.
Survival instinct took over and Jensen hosed the advancing wave with the maglev rifle. He emptied his entire magazine and the jungle filled with supersonic cracks and shrieks. When hit by titanium slugs, the creatures burst in a combination of gore and what looked like bits of shale.
When he reached for a new magazine, he saw how stupid he’d been. He should’ve run.
The first five hit him before he could snap the new mag in place. Bit right through a suit that stopped high-energy weapons, taking shallow scallops of his flesh. He screamed and smashed them with his rifle, squashing three of them before his foot caught on a low bush and he went down.
A wave of them crashed over him.
Shrieking that seemed to come from inside his skull. Biting, biting, a never-ending wave of hungry mouths—
A roar like Jensen had never heard. Roy hit him and the creatures at full speed, turning the fight into a whirling ball of blood, shale, fur, and teeth.
The dog snapped and chomped, ripping, crushing, throwing the creatures aside. The disciplined military K9 had disappeared, replaced by a prehistoric wolf-dog, living through its teeth and fury.
Jensen found the strength to push himself to his feet. He froze when he saw the line of creatures. They’d followed him through the brush, so it was hard to count them hidden in the greenery, but there were easily two hundred of them.
Why didn’t they just come then?
Roy growled and the closest creatures seemed to fold in on themselves. It reminded Jensen of an old vid he saw of a hedgehog rolling up. In an instant, they were hard little balls of rock.
Figuring he’d worry about the whys later, Jensen backed toward the ship. He slapped a fresh magazine in place.
“Roy, let’s go. Back to the ship.”
This time, Roy obeyed. He kept his teeth bared at the creatures and backed toward Jensen.
Once Jensen had Roy under the muzzle of his rifle, the jungle filled with a rustling noise. The creatures he could see moved back toward the dirt they’d come from. He didn’t exactly know what happened. He’d never had First Contact training. All Jensen knew was that they needed to leave. Now.
* * *
Moira’s surgical arms made short work of Jensen’s injuries. The missing fingertip had been the worst of it. The rest of the wounds seemed terribly shallow for creatures apparently bent on killing him.
“I am still unable to identify the chemical they left in the bites, but it doesn’t seem to be harming you. Perhaps it only serves to deaden the pain so they can continue to feed.”
Jensen didn’t answer. He just watched her robotic arms work on Roy. Silicone-tipped metal fingers delicately lifted Roy’s upper lip and pulled another bit of hard material out. His mouth and upper neck were covered in tiny cuts. What looked like porcupine bristles made of crystalline rock were stuck all over his face and inside his mouth.
Jensen held Roy across his lap while Moira worked. He thought for a while before he answered the computer.
“That’s all incredibly interesting information, Moira. But not really. Let’s prep the ship to leave.”
No answer as Moira dropped one of the spines into an analysis chamber. The chamber’s armored door closed, and white light flashed from the seams. Inside, the sample was incinerated and the gases analyzed.
“Interesting,” Moira said. “Initial analysis shows this material has what we might call a genetic code that contains something similar to mica and an unidentifiable organic base.”
“They’re made of minerals?” Jensen said.
“By our definition, perhaps. It is simply a life form we cannot explain. That’s the closest my databanks can come to an answer. In truth, it’s much more complex. A being that is mostly rock could survive for thousands, perhaps millions of years between meals. Rocks don’t need sustenance.”
“But the other part of them does. Whatever that is,” Jensen said.
“Apparently. I do detect bits of plant life among these samples. As well as bits of you, of course,” Moira replied.
“You said there were possibly plants here before. You think they ate them all and then what, hibernated after that?”
“Perhaps. Normally, if a species experienced a population explosion greater than their food source could support, most of them would die off,” Moira said.
“But if they could hibernate, then they could just... wait for more food to show up,” Jensen said.
“You’re not nearly as ignorant as you first appeared.”
Jensen flipped a middle finger at the ceiling camera.
The last of the crystalline things came out of Roy’s mouth and he hopped off Jensen’s lap and shook himself.
“Go sleep,” he growled/said. The dog slumped off toward their quarters. Roy had a kennel, of course, but he always slept in Jensen’s quarters. Jensen didn’t blame him for wanting to sleep. He felt dog-tired, himself.
“Okay, Moira, let’s get the ship ready for launch. I’m actually looking forward to stasis this time.”
“Get some rest, Jensen. Tomorrow we’ll capture one of those creatures and then we can go back.”
“Hey, I said prep the ship for launch. I’m not goin’ out there again. And since you don’t have any legs, or a body for that matter, looks like ‘we’ are out of luck,” Jensen said.
“I shall remind you that you are an employee of the Interstellar Colonization Committee.”
“I’m a soldier.”
“Even more reason for you to follow orders. I quote, ‘If any physical cause of the plant extinction can be found, a sample shall be returned to Earth.’“
“Yeah, we got samples out the ass. Prep us to launch, Moira.”
“Jensen, these are unique life forms—”
“Fine. I’ll do it myself from Override Control.”
Jensen stood to leave and swayed on his feet. “Damn. All that adrenaline has me dizzy.”
“Jensen, you are violating protocol by launching the ship on your own.”
“They can fire me when I get back.”
With one hand on the wall, Jensen headed for the med bay hatch. It got harder to move by the second. A low growl stopped him cold. Roy stood in the hatch, hackles raised and teeth bared.
“Roy, what the hell are you doing? Off.”
The dog advanced on him, walking stiff-legged, eyes rolling, jaws dripping with drool.
“Roy, off!”
No sign of recognition.
“Jensen, he appears to have been affected by—”
“No shit, Moira!”
Jensen backed away until he had a small table between himself and Roy. Feeling more and more dizzy, Jensen leaned on the table. He knew to take the bite on his forearm when Roy made his move, and reach under to choke the dog out. But would he be able to stay up
right long enough to do it?
He took a deep breath to try and clear his head. He drew himself up as tall as possible. The Alpha Dog.
“Roy!” Jensen screamed as loud as he could. “Sit! Now!”
Roy just stared at him, but the growling slowly stopped. He didn’t budge, much less sit.
“Sit, Roy. Now.”
Something seemed to penetrate the brain behind those wild eyes. Roy’s flanks crept toward the deck, millimeters at a time. Finally, he sat.
When Jensen made for the hatch, Roy started to get up.
“No.” Jensen said. “You stay. Me go.”
Finally, Jensen lurched out the door and slapped the control panel. The hatch slid shut, hiding Roy’s baleful stare. Jensen thought his balance would get better on his way to the bridge, but it just got worse. He felt feverish and all the bite wounds on his body started to throb.
Once he got to the main controls, he keyed open the manual operation panel and set the launch order. The drop ship had a built in timer that tracked the best launch window to rendezvous with the Skip-Ship in orbit out there. The screen read 7:48:32 and counting. A little less than eight hours and they’d be home free.
Once they launched, everything was automatic. Back up into the belly of the Skip-Ship and into stasis. A few months of sleep until they hit the Skip Gate in this corner of the Universe. Then they’d blip into existence just on the far side of Saturn for the final glide home.
His stomach suddenly hitched and he threw up all over his boots.
“Jensen? Are you feeling ill?” Moira said. Her voice sounded tinny and faraway.
“No shit, Moir—”
The deck swam up to meet him and he fell into the blackest sleep he’d ever known. He dreamt of whispering voices speaking a language he could never hope to understand.
* * *
Seemed hot in in his sleeping quarters. And his bed felt rock hard.
With a start, Jensen awoke on the steel deck of the bridge. Sweat soaked the fabric of his jumpsuit and his mouth felt like a dry riverbed.
“Moira, what happened?” He could hardly force the words out. He stood, keeping one hand on the wall.
“Moira?”
The eerie silence threatened to release a wild panic he could feel building in his belly. Jensen reached for his rifle... Not there. Now how in the hell did that happen?
The emergency weapons locker stood open. Everything gone. That made his heart start to hammer. Black dots swam in his vision and Jensen couldn’t tell if it was adrenaline or the poison from the creatures.
Well, maybe not poison. He did wake up. Moira would be proud of him for figuring that out. Whatever it was had kept him down long enough to make him mica-hedgehog food if he’d been in the open. Their little bites weren’t intended to kill, apparently. They just put you to sleep so you could be eaten alive.
When he gathered his wits enough to check the control screens, he saw why Moira hadn’t answered him. Coolant alarms were blaring red bands across all the screens, but the sound had been muted. Someone—something had screwed with the cooling system that kept Moira’s giant computer brain alive.
The ‘dumb’ backup systems that ran the ship’s operations had survived. That was a relief. The countdown to launch read 15:42 and counting.
He’d been out for over seven hours.
Jensen checked all systems and saw that the lower hatch was stuck open. Security cameras showed a rock jammed in the track.
Unarmed, Jensen felt exposed when he got to the hatch. He grabbed a fire extinguisher, a poor weapon really, but the weight of it made him feel better. He was relieved to discover an actual rock jamming the door, not one of the creatures curled up in the track. He didn’t need his extinguisher/club.
A quick peek outside—Roy lay there on his side, unconscious. His legs and body twitched like he was having a nightmare.
Figure about fourteen minutes to launch. Enough time to go out there and get Roy. If he wanted to. Jensen wasn’t too sure. The creatures had obviously affected Roy. He said they talked to him, which meant they might have found a way to connect with the dog’s mind.
In the end, though, Jensen looked out there and saw his partner. The partner who had kept him out of ambushes, saved his life by putting his own body in harm’s way, shared body heat with him in that frozen fighting hole during his first combat assignment. Keeping sharp eyes on the jungle, Jensen sprinted out to where Roy lay. When he reached the dog, Roy immediately opened his eyes.
He’d been had.
The rustle from the jungle made Jensen’s body break out in gooseflesh. Hundreds. No, thousands. They lined the launch pad. Most were the size of the ones that attacked him and Roy. Some were bigger, maybe half the size of Roy.
Jensen looked down at his dog. At least his teeth weren’t bared. The look in Roy’s eyes was unlike anything Jensen had ever seen before. A certain... intelligence.
“Roy. We need to go back to the ship.”
“No,” Roy growled/said.
“Why not?”
The creatures advanced across the pad and Jensen tried to figure his odds of beating them in a race back to the door. He wouldn’t have bet half a credit on himself to win.
“They not hurt you. I say,” Roy said.
The creatures parted like a living wave as they reached Roy and Jensen. They went around them and started scampering up the ramp. They were entering the ship.
Jensen stared at Roy.
“Roy. What is this?”
“They say ‘Green is food.’“
Roy nodded his head toward the jungle, an almost human gesture.
“Yeah. I see that. They’re eating it. So?” Jensen said.
Roy stood and walked toward the ship. He stopped and looked back over his shoulder. “But you. Good food.”
Jensen watched in horror as the little creatures climbed into the ship. They poured over each other like water, cramming through the hatch at a terrifying speed.
“No.” Jensen moved toward the ship.
One of the creatures wheeled and let out those little shrieks that reverberated inside Jensen’s skull. They advanced on him, their sharp beaks snapping.
Rapid-fire barking brought it all to a stop. Roy stood between Jensen and the creatures. Those closest to him actually balled up into little rocks again.
These creatures still went by the law of the jungle. The animal with the biggest teeth is king. They went back to boarding the drop ship. Roy stood on the ramp and wagged his tail at Jensen.
“Me go. You stay.”
Roy turned and went inside. The door slid shut and the ramp retracted. The rumble of prelaunch warm-up snapped Jensen out of his stupor and he ran for the jungle. He dove into the heavy brush just before the bellowing rockets shook this world for the second time.
The entire jungle trembled at the drop-ship’s furious power.
A million insects and one lonely primate watched that ship scream into the sky, headed back to Earth.
Where the good food lived.
A Word from Michael Ezell
Okay, several words. I’ve already failed you.
I grew up in a variety of trailer parks in Oklahoma. I had an abusive dad who went through a brewery worth of beer and two wives before I left home at age sixteen. My favorite defense against the world was to check out of that world. Books kept me company through those long stretches when no adults came home, and transported me to other worlds, other universes, places that let me escape a crappy trailer with nothing but beer in the fridge.
I am keen to let a reader mentally escape for a few moments, like most casual readers do. But some folks need the escape more than others, and if I provide it for even a short time, then I’m thankful for the opportunity to pay it back.
Please support hardworking indie publishers like these. Buy a book, leave a review. It takes a few seconds to keep an art form alive, and these days we need all the great art we can get, in every form. We need the escape.
Venatoris
by G. S. Jennsen
“The fast lane I am flying down is one
with no end in sight
filled with reckless adventure and
paved with dangerous delights.”
— Ashley Young
YUZHOU LI ORBITAL STATION
Shi Shen Stellar System
1,080 Parsecs from Earth
March 2317
“DOUBLE BOURBON, STRAIGHT up. Double everything. Except the ice. Don’t double the ice.”
Alexis Solovy glanced down the bar in idle curiosity at the source of the dramatic pronouncement. A woman with frizzy black hair and pale, bleached skin sagged off a stool and onto the bar, arms splayed out in defeat. She looked familiar, but damned if Alex could pull a name out of anywhere. “Bad day?”
The woman didn’t lift her head from where it lay propped sideways on her elbow. “My ship is trashed. A mangled heap. Bloody asteroid spun out when I tried to grapple it. I limped back here like a crippled monkey, jack shit to show for my trouble.”
Alex raised her glass in contrived sympathy and turned away. If the woman didn’t have any useful leads, it wasn’t worth the pain of engaging in conversation, polite or otherwise.
Intel was the only reason to come to this godforsaken place, the sleaziest bar on the sleaziest space station for two kiloparsecs. Tidbits. Information. Leads. On a good night, contracts.
Her eyes roved over the room in search of better prospects. The bar was nearly two-thirds full—loud and busy, but not so full as to preclude card and target games and the occasional display of bravado. Bad synth blaring out of the speakers made it feel rowdier than the reality.
Alex knew half the people on sight. Some she was on a last name basis with; others, an epithet basis. Many were interstellar scouts, freelance—same as her, while a few were traders, smugglers, or both. But she didn’t see any corp reps or brokers. Was no one in this cursed place doing business?