"Screw that," said Emily, and walked briskly across the line to where her husband stood, shock and fear in his eyes now. She had made a reasonable supposition that whatever process was being employed by the Locusts to harvest the red matter would have no ill effect on people when she saw that anything built by humans was still intact; still, she did not appreciate her husband's recklessness. "Not much fun, is it?" Emily said, then punched her husband hard on the meat of his shoulder. "Come on, Thor, at least you listen to me."
Thor rose from where he had been sitting next to Petter and trotted toward Emily. When he reached the line of energy he paused for a second before leaping across it. The rest of the humans followed behind him.
"Which way now?" Petter asked.
"This way," said Emily, and started to follow the pull she felt tugging at her mind.
•••
The going became much easier this side of the energy line. The eradication of anything alien meant the team only had to avoid the newly exposed human trash that still littered the now denuded landscape.
"It's kind of disconcerting, to see it all exposed like this," said Mac.
Emily understood what he meant. The transmutation of the flora and fauna had the effect of drawing back a curtain that had been pulled across the world, hiding what had once been from the survivors’ sight. That invisibility had helped Emily's mind to cope with the loss; out of sight, out of mind, and all that. Now, the ugly, decayed remains of the old world were laid bare, leaving nothing to the imagination, exposing the extent of the utter destruction of their world. She imagined it felt like how she would feel if she had accidentally dug up the moldering remains of an old pet, buried in another life; a better, more innocent life. It left a feeling of profound melancholy in her stomach and heart. It's all just so unbelievably sad, she thought.
"Look! Over there," said Petter. He pointed off to his right, through a gap between the shells of two crumbling houses.
Emily shaded her eyes against the glare of the sun and looked where Petter was pointing. She saw a berm of raised earth, maybe two meters tall. But what caught her attention was the wisps of purple energy flowing up the sides of the berm like smoke being pulled by the extractor fan of a kitchen range.
"Let's check it out," Mac said. He added, "Carefully."
They passed between the two homes, weapons raised. "Slowly now," Mac reiterated.
"This doesn't look like dirt," Emily said as she dropped to her knees next to the berm. "It's so smooth." She ran her hand up the curve of the berm. "It's like it’s been melted." The mound had an almost glass-like feel to it. Thor nosed around the base of it, his eyes following the wisps of purple energy like they were leaves blown by an autumn breeze.
"It's warm to the touch, too. Not cold like I expected," said Petter, standing beside Emily.
The berm was a little bigger than Emily had guessed it to be, obscuring her view of what lay on the other side. Around it, wisps of purple energy snaked over the ground, played over the berm's surface, rippling and moving into whatever was on the other side. The transference of energy was silent; in fact, Emily noted, the only sound other than the crunch of their boots on the ground was the distant hiss and whoosh of surf, as the ocean broke against the shore a kilometer or so west of where they were.
"Give me a boost," Mac said to Billings. Obediently, Billings positioned his feet shoulder width apart, interlocked the fingers of both hands to form a stirrup, then raised Mac up until his shoulders were over the top of the berm, and he could support himself with his beefy arms.
"Well, shit, love. I think you've found what we're looking for," said Mac, his head moving left and right as he surveyed the ground.
"What do you see?" Emily asked.
"Come on up and have a look for yourself," Mac said, nodding to Billings to lower him down. Mac took Billings' place and lifted Emily up. The berm encompassed the opening to a shaft that was about thirty meters across. She leaned over the edge to get a better look, felt Mac's grip tighten on her ankles, and looked straight down, into nothing but darkness. "Hand me a flashlight," Emily said, holding an outstretched hand behind her. Petter gave her his. She flicked it on and moved the beam into the shaft. The beam pushed back some of the darkness but not much. She played the light across the shaft's walls; they were made of the same smooth material as the berm she leaned against. It was almost as if the tunnel had been melted out of the ground. And there was no sign of a bottom to it. The shaft could drop down for a hundred meters or several kilometers, there was just no way to guess.
"Let me down," she said eventually.
Mac lowered his wife back down to the ground. "This the place, you think?"
Emily nodded. The pinging in her brain had stopped at the same time she had first approached the berm.
"Now what?" Petter asked.
"We need to figure out how we're going to get down there," said Emily.
"We're going to need climbing gear," Mac said.
"We have the equipment back at Point Loma," Billings said.
Mac checked his watch. It was about three in the afternoon. "Better get a move on then."
•••
They spent that night in the same house they had stayed in the night before. There was an odd comfort for Emily coming back to the same familiar spot.
"You have a plan?" Emily asked Mac, her voice hushed, the rest of the team already asleep for the night. They sat next to each other on the same sofa they had spent the previous night.
Mac took a moment to reply. "I don't like the odds of this one, love. We have next to no intelligence on what to expect. We don't know what these Locusts are capable of, other than what Adam has told you, and we have no information on the layout of their lair. I mean, I've walked into some shit-storms before the red rain, but that was against human adversaries; they were predictable. All the cards are off the table for this one and that makes me nervous.
"And you don't like being nervous," Emily said before he could, moving in closer to him.
Mac smiled. "How'd you know? So, is there anything else you can tell me about what Adam expects us to do? Can you contact him?"
"Maybe tonight," Emily said, although she didn't hold out too much hope. This last time Adam had communicated with her, she had sensed how distracted he was, how immersed in his constant absorption of the Caretakers' store of knowledge, to the point that he seemed barely able to maintain his focus on her.
"Okay, I guess that's the best we can hope for then?"
In the remaining time between wakefulness and sleep, they sat silently together, enjoying the closeness of each other, their hands intertwined, watching shadows creep across the window as the last light of day left the sky.
•••
When the team woke the next morning, they grabbed their gear and headed outside, intent on getting an early start back to Point Loma.
"Bugger me," said Mac as he stepped over the threshold into the crisp, damp morning air. Overnight, the ring of energy emanating from the shaft had almost caught up with them. It was now only twenty meters away from where they stood. If they had not woken when they did, the ring would have passed right through the house as they slept.
"It's expanding faster," said Emily. "Look!"
The day before, the ring's progress of consuming the red jungle had been barely perceptible, but now the ring's energetic glow was far more pronounced, its expansion probably twice as fast, Emily estimated.
"Well, that puts a different spin on things completely," said Mac. "There's no more time to waste. We're going to need to hump it back to Point Loma." They had agreed the night before that they would head back to Point Loma as quickly as possible, but in the interest of safety—i.e. "Not getting eaten-a-fucking-live by that big fucker under the bridge," as Mac had colorfully elaborated—they would take a more circuitous route back to the Point, and avoid traveling through SeaWorld.
"We're going to have to take the same route we came in by," Petter said, confirming wha
t Emily was thinking.
Mac added, "Not something I'm happy about, but the risk is one we're going to have to take."
"Well at least we know what to expect," Emily said.
"That makes me feel so much better," Mac said, mitigating his sarcasm with a sly grin. "Come on then, the universe isn't going to save itself."
•••
Thor smelled the dead titan long before his human companions spotted its rotting corpse wrapped around a pillar of the bridge, not far from where the two creatures had fought their bloody battle. While the humans had seen no other signs of life on land when they passed through the previous day, the water was filled with it, if the hundreds of smaller creatures that now swarmed over the dead monster's carcass were any kind of a gauge.
Rather than take the same northbound span of the bridge they had used previously, they chose the southbound section instead, which meant they would avoid the section the two titans had damaged when they fought their battle. Thankfully, there was no sign of the victorious titan on either of the islands. Still, the team made a concerted effort to move across the bridge as quickly as possible, using the derelict vehicles that littered it as cover.
Moving quickly through the waterpark, they exited through the same gap in the fence they had entered by two days earlier. Emily felt everyone breathe a collective sigh of relief. Now it was just a case of beating feet back to Point Loma as quickly as possible. And they made good time, arriving back just before sundown; exhausted, dirty, and hungry, but thankful that they had made it home without losing anyone else.
STAR CHILD
CHAPTER 14
"Ladies. Gentlemen. First off, I want to thank all of you who are a part of the assault team for volunteering, especially for such an intelligence-poor mission," Mac said, addressing the gathering of soldiers and sailors who had assembled in the camp's cafeteria. All personnel were in the room for the mission briefing, but Mac had decided on a team of twenty volunteers to make the assault on the lair; enough to provide the kind of firepower they might need, but small enough that they could move quickly, and inconspicuously.
Emily leaned against the back wall of the room, watching her husband's briefing.
Mac continued, "Our primary mission is to infiltrate the alien's lair, and identify the enemy's energy reservoir. Secondarily, we will try to locate and extract any potential survivors. Once we've located said energy reservoir, we will proceed to blowing the fuckers back to whatever godforsaken rock they came here from."
Mac's last line raised a few cheers from the group.
"Everyone who's not a part of the assault team will travel with us and provide logistical support topside. Now, if I've made it sound like this mission is going to be a leisurely stroll in the park, I should reiterate that we have next to no intelligence on exactly what we'll be facing once we get inside the lair. Which means we'll be winging it for much of the time. Sounds like fun, eh?"
Now a wave of nervous laughter rippled through the room.
"How are we getting inside?" asked Bishop, a heavyset sailor in his thirties, who seemed to have a permanent scowl on his face.
"Glad you asked," Mac continued. "We've located a shaft that we believe the Locusts use to direct the energy they are harvesting from the surrounding area down into their lair. We'll be using this shaft to pay them a visit."
Bishop looked at Mac expectantly. "And...?"
"Remember when I said all we had was piss-poor intelligence? I wasn't exaggerating. Once we're inside, we'll have to figure out where we go next. We'll be going in completely blind, but there is no other option. If we don't find the Locusts' energy pool so Emily can do what she needs to do, then we're screwed."
The team muttered nervously.
"It sucks, I know," Mac continued. "Now, I don't want to sound too melodramatic, but the fate of the human race rests quite literally on each of our shoulders. Well, everyone but you Simpson..." Mac nodded at a sailor in the front row "...it'd slip right off of yours." The men and women laughed less cautiously now. When the laughter died down Mac continued, his tone turning serious, "I know it all feels and sounds surreal, but it's all true, every word. These Locusts are here for one thing, and one thing only; to steal every resource this planet has. Now, you're all already heroes as far as I'm concerned, but this is some biblical level shit we'll be dealing with. This is the kind of story that, if we manage to pull it off, people will be talking about two or three thousand years from now. This is your chance to be legends."
He let his words sink in for three heartbeats, then stood, checked his watch and said, "Now get your gear together and meet me at the ready-point in thirty minutes. This is our world, and it’s time to take it back."
•••
"Okay, everyone on board," Mac yelled to the soldiers who had assembled beneath the legs of the Machine, their gear in hand. Without further prompting, the group organized themselves into two lines and began to march up the slipway into the Machine. Once everyone was on board, Emily, Thor, Mac, and Petter followed, the ramp folding up behind them.
Emily took her seat next to Rhiannon.
The previous evening, Emily and Mac had discussed with Rhiannon her role in the coming operation. As reticent as they both were to involve Rhiannon in the potentially violent events to come, she was the craft’s pilot, and the only person who could operate it, and the Machine was just too vital an asset to not have it involved. So, they had agreed, somewhat reluctantly, that there was simply no way to keep her out of the coming operation. Initially, they needed Rhiannon to use the Machine to transport everyone to a location on the beach about a kilometer away from the shaft. This location would serve as their base camp. There was no way to get the huge craft into the lair, so Rhiannon would stay with it, along with everyone who wasn't a part of the assault team, or the ten-person support group who were going to remain on the surface near the shaft's entrance. Rhiannon and the Machine, along with the remainder of the crew would form a rear guard, medical assessment and support section. If Mac's assault crew found any survivors, they would be extracted up the shaft and then directed back to the base camp. Rhiannon's job would be to provide protection for the base camp, survivors, and personnel. Rhiannon had jumped at the responsibility, happy to finally be included in an operation rather than babysitting Thor (even though Emily had already decided that the malamute would remain with Rhiannon for this operation).
Emily looked over to Rhiannon; she was seated in the command chair, her eyes fixed ahead, probably enjoying the super-senses her connection to the Machine afforded her.
"Ready?" Rhiannon asked Emily.
Emily did a quick scan of the other passengers, saw they were all settled securely in their seats, and said, "Ready when you are."
"Machine, follow the coastline north," Rhiannon ordered.
The seats' protective padding expanded to envelop the passengers, then the Machine was off, accelerating rapidly to its breakneck speed. It leaped over the camp's security fence and dropped down onto the beach, its legs kicking up plumes of sand as it powered north, following the beach along the coastline.
The ping-ping-ping in Emily's head had returned almost as soon as they had started for home the previous day. Now Emily used it to guide Rhiannon to a spot on the coast parallel to where Emily sensed the shaft was located.
"This is the place," Emily said.
Rhiannon ordered the Machine to stop, then lowered its ramp. All in all, it had taken just fifteen minutes to travel as far as Emily, Mac and their team had in two days.
Mac stood. "Everyone off." The group began to disembark, organizing themselves into their assigned groups once they were outside.
Parsons and Rhiannon walked over to where Emily, Mac, and Petter supervised their assault team as they triple checked their gear.
"Good timing," said Mac as the two approached. He reached into a duffel bag and pulled out a handheld radio. "Here you go," he placed the radio in Rhiannon's hands. "You'll be our point of contact here, o
kay?"
Rhiannon took the radio and nodded.
Mac continued, "The radios aren't going to work once we're in the shaft, all that rock is going to cause havoc."
"Then how will the radio help?" said Rhiannon.
"I am glad you asked," said Mac, sounding like a midnight infomercial. "In this bag," he tapped the duffel bag at his feet with his boot "we have several radio repeaters. I'm going to position them as we go and they'll boost the signal enough that we'll be able to reach you."
"Cool," said Rhiannon, apparently impressed.
"Yes indeed," Mac said, smiling. "It'll be up to you to pass any information back to Parsons, okay?"
"Roger that," said Rhiannon, making all four adults smile.
"Okay then," Mac said, "it's time we were on our way."
Rhiannon silently hugged Emily first, then Mac, and finally, much to his surprise, Petter. The embraces were long, and wordless. When she was done, she turned to Parsons and said, "Can you take me back to the Machine?" Parsons nodded solemnly at Mac and Emily then led Rhiannon back toward the craft.
Emily sucked in a long inhalation of air then turned to her husband and Petter, "Ready?"
"You betcha," Mac said, and together they walked over to join the waiting assault team.
•••
The hike to the Locusts' lair was probably going to be the easiest part of this whole operation, Emily decided as they approached the shaft. The constantly expanding circle of energy had devoured everything red for more than five kilometers around the shaft, which left only the remains of homes and stores and other such human debris between the base camp on the beach and the team's target. They reached the opening to the shaft around nine AM.
"Jesus," said Mac, his eyes moving over the raised berm that encircled the shaft's entrance.
The flow of energy that just two days ago had been little more than wisps of purple light was now a torrent. It covered every centimeter of the berm, extending out for thirty meters in every direction, floating several centimeters off the ground like a thin, translucent covering, undulating and shifting in the sunlight. Lightning bolts of energy streaked across the ground from the red jungle in the distance, before merging with the pool of energy collecting around the shaft. It created a disconcerting yet fascinating light show.
Extinction Point: Kings (Extinction Point Series (5 book series)) Page 14
