Kali did her best to ignore her cams and focus instead on the darkness before her. She flicked her eyes across the visor cam looking for shadows that seemed out of place or movement, but only the occasional piece of debris caught her attention.
“Not that I’m complaining,” Dickerson said, “but why aren’t they in here?”
“You mean the pinecones?” Carb asked.
“Yeah. I mean, they were stuffed into the corridors. Why aren’t they here too?”
“Good question,” Kali said. “When we get back to Black, maybe the Trio will have some answers for us.”
“The Trio,” Carb spat, “may have left these poor fuckers out in space to die.”
“Yeah,” Elliott said. “Why did Captain Kovacs say that? I can’t believe they’d do that.”
Kali frowned, doing her best to absorb their words while scanning for possible threats down the shaft. “Kovacs seemed to think the Trio knew what was out there. And it doesn’t sound to me like they made it to Proxima Centauri b. Hell, didn’t sound like they ever had any intention of making it there.”
“So why the big cover-up?” Dickerson asked. “You telling me SF Gov convinced all of humanity to spend precious resources and cooperate on the largest, most expensive endeavor in human history on the basis of a lie? For what purpose? And if they weren’t planning on going to PCb, just where the fuck were they going?”
“I don’t know,” Kali said. “I also don’t understand how they managed to keep Mira’s actual design a secret. Humans had to have been involved in the construction of both the refinery and the shuttle bay. I can’t for a second believe the Trio did that and managed to hide it.”
“No,” Dickerson said. “You’re right. Mira’s crew sure as hell knew what was going on. They had to be in on it.”
“In on it. Conspiracy. Who the fuck cares,” Carb said in a raspy growl. “These folks are dead. And we’re going to join them if we don’t find a way out of here.”
That shut everyone up. In a way, Kali was glad for the silence, but the questions kept rattling around her mind. Why would the Trio even agree to be part of something like this? And just how many SF Gov, SF Navy, and SFMC officials were involved? If humanity ever discovered the truth, what would happen? Another civil war between Mars and Earth, with the stations caught in-between? Who gained from that?
Something moved in the darkness ahead. Kali’s breathing hitched. It moved again. “Slow down,” she said, her voice a near whisper. She dragged her glove against the shaft wall, halving her speed. “Possible bogey up ahead.”
“Copy,” Dickerson and Carb said simultaneously.
Kali activated her mag-glove and ramped down the magnetics to the lowest level. The drag would help slow her, but not fix her to the wall, allowing her to easily break the attractive field. The something moved again, darting from wall to wall. “Halt,” she said and increased the magnetic field. She came to an abrupt stop, her body leaning forward from the minor jolt.
“Dickerson? You see it?”
“Aye, Corporal,” he said. “Whatever that is, it ain’t a piece of debris. It’s not moving like one of the pinecone things either.”
Kali narrowed the focus on her lights, changing the diffuse, wide-area illumination to concentrated beams. An amorphous form flipped through the beams of light across the slip-point. Something a little larger strayed through the beams, moving even faster. Kali’s nerves sizzled with fear.
The slip-point floor vibrated beneath her feet.
“What the fuck was that?” Carb asked.
Dickerson groaned into the mic. “Um, Corporal? We have a serious problem. Check my cam.”
Kali brought up his feed and looked. Dickerson was facing the opposite end of the slip-point, his lights stabbing through the gloom. Something large was floating down the hall, silver glinting in its center. “Oh, shit,” she said. “Jet! Now!”
“But—” Carb started to say.
“Fucking move!” Dickerson yelled.
Kali detached from the wall and hit her suit thrusters. Her fuel gauge quickly descended from the middle of the crimson warning pie slice down to the very bottom. She blasted forward at 5m/s, quickly approaching the area where she’d seen the shapes moving in the darkness. She no longer had to wonder what they were.
Dozens of small starfish-like creatures floated and undulated through the z-g, reaching the left wall and then bouncing to the right. Some pushed from the ceiling to the floor. The tiny lifeforms bounced off her helmet and suit as she quickly passed them. A check of her rear cam showed Carb and Dickerson following her lead at similar speeds. But behind Dickerson, the large version was still pulling itself down the shaft even faster. It was going to catch them.
Something struck the back of her neck. Kali ignored it and continued flying forward, the lights from her helmet bouncing as she flicked her head around, looking for threats. Her mind barely had time to process what she was seeing, her mouth opening in wonder. On the shaft’s ceiling, webs of silvery liquid combined to cradle an oblong, misshapen hive covered with perforations about the size of a fingernail.
“Duck!” she yelled into the mic.
“Goddamnit!” Dickerson screamed.
Kali didn’t have time to check the rear cam, but she saw the flash from a flechette round blowing up behind them. She continued forward past two more hives, her flechette rifle pointed down the shaft, finger tight on the trigger. The next junction was less than five meters away. Another web, waist high, blocked the route to the port-side.
“Keep flying!”
Dickerson breathed heavily into the mic. “That thing is right behind me. Going to light it up.”
Kali moved herself to the wall with an attitude burn. Her HUD flashed red. She had enough fuel for maybe one more burn. After that, she’d have to use her mag-gloves and boots for momentum, and that meant having to slow down. Cursing, she powered up one of the mag-gloves to full and clutched the wall. Carb and Elliott flew past her as another round exploded behind her.
She turned and nearly screamed. The starfish thing practically filled the shaft, its arms bending to make room, maw open and salivating silver. Dickerson floated backward and horizontal, head held up just high enough to keep the shaft in his camera view. His flechette rifle sent another round five meters down the corridor. The rocket-propelled projectile missed the center mass and instead exploded with arcs of electricity near the joint connecting one of the arms to the center mass. The creature froze, its long arms bending to cover its mouth.
Dickerson floated past her just as the thing’s arms pushed outward, the ends smashing into the Atmo-steel. It opened its mouth wide and shot a jet of silvery liquid. The thing’s aim was off, the ropey substance squirting past Dickerson and down the shaft. With a yell, Kali pulled the trigger on her rifle.
The round detonated inside the thing’s mouth. The creature seemed to swallow and then belched blue arcs of electricity before finally curling its arms around itself. Kali fired another for good measure, spun herself using the wall, and pushed off after Dickerson.
The large marine had already slowed and reoriented himself to a near-standing position. “You okay, Corporal?”
She swallowed hard and tried to steady herself. “I’m fine,” she managed. “Is that thing dead?”
“Well, it sure as hell ain’t moving its arms anymore or spitting that shit at us.” He gestured down the shaft. “We backtracking to that junction?”
“Fuck no, we aren’t,” Elliott said. “You guys may have been a little busy, but I saw what was down there. Hell, no.”
“What’d you see?” Carb asked.
“More of those silvery webs. And whatever those insect cocoons were.” Elliott groaned. “Just get me off this fucking ship already.”
“Cocoons?” Dickerson asked. “Is that what I saw above me?”
“I don’t think they’re cocoons exactly,” Kali said. “More like hives.”
“Shit,” Carb said. “So what? The little ones
live in there?”
Kali allowed herself to float down the hall until she reached Carb. Dickerson had already mag-locked himself next to her. “That’s what it looked like to me,” Kali said. “I don’t know how many of the small ones could live in there, but I imagine they could swarm us pretty easily.”
“Just better hope they can’t spit,” Dickerson said. “Else we are truly fucked.”
The image of an entire hive exploding outward with thousands of the little starfish creatures all expelling the silvery acid made her cringe. There would be no way to survive that in tight corners. And since they were still in the ship, slip-point shafts and corridors would become death traps.
She pushed the thoughts away and focused on the ceiling. There were no maintenance hatches. Maybe there were some in the egress points leading off the shaft. Kali brought up the schematics on her HUD and checked their position. They’d missed two egresses now. The next would be the last before they ran out of midships and were forced aft. And going there was the last goddamned place she wanted to be.
“We need to make the next egress,” she said. “Whatever’s there, we’re going to have to try and get through it.”
“Aye,” Dickerson said. “Don’t know what ate the goddamned fusion drives, but I sure as fuck don’t want to meet it.”
“Or,” Carb said, “end up in the cargo bay.”
“Copy that,” Elliott said. “Fuck that place.”
Kali checked her HUD again. Yup. Enough fuel for one more burn. And a small one at that. “Squad. How’s your fuel?” It was as bad as she thought. Carb had four burns left in her. Dickerson two. Maybe. “Time to use those mag-gloves and boots,” she said. “Only burn if it’s an absolute goddamned emergency and you’re going to die if you don’t.”
“Copy, Corporal,” Dickerson said. “Back to mag-walking?”
She nodded. “Back to mag-walking. It’s going to slow us down, but going to be a lot safer now that we know they can create those webs.”
“No, shit,” Carb said. “I don’t think we want to know what happens if we get caught in one of those.”
Kali couldn’t agree more.
Chapter Fifteen
Thruster placement. Bullshit, Gunny thought. More like placing marines in the middle of fucking pinecone heaven.
The further they traveled from midships, the thicker the carpet of pinecones became. The creatures seemed to have begun a mass migration. He couldn’t be sure, but it looked like hundreds of the alien lifeforms had emerged from an opening and planted themselves on the hull. The only good news? They appeared to be stationary instead of flocking. Taulbee had already called in a warning about that. Also told him to be on the lookout for starfish.
“Starfish,” Gunny grumbled. Goddamned creatures didn’t look anything like starfish to him. Except for their basic anatomy, that’s where the similarity stopped. No starfish he’d ever read about or seen in holos acted like that. A fast-moving z-g predator that squirted a substance caustic enough to turn Atmo-steel, the most durable human-made substance, into crumbling, decaying material? No. That was most definitely not a starfish.
And the pinecones? He shook his head. Dickerson may have coined the term, but the marine was way off. They looked more like seed pods to him. And the idea they may flower into something else was downright terrifying.
Every creature on Earth served a niche. Even humanity, which had altered its environment to near destruction, had its place as an apex predator. At least on land. The remaining terrestrial fauna and flora had only survived by quickly adapting to nuclear winter, mutating from radiation, or by being hardy enough to weather the wholesale environmental changes. If nature hadn’t found a way to live outside the city domes, perhaps the only creatures left on Earth would be humans and the ever-evolving aquatic life.
Gunny hadn’t exactly studied much biology. While most schools on Earth still taught it, outside of the few remaining religious conclaves, the bottom line was that humanity was more interested in the stars and mining Sol System’s remaining resources. Students spent far more time learning technical skills such as manufacture, repair, and invention. 3-D printers had practically rendered human hands obsolete. With the exception of some artistic types, and boutique craftspeople, both heavily patronized by the wealthy, humanity had already lost its history as toolmakers. And with AIs, there would come a time when humanity lost the ability to think for itself. Gunny feared they’d already reached that point.
Biology? Chemistry? Physics? Math? History? Philosophy? Of these, only physics and mathematics seemed to really matter. Apart from SF Gov’s staunch insistence on teaching the lessons learned from the end of the Common Era and how they applied to the Sol Era, very little history was taught at all. If you wanted to know about the Common Era, you had to work on that yourself. Gunny had spent most of his downtime doing just that. His conclusion? Humanity had boxed itself into a corner it might never escape. Unless, of course, they found a way to reach beyond Sol System. And if Mira was any indication, that wasn’t going to be easy.
“Gunny,” Wendt said. “They’re getting thicker.”
The marine’s voice snapped the stream of thoughts and brought him back to the screens. To avoid the fields of pinecones, he’d raised their hover to seven meters above the hull. It was as far as the skiff could get without losing contact with Mira and flying off into space. Or worse, getting hit by the ship as it slowly tumbled through space.
Gunny checked the feed from the skiff’s underside cameras. Yup, Wendt was right. “Where the hell are they coming from?” Gunny said aloud.
“Is it just me,” Wendt said, “or does it seem like they’re multiplying? I see small ones and a few that are much larger. Some of them are nearly two meters long.”
“Two meters,” Lyke mumbled. “Fuckers could eat us.”
Gunny growled. “Just remember that when you step off to check the lines.”
Silence filled the comms. After a few moments, Gunny slowed the skiff and took up position over a harness piton. He cursed and initiated a connection to Dunn.
“Go ahead, Gunny,” the captain said.
“Sir, I think we have a serious problem here. The pinecones have covered the furthest line on this side of the hull. My marines will have to step on them just to get close.”
The comms fell silent again. Gunny waited for a response, wondering if the interference had finally rendered communication impossible. Dunn’s voice returned with stress brimming beneath his words. “Is it possible to get them to move?”
Gunny raised an eyebrow. Still hovering far above the creatures, the harness line glowed on his HUD, but well beneath the bed of pinecones. “We can try, sir. Perhaps one of the new flechette rounds will get them to move?”
“I’m looking at your feed, Gunny. I think we have three options here. Either you slip off the hull, turn, and try and get them to move, pilot the skiff further toward midships before firing, and hope like hell they don’t come back at you, or we give up on the line.”
Well, that’s a cluster fuck waiting to happen, Gunny thought. If they fired on the creatures while off the hull, they might drive the herd further toward the midships and thus closer to S&R Black and his two marines guarding the spindle. If he pulled back and fired at them, driving them off the ship entirely, they might come back at him like a wave. But really, he just wanted to fly back to the ship, disengage it from the spindle, and get the fuck out of here. Blast Mira to pieces and call it good.
Colonel Heyes would no doubt court-martial Dunn if they did that. But what was a court-martial compared to dying out here in the wastes of the far Sol System? Gunny smirked. As if half the marines in S&R Black hadn’t already been court-martialed once or twice. Especially Dickerson and Carbonaro. Having the captain serve some time in the brig wouldn’t exactly be out of character for the company.
“Gunny?”
“Aye, sir,” he said, his cheeks flushing with embarrassment. “I’ll pull the skiff back toward the midships a
nd give the little buggers something to think about.”
“Very good, Gunny. Dunn, out.”
Gunny sighed, the sound echoing in his helmet. “Okay, marines. Change in plans. We’re going to head about twenty meters toward the midships, turn around, and fire at these things. See if we can get them to move.”
Wendt immediately responded. “You trying to get them to swarm off the hull?”
“That’s the idea,” Gunny said, his voice little more than a growl. “If they get the hell off the hull, we can proceed with our mission. If not, well, we’ll figure something out.”
“Is that really a good idea?” Lyke asked.
Gunny narrowed his eyes. “Good and bad don’t matter here, marine. Those are our orders.”
When Lyke responded, his timid voice did nothing to improve Gunny’s mood. “Aye, Gunny.”
Gunny activated the forward thrusters and the skiff began moving backward. He kept an eye on the rear screens, as well as the marker he’d placed on his HUD. When the skiff reached a distance of 25 meters, he brought it to a stop with a few puffs of gas. “Wendt? You’ve got the duty.”
“Aye, Gunny,” Wendt said. “How many rounds? And what type?”
“Regular flechettes, marine. But be ready to switch to the other ammo. If those things take off like a pissed-off flock of birds heading straight at us, I want you to blast everything in range.”
“Acknowledged,” Wendt said.
“Lyke? You’re the lookout. I want to make sure nothing is going to creep up behind us.”
“Aye, Gunny. Same instructions?”
“As far as what? Ammo?”
“Aye.”
Good question, he thought. He wasn’t all that concerned about a pinecone attack from the rear. Instead, it was the goddamned starfish things that had him spooked. If one of those things rammed the skiff, there was no telling what would happen to his squad. And ramming might be the least deadly thing one of those creatures could do. If one attacked, it could wrap its arms around any one of them, break the magnetic field, and disappear with a fresh meal.
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