Gaines swiveled around in his chair. “If they’re no longer with the shuttle, they may not hear our calling them. The comlinks may, or may not have the signal strength for us to communicate together.”
“Why wouldn’t they be in the shuttle? How far from the colony did they land?”
Land was a relative word Windsor demanded using. He refused to accept that Commander Meyers and her crew had crashed on Neptune.
“Before we lost the signal, I showed them about six, maybe seven clicks out.”
A forever distance away, Windsor thought. Venturing out of the shuttle was suicidal. With limited air and freezing temperatures, even in their suits they would be exposed, risk hypothermia, frostbite, or death.
Gaines had explained how they could not center on any readings for any of the starfighters. The fighters were small and more susceptible to bow to the sudden onset of a raging storm.
How could the radar not have picked up the weather front? They should have had some advance warning prior to launching the shuttle, or even minutes before the wind struck. Minutes would have given them time to abort or redirect. Windsor knew he would forever blame himself for the oversight.
Right now, there was no point worrying about the whys. Doing so changed nothing, but feed his personal anxiety.
“Sir, there is one other way of looking at this,” Gaines said. “There might not be anything wrong with the communicators at all. The storm clouds may just be thick enough that all communication attempts are bouncing back.”
“Is that possible?”
“Aye. Possible, and likely, sir.”
“So, perhaps when the storm passes, we’ll be able to talk to the commander, whether she is inside the shuttle, or in her space suit, or inside the colony?” Windsor hated getting his hopes up, but when he considered his second option … Radioing back to Euphoric was the last thing he wanted to do. It was more than admitting defeat or failure. His reluctance stemmed from the last transmission he had had with corporate. They were not interested in saving lives. All Euphoric was interested in was the recovery of the diamonds.
Not the people.
Windsor put a hand over his stomach.
“Are you alright, sir?” Gaines asked.
“Aye.” Windsor removed his hand, looked at his own palm like as if an alien limb, and then quickly placed his arm behind his back. He returned to the commander’s chair, and sat down. Although Gaines made progress, and Lieutenant Bell was indeed trying to reach them, the unanswered questions were what caused his stomach to flip and flop. He knew he was going to have to get a hold of Euphoric and inform them of their current situation.
Euphoric was the only one with the authority for the launch of their second shuttle.
The question was if they would authorize such a rescue mission?
Chapter Twenty-Two
Captain Adam Stanton and Lieutenant Angela Ruiz ran.
They pushed forward, the colony in their sights, but each kept looking back over a shoulder. The creatures that possibly had emerged from the ocean depths were nowhere to be seen, but that did not mean they were gone. It did not mean nothing followed, or stalked them.
“I feel like prey.” Ruiz spoke between haggard breaths. Running was not simple. The loose gems crunched underfoot. Her next footfall crashed through, and her leg sank almost knee deep into a snow-like substance. She tumbled forward, grunting. “Adam!”
Stanton stopped, turned around. “Are you okay?”
He struggled, catching his breath as he walked back toward her, and extended an arm.
Ruiz clapped her hand onto his forearm. He wrapped his fingers around hers. As he helped her out of the hole and back onto her feet, his eyes caught sight of something slithering behind them.
It wasn’t close, not too terribly close. The thing slid behind a dune of diamonds and snow.
“What?” Ruiz asked, and spun around.
Stanton slowed his breathing. He did not want to frighten Ruiz, not any more than she already was. “It’s nothing. Sun must have hit a stone just right. Really, It was nothing.”
Ruiz brushed snow off her lower legs and padded her hands against her thighs. “You know what? You’re an awful liar.”
Captain Stanton did not even attempt denying it. Instead, he turned Ruiz around. “Colony’s dead ahead. Let’s just keep moving. We’re going to be there in no time. I don’t know about you, but I am looking forward to getting out of this suit, and having a hot meal. All right?”
“Dead ahead, really? Did you just say dead ahead?”
He saw only his own reflection in her helmet’s glass, and even that reflection was obscured by the planet brightness surrounding them. “Poor word choice. My apologies.”
“Apology not accepted,” she said. He wondered if she smiled. “Let’s go.”
Just then, from the mound on their right, a geyser erupted. The sound, like a starfighter engine roaring when it turbo-launched into space, startled them both. They fell over one another. Ruiz landed on top of Stanton.
Jagged, sharp diamonds sprayed into the sky.
Stanton and Ruiz struggled back onto their feet. Stanton took Ruiz by the hand. They ran, as best they could, away from the downpour. The diamonds could easily cut through their spacesuits. The shower of gems and poisonous ocean water presented a host of dangers.
The mist from the geyser rained on their faceshields.
Ruiz raised a hand in an attempt at wiping the spray away.
Stanton yelled. “Don’t touch it! You don’t want that concentrated onto your gloves. The ammonia might damage the integrity of the suit’s material.”
The geyser continued spitting contents skyward. The sound became nearly deafening. “Can it?”
“What? Don’t slow down! Keep running!” A large diamond thudded against Stanton’s shoulder. He winced. His hand touched the area, checking for a tear in the suit. It was difficult determining if one existed while wearing gloves. With his helmet on, he could not crane his head around for a closer look.
“I said, can it?”
Can it what? Then Stanton remembered. The integrity of the suit. “It could. We don’t want to risk it.”
“But it’s raining down on us right now! You’re covered.”
“How’s my suit?”
“What?”
They stopped running. They were just past the reach of the raining down gush from the geyser. Maybe they should have kept running. He was worried about his suit. Even if the material was compromised, there was nothing he could do about it. “Here.” He pointed at his shoulder. “Is it ripped.”
“I don’t see anything.” She ran a finger over the area. “No. Nothing. It looks fine.”
Stanton sighed. His quick breaths fogged the inside of his faceshield and then cleared, and then fogged again. For whatever reason, all he could think about was drawing a smiley face in the collected moisture. “Come on. We have to keep moving!”
For the moment, just a moment, Stanton had forgotten all about the creatures still closing in on them.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Lieutenant Murray Bell, not thrilled about wasting air in one of the suits—the supply indeed limited—knew, beyond a doubt, something outside had passed in front of the shuttle porthole. If someone needed his help, he would be negligent not to at the very least to go out and give the ship a complete once-around.
Checking the perimeter did not mean he did not have to play it safe. He made sure the blaster was loaded and held the weapon with a finger over the trigger. Part of him suspected it had not been the commander or anyone else from the crew outside the shuttle. He tried not allowing his imagination get the better of him.
Colonists? Aliens?
He shook his head and concentrated on his breathing, keeping it to slow but shallow breaths.
The sound of his breathing, however, was loud inside the secured helmet.
The digital display showed his pulse and heartbeat in the upper right-hand corner. A map of the area i
n the left. The radar wasn’t picking up any other signs of life. That alone made him feel somewhat relieved. It also made him think he might be crazy. He had seen something. If anything was out here, why hadn’t his radar locked on.
He would rather find his mind was messing with him, as opposed to learning some creepy extraterrestrial lifeform was slinking about Neptune’s surface, that some unknown thing might be circling the shuttle.
Standing by the hatch, about to exit the safety of the shuttle and step out into the icy cold, an involuntary shiver raced down his spine. He shook, freeing himself of the sensation, and blinked away a bead of sweat from the corner of his eye. It rolled down the side of his face. The damned helmet kept him from wiping it away. “Yeah. This is nuts. Absolutely nuts.”
Hesitantly, Bell reached out and depressed the door lock. The door hissed, hydraulics engaged, locks disengaged, and then almost soundlessly, but smoothly, the hatch swooshed open.
The planet was bright. The crusted blue snow best resembled a thick dusting of crushed diamonds over layers of larger, fuller diamonds. The surface glittered and glowed. When Bell stepped out of the shuttle, his boots crunched on the ground. Only after looking left, and right, and then left again, did Bell venture out a few feet beyond the supposed safety of the shuttle, and then after a few heartbeats, he took a few more.
Bell’s Basic Combat Training (BCT) took place on Earth, in Florida. Once Bell got off Earth joining with Euphoric, Earth became the last place he ever wanted to visit again. There was more than just memories of his family being taken by soldiers to the quarantined areas and him being left alone. Once abandoned, he received what he referred to as Basic Life Training, and it made Euphoric’s program seem, and feel, almost trivial, if not academic.
There was downtime, sure. A long period where he let himself feel bad for himself. Leaving the house he’d grown up in (once all of the food was gone, and the area in general no longer felt safe), Bell went to the second place that felt most like home. Bow River.
Staying close to the river, a place his father had regularly taken him fishing, Bell accepted he’d now be forced to survive alone. With a backpack of essential belongings, his fishing pole, and some tools, Bell set to work.
First, he made a lean-to from leafy tree branches, garbage bags, and someone’s discarded clothing. He kept it as close to the brush as possible, keeping the shelter naturally camouflaged. He set up a box trap near his lean-to, using scraps of fish as bait, and tied off the stick holding the box up, or open, with some twine.
He started fires at night, kept them small enough not to attract unwanted attention, but large enough to give off some heat.
On more than one occasion, Bell found himself on hands and knees snaring bugs between cupped hands and devouring them live, as if dining at a luxurious restaurant and the insect part of a delectable meal.
In BCT, they did not teach him how to survive as much as how to kill, and not get killed.
Bell supposed he was thankful for both training opportunities. Each served a different purpose, both contributed in making him into the man he was today.
Except, right here, right now, he didn’t have the confidence he should have had. The mission seemed cursed from the get-go. He supposed all he wanted now was …
Something moved. No. That wasn’t right. Whatever it was he saw slithered. Moved sounded too jerky and mechanical. That was not at all what he’d just witnessed. The thing he saw slipped, slinked … slithered.
While all of this ran through his mind, Bell spun around.
Again, there was nothing. It was somewhere. There had been something. Had it rounded a corner of the shuttle?
The lieutenant, hesitant about straying too far from the shuttle hatch, knew if he were going to do a walk-around, he would have to do it now. An entire pass could not take more than six, seven minutes.
Everything inside of him knotted, knowing that if he continued and walked all the way around the shuttle it could prove detrimental. He was confident it was not someone from the crew out there. It could only be one of the colonists, or an alien.
All of their gathered intelligence suggested nothing lived on Neptune.
Suggested. He supposed that was the key word.
He did not want to die. Not while on a mission in space, and not on some godforsaken planet at the edge of the galaxy.
Yet, none of it mattered. There was a job to do, and he was the only one here to do it. Maybe he should not waste time policing the area. Inside the shuttle was clearly safer than outside of it.
With his arm extended, blaster in front of his body, he turned over his arm and double-checked the bolts, ensuring the safety was off. If he ran into a hostile, he would tear it apart and ask questions later.
Bell pressed his back against the shuttle. He cautiously moved toward the corner of the shuttle where he had seen the thing, something. His eyes continually reverted to the map in the corner. He clearly saw the boxy layout of the shuttle. More importantly, he noted the lone red dot. He was that dot.
There were no other life forms present; none his equipment could detect, anyway.
That should have been some consolation. In a way, maybe it was. He would laugh aloud if it turned out he were just losing his mind, literally. Could going crazy be better than a lurking E.T.?
Yes. Why, yes, it could, he thought.
At the corner, Lieutenant Murray Bell peaked around the edge and screamed!
He had not properly prepared for what faced him. There had been no way to get ready for something as unexpected.
Black scales reflected light from the sun, from the diamonds, from the blue snow. The long snake-like creature was semi-coiled, ready to strike. The body was meaty and wide. The crocodile-like head looked as if it floated above the tail, supported by a thick, strong neck.
The thing had arms, or were they legs. There were more than four, regardless. Bell wasn’t sure. All he knew for certain was in one bite this thing could easily swallow him whole.
Once the thought registered, Bell’s training kicked in. His survival mode activated. His finger pulled the trigger. Bolts shot from his blaster. Red lasers soared past the thing.
One bolt struck it below the head.
The thing reared up, reached a towering fifteen feet high, and still more of its body slithered around on the icy ground.
Bell never moved his finger away from the trigger.
It seemed as if the bolts had little to no effect penetrating the black scales. It did not hinder Bell’s response. He yelled, and screamed as his blaster kicked from the recoil in his arms. He felt the kick reverberate from his wrists, up his biceps, and into his shoulders.
There was no other choice but to keep firing. He had no other weapon to combat the creature.
And then the thing surged forward. It moved fast. Jaws opened wide. Bell saw every detail. Rows of large, sharp teeth. Saliva dropped from the ends of bowed fangs. A fat, thick tongue shivered inside its mouth as it roared.
Bell thought to take a shot into its throat.
Before he could find the mark, it was on him.
A shadow of darkness fell over him, and he turned to flee. Jaws snapped shut. The teeth punctured through his suit, and sank into flesh.
His hand released his blaster and Bell screamed!
Chapter Twenty-Four
Seven hours had passed. Felt more like days. Commander Anara Meyers hated the time visible on her faceshield. The display had been a constant reminder time was running out. The indicator to the right of the time was a gauge. Air supply was dangerously low. The level was just above the red. Still in the green, but barely.
Thankfully, they had reached the colony.
The structure stood like a white, barren, but safe haven. It reminded Meyers of an abandoned ghost town. The walls were iced over and snow-spotted. They sparkled and shined. The jewels reflected every fraction of light touching the buildings. It was almost as if the colony Euphoric built was an ancient castle in some fantas
y movie. If a unicorn galloped by, she wouldn’t be surprised.
“We’re there,” she said. “We’ve made it.”
As if to punctuate her proclamation, her air gauge fell into the red. She felt a slight stutter inside her helmet. It was part of the alarm system, and the gauge itself lit brighter on the faceshield; safety efforts made to ensure an astronaut knew the air was nearly depleted.
There was, maybe, an hour’s supply remaining. Maybe.
Seemed like plenty of time; however, they were not inside the colony just yet. They were far from safe. There were limited entry hatches available. Where they now stood, looking at the facility, there were no doorways.
They would need to continue the trek around the buildings until they found an accessible entrance. Additionally, it would be easiest if they reached someone on the inside to let them in.
“Check out the sky.” Lieutenant Marshall Weber pointed. “It’s going to be dark soon. Very soon. As good as these suits are, we’ve got to assume temperatures are going to plummet even more when nightfall hits. I’m sure I speak for all of us when I say I’d like to be inside the colony before then.”
A day on Neptune lasted sixteen hours. The night the same. Weber was right. The temperatures would drop drastically. Meyers knew they needed to get inside the colony and out of the cold sooner, rather than later.
“This is probably one creepy place in the dark,” Captain Danielle Rivers added.
“There’s no life forms on the planet,” Weber said. “Nothing at all I can detect. No one. Not out here with us, and not inside those walls.”
Danielle said, “Doesn’t matter. There’s just something not right here. I mean, don’t you all feel it?”
Meyers would not admit anything, but she did feel it. There was something off. An odd sensation tickled her senses. It was almost as if someone were watching them or following them. Except that just did not make sense. Who would be following them?
Unless it was her escort, the starfighter pilots?
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