by S. A. Lusher
There must be some explanation. He was hearing his own heart inside the suit or maybe it was some kind of malfunction or perhaps even just a natural background noise that the building, for some reason, produced.
Glancing at the signs posted above the doors, Trent managed to piece together that the hangar was to the left and several different rooms were along the right. They passed a storage room, a break room, a bathroom, a security center. They reached the end of the corridor without incident and passed through it into an open room of blue carpet, blue-tinted walls and a blue ceiling. A handful of couches occupied the area along two of the walls.
“Tram station,” Trevor said.
“At least we don't have to clear it,” Trent murmured, staring around. There was nowhere to hide.
Opposite of their current position was an identical door, presumably leading to an identical corridor. Corporations loved symmetry. To their left were a pair of doors, each one leading to the actual trams, Trent figured. They approached the pair of doors. Trevor got there first and hit the access button. Nothing happened.
“Fuck,” he muttered.
He knelt and pressed a few more keys, then sighed heavily and pulled out his kit.
“This is going to take a minute.”
As he finished his sentence, a rapid series of knocks, something hard against metal, filled the room. Everyone spun around, pointing their collective arsenal towards the origin of the sound: the closed door leading to the opposite corridor.
“Check it,” Sergio murmured.
Trent, Drake and Gideon broke away from the group. They crossed the room, keeping their weapons aimed at the door. Trent got there first. Drake and Gideon covered the door while he hit the access button. It slid open smoothly. Nothing waited for him. He stepped through, his rifle raised, finger inside the trigger guard.
Trent heard the others moving in sync with him, as precise as any military squadron, covering all the angles.
“There!” he shouted, spying a blur of dark movement about halfway down the corridor.
It had gone left, into the hangar. The trio hurried to the nearest door along the left-hand side. Trent opened it and they poured through, moving their weapons in tight arcs, covering different portions of the massive room they found themselves in.
“What do you have?” Sergio asked over the radio.
“Don't know. Something dark, roughly human sized, went into the hangar,” Trent replied.
As tense as he was with anticipation and a small amount of fear, Trent felt hopeful that he might finally see what had the corporate dogs so spooked. He scanned the hangar. It was immense, its far walls and ceiling lost to the shadows. A handful of jump ships and small cargo-haulers were scattered across the area, some of them in varying states of repair. Not what he had expected to find. If the situation was as bad as they painted it to be, then why weren't all these ships gone? Or at least the ones that could still fly.
Why hadn't everyone bugged out?
Maybe these were the ships that couldn't fly, but there were a lot of them. There must have been close to a dozen of them. There was no time to check and see anyway. This was a smaller mystery for later, if at all. Right now, they had bigger fish to fry.
“Anyone see anything?” Drake whispered.
“I've got nothing,” Gideon murmured back.
“No,” Trent said quietly.
They moved slowly through the hangar. There were any number of places to hide in the dim light. Behind piled crates, underneath or inside of ships, the shadows. Hell, even the vents. After another moment, Trent sighed, feeling the tension going out of him.
“Maybe it went into one of the other rooms,” he said.
“But why would...” Drake hesitated, then grinned. “Oh, yeah, maybe it did.”
Gideon chuckled quietly.
“What's happening?” Sergio asked.
“We're still tracking it, whatever it is,” Trent replied.
“Don't stray too far. I want everyone back here in five minutes.”
“Roger that, boss.”
They came back out into the corridor. Trent looked left, right, found nothing, then went over to one of the doors marked Security Station. He opened it up and played his light across the dim interior. The only light came from a bank of screens stacked up behind a desk. The trio secured the room with quick sweeps of their weapons, then approached the monitors. Most of them showed nothing but empty corridors and abandoned rooms.
Everywhere he looked, Trent saw signs of abrupt abandonment. Half-eaten meals. Tipped over chairs. Infopads dropped on the floor.
“What happened here?” Drake murmured.
Only one screen showed any movement, and that was the tram lobby. Trevor had just finished getting the doors opened. Sergio looked back to the door Trent and the others had gone through just a moment ago. He seemed impatient.
“You see anything?” Gideon asked.
“No, nothing. No movement. Whatever it was, it's gone now,” Trent replied.
“Sure it wasn't your eyes playing tricks on you?” Gideon asked.
“No, I saw it, too,” Drake said.
Gideon said nothing. Trent watched the screens a few seconds more, then turned and led the way out of the security station. They retraced their route back to the tram station and found Sergio waiting impatiently for them.
“Well?”
“Nothing. Whatever it was, it got away,” Trent replied. “Any ideas on what it might be?”
“Probably one of the personnel, frightened or something,” Sergio replied.
Trent scoffed. “If that's true, then shouldn't we make a more concerted effort to find them? Maybe they need help.”
“I told you all, we're not here for survivors. Now I want everyone to listen up. I need to reiterate that we're paying you all, and very well, I might add. One of the conditions of payments is to shut the fuck up and stop asking questions. Corporations do secret things. Always have, always will. It's in our nature. So, here's how we're going to proceed. Sharpe is going to lead Trent, Drake and Tristan. Everyone else will come with me. Sharpe's team will hit up the living quarters, my team the storage. We'll meet at the utilities building. Sharpe knows how to raise the lockdown, so you'll be watching her back. Everyone get to it,” Sergio said.
They split into two groups, each heading into one of the tram stations. The loading bay was empty. The tram sat in its nest, doors open, waiting for them. Something about that sent a shiver of anticipation down Trent's spine.
After making sure nothing was hidden inside, the quartet got onboard. It was little more than a passenger cart with a small cockpit at the front. Sharpe moved forward and disappeared into the cockpit, closing the door behind her.
Trent, Drake and Tristan sat down as the tram fired up and began moving.
Chapter 06
–The Nightmare Begins–
The tram moved slowly, almost imperceptibly. Trent, Drake and Tristan were seated in the passenger area, Sharpe sat up front behind a glass door with her back to them, silently working the controls. He glanced over at Drake, who sat still and relaxed, as though he didn't have a care in the world. Tristan, on the other hand, looked paler than she normally did, her face framed by her visor.
“You doing okay?” he asked.
“Yeah, I'm fine. I've been shot before,” she replied.
“You think we should stop by an infirmary?”
She stared at him, as though uncertain whether or not his question was genuine or he was making fun of her. Trent wasn't sure himself. He knew it was impossible to sleep with someone and form literally no attachment, but he'd gotten it down to a very manageable level. At this point he'd slept with a fellow mercenary and watched her die. After a day or so of silent, internal mourning, he’d moved on.
He'd always found the tough guy act a little humorous. He knew that he put one on, all mercenaries did to some degree, but that didn't stop it from making him smile a little. Trent had come across a great deal of merc
enaries in his time, both genders, all shapes and sizes and backgrounds. If he were forced to guess, he'd say that less than ten percent of them were truly without fear. Hence the tough guy routine.
You had to pretend. When you toted a gun and body armor, that glazed boredom that spoke of 'been there, done that, seen it all and I wasn't too impressed' kind of came with the job description. There were a few variations on it, from Gideon's stoic demeanor to a dozen shades of fury Trent had seen in his life. Stephen was an exception. The guy was a bag of nerves, but he was a tech-head and the same rules rarely applied.
“I don't think so. We shouldn't be here for long,” Tristan said finally. “I can wait until we get back to the ship.”
Trent shrugged. Fine by him, either way. He glanced at Sharpe. She frightened him. Everything from her small smile that spoke of a perverse delight in violence to her black lens-eyes. Still, he couldn't help but wonder what she might be like in bed. He'd never had an aversion to tall women, or women with muscles. All the rage nowadays was small and petite, but Trent always felt afraid of breaking women like that.
As his brain turned towards trying to imagine Sharpe without any armor on, a loud thud interrupted his thoughts. The three mercenaries were on their feet in an instant, weapons in hand, pointing at the roof of the cabin.
“What the fuck was that?” Tristan hissed.
There were no windows anywhere in the cabin. The doors separating the cockpit from the cabin hissed open.
“What's going on back there?” Sharpe asked.
“Something jumped onto the tram,” Drake replied.
They heard several rapid footfalls across the top. For a crazy second, Trent had a vision of a lizard crawling hastily across a rock. Whatever it was definitely had four feet. He raised his rifle, trying to track the thing atop their tram. It moved swiftly, first to the front, then to the back, then down one of the sides.
The tram jolted slightly as it leaped off. Trent was tempted to rip the door open and look back the way they'd come to see what the hell it was. He had the distinct impression that it wasn't human. His mind ran through a quick series of possibilities as to what it might be: some kind of animal or perhaps a bizarre experiment. He'd seen both in his time.
Unless it was something else entirely.
“Whatever it was, it's gone now,” Tristan murmured.
“Any ideas on what that was?” Trent asked.
Sharpe closed the door again.
Trent sighed and they settled back down.
“This is a lot fun,” Drake said.
* * * * *
The tram ride came to an end without further interruption.
Trent took point again, leading the way into an equally empty and deserted receiving station. Once he gave the all-clear, the others came in. Sharpe immediately walked over to an information terminal set into the wall and began typing, letting her large rifle hang by its sling. Trent looked around the lobby. He frowned.
“Look,” he murmured. “Blood. On the floor. And the wall. And that ventilation grate is broken open.”
“Looks like we've got a situation,” Tristan said softly. She turned and looked directly at Sharpe. “What's here?”
“None of your business,” Sharpe replied without looking back or ceasing her work.
“It is our business. Our business is getting you into and out of this facility alive. You're paying us for it, that's what business means. Part of that business is learning what kind of threats are inhabiting this facility. Obviously this place is dangerous. We're in a dangerous environment and some serious shit went down here.”
Sharpe slammed her hands down on the terminal. She spun around so suddenly that Tristan, Trent and Drake took involuntary steps back.
“Look, Trevor doesn't know dick about what we're doing here and Sergio has a lot more patience than I do. You keep asking and I make it so that you never ask again. You mercs walking out of here isn't on the list of things required for this mission to be a success so it's no skin off my ass. Keep your fucking questions to yourself.”
“You don't know what's here either, do you?” Trent asked suddenly.
Her twin black lenses snapped in his direction and she stared at him for several seconds, her mouth a flat, grim line.
Abruptly, she turned her back on them and kept working. It had been a stab in the dark, but Trent felt that his assessment had been correct. Sharpe was as curious as the rest of them, she was just better about hiding it.
“Come here,” Sharpe said, taking a step back from the terminal.
The trio approached, gathering around. Trent stared at the screen. It displayed an overhead view of what must be the building they were in. He memorized it as quickly as he could, just in case he was forced to navigate it solo.
“We're here,” Sharpe said, pointing. “We need to get there. That simple.”
It was simple. The path was little more than following a corridor, taking a right and then going in through a door. Trent wondered why she'd even bothered to show them. Maybe she felt bad about threatening to kill them, only that didn't quite fit. Maybe she really was afraid of what might be lurking around and knew that an informed mercenary was a more effective one. Either way, Trent was thankful for the information.
“Let's go,” she said, shutting down the terminal.
They walked across the tram lobby and slowed, then stopped as they came to the door they were supposed to go through.
“Fuck,” Drake declared.
It had been welded very firmly shut.
“Now what?” Tristan murmured.
“Blow it?” Trent asked.
“No, I don't want to give away our presence anymore than it's already been. The primary corridor is basically a big circle. We'll just have to go the long way around,” Sharpe replied.
She turned and led them across the lobby in the opposite direction. This door hadn't been tampered with. However, Trent noted unhappily, it was covered with blood. Not a good sign. As they came out into a corridor that ended a few meters up ahead and turned sharply to the left, he found himself thinking about all the horror games and movies he'd been into as a kid. Reading had never really been his thing, but he was a sucker for entertainment.
A lot of those games and movies started off with people coming to some isolated location...and finding a lot of blood and death.
Trent could feel tension rising and willed himself to relax. If he got too wound up he was liable to start popping off rounds left and right if something made too loud a noise. They reached the corner and went around it.
Trent stopped, finding himself staring down a very lengthy corridor. The lights were dim and, in some areas, either dead or flickering. It was obvious that a great deal of combat had gone on inside this corridor. Bullet holes marred the walls, blood pooled on the floor, and a handful of bodies were spread out across the length of the hallway.
“Fuck,” Drake whispered.
Sharpe reached up and flipped the safety off of her rifle. The others did the same. Trent felt pre-battle adrenaline begin to slip into his system, preparing him for whatever lay ahead. His eyes fell to the first corpse, a few meters down the hallway. It was lying on its side, facing towards them, wearing a ripped, bloodied blue jumpsuit. Immediately, Trent could tell that something was wrong, but it was too difficult to tell from this distance.
He moved closer, keeping low, his movements quick and quiet, eyes continually scanning for whatever might still be hanging around. When he was close enough to the body, he crouched by it, hunting for the killing blow. There were no gunshot wounds, though the suit had been shredded in a few places by what might have been knives...or claws. Trent reached over, placed a hand on the body's shoulder and pulled it onto its stomach.
“Shit,” he whispered as he was given a full view of the head.
“Oh my God...that's fucking sick,” Drake said from behind him.
The back of the man's head, just above the neck, had been ripped open by what appeared to be brute f
orce. Trent tried to peer into the hole, but the lighting was too poor and it just seemed like a black space. He activated the flashlight on the end of his rifle and pointed it towards the hole in the back of the poor bastard's head.
“Now that is creepy,” Tristan said softly.
The man's head had been hollowed out. His brain was missing entirely.
“Got something to tell us?” Trent asked.
Sharpe said nothing. She simply stood and moved further down the corridor, kneeling by another corpse. They joined her, abandoning the blue-suited corpse. This one was obviously some kind of security personnel. He wore a red uniform with black combat armor over it. His head had been hollowed out as well.
“Come on,” Sharpe said, straightening up.
She set off down the corridor again, stepping over a third body. Trent's mind raced as he and the others followed her. What could possibly be doing this? In all his time, he'd never heard rumors of hollowed out skulls. Of course, he hadn't heard all the rumors and scary stories mercenaries passed among themselves like the STDs of the old world. What the fuck could possibly be doing this? Something that wanted human brains?
They reached the end of the corridor, turned and came to another door. Sharpe opened it and went in gun-first. Trent was right behind her. They'd come to a mess hall, through which they'd have to pass through to get to the corresponding corridor on the other side. The room was cavernous, studded with support pillars and bolted-down tables with benches placed with mathematical precision across the smooth steel floor.
It was a war zone, coated in an aftermath that spoke of slaughter.
Several of the benches had been physically ripped free of their moorings and tossed aside like so many toys. Silverware, shattered plates and cups and bowls and several bodies, each with their own, personal pools of blood littered the floor. The lights, high overhead, flickered, making the shadows around the edges of the room swell and shrink.
“Whoa...” Trent said as his eyes fell on something new. He approached it and gently touched it with his foot. “What the fuck do you make of this?”
