by Aaron Bunce
Jacoby could feel her tension, the anxiousness bubbling just beneath the surface. She dropped her hand and drew in a breath through her nose, nostrils flaring ever so slightly. Then she grunted and coughed.
The next few heartbeats brought on a host of additional emotions and sensations. He felt Lex’s doubt, a barely veiled insecurity, but below that, even deeper, a fear. And yet he couldn’t quite tell what of.
“Out there…the doc said you’ve got a lady friend here with you…Anna?” Lex stared at the wall next to her, refusing to look his way.
“Yes. She’s been my best friend since we were kids. We came out here together. She…she…” Jacoby stammered as Lex spun back around, her remarkable green eyes snapping up to his. He struggled with how much to tell her…to confide in her. Despite their few odd encounters, one of them ending with her shoving a stun baton in his face, Jacoby felt a significant connection to Lex. Some part of him needed her, wanted her, but the rest of him felt it, too. He wanted her to need him, and not just sexually, but deeper than that.
Tell her…show her who we truly are.
“Anna paid my way off earth when I didn’t have two credits to rub together…when I ran away from home, my abusive, dickhead father, the booze, and the violence. She was my only friend in the world,” Jacoby said, deciding on honesty.
He felt her hand slide overtop his – her skin soft but grip firm and strong. The contact elicited a spark inside him, his heart immediately starting to race. The voice didn’t pop up in his mind, but he felt it, the pressure thrumming behind his eyes.
“I had friends like that once. We served together on a gunship. We were a crew – tight, as close as any people could be that didn’t share blood. Mikey, Shawna, Ayo, and Liriano. We had engine troubles on a training mission…a turbine blade in the engine came loose, or something like that. Ayo flew the hell out of that bird, tried to get it on the ground safely, but we lost power and that thing dropped. I was thrown out of my gunner pod when we hit the tree canopy. I fell a hundred feet before my rig snagged on the branches and stopped my fall. I watched my gunship…my friends, go down, watched the fuel cell explode when it hit.
I hung in that tree for a day before they found me, broken ribs, dislocated foot, broken leg and arm. They fixed the broken stuff and my body healed, but the stuff inside, the loss of my friends…that never did,” Lex said, clearing her throat at the end. When she met his gaze again, her eyes were wet.
Jacoby squeezed her hand back, but didn’t speak. He understood she didn’t want empty words.
“I…I don’t know why, but I felt like I needed to tell you that. I never talk about them; just kind of keep their memory stuff inside. But you, I well…” she straightened and quickly swiped her eyes dry, and then held a data point up between them.
Jacoby accepted it slowly.
“It works…administrative privileges. Check on your friend. Even if she can’t connect, you can leave her a message, so when the network comes up for everyone else, she’ll know where you are and that you’re all right.” Lex threw him a crooked half-smile, and then promptly turned and walked out.
0500 Hours
Anna turned back just before she turned the corner, only to see Garrett’s body move, the larger of the two security officers pushing himself up onto his hands and knees. Soraya pulled Anna out into the main hall, the batons clutched under her left arm.
“He was getting up…he was still alive,” Anna gasped. Even when her mind screamed at her that it was impossible…that no one would get up after being so violently impaled.
“He’s already dead…even if he’s still moving. We’re alive. We run and keep it that way,” Soraya grunted and propelled her forward.
They sprinted down the sweeping hall, the long queue of people appearing ahead. A man and woman turned as they stomped up, their wary smiles melting away as they searched Anna’s eyes.
“What happened? Is it another malfunction? Is it worse than they say?” the woman asked. Anna gave her a cursory scan – Asian, most likely Korean, short, thin, perhaps mid-forties. Her mind reeled, collecting and collating the observations in the blink of an eye.
“Just move…we need to move,” Soraya said, shrugging forward and urging the couple to crowd forward. They bumped into the people in front of them, who turned and immediately started to complain.
“Move forward. Please…move!” Soraya yelled, her voice clear and loud.
“We can’t. There is a line for a reason. We’re waiting our turn, and so should you!” a man yelled from just up the queue, his face appearing as he lifted onto his tiptoes.
Soraya didn’t back down. She urged the couple in front of them forward, muscling the entire queue down the hall. They bunched up, shoved back and complained, but Soraya continued. Anna watched people shuffle together, pushing and shoving everyone in front of them. They piled up, filling the hall from wall to wall, but were moving.
“Soraya!” Anna yelled as she turned to look back down the hall. Garrett stood a dozen doors down, legs shaking as he wavered in place.
“Good! Come…you can make it!” Soraya called, waving him forward as she turned.
“No! Look at him!” Anna said, catching her arm and pulling it down.
Garrett twitched and shook, lumbering towards them in an awkward zigzag between walls. Blood and dark matter ran down his white and gray armor. A blurry form moved behind him, coming up the hall in a much faster, straighter line. Blake sprinted by Garrett, running right at Anna and Soraya, his armor even messier than his counterpart’s.
“They’re not right, Sor–” Anna started to say, pushing into the man behind her. He turned and caught sight of the two men approaching, and started to scream. Panic hit the crowd like wildfire, the former calm split by the churn of feet and pushing arms.
“I know…keep them moving!” Soraya pushed Anna back and propelled herself forward. She grunted and kicked out hard, catching Blake in the gut.
The security officer staggered back and doubled over, a black mess spilling out of his mouth. But he was up in an instant, screaming wildly and clawing forward.
The people in line reacted to his voice, turning and pushing, shoving and fighting by one another. Anna felt their panic, the energy flooding over and through her. She pulled a man back as he tried to crawl over a woman, but he turned on her, swinging his hands at her face. The whole queue smashed forward, shoving and trampling the people in front of them.
“Soraya, what do we do?” Anna yelled, falling back against the wall.
“I don’t know…not let them kill us,” she spat back as Blake came forward, arms splayed as he tried to tackle her to the ground. The former athlete dodged around him and jabbed one of the batons in his side. He staggered, tumbling head-first into the wall with a crack.
“This is crazy. These guys are supposed to be the ones keeping us safe!” Soraya said, jumping back between Anna and the two men and waving the batons. “Aren’t these things supposed to, I don’t know, zap them?”
“Hold them off long enough for people to get off the floor? I don’t know, I work with maintenance,” Anna hollered, pushing off the wall and pulling a woman out from the bottom of the churning pile. “Does the baton have a trigger or button? Look for a trigger.”
“Get away from me!” Soraya growled as Garrett ambled in. She jumped clear of Blake and shoved the bigger man away.
“T-w-e-a-k…” Blake moaned and burst off the ground. He looked at Anna, his eyes milky-white and unblinking, and pitched forward.
He was on her before Soraya could react. Anna fell back onto several people, her weight tumbling them all to the ground. Blake fell onto a man next to her, the security officer clawing at his face and chest.
“Get him off me…please!” the man screamed, bloody scratches extending from his forehead all the way to his lips.
Anna rolled over a woman’s legs and tried to stand. Blake clawed his way forward. Biting and clawing at anyone close by.
“Get up!” Soraya yelled and
lunged in, driving a baton into the back of the officer’s head like a club. Bone cracked, but he rolled to the side and latched onto another woman’s ankle, biting clear through the pant leg of her suit and into the meat of her calf. The woman screamed and pitched forward, toppling even more people to the ground.
Anna pushed off a man’s back and grabbed ahold of Blake’s feet and pulled him back. He thrashed, flopping around but she managed to get him free of the crowd. He kicked up and lunged at her, but Soraya stepped in and jammed a baton into his side. The prong connected with an audible crack and snap. Blake pitched against the far wall, the whole right side of his body convulsing violently.
“Hey, I figured it out,” Soraya yelled. She turned as Garrett lumbered in, jamming the other baton into his stomach. The man doubled over, a trickle of smoke rolling up where the prong struck, but he didn’t fall back, or cry out.
Soraya jammed the other baton into his chest, the resulting arc flashing blue in the hallway. Anna immediately smelled ozone on the air, the sour, caustic tinge of burned flesh drifting in right after.
Garrett moaned and batted the baton away, lurching forward to wrap his arms around Soraya. She swatted his arms wide with the batons and jammed them both forward together, the combined force knocking him back just a few well-earned steps.
“I can’t hold these fuckers off forever, Anna. Think of…something,” Soraya yelled. She swung the right baton like a club, catching Garrett in the jaw and spinning him around. She turned, just as Blake surged off the ground, the weight of his body throwing her back into the opposite wall.
Anna managed a step forward, desperate to help, but Soraya shoved Blake back and caught him in the stomach with a baton, swinging the other across into his face. The last blow crackled with double the electricity of before, the flash of light burning a blind spot into Anna’s vision.
Blake spun away and fell, half of his face blackened, his jaw hanging free on one side. Soraya was impressive to watch, an almost perfect amalgamation of grace and strength Anna could never match. That was her…it was who she was.
Think, Anna. Use your brain…that is what you are good at. Be smart, she thought and shook her head. She turned and looked up the hall. The people in the queue were frantic, smashing together en mass, but she could see her destination now, the side halls turning to the left and right. The black doors of the station’s transit elevators stood just beyond. A chime sounded and she glimpsed the doors opening, someone standing next to the lift ushering the panicked people inside.
“Tell them to squeeze as many people in as they can. Fill it up! Tell them they need to get as many people in as they can! Get everyone off this floor!” she screamed, and then nodded to the people close by. She saw eyes flick from her, to Soraya and the two bloody men, and then they turned, repeating the message down the hall.
Anna stumbled forward as someone crashed into her back, and then she was falling, stumbling, and rolling down the hall. She caught her bearings and realized it wasn’t Soraya, but Garrett. The former security man launched his body towards her, his jaw hanging on one side, his mouth a wide, bloody hole.
She rolled back and caught him with her feet, his weight immediately bending her knees. Anna could hear Soraya grunting and cursing, the batons cracking against skin, the violent snap of electricity splitting the air.
Garrett clawed his way forward, his hands raking against her legs. His tongue lolled out of his face, strange, dark tendrils weaving around it, slithering out of his body like frenzied snakes.
“Get off me!” Anna grunted and kicked him free. She rolled sideways and pushed to her knees as Garrett came back in. His eyes were dead, glassy orbs, but she didn’t doubt that he, or whatever he was becoming, could see her.
Use your self-defense training…remember!
Anna closed the distance between them with a quick step and brought her knee up in a violent strike. Her kneecap hit Garrett squarely in the genitals, the padding of his armor absorbing some of the force. She reared back again and again, running her knee into the same spot, the former man’s genitals smashing beneath the onslaught. The last kick cracked the his padded armor, but he didn’t groan or cry. Hell, he didn’t even seem to notice. A horrible groan issued from the ruined hole of his mouth and he grabbed onto her upper arms and started to pull her close.
His body was cracking, popping…shifting under the padded suit and segmented armor. She remembered Preston, the strange spines that shot out of his chest, and reacted. Anna chopped her right hand down on his right arm, and rolled his grip over.
She felt his grip break, slid her hand down, and twisted his hand into a perfectly executed wristlock. Garrett grunted, the force and leverage turning him away. Anna used the hold and pushed him across the hall, running his face into the wall.
The impact snapped his head back, dark, bloody fluid spattering the ceramic wall panels. Anna increased the pressure on his wrist, forcing him down to a knee.
She felt Soraya, her fear and need spiking, and looked back just as Blake knocked the batons from her grasp and caught her by the collar. Something pushed out from beneath his armored suit, sharp points digging and tearing through the fabric.
Long, boney appendages burst out of the man’s body, hinged and curving, the ends tapered like a knife and dripping with dark, toxic bodily fluids. Blake pulled her arms wide, the cruel spear-like limbs twisting towards her exposed stomach and chest.
No!
Anna wrenched Garrett’s wrist down hard, the bones in his arm breaking with a loud snap. She grasped him by the shoulder and heaved him back, before driving his head into the wall with all of her strength.
She jumped clear, letting Garrett’s body fall away, and scooped one of the batons off the ground. She came forward with a roar and swung down, the heavy weapon hitting Blake’s right arm with a satisfyingly solid crack.
He twisted from the blow as the boney limbs stabbed straight out, blood and skin spattering the ground all around them. They missed Soraya’s stomach by an inch on either side. Anna brought the baton down on the other arm with all of her strength, the humerus breaking loudly. Soraya stumbled free as Blake’s arm flopped towards the ground.
Anna recoiled as he swung her way, broken arms flailing at his sides. Her training kicked in and she lunged in close, narrowly avoiding a skewering stab and violently jammed the pronged end of her baton into the hole that used to be his mouth.
He groped for her, the jagged bones from his broken arms jutting out through the skin. The flesh tore, and his hand flopped to the ground, still grasping and clutching.
Her finger wrapped around the baton’s trigger, an impulse firing like a gunshot in her mind. Her thumb flicked down to a small knob just down from the trigger. She felt a hand, not hers but so very familiar, push it in and turn it. Anna did the same, and then pulled the trigger.
The baton came alive in her hand, an angry crackling buzz filling the air. Blake’s body went rigid, but Anna had to dance back as the boney limbs stabbed down at her legs. She held onto the baton, her finger smashing the trigger down.
Blake’s left eye burst, a ropey tendril shooting out and waving frantically through the air. His right burst next, the man’s face splitting open down the middle. The boney arms stabbed out again, banging into the floor between her feet, but she refused to let go. A horrible burned meat smell tinged the air as black spots appeared on his mutilated face. And then his head started to burn.
Anna shoved him back against the wall and yanked the baton free, jumping back as the stabbing arms jabbed for her midsection. Blake’s body thrashed from one wall to another and crashed onto the ground. Anna helped Soraya up and they dodged around Garrett, the tall man lunging at their feet.
Blake gave one final, violent flop and went still, dark smoke wafting off his smoldering skull. A heartbeat later, a shrill scream echoed from down the hall. Anna felt Soraya go rigid, and heard the people massed behind her go silent. A bang reverberated through the floor, another ear-s
plitting screech ringing out.
“What in the hell was that?” Soraya asked.
They turned together down the hall in time to see a massive, dark form moving slowly up the passage. Garrett flopped over onto his side, a broken chunk of skull sticking out of his scalp, and crawled back down the hall. Had Anna done that? There was no way she was that strong.
The transit elevator dinged behind them, and she felt the crowd of people move, shrinking behind her as the lucky piled in.
“Move…move!” Anna gasped involuntarily as the creature appeared fully around the bend. Long, segmented arms lashed out, cracking loudly into the walls and floor.
It pulled its bulk along slowly, shuffling forward and lashing out again for another hold. The walls shuddered as if it were punching holes clear through the ceramic and metal plating. Its head…Preston’s head, swung from side to side, empty eye socks dark in the light. The hooked, teeth-like ribs curved and flexed on its wide-open torso, the head jutting out of what used to be a man’s chest moaning and screaming. A pair of arms burst out of the mess of its abdomen, clawing at the ground, grasping and reaching, ready to pull something…anything into its embrace.
“We have to get out here now…like now…now…now!” Soraya screamed and immediately started to push the back of the pile towards the elevators.
Anna watched the horror move slowly down the hallway towards them, its body changing, blood and fluid spattering the ground beneath it. Each new appendage looked sharper and more deadly than the last, until it filled the hall like an alien insect, tearing the station apart as it moved to reach them. A spidery arm streaked up and cracked into the ceiling again and again, finally striking a light panel.
Think, damn you, girl, she thought, but choked back a scream as a spidery arm burst out of the beast’s back and swung up into the ceiling, shattering the light. That section of hall fell into darkness. The boom…smack continued as it pulled itself forward into the next pool of light, but that light went dark as well.
