Unleashed: A Science Fiction Horror Adventure (NecroVerse Book 1)

by Aaron Bunce

  They ran together, and slipped through the service door. Lex sagged between them as the man in the flight suit pulled the doors closed.

  “I hope you’re it. I’m Gil…part of the Nielson’s flight crew. They’re loading people on board now, but we need to go!” the man in the flight suit gasped.

  “Jacoby!” Anna spun, catching a glimpse of him wedging something through the handles of the door. “Jacoby is still out there! He is coming, don’t block the door!”

  “I hate to break it to you, but if he ain’t here now, he’s gone, honey!”

  “He’s coming…” Anna yelled, her anger spiking, just as Lex tipped forward, gagging and coughing. She jumped back and reached down, expecting pain to flare in her belly. There was a hole in her jumpsuit, just to the left of her bellybutton. She’d felt it keenly when wrestling the infected man off Soraya, the sharp bite, and yet when her finger worked through the hole in the fabric, she found no cut, hole, or blemish in her skin.

  “Hey-hey-hey, she doesn’t look so good! Is she…is she…like them? Infected?”

  “No, she’s just sick, uh she’s fine,” Anna growled. He wasn’t listening, wasn’t even meeting her eyes. He wedged another long bar through the handles.

  “But…but, how do you know? They said that’s what happened to the others, too. That they were just sick, but then…well, I don’t know. Freaky shit started to happen to them. They went crazy. We can’t let those people anywhere near the freighters,” Gil said, walking back behind Soraya and over to a mesh gate down the hall.

  Something hit the doors hard, like fists or palms smacking against the metal.

  Anna glanced between the door and Gil. “Please, unblock the door! That could be him now. Please, let him in!” She could feel Jacoby, somewhere…somehow, but could feel the creatures as well – their poisonous anxiety, skin-tingling creep, and gut turning presence dulling even Soraya’s warm spark.

  Anna eyed the door, looked to Lex, and glanced up, trying to pick through the mess of it all, desperate to feel Jacoby, to know he was still alive. The ceiling over her head was made out of some sort of metal grating, the holes big enough to see through to the space above.

  “I can’t do that, honey. If one of those things gets in here, it could be the end for all of us. You just follow me, and I’ll make sure you pretty things are taken care of.”

  “Ugh, my stomach,” Lex gasped, her rifle clattering to the ground.

  Anna’s anger flared and her arm snapped out, her fingers bunching up in Gil’s flight suit. All of the fear, frustration, and helplessness broke loose at once.

  “We’ve seen people we care about pulled apart and turned into monsters. I still smell them, hear them crying – their sobs, their pain, their desperate pleas for help. They’re never coming back. Do you understand that?” Anna growled, and slammed Gil back against the wall. Her fist tightened, the fabric tearing beneath her fingers.

  “Please…she’s…sick!” Gil gasped, his eyes wide and locked on Lex.

  “Anna!” Soraya said, her eyes snapping down to Gil’s feet. Anna looked down to find the man’s boots hovering clear off the ground, and her arm barely shaking from the effort.

  Soraya leaned back as Lex pitched forward suddenly and vomited onto the ground.

  “Gack…get away from her. Come on, we have…to…go!” Gil grunted.

  Anna released her grip, and held her hand out in front of her face. Her arm looked as it always did, except for the sad state of her nails. Somehow she’d just lifted a grown man into the air with one arm, and not broken a sweat doing it.

  Gil slumped against the wall, coughing and cursing. The smell of sick washed over her as Lex staggered back and sucked in a shuddering breath. Then she wiped her mouth. Anna watched as a large red bubble formed in the strikingly blue mess at Lex’s feet, and then popped.

  “She’ll go crazy and hurt you!” Gil yelled, running down the hall and through an open gate.

  Anna met Lex’s gaze, an energetic sparkle quickly filling the redhead’s eyes.

  “Jacoby…” Soraya whispered, smirking as she looked up from the mess on the floor.

  “…Jacoby,” Anna quietly agreed.

  Anna and Soraya reached down and each took one of Lex’s hands. The spark ignited inside, an electric, enervating pulse shooting from Lex’s hand throughout the rest of Anna’s body.

  She felt Soraya, that familiar strength and resolve, but felt Lex now, too. She felt bright, lively, and unpredictable, a swirling mix of lust and aggression.

  “Shit! I can feel you. Like really feel you, both of you, as if a part of you is inside me,” Lex gasped.

  “I’m sorry! I told you not to touch her!” Gil yelled. Anna’s head snapped around as hinges groaned loudly. They jumped forward as one, all sharing the same impulse. The gate crashed closed with a loud bang, Gil turning the lock and jumping back.

  “Gil…open this gate!”

  “Shit!” he sputtered, staggering back. “Can’t you see? I’m sorry. You’re infected now…you’re probably infected. If I let you through, it…you could kill…could kill everyone. It’s for the best. I’m…I’m sorry!” Gil yelled.

  Soraya cursed and grabbed the heavy bars and pulled. The metal groaned, the wall cracking next to them. But then she staggered away. A wave of creeping cold pushed over Anna’s skin, the familiar dread bubbling up inside. A shadow passed overhead, like a cloud sliding before a warm sun, its chill settling over her skin like a blanket.

  “What is that…?” Lex gasped. They looked up. A massive dark form moved across the grated-metal ceiling, and then they were peeling it open, tearing through the metal as if it were wet cardboard.

  Gil looked up, screamed, and turned to run. He made it two steps before the first dropped behind him. Another tumbled down after, and then another. They swarmed the hallway, screaming, horrible limbs snapping and smashing.

  Soraya pushed away from the gate as Gil screamed, his cries dying away in the storm of thrashing bodies and screaming voices. Lex turned and scooped her rifle off the ground as the doors behind them shuddered violently, a boney limb breaking through the metal.

  1030 Hours

  We are healing, but you’ll never be able to keep up. You can feel them. They are converging. They feel us. You cannot fight all of them! They are only growing stronger and will not stop! They can never stop.

  Jacoby limped through the broken door and turned around, spooling the saw and taking a deep breath. He could indeed feel them all around, the sickly sensation seemingly creeping in from all sides.

  “It’s spreading like an infection…taking over the station. How do we stop something like that?” he gasped, pounding a fist against his throbbing leg. The pain was dimming, the strength slowly returning, but it wasn’t fast enough. He needed to run.

  Cut it, burn it, scoop it out.

  “We’re in a damn space station. How do you…?” Jacoby started to ask as a monstrous gangly creature streaked through the clinic and shoved through the broken doorway after him, its long, spidery legs stabbing and swinging into the walls and ceiling. Jacoby jumped back, wincing as his leg almost buckled. The beast had a single pelvis, but what looked like three human torsos melded together. Two, withered and skeletal heads hung limp on the two outside bodies, but the torso in the middle had only a mound of flesh where the neck should be. Its ribs grew out through its darkened, mottled flesh, and flexed, moving like the spines on some horrible, human-shaped fish.

  Infected people stacked up behind the creature, seething, grunting, and coughing. They pulled and pushed around it and through its legs, but the creature snapped a hook-like arm down, pinning the first to break through to the ground. It stabbed another through the face, and promptly pulled its body apart. Jacoby watched as the dissected person’s limbs started to melt and grow into the larger creature’s body.

  The plasma saw came up and waved before him, the brightly glowing blade throwing angry sparks into the air.

  The creature s
creeched loudly as slender, boney appendages burst out of its disfigured body. They slammed into the walls and floor all around him, hooks bursting out of its back and stabbing into the ceiling, until it filled the narrow space with a web work of churning, limbs.

  The infected people suddenly shrunk back, stepping into the clinic and going quiet. He spotted dozens of them – some wearing admin suits, maintenance jumpers, while others wore hospital gowns or scrubs.

  “That’s new,” Jacoby muttered and limped back another step.

  Do you feel it?

  Jacoby nodded, wincing as he limped back another step. He could feel a great many things – the fibers of his leg stitching back together, Anna, Soraya, and Lex running scared, but also the corrupted, vile things crowding in around him. And yet, none of the myriad of sensations was as strong as the one radiating off the massive, bastardized creature in front of him.

  We cannot fight something like that. Not with just a saw, and not without our full strength, the voice said, the pressure building behind his eyes. It was prodding around in his skull, as if someone’s hands were gently pulling the different parts of his brain aside, looking, searching for something.

  “I feel you in my head!” Jacoby grunted, his right eye twitching. “You seem to know more about what is happening in my brain than I do. It’s making me heal faster, feel things I never could before. I can’t seem to control it. But you…can’t you use it? Can’t you heal my leg? Or, make me stronger, faster?”

  The creature ripped its multitude of limbs free, showering the hall with debris and came forward, hooking and ripping to pull its bulk along. A short arm swung at him, but the hallway was too narrow, and the long legs folded awkwardly in the narrow space. Jacoby caught the limb before it could pull away, the saw severing it cleanly just above a joint.

  You can hear me, and I you, but there is something blocking us…keeping us from coming together. I can feel the thing growing in your brain, like a fiery and powerful energy source, begging to be used. It has and continues to change us. It gave me a voice and the strength to take a sliver of control, but I do not know why or how. All I know is that I can feel it, that you can feel it, but there is something holding it back.

  Jacoby hobbled and ducked as the shortened leg swung around at his head. The saw came up and took the limb off at the body. He swept the tool back at waist level, catching the middle torso with the tip of the blade. Black flesh and muscle sprayed the wall next to him, a coil of looping, stinking intestines spilling out of the cut.

  “What do you mean ‘holding it back’?”

  Two spear-like arms cut straight down at his head. Jacoby twisted and turned. He dodged the first, but the second caught his right shoulder, his collarbone popping loudly in respond.

  “Argh!” Jacoby cried out and swept the saw back in response. The blade caught the creature’s leg, biting deep into the muscle and tendons, and swung back out the other side. But it didn’t fall, nor had he cut deep enough to catch bone. A horrible, numb ache shot down his right arm and his finger slipped off the trigger.

  I am your right hand…but you don’t know why, so I don’t know why. There is something in you, in your mind, splitting us apart. You need to break through it…tear it down. Make us whole! Make us whole! Then maybe we can take control and seize its true strength…

  Jacoby staggered back against the wall, barely keeping his one-handed grip on the saw. He threw himself against the other wall, a spiny arm clawing against his back. The blow tore his suit and spun him around, red-hot pain stretching across both shoulder blades.

  He lurched painfully for the doors. They were just half a dozen steps away. He caught movement out of the corner of his eye. The creature reared back with the broken limb, and Jacoby could only watch as it shot towards him. The impact knocked his breath away and sent him tumbling through the doors, and out into the concourse hallway.

  Jacoby landed flat on his back, the saw clattering free from his hand and sliding across the floor. He saw people running down the wide concourse to his left, their forms just distant, blurry shapes.

  Go! he silently begged them.

  The doorway bowed and then shattered outward as the creature pushed through, its multitude of legs spilling into the hallway.

  Jacoby pushed away and stood, but only made it a few steps. His feet were pulled out from under him, the ground painfully embracing him. He rolled over as he started to slide back, a ropey tendril wrapped around both of his ankles.

  It hadn’t been intestines that spilled out of its body when he cut it open, but squirming, churning tentacles. Boney arms slammed down on either side of his legs, breaking the floor panels. He reached for the saw, but it was well out of reach.

  Break free!

  “I can’t,” Jacoby grunted, kicking his feet, and then he stopped fighting as the creature moaned. The noise was disturbingly human and distantly familiar – a strangled, almost drunken cry, muffled by a cocoon of writhing flesh.

  Two arms speared out, stabbing hard into his shoulders, plunging deep into muscle and bone. The pain was so intense he didn’t feel it at first, just a white-hot wall that washed every other thought and concern away. He felt his body wrenched up and off the ground, his feet kicking pathetically.

  Jacoby grunted and gagged, struggling for breath. He picked up his head as the middle torso shuddered, and then the mound sitting atop the shoulders split open. Goopy black liquid spilled out over the chest and writhing spines, the skin pulling apart as if someone had grasped a zipper and pulled down. A face pushed forth, the human head emerging into the light as if birthed by the monster itself.

  Muddy brown eyes slid open slowly, the crow’s feet and papery flesh pulling tight as the mouth opened to reveal jagged, coffee-stained teeth. Janice’s nostril’s flared, her grayed red hair plastered to her head.

  “Jack-Jack-Jack,” she chattered, her dark, emotionless eyes locking on him. The skin pulled away under her face, revealing the handle of the stun baton, the metal and flesh surrounding it scorched and black.

  “No…fucking…way!” Jacoby grunted, fighting to lift his hand and pull free from the skewering limbs.

  “Jack-Jack-Jack,” Janice’s face continued to chatter over and over again. But there was no comfort in seeing her face. It wasn’t really her, just a monster wearing her skin.

  She reveals her true form.

  The opening under Janice’s head flexed open, exposing a wide hole, covered in curved, flexing teeth. She began to draw him in, pulling him towards the gaping mouth.

  Break free! Tear down the barrier and make us whole! Find the hole in your memory, and remember! the voice screamed in his mind. The tentacle wrapped around his right leg pulled tight.

  “Hole in my memory? Remember what?” Jacoby gasped, fighting and pulling to free his leg, but the pain burned like scorching fire in his shoulders. The pressure was too great, cutting into him, pinning him into place. No, not pressure. It was weight…crushing him.

  Something stirred in Jacoby’s mind, but it wasn’t the voice. He wrenched his left leg free and kicked against the creature’s body. Janice’s face contorted, and the manic chatter grew more intense.

  “Jack-Jack-Jack-Jack!”

  “Stop!” he screamed as the tentacle pulled harder on his right leg. A strange odor drifted over his face – stale cigarettes and synth alcohol. The monster’s shadow and weight grew stifling. He caught a flash of movement, a distant part of his mind swelling in response, the pressure pushing out on his skull, his eyes, and his ears.

  A small, white shape stabbed out of Janice’s body, flashing like a dagger at his face. His right hand snapped up, the muscles and tendons tearing around the boney intrusion in his shoulder. He caught the sharp bone weapon, somehow, his knuckles turning white as a gray tinge washed over his skin.

  “Dad stop…please!” He heard the voice. The young man sounded scared, small, and far away. It wasn’t in his head. It wasn’t.

  Jacoby’s gaze snapped to the sh
arp bone arm, his right arm shaking, the small part of him fighting back, struggling to keep the point from jamming into his face and ending his life.

  Remember…remember what he did to you! Remember what you did! That is the key. You have to remember!

  The young man screamed out again, but Jacoby couldn’t hear what they said. Another voice responded in kind, angrier than the first. The pressure suddenly doubled, and something snapped in his head.

  Jacoby was toppling through darkness, a swirling mist and noxious aromas burning his nose. He felt pain cut into his body. A fist struck his mouth, then the side of his head. He felt it crack into his arm again and again and again.

  “Stop it. It hurts. It hurts,” he said, but it wasn’t his voice. It was the young man.

  Jacoby blinked but he didn’t see Janice’s monstrous form anymore, but his father. He held a knife in his fist, his nose reddened from too much drink. Hot spittle and alcohol spattered Jacoby’s face as he screamed.

  “You took my knife! I told you to never touch my stuff!” his father screamed. His eyes bulged, the whites stained with yellow and red.

  “I…I just,” Jacoby heard himself say, but his father’s open palm snapped up into his mouth. He tasted blood, felt his teeth knocked loose.

  “Yeah I saw the mess you made, whittling on that stick. Was it for that little rich girl you insist on talking to? Well, is it? What we are and got ain’t good enough now? I know you sneak out to see her, know you lie to me about it! Lie…to…me!” his father screamed, his fist snapping into his mouth, then his nose, and finally the side of his head.

  “Dad stop…please!” Jacoby sputtered, choking on a mouthful of blood. His vision went blurry as a pain flared inside his head.

  “She doesn’t like you for you. She lifts her nose up at the thought of who you are and where we come from. Those people think you’re nothing,” his father screamed and drove the knife into the wall. “You’re nothing, Jack. Nothing! You’re supposed to love me, Jack! Not them!” The knife stabbed into the wall next to his head again and again. His father’s face grew redder, the knife cutting into his ear. It pulled back again, but his father’s arm was wavering, the gleaming blade poised to come down right on his face.