There was nothing he needed back from where he had come. His house, his mirror, his scopes were useless to him now. He had a whole other world available to him on through the bridge.
As he began to extricate himself from his hiding spot, he realized that he had unwittingly literally buried himself within the very rocks themselves. Almost without thought, he used the sight that was now his only means of perception and shimmered back into the open area in the center of the bridge. A constant wind blew briskly through the tunnel. Slowly he began to tread down the length of the bridge towards their sister planet. When he could see far ahead, he tessered the entire length of what he could perceive as being in sight. It wasn’t until the third such jump that it occurred to him that if he expanded his senses just a bit he could jump to the very edge of the bridge. Moments later he shimmered into view on the edge of the bridge. The opening on this side was much more abrupt. There was only a shoulder-wide shelf that protruded out from the opening and for most individuals, it was most disconcerting to stand there face down to the world underneath. Baryesu was unaffected by this. His normal senses had been stripped bare. What he perceived was more of the reflection or flow of energy that was being drawn away from everything toward the dark sun, the black hole that was the opposite of the bright sun that provided light and heat for the living. Where the light sun gave life, the dark sun took it away. It was a constant pull and cycle. The dark sun scarcely visible to those back on his home planet, but here he could sense it drawing nearer. It was calling from the far side of the sister as if it gave him what it took from everything else. It was to the far side then that he must go.
He sat in a heap on the edge of the shelf and sent his thoughts out seeking the ideal location to escape and strengthen himself.
On the near side where the waters met the hills, he encountered more of the same creatures he had encountered in the strange fated craft on the other side of the bridge. He ignored them, merely noting their existence. He ignored the myriad of brainless creatures that fought for survival in the mountains beyond. The screeching monkeys, slithering snakes, and the ferocious cave cats were of no consequence to him. He paused only briefly to note the whereabouts of the yulupalexa sunning their scaled hides along the rim of a smoking volcano. He paused even longer when he encountered a hovel of his own brothers and sisters rejected for their crimes, stripped of their skills and banished to this forsaken planet. “Not yet,” he told himself. “Only when I am stronger, then I shall lead them out.” On he continued, past yet another group of the creatures from the stars and on into the hot and barren wasteland where a finger of black reached up out of the sand like a monument to some unknown deity. There! Concentrating, he willed himself to step through time and space and he shimmered onto the dark mountain. Heated from within by some volcanic lava it seemed to fuel the heat of the atmosphere of the southern part of the planet.
The flow of energy that he perceived cycled from his surroundings towards the dark sun and back. It was even greater here and the details of his surroundings now available to him were almost as great as what he had sensed before with the other five senses. He felt a peculiar sense of satisfaction that welled up from the other presence that was now an integral part of him. He set a chunk of the bridge that he had brought with him on the ground and holding it firmly under one crusted, skeletal hand, he buried his other hand in the hot volcanic crust at his feet. He was ready to grow the footings to the tower he had in mind. Guiding the flows of energy that he perceived, he began to pull and weave the two materials together. The ground beneath him began to swell and burst open with new growth a pitch-black obsidian material almost as hard as diamond, but which gathered and trapped light rather than sparkling and reflecting light. When the base was up to his waist, he collapsed, drained. He could hardly move. He had plenty of time he thought as he dragged himself under the shadow of his new creation and fell into a fitful trance. It was as close to real sleep and rest that he would ever get.
Captain McNally sat up in his tent with a jerk. His eyes were wide and hair disheveled as he fumbled for his cold torch. When he found it half under his pillow, he didn’t turn it on immediately. Instead, he crawled slowly toward the door hanging and rustling softly in the warm night breeze.
Whatever had woken him had been something other than the typical settlement noise. Until it was repeated; he would not remember what it had been or be able to identify it. A feeble light shone from the half-moon that now stood almost directly overhead. Even that felt like there was something off with that too. It was probably just his imagination, or perhaps he had just expected everything to be similar to how it had been back on earth.
The moon was larger than the earth’s moon or closer, but it didn’t give off as much light. It was almost like the light from the “southern” facing portion of the moon was not reflecting light as well as the other side. But that shouldn’t be the case. Perhaps it had something to do with the other planet in orbit so close to this one.
The noise that had awakened him broke through the night again sending shivers of fear down his spine. It sounded like a yowling cat but was a deeper, fuller sound than would have been possible for an earth cat. It sounded again much closer this time, and now he could hear the cacophony of the encampment as parents and children yelled and comforted one another.
He hurried out of the tent and made his way towards the highest concentration of noise. He picked up a shovel to serve as a weapon from next to the outhouse since he had left his laser pistol on the shuttle like a dunce. He had walked not ten steps past the outhouse when a thin ray flit through the air to his right followed by a yelping growl and a human scream. With his eyes now streaked and dimmed by the laser blast, he switched on his cold torch and set off in a run towards the screams and shouts now rising up from where the laser had been fired. By the time he reached the area of commotion, he had to push through a crowd of people wearing a mix of nightgowns, shirtless, and barefoot.
“Let me through!” He yelled, “Stand aside! Move! Out of the way!” Slowly a gap opened just large enough to let him through. As he stepped into the clearing, a woman vomited, splattering his bare feet. “Security!” he yelled. “Break this up and lock down the camp. People go home. It’s not safe for you to be out here. There’s now a curfew, so stay inside until morning.” As they began to break up and head home, his attention returned to the remains of the security guard on the ground. He forced his own food back down as it fought to join that of the woman’s on his feet.
Something had ripped the shoulder and half the chest right off the guard. His head was all but completely severed from his body. The lead security officer arrived and the captain took advantage of the opportunity to take his attention off of the hopeless guard.
“Brian, we need to beef up the perimeter guards here. Did anybody see what did this?”
A security guard looked up from where he sat shaking on the ground. “I swear it looked like a saber-tooth tiger, captain. It just jumped right out of nowhere and started dragging Jed. I got off a shot at it, but it just shook his head and tore.” He waved his hand at the dead guard, “Tore, and then the monster was gone just like that—gone.” He would have kept on babbling, but Brian stepped in to take charge.
“John, you and Garrett help Raul here back to his tent and stay with him. Captain, I need you to find me a cleanup crew so I can get this mopped up before daylight. The last thing we need on our hands is mass hysteria.”
“I’ll get you a cleanup crew, Brian, but as soon as you are free, I want to see you in my tent. We have some major damage control to do, and some big decisions to make.”
“I agree with you, Captain,” said Brian. “You go ahead and gather whomever you deem necessary, as will I. I’ll be there in two earth hours, just get me those cleaners. I don’t know how much time we have until light.”
“Yea. Will do.” The captain avoided even looking at the mess on the ground as he turned and started back towards his tent. Somewhere in
his pile was a settlement roster that would tell him where the folks were that he needed to contact. He was lost in his thoughts when Shorty popped seemingly out of nowhere into the beam of his cold torch two strides in front of him. He almost dropped his light and gave a yelp that turned into a growl as he got a hold of himself. “Buster, after a night like tonight you need to make more noise before you go scaring the bejeebers out of someone.”
“You want me to say boo next time?” he laughed. “Listen, I may know where this thing hangs out. At least I know where something large spends some time. I…”
The captain interrupted him. “Good, I wanted you to come to the meeting anyways. Listen, we are going to have a security meeting in about two earth hours at my tent. Make sure you are there and you can tell us all about it. Bring ol’ Looney Rooney with you when you come. A geneticist will have to pass for a biologist until we get connected back up with the Windfall folks. Don’t be late now.”
“Uh, yeah, sure Cap’n,” Shorty said. “I guess we won’t be tracking that thing until its light out will we. O.K. See ya in a couple.”
The captain resumed his trek again, still lost in thought about who should be in on this meeting. No matter what you planned for, there was always something new to throw you for a loop.
CHAPTER EIGHT:
Discovery
Brian and Captain McNally stood side by side at the entrance of the captain’s large tent sipping on their morning cups of coffee. They both looked exhausted, but Brian was especially bleary-eyed. He was a large man standing two meters tall, and his hands resembled bear paws in their size and strength. The dark bags that hung loosely under his eyes spoke of more sleepless nights than the one he had just endured.
“We got him cleaned up, Captain, but it’s not going to make much difference. The folks are scared. I’m scared as far as that goes.” He looked sideways at the captain, watching him sip slowly on his coffee.
Captain McNally returned his look over the brim of his coffee before looking back out over Outpost’s tent city. “Me, too.” he murmured quietly. “Me, too.” They stood a few ticks longer watching the sky brighten behind the mountains that surrounded their settlement. A thick fog followed the course of the river as it wound its way out of the valley giving it a surreal appearance. “We’ll handle it, Brian. You are good at what you do and we’ve got a good team. Speaking of our team, it looks like everybody’s here.”
They clasped hands and greeted the newcomers. “Grab yourselves some coffee off the burner there and come on into the tent. We’ll get this meeting underway just as soon as everybody’s settled in.” He went into the tent and sat on a crate at the far end. He sipped his coffee slowly as he watched them come through the tent flap. “Just have a seat wherever you can. We haven’t had time to get seats out for everybody yet.”
They were a quiet lot today. It was probably a mix of tiredness and the stress of the unknown predator that hung over their heads. Looney Rooney seemed to be the least affected, but then he was always wide-eyed and disheveled. Shorty stayed close to the exit and shifted warily from foot to foot while the tent filled.
When everyone was present, the captain said, “Thanks for coming everyone. I’m sure you all know by now what has happened. Let me just fill you in on the details to make sure we aren’t working off of assumptions.
“Something attacked Jed last night and literally ripped him to pieces. I’m sorry, there’s no other way to put it. Raul managed to get a shot or two off at it before it disappeared. Raul, do you have any more details you want to share? I know this is hard for you.”
“No. Just that it was big, fast, and lethal. Jed had no chance.” He paused and gathered himself. “We’ve got to track him and kill him before we are all picked off. Next time it could be one of the ladies or children.”
“Thanks, Raul. So, we have a three-fold job ahead of us. First, we need to track and kill this beast. That will give our folks a sense of security. Second, we need to find out as much as we can about it and where and how it lives. There are bound to be more of them around than the one that killed Jed. Third, we need to figure out what kind of housing we can build, or a wall for our settlement, or something that will allow us to protect ourselves from this and other similar creatures.”
Shorty stepped forward as he finished speaking. “As I started telling you earlier, Captain, I believe I may know something of either where this beast lives or where it hangs out.”
The captain waited expectantly for Shorty to continue, but when he didn’t, he said, “Well go-ahead Shorty, we’re all ears.”
“As I was going into a cave I found about halfway up the side of the ravine where we were exploring yesterday, I saw some evidence of a large animal. There were some large droppings to the side of the entrance, and possibly some scratch marks on the floor of the cave. I’ll gladly lead a team back in there to try to find something.”
“I’ll be glad to have you lead some guys back in there, but because we wounded the beast, I want to have a team track it from the scene of the incident just in case it lives elsewhere. Brian, I was hoping you could lead that team. Raul, could you go with Shorty and a couple of other guys and see if there is any more evidence of this thing or something else dangerous in the cave?”
“Sure, Captain. I hope it’s there. We’ll finish it off for good,” Raul said, his anger bubbling into his speech.
“Yes. Just leave us enough to study it if you do find it. That brings me to another point. Rooney, you can go with either group. When we find it, you will be called so that you can catalog it for us and run whatever tests you’d like to on it. Brian let’s break out the comlinks and give one to me and one to each group that’s heading out so we can stay up on the situation. I know we wanted to do away with the comlinks, but until this emergency situation is over, this is how I want to proceed. Does anybody else have any input?” He listened briefly to a chorus of no’s echo around the tent, then said, “O.K., then let’s get started. Brian, how long until you can have the comlinks here?”
“Give me ten ticks, Captain, and I’ll have them all programmed and ready to go.”
“Everybody, report back here in 15 ticks then, and we’ll have the comlinks that you can take with you.
Brian quickly disappeared to get the comlinks, but everybody else was already ready to go so they just milled around drinking their coffee or tea, eating the rest of their dried breakfast, and chatting with one another in a subdued fashion.
When Brian arrived back at the meeting tent, they tested the comlinks and then split up. Looney Rooney decided to go with Brian and his crew, and they headed up to the site of the incident. Shorty and Raul and his crew headed almost due east towards the ravine where the cave was located.
Captain Paul McNally watched as they left until he could no longer see either group as they disappeared around the myriad of tents. He hoped that they took every precaution they could. He did not want to lose anyone else needlessly. He paced restlessly back and forth inside the tent as he listened to the sleeping settlement slowly wake up around him.
As Shorty guided Raul towards the cave, Raul refused to let him lead in front of them, so their walk was punctuated with multiple rest stops while Raul conferred with Shorty on the directions to the cave. It wasn’t really that far, but Raul insisted on checking a wide perimeter around them as they walked in the hopes that they would find the blood trail.
Shorty took them up the ridge of the ravine rather then up the lower part because he hadn’t seen what was on the other side yet and they wanted to approach the cave from above rather than below to give them as much tactical advantage as they could, if necessary.
The cave was not even visible from above. The only reason Shorty didn’t totally miss it was because he recognized the place where he had thrown his shadow over Looney Rooney while he was sprawled out on the ground looking at something.
They approached the cave as silently as they could, but they were not woodsmen and they slid, jumped, and
stumbled their way quite noisily to the entrance of the cave. It appeared to be empty as it had before, but upon closer examination of the entrance area, they found what they were looking for. There was a small trail of blood that was smeared into the front of the cave. Raul set up the guards that were with him so that two were facing into the cave and one was facing outward looking out for the beast or any other nasty surprise of which they were unaware of. Immediately when they found the blood, their demeanors changed from an almost carefree, “We’ll probably not find anything,” to an, “It’s either you or me,” attitude.
Raul kept half of his attention on the floor following the trail of blood, and the other half towards the rear of the cave where the blood led.
“The cave curves to the right up there,” Shorty said, “and it gets quite low before opening up again into a high-vaulted ceiling.”
The two guards in front turned their attention towards the back right of the cave. Their cold torches blazed the surface into near day brightness. About halfway back, Shorty paused. The blood was much thicker here, and where the smear had been mostly dry before, it was thick and wet now. “It must have lain right here until it heard us approaching, and then moved further on back.”
“Heads up, gentlemen,” Raul said. “It’s alive and still moving.”
“The two in the front got a bit nervous at that remark, but they were ready. With lights ablaze and their pulses ready, they edged forward towards where the ceiling and floor angled towards each other. They were ready for anything. (At least that’s what they told themselves.)
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