Alien Jungle (11 page)

I
mpani stared at the flames where Trace’s silhouette disappeared. Noise crashed all around her—the roar of the fire, the rev of engines as forklifts climbed the trench, voices calling to one another. She didn’t move. Her head buzzed.

“Did you hear him?” she whispered.

Anselmi moved closer. He spoke gently as if reading her mood. “He said he needed you.”

“No. He said I couldn’t be trusted.”

The words stung even when she uttered them. They echoed from her childhood—the social worker at the orphanage she’d escaped, the police officer who found her sleeping in the trash can. Even the old woman.

“Old woman?” asked Anselmi.

Impani glanced at him. Had she spoken aloud? “The woman who raised me on the streets. She told me I craved challenge and danger like an addict, and that it would come back against me someday.”

Now it had. Now she understood. Her recklessness endangered everyone around her. No wonder she hadn’t been named team leader. She wasn’t fit to give orders. Not when it mattered. Not when lives were at stake.

“You’re a fine leader,” Anselmi told her.

“That’s not what you said when I nearly got you drowned.”

He put his hands on her shoulders, stooping to peer into her eyes. “I didn’t drown.”

“But you might have. I might have. Or I might have died in that snake pit.” Tears clogged her throat in a hot ball. “Everything I do is wrong.”

He straightened. “I will not allow you to wallow in self recriminations.”

“Wallow?” she cried. “Is that what I’m doing?”

“We have a mission to complete.”

“I can’t.”
Can’t go on, can’t pretend that I belong. Not fit to be a Scout.

“I know it’s difficult,” he said, “but that’s what it takes to be a hero. We do the difficult thing because it’s right.”

Impani froze. Was he mocking her? She’d never told him that she wanted to be a hero. Never. She looked up, and he smiled. No, not taunting her. He was her friend. Doubtlessly thinking that human beings were so fragile—

“That is correct.” His smile widened. “They are.”

Impani gave a shaky laugh. “You seem especially attuned to my thoughts.”

“It’s this planet. It’s opening me somehow. Not a comfortable sensation.”

“No.” Impani also felt like she’d been flayed open. She raised a hand to wipe her eyes but wiped her mask instead. She chuckled again.

“Good, then,” Anselmi said. “We should be going. I don’t think Trace intended us to take a break.”

But the idea of trudging through the jungle made her ache. “I just came down that hillside. I can’t bear the thought of going up again.”

“I can carry you.”

“No, you
cannot
.” Impani didn’t know if she should laugh or feel offended. “I’m perfectly capable of walking on my own.”

“We’d best walk quickly, then. The sun is nearly down. Come. Let’s go be heroes.”

But as she followed him over the trench and around the burning stockpile, she knew that this time she wasn’t doing it to look like a hero. This time, she was doing it to help Trace.

<<>>

T
race paused to look around. The sun must be setting, but he couldn’t tell beneath the dense overhang of mushroom caps. He held out the resonator in a slow sweep, and the surrounding plants bent away from the sonic waves.

He remembered seeing the phenomenon when his team first arrived onworld. They’d laughed and found it an interesting curiosity. Imagine a world where plants could move. He wasn’t laughing any longer.

The resonator’s tiny screen glowed in the gloom. The constantly shifting colors showed nothing that he could attribute to human movement.

“This is crazy,” he muttered. “The whole jungle is in motion.”

Then he noticed a consistent abnormality: a puckered wave crossing the screen in a straight line. The instrument didn’t display moss creatures in that manner. It read them sporadically as they darted among the trees. This had to be either Cole or his father.

With the resonator in front of him like a compass, Trace ran forward. He was tempted to flip back his mask and call out—but the air was thick with spores and pollen dredged up by his footsteps. He couldn’t risk uncovering his face.

He continued to run, one eye on the screen, adjusting his course, when he noticed several blips to either side of the first. These moved erratically. They appeared and disappeared among the pulsing foliage. Moss men.

“Dad!”

He ran flat out. The terrain became hilly. Several times, he feared he lost the signal. Then it would appear again, each time showing the erratic blips closing in on the solitary wave.

At last, he was near enough to hear the uneven tramping of boots. Trace slid his flamethrower from his shoulder, scanning for creatures. Through the trees, he glimpsed a man with a limp. He fought to catch up to him.

“Dad! Wait up!”

Aldus turned. “Trace? What are you—”

The air shivered with howls.

Aldus’ eyes widened. “Uh-oh.”

Trace stood at his father’s side and glanced about, heart pounding.

Beneath his breath, Aldus said, “What do you mean by following me, boy?”

“Who said I was looking for you?” Trace muttered. “Cole is my friend, too. And what are you doing out this far, anyway?”

His father sighed. “Cole wasn’t in the clearing. I figured that if he couldn’t get down the hillside to camp, he might go back to the Lander. It’s the only other place I know that’s safe.”

“Where is this Lander?”

“Here—I thought. I’ve been wandering around.” Aldus raised his voice. “There used to be a road. Nothing stays put on this planet.”

At that, all around them moss men stepped into the open. They blended so well with their surroundings, Trace hadn’t noticed they were there.

He waved his gun and drew a smoking line in the air. “See this? It’s fire. You don’t want to mess with us.”

For emphasis, he touched the tip to a nearby tree. Flame burst in a fireball and ran up the trunk. In the flickering light, he saw more creatures than he wanted to count. Certainly more than he could fight.

Abruptly, the flames guttered and dimmed. Alarmed, he looked again at the tree. A thick sludge slid slowly down the trunk. The blaze snuffed out as if the mushroom consciously fought the fire.

“Drel,” Trace said. “It would have burned if I’d cut it down first.”

“It doesn’t matter. I think our friends got the idea.”

The moss men vanished into the shadows.

“I’ve seen this sludge before.” Aldus examined the tree. “At the attack on the hospital. Your girlfriend called it fingerprints.”

He winced at the word girlfriend. “Tell me more about this Lander of yours.”

“I lost the thing. What do you want me to say?”

“Did it have power? Would it have an energy signature?”

“Maybe. I don’t know.” Aldus motioned with his chin. “They’re coming back.”

Trace glanced at the approaching creatures. Setting the resonator on wide dispersal, he scanned for an energy spike.

An immediate howl rent the air. The moss men cringed and writhed.

Aldus slapped Trace’s back gleefully. “You’re hurting them! You’re hurting them!”

Trace fought the urge to cover his ears. The whistling howls were so loud, so piercing, he could barely think. He concentrated on the resonator’s screen then nearly dropped the instrument in surprise when it showed a spike. Like a heartbeat—or a system on standby.

He closed his eyes for a moment, giving a prayer of thanks, then shouted to his father, “The Lander is this way.”

I
mpani stood at the tree line and scanned the overgrown camp for movement. The bio-domes and Quonset huts were barely discernible from the surrounding jungle, but she knew they were there. Her resonator led them to the camp’s energy pulse.

Anselmi whispered, “It appears we are alone.”

“Yeah. I wonder where our friends are.”

Glancing over their shoulders, they walked along a depressed stretch of growth where the road once ran. The sky was a deep shade of magenta. The air was still. Spores hung overhead as if defying gravity. Somewhere, a puffball ruptured, filling the silence with an echoing crack.

“We should go to the dome we saw before,” Anselmi told her. “Science lab thirteen. The computers were working. We can scan the records there.”

“Sure, if we wanted to find the official reports. But if you want behind-the-operation news, you don’t look in authorized accounts. You look in diaries, personal logs. What we need is the residential section.” She halted and looked around. Science lab thirteen had been clearly labeled, and as she glanced over the area, she saw other structures had signposts as well. One of them did not. “Come on. The housing unit is this way.”

They tiptoed to a dome so thick with vegetation it looked like it had sprouted there. Reeds rattled as they approached. She handed her gun to Anselmi and ripped at the thorny vines with both hands. Clouds of dust and mildew rose around her.

“You don’t know this is the right dome,” Anselmi said.

“I know there is a chance this is the right dome.”

Blue flowers shot pollen at her head as she searched. Yellow accordion shapes appeared to breathe. At last, she uncovered a control box.

“Keep a lookout while I bypass the lock.”

She pried open the panel and exposed the polarized dielectric plates. Easy to reroute. She could have opened the lab, too, if Robert had given her half a chance. The idiot, shooting it like that. She smiled.

With a clank, the hatch released, creating a bulge in the overgrowth. Anselmi dug his fingers in the crack and forced the door open wide enough for them to step inside.

The airlock reminded her of the one at the camp’s weather station. She climbed in behind him and pulled the hatch shut. In silence, she awaited a radiation burst that never came and entered the dome feeling dirty and contaminated.

Darkness shrouded the interior.

Anselmi shone his flashlight over gray-splotched couches and chairs. The center of the room held a ping-pong table. “Definitely residential.”

Impani glanced again at the energy residual showing on her resonator. “The place must have an internal generator. Maybe the lights still work.”

She groped the walls and found a recessed panel. Lights flickered then grew. Shadows pooled around furniture: two couches, a drink dispenser, lunch counters with stools. Beyond the ping-pong table, several overturned chairs blocked a doorway like a fallen barricade.

She peered past them into a corridor—and found a sludge-like handprint on the wall. “They’ve been here.”

“How would they get inside? The lock was intact.”

She shook her head and motioned down the adjoining hall. “Bedrooms must be down there.”

They moved into the corridor. Their boots crunched upon the gritty floor. Huge, purple rings dotted the walls like cancer. The lightbars overhead were colored by pink dust which multiplied as she watched, threatening to snuff out the light again.

Impani stepped cautiously, ears strained as if the silence itself were set to pounce. The hallway curved with the dome. Doors lined the inner wall; bedrooms locked with handprint readers.
They won’t be easily jimmied.

“No problem,” Anselmi said. “We can follow Wilde’s example and blast them apart.”

She snuffled a laugh. Then she paused. “Do you hear something?”

Gun out, she crept ahead. The noise became more distinct. A rhythmic whine and bump. Through the pink-tinged gloom, she noticed movement. A door slid back and forth, attempting to close upon something in the doorway. She hesitated in rising dread, convinced it was a body. But as she neared, she saw only a pile of moldy bedding.

Anselmi grasped the door and unseated it from its track to halt the movement. He shone his flashlight inside the room. Papers and personal items littered the floor. On a desk, a ready light blinked in the corner of a computer monitor.

Impani widened her eyes and looked at Anselmi. An inner voice warned that a creature could be inside, blending with the shadows. Taking a steadying breath, she stepped over the pile of blankets and into the room.

<<>>

T
race rushed into the clearing, running sideways, shooting a stream of fire between the trees behind him. He was no longer elated at finding the Lander’s energy spike on the resonator. He was tired, confused, and increasingly alarmed. They were deep in the jungle, and he had no idea how to get back.

“It has to be here.” He handed his father the gun then held out the resonator to check the multicolored screen again.

“Are you sure you know how to read that thing?” Aldus asked.

Trace glanced around, perplexed. “The signal keeps fading. Power’s low. It’s not meant to be left on for this length of time.”

“Great. Just great.” He approached Trace as if to say more, but spun toward a sound in the undergrowth.

Trace watched the shadows. Perspiration gathered along the insulator band at his forehead and dripped down his temple. An unexpected memory brought back the advice his father once gave him.
Now you have a choice: you can save your pride, or you can save your ass.

He keyed open his com. “Impani, can you hear me? Impani, do you read?”

“Not the best time to call your girlfriend,” Aldus muttered.

“She can relay a message to camp. They can pinpoint the Lander with the weather satellite.”

“Good plan but a bit late, don’t you think?”

“Impani, come in! We must be out of range.”

Aldus faced him angrily. “Well, if we stand here much longer, those things are going to circle around and—”

A moss man leaped out of the trees and wrapped Trace’s father in its long, scraggly arms. Aldus swung the gun overhead and bludgeoned the thing. Trace pointed the resonator. He narrowed the frequency to boost the power. The creature arched backward and hissed. Aldus fought and kicked. At last, the thing dropped him and fled into the jungle.

Trace rushed to help his father up. “Are you all right?”

Aldus stood then twitched about, tugging off his jacket. “Cursed thing sludged me.” He threw the jacket down as if it were obscene.

As Trace stared, a leafless tendril lifted from the sludge mark and spiraled toward the light.

What was he doing here? If he had just followed orders, his father would be home right now—and Impani would never have been in Wilde’s arms. He winced, wishing he had contacted her. He hoped she was safe.

<<>>

I
mpani stood in the doorway of the darkened room. Within her skinsuit, her flesh crawled. She ran her fingers over a nearby wall, searching for light controls. Seized by inspiration, she called, “Lights.”

The ceiling panels flared. With her flamethrower held ready, she moved deeper into the room.

Anselmi stepped next to her. He gestured at a bed tipped against the wall and a pile of empty bureau drawers. “Another failed barricade.”

A shudder coursed through her. She crossed to a shelf stacked with field rations and water. The air vents were stuffed with rags. “This was someone’s last stand.”

“Where are they now?” He stepped over the cluttered floor.

Impani picked up a holoframe. A smiling blond woman and a girl about six years old sat together on a tire swing. A lake sparkled behind them. Across the glass, she saw the same greenish fingerprints she’d found in the quarantine area of the hospital.

She set the frame on the shelf beside the rations. “It doesn’t make sense. Even if moss creatures had somehow gotten into the dome, how could they break through a locked and barricaded door?”

“Maybe this will help us find out.” Anselmi held up a small case. “Data strips.”

Impani hurried to him. Computer strips were scattered around the desk as if thrown. She took the case and read the label. “Activity logs dated ten years ago. These might be what we’re looking for.”

She slid a strip into a ten-centimeter slot beneath the monitor, and the screen lit. ACCESS DENIED.

“Files are encrypted. Give me a moment.”

Her fingers flew over the keyboard. The screen flashed, and the image of a woman appeared. It was the blond woman from the holoframe.

“Day 132 Supplemental,” the woman said. “I tried to bury him but the ground wouldn’t let me. It filled as fast as I dug. New growth laced his body as if claiming him.” She pressed her palms against her temples. Deep smudges about her eyes accented the angle of her nose, the sharpness of her cheekbones. “All I could do was leave.” Her voice wavered. She cleared her throat and straightened her shoulders. “I will continue to run the telluriate analysis in hope of shedding light on our failure. At any rate, it will keep me busy until Dr. Lloyd returns with the group from First Settlement.”

The screen blanked. Impani removed the strip.

“No mention of creatures,” Anselmi said.

“No, and they had time to establish at least two settlements. Trace’s father told me that his camp was attacked from the beginning.”

“Incongruous.”

“Find another strip labeled after 132.”

Anselmi handed her a strip, and she slid it into the slot.

The same woman came onscreen, this time looking feverish and animated. “Day 145. The analysis of the soil samples is conclusive. The moss contains ionized particles that repel each other like a magnetic field. Combined with the silica already established, these particles act like an abrasive, eating away the root system, actually slowing the growth of our seedlings from expected norms. This explains the failure of our crops, but not the accelerated state of indigenous growth. There must be another factor.” She collapsed in a fit of coughing. When she caught her breath, she looked up with red-rimmed eyes. “Unfortunately, this discovery goes unheard. I am unable to re-establish contact with First Settlement. Dr. Lloyd has not returned. And I can’t find Dalwin.”

Impani pulled out the strip and tapped it absently before setting it down. “Poor woman.”

“Yes. Obviously, she was ill.”

“The disease they warned us about.” She frowned. “But then, why the barricade? Why the last stand?”

“Perhaps the fever causes madness.” Anselmi held up another strip. “Try this one.”

She fed it to the machine.

The nameless woman stared blankly from the monitor. “I’m alone here. I know I’m alone.” She looked pale and fragile. She flicked a glance behind. “There will be no rescue from First Settlement, no directive from home. But sometimes—”

Her mouth stretched wide in a soundless sob, revealing blue patches inside her lips. She raised her hands. Purple mold splotched her shirt beneath her arms. She tangled her fair hair in her fingers and tore it from her scalp. Impani leaned forward as if she could stop her.

“Sometimes,” the woman said, “I think they are all out there, Dalwin and Cheevers, disguised as the jungle, entering the dome when I’m asleep. Watching—” Her words dissolved into a violent cough. She hunched forward and grasped her chest as if it were cracking open. Pink dust sprayed from her mouth and hung in the air like fog.

Impani sat transfixed. Her heart thudded.

The woman looked up with pale, rheumy eyes, her teeth stained with spores. Blood rimmed the bald patches on her scalp. “They call to me.” She turned her head as if embarrassed. A black, fan-shaped growth nestled behind one ear.

Impani’s stomach lurched. She tore the strip out then dropped it as if it were hot. “Oh, God,” she whispered, trying not to think—then jumped at Anselmi’s touch upon her shoulder.

“What was that?” he blurted. “Did you see that on her neck?”

Impani couldn’t bear to answer, couldn’t bear to have her suspicions prove true. She knelt and rifled through the strips scattered upon the floor, reading the dates. 152 days. 158. Finally, she found a strip with no date at all. She held it for a moment, closed her eyes, then returned to the desk and slid it home. The screen flickered to life.

The woman was not recognizable. Her skin was mottled and discolored, her hair all but gone. Her throat seemed oddly veined as if laced from the inside. When she looked up at the camera, her eyes were nearly crusted shut. And when she spoke, her voice was windy. “The moss is the answer.”

Movement. Impani spun about. A moss creature stood in the doorway. Impani tumbled backward from the chair. Data strips slid from the desk onto her chest. Anselmi pointed his gun—but then dropped it. He doubled over and clutched his head.

Impani shouted, “Anselmi!” She leaped in front of him, arms out, glaring defiantly at the being before her.