Alien Jungle (8 page)

T
race gasped as Impani’s wrist lamp snuffed out. He keyed his com. “Impani, where are you? What’s your position?” Silence rattled his nerves. “Impani, respond!” Eyes wide, he stared in the direction she’d gone.

Cole exchanged a look with him then sprinted after her. His heavy boots smashed through the undergrowth.

Trace followed. He weaved in and out of mushroom trunks, all the while imagining a steep cliff and a gorge of writhing pythons and Impani’s unconscious form—

“Hold on.” Cole stopped suddenly. “The pit is somewhere around here.”

Trace strained against Cole’s outstretched arm. “Impani!” he called into the com. “Can you hear me?” Against his own command, he switched on his flashlight.

They stood near a black hollow, seven or eight meters wide. Trace approached, and vines reared into the air as if reaching for his light. They reminded him of the orange cords that had pinned his arm to the ground—only these were thick and coarse.

Cole rushed forward. “There she is!”

Trace sidestepped along the bank. Impani lay motionless on the downward slope. Vegetation covered her so thickly he could barely make out her form. Rage roared through him. He wanted to leap at the plants, tear them away with his bare hands.

Cole ignited his gun. He swept bright flame before him as he climbed into the pit. The ropy growth blackened and curled. Trace skidded down the steep grade then directed a jet of fire over Impani’s body, trusting her skinsuit to protect her. Vines coiled and squirmed like snakes. He made another pass with the roaring flame and heard a loud intake of breath over his com. Impani arched her back.

She was alive!

Throwing down the gun, he leaped beside her and ripped away the remaining vines. With his arms about her chest, he dragged her up the slope. Impani moaned.

He held her tightly. His heart hammered his chest. “Impani. Oh, God.”

“I heard you call me,” she whispered. “I thought you were a dream.”

“I’m here.” He closed his eyes and cherished her weight in his arms.

Cole’s flamethrower continued to roar. Trace turned to tell him that Impani was safe—but Cole seemed determined to clean out the hollow, as if he were taking revenge. Vines reduced to twisting, glowing lines amid mounds of black ash.

Impani sniffled. “I dropped my gun.”

He glanced about and spotted the fallen weapon amid the undergrowth. “I’ll get it.”

Reluctantly, he released her and walked to the gun. He held it toward the flickering light of Cole’s fire and checked it for damage.

Cole climbed the bank and leaned over, wracked by coughs. Trace slung Impani’s gun onto his back and hurried to him. He held his friend’s shoulder.

“Smoke,” Cole said in answer.

Trace looked at the smoldering hole. As the flames diminished, the ash glowed like banked embers—and in the red light, he saw several moss men on the other side.

“Uh-oh,” he said.

Cole lowered his voice. “We can’t outrun them.”

Trace nodded. The moss man in camp moved so fast it seemed to have materialized. He remembered how much flame it took to chase the thing away. Could the three of them take on a whole group? Or would they run out of gellasene?

Then he realized his gun was still down where he’d dropped it when he found Impani.
Oh, drel.

Impani appeared at his side. “What should we do?”

Trace’s thoughts raced. They needed something to burn, something that would cause a great blaze. He glanced about at gnarled toadstools, at tall, mushrooming trees. When he’d first arrived onworld, he’d taken a sample of one of the huge trunks—and colorless oil bled out. Was that oil flammable?

The night grew darker by moments as the smoldering ash died. Trace glanced down at his flamethrower. The moss men inched forward as if the dimming light were a signal. Cole raised his gun.

Trace pulled out his stat-gun.

“That won’t work,” Impani told him.

“Be ready to run,” he said.

With his eyes on the advancing horde, he leaped sideways to a mushroom tree, pulled the trunk forward, and sliced the base with the narrow beam of his stat-gun. The huge mushroom toppled and fell into the pit. The cap struck the ground and snapped off. Trace stepped to the bank, aimed his stat-gun at the flamethrower, and fired.

The resulting explosion knocked him on his butt. Fire erupted into the air, engulfing the fallen trunk as well as two moss creatures that had advanced to the bank. They fled with their flaming arms over their heads.

Trace hoped the others had run off as well. He stared for a moment at the rising blaze. The flames turned green. The mushroom trunk popped and crackled as oil sacs ruptured within it.

“Go!” Cole darted past him.

Trace grabbed Impani’s hand and ran into the jungle. The darkness seemed impenetrable after looking into the dazzling flames. He dodged through the mushroom trees as he followed the thud of Cole’s footfalls.

But Impani tugged his arm. “Slow down.” She panted. “I can’t—”

He skidded to a halt. She released his hand and held her chest as if struggling for breath. Trepidation filled him.

“Cole!” he called. “Help me.”

After a moment, Cole joined them. “Is she all right?”

“She’s hurt,” he cried. “Her ribs might be broken. I don’t know what to do.”

Just then, a rustling cry settled over the jungle. It seemed to come from all directions. Impani straightened and looked around.

Cole ignited his gun. A puff of flame swirled from the tip, casting him in flickering shadow. Above his neckerchief mask, his eyes were grave. “Keep moving. It’s not far.”

He turned and the tip of his gun brushed a tree—but instead of the mushroom bursting into flame, the resulting scorch mark simply darkened and oozed. Trace frowned and filed the information away with all the other inconsistencies about the planet. He handed back Impani’s gun then ducked beneath her arm and urged her into a trot.

They followed Cole down the elephant-ear steps and into the abandoned camp. Overgrown domes scalloped the darkness. The growth of mushrooms thinned and allowed the misty drizzle to reach them once again. Trace wiped his glove over his facemask, smearing it, and strode cautiously down the camp’s main road. He passed a cluster of reeds, and it clattered loudly although there was no wind.

Immediately, a moss man’s eerie cry drifted over the camp. Trace paused, struck by the unlikely notion that the creatures and the reeds could communicate.

Cole darted ahead. He pressed against the moldy wall of science lab thirteen while Trace and Impani caught up to him. Guns drawn, they moved to the front of the dome.

The hatch stood wide open. Trace pictured Wilde blasting away the lock. Cole glared at him then stepped through.

Trace groaned. It wasn’t fair. He hadn’t told Wilde to shoot. But an answering voice said,
You’re team leader.
Take responsibility.

“Aren’t we going inside?” Impani whispered.

Trace held out his flashlight and played the beam before them. “Stay close.”

The lab was in shambles. The seedling beds he’d seen before were upended, and cobwebby growth draped the table legs. Thick moss spotted the floor like footprints.

Cole stared about, arms spread wide. “Why would they trash this place?”

“All we need is communications.” Impani swept past him. But as she neared the computer bank, her stride faltered. “Com station is gone.”

Trace swallowed a smile. So much for his father sending a request that Trace be recalled. He stepped beside Impani, and his face dropped.

The communications console was smashed. The control board was ripped open. Wires spilled from the gutted box. But only the com station was destroyed. The other computers were undamaged. As if the creatures had an agenda.

He looked at Cole. “What sort of beings are these?”

I
mpani slid from the examination table in the hospital’s emergency room. She pulled her skinsuit to her waist and gingerly worked her arms into the sleeves. Dr. Abrams insisted that her ribs were only bruised, but she swore they were broken.

On the trek back through the jungle, she’d had to walk propped against Trace for support. She thought she’d feel better once she rested. But after spending the last hour in the camp hospital, she found her aches and pains multiplying.

Trace stuck his head around the curtain. “Are you decent?”

With a mixed laugh and groan, Impani tugged her suit closed. “Don’t make me move.”

He stepped into the cubicle. “I was going to bring you flowers, but I found out anything that blooms on this planet is poisonous. Besides, the doctor says you’re well enough to leave. Let me help you with that.”

He stilled her fumbling fingers and ran his hands up the front of her suit, sealing the triple seam from waist to neck. His touch was gentle, his breath soft on her cheek. Yet despite his nearness, she was aware of the distance between them.

“I remember when we first met,” she said. “We were on that planet with the lizard creatures.”

“Your belt broke, and I helped you adjust it.” He slid his hands around her waist to the small of her back.

She leaned into his embrace, hugging his heartbeat. “We were so afraid of each other then. We kept so many secrets.”

He nuzzled her temple.

“I’m glad we’re past that now.”

“Past what?” he murmured.

She pulled away. “Keeping secrets.”

His hooded gaze was indecipherable. Impani waited, hoping he would take the opening, hoping he would tell her about the skinsuits in his backpack.

“You’re right. No more secrets.” His shoulders slumped with each syllable. “I know you’re keeping something from me.”

“Me?” she yelped. “Why would I—”

“I saw you with my father.”

“Oh, that.” She choked back a laugh.

“What were you two talking about?”

Annoyance flashed through her. “You, if you must know.” She turned away, then remembered Mr. Hanson’s words.
No more secrets
. “He thinks that I don’t love you.”

“You never said you did.”

Impani closed her eyes.
But I wanted to.
Why am I unable to love?

“Your father told me that I put the mission first, and in a way, he’s right. I thought I should be team leader.”

“I wish you had been.”

She marshaled her words. “I think it is unfair that you were named leader simply because of your father.”

“I couldn’t agree more.”

She looked at him, and his gaze skittered away.

“Then why have you shut me out of this mission?” she asked.

“What are you talking about?”

“I think you know.”

“Well, I don’t.” His voice rose. “You’ve been involved. I asked you to take the resonance scans.”

“Anyone can take a resonance scan. Robert has a resonator. Why don’t you ever ask him?”

“I thought you wanted to be included.”

“
Included
, not lorded over, as if I can’t do my job without your instruction.”

“Is that what you think I want, to lord over you?” He grimaced and shook his head.

Impani sensed the growing distance. The trust between them was slipping away, and she wanted it back. She took a step toward him.

He yanked open the curtain. “I came to say I’ve called a team meeting. There’s a private room outside the cafeteria we can use. You remember where the cafeteria is, of course.”

“I’ll find it,” she said without looking up.

“Good. Be there in fifteen minutes.” He left the cubicle.

Impani sat on the exam table. Her face screwed up against a bout of tears—and part of her asked if it was only the job that was important to her, why did she feel so horrible?

“You two lovebirds still at it?” Wilde asked as he and Natica entered.

Impani let out a quavering breath. “I shouldn’t have made him angry. Now we might never find out.”

“Find out what?” Natica sat beside her.

Impani hesitated. “Why Trace has fifteen skinsuits stashed in his backpack.”

“Are you serious?” Natica asked.

“I saw them myself. No med-pacs, no emergency gear.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” Natica said.

“Sure, it does,” said Wilde. “The raffer is smuggling them off base, selling them on the black market. Skinsuits have military applications. Mercs would love them.”

“No.” Natica shook her head. “That’s crazy.”

Impani said, “He wouldn’t do anything illegal.”

“Wouldn’t he?” Wilde said. “He came from a penal colony.”

Impani stared at him, suddenly cold, unable to think of a rebuttal.

<<>>

T
race growled. The heaviness of his footsteps rattled his teeth. Impani’s words boiled in his mind. For a moment, she’d thrown him. It was as if she alluded to his secret mission—but she couldn’t have found out about that. Right?

If he lived to be five hundred, he would never understand her. What did she expect of him? Either she wanted him to treat her as part of the team, or she wanted him to ignore her. At this point, he leaned toward the latter.

He entered the meeting room that Cole had set up for them and was surprised to find Anselmi already inside. Anselmi looked worn out, his eyes shadowed, his expression haunted. Trace wondered if he still heard voices. The thought made him uncomfortable, as if Anselmi might be insane.

Yet Trace had heard voices once. On an alien planet, a telepathic animal cried out to him for help. Its mental pleas had been loud and insistent. Trace could not have blotted them out if he’d tried. Was that what it was like now for Anselmi?

Not knowing what to say, he nodded in greeting and sat at the head of an oblong table. Minutes later, Impani came in with Natica and Wilde. He motioned them into seats.

“We were given three days to secure this colony,” he said. “We’ve already wasted one.”

Natica looked around the group. “We’ve been fact gathering.”

“Now, we’re acting.” Trace sat forward. “Your report mentions heavy equipment. Bulldozers. Hole diggers.”

“That’s right,” Natica said. “They have a garage full. But I don’t see how that can—”

Just then, Cole, Aldus, Madsen, and a woman Trace didn’t recognize came into the room. Madsen drove a motorized scooter. His scorched face looked shiny and patchy with synthoskin, and he wore a hat.

Wilde stood to shake the man’s hand. “Bald, eh? Now you look like one of us.”

Madsen’s eyes winced around his grin.

Aldus said stiffly, “I hope you don’t mind us sitting in.”

Trace avoided his father’s stare. Impani’s voice rang through his memory—
lording over me as if I can’t do my job.
He wouldn’t allow his father to browbeat him. “Have a seat.” The scrape of chairs filled the room.

Cole cleared his throat. “This is Celeste Meade, our new supply clerk. I thought you might have a few questions for her.”

Celeste looked on the brink of panic.

“I’m glad you’re here.” Natica smiled. “We were talking about the garage.”

“We were talking about priorities.” Trace’s voice rang out. “The safety of the colony is paramount. We must keep the moss men out of camp.”

“How?” Wilde spread his hands. “They don’t respond to our weapons. Only fire is effective.”

“Exactly.”

“May I remind you,” Impani said, “that the colonists are low on gellasene?”

“Yes, but they have plenty of mushrooms.”

Her face changed, caught between realization and awe. “Oh, Trace. You aren’t going to set fire to the jungle.”

“Of course not.” He rolled his eyes then got to his feet. With the weight of their stares upon him, he spread out the satellite image of camp from Wilde’s report about the weather station. He jabbed the picture. “I want pilings driven in here, here, and here. Then I want bulldozers to go into the jungle, knock down the mushroom trees and roll them down the hill. The pilings will catch them. In the meantime, excavators will dig trenches all around the camp.”

“How deep?” Cole asked.

“Two to three meters and twice as wide,” Trace said. “We’ll fill them with trunks, keep them burning day and night.”

“This is brainless,” Wilde said.

“I think it’s brilliant.” Madsen blew out his breath as he looked at Trace’s map. “Why didn’t I think of that?”

Trace straightened. “It’s only an interim fix until the relief ship gets here.”

“What relief ship?” Celeste burst out. “You can’t even get a message off world.”

He met her gaze. “The camp is out of communication, but the Scouts are not. We can return to Central at any time. And when we do, we will order a relief ship. Now, I want you to prepare a consumption report and let me know how much gellasene we can spare to jumpstart the trenches.”

“Of course, sir. Right away.”

Trace turned to Cole. “Can you set up a work schedule? We need everyone on this. We can’t wait for nightfall.”

“They won’t like moving around that jungle during daylight,” Cole said.

“I don’t blame them. Natica, you’re good at sweet-talking. Go with Cole and keep the colonists calm. Impani, you and Wilde work with Madsen. We need a plan for keeping the bulldozer team safe. I don’t want any more casualties.”

“All right.” Wilde shrugged.

Trace turned to the last member of his team. “Anselmi, how are the voices?”

Anselmi blinked as if that was the last thing he expected to hear. “They’re weaker now. Dr. Abrams gave me medication to—”

“Whatever she gave you, I don’t want you to take it.”

“Do you realize what you’re asking of me?”

“I know it’s hard, but… I think the reeds are a warning system. They rattle when we’re near, and they tell the moss men what we’re doing.” Trace was suddenly aware of how crazy that sounded. He was conscious of his father’s gaze upon him. “Anyway, I want you to listen. Go out there and listen, and tell me if the voices start making sense.”

Anselmi gave a slow nod.

“All right, let’s move,” Trace said.

With a dispirited mutter, his team got up and filed out the door.

Trace sank into his chair, elbows on the table, face in his hands. Two days. How would he save them all in two days?

His father’s voice broke his reverie. “Your friends don’t respect you.”

He groaned. “What are you doing here, Dad?”

“This is my colony. I have every right to attend a meeting if—”

“No, I mean here.” He looked up. “On this world.”

“Ah.” Aldus nodded. His face split in a slow grin. “Come on. I’ll show you.”

Trace sealed his mask as he followed his father out of the dome. Dawn glowed behind the mist and gave a surreal quality to the silent camp. He looked toward the jungle. He should hear sounds of animals waking. He should hear birds calling from the trees—not this weighty stillness, as if the jungle were preparing to pounce.

Aldus led him to the warehouse sector. They walked down a road scarred with tread marks. Prefab structures rose to either side. Trace noted the garages that Natica mentioned. Their barn-like doors stood six meters high. Inside the buildings, huge plows and tillers sat unused.

Ahead, he saw a greenhouse. The transparent walls appeared dull and cloudy, dotted with rings of mold. It was the first place in camp with indigenous growth.

“Go on in.” Aldus parted a heavy drape of vertical straps. “We need to disinfect our boots. I don’t want to track in any uncontrolled substances.”

Trace ducked beneath the curtain and entered a dank vestibule. Following his father’s example, he sprayed his boots with foam from a canister. Then he pushed through a second curtain and into the main house.

Table after table stretched before him, each laden with seedling beds. Blue grow lamps perched above half of them. Shadow shrouded the rest. Downy mildew furred the table legs. The greenhouse was grubby but artificially so, as if his father monitored even the amount of grime.

“This is my test lab,” Aldus said.

Trace walked among the tables. The seedlings ranged from a few centimeters high to half a meter. Each bed was neatly labeled—but he didn’t need to read the signs to recognize the varieties of wheat and rye. Squash hung from hydro-baskets, their exposed roots dripping with mineral-laden solution.

“There are a few hybrids here that I don’t know,” Trace said, “but for the most part, this is pretty standard. Everything looks healthy.”

Aldus nodded. “Off-world crops grow fine on this planet, but only at a normal rate. Oddly, the local fungi also grow slowly when taken from their surroundings.”