The Betwixt Book One (19 page)

‘
Put the gun away, Mini,’ Od appeared at my side out of
nowhere, ‘we must concentrate—’

‘
I don't think so. We can't afford to see it
escape.’

Don't do anything stupid,’ Doctor Cole snapped from somewhere
behind me, ‘we have it in containment for now—’

‘
Like hell.’ I was annoyed, angry at their seeming stupidity. I
felt like the only person who really knew what was going on – like
the sole person smart enough to bring along a shotgun to a zombie
attack when everyone else had packed tea and biscuits. They were
all hoping for the best, without planning for the most likely
scenario. That thing would get out and kill us – the only option we
could take was to act now.

I raised my gun, eyes locked right on my target. I could feel
it in my mind like a scar – a painful reminder of some deep wound
that hadn't quite healed. This is how the Twixts operated, how they
survived – they managed to make people forget what they were, what
they could, and would, do. Well I wasn't about to-

Od walked in front of my rifle. His expression
was . . . real. It wasn't overly nice, pleasant,
chirpy, or clear-water calm. It wasn't cute, annoying, or
enthusiastic. He was looking straight at me as if he'd known me for
years – as if I knew exactly who he was and he no longer had
anything to hide. He didn't say anything.

I lowered my weapon.

Neither of us spoke.

‘
We need it alive,’ Doctor Cole said from behind me, voice
relieved but still sharp. ‘We need it to help us
understand . . . to understand what we're up
against—’

‘
I know what we're up against, Doctor. I don't need that
example staring me down to figure out what a Twixt is.’

‘
We have to study it, find out if they have a weakness. The
People are no longer with us . . . well, you're the
last. How are we supposed to win a war with one half
bre—’

‘
By not being idiots,’ I snapped. My human side was well and
truly buried on this one. I knew what I had to do, and there was no
way anyone was going to get in my way. The Twixts weren't there to
be studied. You could safely study grass and space dust if you felt
like observing and recording natural phenomenon. Twixts weren't an
object of science – they were the stuff of nightmares. And the only
way to stop a nightmare was to confront the beast.

‘
There's only one of you now,’ her voice was almost pleading,
‘we have to find a way other than all out war.’

‘
You said that's how Central had failed last time – that they'd
spent valuable time trying to figure these things out when they
should have been fighting them. This is the wrong plan, Doctor, you
have to trust me on this,’ I looked right at her, authority coming
from somewhere truly deep inside me.

Od was looking right at me with such intensity it almost
pulled my gaze from the creature.

‘
You sound like my son, too willing to take the brute force
option—’

Jason . . .
I . . . .

I flicked my eyes to Od, then back to the creature.

‘
If we don't find out as much as we can, we will be fighting
blind. Don't be selfish, child. You may be the last of your kind,
but there are more races in this galaxy than one – and it is up to
us all to fight for our own freedom. You can't be the guard of
everyone.’

I kept flicking my gaze between Od and the creature – back and
forth in a steady motion.

What would Jason do?

I rallied. I wasn't going to lose control of this situation,
not now. ‘You're right, Doctor, I shouldn't talk for everyone.
Crag'tal, what do you think we should do? Leave the thing alive so
it can break out and take us from behind? Or should we just shoot
it now?’

It was odd listening to my voice sound like that – harsh and
unforgiving. It was even odder to hear myself say those things. Was
I really suggesting we murder in cold blood? That sounded like
something a hardened soldier would say, not normal Mini the
waitress . . . .

I shook my head, clearing my thoughts.

Crag'tal moved his hands along his gun and shrugged his
shoulders. ‘Now or later—’

‘
No,’ the Doctor had her hands up, ‘we can't do
this.’

Kill it now while it rested quietly in the cage – what would
be the problem in that? It was our natural enemy, the sworn nemesis
of the whole galaxy. If the situation was reversed, and I found
myself in the cage and the creature free to face me – it would have
attacked first chance, no questions asked. So why was it so wrong
to do the same now?

It was us or them.

I put my hand back around the trigger.

‘
It doesn't work that way, does it, Mini?’ Od said so quietly
no one else in the room would have picked it up. ‘You can't be both
at the same time – yet it tears you up when you allow one to
overpower the other.’

He was talking in a soft, still code. I didn't want to follow
his words, but I still knew what they meant.

‘
You have to be both at once. Just find a
way . . . ‘

Both human and . . . a
Person . . . at the same time. But I was a whole
right now. I was just one person inside one head on top of one
body . . . . So why did I feel so
torn?

A part of me won and lowered the gun. No, I lowered the
gun.

A tense couple of seconds followed before I turned to face the
others. I couldn't describe the feelings churning through me, I
just had to ignore them for now. ‘So what do we do then?’ my voice
was quiet, but it wasn't little – it was full-bodied, but almost
silent at the same time.

The Doctor looked at me for a couple more seconds, obviously
assessing whether she could trust me. ‘You guard that thing. I
can't believe I'm saying this – but there it is. I don't want
either you, or the thing, coming in contact with the Tarians. We
can't afford to lose either of you.’

I didn't speak up at being lumped in a group with the psycho
shadow killer here, but I didn't appreciate it either.

‘
The Crag comes with me, and we shore up the top of the site as
best we can – make a front line at the bottom of the ladder so we
can pick off any Merc coming down. All those unable to fight are
going to go deep into the other side of the dig were we keep the
storage bay – hide in the safety pods we've got there. The rest of
us are going to form a mid-line between the chamber and the
ladder.’ The Doctor looked at me.

‘
So, that leaves me alone with the creature,’ I didn't bother
looking back at it, I didn't think I could survive another round of
mind games with the Twixt.

‘
No, Od will stay with you.’

I nodded. Od and I against the Twixt – just like old times.
‘Do you even have any weapons? Crag'tal's gun is coded to me – do
you even have anything to fight with?’

Doctor Cole took a breath. ‘No. A couple of sonic diggers and
some light saws – no guns.’

I didn't bother replying to that – because I'd either laugh
out loud or cry, and I really didn't need people thinking I was any
more insane than they already did.

‘
I'm sure we can find someone to un-code your gun though – we
aren't above license fraud in a time like this.’

I shrugged. ‘Okay.’

‘
No, but it will be,’ the Doctor turned to her people, ‘you
know what we have to do, so let's do it.’ I could see the same
direct command in her I'd already seen in Jason. Both of them
seemed to be built to guide and protect people. With a mother like
that, it was no wonder Jason had turned out the way he
had.

And he was coming, wasn't he? I took a deep breath and watched
everyone pile up the metal gangway that led out of the chamber.
He'd be here . . . sometime.

I felt the cold of fear return to my arms, making them stiff
and heavy as if there were icebergs tied to my wrists. But the cold
didn't totally overwhelm me . . . it just made the
situation sharper . . . and made me feel more
human.

You better get here fast, I thought bitterly, trying to send
my thoughts across space in a desperate prayer. Because I'm pretty
sure I need another ally on this one.

The next twenty minutes were agonizing. I could hear the
others working through the corridors – my hearing returning to its
super-charged state. I could feel the rumbles beneath my feet as
they shifted equipment, turned on diggers, even screamed to each
other to hurry. But I couldn't see them . . . I had
to put up with my imagination to fill in the visual gaps. Their
strained faces, sweat-stained brows, and dust-coated
clothes . . . 

Meanwhile, I stood stock-still behind the creature, behind it
and the only exit out of here. I wanted to be able to see whatever
would come down that gangway – and shoot the thing before they made
it to the bottom.

Od stood right next to me, as still and straight as a pillar.
It was like we were both those stone statues you have at either
sides of important gates – guarding in figure and stature alone.
Oh, except I had a perfectly working gun.

It took twenty-three minutes for the sounds of battle to
begin. I heard it first as a high-pitched whine filtering down from
the surface. It sounded like an insect stuck in the metal mesh of a
microphone - a high pitched, distorted buzz. I didn't need Od to
tell me those were the engines of a ship powering down. It was
probably right over us, I realized, face cold. Hovering just over
the hole down into the dig site – enabling the mercs easy and quick
access down the ladder.

In another second, blast sounds made it into the chamber –
ricocheting around weakly. That was my gun, I just knew it, that
was the sound of Crag'tal desperately firing away at the intruders.
And those other odd pitched sounds that were mingling over the top
were the whir of a light saw and the shake of a sonic
digger.

I started to sweat – like I'd just run into monsoonal rain. It
dripped off my brown and collected at the spot between my neck and
the seal of my space suit.

How long would . . . how long
till . . . who was going to be first to reach those
stairs up there? Would it be the Tarians? Would they break through
the defenses quicker than a light saw through paper? Or would
Commander Cole get here in time, repel the invasion and descend the
stairs with a half-smile on his lips?

I put a shaking hand up to my mouth and wiped away the sweat
that sat between my top lip and nose, making my breath too hot to
handle.

‘
This is not what you were meant for, child,’ Od said in an odd
voice. ‘You are needed elsewhere – out there in the galaxy, not
down in this pit.’ It was almost as if he were talking to himself,
ticking off some mental list as he stared dead-eyed into the middle
distance. ‘Your mother never intended to give you up for
this.’

Give . . . give me up?

It was the only thing that could distract me from my fear,
aside for the slim hope Commander Cole would get here in time. But
my mother, my mother – Her. ‘What? My mother—’

But that's when the sounds of battle changed. They became
quieter as if a wall had descended between me and everywhere
else . . . except this chamber.

I could feel the symbols around the ring that held the Twixt,
as if they were burning into my skin. They scorched, but then
faded, like hot coal thrown into ice-cold water.

The ring was failing – the containment around the thing was
failing.

It was silent, not a crack, a bang, or a pop. The ring didn't
scream or screech like metal crashing into a wall. It just silently
descended to the ground, the symbols on its surface
dying.

I grabbed Od under one arm and threw him towards the other
side of the room – towards the stairs, towards escape.

The guy rolled as he hit the ground, gave me a look as he
scrambled to his feet – I could see his face in still frame. Wide
eyes.

It was moving at me before I could turn to face it. I could
feel it behind me like a gun pressed to the back of my neck. I
pushed myself into a dive roll, twisting in mid air, so that I
changed direction as I rolled up onto my feet.

It screamed. And I will never hear another sound like that
again. It cut through everything, every other terrible noise of
battle filtering in from the other room – just flattened them with
its throaty blare. It sounded like a human scream distorted by a
strangle. It bounced around the room, getting louder and louder –
till dust and chunks of small rock fell from the
ceiling.

Its throat was still extending from the effort of the scream –
veins bulging across the stretched, gray skin.

I brought up my gun and shot right at the thing, but the Twixt
ducked just in time – descending onto its hind legs like a tiger
ready to pounce.

It launched at me – filling my view as if I were barely a
centimeter. away from the sun. I twisted and strafed to the side,
firing as I went.

None of the shots were hitting home – the thing was just too
quick. Doctor Cole had been right – this creature was different to
a Twixt. It was faster, and, I noted with a truly sick feeling, it
had no shadow. It was like it was here, without being real at the
same time – like a walking nightmare. I wondered, as I kept
shooting but missing, whether I could hit it at all. It didn't feel
entirely real – as if . . .