The Caverns of Mare Cetus (58 page)

   "SQUIDS don't work with recognition," said Trent as he aimed his gun at the doorway. "They're more muscle than brains. To them, everyone's an enemy. They only respond to the codes. Without the codes, you aren't getting past them without a fight. Hunter was right." There was dismay in his voice. "Garrett never should have put them on the ships."

   "We won't be able to lure it out, will we?" asked Renata.

   "No. I've got to go in and get it."

Renata grabbed his arm. "Not just you. Both of us."

"Can't risk it. You're the only pilot we have now."

   "No!" said Renata emphatically. "If Arielle dies, and I didn't do something to destroy that thing, I'd never be able to live with myself." She glanced at Arielle; Edison and Richelle were continuing to work on her.

   "Well, we can't use the MC inside the ship," said Trent. "We'd risk catastrophic damage to the ship's electronics." He bobbed his gun. "We have to use these."

   Renata glanced at Arielle again. "We have to take the ship back. We need to get her hooked up to its med-unit."

   Trent entered a code into his Vimap. "A trick I learned from Garrett. It's our ticket into the ship." A crying voice of a woman began sounding out of the Vimap. He began slowly moving up the steps, pressing his back against the left side rail.

   Renata covered him, her gun aimed at the doorway, her finger playing with the trigger.

   When Trent got to the fourth step, he reached up and flung the Vimap through the doorway and toward the cockpit of the ship. Immediately the SQUID rolled past the doorway on its eight curled tentacles.

   Startled, Renata let loose with two rapid shots, sparks flying from where the bullets ricocheted off the ship's floor.

   "Now!" shouted Trent. He flew up the remaining steps, then toward the back of the ship. Renata followed. When she entered the ship, she spun to the left. She took three steps, then threw herself to the floor, landing painfully on her left shoulder. She quickly sat up and pressed herself against the back of the starboard right rear seat. Trent was sitting up behind the other seat, leaning to the right and peering toward the front of the ship along the port aisle. The only sounds she heard were her breathing and the crying of Trent's Vimap from the front of the ship. Then there was a flash and a pop; the crying stopped.

   Renata got to her knees and cautiously peered over the top of the seatback. At once she saw them—four tentacles hanging over the back of the copilot's seat. She rushed her gun up to take a shot, but the robotic swiftly pulled itself up and over the seat, its central disk and tentacles disappearing from view. "It's in row two. Damn, it's quick." She brought her head back down behind the seat.

   "It knows we're armed," whispered Trent. "The only way we can beat it is to force it to make its move." He lowered himself to the floor and began crawling into the port aisle of the ship.

   As Renata raised her eyes above the top of the seatback again, the gun barrel held by her face, she was surprised to see a thick white fog pouring from the front of the ship and spreading aft. As she peered into the fog, she saw the glimmer of tentacles again, wrapping over the back of the row three seat on the right. She hurriedly aimed, pulling the trigger just as the central disk was moving over the seatback. As a cannon shot sound pounded through her ears, she thought she heard the sound of cracking glass. She dropped to the floor, seeing a flash of light from the corner of her eye and hearing two pops. Instantly a torrent of sparks sprayed over her from the ship's aft storage area. She glanced up behind her, seeing two side-by-side golf ball-sized holes, encircled by a ring of bluish-white metal, in one of the storage doors.

   She stretched her legs out and pressed her head against the floor. She began searching beneath the seats, trying to get a glimpse of even one of the SQUID's tentacles, but the thickening fog had already reduced her visibility to just a few rows in front of her. She began crawling forward in the starboard aisle, holding the gun out ahead of her with both hands.

   Before she got far, a cannon-shot blast sliced through the air, causing her to flinch. Another followed, its echoes bouncing all over the cabin before trailing away. Then there was a flash of light, three distinct pops, and an explosion behind her, a flood of sparks lighting up the rear of the ship for a brief moment. She didn't look back. She knew what it was.

   Renata's head was by the row six seats. She lowered her face down to the floor and looked under the seats toward the port side of the ship, but she could barely see an arm-length in front of her now; the fog was obliterating everything. An intense fear struck her. She couldn't see—it could! Why didn't Trent warn her about the fog? It was going to kill them both! She had to get out of the ship. But how? She slipped behind the row six seats, pressing her body against the back of a seat. It was only two rows ahead of her at most. She listened, trying to pick up even the faintest mechanical sound or movement against the seats or floor, but the only thing she could hear now was the beating of her heart. Then there was some rustling—above her. She looked up. Four tentacles were snaking their way across the seats, right above her head. As the SQUID latched onto the other seatback and began swiftly pulling its central disk over her, she hurriedly aimed the gun from her lap. She fired twice, missing, shooting between its trailing tentacles, the bullets screaming off the metal roof above her. She quickly aimed the gun barrel toward the top of the row seven seats, but the SQUID was already gone!

   Her heart racing, she scampered into the starboard aisle, and using her hands to feel the seat struts, she blindly worked her way to a position in front of the fourth row of seats. "Aft!" she shouted. "It's aft!" She at least owed Trent that much before she got out. And she
was
going to get out. This was madness! There had to be a better way. She scooted across the floor on her buttocks until she bumped up against the ship's outer wall. As she moved away from the rear of the ship, she began feeling along the wall for the doorway, but her fingers found nothing but metal. She felt around some more, and then she found it—the seam between the wall and the door, but that wasn't right. The door was closed!
No! How could that be?

   She followed the seam upward with her fingers, the fog so thick now she couldn't see a centimeter in front of her face. When she got her hand high enough, she began waving it back and forth, hoping it was in front of the door's sensor, but nothing happened. She began moving her hand up and down, back and forth, any way she could. She had to find the sensor. She had to get out. Then at once she heard whirring coming from the rear of the ship. Then she heard metal clinking dully along the floor. It sounded like it was on her side, coming her way.

   Panicking, she used her hands and feet to push herself backward along the floor, the Iravano, still held tightly in her left hand, clunking along the floor as she moved. When her back ran into the side of a seat, she hurriedly felt around with her hand to get her orientation, then slipped into a row.

   At once she got a feeling, a horrible feeling. Her body stiffened. With only her eyes, she began glancing up and down and side to side, but she couldn't see anything but fog. Then at once she felt cold cerametal plates sliding around her throat. A tremendous shudder surging through her, she pulled the gun up from the floor, but a tentacle grabbed her by the forearm. She began fighting to raise the gun, but the tentacle squirmed around her arm, tightening as it continued to press her arm toward the floor. Immediately a second tentacle slipped around her neck, right below her chin. As if the arrival of the second tentacle was a signal for the first, both began rapidly twisting around her neck. She tried to scream, but only a weak, pathetic cry came out. She tried again—nothing.

   Suddenly the tentacles around her neck began pulling up on her. She grabbed at the seat with her right hand, catching her fingers around a metal seat support, but pain shot through her arm from her broken finger, causing her to almost immediately lose her hold.

   Her mouth opening wide, she began gulping frantically, trying to suck in any air at all. Another tentacle twisted around her left wrist and began shaking her hand, causing the gun to slip from her fingers and land on the floor with a thud. As the SQUID continued to slowly and methodically pull her toward it, she could see its bright central blue "eye" glowing through the fog. The glow was enough for her to see the SQUID had positioned its central disk on the top of the seatback, four tentacles beneath it firmly wrapped around the seatback, securing it. She knew what was coming next. It was raising her up to blow out her heart or her liver at point blank range. She could only hope it was her heart—Garrett once told her the SQUID's liver attack was one of the most excruciating ways to die. The way the tentacles were crushing her throat now, she didn't think she'd live long enough to find out what technique it was going to use. Lightheadedness poured into her head—her vision blurred. Her hands went limp, then her arms, the rest of her body following. Though she could still feel herself being pulled up toward the SQUID, her thoughts began to fade. In a second it would be over.

   Suddenly two tremendous shots rang out, sparks spilling all around her. The tentacles around her neck yanked her head forward against the tentacles that were wrapped around the seatback. Another shot rang out, sparks now spilling over her head. The tentacles dropped her head into the seat, and she could feel their hold weaken. She gasped for air. She got some. She gasped again. The tentacles slipped off her arm. She began clawing at the tentacles around her neck. Then Trent's hands began working on them as well.

   She continued to quickly and deeply gasp as they pulled the tentacles away. "What took you so long?" she croaked when they had gotten her free.

   "Sorry," he said. "Its defensive fog was way more than I expected. And when I found you, with the way it was holding you…"

   "Holding me? It was strangling me! When were you planning on firing? Before or after my throat was crushed?" She began coughing and holding her throat in pain.

   "I didn't anticipate that." He helped her sit up on a seat. "But that's the only reason I found you—the glow of its eye…"

   She began flailing her hands in front of her as she continued to cough. "Get me out! Get me out! I need air."

   He helped her to her feet, and they blindly groped their way to the door. Within a brief moment, he located the sensor and opened the door, a stream of fog rushing out with them as he hurried Renata through the doorway.

   Richelle immediately climbed up the steps and grabbed her. As Richelle consoled Renata, she examined the imprints of the SQUID's tentacles on Renata's neck. Then she told Trent they had stabilized Arielle, but she had severe internal bleeding and her left lung was badly punctured.

   Trent helped Renata down the steps and sat her down by Arielle. It was painful for Renata to look at Arielle now—Arielle seemed hardly able to breathe, and her face looked terribly distressed.

   "Edison, can you check out the ship?" asked Trent as he began checking Arielle over.

   Edison nodded and went inside the ship. After what seemed like only a few moments to Renata, he came out and stood at the top of the steps, holding what was left of the SQUID. "Looks like a war zone in here." He flung the remnants of the robotic on the ground. "Piece of crap. I've got the IRM venting out the smoke and checking for damage. One of the cockpit's windows is cracked. The IRM's patching it now. Doesn't look like the hull has been breached anywhere else. Let's get her onboard."

   Edison came down the steps. He helped Richelle and Trent carry Arielle back up, Renata following. Once inside, Edison guided them back to the med-unit, which was housed beneath the floor behind the row five seats. He activated the med-unit, which began transforming the row five seats into a makeshift bed as an assortment of monitoring devices, life support modules, and medical supply bins began rising up through now open compartments in the floor.

   As Renata anxiously waited for the med-unit to finish initializing, she glanced around the ship, noticing most of the fog had already been vented out. She looked toward the cockpit, seeing three miniature IRM robotics fusing the cracks in the glass, a hot orange glow surrounding them. The robotics looked like little more than blinking oversized cockroaches clinging to the glass, but they and the other often underappreciated robotics in the IRM arsenal were true lifesavers when rapid repairs to the hull of the ship were required.

   As the med-unit came online, Edison and Trent laid Arielle down on the bed, and Edison hooked up a ventilator to Arielle's face. Trent got an IV going, then, with Richelle's assistance, he carefully inserted a tube into Arielle's pleural cavity to help her lung re-inflate. After he had connected Arielle to several other life support modules, they strapped her in.

   "You can't die on me, girl," said Renata, tears falling from her eyes as she held Arielle's hand. "You can't. I'm going to get you home. I promise."

   "I won't let her die," said Richelle. "I promise. But you need to get your butt in the pilot's seat, and do what only you can do." She shooed her way with her hands. "Now go!"

   She nodded, then went to the pilot's seat and sat down. She strapped herself in, and in a flash she was running through the preflight diagnostics.

   Trent sat down in the copilot's seat. He picked up what was left of his torched Vimap and put it in a storage bin.

   After just a few moments—READY FOR LIFTOFF—came up on all the forward screens, the PRA system checks verifying no major ship components had been damaged and the glass had been adequately sealed.

   Renata powered up the engines and began pulling the Jumper off the ground. She looked toward the horizon. There were now about a dozen funnels north of them, making their way slowly across the barren landscape, spewing vast amounts of soil and rocks skyward.

   "We're at four hundred meters," she said as she looked at a navigation screen. "Going to turn east for liftoff. Secure in!"