Authors: Jason Halstead
Kira stepped away from it and held up the crystal. Blood ran down its length, most of it her enemies but some her own. “Thank you, Mother,” she whispered. She closed her eyes for a brief moment then felt a wrongness in the air to her right.
Kira jumped into the disturbance she sensed. Her shoulder slammed into something hard yet yielding. It fell away from her even as she bounced away. Something whistled through the air just over her shoulder fast enough to create noise with its passage.
Kira held the crystal before her, both of her feet and her other hand on the floor. She gathered her legs beneath her to prepare and leap in any direction. Opposite her the nightmare apparition climbed to its feet. Wings or a shell tucked into its back as it gained its own feet. It turned to face her and left her momentarily stunned.
The new monster walked on two legs and possessed arms much like her own. Three claw tipped fingers and one opposable clawed thumb were at the end of each arm. Its feet were similar, save for the lack of an opposable toe. In many other ways it resembled a human, including the oval shaped head and placement of eyes, nose, and mouth. A set of mandibles over the mouth ended the similarity. The creatures chest was armored with a shell, though below it she saw that not only did it resemble a mammalian male, but it also seemed quite excited at the prospect of killing her.
“You’re big for a newborn,” she muttered. The spitter hybrid hadn’t been running from her, it had lured her into a trap. It stood slightly taller than she did, perhaps six feet. “Smart too, but not smart enough to know better than to mess with me.”
It roared at her, the sound disturbingly human in spite of the lack of words. The tone and pitch changed, almost as though it was trying to form words. Rather than attack her it reached down to its member and grabbed onto it. Her eyes widened as she saw the tip glistening.
“Not a chance, beetle-boy,” she growled. She threw her bone at it, drawing its arms up to block. She leapt after the bone, her crystal leading the charge.
Chapter 8
By the time the group had returned to Treetown Elsa felt fine, aside from a gnawing hunger. Even the stiffness in her side was gone. She picked at the stitches, tugging when Jess wasn’t looking at her.
“Gather everyone up!” Sharp ordered. He headed for the communal fire pit, gesturing for Elsa to follow him.
Klous watched them as they moved away, the muscles of his jaw twitching. He hurried to catch up to Ling and whispered a few words in his ear. Ling glanced at him and nodded before continuing to carry the equipment from the screamer to the ropes used to lift large loads into Treetown. Klous watched his engineer go for a moment before he turned and followed Sharp and Elsa.
“How long until everyone’s gathered?” Elsa asked as Klous approached.
“Half an hour, maybe less,” Jonathon said. She frowned. “Why?”
“I want to see these defenses Klous talked about.”
“Tarn can show them to you,” Klous walked up and offered. “I don’t think he’d mind.”
Captain Sharp’s eyes tracked Klous with the intensity of a hawk. “Go and find him, but make it quick.”
Elsa nodded. “Yes Sir, be right back.”
“Oh, and Elsa?”
“Sir?”
“Good job out there. I’m glad you made it.”
Elsa felt her training slip as a grin stretched her lips. She was off in a flash, jogging lightly both to test her body and to find Tarn. She found him hauling up a rope with one of the larger cases from the supply drop tied to it.
“Tarn, get down here, I need a guide!”
He turned to Barry and handed him the rope. “Think you can handle this, Meat?”
Barry blushed. He’d been considered the biggest and strongest Marine in Elsa’s unit but next to the muscular Tarn he felt like a teenager showing up for his first workout at the gym. He nodded and pulled on the rope, yanking it up harder and faster than necessary to prove a point.
Tarn slid down another rope and thudded into the ground beside her. “Where we going?”
“I need you to show me the defenses you’ve put up. You’ve seen the spitters, you know what we might be up against. There’s nobody’s opinion I trust more on whether we can handle them or not.”
Tarn grunted and turned to lead her away. Elsa noticed the rise of his lip at her praise. She also remembered when he’d called her beautiful when she lay in his arms at the beach. It was almost too easy, wrapping him around her finger. Kira hadn’t said as much, but Elsa suspected the woman wouldn’t hesitate to have her use him if she could. The question was, were Kira’s motives pure?
“Tarn, what can you tell me about Kira?” She’d heard about Kira from Fiona, but Fiona practically worshipped the ground Kira walked on. Kira kept waffling back and forth about sex casually, even hinting at possible relations with her, then saying something else that refuted the implication. She wondered if Fiona’s loyalty was based on more than just respect. It would go a long ways to explaining the problems she claimed she had with Jeremy.
Tarn sighed. “Ain’t much to tell. She’s a badass. Captain Sharp took her on because we needed a navigator and she must have impressed him. She acted like it was her first time on a ship though, real girly and flighty at first. Then the weird shit started happening. Not the pirates attacking, I mean weird shit with her. It was like she turned into someone else.”
“She said she was someone else. Emily Bradford?”
“Yeah, that’s the name. She killed a bunch of pirates when they tried to board us, then she ended up being able to fly the
Rented Mule
like it had wings. Ain’t no doubt about it, we’re alive today because of her.”
“You don’t sound happy about that,” Elsa watched him carefully for his reaction to her question.
“I’m happy enough being alive. This place gave me back a lot of what I thought I’d lost,” he answered. “Just kinda frustrated that I didn’t do more, you know? I don’t like owing people, and Kira’s got this way about her that always reminds you that you owe her.”
“I get that,” Elsa said, thinking about how Kira acted. She never said or did anything directly, but there was just something about her strong and confident nature that made Elsa feel like if Kira wasn’t around, Elsa wouldn’t be either. She shifted back to Tarn. “What about you, what did you think you’d lost?”
Tarn frowned. “I’m an ex-Marine,” he said, as though that explained it.
“No such thing,” Elsa chided. “Once a Marine, always a Marine. It gets in your blood and there’s no getting it out. Kind of like Vitalis, I guess.”
Tarn snorted. “Mistakes were made. I was young and full of myself. Code of conduct didn’t matter. Spent some time in Cerberus, then I was dishonorably discharged. I was convinced the Corp turned on me and it wasn’t until I got here and we all learned we had to take care of each other that I realized I’d turned on the Corp first.”
Elsa reached out and grabbed his meaty forearm, pulling him to a stop. He turned and stared at her, his expression intentionally blank. Cerberus was the Navy prison and, from what she’d heard, one of the worst places a person could go. “I don’t know what you did and it doesn’t matter. We’ve all done stupid shit, it’s a requirement for being a Marine. Maybe you don’t have the stripes anymore but since I’m the senior Marine on planet, the Corp is proud to thank you for your service.”
Tarn nodded to the side, rather than offering a response. She followed his gesture and saw a large ditch that had been dug along the southern edge of Treetown. She’d come in from the east through the stream every time. The bottom of the ditch was lined with sharpened stakes. On the near side a ridge had been built up allowing for a higher climb and a superior position for defenders. More importantly, it also allowed for cover from the spitters venom.
“Is this it?” Elsa asked.
“Pretty much,” he admitted. “Got a couple of pits covered with vines and leaves too, but not enough to make a difference. We put them in to keep anything big from making our life difficult. Biggest predator in the jungles is the chickasaurus. The pits will make life real miserable for them.”
“Okay, let’s get back,” Elsa said. The defenses were far from what she’d hoped, but they were better than nothing. If Vitalis would let her she’d prefer to string up proximity mines and sensor nets as well. Maybe a few auto-turrents for good measure. Those weren’t the cards they’d been dealt with, so she turned her attention back to Rosh. “You were a FIST, weren’t you?”
Tarn nodded. “Exo-planet. FIST team one a lot longer back than I want to admit.”
Elsa racked her brain then gasped as she put the timing, his FIST team, and military history together. “Blue Vistas?”
Tarn nodded again.
Elsa fought to remember the particulars. Something about a group of terrorists taking over the station and holding hostages. FIST team one had secured the station and gotten in a long standoff with the terrorists. It seemed a stalemate until an incident occurred the depressurized one of the bays and wiped out some of the terrorists, as well as nearly two hundred civilian hostages. The rest of the terrorists had surrendered. No official word had been released on the explosive decompression. Unofficially, rumor had it the hull had been holed by the FIST team on purpose. Now Elsa suspected she knew the truth.
She opened her mouth to ask Tarn if it was true when he pointed ahead of them. They were too close to the gathering. She nodded and stepped into the small clearing, standing several feet away from Sharp as he finished explaining the situation to the rest of the survivors.
“Tarn and Elsa just reviewed our defenses. If the spitters come at us in force, can we hold out?”
“No,” Tarn answered.
Elsa stared hard at him, then turned to the Captain. “Sir, we can hold them off for a while. Maybe indefinitely. It depends on how many there are. We could make more weapons, rocks or logs swinging on vines and held up in the trees. That’s if we even need to. Fiona and Kira might stop them – if anyone can, it would be those two.”
Grumbling from the small crowd was her response. Klous held up his hand and stepped forward. “After all the time we’ve put in to this place we can’t just abandon it! We don’t know the planet well enough, especially without Kira and Fiona. We could wander into anything and get ourselves killed. We’re safer here, by far. Especially now that we have Elsa, Ben, Jess, Gresham, and Barry. I’ll bet on five Marines against a hundred spitters all day long!”
A few people cried out while others nodded. Elsa bit back her frown. Something about Klous put her off. If he wanted to stay and fight there had to be something she didn’t see behind it. He was right though, Vitalis was a deadly place and they didn’t know the geography outside the patch of jungle surrounding them. She didn’t even know her way around Treetown yet.
“Sir,” Elsa had to repeat herself twice to cut through the ascending volume of voices. “Captain, I’ll go and find out what’s happening. I’ll look for Kira and Fiona, but mostly I’ll head for the ridge and see if the spitters are mobilizing.”
Sharp frowned. “Take Tarn with you, he knows the land.”
She turned and gave Tarn a faint smile. He nodded back to her, a twinkle in his eyes. “As for everyone else, pack up what you need to survive in case we have to move out in a rush. I’d say a few scouts should head out to find a fall back point, but we don’t have enough people to risk it.
“You heard the lady,” Sharp said loudly enough to quiet any muttering. “Get yourselves ready. If we don’t hear from Elsa and Tarn by tomorrow morning we’ll head north.” He turned to look at the Marines. “Good luck.”
Elsa snapped off a salute and spun away. She grabbed Tarn’s arm to pull him after her, then hurried to the rope ladder. Tarn waited while she climbed, watching her effortlessly ascend to the platforms. Elsa glanced down once and wondered if Tarn had enjoyed the view. She pushed the thought aside in spite of the warmth it caused in her belly. They had work to do and she needed some new weapons.
Chapter 9
Fiona worked through the narrow trees the spitter she’d followed had entered. She’d managed to track it beyond sunset, though how she wasn’t certain. Kira would tell her the spirit of Vitalis was guiding her. Fiona had scoffed at the pseudo-religion Kira preached at first, but with every passing day her doubts wavered.
Nearly every species of animal they’d encountered was matriarchal, or as matriarchal as the intelligence of each given species allowed. Humanity had accepted equal rights for a couple of hundred years but with Kira, Fiona, and now Elsa proving themselves more than capable fighters, she wondered if Treetown would soon shift as well.
Captain Sharp was a capable leader, though he seemed at a loss at times when it came to dealing with managing a small town instead of a ship. Especially when Klous stood ready to offer suggestions that often made little sense. The crew of the
Black Hole
merged with the others well enough, but anyone who watched them saw the deference they paid to Klous. The only one who seemed independent was Aran, but his interests were obvious and self serving. He dreamed of finding a way to benefit himself and no one else. Ling and Lizzie had settled on each other as a couple, even having a baby, but they always sided with Klous.