by I. O. Adler
If it wasn’t the Melded, then why was this doctor taking her sister with her after murdering a roomful of soldiers?
She hurried to follow.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Carmen walked quickly and caught up to the doctor pushing the bed. Although the woman no longer had a rifle, Carmen couldn’t tell if she might still have a sidearm. If she were suffering from some kind of space plague, there would be no helping it. She had to stop her.
“Hey!”
The woman didn’t respond as she approached the elevator. Without power, there was no way she’d get the bed upstairs. She stopped and stood there as if in a sudden trance.
Carmen paused at the nearest doorway. “There’s nowhere to go. That’s my sister there.”
Ovo crouched next to her and shined his light.
The doctor turned. The woman’s eyes were sunken. Her jaw quavered. A sharp sigh erupted from her throat. Then she moved to pull Jenna from the bed.
Her hands in plain view to show she wasn’t armed, Carmen approached. “Just wait. Where are you taking her?”
The doctor didn’t have any problems lifting Jenna. Jenna’s eyes were open and she squirmed, but she looked groggy or sedated. She was muttering as the doctor carried her towards the stairs.
Carmen grabbed her shoulder. The doctor spun, Jenna firmly in her arms, and that was when something glistening around her neck moved. Carmen sprang away as a nearly invisible tentacle swiped at her. Ovo steadied her and pulled her back a step. The fluid, pulsing shape reflected some of Ovo’s light. It then constricted around the doctor’s head and the woman stiffened, turned, and opened the stairwell door.
It was the shadow that had caused Carmen to disconnect from the sphere after she had landed it in front of the hospital. If it was the same type of creature as the one that had attacked Ovo on board the Framework, its touch could hurt him and disable his cybernetic body parts. And now she knew it could also hurt humans and afflict them with some kind of mind control.
She stopped the door from closing and kept pace as the doctor carried Jenna upstairs.
They emerged into the shattered ER. Glass and debris crunched underfoot. Whatever the shadow was doing, it appeared to know where it wanted to go. Carmen hesitated as the doctor brought Jenna outside.
“Your people are out there?” she asked Ovo.
“Yes. And they’re waiting.”
“For what? For them? Is the shadow working with the Melded?”
“I don’t know.”
Carmen felt the moment was slipping away from her. If she hesitated, she’d lose her sister to whatever designs the shadow had. And her mother might be behind it all.
She ran to catch up, stepping through the broken windows and down the curb.
The sphere stood before them. The shadow was carrying Jenna straight for it. A dozen lights lanced out to illuminate them. The army? No. Carmen glimpsed several shapes in the darkness. One of them was the worm. It said something that sounded like an order and the Melded spread out into a line.
Ovo was close at her side and clinging to her arm tight enough that it was losing circulation.
The doctor carrying her sister paused when one of the Melded got close, pointing their weapon in her face. With all the bright lights, it was impossible to see clearly. Did the Melded not see the creature wrapped around the doctor’s neck? The Melded reached for Jenna and pulled her out of the doctor’s arms. The doctor remained in place as if in a stupor.
So there it was. The shadows, this one which had been a stowaway, the one she had faced on the Framework, all of them…they were helping the Melded.
Carmen broke away from Ovo. She hurried to the Melded grunt and tried to take her sister away, but the Melded struck her. Another appeared next to him, jabbed her back, and pressed his weapon in her face. Other hands gripped her. Ovo screamed as a Melded soldier seized him.
Carmen heard her mother’s voice, but it was distant, no longer amplified, and she couldn’t follow the words. But then Sylvia Vincent was moving alongside Carmen as two Melded brought her along with them.
“Fighting will make it worse,” her mother said.
Carmen tried to twist free from the hands holding her. “Don’t do this. Mom? Don’t do this.”
Jenna’s voice came from somewhere behind her. Pleading. Questioning. But confused, her words slurred.
“You’re okay, Jen. It’s me. It’s Mom. You and Car will be with me and we’ll be together and everything will be okay.”
The Melded goons dragged Carmen and Jenna to the parking garage and brought them to the top level. A ramp led up into the belly of the frigate, which hovered in place above them, blotting out the night sky. When Carmen hesitated, her escort jerked her violently forward.
Sylvia joined them in the airlock, which took a moment to cycle before the opposite door opened, allowing them into the inner corridor.
“No more tears, Carmen. Now that both of you are here, we can replicate the encryption. It won’t be long.”
“I’m not letting you do anything to us.”
“I’d never hurt either of you.”
“You’re not well,” Carmen said. “Ask yourself if you could ever imagine doing any of this before you launched on the Mars mission. You’re turning your back on your family. On your world.”
Sylvia Vincent walked ahead of them and with the wave of a hand opened the door to a small room. “I’m fighting to save you.”
“And what about everyone on the Framework? Are your shadow monsters going to sabotage more of the survivors’ ships?”
“I told you already we don’t know what they are.”
“Stop lying!” Carmen shouted. “Just stop. I saw what just happened outside. And one of those things disabled my controls over the harvester. Another attacked the Cordice so no one could be warned about what you and your friends were doing. The One was right, trying to warn us about them when it came for us on the Framework. And he was right when warning us about you. What did you do to him?”
“He lives. We flooded his ship with argon so he’d sleep and not cause any more problems. He’ll be returned to the Framework with little more than a headache. But we don’t know what these things are.”
“Oh, really? It shot those soldiers downstairs. They’re dead, Mom! And then it delivered Jenna straight to you.”
Her mom cocked her head as if distracted. “Calm down. Our demand was for the army to clear the grounds around the sphere and for Jenna to be brought to us. I thought they were ignoring us and weren’t going to comply. The violence was unfortunate. And I didn’t see any other creature.”
“It had that doctor pushing the bed under its control. If it’s not with you, then that means it wanted Jenna here. Mom, are you even listening? It’s still out there!”
Sylvia Vincent had a hand to an ear and her stern expression grew hard. With a gesture from her mother, the Melded guarding Carmen plopped her onto a stool next to a table. Both items of furniture were fixed to the floor. They laid Jenna out on a crash couch and Sylvia and the guards left them.
“Mom? Where’s Ovo? Don’t you hurt him!”
The door slid shut. Carmen slapped the metal and only succeeded in hurting her hand. The air inside the room felt dry and hot. She inspected the door in search of a control mechanism. Found none. No doubt the Melded had bionic door openers among their other accoutrements.
Jenna moaned.
Carmen crouched next to her and took her hand. “Jen, it’s me. Are you okay?”
She was making a choking sound. She was breathing, Carmen confirmed, but something was wrong. Her skin was pale. Beads of sweat dotted her forehead.
“I’m right here,” Carmen said. “I won’t let Mom or anyone else hurt you again.”
“Guh…guh…ckkk.”
“What did they do to you? Did they give you something?”
Her sister’s eyes went wide. Her hand gripped Carmen’s hard enough to hurt. Jenna turned to face her. Jenna’s mouth opened
, but no sound came out but a dry rasp. Then something beneath her hospital gown writhed.
Chapter Thirty-Five
The shimmering ooze that uncoiled itself from Jenna’s body stood almost as tall as Carmen. It had the shape of a wide ribbon or nearly transparent blanket, with tiny bubbles and floating shapes within it which drifted about like foam carried on a tide.
A pair of thin spaghetti-like tendrils dangled to the floor. The thing was still extricating itself from Jenna, the last parts of it flowing from beneath her gown.
“It was you,” Carmen whispered. “You attacked me.”
The creature stiffened as it collected itself and grew taller still. Carmen backed away to the corner.
“What do you want?”
It stood completely detached from Jenna now. Its tendrils probed the floor as if feeling about. Its shape went from sheetlike to a narrow tube that appeared ready to collapse.
Carmen licked her lips. “Can…can you understand me?”
Was it even facing her? And where were the Melded? Were they not monitoring them? Then a thought occurred that chilled her to the core. Had her mother placed them together deliberately? If this monster was a Melded agent, then its presence was no accident, and she and her sister were locked in a room with it.
Jenna began coughing.
Carmen edged her way. Before she could move more than a few steps, the creature lurched towards her. Carmen stumbled back until she collided with the table. Tiny tentacles emerged from the thing’s body. It reminded her of a sea anemone or jellyfish. The small limbs probed her face and hair. She kept her mouth closed and shut her eyes and tried to turn away. But the creature pressed closer. An electric tingle stung her cheek. She swatted at the tendrils. Felt more stings.
“Get away from me!”
A hum rolled through her ears and teeth and skull. Sound. Faint voices. Tones. Car engines. Music. The thing in front of her, her sister, the Melded ship, all faded, overlaid with flashes of faces—her father, her nephews, Jenna and herself, young, at play in their first backyard. She felt the pain of a scraped knee. Heard Jenna’s wail when Carmen wouldn’t share the swing and felt the guilt as her sister ran for their mother inside the house.
Scents took over. Savory meat smoking on a grill. Frying catfish. Her father instructing her on how to brine shrimp, and the aroma of pepper and garlic powder before the breaded shrimp dropped in sizzling oil. Burned toast on a school morning when neither parent was home.
The scenes played more cohesively. But Carmen felt the invisible hand directing her memories. It was the creature. It was doing this to her. Making her see and hear and smell and forcing recollections of events past. It loomed behind each glimpse into her life, tainting them with its unwanted presence. It was an eavesdropper and spy, and its desire to share her most private moments felt insatiable.
It sought those shards of her life out. The fights with her mother. Raised voices. Carmen’s verbal outbursts. Slammed doors and abandoned dinners. Bitter disappointments at school. Minor triumphs with no parents in attendance to cheer her on.
The junior high jazz band recital where Carmen had performed the trombone solo for a Wycliffe Gordon number. The applause had felt hollow when Carmen couldn’t spot her mother, who had promised to make it in time to see her daughter play.
More embarrassing, the meeting with her freshman year counselor following Carmen being caught gluing the lock to her algebra class’s door to avoid a quiz. Mom was again a no-show. The school had reached her father on the phone, but the connection had been bad and it was the counselor who had apologized to Carmen after the conversation.
Carmen felt her breathing coming in fits.
The creature burrowed deeper.
Embarrassment gave way to shame. She had overslept at her boyfriend’s apartment and her phone had been muted on the afternoon her dad was to return home from the hospital following a round of kidney surgery. She was supposed to have been there and had just gone to the apartment to pick up some things. Exhausted, she had taken what was supposed to be a ten-minute power nap. During her slumber, her dad had made it home somehow and had slipped from bed. Mercifully, he hadn’t broken or ruptured anything and had managed to reach his phone. After waking and hurrying back, she had made it to his place to discover the fire department and the paramedics there. They had gotten him back to bed.
“Stop it!”
But the shadow delved further, was drawn to the darker, harder emotions like a moth to a flame. Kept pulling at them, no matter how vague the memory. Things Carmen had let go. Forgiven. Forgotten. Hatchets buried and things she had considered learning experiences in hindsight. Events now unimportant. The thing drew them up. Carmen felt its appetite. It had taken its fill, yet still it craved more instances of sorrow and pain.
Carmen resisted. And then it pushed.
Spilled hot chocolate and Carmen had blamed Jenna. Ramming the car’s bumper into the garage drywall after misjudging her speed while blasting music too loud. Cornered by a gang of girls on a playground after a move to a new town. Spat upon. Taunted when she had refused to fight an ogre of a fifth grader. Getting thrown out of band class in front of everyone.
Yet the shadow oddly disregarded the thought of how during that class, when everything and everyone behaved, Carmen could lose herself in the flurry of sounds, become one with it, find peace even when they blasted and squeaked their way through the “Liberty Bell” march. Even within the worst practice sessions, Carmen found joy in the moments of harmony.
The creature wasn’t interested. Kept pushing.
Carmen felt her face grow hot as fresh memories came forward.
Her supervisor firing her from the cable company with the threat of calling the police after her illicit router had been discovered, which she used to better search the web following the Big Wipe. Panic at seeing Jenna shot down by the Melded.
And the now moments. Losing her mother again, to something incomprehensible.
The hard memories twisted inside her, conjuring up rage and tears and helplessness.
A final jolt sent Carmen to the floor. The creature moved away from her. She couldn’t decide if it was finished or just hadn’t found what it was searching for.
Then a new recollection came to her mind, and this one was not her own. There, as plain as a rough drawing on a page, the impression lingered, something left by the creature, perhaps unwittingly: Earth’s end. Her world, a pitted landscape. The remnants of the Framework floating vaguely nearby. Everything lifeless. Everything smoking and dark except for the uncaring sun. And then, as if the page turned, she saw more.
The harvester.
It wanted it, its need as fierce as its desire to feed on every strong feeling it could draw from its victims. It wished to see it broken. Destroying the harvester and witnessing everything else end were linked with a steel-willed certainty. And it thought Carmen and Jenna would play a role in the harvester’s destruction.
She realized she was wrong about the Melded concerning this monster. They weren’t using it. It was using them. And it needed Carmen and Jenna. Somehow they were where it wanted them to be, here, on board the Melded vessel.
The creature had slid to the door and seemed to be inspecting it with its feelers.
“Mom?” Carmen called. “Mom, can you hear me? It’s here. The thing is here! It’s inside the ship! Mom, please—”
In an instant, the creature leaped at her. A shock jolted her as its tendrils seized her arms and throat. A numbness quickly replaced the pain. The world drifted. As she slid to the floor, she could do little but watch. The thing had returned to the door. Somehow it found a gap between the door and the wall. The creature slid away and out of sight.
A second later, one of the Melded guards appeared. The creature that had disabled the harvester was now loose on board their ship, and it was precisely where it wanted to be. She needed to warn them. But at that moment, as the guard pointed his weapon at her, she couldn’t even whisper.
&n
bsp; Chapter Thirty-Six
A second guard joined the Melded grunt confronting Carmen. One crouched over Jenna as if to check on her. Jenna wasn’t responding and appeared to have passed out.
Carmen kept trying to speak.
The bug doctor entered next. He went straight to Carmen and pressed a device against her skin. His wings kept vibrating, and he leaned in close enough that she got an excellent view of his mandibles. He kept making a series of muted snapping sounds.
One guard she knew: Four Arms. He kept watch with his multiple hands on his weapon, as if either of the sisters might make a break for it.
Carmen worked her jaw. Tried to speak, to repeat her warning. Had they heard? Had they understood? And where was her mother? She forced her jaw to work but could barely swallow. The bug doctor lifted her hand and prodded the meat of her thumb. She flinched, but barely. The bug chittered irritably as if disappointed.
So much for bedside manners.
He then jabbed her. It didn’t exactly hurt, but it surprised her. And barely being able to move as the giant bloated cricket touched her made her want to scream.
And then she did. A soft moan, at least. Pins and needles rolled through her body. She bit her lip and massaged her fingers. The doctor refilled an object like a cigarette lighter. Before he could inject her again, she stopped him.
“No,” she said firmly. “No more medicine. Don’t give me anything! Where’s my mother? You need to warn her.”
His reply was gibberish.
“Then let me talk to Ovo. He can translate. There’s something on board your ship.”
Four Arms made a series of gestures with his free hands. He tapped his feet and clicked his mouth. The doctor replied and put his devices away. Then the bug headed towards the door.
She reached to stop him. “Your people came all this way for the harvester. That monster that’s aboard your ship is going to take it from you.”