by J M Guillen
Just get them away from the car, Hoss.
Copy that, Alabama Slim.
I slunk to the side of one of the creatures, determined to be slow and cautious. The emitter might not mask sound in this bizarre place.
I count six remaining, Michael, Anya informed me.
Five. I slipped up behind one, the kinetic disruptor centimeters from its skull. I fired, sending a sharp siiiiuu sound keening through the cavern.
Less than a second later, bits of brain and skull sprayed over one of its fellows, who roared in uncomprehending terror.
As the corpse fell, I saw the tendrils writhe within the body, madly squirming beneath the flesh.
That aside, there’s something else here… something inside them. The link conveyed my revulsion.
Copy that, Bishop. Awe and disgust filled Wyatt’s link. I can see it in one over here. It’s like thick cables running through them, just below their skin. It’s— He broke off, and I felt him retch. It’s… it’s moving! Wriggling.
Assets. Anya’s crisp link came across almost curt. These aberrations may be host bodies for some type of phage. I felt her deliberately maintain calm as she linked. Many Irrational species seek host bodies and—
And they can go straight to hell. Wyatt recoiled at the thought. You mean like a parasite?
Exactly like that. My heart hammered against my ribs as I watched coils of tendril writhe within one of the corpses. Of all the fates that could befall an Asset, forced to be a host body for such unearthly horrors seemed like one of the more horrifying.
I felt quite vulnerable.
As quietly as possible, I stepped behind one of the other behemoths and aimed both pistols at the back of its head. I didn’t know if it would stop the parasite…
I shrugged. Couldn’t hurt.
The weapons sang, siiiiuu siiiiuu.
The monstrosity’s skull cracked. It jerked twice from the force, then collapsed against the dark stone ground.
Bishop… I felt the warning in Wyatt’s link. We got five left, but they’re all over there with you.
Copy that. Now might be the time to grab your gear.
Yup. He flung the door open and ducked behind the far side of the Legacy. The movement caught the attention of one of the behemoths, which started to turn in his direction.
Nope. I took two quick steps to my right, aiming for that particular brute. Several more stood between us, and I couldn’t get a square shot.
The beast cocked his head to see if something lurked on the far side of the car.
“Hey!” I cried, knowing none of them could see where I stood. “Let’s look over here instead!”
I shot another of the creatures with my left-hand Stiletto and hit it squarely in the chest. The blow hurled the troll thing back over six yards where it crashed into one of the stone columns.
The remaining four roared their outrage. One of them, the smallest of the lot, stared around wildly before running off into the shadows.
They’ll hear me the moment I shoot ol’ Rosie. Wyatt opened the trunk and pulled out his gear. I can crouch over here and get suited up. But the moment I fire up, I’m caught.
I get it. I started to jog away from the remaining three creatures. This should be easy. Our friends here aren’t very bright. I can handle them all here in just a moment anyway.
Seems like it, Wyatt linked. As easily as you’ve put these guys down, I might as well wait before drawing attention to myself. I’ll set the spikes when you’re finished.
That might be preferable, 423, Anya linked. You’ll need the time to place them properly. I felt a small twitch as Anya sent a patch. This will help.
Five glowing green indicators settled within my field of vision, widely scattered around us. These, I felt certain, showed exactly where Wyatt needed to fire. I needed to take care of business if Wyatt was going to place his algorithmic alterations in that pattern. He had quite a bit of space to cover.
Copy that, Anya. I felt Wyatt’s grudging respect through my Crown.
I’ll get them all over here, for a start. I powered the Wraith down where I stood, a good six meters from the nearest aberration.
Um, that’s stupid, Wyatt opined.
The moment I faded into sight, the closest one snarled at me.
“Hey there, tubby.” I fired once at the ground between us, leaving a hole nearly a meter across. “Look, I’m right here. All soft and pink and small.” I grinned at it.
It roared and charged me.
I hadn’t taken into account how fast the muscled creatures might be, due to their lumbering stride and immense size. But a charging gorilla can move scarily fast, as can a stampeding bison.
This thing put those two to shame.
It cleared the six meters in what felt like a step. Like the hammer of an angry god, it swung its maul-like fist down on me.
By sheer reflex, I leapt backward. Were it not for the grace and dexterity of the Adept, I would have been paste.
“AIIIIIRI!” it roared, charging me again.
Ack! I frantically linked as I reengaged the Wraith. I raised both Stilettos and fired wildly. Oh damn it, I—
Michael! Anya linked, desperation woven through it.
The behemoth came crashing down at my feet, most of its skull blasted open.
I leapt backward, dodging away from the heavy corpse.
—ucking idiot! Wyatt yelled through the link. Of all the batshit ideas!
Hey, it worked. I sent him a weary sigh. They’re headed toward me.
More aberrations incoming, Anya reported. Seven degrees off functional northeast. She inserted a small, pale blue marker over my display.
If I peered into the distance, I could just make out several lumbering shapes.
It’s the same direction the other one ran off, Wyatt noted. The little shit got reinforcements.
Indeed, Anya linked, as concise as ever. In addition, the more time passes, the more difficult our operation may become. I have concerns that we need to act as quickly as possible, while the realmwall remains weak and the topia remains in alignment.
Right. Wyatt moved a meter around the side of the car. Let’s just end this, Bishop, and then we’ll move on.
The corpse of the one I’d killed caught my eye. Movement under its flesh made my skin crawl.
Involuntarily, I took one horrified step back. Wyatt? Do you see this? I took another step back from the corpse.
Asset Guthrie, Anya cut in. I do not know how this topia intersects with ours, but further axiomatic drift is confirmed. Soon, we will need more than your equipment to return.
Copy that. Wyatt glanced around to gauge the creature’s movements. He shrugged the backpack portion of his gear onto his back and settled the crescent-shaped keyboard at his hip.
Um, you guys. I peered closer at the wriggling beneath the dead flesh. It positively writhed, far more intensely than before. It looked as if a nest of snakes lay just beneath the skin.
Not now, Hoss. Wyatt primed the business end of the Tangler, firing it up with a keening whine. He held it as one might hold a shotgun, with the keyboard within easy reach on his hip. He stepped over to one of Anya’s markers, and I heard his gear whine a bit louder.
I really think—
In that moment the corpse before me exploded into a spray of warm, crimson viscera.
Shit—! I cried out in surprise and leaped backward as steaming globs of thick wetness struck me, covering my face and chest. I stumbled, and only the Adept kept me from landing on my ass.
The last two behemoths cried out with something like adulation. They fell prostrate, wailing in adoration.
What—? Wyatt’s link went dead as he got a good look at what had happened.
I thought I might retch.
Sinewy blue-black tentacles, some masses of thin strands and others as thick as my wrist, burst from the corpse. I couldn’t make out any center body, only hooked and fanged feelers. They ripped their way free from the creature’s chest, tearing out
from the mouth and nostrils.
“Oh,” I mouthed, stumbling backward. “Oh God!”
With a wet, rending sound, they burst into the air, floating there through some power I couldn’t name. They undulated, a grotesque testament to inhuman awfulness, a tangle of wet tendrils, repulsive in their thrashing grace.
Like a tide of turbulent malignancy, they fell on me.
2
Without thought or any active will of my own, the Adept kicked in.
The packet came installed with dozens of different combat routines, most of which involved tonfa, katana, and various knives. Oftentimes when I equipped it, I struck before I could even think, by reflexive instinct.
As the torrent of alien horror crashed down upon me, I leapt backward, springing into a crouch. Faster than the eye could track, I whipped up both hands and brought the Stiletto pistols to bear.
I frantically fired at the mass of tendrils and screamed.
The bursts from the weapon in my right hand drove straight through the mass, sliding between them like a needle into a mass of yarn.
My left Stiletto, however, had been calibrated with a very wide focus. Those shots punched into the greasy mass of squirming tentacles like extra-large cannonballs with a massive WHUB.
Some of the wriggling appendages under that onslaught flew away from the primary mass, only to continue their disgusting undulations.
Michael? Anya linked.
They can see me! Panic threaded through my link. I don’t know how, but they know exactly where I am!
You’re covered in a blood and guts, dumbass! Wyatt sounded exasperated, but I felt his mounting fear. The gunk uncalibrated the Wraith. You’re all flickery.
Shit! I bit my lip. I hate it when you’re right.
You must ‘hate it’ an awful lot then. It’s a burden being this brilliant.
I toggled the packet off and faded into full view. It would only take a few moments for the packet to reassess how much physical matter it needed to cloak, but…
Those could be a dangerous few moments.
Get to work, I shot back through the link, staring across the clearing.
Already on it. From across the way, I heard the keening, high-pitched whir of Wyatt’s Tangler. It built up power and made a loud WHUF as he shot the first spike into the stone at his feet. For briefest instant, a sphere of rippling energy silhouetted my large friend.
Spike one set, he drawled.
That’s just awesome, I sarcastically linked as I continued to drive back the mass of squiggly horror. Let’s get this finished up.
Michael, Anya warned. Reinforcements have arrived.
It would be handy if they all fell to their knees like their friends. Around us, the trollish brutes continued their prostrations, in awe of the tentacled creature.
Creatures. As in more than one.
Maybe.
Fuck, I found it impossible to tell. The main mass of tentacles began to break up into individual strands, each of which continued to writhe in the air like a serpent in the water.
No, Anya linked firmly. In fact, they seem to be encouraging their comrades to rise.
Not what I need right now. I toggled the Stiletto in my right hand so that its field focused wide, just like the other one. I fired the weapon and hurled four of the dark, mucous-slicked tendrils back. Other tendrils, to my left, formed another body—a composite of individual lengths twisted together. Some held writhing hooks on the end, while others sprouted tiny maws or pods of ancient, mad eyes. The rotten, low-tide stench of it made me retch.
Second spike set. That same WHUF sound accompanied Wyatt’s link. Again, a shimmering sphere of radiance briefly surrounded him, indicating the spike as active—for now.
It wouldn’t remain so forever. Axiomatic programming instructed the Tangler’s tungsten alloy spikes to disintegrate after a certain period. Until they did, the spike would alter reality itself within its given range—just what we needed to get home.
“Fuck!” Wyatt’s sudden cry from behind one of the large columns drew my attention. I glanced over just in time to see one of the three-meter tall assholes chasing him, roaring.
It seemed as if the brutes had rejoined the fight.
That momentary lapse of attention cost me.
One of the tendrils, a thing the circumference of a garden hose, wrapped cunningly around my left ankle. A baleful eye sprouting from a pseudopod leered up at me.
“Oh God!”
I kicked my leg, trying to break loose. The tendril dug in tighter as a response. As it pulled, I felt the wicked hooks on its underside shred my quasi-steel pant leg and cut into my flesh.
And… something whispered behind my mind. A faint echo of a tongue I didn’t know, words that felt sharp, wicked, and alive.
“No, no, no!”
Panicking, I fired at the tendril again and again, blasting it into paste with a flurry of keening cries bursting from my weapons. The hooks still dug into my skin, not releasing even when the rest of it had been liquefied.
I whirled and aimed at the writhing, serpentine terrors that still swarmed around us.
They’re surrounding me, Wyatt linked. I don’t even have a mundane pistol!
Gonna have to spike them. I dodged a swiping tentacle as I linked. I know, it’s not regs.
Nothing about this is regs, Wyatt complained. Simple dossier my ass!
He wasn’t wrong. I’d always found Wyatt’s ass to be quite complicated.
“You can eat this!” Wyatt roared, accompanied by the WHUF of his device. I glanced up in time to see the one of the muscled behemoths stumble back, pawing at its chest where Wyatt had just sunk a spike.
“Hope you like it,” he spat.
The head of the spike, the part I could see anyway, began to radiate a dull red light, gradually increasing to a brilliant white glow.
The behemoth screamed as Wyatt’s spike altered the physics of heat, of thermodynamics itself.
He cooked the terrified brute alive.
That’s horrifying, I noted
The Artisan can be a bitch in combat, Wyatt replied. In the right person’s hands.
There are a total of eight of the large aberrations, Anya informed us. At least four infected with the phage parasite.
I don’t like the way that sounds. The thrill of the Adept still coursed through my veins, augmented by whatever synthetic stimulant the Facility applied. Yet even as I blasted another knot of the dark tendrils apart, I felt myself begin to slow. The packet truly hadn’t been designed to run for more than a few minutes.
I’ve got the third spike placed now. I heard his device whine as Wyatt linked. This will be over real fast.
No. Anya’s link felt curt in my mind. Unfortunately not.
What? I frowned at her through the link as I fired at one of the lumbering behemoths, bowling him over.
Current algorithmic alterations aren’t achieving their specified effect. Anya paused for a moment; I felt her mental calculations. Something is bolstering local axioms.
Is it, Anya? I linked with more than a bit of impatience, as I leveled a shot into the skull of one of the lumbering beasts. Because that would be just superb.
Emanations originating approximately two kilometers away are augmenting the natural properties of this place. Our current endeavor is futile.
Just what I wanted to hear, Wyatt linked sourly.
It is likely altering those emanations will allow us to continue our operation, she clarified. We just have to get there.
Sounds like we have a new Locale One. I frowned. Assuming we can get away from these jerks.
Fine then, Wyatt grumbled. At least that frees me up to deal with these assholes. He punctuated his link with a WHUF, and I heard one of the mammoth freaks begin to scream.
Michael! Anya linked frantically.
I spun, Stilettos at the ready.
Tentacles, regrouped into a larger knot, swam right for me.
Their movement through the air entranced m
e, beautiful after a fashion. This group appeared thickest in the center, where the strands all intertwined. Five—no, six—with drooling maws all snapping and hissing. Other tentacles reached for me as well, reminding me of a nightmarish squid.
“Nope.” I fired and fired and fired and fired, squeezing off a half dozen bolts of kinetic force that rippled through the air.
This time, they seemed to expect it. The tendrils responded as a fish might to a strong current, sliding up, then down, riding the force.
They simply slipped around my shots with no apparent effect.
“Oh shit!” I hurled myself to the left, desperately dodging the clumsy swing of one of the large-muscled monsters. I fired at that brute and knocked him backward.
Frantically, I glanced back over my shoulder to get a fix on the parasite.
Even more tendrils had wriggled into the mass. Now it appeared almost as large as when this mess started.
Michael! One of the gray figures apparently noticed Anya crouching in the Legacy. It slammed a fist into the car, causing the entire vehicle to slowly spin.
I can’t! The wriggling knot of horror undulated toward me, relaxed in its certainty. As it grew close, I felt the spidery touch of those whispered words, caressing my thoughts.
Huuursushhh mmnemissshhh scoisssshhh…
I couldn’t help but shudder at their awfulness, as the alien logic trickled through my mind.
Hold up, Anya! Wyatt linked as he shot one of the ogrish louts squarely in the neck. It fell over, gurgling in agony as the large man stepped past it.
Yet Anya had no time. Her attacker punched the car again, shattering the reinforced glass of the passenger window. Even as it bled profusely, it grappled inside the car, grubby fingers reaching for her.
Get out! I linked as I fired on the tentacled awfulness again, this time striking it center mass. Anya! The opposite side!
As I linked, the parasite bore down on me, swimming unnaturally through the air. I turned, thinking to dodge behind one of the large stone columns…
Only to stop dead in my tracks.
Not two meters in front of me, one of the gray-skinned abominations waited, a sneer on its huge face. It held a crude stone axe, and unlike its counterparts, wore no clothing at all.