Science Fiction and Fantasy Box Set 1: The Squishies Series

by Claire Chilton

  He moved down the massive room toward the stairs at the back end of it, and headed up to the first-floor. The first-floor was all storage, containing thousands of pallets. Each one held hundreds of immunization serums, which were stacked up to the ceiling. If these were all tainted with the disease, it would wipe out half the population of the planet—the younger half. The disease only targeted children and teenagers, and it would kill all of them. It wouldn’t end there. The disease would evolve. It would eventually become airborne and cause mass destruction worldwide.

  He wandered down the length of the room, glancing around and finding only storage, with no clue to what was contained in the boxes.

  Determined to find out more about what was stored in this facility, he climbed the stairs to the second-floor, ignoring the industrial lift. Being stuck in a lift right now didn’t seem like a good idea.

  The second-floor was made up of several rooms, a couple of offices and a few laboratories. There was a large production area in the middle of the room. The answers will be in here.

  Parklon hurried into the first office and turned on the computer. It asked him for a password, but it was a basic operating system, so he bypassed it easily by pressing a standard key combination on the keyboard that put him into the Administrator area of the computer.

  The computer contained shipping logs. According to the records, only one pallet had been sent out to Maklaw so far, for a test run. He printed out the information for HQ to send assistance to them, in case it did turn out to be the disease. Thanks to Carla, there’s a cure for this thing.

  He sealed the document in an airtight bag, folded it up small, and slipped it into his back pocket, knowing that it would get wet on the way home if he didn’t.

  He quickly searched the rest of the computer. There was nothing else here. It was just an admin office.

  He searched through the other rooms one by one and checked them for anything to hint at Derehtob being produced here. The labs had chemicals in them even he hadn’t heard of, but nothing that was evidence of the disease.

  When he came to the last office on the second-floor and opened the door, he hurried inside it. This is taking too long. He glanced around. It was a management office, judging by the furniture, which consisted of a large mahogany desk with a leather executive chair behind it.

  He tried filing cabinets on the right-hand side of the room, finding that they were locked. Narrowing his eyes, he forced the cabinets open by breaking the locks with his knife, and then he flipped quickly through the files.

  Shipping documents, accounting and project files were alphabetized within. He opened the project files and quickly scanned the documents.

  Inhaling sharply, he stared at a document labeled: ‘New Projects’. The document contained design plans for the Derehtob disease and listings of the chemicals that went into the immunization shots. This is it.

  He grabbed the files and hurried out of the room. This was all the proof he needed. The disease was in every single shot. They were going to be shipped globally. It was an act of genocide directly linked to DalsonCorp.

  He scanned the pages while heading for the stairs, shaking his head. Then he shoved the file in another airtight bag and pushed it down the back of his waistband, under his shirt.

  Gritting his teeth, he raced down the staircase to the ground-floor. This place was going to burn tonight.

  When he reached the pallets of immunization shots, he pulled a bomb out of his bag. It had enough firepower to send the building up like a rocket. He set the timer on it to five minutes, placed it on top of one of the pallets, and then ran toward the staircase.

  He jumped when a bullet ricocheted off the wall near his head, and he spun around at the foot of the stairs, staring in shock as seven large men in black suits ran toward him, shooting.

  In a fluid motion, he spun around and raced up the stairs to the first-floor. I must have tripped one of the alarms, damn it!

  One of the many bullets zooming through the air toward him hit the window in front of him on the first-floor landing, and it shattered as he ran past. Splinters of glass embedded themselves in his waist and chest on one side, and he closed his eyes instinctively to protect them when more glass hit his face. He cried out in pain. It felt like a hundred needles stabbing the right-hand side of his body all at once.

  He ran down the center aisle of the massive storage area and dropped a second bomb, with a four-minute timer on it, into a stack of immunization serums.

  After exploring his face with his hand, he discovered that there was a small piece of glass in his right cheek and several splinters.

  He pulled the largest piece of glass out of his face, and then he ripped open his shirt and dabbed his face with his shirt tail. There was a lot of blood, but the bleeding slowed down when he applied pressure.

  Examining his chest and waist, he saw a large piece of glass jutting out of his side. Gritting his teeth, he hoped it wasn’t too deep a wound. He ripped the arm off his shirt. Then he pulled out the large shard of glass in his side, clenching his jaw so that he wouldn’t scream.

  He wadded up the shirtsleeve, pressing it against the wound. Next, he removed his belt and fastened it tightly over the makeshift bandage to hold it in place.

  Glancing down, he was relieved to find that the rest of his body was unharmed with only small cuts and splinters of glass in the right side of his body.

  He heard the men come up the stairs, and held his side while he sneaked around the pallets. Breathing heavily from exertion, he peeked around one of the pallets.

  The men were systematically checking the aisles in formation, sweeping the room. It was only a matter of time until they found him.

  He inhaled a deep breath and waited for one of the men to turn down an aisle. Once he was out of sight, Parklon ran for the staircase and then up to the second-floor.

  Spikes of pain shot up the right-hand side of his body, but he forced himself to move as fast as he could. He heard shouts and more gunshots. They must have seen him run past. Crap!

  Gasping for breath, he reached the second-floor, searching desperately for an escape route. The ceiling was low here and the roof was glass.

  He pulled out his gun and raised his arm, causing the wound in his side to protest with a streak of pain. He ignored it and shot at one of the glass panels near the back of the building. It shattered when the bullet hit it.

  He could hear them coming up the stairs, so he pulled out the third bomb and set the timer for two minutes. He dropped the bomb on a desk near the back of the room and then jumped onto the desk. He dropped his bag and left it beside the bomb, keeping only the gun with him.

  Glancing back, he saw the men were coming into the room. He shot at the stairwell entrance, and they ducked back out of the room.

  Parklon grabbed hold of the metal joist in the ceiling above him, and—with a growl of agony—he pulled himself up onto it. The odd gunshot was still being fired, so he sat on the joist and shot at the stairwell again to keep them back.

  Then he stood up on the joist and reached up to the broken glass pane leading to the roof of the building. The edges were jagged.

  Tucking the gun into the front of his belt, he pulled the shirt up his broad chest and over his head. He threw the shirt over the sharp edge of the hole in the roof and launched himself at it with a roar.

  His wounds all seemed to open up, burning with pain. He snarled and determinedly pulled himself up, fully aware of the men below running straight toward him.

  Once he got onto the roof of the building, he didn’t pause. He set off running as fast as he could. The roof was flat and made of thick glass, which was slippery underfoot. The building next to it was flat too, but had a tarmac roof. The next building was only a few feet apart from the back of the warehouse.

  Parklon took a run at it and leapt over the gap, landing clumsily on the next building. He set off again, this time with more speed and less sliding around.

  Glancing back, he saw
three of the hired guns already on the roof of the warehouse and catching up with him.

  He ran faster, jumping across buildings on his way to the edge of the docks, turning back occasionally and shooting at them to slow them down. He put some distance between himself and his pursuers, but not enough. They were closing in.

  A thunderous boom made him cover his ears as the warehouse blew up behind them. The massive explosion knocked over three of the men.

  Waves of heat rippled over his face and bare chest as the warehouse became a beacon in the night sky. Huge flames shot up and the warehouse became an inferno with minor explosions fuelling the blaze as each box of vaccine exploded.

  The men on the rooftop watched the blaze in shock and awe.

  Now is a good time to disappear.

  He scanned the rooftops, took a deep breath, and braced himself. Then he sprinted across the roof and dived off the edge into the icy waters of the Great Sea, three stories below.

  He hit the water hard, and the impact delivered a sharp slap that knocked the breath out of him. The cold water soothed his burning wounds, but the salt in the water stung. His trousers weighed heavy on his legs and the boots felt like anvils on his feet.

  He swam directly to a small niche in the rocks, which he could just make out through the murky water.

  He jerked to a stop when his leg caught on something in the water. Peering down, he began violently kicking his legs. The trouser cuff on his left leg was caught under a heavy, dark object in the water.

  Oxygen escaped from his mouth in panicked bursts as he struggled to untangle himself. The cold water slowed his reflexes as air escaped from his lungs, and the seconds ticked by underwater.

  He curled in the water, trying to unhook his trousers from the rock, but it was too heavy to move. In a moment of panic, he struggled out of his trousers, but they became caught on his boots. He knew he wasn’t going to last much longer underwater. His lungs ached from the short supply of oxygen in them. He fumbled to untie his boots with numb fingers and push them off his feet.

  His fingertips felt bruised while he tugged the boots off and pulled off his trousers before finally breaking free. He grabbed the airtight bags containing the precious documents and swam the last few meters into the cave.

  He surfaced inside a small underwater cavern, gasping for air. Quickly finding his footing on a ledge, which was a few feet under the water, he stood up on it.

  His body felt heavy when he rose out of the water with his hair was plastered to his scalp and icy water running down his body.

  Shivering as the cold air hit his wet skin, his lungs tightened, as if unable to take in enough air. His hands and feet were numb, and every movement was an effort. There was no power in his muscles.

  With some effort, he boosted himself out of the water and onto a rocky ledge above sea level. He reached over for the bag he’d left there the previous night.

  Pulling out a survival blanket, he wrapped it around himself, and then felt around for the electric lantern in the bag. He found the plastic base of the lantern and pulled it out of the bag, then flipped the switch. It lit up the small cave, which consisted of a few ledges around a water-filled entrance leading out to the Great Sea.

  Parklon grabbed a medical kit out of the bag and began bandaging himself, using tweezers to remove most of the glass splinters and sterile dressings on the larger wounds. He explored the cut in his right side. It hadn’t gone too deep, so he covered the wound with a bandage.

  Next, he pulled the spare gun out of his bag. He checked to see if the magazine was fully loaded. It was. With a loud click, he snapped the gun shut. He put it on the ledge next to him. Just in case they find me.

  There was a military radio in the front pocket of the bag. He set the frequency and pressed the ‘talk’ button. He waited for the familiar clicking sound to indicate he should speak.

  “Task completed. Four-five-nine at pick-up point, ready to come home. Out.” He told the machine before he released the button. They would extract him soon. All he had to do now was survive until they arrived.

  He leaned back against the cavern wall, looking forward to being in his own apartment again and catching up with his normal life.

  When the Derobmi government had approached him about covert operations six months ago, he’d jumped at the chance.

  As a Zoolaf with a background in medical science, he was in the perfect position to go undercover in Zoola to help them find out where the mysterious Derehtob disease had come from, and if there was any further risk from it. There were also rumblings about a big military power growing in the west. Both of these had needed investigating. Derobmi officials had offered Parklon the opportunity to be a part of the investigation.

  He’d been sent off for training for three months in the Enip Mountains, which were in the bitterly cold north of Zoola. After his training, he had been provided with an office in Zoola and put to work.

  It had been an amazing experience. He’d seen more than his fair share of danger and espionage in the last six months. This final piece of intelligence would hopefully lead to some answers in the investigation.

  His only regret had been leaving Carla. He’d wanted so badly to tell her what he was doing, but he had been sworn to secrecy. Six months without talking to her had been hard.

  He opened his wallet, pulled out the battered photograph of her and stared at it. I hope she’s okay. She was one of the reasons he was doing this. Not the only reason because he enjoyed it, but the deeper he dug into the mysteries of the disease and the potential war, the more it connected to the purple colony of Rhecknaw, and to her.

  He smiled at her image. He’d be home soon, and then he could take a trip to Derobmi and see her again. That was his plan now that this mission was over.

  He couldn’t wait to see her again.

  Sneaking into the city was relatively easy. Isabella just walked in. There were no boundaries stopping her going in or out. A few people glanced at her, but not many. Most people just averted their eyes when they saw her staggering into the city.

  They think I’m a vagrant, she realized when an orange man in a business suit flashed a disgusted look as she passed him. In all fairness, I probably do smell like one by now.

  It was a strange experience for her. She’d never been looked down on before. She was Lady Foamy, a woman of considerable power in her own colony.

  But this could be a good thing. She headed for the city slums, warily scanning her environment. She’d visited the slums on her previous visit here with Bob, but had never ventured into them before.

  She found that she blended in here, amongst the homeless and vagrants of the city. Other people here also avoided looking at her, but for different reasons. Meeting someone’s eye in this neighborhood was a direct challenge, and tended to lead to a fight. No one met her eyes when she passed by them.

  She fought her own exhaustions, realizing that she needed to find a place to stay for the night. Tomorrow, she planned to head to the borders of Kalamar and find a way home.

  She wandered around the slums, looking for shelter. Whole families lived under small tin roofs. No walls or doors protected their homes, just tin awnings with several people sleeping on the floor beneath them.

  She found an empty shelter that was only big enough for two people and crawled into it. She expected someone nearby to tell her to get out of their house, but no one did.

  A small girl ran over to her from the shelter across the way, offering her a piece of bread. Isabella smiled at her.

  Large hands scooped up the child before she could reach her.

  “Don’t touch the sickness,” a rough male voice said to the little girl.

  “What’s wrong with her?” the little girl asked.

  He glanced at Isabella. “Skin sickness,” he said simply. He seemed scared of Isabella as he took his daughter back to their shelter.

  Isabella held up her water canteen, trying to see her reflection in it. Good God no wonder people th
ink I’m ill!

  The mud had dried to a sickly brown color. It had cracked all over her face, exposing green lines of skin under the cracks. It looked as if her skin had died, and where it had cracked, it looked as if her blood ran green.

  She knew that all she needed was a wash, but to the Kalamarians, she looked like someone with severe skin and blood disease.

  She pulled out her bedroll and lay down on it to sleep.

  At least I don’t have to worry about people bothering me in this state.

  She curled up and slept soundly for the first time in days.

  Carla was singing at the top of her voice, but no one could hear her over the loud music. She shimmied and danced wildly around the crowded dance floor. People knocked into her while they too danced like lunatics, and she drunkenly elbowed them out of the way to keep her small space on the crowded floor.

  Her head was even more woozy than normal. She checked out the hot guys surrounding her. Everyone’s so beautiful!

  On the stage, a live band called Escape Artists, were blaring their new set out to the crowds.

  Carla was so happy to see her old friend Jeremy up there doing what he did best, singing his heart out, and looking like a rock god. His blond hair was spiky and messed up as if he’d just got out of bed. His trademark white t-shirt and ripped jeans perfectly showed off his glorious body. She joined all the other girls in adoring him.

  He had seemed much younger when she’d first met him in the Whitcomb Institute for Depraved Youngsters. He was still a green-skinned Derobmi boy with sparkling green eyes, but he seemed older now, full of confidence. His chest and arms were broader than she remembered.

  The set ended, and she headed through the sea of other girls, rushing toward the stage through a large wave of people.

  He smiled at the crowds when he stepped off the stage. She jumped up so she would stand out and called his name.