Kir concluded, “It’s all right, General! I know that you worry about your granddaughter, and you adore her, but you must not blame yourself. You didn’t send her to Godeena…”
He shook his head, and he could tell that she was reading his thoughts, but did not resist. “You are right, enough of these self-accusations,” he said. “I’ve come here to take the conclusions from this meeting to Supreme Headquarters. You’ll be the latest expedition that we send to Godeena. If you don’t succeed, nobody will be allowed to go to that damned planet ever.” He stopped for a moment and looked at Henry sadly. Henry had a feeling that he didn’t want to send them. Henry felt that he was waging an inner battle between his love for his granddaughter and the risk of sacrificing his men. He looked very old, as though he had had enough of this mental battle. Physical battles were much easier than these ones. He had to be sure that he was taking the right decision. “Also, Brigadier, I have to tell you, that we thought that Major Vallery should lead this action.”
“I beg your pardon. Why?”
“We don’t want to lose someone like you.”
Henry was surprised since the battle was all he yearned for and definitely not an office at Supreme Headquarters.
“Don’t bother. I ensured that you lead the expedition. It took me some time but it finally happened,”
“And how did you make that happen?”
“I told them that if they insisted then, they would have to accept my resignation.”
Henry was glad that the General didn’t forget his promise. “For me, you were ready to sacrifice your career?”
“I am already an old man and soon to retire – it wouldn’t be that bad. You have much more to live than me. First of all, you have to justify my confidence and then the confidence of the entire Supreme Headquarters.” From his briefcase, he took out another plate. “Here are all your orders. You’ve got a week for you to be ready.”
Henry ran over them and pointed out, “A sole problem might be with the military training. Too short a time.”
“During your flight to Godeena, you’ll have ample time for training the crew. It lasts for three days.”
Henry directed his gaze towards Vallery. “The training will be the responsibility of Sergeant Colburn and Major Vallery. As for the equipment, it has already been loaded in the transporters.”
“If you have any additional requirements I will personally hand them to you at Supreme Headquarters.”
“I think we have all we need.”
“Well then. I’d gladly stay here longer, but duty calls. In a couple of hours, I have an audience with the Planet Superior Derot III. That is boring but inevitable.” He shrugged his shoulders and accepted the obligation. “And something more, if you need anything to do with equipment or any other need,” he handed Henry a card with his communication code, “you may contact me directly through this code channel.” Then he tapped him on the shoulder and concluded the conversation. “Take care of the crew and yourself.”
The Desert Mouse
VII
Diana’s couldn’t help the stream of thought and past experiences with Gordon and Nelly, who, unfortunately, were lying dead on the hot desert sand.
All the time she asked herself, “Why didn’t they listen to me? Why did they try to get to the transporter ship? And why did they send the message through the radio transmitter at all when they knew that the Being would appear?”
She covered her face in despair. “Dear God! This can’t be happening to me! This is an ugly dream which going to end now.” Nothing changed, though.
She heard only the moaning of the wind through the tiny opening of the air purifier in her helmet. Diana had already got used to the hermetic space suit, which she had worn for months, and she knew very well that she was still alive because of it. The Being which was hunting them couldn’t see or feel her while she was in the space suit.
Only a miracle had saved her and the four members of the exploring team. They had put on the latest, state-of-the-art military space suits when they entered the tunnels under the town of Absolute. The suits protected them from all sorts of radiation, poisonous gasses, and could withstand temperatures in excess of 100˚C, though they couldn’t stay in such extreme conditions for more than an hour. The helmets were plated with solar cells charging the storage cell pack and the cell packs, in turn, energized a system capable of purifying and cooling the air in the suit. With the energy stored in the storage pack Diana and her friends could work all day before they were used up. Despite the innovative system, the cell pack was simple to use and could be customized to each individual.
With the other four members of the team, Diana explored underground for hours. They surveyed only a small part of the complex. When they lost communication with camp, they came back to check if all was well. They were shocked to see that the camp was completely destroyed, and all their friends were dead. A bluish haze appeared to settle over everything, making the parts of the butchered bodies even more grotesque. Diana’s deputy, Aron Coller, took off his helmet and ran anxiously to his wife’s tent at the other end of the camp, but he couldn’t find her. Diana and the rest of the team watched him with pity; he was behaving like a madman turning over the dead that lay around the tents. While they watched, they noticed a boy appear from the haze like an apparition. Aron ran up to him, knelt down and gently stroked the boy’s head, watching his large grey-black terrified eyes.
“Where were you? Did you see what happened?”
The boy remained speechless, shaking his head left to right. Suddenly he uttered a word in an icy voice which made them all tremble. “Naughty!”
That’s when they saw behind Aron; a sight that frightened them out of theirs wits and froze them on the spot. From the dense indigo haze, monsters from their worst nightmares materialized. Filled with horror, they watched the black, armored torsos, from which spurted forth sharp thorns dripping turbid and, greenish liquid. The monsters were towering over Aron by more than two feet. Their heads were longish, big-boned, almost-predator like with huge teeth. Like wings, they spread their armored, jointed limbs, which ended with long black sharp edges and on which blazed greenish slime.
In what looked like last moments of his life, Aron felt a presentiment of danger and hoped someone could help him. The monster nearest to him swung and with a single stroke cut off his head. Blood gushed out of his neck like a geyser. The head rolled down to the ground and towards Diana and her team. She trembled to see his eyes which showed the final moments of writhing pain.
The monsters jumped on the remnants of his body and started to butcher it. The little boy was completely sprinkled with blood, but he didn’t move. He was looking at her team fixedly and muttering something that they couldn’t comprehend. Fear had gripped them, and not one of her teammates moved; – they stayed put despite the horrible sight. The silence that followed seemed to last for eternity.
Suddenly the boy waved his hand. The monsters disappeared, and he was again wholly clean. Once more he looked towards Aron’s chopped up the body and in his voice, which was more like the hoarse grating and raging growl of a prehistoric animal, he retorted angrily, “Very, very naughty,” and disappeared in the haze just as he had appeared.
They couldn’t surmise up till then that they had been lucky because they hadn’t taken off their helmets, or else they would have experienced a fate like Aron’s. Diana and rest of the team lingered around for some more time, afraid to make any sudden moves.
After giving the incident sufficient time, Diana made a sign with her hand for the others to move. “You saw what happened to Aron. Don’t take off your helmets, for there is a good chance that the boy can’t see us while we are in these space suits. Anyways, let me check what is left in our transporter ships and if they are in good shape. You’ll wait for me here.”
Nobody had differing thoughts on her decision and so Diana set off to the runway, knowing very well that the team was as shaken as h
er.
Walking through the haze, she thought about the boy a couple of times. He was floating like a ghost above the butchered bodies. All her friends and colleagues were dead. Nobody was spared. What shocked her most were his satisfied smile and his rapture as he bowed and gently touched some of the butchered bodies with his fingers. Above all the craziest thing was that he was singing a bizarre song the whole time:
“You’re very, very, very bad,
Now not worth what you wept,
It’s time to be refunded,
Let life come back to death.
You’re very, very, very bad…”
At a steady running pace, Diana reached the runway on the other side of the small hill, feeling absolutely sure that the boy couldn’t see or sense her. When she saw their transport ships, she ran toward them with hope. Diana entered the pilot cabin of the nearest one and checked the safety system. Luckily it was working. She turned on the communication console and activated the safe channel for help. “Hello, is anybody there? This is Diana Uterra from the expedition base on the planet Godeena. There has been a slaughter. We need help…” and suddenly she felt silent.
In those harrowing moments, she once again noticed the boy’s face on the opposite side of the pilot’s window. He wasn’t looking at her but the communication console. Right away Diana left the microphone and started withdrawing to the door of the transporter. Not long after that, one of the monsters who had killed Aron materialized at the console, spread its jointed limbs and started to grate with its sharp cutting edges on the outer hull of the craft, making a squealing noise that irritated her eardrums. She stepped cautiously, looking around so as not to bang into anything or knock anything down, lest she should attract the boy’s attention. Diana couldn’t help but continue to watch the boy too, who was all focused on the communication console, waiting for some signal.
The silence was broken by the voice of somebody who had heard her call for help. “This is the cruiser Nebula 2. Repeat communication. What’s happening on the planet Godeena? Answer the call. This is the cruiser…”
Before Nebula 2 could complete the creature broke the communication by shattering the equipment with its claws. It didn’t stop at that but continued destroying the whole cabin, breaking all that it found in its way. Diana, in the meanwhile, succeeded in escaping through the door of the transporter. Now she knew that they wouldn’t be able to call anybody; it wouldn’t allow them to. It was a no-brainer to her that everybody who had remained at the camp was dead. The Being was attracted by the warm bodies, radiating warmth, and static electricity.
Diana went back to the rest of the team, informed them about all that she had experienced and forbade them from using the communicators in their helmets. She wasn’t sure if they would succeed in escaping from their planet in the transporter ships, and then there was this one another question- would the Being get a sense of their transporter and destroy them if they attempted to fly back?
Now everyone was thinking of ways to send a call for help in case they couldn’t escape from the planet when suddenly she remembered some of the games from her childhood. Diana used to play with her grandpa by means of Morse codes. She told the others that it would be good to send such codes using the little location devices that were meant to help them mark the surveyed parts of Absolute. It was a huge city, and they had intended to map the complete city; unfortunately with the current developments that would be a distant dream.
Gordon, one of Diana’s came up with a good suggestion. “We could use a remote control to start one of the two remaining transporters and lure the Being away from the base, while we can try to fly off the planet from here.”
It sounded like a good plan, but the real success would be known only in time.
*
After her team had collected dry food and equipment, they prepared for departure and started to execute the plan that Gordon had suggested. When they had boarded one of the transporters, Gordon started the motors of the one neighboring, and it took off. Initially, the boy appeared on the runway, but he didn’t react at once. He simply appeared to watch with resignation as the transporter disappeared from the city at a great speed. Then he shape-shifted before their eyes and transformed into a big black cloud, and like an arrow he darted off to follow the flying craft.
Diana waited a few moments and then turned on the engine of their aircraft and flew in the opposite direction. Through the cameras in the craft which Gordon was remotely flying, they noticed that the boy had caught up to the aircraft and was in the pilot’s cabin. He was watching the pilot’s console, and he raised his eyes to the camera and smiled sarcastically. He was angry that they had tricked him. He sang the cold song again watching the camera, “You’re very, very, very naughty…”
And within a lighting second, the picture disappeared, and Gordon threw the remote control on the floor by reflex. “We’ve lost him! I think.”
“Great! Let’s keep going” Diana said. “What height are we at the moment?”
“We have reached only 15,000 yards, but soon…” Gordon stopped as he noticed that Diana’s countenance had become pensive.
Diana, on the other hand, saw an enormous black cloud in the rear camera. It was approaching at high speed. “O my God!”
She hastily started lowering the ship back to the planet’s surface. Unfortunately, the ship wasn’t made for such sudden maneuvers, and it started vibrating due to the added gravitational pull. They were approaching a desert like an area but were too fast for an emergency landing, so with both hands, Diana pulled at the stick and attempted to raise the ship upwards. However, the starboard motor couldn’t endure such a strain. First dense smoke appeared, leaving a wide black trail but then soon the motor burst into flames and exploded when the ship was about 200 yards above the surface. At once, Diana turned off the second motor that was flying the craft and pressed the button for an emergency stop. Parachutes opened out at the back and slowed the transporters-deadly descent. It was just enough to ensure that their crash landing wouldn’t be fatal.
The ship glided down a desert dune and stopped at the bottom of it, ramming against a sand alluvium. Her team was bruised from the crash against the hard sand, but as they were strapped in, nobody was badly injured. At once Diana turned off all the running systems, hoping that the Being wouldn’t approach them despite the chase. Everyone was watching her, horrified, not knowing the real reason for the near fatal landing.
Diana asked, “Are you alright?”
Gordon, who was sitting next to her, having seen the entire ordeal couldn’t suppress his anger and demanded to know what Diana was up to, “What the fuck? Why did you land?”
“Watch your tongue. We are in bad shape, but I am still the commanding officer.” Diana gave back as fast as it came. However, she knew that her team deserved to know the reason. “That lunatic was chasing us, and I had to react swiftly. What other option did I have?”
“Why didn’t you attempt to make it beyond the atmosphere?”
Diana knew that he was in shock, but she did not want to relent and had to ensure that the team knew that she had taken the right step. “We wouldn’t have had any chance against those monsters! We would have been dead before we reached the clouds, forget the atmosphere.”
“You’re totally crazy…” Gordon said but abruptly fell silent when a bluish haze rose all around them. Full of fear, they watched the dusky clouds, which were whirling wildly, illuminated every once by lightning flashes. At that point, at the top of the dunes, they spotted the boy. His face was glaring red, and his eyes were lightning bright while he searched all around. The tense situation was mirrored in the team’s reaction. Nobody moved and stayed stuck to their seats.
Visibly raging, the boy started stamping the ground with his legs while the lightning flashes became more intense. Now the dark skies whirled with lightning, crisscrossing like a spider’s web. One lightning strike not far from the boy whirled up a cloud of sandy dus
t, thundering and echoing its sound across the desert. The boy didn’t even move or blink. He simply raised his hand and started rotating it in the air. The sand in front of him began to whirl and rotate in a circle, making at first a smaller and then a bigger whirlwind. The sand whirlwind hides the boy, and the condition was only worsening every moment.
They moved to the back of the transporter as it was being dragged by the parachutes at the back. The wind was growing stronger, and they all risked being thrown away along with the transporter; not to mention the possibility of the fall being fatal. Gordon stretched and unclasped the parachute which was instantly devoured by the raging whirlwind. The transporter then rolled down the dune. They all were injured by the fall, but their injury was hardly anything compared to things happening outside. The storm grew more furious, but none of them dared to go to the pilot’s cabin to check what was going on outside. For more than an hour they sat in silence, not speaking a word, and then Vera Kruzman, who had been thinking about the Being all the time, said, “He is angry that he isn’t able to find us!”
“Why do you think that?” Diana asked.
“Because he supposes that we are somewhere here but not able to pinpoint us and therefore want to destroy us through the storm. Most probably this would not be the first time he is trying to destroy his victims.”
Gordon, who was drawing on the sand which filled the floor, said, “Why did he only attack us after ten days?”
Vera shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know. Maybe he was studying us.”
Diana added, “One thing is sure, he has learned our language while he was studying us.” she stopped for a moment and cleared her throat. “When I went to the transporter I watched how he touched the butchered bodies and enjoyed singing a song about dying. You should have seen his face and that lunatic shine in the eyes.”
Vera looked at her, interested, and leaned against the partition of the transporter. “We have seen what he is able to do with his strength of spirit. Those aren’t normal things.”
Godeena: SF Novel Page 15