The Fifth Civilization: A Novel

by Peter Bingham-Pankratz

  Suddenly there was commotion in the food court. Voices got loud. A few people shouted. All three at the table jerked their heads to the ruckus. At first, it wasn’t easy to see what was causing all this noise. People were standing up from their seats left and right, as if a mole was running across the ground. But then the three at the table saw it: a hooded mass working its way through the crowd. A two-meter tall specter of death.

  Chapter 7

  One moment people were eating peacefully at their tables, the next they were dropping their plastic trays to the floor. The crowd parted frantically, some customers fleeing and others darting behind waste bins. Roan focused on the hulking figure, clad in brown cloth, and did not see Aaron’s face as his friend breathed “Oh God.”

  The figure approached slowly on its long back legs, the hood cascading off its head to unveil the long ears and naked snout of a Kotaran. He was as grey as a shark and quite muscular, certainly larger than any of the humans present. In the alien’s clawed hand Roan had a split second to see something glint. It was unmistakably a pistol. And the three were in its sights.

  “Go, go,” Roan hissed, and the three scrambled to their feet, huddling together away from the table and inching back as the Kotaran advanced.

  The Kotaran said nothing. Just quickened his strides toward the three.

  Someone cried out from the left. A human. And then came the shrill, piercing shriek of a Kotaran. A second alien, also wearing the robes of a monk, leapt onto a table just a few meters away. This one shrugged his robes off and also raised a pistol to the air.

  The first Kotaran barked something in his companion’s direction. But the second just aimed his pistol.

  “Down!” Roan cried. The three scrambled under a table.

  The first bright green bolt just missed them, splintering the glass window at their backs.

  “Go, go!” Aaron screamed.

  The Kotaran was almost upon them now, leaping from table to table. Aaron motioned for the trio to dart left and they did so, Roan’s fingers picking up sticky residue from the food court floor. A second shot shattered the table and sprayed plastic everywhere.

  Screams ricocheted across the court. The Kotaran’s boots squeaked on the table tops, a dance of death before the hunter caught its prey. Roan swore he heard the snarls of the thing.

  A dozen rows of tables stood between their position and the exit, and there was no clear path through them. Aaron dashed under one, commando-like, with Roan and David following suit. Not since his short stint in the military had Roan been required to do this. Under one, two, three tables they rolled, their pursuer’s bolts scorching each table they ducked under. It didn’t take the alien long to leap on top of the one they sheltered under.

  Roan had a millisecond to act. He slammed his shoulder into the underside of the table. It hurt like hell, and Kotarans were not light beings. But the thing was thrown off balance. With a grunt, the Kotaran crashed to the floor face-first. Roan flung himself from under the table and jammed his heel into the alien’s spine. It roared and turned its face to him. Roan jammed his heel into the Kotaran’s snout, snapping cartilage and bone.

  Aaron and David emerged near the front of the food court, which emptied rapidly. They called out as Roan pounced on his assailant.

  “Nick, let’s go!” Aaron yelled. “We need to get out of here!”

  Aaron was right. Time to go. Roan lunged for the kanga’s pistol but the alien’s claws were locked around it, and the other Kotaran was making a run for them. Roan made do with a kick to the kanga’s head. Then followed his friends out of the court, all the while wondering where the goddamn security was.

  ***

  Godsdamn Talmar. He’d ruined the grab. Grinek could have easily taken Vertulfo and killed the others right then and there if his young subordinate hadn’t interfered. What was worse was the way Talmar had been pummeled by the cap-wearing Earthman, who had now joined Vertulfo and the Nyden in leaving the food court.

  Grinek stepped next to Talmar. The man was back on his feet, though his face was bloodied and bruised. He gritted his teeth and eyed his leader.

  “I will kill them, Commander.”

  “Talmar, listen to me—”

  “For our people, Commander!” Talmar screamed, and then ran after the three targets. Grinek wished he’d chosen a less impulsive and impatient partner for this task. The Earth division had assured Grinek that Talmar was the best they could offer. If so, then Grinek would hate to see the lesser operatives.

  Calmly, Grinek stepped out of the food court, pistol at his side. He sized up the scene before him: Vertulfo and the two others running up the spiral walkway, parting the crowds as they ran. Talmar was close behind, though if the three darted into any of the nearby shops they would lose him. Grinek raised his pistol. Aimed at the capped man.

  Hands clasped around Grinek’s arms. His attackers were muscular, fierce—but Grinek was stronger. Apparently, some of the mall security men decided they would try to tackle the Kotaran by grabbing his arms, which were half the length of their fleshy bodies.

  Their mistake. Grinek smashed one’s nose with his free palm and then shot the one foolishly clinging to his pistol hand. The men fell to the floor, unconscious or dead.

  Upon hearing voices behind him, Grinek whirled and caught sight of three men with plastic shields and helmets working their way up the spiral. More security. It took him mere moments to aim and fire. One security man was cut down, while the others fled behind the railing. These men were not professionals, Grinek realized. The elite Tokyo Guard would soon be on the scene.

  Grinek turned back to the spiraling walkway, which had all but emptied of Earthmen. All the better. He saw Talmar enter a storefront and assume he’d chased the three into it. The young operative was a fool, but he might have done some good by trapping the men inside. Apprehending them would not be difficult. Grinek made his way to the store, throwing a few more energy shots behind him to dissuade the security men. Perhaps capturing Vertulfo would now be a challenge, but one way or the other, he would get the information he needed.

  ***

  The three of them ducked into a clothing outlet. Most of the customers had fled the store, but a few were cowering behind racks of designer slacks and the latest in fashionable women’s body suits. Roan, Aaron, and David worked their way to the back of the store, finding sufficient cover behind a rack of men’s suit jackets.

  David yelped. “There’s no way out! We’re trapped!” The Nyden nervously rubbed his feathery appendages together and his head glowed a bright shade of green.

  “Shut it!” Roan said. He had his eye on an employee kneeling behind a rack of neckties across the aisle, a uniformed Japanese kid no more than twenty with slicked-back hair and silver earrings. The kid was trembling, peeking through the ties toward the front of the store.

  “Hey kid!” Roan whispered. “There a back door?”

  The employee didn’t respond. Only continued his trembling. Toward the front, the whimpering of customers mixed with the heavy wheezing of the Kotaran.

  “He sounds like a bull,” Aaron muttered, crouching so low his chin touched the carpet.

  “Huh? Look, we gotta find an exit. Now.”

  “I think that employee is our best chance of that,” Aaron said, very calmly.

  Roan called out to the employee once more. A little louder, and firmer. Finally taking note of them, the kid pointed a shaking finger toward their right. The back door, marked “Employees Only” in Japanese, was very close.

  And then came the crunch of clothes racks being pulled aside. The heavy boot falls of the Kotaran. He was coming to them, fast.

  Roan pushed a few of the suits aside and looked into the store. He could see a shape moving behind some racks of clothes, a big one. It had to be the Kotaran. He pulled the long-barrelled Nalite pistol from his coat pocket, suddenly feeling a little bit safer. A faint chirp from the weapon meant it was ready to fire.

  The big shape appeared again.
Roan could hear the noise that sounded like a bull, and he took aim.

  “When I fire,” Roan said, “Head for that door.”

  He fired.

  The first of Roan’s energy bolts struck a clothing rack, setting some dresses on fire. As soon as the zap of the gun crackled through the store, Aaron and David took off to the back door. Roan hopped up and laid down some more cover fire, which was haphazard at best, and which was soon answered by return fire from a Kotaran pistol. Green bolts incinerated jeans and short shorts every which way. A “Find Your Size” monitor exploded, showering the store with sparks.

  Roan crouched low as he ran. This back door had better be worth it.

  Aaron was the first through the door. Roan and David were close behind. A bunch of boxes and metal racks fell to the floor as the door was forced open, probably some kind of crude barricade the employees had erected. Roan assessed what he saw behind the door: a backstock area with ceiling-high shelves full of store inventory. A few employees huddled behind a forklift, staring wide-eyed at the two humans and a Nyden intruding on their workspace.

  Roan yelled for them to get the hell out of there. The employees took heed and ran toward another door at the back of the mini-warehouse. Perhaps that led outside.

  “Get to that door!” Roan barked.

  Aaron turned and froze.

  “Nick! Behind you!”

  Roan swiveled, his pistol at the ready.

  The fierce cry of a Kotaran filled the room. Calliopean, rising in pitch until a shrill crescendo, the cry was as much a warning as it was terrifying. Stepping into view, silhouetted by the bright light of the store, was the enormous shape of a Kotaran. His ears were pointed straight back. His tail was curled behind his body, scorpion-like, the tip a dagger aimed to its prey. And in his hands was an energy pistol.

  To Roan it happened in slow motion:

  The alien got off a shot. He heard Aaron grunt and go down. The second brushed near David, who squawked. Roan didn’t let him get off a third. He brought up the Nalite and fired it at the Kotaran’s torso. One red burst after another went into the Kotaran’s chest. Roan wasn’t counting his shots, but he’d heard it took a lot to take down a Kotaran.

  It did.

  As his face squeezed into an agonized grimace, as his tail swished every which way, the Kotaran catapulted from the doorway and fell against a rack of pleated sacks. With a thump, the alien collapsed from his bed of clothes onto the floor.

  Go to hell, you kanga bastard.

  Roan’s hand seared with pain. The Nalite pistol was scalding hot and smoking from overuse, and Roan threw it to the floor. Its energy pack was spent. The thing was useless.

  “Nick, help me…”

  Aaron.

  Roan bent down to see what the damage was. The man’s pant leg had been burned off and his skin underneath was red and blistered from the blast. Telling him it was going to be all right, Roan slung Aaron’s arm over his shoulder and lifted him up. Aaron groaned in pain, then limped along with Roan on his good left leg, clutching his wound. David, meanwhile, climbed off the floor and looked at the injured man in horror.

  “David, goddammit, help me—”

  A growl from outside. Roan turned as much as he could with his friend on his back, and saw the Kotaran writhing just outside the doorway. He muttered something and—to Roan’s horror—was fingering something in one of his claws. A device.

  A grenade.

  “David, run! Now!”

  David didn’t need the encouragement. He knew what was coming. The Nyden took flight and Roan got maybe a yard before heat and a thousand tiny shards stopped their gallop to the exit.

  ***

  Curse Talmar.

  Grinek knelt and covered his head to shield himself from the explosion. If he’d only waited a few moments before blowing himself up, Grinek would have arrived to finish off the Earthmen. Grinek had been approaching the door, ready to come to the aid of his subordinate, when he saw the grenade appear in Talmar’s hands. On Kotara, they revered those whose suicidal actions took out enemies. Here it was a stupid tactical move.

  His ears still rang from the blast, but Grinek could hear the gentle hail of clothing shreds and what remained of Talmar fall to the floor. A few meters ahead, he saw the charred doorway was now shrouded in smoke. Slowly, pistol in hand, he made his way to it, his giant feet making cautious and calculating steps.

  ***

  The explosion threw them all to the floor. Though far enough to avoid its flames, Roan couldn’t imagine anyone had escaped without taking some shrapnel. Roan, for one, figured he had a few chunks of aluminum impaled in his back.

  Still clutching his friend, Roan lifted Aaron back onto his feet. “Come on, buddy, easy,” he said, and Aaron nodded and coughed. He was OK, but they needed to get to a hospital, quick. And to some kind of transportation, because Roan couldn’t carry the guy all the way. Aaron was pretty heavy for a thin man.

  David had also gotten himself onto his feet and was brushing off his feathers. “David, get that door open for us,” Roan said, nodding toward the one marked “Exit” at the back of the warehouse. David didn’t respond, as if in a daze. “Goddammit you pigeon, fly!” Roan snarled. At that, David jumped and ran to the exit. Roan looked behind at what was left of the doorframe, seeing only smoke and fire. There was a second Kotaran out there. Any minute he was bound to appear.

  “Nick,” Aaron wheezed. “Nick, you need to take this.” He was holding the hexagonal pad in his bloody hand and thrusting it to Roan.

  “Not now,” Roan said, hobbling as fast as he could to the exit. David heaved it open and a sweet and salty smell filled the mini-warehouse. Beyond that door was Tokyo Bay. Freedom. David stepped outside into the sunlight, and Roan could make out a small balcony beyond the exit. Behind him were shuttles and cars shooting over the harbor, the oblivious bustle of the real world.

  Another moan from Aaron. “Take it,” Aaron wheezed. “You don’t need me. This pad has all the information you need to find this planet.”

  “What?” Roan threw his friend a look that could only suggest he was out of his mind. “Come on, just a few more meters. You’ll show me yourself.”

  “Leave me behind. I’m the ones the Kotarans want,” Aaron pleaded. He grimaced with each step of his good leg. Roan could feel blood from Aaron’s injured leg on him and felt the arm around his shoulder grow slacker.

  ***

  Kotarans’ large ears give them a keen sense of hearing. Waiting just outside the grenade-kissed doorframe, listening to the sounds of the Earthmen, Grinek picked up the words of Vertulfo. The scientist was trying to pass off something to the other Earthman, suggesting the valued information was not stored in his mind. Therefore, it did not matter if Vertulfo was brought in alive.

  He was waiting for nothing.

  Grinek rounded the corner, plunging himself into the smoke. He aimed the pistol into the cloud and fired.

  ***

  “Get to a ship,” Aaron continued as they stepped out onto the balcony outside. Roan breathed in the cool fresh air, tried to focus on the water and not the protests of his friend. “Find this planet.” Aaron shoved the pad into Roan’s jacket.

  Roan was going to say that he’d never leave a friend behind, but a half dozen green bolts sliced in their direction, two piercing Aaron’s back and a third grazing Roan’s nose. In shock, Roan let go of Aaron and his friend fell to the floor, gasping. Roan moved against one side of the door, but realized taking cover was useless. The Kotaran was running down the length of the warehouse at them, his speed and shooting making it certain he would kill them all.

  With a pleasant beep, the emergency exit whirred shut. The Kotaran’s momentum propelled him into it with a dull thud. On the opposite side of the doorway, David stood at the controls, his simple pressing of the close button saving their lives.

  “Help me lift Aaron!” Roan said to the Nyden. They each grabbed an arm and hauled Aaron off the ground, rushing him down the emergenc
y exit staircase connected to the balcony. Help was not far away, Roan thought. The staircase connected to a walkway that ran along the side of the mall and eventually to safety. But they were going to have to be quick. Each step they took sent another waterfall of blood out of Aaron’s mouth. And at any second the door behind them could open and the Kotaran could kill them all.

  ***

  Grinek rubbed his snout and cursed. He furiously pressed the release button on the door but it signaled it was locked from the outside. Another curse. Grinek looked back at the smoking doorway from which he entered and heard Earthmen voices and shouts. The security men had arrived. To distract them, he fired a few shots into the clothing store and imagined a dozen security men scrambling for cover.

  He remembered Talmar’s fiery death. Grinek reached into a pocket of his uniform and pulled out the grenade that he, too, carried. They were of low intensity, but could breach a door. Grinek slid a button on the device and armed it. He threw it toward the emergency exit, turned away from the door, and squatted behind some pallets. This time he put his claws to his ears for protection.

  ***

  A deafening blast hurled the exit door over the balcony railing and into the harbor, knocking Roan, David, and Aaron to the bottom of the staircase. David immediately got to his feet and tugged Roan’s arm.

  “Get the hell off me!” Roan said, brushing away the helping hand. “Help me get Aaron up!”

  “He’s dead, Mr. Roan!” David shouted. “If we don’t leave now, we will be too!”

  Roan realized the explosion meant the Kotaran was in hot pursuit. They had to go. He looked down at the man he’d been carrying, now laying on his stomach.

  Aaron’s eyes were open, but the purple in them lacked any twinkle of life. Instinctively, Roan bent down and felt Aaron’s neck. No pulse. The blood had also stopped gushing from his mouth.