The Prize: Book One

by Rob Buckman

  "Yes, and that's to get your cute tush to the bloody Prize in one piece.” Her face tightened. Men didn't refer to her behind as a tush, at least not to her face. An odd feeling rose up inside her, and it wasn't anger.

  "I still can't permit you to go, it's too dangerous. The benefits don't outweigh the risks.” She knew he was going to argue, but there was no changing her mind on this issue.

  Penn didn't answer. She waited a moment, listening to the sounds of the jungle around her as her head swung from side to side. Hearing nothing, she looked over her shoulder. He was gone. One second they were talking, the next he simply became part of the jungle, indistinguishable from the plants and shadows.

  “Penn, get your ass back here!” she hissed, hearing a soft chuckle coming from somewhere off to her left. For a moment, she considered using the pain inducer to force him to return. Her hand reached into her pocket, fingers stroking the warm plastic. But no, having Penn thrashing around in the bush, screaming in pain wouldn't help the mission. At least that's what she told herself, angry that he'd slipped away from her so easily. She made her way back to the CP through the deepening darkness, cursing him under her breathe, doubting she ever met a more infuriating man in her life. He'd left before she'd got the chance to say something. Maybe she'd have added, 'be careful'. Maybe.

  "You okay, Major?” Captain Carras whispered, startling her. Distracted, she hadn't noticed his approach.

  "Yes, I'm okay. Penn's gone off on some hare-brained scouting mission. Pass the word around. If, and when he comes back, try not to shoot the idiot.” Ellis pulled her ear lobe, feeling frustrated.

  "We'll use caution, Major, but I'm not sure how he expects to get through the defense shield. He'll also show up on infrared," Captain Carras murmured, peering into the blackness of the nightscape around him. His night-vision goggles showing shades of gray and green, not the red hot spot of a heat source. If Penn was out there, he couldn't see him.

  "Don't bet on it, Captain,” she huffed. ”You won't know he's around until you feel the cold steel on your throat.”

  "You have to be kidding...” Carras looked quickly over his shoulder, just in case.

  Penn didn't have much love for the Empire, much less its military, and if the reports were true, he was supremely skilled at what he did. If he wanted to, Penn could quite easily sneak around the clearing and kill them all, including her and go after the Prize himself. Finally, she understood just how powerless she was to control him and the real reason they'd sent her and the troopers. It was to make sure Penn turned the Prize over if and when they reached the pyramid. If Penn didn't care to go after the Prize himself, all he had to do was walk off, and let them try to get to the building on their own. What could she do? Even the pain inducer might not control him. Sergeant Jaxx was right. This was Penn's area of expertise. Between the jungle and the Thrakee, she doubted if any of them could make it without Penn. Ultimately, she had to trust her instinct. He told her he was going to scout the Thrakee position, and even if she had no idea how the hell he'd manage to do that without getting himself killed, she had to accept his prerogative.

  CHAPTER - THIRTEEN: The bogyman.

  Penn moved through the undergrowth with ease. His night-vision wasn't perfect but far better than most human's. They couldn't see at night without a visible source of illumination, or night-vision equipment. He attributed his ability to whatever the doctors had done to him, and by concentrating he could simply adjust his eyes to see further into the energy spectrum. As he moved, he saw the jungle in dark tones, with the occasional shade of white or gray. To Penn, the feeling was more like walking at twilight than in real darkness. He made slow, steady progress for an hour until he saw a faint light peeking through the trees. Penn smiled to himself, thinking of how Sub-Major Ellis sounded when he'd disappeared. He hadn't actually left, simply moved a few feet to the right and sunk down in the bushes. His instant cammo rendered him invisible to the naked eye. Before she had time to flip down her night-vision goggles again, he'd moved. He watched carefully, seeing Ellis reached into her breast pocket, guessing that's where she kept the trigger to whatever was in his neck. It was a point to remember.

  Penn moved into cover between two giant tree roots. The massive root slabs were remarkably similar to the Kapok trees of the Amazon, but without the same stubby thorns. He paused for a moment, letting the sounds of the surrounding jungle seep into him, feeling at home in the warm damp air, comfortable near the smell of the wet Earth. He smiled to himself as his hand touched the tree root. For some reason the shape of these roots always reminded him of dinosaur knees, all green, with spiky knob like lumps all over them. It brought happy memories of childhood back, and could almost hear the laughter of his friends as they chased a deer, or wild pig through the tangled underbrush. Sometimes, they'd take the six-foot long blowguns, and go hunting monkeys or hummingbirds. He never had any trouble hitting monkeys or snakes, and he was fond of eating them both. The deadly bushmaster was his favorite, and no matter how much the soldiers kidded him, he knew it didn't taste anything like chicken. The boys would never kill the hummingbirds, merely stunning them with the curare tipped bamboo darts, collecting the dazed birds and offering them to collectors or zoos. Penn was an excellent shot but developed a kind of affection for the beautiful little birds. He preferred to put up with the good-natured ribbing for his surprisingly poor shooting skills rather than risk hurting one. At that age, he'd believed the hum of their wings was just their way of expressing happiness, and he'd rather see them flitting through the trees than flying at the end of a long string. Occasionally, if he remained perfectly still, one would come over and hover right in front of his face. Penn always thought it was the humming bird's way of saying 'thank you'.

  He knelt there, surveying the area for possible dangers. Boys that didn't pay attention didn't live long. Besides the obvious threats from poisonous snakes, spiders, frogs and jaguar there were also hidden pitfalls in fording a river. It was almost impossible to know if an anaconda might lurk nearby, coiled, and deadly. More than one young child had ended up in the belly of an anaconda, slowly crushed to death in those strangling coils before he or she was swallowed whole. Underfoot, he knew to be wary of hidden pantana, or old rivers and stream channels, overgrown by the jungle until they were indistinguishable from the surrounding forest floor. Many even had small trees growing on them. Penn knew from experience the way to find them was to walk carefully, feeling the undulations of the watery black mass underneath through his feet. If he broke through, he'd be sure to fall at least a few feet into the stinky black muck. Penn had it happen to him as well as his friends. If you were unlucky, you could break through and vanish underneath the root mass and never find your way back out. His thoughts inevitably led him to the day he'd returned home from a hunting trip to discover the destruction of the base. The Tellurian search and destroy team hadn't even bothered burying the dead, just left them there for the animals and insects to devour like so much carrion, or garbage.

  Pen felt a prickling behind his eyes, but after so long he couldn't cry anymore as he'd done that day. He'd lovingly buried his friends, teachers, mentors, and his mother and father with special care, sitting by their graves with tears streaming down his face, not caring if he lived, or died that day. It was the tiny hummingbirds that brought him back to life, as several of them flittered, and hummed about the flowers, he'd placed on each grave. They hovered around him for a moment as if consoling him before vanishing in a wink of an eye, back into the deep jungle. Anger took over then, a deep dark anger he never knew was there. An anger that was still with him to this day, now deeper and blacker. He knew then what his purpose was, what he'd been genetically engineered to do, the twelve year old boy became a warrior, but not just any warrior. At the moment of his parent’s death, Penn became a soulless, killing machine with one purpose in life. To kill as many of these Imperial scum as could before they killed him. Packed, and walking away from the one home he'd ever know, he left hi
s childhood behind forever. There would be no more laughter, no more children’s games, and no more tears. Now he became the consummate warrior, applying all the deathly skills he'd learned from his many teachers to the task of killing as many Tellurian, and Empire troop as possible. By the age of eighteen, he was six-foot two inches tall, and one hundred and eighty pounds of murderous fury. He never let his anger get in the way of killing, never second guessed himself, or had self doubts, as other young men did. All that died with his friends and parents, yet no matter how many Imperial troops he killed, it was never enough, seeing each dead Tellurian as another link in the chain that led to the Emperor himself.

  Even so, no matter how much his mentors taught him, they couldn't prepare him for love and betrayal. Trust was his Achilles heel, naively believing that all human's wanted nothing more than to drive the Empire from Earth. He'd fallen in love with a beautiful young woman, and like many men throughout history had paid a terrible price. As much as he hated to admit it, like General Tandy, he too was one of Markoff's pet bitches, trotting to his side like an obedient dog when he whistled. He'd called Ellis a traitor, but was he much better? With millions of his fellow human's held hostage to his obedience to Markoff's orders, he could claim he didn't have a choice, but it was partly a lie. He enjoyed killing aliens, especially Tellurian, and he was long past the point where he felt nervous, or hesitant about taking the life of another creature. Now it was second nature, and as natural as breathing. They'd genetically engineered him to be a killing machine, a super soldier, then so be it. That's what he would be until they killed him, but the one thing that thing bothering him most was Ellis. She irritated him in a way he could put his finger on. It was almost certain she was another genetically engineering human, maybe even a soldier, like him, from her performance to date. Penn scratched himself behind the ear, admitting to himself that he wouldn't kick her out of bed if he got the chance, but there was danger in those gray eyes of hers, and he wasn't about to go down that road again. The cost last time was way too high. Penn breathed in the warm, moist air, and the darkness, becoming one with the night, and just another predator out looking for his next kill.

  The faint glow of the Thrakee campfire flickered in the distance as Penn moved in a careful circle around the perimeter, using the glow of the fire as the center point. He planned on approaching from the opposite direction of Ellis's camp, knowing from experience, the enemy would unconsciously keep their attention that way. As he drew closer, the firelight illuminated more and more of the jungle. Perhaps the Thrakee felt more confident than Imperial troopers. More likely, the lizards needed of a large campfire for heat. As he'd told Ellis, lizards didn't do well after the sun went down, betting the Thrakee came from a much hotter climate than this. Narrowing his vision, he took a close look at a Thrakee, never having seen one close up before. They definitely looked saurian, remembering an artist' renditions of what dinosaurs looked like. Parallel evolution wasn't unknown, and the Thrakee probably had some dinosaur in their family tree not too far in their past. From what he could see, they had flatter faces than true lizards, with a short snout, filled with lots of needle sharp teeth. The rest of their head was all green and scaly, with recessed eyes under thick bony eyebrows. The ridge flap lifted and sank, to some unknown emotion that probably had something to do with their communications.

  CHAPTER - FOURTEEN: Pleasant dreams.

  Soru Sepac adjusted the heating control on his body suit, cursing softly as he turned it up a couple of notches. It was just his misfortune to run afoul of Tecash, one of nine, the leader of the platoon when he was looking for nest mates to put on guard duty. At least it wouldn't be for long, and he could get to his sleeping mat and pull a heating blanket over his cold body. Privately he doubted guard duty was necessary, skeptical that the cursed Tellurian's troops had the courage to attack them at night.

  He stood and stretched, walking back and forth a few steps to get the blood circulating. The bulky IR helmet made his head hurt, but as much as he hated it, darkness as such didn't exist with the combination night-vision and infrared. Standing by the tree he'd chosen for his first watch, he carefully surveyed the surrounding jungle outside the defense shield. Other than one or two hot spots of small animals scurrying about in the underbrush he saw nothing threatening. He did a 180-degree sweep twice, slowly so as not to miss anything, spotted some kind of large snake slithering across the ground not far away. He watched it for a moment to make sure which way it was going. Not into camp mores the pity. It would have made a tasty snack for the morning-meal instead of the re-cycled boot leather passing itself off as a ration bar. He shook himself, wishing he were somewhere else instead of this damp, dismal swamp. A nice hot desert would be preferable, but then again, he was alive while half the nest he'd embarked with died in the crash landing. That meant promotion, so at least he'd moved up from eight of twelve to three of twelve, so that was something to be thankful for. He surveyed the forest again, but it remained the same. If there was anything threatening out there, he couldn't see it from this position. Settling down on his haunches, his eyelids grew heavy, and it didn't take long for him to nod off. Jerked himself awake and stood up, wondering how long he'd nodded off. He quickly looked around to see if one of twelve was creeping up on him, snorting in relief when he didn't see him. He was probably over by the fire fast asleep under a lovely warm heated blanket. For a moment he looked longingly at the fire, wishing one of nine had picked him as the roving guard instead of another. At least he wouldn't have to worry about falling asleep. The body suit seemed colder, and checking the power pack, he muttered a soft curse. The meter showed it was almost out of power. He dare not leave his post to get another, which meant he'd have to put up with the cold until his relief arrived, hopefully soon.

  CHAPTER - FIFTEEN: Monster under the bed.

  Penn moved cautiously as he attempted to locate each of the guards. Finding a low spot below the level of the light, he adjusted his eyes. Even so, it took a moment to see the odd eerie flicker of the Thrakee defense screen. It operated on a slightly different frequency than its Tellurian counterpart. Moving carefully just outside the field he looked for, and found a rain gully, inching his way beneath the shield by burrowing his way through the muddy soil. At one, point, he felt a slight tingling sensation along his back as he brushed the edge of the field, but it wasn't sufficient to set of any alarms. It never ceased to amaze him how much people relied on their technology. It sometimes got to the point where they thought it infallible. Unless he screwed up and drew their attention, guards rarely if ever look at the ground near their feet. Inch by inch wormed his way closer, forcing his body temperature lower and lower as he deliberately slipped in and out of the cold mud puddles to make sure his body heat stayed below the infrared threshold. By now, his heat signature should be close to that of the background jungle, but he wasn't taking anything for granted. He had all night to do what he wanted.

  He slowly slithered into a slight depression probing every shadow and bush, finding the first guard hunkered down by a tree wearing a bulky looking IR helmet. As he waited, a snake slithered across his back, but he didn't move. If he didn't bother the snake, he doubted snake would bother him. He wondered if the snake even noticed it was crawling over a living body. Penn backed off and worked his way around the perimeter to look for the rest of the guards. In all, he counted five on the first stick, or watch, betting they'd change them every two hours or so before torpor set in. Settling into a shallow depression some distance between two guards, Penn waited patiently to see what happened. Soon, a sleepy second stick took over, and checking his crono, he found he was right on the money. Settling to the ground, Penn made himself comfortable, listening to the idle chatter of the guards as the shift changed, their attention elsewhere. He'd already picked his entry point, so all he needed now was wait until the camp free of movement, or anyone stumbling around for a late night piss or a drink of water once he'd left his hiding place. That meant keeping still until the
rhythm felt right, despite the insects crawling over him. Half an hour later, the night felt right, and he started to move, keeping a wary eye on one wandering guard who seemed more asleep than awake, it looked as if he was just going through the motions of walking the perimeter than actually paying attention to his surroundings. That was perfect from Penn's point of view, and he waited until the Thrakee was on the opposite side of the camp before worming his way toward his first objective, a cast off blanket near the edge of the sleeping area. By this time, the fire had started too died, and hopefully the wandering guard wouldn't come over to put more wood on it.

  Once he reached the blanket, he carefully pulled it over his body, finding, much to his surprise, the underside of the blanket was hot. Feeling around the edge, he located the temperature control and switched it off. He still had to egress the camp, and didn't want his body showing up like a solar flare as he exited. Settling under the cooling blanket, he now becoming invisible, just one more sleeping form around the fire. Thankfully, the mud he'd wallowed in acted as a deodorant as well as camouflage and it helped mitigate the strong lizard smell. Peeking out from under the blanket, Penn wormed his way between the sleeping bodies, at one point coming face to face with a Thrakee as he rolled over in his sleep, his face no more than six inches from Penn's. He froze. Had the Thrakee opened his eyes, even for an instant it would be all over. Penn reached down to his chest for his blade and waited. Thankfully the Thrakee sleep more deeply than mammals and didn't open his eyes. The Commander was easy to spot as the comm unit stood by his sleeping mat, but it took Penn almost an hour to reach him. As he expected, another Thrakee slept nearby, probably his lieutenant, and the key to his plan. Inch by inch, Penn maneuvered his way through the sleeping lizards, once having to freeze in place as a Thrakee tossing in his sleep rolled over and nudged him. Penn held his breath, hearing the lizard muttered something, most likely an apology for disturbing his neighbor. Slowly, Penn closed with his sleeping target until he could feel the Thrakee's warm, night breath on his face. He was definitely in need of a breath mint. The distance was perfect, and Penn carefully rolled onto his back, checking to see the position of the wandering guard.