The Prize: Book One

by Rob Buckman

  “Oh my God! We fell into the trap, and didn't even know it.”

  “Right, as it was designed to do.”

  “But what about the Thrakee, the Silurian? What if they had found this place?”

  “I suspect it would reconfigure itself to conform to their notion of paradise.”

  “Oh shit! Then how do we know this whole place isn't some kind of mind trap? The tunnels and tricky rooms could just different forms of this mental trap!”

  “Now you are beginning to understand. This whole place could be just that, and we could all be still standing in the entryway. You can't get out of it, or find the Prize without the journey to get there.”

  “So each person sees, feels, experiences something different?”

  “I'd bet my life on it.”

  “So how do we beat it?”

  “We don't, we can’t, even those we know this is all a mind trap we have to keep going until we reach an answer, or die trying.”

  “Not much of a choice,” Ellis muttered.

  “I don't think there is a way out once you enter the building.”

  Ellis looked longingly at the beach, the cabana, and the island. He could see she wanted to stay here, to end the struggle to be who she was. Penn reached out, touching her face with the back of his fingers and stroked her cheek. Ellis leaned into the caress, and the unspoken plea for forgiveness.

  “We have to go, my love, or stay here forever.”

  “Why can't we…” Even before the words left her mouth, she knew the answer.

  Neither of them could be lotus eaters for long. It wasn't in their nature. Their restless spirits would drive them out of paradise eventually. Reluctantly they dressed and loaded up the camel packs with fresh water and their back packs with food. Even Penn looked longingly at the ketch anchored just off the beach, and sighed before taking Ellis's hand. Together, they turned their backs on paradise.

  CHAPTER - THIRTY NINE: Captains & Generals.

  Captain Melche eyed General Tandy with distaste, wishing he'd do his pacing somewhere else beside his bridge. As the Commander of this ship, he couldn't very well tell him to go somewhere else. As the Captain, his function was to fight any Naval battles, which Tandy pointed out to him at regular intervals. As a career Naval man, he wasn't about to short circuit his rise by getting into a dick measuring contest with an IMPSEC General, especially with the Director backing this mission. He just wished he wasn't so much in the dark about what this mission was about, and other than knowing an IMPSEC team was on the surface of an uninhabited planet investigating a strange building, he knew nothing at all.

  “Captain, we are coming around into the debris field again.”

  “Good. Relay to all ships they can begin gunnery practice… and tell them to try and hit something this time, Humm?” His comm tech smiled slightly at the joke.

  “Captain!” His gunnery officer called. ”I'm detecting life pods and some of them are still active.”

  “Ours or?...”

  “Several Thrakee, and a few Silurian's… two of them are ours.”

  “Good. Order search and rescue to go after them.”

  “And the rest, Captain?” Captain Melche eye General Tandy, seeing him looking at the battle board.

  “Those Thrakee and Silurian pod would make for good target practice, Captain.” Tandy announced. Melche stiffened.

  “I don't think…”

  “That's wasn't a suggestion, Captain.” Tandy spoke softly, but there was no mistaking the command in his voice. The midnight black uniform of IMPSEC reinforced his words.

  “Yes, General.” Captain Melche gritted his teeth and nodded to his gunnery office.

  “You heard the General's order, lieutenant. Carry on.”

  "I'm getting a little concern, General. Your team hasn't reported in for a day and a half. Is there anything we can do to assist them?" General Tandy looked at the Captain a moment before answering. Clearly, this was another attempt to solicit information about what was going on, and why this planet was so important.

  "No, Captain. Thank you for the offer, but there is nothing we can do up here to assist them. It's all up to them. Hopefully it shouldn't be long before we see some results.

  CHAPTER - THIRTY: The Journey continues

  That night, they slept in the corner of a drafty passageway, and even without getting into his favorite lotus position, Penn managed to meditate for a few hours. As he did, the path became clear. If he was right, there was just one way to get to the prize and end this nightmare, but it was a risky move. He knew it would be hard, not just from the traps set by the building, but those from within his own mind, and hers. Therein lay the rub, and he knew, the key to getting to the prize. The passageway led in one direction for miles before the smooth walls gradually turned to rough dark rock. They exited into another giant circular, dome like cavern, about a mile across, and they could just barely make out the exit on the other side. All they had to do to reach the exit, was get across a gleaming expanse of pitch-black tar-like substance that came within fifty feet of their exit point. A slight sound made them both turn, now no longer surprised to find the doorway gone. Walking to the edge of the pitch-black lake, Penn knelt down to examine the substance a little closer, not liking what he saw. There was something almost evil in its Stygian blackness. He started to reach out to touch it, but much to his surprise, the substance reached out toward his finger. He snatched his hand back, as the tentacle sank back into the main mass.

  “Damn! I don't like the look of that.” Ellis took a step back.

  “Me neither.” Looking around, Penn found a hand-sized chunk of rock, and reached out toward the black pool again.

  The tentacle came back up and connected with the rock. Penn pulled, expecting the black stuff to stretch, but it didn't. For a few moments, Penn and the black stuff waged a tug-of-war, but no matter how hard he pulled the rock he couldn't pull it free. In the end, Penn let go and the tentacle pulled the rock beneath the surface.

  “Christ! Thank God, you didn't touch it with your hand.” Penn suspected that if he had, the black stuff would have pulled him in, and engulfed him. What happened after that was unknown, death probably.

  “I wonder what that stuff is supposed to represent.”

  “Could be it represents all the evil in the world.” Ellis mused.

  “But there's no one except us on this rock... well maybe a few others, but not enough to account for this much evil.”

  “The universe then, but if it is, how do we cross it without getting dragged in?”

  “You've got me there.”

  “Shit! Now what do we do?”

  Penn dropped his pack and walked carefully along the twenty-foot length of rocky beach. The pool seemed to ripple with him, as if following his movement. This set up a slow motion waveform across the whole lake that seemed to take forever to reach the other side and start back. With nothing better to do for the moment, they sat on the rock near the edge and ate to feed their roaring metabolisms. While they did, Penn watched the waveform slowly roll back and forth. Maybe it was his imagination, but the wave seemed to be getting bigger each time it came back, gaining momentum. His suspicion was confirmed when part of the returning wave lapped the edge of the beach, and reached out for him.

  “Holy shit! Penn yelled, scrambling back out of reach. Ellis almost choked on a mouthful of food as she followed him.

  “Jesus! That has to be out of someone nightmare!” Ellis choked out.

  “Well, it sure as hell isn't mine!”

  “Well, don't look at me.” They stood side-by-side looking at the inky black lake.

  “You know what?” Penn murmured, cocking his head to one side. ”That stuff reminds me of that old movie with what's his name… Steve McQueen. 'The Blob'.”

  “You mean the one with that creeping black tar stuff?”

  “Yeah, that's the one.”

  “That's doesn't help us get across it, and we have no way to freeze it either.”

/>   “True, but I just noticed something.”

  “What?” Ellis asked.

  “The whole mass isn't moving uniformly.” He pointed to a spot about six feet from the edge.

  By now, the mass had stopped moving, as if they were too far back for it to sense them. Penn looked at the discarded food pouch for a moment, and then carefully threw it out onto the lake. It landed about seven feet from the edge, and much to his surprise the lake didn't grab it and suck it under. The pouch just sat there, almost mocking them.

  “You think that's the safe part?” Ellis asked, looking first at Penn, then the container.

  “Yeah, I do, but then what?”

  “We need more rocks.”

  “Huh?”

  “To test out your theory.”

  They each found five large rocks along the bottom of the rock face that made up the wall of the chamber. Ellis went first, throwing her rocks one after the other progressively further out beyond the food pouch. None of them sank.

  “Your turn,” she said, standing back. Penn took aim and threw his first rock. The moment it hit, the lake pulled it under.

  “Try to your left this time.” Penn nodded and threw his second rock. Again, the rock slowly sank below the surface. The next one went right, and this time stayed on the surface.

  “Think I need to find some more rocks, and work our a way across.”

  “That's taking a hell of a chance.” Added, moving along with Penn to pick up rocks and stuffing them in her pockets. Eying the distance they had to travel, she added a few more for good luck.

  “We don't seem to have much of a choice.” Penn murmured eyeing the other side of the lake, but as far as he could see, the exit was on the other side.

  “So we have to do the long jump, and land as close as we can to that pouch, right?”

  “You've got it, Princess, but I go first…”

  Before he'd even finished the sentence, Ellis flew by him and took a tremendous leap, landing almost beside the food container. Even so, the lake tried to reach out and grab her as she landed. She quickly moved out of reach.

  “Your turn!” She called, grinning from ear to ear. ”You didn't think I'd let you take all the risks did you?”

  “Of all the… How's the surface feel?” He asked, keeping the rest of what he thought to himself.

  “Solid as a rock, not even sticky.”

  “Yeah, for now. Stand back.”

  Penn backed up to the entranceway and took off running. Even before he'd reached the edge, the lake reached up to tried to grab him. He cleared the reaching fingers of blackness and landed just beyond where Ellis had.

  “Guess this lake doesn't like people crossing it.” Penn spit on the rippling surface.

  “You think?” Ellis answered, giving him one of those looks.

  “You know, you can be such a brat sometimes.” Ellis blew him a kiss.

  They tested their footing on one of the rocks they'd already thrown but didn't sink and the surface didn’t feel sticky when he touched it. When they reached the last one, they took turns throwing rocks. Penn decided not to remove the ones they already thrown just in case they needed to back track. They carefully negotiated their way across, zig-zagging back and forth where needed. The last two rocks showed them the way, and somewhat to their surprise, they were on the other side.

  “I take it the lesson is to avoid evil at all cost.”

  “Might be. Otherwise you could get sucked down into it, and never escape.” Ellis seemed to disagree.

  “I was just thinking that sometimes, you don't have a choice between evils as the whole surface seems to indicate.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Like when I joined the Empire military. Escaping one evil, to find another, in all the things I've had to do in my career since then.”

  “Sometime we all have to do things we aren't proud of.” Penn's voice trailed off.

  “Do you want to tell me about it?”

  “Was it evil of me to agree to send twenty seven young girls to their deaths?”

  “Penn! You didn't?” Seeing him nod.

  “They were just children. God help me, they volunteered. They wanted to go,” Penn choked, “and blow themselves up.”

  “The suicide bombers? That was you?” She wanted to take him in her arms, to hug him and tell him it was all right, but she couldn't.

  His anger at himself was a shield that she couldn't penetrate. Penn turned away and exited the chamber. Ellis bit her lower lips, stopping herself from saying something she'd regret, and followed him. As they entered the tunnel on the other side, three troopers came out onto the beach Penn and Ellis had stood on and looked across the inky black lake. Squad Leader Dana looked at the departing human's with cold, back eye, with a soul to match and spat on the ground. His hatred for humans was all-encompassing, but for these two, he couldn't think of a worse enough death for either of them than sinking into that black tarry mass.

  “Well, what do you know? The humans have shown us the way,” Breen said.

  “Let's give them a head start before we cross.” Dana responded.

  “I wonder what that shit is supposed to do?” Covers asked, bending down at the edge of the lake. The moment he touched the surface, the blackness grabbed his hand. Covers screamed as he tried to pull away, realizing the lake was gradually pulling him in. They rushed forward but no amount of pulling could get him free.

  “Breen, get his pack off him. Now!” Breen was careful not to get to close to the black stuff as he unhooked and pulled Covers pack off.

  “Now what? I don't think that'll help him.”

  “No it won't, but it will help us.” Dana answered.

  By then, Covers was up to his elbow in the blackness. Dana quickly knelt behind him, and grabbed the screaming man's ankle he gave a quick heave, flipping Covers on his back in the lake. He screamed louder as he slowly started to sink, begging them for help.

  “What the fuck?!” The Breen demanded.

  “We're not going to get him out of there, so why waste the food and water?” Dana shot back. ”Follow me.” There was no way they could make the jump the human's had, so he didn't try.

  Dana leapt from the beach onto the stuck man, and finally next to the discarded food pouch. There was something coldly clinical in the way he stood and observed his sinking comrade.

  “Well, what are you waiting for a written invitation? Let's move.”

  After a long look at Covers, Breen followed. He stopped for a moment after reaching the other side and watched with a horrified fascination as the man slowly sank until just his contorted face showed above the surface.

  “Help me! Help me!” Covers screamed. Breen turned away to follow Dana across the lake, the man's dying screams echoing in his deaf ears. Breen looked at Dana’s back wondering for a moment if he should stick a knife in it before Dana did something similar to him.

  CHAPTER - THIRTY ONE: Aladdin's Cave.

  Walking down a long, smooth tunnel, Penn tried to puzzle out where the light was coming from. He knew it strengthened ahead as they walked, and dimmed behind, yet even that wasn't always consistent. Penn brought his attention back to where they were as the tunnel started to slope downward. Gradually it steepened, and the surface became smoother until it was difficult to walk at all. Worse, the floor started getting wet but he had no idea where the water, or wetness was coming from, it just seemed to ooze up out of the rock. It wasn't long before Ellis slipped, and all Penn heard was a squeal and a curse, and before he could even look round, Ellis crashed into him. The impact sent them both sliding down the tunnel.

  “Oh shit! Here we go again!”

  Ellis managed to slow her descent until Penn was about a hundred yards ahead of her, hoping it would give him a chance to get out of her way at the bottom. They rocketed down the slope, whizzing around bends, and no matter what he tried, Penn couldn't slow himself. A few hundred feet further on the floor gradually leveled out before becoming flat again, and he dug
his heels in too gradually bring himself to a stop, turning quickly to try and catch Ellis. To his surprise, she didn't come hurtling out of the tunnel at him. Penn dashed back up the tunnel as far as he could, thinking she might had got stuck, yelling her name at the top of him lungs. He heard a faint, far off scream, but couldn't tell where she was. Fear-sweat pop out on his forehead, and pulling both knives, he started back up the tunnel. Thankfully, the tunnel narrowed enough so he could jam his feet against each wall, and reach up to dig the tips of the knives into the floor. Foot by aching foot he pulled himself back up the slope, cursing and redoubling his efforts each time he slipped back. He never once thought of giving up. He had to find Ellis, no matter how long it took, or how many times he had to climb back up the tunnel. After slipping all the way back to the bottom for the fourth time, he used his rope to tied his pack, securing the other end to his belt so it wouldn't get in the way, or weigh him down while he climbed, hoping the lack of weight would help.