“Weapons on the ground,” the guy in the middle commanded.
We were out-gunned and out-numbered. I calculated how many we could shoot before they fired back. I didn’t like the odds. I nodded at Megan. We set the guns down.
“Now what?” I couldn’t keep the sarcasm out of my tone.
One of the Raspers picked up the guns while they formed a circle around us.
“Now you will follow us. We have been waiting for your arrival,” said the one who seemed to be in charge.
“No, you will leave all of the guns, and you will let us go,” I ordered the Raspers.
They all stared at me, and for the briefest second, I thought they would listen. After a moment, the main guy laughed, then the rest did too. “Nice try, but that won’t work inside here.”
Damn. I knew it had been a long shot. “Why not?”
“Because the queen’s commands override yours here.”
“Where are my friends?” I let my anger seep into my words.
“You are not in charge here. The queen is.”
“Then I demand to see her. All of you have been saying she wants me to join her. Well, here I am. Take me to her.” I still had my extra gun. When I saw her, I was going to enjoy shooting her.
“Move out,” the head guy told the others.
Two walked ahead of us, one on each side, and three behind. As we walked further into the honeycombed walls, the Bugs scuttled out of our way. Some of the Bugs pushed what looked like rocks with pulsating lights inside.
We reached what I had thought was the end of the cave and turned into a tunnel whose opening was between two overlapping honeycombed walls.
The further we went into the tunnel, the more the cave looked unnatural. The white glow remained, keeping our path lit. Up ahead, I spotted more lights. My stomach rolled. What was this place? It had the feeling of Site R. Like we were filing into a hidden bunker never to escape. I turned to run, but the guy closest to me grabbed my arm.
“No.” He squeezed hard enough to leave a bruise.
I sighed. Like it or not, I was going to be taken inside another place that probably wasn’t on any map.
We were directed into a space without the honeycombs. It looked like something out of a sci-fi movie. Spheres of light blinked different colors. Bugs zoomed up and down the walls. I turned and gasped when I caught Adam and Taylor standing still with their eyes closed. Bugs held small black rods to their necks. Megan and I locked glances. I made a move to run to the guys. The Rasper soldier buttholes stopped me.
“No. You wait here.” The leader guy tapped a spot on his upper arm. I hadn’t noticed the black band wrapped around his larger-than-average bicep.
A series of colored lights flashed from the band that held what I assumed to be lots of technology. It was flat with no buttons, handles, or levers. A field of red light formed between the guys and us.
“Let them go.” I debated jumping the light field.
“They will be fine. And here, to prove we’re not hurting you.” He tapped his armband again.
The darkness of the wall disappeared, revealing Rollins sitting on the floor with his legs straight out in front of him. Bugs held tiny glowing spheres all along his left leg.
“What the…? How? He has a broken leg. How did he get here?” The questions spilled out before I could organize them.
Rollins looked up. “Yes, I had a broken leg. The guys,” he nodded at the soldier types filling the room with too much testosterone, “found me and brought me here. They claim this will heal me.”
“How is that possible?” Megan beat me to the question.
Rollins shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal. “The tech they have here is far beyond anything we have or had. I don’t feel any pain.”
“Why are Adam and Taylor like that? They’re not hurt.” I took a step closer to them. “Let them go.”
“They’re not being healed. Their blood and systems are being analyzed.” Rollins had the decency to look a little upset.
A chill snaked across my back. “Analyzed for what?”
Before Rollins could answer, a Rasper, again with very little yellow tint, swept into the room, his black cloak billowing behind him. His clothes, all black with buckles, leather, and metal, reminded me of a steampunk costume. He just needed a pair of goggles and a top hat to complete the look. “Hello. I am Xavier. Thank you for coming.”
I glared at him. “Why are my friends being analyzed?”
“Standard procedure. Need to see who is capable of what level.” Xavier did a mock bow. “Please, we need to check you. Since you were holding hands, we couldn’t get her before.” He held his hand out to Megan.
“No way.” Her voice was low and forceful like a simmering volcano on the verge of exploding. “I’ve had enough analyzing. Look what happened to my face.”
“Oh. I see. Well, what can I do to make you comfortable? We are here to help.” Xavier had a slight accent, but I couldn’t place its region or nationality.
“If you want to help, release them.” I crossed my arms over my chest but itched to pull out my backup gun and start shooting.
“Sorry. I am unable to comply with that request.”
I wanted to yell that it wasn’t a request. But I couldn’t tip them off that I had another gun. Again, I needed to agree to find a way out.
“I’ll only let you analyze me if you release the two of them.” Megan mirrored my cross-armed stance.
“Megan, no.” I couldn’t trade any of my family for another. “I need more information before anything else non-voluntarily happens. I highly doubt Adam and Taylor agreed to be tested.”
Xavier raised his left eyebrow. “Fine. What do you wish to know?”
“What is this place?” I knew I wasn’t going to like the answer.
Xavier smiled a smile that made him look like an evil villain. “Welcome to the Hive.”
33
“The Hive? Is this some other damn secret government laboratory?” I was trapped in a nightmare on repeat.
Xavier laughed. “No, my dear, this is most certainly not a government laboratory.”
I didn’t like his smug attitude, and it took all my willpower to not punch the self-satisfied smile off his face. “Then what the hell is it?”
“Something best left for our queen to explain. Now may we continue?” He again held his hand out to Megan.
“No. We want to see the queen now.” Megan’s words held more venom than I had ever heard her use.
Xavier held up his hands in mock surrender. “Okay. But you”—he pointed at Megan—“can’t go inside the queen’s chamber. Only those that have been analyzed.”
“Why don’t I have to be analyzed?” I challenged him.
“The queen said you are allowed to enter her chamber as is. She makes the rules. I am but her humble servant.” He grinned again.
I so wanted to hit him. I put my hands in my pockets and clasped the gun in the left side. “We all go in as one. Megan, Adam, Taylor, and me.”
“You mistake that you are in a position to negotiate. You are not,” Xavier said.
“Just give them a chance.” Rollins sounded like he meant it.
Was he on the Raspers’ side now? I reminded myself that not too long ago he had been working for Zigotgen, and they were definitely the enemy. “The queen’s the one who has wanted me to come. If she wants me so bad, she’ll let my friends come with me.” I wasn’t betting on Xavier caving, but it was a slim chance.
“Not acceptable. You only,” Xavier said in a deeper tone.
“You know it has to be you. We’ll be all right.” Megan tilted her head, and her blonde hair fell to the side making the handprint mark on her face more apparent.
Megan was right. This was something I had to do alone. I had known it would come down to just the two of us when that first Rasper used my name. I had to protect the three of them. If it meant I had to sacrifice myself for them to live, I was ready.
“Fine. Let’s get
this over with. And if anything happens to any of them, I will kill you.” I glared at Xavier.
He did another little bow. “I do not doubt you would.”
“Good luck.” Rollins gave me a hint of a smile.
Megan turned and wrapped her arms around me and squeezed. “You’ve got this.” She let go, and I thought I caught tears in her eyes, but she bent her head down so her hair hid her face.
For so long, it felt like a piece of my heart had been missing. Now I knew that Adam and Megan, and even Taylor, had filled the void. “Xavier, can you show me the way?”
Xavier had the decency not to comment. I followed him out of the area and into a hallway. The walls and ceiling were made from shiny silver metal, while the floor appeared to be concrete. Every so often there were closed doors and lights blinking on and off on panels of every shape and size. Bugs, pushing what upon closer inspection were colored spheres and not rocks, scuttled back and forth on both sides of the corridor.
The air grew different. Lighter somehow, and my head felt heavy on my shoulders and begged for sleep. No. I had to stay alert. I bit my lower lip hard until I tasted blood.
“Here we are.” Xavier stopped in front of a panel filled with lights. “I cannot follow you in. She said you were to be alone. Hit the button there.” Xavier pointed to a button that sat in the middle of a dozen others, then he turned and walked away.
I didn’t have to push the button. I could run back and shoot my way out with my family safe and sound. If I went in, I had no idea what I would encounter. The Rasper queen wanted me. So had Zigotgen, and look how that turned out. There might even be more weapons somewhere in this place. I still didn’t know what it was, but it certainly wasn’t a nature-made cavern in the mountain.
I couldn’t run. I had to face this head-on. I wasn’t a coward. I hadn’t survived for so long on my own by backing out. But then, I only had me to worry about. Now, I had three beautiful people who were my family. I had to do this for them. I had to tell the queen to take her Rasper army and get the hell off my planet. Then we could find more survivors and rebuild.
I took a deep breath and pushed the button. The barrier before me disappeared. I stepped into a surreal area.
The sidewalls were all honeycombs, and dark purple mushroom-looking things filled the room. A black shelf of sorts held all sorts of the spheres. The soft lighting made the colors inside the spheres dance and drew me closer. They swirled around as if they were filled with colored smoke. I scanned the room. Where was she? The far wall was all black. It looked like glass without a landscape to admire.
A ticking noise drew my attention to the right side of the black wall. A figure glided into the space.
All the air slipped from my lungs. Pressure squeezed inside my head. I couldn’t breathe. There was no way this was real.
The human-looking female figure wore a black outfit like Xavier’s but more opulent with silver accents along her neck. She spread her arms wide. “Val, I’ve missed you.”
No. No. No.
I had to be hallucinating. Or dreaming. Or had been drugged. There was no other explanation.
My chest burned and my mouth went dry. I stumbled back, spun to look for an exit button. I couldn’t find it.
“Val. Wait. Give me a moment, and all your questions will be answered.” The queen rested a hand over her heart.
This had to be a cruel trick. The damn Raspers had figured out my weakness and exploited it somehow. But how? It wasn’t possible it was really her. Was it?
“Mom?”
34
I shook my head. I was really tired and hallucinating. There was no way that my mom was the Rasper queen. She had been at school teaching when the Great Discovery happened. Once I came out of the basement, I had biked to the school. It had been destroyed. There was no way she survived.
“Thank you for answering my call.” Her voice sounded like she had once been a heavy smoker and not like my mom’s soothing voice.
She moved in a half-circle around me. A mountain lion eying her prey. But even in her slow deliberate movement there was something familiar. She walked like my mom. Her skin wasn’t yellow. She looked tired like she’d just gotten over the flu.
I kept my left hand ready to grab the gun in my pocket to make a statement when the time was right. “I really didn’t have much of a choice. Why do you look like my mother?”
“Because she was the first. She is almost the perfect host. Most are compromised by our use. Life expectancy is too short with the complication to their system.”
All my emotions wedged themselves in my throat. “That’s not possible. She died at the school.”
“No. We took her from the school before.”
“You killed her then!” My voice cracked from the pain. I had to get myself under control.
“No. I kept her alive.”
Damn. She was right, but there might be a chance. I might be able to save her. “How do you know our language?”
“We are the Nahylthan. Well, that’s the closest word in your language. Our two suns collided and destroyed our planet. We were sent out to this system to find a suitable place to… live. Our vehicle crashed into your ocean. We were mistaken for a meteor by your kind. Some of my Colony was able to escape, trying to find a way for us to get out. It wasn’t until recently we were freed.”
“Why us? Why here?”
“Your species makes it easier for us to exist. We can be a better version of ourselves. The language is simple when using your bodies.” She titled her head like my mom used to do when she was teaching.
“Why are the Raspers killing people?”
The queen smiled, and I was transported back in time. To every time I watched her. Her kissing my dad when he came home from work. Her putting a cool cloth on my forehead when I had a fever. Her smiling at me, and me thinking how beautiful she was. How I hoped to grow up and look like her.
“You created the name, didn’t you?”
I nodded.
“Why Raspers?”
“When you take over a human, their breathing is uneven. Raspy sounding.” I shrugged. “Are you commanding them to kill us?”
She shook her head. “No. That is part of the problem. I have to command them not to. I have been taking the dead and reviving them. Trying to make them able to be hosts. But so many of your kind do not work. Their bodies are faulty. Their internal system is imbalanced. I’m trying to reprogram the ones you saw in the forest. The black shroud I have been using isn’t working like it should.”
I was struggling with the conversation. I saw my mom and wanted to hug her. Wanted her to tell me why she lied. Have her tell me she’s proud of what I’ve done. Have her apologize for hiding it all from me. Have her tell me she loves me. “What do you want from me?”
“With the use of your blood, you can help me engineer your species to accept mine.” She said it so matter-of-factly, like she was telling me to pick up my room.
Anger took over. And anger was an emotion I could deal with. “You want me to help you destroy what’s left of the human race? You obviously didn’t learn anything about me when you invaded my mom’s body. There’s no way in hell I will help you.”
“That’s what I thought you would say. Glad I planned for this.” The Rasper queen—I still couldn’t think of her as my mom—waved away a black mist I hadn’t noticed before. She walked forward assuming I would follow.
I didn’t want to follow her. I wanted to kill her. But she had been my mom. And if there was even the smallest chance of getting her back, I couldn’t shoot her.
So I followed.
We entered a place that was almost beyond description. Lights glowed from the walls, a soft hum filled the room, and Bugs zoomed along the walls, moving the colored spheres to different honeycombed holes. A large black rock stood in the middle of the space. Neon plants that resembled jellyfish hung from the ceiling. Nothing here was man-made.
“Did you create this place?”
Th
e queen tapped a sphere about the size of a golf ball. It glowed with orange light that zigzagged through the object. Then small white images of lines and circles spun through the sphere. “Yes, this is our home for now.”
She set the sphere down. “Thank you for bringing the AI with you. We were able to download the research they had done at Zigotgen. How they were planning to control us. Destroy us.”
No. I needed that information to fix the flawed Rasper antidote in my pocket. She better not have wiped it from Carter’s internal drive.
“Seems they were close to finding out how to keep us from using their bodies by disguising their blood as already hosting. Can you guess why their formula didn’t work?” She gave me a look that was so much like my mom asking why I got home late.
“Me.”
She grinned, but it wasn’t a smile my mom had ever given me. “Yes, you. While I said your mother was almost the perfect host, you absolutely are. You have the serum from the injections you were given, but you also inherited the genetic sequence. So while you are the key to camouflaging the humans’ blood, you are also the strongest person for me.”
I was trying to follow her science, but she couldn’t be saying what I thought she was.
“I see you’re trying to work that out. Let me help. I wanted you, but we were unable to locate you. I followed the tracker beacon your mother had possessed since the original sting. We found her at the school, but you weren’t there. And she refused to tell us where you were. So, to protect you, she offered to host me herself.
“And now it’s your turn to pay her back. You won’t reject me. I had thought it to be true, but when you were able to command my people, I knew for sure. We will be symbiotic. Cohesive. A true merger together. What my kind has been searching for longer than yours has been alive. If you allow me to use your body, I will let your mother live. If not, I will kill her and take you over completely. If you take me willingly, you will remain, but will be better. You will be enhanced. You would be what the scientists at Zigotgen wanted to create. A superhuman.
The Hive (Rasper Book 2) Page 21