by Anna Hackett
Yep, really mad. “No.”
“You jumped into those bushes with no thought, no plan, no—”
He grabbed her shoulders. “I knew if we shot the damn thing, the aliens would’ve heard. I wanted to protect the mission.” And you.
He kept his mouth shut on the second part. He was well aware that Cam could take care of herself. If she knew he was trying to protect her, mad would be the least of his worries. But it wouldn’t stop him from doing what he could to keep her safe. He figured it was best not to tell her, though.
“And now you’re going to make yourself bait for a damn creeper.” Anger vibrated in her voice.
He reached out and cupped her cheek. “Cam, I’ll be fine.”
“You think I care if you get eaten by an alien?” She lifted her chin at a haughty angle.
Yeah, he did. He could see the worry in her brown eyes, even if she couldn’t admit it. “The plan will work.”
“And if it doesn’t?” she countered.
“I have a Plan B.”
She frowned. “And what’s Plan B?”
He winced. “Let’s just hope Plan A works out.”
Cam squeezed her eyes shut for a few seconds, then released a long breath. The next thing he knew, she grabbed the front of his armor and yanked him close.
“Don’t get yourself killed, Rahia.”
“Dying isn’t part of the plan.”
She lowered her voice so only he could hear. “If you do, you won’t get to claim your prize.”
Shit. An image of her lips stretched around— He mentally cursed, his cock twitching. He grinned at her. “Roger that.”
They all headed down the hill, and Hemi forced himself to focus on his part of the mission. At the base of the hill, they stayed in cover under the trees. Shaw gave Claudia a quick kiss and nodded at Hemi and Cam. Then he disappeared into the trees.
He would circle around the hill to the location they’d selected. He’d get ready and wait for Hemi to lure the creeper around to him, well out of view of any other aliens.
Hemi pulled his carbine off and handed it to Cam. He checked his combat knife and his backup knife. He nodded at the women, then looked out into the valley.
He saw a group of creepers ahead. They were skittering around, two scuffling with each other. Their glowing orange bellies were empty. One raised its head and screeched.
Damn, they were ugly motherfuckers.
He glanced at his watch, pushing the protective cover off the face. Shaw should have had enough time to get into position.
A creeper wandered closer to them, and he felt Cam and Claudia tense. Come on, creeper. Just a little closer.
Just a few more meters, and it would be a good distance from the group and out of the direct line of sight of the raptor soldier babysitting them.
Closer. Closer. It was close enough now for Hemi to see the hard, black outer shell. It looked more like an insect than the raptors. He saw its sucker mouth moving.
It was now or never.
Hemi stepped out of the trees. At first, the alien didn’t notice him. He watched it lower its head to the grass.
What was it doing? Its movements increased, and that’s when he realized. It was sniffing the ground.
The creature lifted its head and looked his way. He saw glowing, red eyes lock onto him. Hemi started walking backward. He needed to get around the hill, well away from the other creepers, and close to Shaw. He had about a hundred meters to reach the sniper.
Walk in the park. Hemi kept moving steadily, not taking his gaze off the animal. The creeper was following him.
Suddenly, it stopped.
“Come on, you ugly motherfucker,” he muttered. He kept his tone calm and coaxing.
Suddenly, the creeper bolted toward him with a blast of speed.
Shit. Hemi turned and ran.
He leaped over a fallen tree, and skirted around the hill. He heard the alien running close behind him. He smelled the stench of it.
Ahead, he spotted the trees Shaw had selected as his position. Just another twenty meters.
Something slammed into Hemi’s legs and he went down, rolling across the grass.
He rolled onto his back and saw the creeper looming over him. It’d knocked his legs out from under him.
He yanked out his combat knife. The creature jabbed at him with one of its sharp legs.
“Hemi! Move!” Cam’s frantic voice in his earpiece.
“You’re still out of range,” Shaw said. “Get it closer!”
Hemi rolled right beneath the creeper, dodging all six legs. The confused creeper turned in a circle, searching for him. Hemi pushed to his feet, dodged between the legs, and started sprinting.
“Come on, Hemi,” Cam said. “Just a bit farther.”
He felt something slam into his back, a sharp tip piercing his armor between the center of his shoulder blades. It sent him stumbling.
He recovered and kept charging. Just pretend you’re on the rugby field, Rahia.
Ahead, he saw Cam and Claudia break out of the trees. Both of them were holding containment nets.
Cam tossed hers, and it flew through the air. The creeper screeched and dodged. The net skimmed over the creature but missed.
The creeper spun, and its gaze locked on Cam. She was out in the open now, a clear target.
It charged toward her.
“No, you don’t,” Hemi growled.
He leaped at it, stabbing his knife at its orange belly. It turned, rearing and lifting its two front legs off the ground. They waved madly.
Good. Now its attention was back on him.
“Still out of range,” Shaw yelled.
Hemi saw the creeper tense. Then before he could move, the big, ugly sucker mouth pointed right at him.
Fuck. He turned, pumping his arms as he tried to run.
The mouth slammed down on him and closed around him. The world went black.
Chapter Seven
Hemi had just been swallowed by a creeper.
Cam fought back the panic threatening to choke her. She’d done it a hundred times before on previous missions, but what she felt now was overwhelming.
She ran at the creeper. Hemi only had seconds, minutes, who the hell knew? There was no room for out-of-control emotions in a life-or-death situation.
“Fuck me.” Shaw’s horrified voice echoed over the comm line.
Cam swung her carbine off her shoulder. Nearby alien raptor be damned. “Concentrate fire on its head.” They couldn’t risk hitting Hemi.
She didn’t care if the noise brought every alien on the goddamn planet down on their heads. She was getting him out of there.
As Cam opened fire, Claudia’s carbine fire joined hers. A bad taste filled Cam’s mouth. Could he breathe in there? Was the transformation process starting already?
She saw several precise shots hit the creeper’s eye, making it rear up. Yes, Shaw.
Together, the three of them advanced on the creeper. Its belly was swollen and bulging. God. Its legs slammed down again, and it spun in an unsteady circle.
The creature screamed under the hail of laser fire, and started shaking. Then it reared up again, legs waving madly.
Suddenly, Cam saw its belly split open in a long vertical gash. There was a rush of orange fluid, and then a large object fell out.
Hemi rose up on his knees with a roar, holding his combat knife in one hand.
Behind him, the creeper teetered like it was drunk, then its legs went out from under it and it collapsed.
“Woo hoo! That was one ride I don’t want to do again,” Hemi called out.
He looked like something out of a horror movie. He was coated in orange goo, his hair plastered to his head.
“Jesus.” Cam ran to him, her heart thumping like a drum in her chest, and leaned down. “Are you okay?”
“Hell, yeah.” Then he leaned over, falling on all fours, and vomited.
She crouched beside him, gingerly touching his back. She didn’t
give a damn that he was covered in alien goop. He was alive. “Get it all out, big guy.”
He managed a nod. When he sank back on his hunches, his face was a little pale but he was smiling.
“You are one tough guy, Hemi,” Claudia said.
Alive. Grinning, like he’d just done something fun.
One part of Cam just wanted to reach out and wrap herself around him, and hold on tight. It was a part of her that terrified her. She reached for her anger instead. “What the hell were you doing?”
He lifted his head. “Cam, baby—”
“Don’t baby me,” she yelled. “You let yourself get swallowed by an alien.”
“I’m okay.”
“You were gone. Inside an alien.” Cam realized she was panting. A solid ball of emotion was lodged in her throat.
Hemi pushed to his feet and reached for her. “Cam.”
She managed to pull herself together and took a step back. “You touch me with that gunk all over you, and I’ll shoot you.”
He grinned at her, his standard shit-eating grin, and seeing it settled her a little. He was alive, and he was okay.
“Ah, guys?” Shaw said. “We have company.”
They all spun, carbines swinging around.
Nearby, another creeper was watching them, and standing beside it was the raptor keeper.
The raptor pivoted and started to run. Cam’s jaw locked. No doubt to raise the alarm.
“I’ll get the raptor,” Claudia shouted, as she took off in pursuit. “You guys get the creeper.”
The creeper screeched. It wasn’t running.
It was staring at Hemi, Cam, and Shaw.
Then, it rushed forward in a dizzying burst of speed.
***
Hemi swiped gunk off his face, his gaze zeroing in on the creeper. This bad boy was going down.
“Come on,” he shouted. “Shaw, get out of the way and get that fucking sedative ready.”
The sniper backed up. “Give me a minute.”
“You’re crazy.” Cam stepped up beside Hemi. “You just got eaten, and all of the aliens will know we’re here, any minute now. We need to go.”
Hemi snatched the stun prod off his belt. With a shake, it extended. The creeper came closer and closer. “Planning to get myself a little revenge first.”
Beside him, he saw Cam grab her stun prod, as well.
The creature skittered forward, and Hemi lunged at it, leading with the stun prod. The weapon touched scaly skin and he heard a sizzle.
The creeper paused, but didn’t seem worried, and it certainly wasn’t stunned.
Damn. “Need to find its sensitive spots,” he said. “Any place where the skin’s not so tough.”
He and Cam circled the creature. It watched them with burning red eyes. Hemi scanned the thick, black shell, searching for anywhere that might be more vulnerable.
It spun to watch them, raising its front legs. Cam leaped forward, and shoved her stunner against its chest.
This time, it jerked back and made a screeching sound. Still not stunned.
“The belly is softer,” Hemi said.
“But you have to get past those legs, and put yourself at risk of getting eaten.” Her gaze was hard as granite. “You are not doing that again.”
He frowned, studying the now-wary creature again. He spied something.
“On its back,” he said. “There’s a soft spot right on the back of its head.” It was a paler patch of skin.
Cam craned her neck. “I see it.”
He gripped the back of her armor. “I’ll throw you up there. You stun it.”
She kept her body relaxed, and nodded. He gripped her waist and, using his own strength, combined with his exoskeleton, he tossed her up in the air.
Cam landed gracefully on the alien’s back. Instantly, she went to her knees, grabbing onto the scaly hide.
It started bucking like a rodeo bull. As it spun, trying to knock her off, Hemi jumped in front of it. He needed to distract the damn thing and keep its attention on him.
He saw Cam scrambling to get closer to the weak spot, the stun prod clutched in her hand. But with the creeper shaking like a wild bronco, she couldn’t take the shot.
All of a sudden, she flew off. She hit the ground and rolled. Hemi raced over to her, yanking her to her feet.
“Damn, it’s a stubborn bastard,” he muttered.
“Like someone else I know.”
Hemi smiled. “You love it.”
She snorted. “New plan. Disable it. Aim for the legs.”
They went in together this time, both of them swinging their stun prods. The creeper swiped at them with its sharp legs. Hemi dodged and saw Cam rolling out of the way.
As they continued to antagonize the creeper, slamming the prods into the creature’s legs, Hemi realized how much he liked working side by side with Cam. She was strong, smart, and gutsy.
He swung his prod again and this time heard a crunch.
The creeper let out an ear-splitting screech. It held up its broken leg, moving backward. But then it stared at them and charged.
Uh oh. It was really angry now.
Hemi lunged sideways, knocking Cam out of the way. He heard her swear and one of the creeper’s legs slammed into his gut with the force of a baseball bat. The air rushed out of him and he went down on one knee.
When he looked up, he saw that sucker mouth rushing down at him.
Not again.
“You are not eating him again.” Cam leaped over Hemi, planting her boot in his back and using him as a launch pad. She jumped up and jammed the stun prod into the alien’s ugly, gaping mouth.
The creature shuddered. On the soft flesh of the mouth, the prod worked.
Thwap. Thwap.
Hemi registered the sound and saw two darts sticking into the alien’s belly. It staggered back, took two ungainly steps to the side and collapsed.
Shaw jogged over to them. “Everyone okay?”
Cam blew out a breath. “Yes.”
“Hell yeah.” Adrenaline was punching through Hemi’s system. He spun, swept an arm around Cam and yanked her to him. He crashed his mouth down on hers.
She wrestled for a couple of seconds. He knew he was covering her in alien goo, but dammit, he felt gloriously alive.
Then she kissed him back and he forgot about everything else.
“You two done?” Claudia’s dry, amused voice.
Hemi reluctantly raised his head. He saw Shaw grinning at them, and Claudia walking closer. The woman was dragging a dead raptor behind her.
“I wish I didn’t have to be,” Hemi said. “But, yes.”
Claudia dumped the raptor body.
“Hey, sweetie,” Shaw said. “How’d it go?”
Claudia shot him a look. “Good. Killed the raptor. You?”
“Tranquilized the creeper before it ate Hemi or Cam.”
Hemi snorted. “Right. And Cam and I just sat back and had a beer.”
Claudia crouched and patted the raptor down. She pulled something off the leather straps that crisscrossed the alien’s scaly chest. She held it up.
Hemi instantly recognized the black object. One of the alien’s data storage cubes.
“Geek squad should be able to get something off it.” Claudia slipped the cube into her backpack. “Now, we need to get sleeping beauty out of here before reinforcements arrive.”
Hemi pulled a device off his belt. It was a small silver box. He pressed the button on the side and it opened up into a stretcher. The iono-stretcher hovered off the ground.
“Need a hand,” he said.
Shaw stepped up on the other side of the creature, with some grunting and a few curses, they wrestled the creeper onto the stretcher.
Claudia looked at her watch. “We have a lot of ground to cover before we get far enough away for a Hawk to land and load the creeper.”
Hemi glanced toward the west. The sun would set in a few hours. Shit. They had a tight window if they were going to manage a
pickup before nightfall.
“I’ll hide the raptor body and then let’s get moving,” Claudia said. “We’ll contact the Enclave and then work out our next movements.”
“And let’s find a river to dunk Hemi in.” Cam’s nose wrinkled. “You stink.”
He bumped a shoulder against her, laughing when she tried to dodge away. “You’ll have to join me. You’re covered in as much muck as I am. I’m happy to wash your back.”
“In your dreams, Rahia.”
Oh, yeah. Hemi nudged the stretcher to get it moving as Claudia dragged the raptor body toward the trees. He was planning to have sweet, sweet dreams.
Chapter Eight
After an hour of hiking through the Snowy Mountains, they were back in drone range.
Cam leaned against a tree, watching as Claudia touched her earpiece, talking to her comms officer, Elle. Behind Claudia, Shaw and Hemi were keeping an eye on the sedated creeper. The men still didn’t trust that the thing was knocked out.
She glanced west, at the burn of orange lining the sky. Night was falling.
Finally, Claudia lowered her arm and turned to look at them. “The Enclave confirmed that it’s too late for them to come and pick us up. We’ll need to hole up for the night.”
Cam glanced at the creeper. “Do we have enough sedatives to keep that thing asleep all night?”
“Let’s hope so,” Claudia answered. “Emerson said we should be fine, and to give the creeper a top-up every few hours.”
“So, what now?” Hemi asked.
“Elle says there is a camping area with a lodge in the National Park, not too far from here.”
“Well, it is a lovely day for a stroll,” Shaw said cheerily.
Hemi and Shaw pushed the iono-stretcher, maneuvering the creeper around the trees. They trekked deeper into the forest, the shadows deepening as the day gave way to night.
Cam glanced at Hemi. The alien fluid had long ago dried, and formed an orange crust on his armor. There was still some streaking his dark hair, but other than that, he looked recovered from nearly being an alien meal.
She worked up a light sweat as they hiked through the hills, but Cam couldn’t complain about the extended exercise, since it was nice to be outside in the fresh air. Even if they had to drag a freaky alien along with them.