Alien Shores (A Fenris Novel, Book 2)

by Vaughn Heppner

  Klane started paying greater attention to details, and he tried to take over control of Malik’s eyes, ears, nose, and bodily functions. Eventually, Klane hoped to take over the man’s entire identity.

  Klane realized that he’d joined Timor Malik on day three of the nest invasion. Malik and his squad had traveled from the southern pole region. Several hundred supply barges arrived each day, bringing ammo and material and taking away the lightly wounded.

  On day three, Malik and his suicide squad, the entirety of Cohort Invincible, traveled through surface tunnels to the lower levels. They marched deeper still and soon arrived at their battle zone. They were here to breach a tunnel strongpoint that was halfway to the Nest Intelligence. It was a nexus node, and Chirr warriors would heavily defend it.

  Klane struck at Malik’s identity fast and hard. He smothered the other’s mind, and in the tunnels, squat Timor Malik, a soldier known for his stubbornness, seemed to faint. In those seconds, two wills fought for control of the body.

  What are you?

  Trust me, Klane said.

  No, no, you’re a Chirr.

  Malik tried to roar a warning to his comrades. Klane couldn’t afford that. He clamped down on the speech center.

  In the tunnels, as worried soldiers gathered around Malik’s body, the internal war continued.

  I’m human, and I’ve come . . .

  Klane wasn’t sure why he’d come. He’d needed to escape the Kresh, the mentalists on Jassac. He had roved outward with his consciousness, and for some reason Timor Malik’s mind had drawn him like a magnet.

  There’s something here I need to see. Was that clairvoyant knowledge? Maybe this was a way to free humanity from the Kresh. They needed Chirr allies and he’d come to bargain with them.

  I hate the Chirr. I want to kill the Chirr, Malik thought.

  The Kresh have conditioned you to hate the Chirr, Klane told Malik.

  I don’t care why. I hate them. I hate them.

  The struggle of wills turned savage. Klane’s consciousness weakened. If he went under, then everything he’d done so far would mean nothing. His life, the spark of him, would flicker out and that would be the end of the story for Klane the demonslayer. I must use my wits. I must think like a seeker. What did that mean? How could he—

  It came to Klane. He needed to use Malik’s memories. He needed to convince the soldier, not just batter at his extremely stubborn will. He saw how Timor Malik had waited twelve days on the other side of a tunnel collapse. The trapped soldiers had fought off Chirr wave attacks, waiting for the Kresh to drill through to them. Twelve days in the dark had strengthened Malik’s rebellious thoughts into hatred for the Revered Ones.

  I can show you how to defeat the Kresh, Klane told Malik. And he showed the soldier what had happened in the demon city on Jassac.

  You lie! This is simply another Chirr trick. Get out of my mind!

  They fought for control, and both grew weary. Malik proposed a bargain: they would have joint control of the body and mind.

  Klane accepted even as he took over the citadel of the mind.

  The soldier, however, had fought all his life. He was a master of tactics and fighting retreats. He grabbed eyes, ears, and bodily functions.

  And Timor Malik sat up in the tunnel. He snarled at his friends and underlings hovering over him. He told them nothing was wrong with him.

  Weary from the flight from Jassac and the battle of wills here, Klane waited and watched in the citadel of the ego. He sat like a man besieged in a castle, in control of his patch of ground behind the stone walls, but unable to go outside. He saw what Malik saw and heard the same sights, but for the moment, he could not control the soldier’s body.

  The veteran Vomags now gathered on a ridge, with dark tunnel openings before them. The damp dirt ceiling was high here, as far as Malik could hurl a grenade. Like the others, Timor Malik wore a helmet with a shining lamp, a breathing mask, and body armor. For the tight confines of the tunnels, the soldiers carried steel hatchets and pistols with exploding pellets. They were the suicide teams, there to create breaches in difficult spots.

  The order came down from cohort HQ. The battle chief ordered them to attack.

  With Timor Malik leading, and with Klane’s consciousness watching and learning, the suicide squad slipped and slid down from the ridge. Their booted feet dislodged quarry rock and kicked up dust. Muffled alarms clanged from the Chirr strongpoint, but no warriors appeared. As they charged, the Vomags chanted an attack paean. Fighting in the tunnels took fantastic courage and resolve. Klane noticed how fierce elation seized Malik.

  It was more than simply conditioning. The soldier liked to fight.

  As Malik/Klane neared the strongpoint—pink, crystal-like walls in a fused, jigsaw-puzzle pattern—an odor like sour milk drifted up from the soil. It was a mist, a chemical attack.

  One soldier must not have secured his breathing mask well enough. He exploded into a coughing fit and stumbled onto the ground, quivering. Malik twisted his head so the helmet-light washed over the soldier. The Vomag was still, already dead.

  The rest of the squad trampled across something like moss. Malik’s boots sank into the substance. In places, the mossy soil opened up and soldiers plunged out of sight. Wet sounds and painful grunts told of traps. From experience, Malik knew the Vomags had fallen onto poisoned spikes. A single scratch killed. A few soldiers veered into brittle vetch. Maybe they thought to avoid the moss traps. Loud snaps and accompanying groans told of whip spikes that impaled the men through body armor and into chests or stomachs.

  Malik roared orders at the others, “Break into the strongpoint!”

  The soldiers took out their steel hatchets. The first to reach the crystal wall hacked at it, causing glassy chips to fly. Malik knew and Klane learned that the crystal was really dirt fused with Chirr spit. Even so, it was hardly softer than asphalt.

  The defense became active as portals opened above and toxic liquid sprayed out in hosing arcs. Malik leaped out of the way. Others weren’t as fast. They screamed as flesh boiled away. Some had dislodged their masks and coughed black gouts of liquefied flesh and blood. Sickened, Klane had his first true taste of what it was like battling in the tunnels of the Chirr.

  More soldiers rushed to the attack. Only a few of the vanguard survived. Malik was among them. With their hatchets, the soldiers hacked out handholds and scaled the crystal wall. Another portal opened. Malik was near enough and scrambled for a grip. He drew himself within and surprised a Chirr worker. With a roar behind his breathing mask, Malik lay about him, slaying the creature with three crunches of his axe. The head fell from the body, with black ichor squirting from it. The worker was a small thing like a dog, with mandibles for a mouth and brittle tentacles instead of arms and legs.

  More soldiers squirmed through the portal and into the chamber.

  “Slay them all!” Malik shouted.

  With helmet lamps, pistols, and hatchets, the soldiers ran amok throughout this portion of the strongpoint. Battle madness took hold. They kicked down partitions, slaughtered workers, and broke the sprayer pumps.

  Then Chirr warriors arrived. They towered over the squat Vomags. The beams of the helmet lamps washed over red things with black eyes like charcoal. They stabbed with lethal braches and spit acid with uncanny accuracy. In the confines of the narrow chamber, the Chirr warriors boiled at them, slashing hatchets, firing exploding pellets, and laughing madly.

  “Blow them up!” Malik bellowed. “Avenge our fellow soldiers!”

  In fury, the Vomags demolished the first Chirr wave. Then they broke into the many chambers and massacred imps and bantlings. They cut down fecund genetrices with swollen bellies. The Chirr queens were sluggish, monstrous things, surrounded by molds and fungus, likely their food.

  Despite the depth underground, fires raged here, making the air smoggy. Anyone
without a breather soon sank to the ground, exhausted.

  It was a nightmarish battle fought with desperate courage and admirable skill. Klane had Malik’s memories and understanding, but even so, everything around him seemed grossly alien. The sickening reeks, the high-pitched squeals, and the black gore that poured out of the creatures nauseated Klane’s consciousness.

  Finally, the vanguard broke into a grand chamber. Malik panted; his limbs ached and the notched hatchet looked more like a saw blade. More soldiers poured in behind him. A barker joined the throng.

  “Charge!” the barker roared.

  They did, but halfway across the grand chamber a strange lassitude slowed Malik’s step. He found it nearly impossible to keep his axe up. He wanted to look back, but was too tired now. He fought to keep his eyes open.

  “What’s wrong with me?” muttered a soldier beside him.

  Klane knew with a sudden, grim understanding. The soldiers weren’t suicide fighters because of the bleak tactical situation, but because they fought beyond the protective psi-shield of army Bo Taw. With his heightened senses, he felt the Chirr psionic presence. By then it was too late and he couldn’t keep the body awake.

  As Timor Malik attempted to answer the soldier’s question, he—and Klane’s consciousness—went blank.

  Malik/Klane awoke with hundreds of other soldiers. They stood in a different chamber. Malik still gripped his notched axe and he wore Chirr-bloodied armor. He couldn’t turn his head, but he heard the breathing and rustle of many cohorts of soldiers. With some of the same lassitude as before, he halfheartedly examined his surroundings.

  A shimmering pool of some inky substance lay ahead. A few feet above his head was the ceiling, an odd wattle-and-daub construction. Then he noticed the new Chirr. In ways they resembled the red-skinned warriors. They were thin like praying mantises, holding their sticklike arms in a similar manner. They had long insectile heads with small mandibles and horrid eyes like gigantic flies. Their mandibles moved, but not vertically like a man’s; theirs worked side to side. They chanted, but Malik couldn’t understand the words.

  More than anything, he wanted to attack them. He realized with a numb horror that their chants had immobilized him and the others. The Chirr held everyone captive with words. Malik’s eyes widened with true revulsion.

  At that moment Klane rushed from the citadel of Malik’s mind to the forefront. He took over eyes, ears, and bodily control, and he discovered that with the takeover came the ability to use Malik’s mind in a limited psionic manner. His consciousness must have altered Malik’s mind patterns just enough.

  Klane grew aware that something vast shuffled behind the psionic Chirrs.

  Before Klane could investigate that, a new type of Chirr warrior approached. It was tall, red, and massive. Between its pincers it held a metal rod with an electronic device on the end. It raised the rod and spoke in the language of the Kresh. It was an interpreter.

  “Men of the Kresh, you have invaded our home-hive. You have killed Chirrs. Now, to your dismay, you have witnessed our newest modification, the magus-Chirr. In olden times, your flesh and blood would have fertilized the hatcheries. Now we have devised a greater use for your flesh. You shall feed the Great One and he shall empower our magus-Chirr. It is a terrible doom, for it will strip your minds in the most agonizing manner possible. I bid you to know terror, men of the Kresh. And know that the greater your terror, the more it delights the Great One. If his delight is great enough, he will teach the Nest Intelligence more and marvelous magic techniques. So, men of the Kresh, the magus-Chirr will force you into the pool in order to extract your combined essences. Think upon your doom. Think upon your helplessness, and let your terrors mature for the benefit of the hive.”

  The interpreter scuttled back toward the vast and shadowy shape behind the chanting magus-Chirr. The interpreter chittered in the language of the Chirr to the Great One.

  Klane struggled against the psi-induced lassitude. The clatter of body armor told him the others likewise sought greater movement. The mandible chants of the magus-Chirr grew louder and more earnest.

  Klane exerted his considerable power, and the lassitude fell away. At that moment, Malik strove to regain control of his own body, but Klane held him down.

  After the swift victory, Klane finally felt what it meant to be deep underground the surface. The stench was like rancid water and the psychic weight of the depth pressing against him was crushing to his ego. He found it hard to breathe. He might have shouted with fear, but he didn’t want to give away his ability to control his body.

  All around him, the soldiers began to move in a mechanical, puppetlike fashion. Klane glanced at the nearest Vomag. Fear, loathing, and terror twisted the soldier’s features. Maybe because he hated being so deep underground, Klane felt compassion for the man. He needed a friend in this place of horror, because it was easier to deal with horror with a friend beside him. Klane grabbed the soldier’s arm, breaking the Chirr psionic paralysis.

  With the touch came knowledge about the Vomag. His name was Turk, and this was his first battle. Ah . . . Turk was Timor’s friend, a third cousin, it seemed.

  The rest of the soldiers shuffled toward the shimmering pool. It changed colors, from black to green, to red, and then to an inky color of doom. Within the blackness Klane spied a grotesque creature of vast bulk with many tentacles moving at once.

  With a start, Klane realized several things. The creature wasn’t in the liquid. It projected its image onto the liquid. Soon, it would use the liquid to drown the Vomags and extract what it considered their essence from them. The creature was a Nest Intelligence, the highest level of Chirr, and a powerful psionic being. It was the Great One.

  Magus-Chirr chittered, and the mass of Vomags halted, some already in the pool up to their hips.

  The interpreter scuttled forward with its rod and electronic device held up. It neared Klane and the trembling Turk.

  “What are you?” the interpreter asked.

  “I am a soldier,” Klane said with Malik’s mouth and tongue.

  The interpreter turned back to the tallest magus-Chirr. A fast sequence of chitters and clacks passed between them. The interpreter faced Klane again.

  “Who are you?” the creature asked.

  Klane could feel psionic fluttering against Malik’s mind. He raised a psi-wall, blocking the Chirr.

  “There is another mind inhabiting the shell of the soldier,” the creature said. “We want to know who the other mind is.”

  “I am Klane.”

  “What is a Klane?”

  “That is my name. I am an enemy of the Kresh.”

  The interpreter stood motionlessly, staring at him. Finally, it turned to the magus-Chirr. They seemed to speak to the Great One.

  “Tell us more,” the interpreter said.

  “Release these men first,” Klane said.

  The interpreter lifted its rod high, and noises emanated from the device.

  Klane clapped Malik’s hands over Malik’s ears. At the same moment, magus-Chirr mentally attacked him much more powerfully than earlier. Klane strove to shield himself and his host. He felt the alien Chirrs pressing in, and then Klane’s mental strength failed. Deep in the equatorial nest on Fenris II, Klane lost consciousness and he lost control of Timor Malik’s body.

  20

  Cyrus Gant sat on a fallen branch, a thick one. He tapped the dirt with a much thinner stick.

  Around him, triangular leaves rustled in the cool breeze. He sat alone, the Berserker compound hidden by the forest. Every so often, usually with a shift of wind, he heard a child shout in play or a woman telling the children to stay away from the seeker’s tent. Otherwise, the leaves and whispering wind were his only sounds.

  He’d been doing some hard thinking. The seeker’s revelation concerning the transfer was interesting, but he didn’t see how it could
help their situation any. It let him know why the seeker understood star mechanics and other technological concepts. The seeker had never seen such things herself, but she had sharp memories concerning them.

  Cyrus snorted to himself. What would that be like, knowing things that had never actually happened to you? It struck him as odd.

  He rested the stick on his knees and wondered what in the world was going to happen to him next. The clan had debated the critical issue for Skar and him. After the initiation yesterday, they were Berserker Clan members. It seemed silly to force them into clan membership, but the Berserkers either killed “others” or made them slaves. Now, as clan members, they were safe, in a sense. However, because he was a Berserker, Cyrus only had three days left with his mind intact. After that, the seeker or he would have to submit to the psi-burning medicine.

  Cyrus took a deep breath. Could he accept the clan verdict? It didn’t matter that it didn’t make sense. He had to abide by the custom or run away. If he ran, he was out of the clan. He would be an outcast. Yang would hunt and kill him. Not only Yang; all the warriors would have to give chase.

  Cyrus picked up the stick again and tapped the tip against the ground. He’d set up stones to represent Fenris System’s planets and moons. There were Jassac, Pulsar, and High Station 3. There were the Fenris sun and the outer asteroids. Then he’d put in the other planets from memory, the inner ones and the outer ones, the gas giants.

  He’d scratched a C by Fenris II and one by Fenris III. From what he knew, the Chirr held those planets. The Kresh held everything else. He’d written “CYBORGS” beyond the outer asteroids. The cyborgs were the X factor, the unknown in all this.

  Cyrus was piecing together what he knew to see if he could come up with a better plan. The Kresh had Discovery and were likely reverse engineering it. They, therefore, had a Teleship. By logical deduction, the cyborgs must have Teleships. Those were the only spacecraft in the Fenris System able to travel back and forth in a matter of a year or two from Sol to Fenris. If he wanted to see Earth again, he had to acquire a Teleship from either the Kresh or the cyborgs.